Shay Pierce made it clear why he turned down steady pay and benefits when Zynga bought his old employer, OMGPOP, the makers of Draw Something. He was concerned that his ownership of a personally developed and published game on the iTunes App store would be a conflict. He chose not to join Zynga with the rest of OMGPOP, and maintain control of that game, Connectrode. Writing for Gamasutra about his decision to do so, he said Zynga, in so many words, is an âevilâ company.
https://lastchance.cc/one-indie-developer-walked-away-from-zynga-s-210-milli-5896720%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E
âThe one omgpop employee who turned down joining Zynga was the weakest one on the whole team,â Porter wrote in a series of now-deleted Tweets. âSelfish people make bad games. Good riddance! Whatâs so interesting about success is the number of failures who try to ride on your back. Shay Pierce is just one of manyâŠâ
Kotaku had reached out to Porter on Friday to ask his reaction to Pierceâs editorial, back when this was largely an inside spat. âOMGPOP has always been a team effort and thatâs what we celebrate. Not self promotion or people hopping on the gravy train. We are all incredibly excited about working with Zynga. Itâs all about team.â
Something must have really pissed off Porter about it yesterday, though. His was such breathtakingly douchebag behavior that no less than Markus âNotchâ Persson, the creator of Minecraft, took to Twitter to call out Porter. âYou are an insane idiot,â Notch wrote.
So we have an independent games developer plus a powerful and admired figure in independent games development, versus Facebook games giant Zynga, not exactly widely liked among gamers. Either Porter came to his senses or quickly figured out what a world of terrible PR he was in for if he didnât man up and say sorry. He did.
âIâm sorry for what I said last night. No excuses,â Porter wrote. Iâve been down that road myself. Itâs like ripping off a Band Aid, but you have to do it.
Pierce, just to restate it, did not turn down his portion of Zyngaâs buyout of OMGPOP. He âhad a small amount of equity,â in the studio and was compensated for it. Though he did call them âevil,â he explained why and said the companyâs values were contrary to his own. But the decision was mostly about the game heâd built himself.
