THQ’s Jason Rubin Responds to Darksiders Fans

THQ is a financially troubled company, and newly appointed president Jason Rubin probably has enough on its plate, but comments featured in a recent story on Polygon have provoked the ire of many fans. Rubin's chosen to respond twice now.

Rubin has been THQ's president less than a month.

Rubin pushed back on his quoted characterization of Saints Row: The Third as “embarrassing” after that blew up last Friday, and he published a lengthy statement to Darksiders fans on the game’s Facebook page today.

The inflamed response was the result of this quote:

"Darksiders II is very interesting," said Rubin. "but I think I can get that team to make other very interesting games."

Darksiders fans took that to mean he was coming in and killing the Darksiders franchise. Not so, according to Rubin.

“The quote implied that I am not enthusiastically behind the Darksiders universe, and that THQ has made decisions not to continue the Darksiders franchise,” he said. “This is simply untrue.”

“My quote ‘I can get the team to make other interesting games’ was intended in the context of having different teams within this incredibly talented studio work on new original IP, as well as continuing to support the Darksiders franchise,” he continued.

That sounds pretty good to me.

Darksiders II, set prior to the events of the original Darksiders and featuring a different member of the four horsemen, Death, is scheduled for a release on August 14. It had originally been aiming for June but was briefly delayed.

“I'm incredibly excited about Vigil and the Darksiders franchise,” said Rubin.

Great! Really looking forward to Darksiders II!!

no plans at the moment unless the sales are bad i guess

Darksiders III, confirmed.

I mean, with this new guy it (apparently) won't be Darksiders The Third.

He only got hired because of his good looks and his height. It makes me sick to my stomach.

As long as they make 'em good.

Oh, thank god.

Darksiders> Saint's Row the Third

Rubin totally has good intentions for the THQ teams but I think he just needed to say things better as his first statements do sound like he's deconstructing THQ for something different.

Rubin seems to have a terrible way with words.

That's two quotes in a short period of time that he's had to go back and say "no, no, this is what I meant..."

Neither of them enraged me, personally, but it seems like he could do a bit more thinking about what he says before he says it.

and he published a lengthy statement to Darksiders fans on the game’s Facebook page today.

So, wait - did he respond to the backlash via Facebook or did he say the initial quote that caused issues on Facebook? Or both?

NO DON'T MAKE ANY OTHER FUCKING GAMES ALL I WANT ARE DARKSIDERS GAMES.

Fucking Twats. I am so fucking sick of you gorramn retards. Saying that a developer can make games outside of one franchise is like saying their a developer. Those guys make good games, and will probably continue to for a while. So yeah, they'll probably work on games outside of the Darksiders universe, and that's good. Not bad.

@MordeaniisChaos said:

NO DON'T MAKE ANY OTHER FUCKING GAMES ALL I WANT ARE DARKSIDERS GAMES.

Fucking Twats. I am so fucking sick of you gorramn retards. Saying that a developer can make games outside of one franchise is like saying their a developer. Those guys make good games, and will probably continue to for a while. So yeah, they'll probably work on games outside of the Darksiders universe, and that's good. Not bad.

I think the issue is that this, combined with the Saint's Row comment, paint Mr. Rubin as a man who doesn't like the fact that THQ's top sellers are games he doesn't personally enjoy. That's a poisonous attitude for a game company CEO. The customer may not always be right, but their pocketbooks tend to be.

I didn't think Rubin could backpedal any harder, but here we are.

@YukoAsho said:

@MordeaniisChaos said:

NO DON'T MAKE ANY OTHER FUCKING GAMES ALL I WANT ARE DARKSIDERS GAMES.

Fucking Twats. I am so fucking sick of you gorramn retards. Saying that a developer can make games outside of one franchise is like saying their a developer. Those guys make good games, and will probably continue to for a while. So yeah, they'll probably work on games outside of the Darksiders universe, and that's good. Not bad.

I think the issue is that this, combined with the Saint's Row comment, paint Mr. Rubin as a man who doesn't like the fact that THQ's top sellers are games he doesn't personally enjoy. That's a poisonous attitude for a game company CEO. The customer may not always be right, but their pocketbooks tend to be.

Well, no, because everything he's said has been taken completely out of context because some idiot "journalist" pushed half of a quote that should have been surrounded by about 20 other quotes and when read in context actually sounds pretty reasonable.

@Anwar said:

@MordeaniisChaos said:

NO DON'T MAKE ANY OTHER FUCKING GAMES ALL I WANT ARE DARKSIDERS GAMES.

Fucking Twats. I am so fucking sick of you gorramn retards. Saying that a developer can make games outside of one franchise is like saying their a developer. Those guys make good games, and will probably continue to for a while. So yeah, they'll probably work on games outside of the Darksiders universe, and that's good. Not bad.

You're so mad that you can't even type properly anymore, calm down.

THATS JUST THE WAY I TALK.

Seriously, I'm pretty sure I've had this conversation before. I'm not mad, I just talk like that.

A lesson was learnt here: don't take interviews with Brian Crecente.

Is someone trying to get Rubin fired or something? A lot of crazy contexts of quotes going on.

@zeekthegeek said:

A lesson was learnt here: don't take interviews with Brian Crecente.

This man has to stop speaking publicly. He can't say anything that can be taken in it's proper context.

This guy sure hasn't had a great month. Insult two of your biggest, most well-received, and best-selling IPs, implying that the company should change or shift focus away from them. As though Darksiders and Saints Row are the reason the company is doing terribly.

@PrintedCrayon said:

Rubin seems to have a terrible way with words.

No, Crecente has a terrible way with words. He was the one responsible for the biased interview on the verge. Kotaku asshat.

Where is the link to his new statement about Saints Row?

I loved Darskiders 1 and from what I've seen Darksiders 2 is just more of that with a side of chips.....

......

......

But anyway I would like them to try and do a sort of co-op hack'n'slash dungeon crawler with Darksiders combat, and I hope that that'll be what Darskiders 3 will be.

Jason Rubin's Way of the Warrior 2 developer list:

Volition

Sigil Games

Runic Games?

Referring to Darksiders 2 as "interesting" when it hasn't come out yet and it's your job as President of the company to sell the thing seems kind of totally fucking insane.

omg this guy whos proven to be smart is saying something smart...BURN HIM AT THE STAKE

A lesson was learnt here: don't take interviews with Brian Crecente.

@Anwar said:

@MordeaniisChaos: Okay, GORRAMNIT! Just be aware that you're spouting gibberish.

What are you fucking talking about? I'm pretty sure you'd have to be thick not to get what I said. Granted, that wasn't the most developed statement, but I don't have much to say beyond "Fuck the people taking that shit out of context and without a second of thought"

Foot in mouth. Repeat.

Jesus, people. The second game isn't even out yet and you're upset over the idea that the developer may make other games in the future?

Um. What? Change and progression are generally good things in video games.

A lesson was learnt here: don't take interviews with Brian Crecente.

So did Rubin go around shitting on all the popular THQ games for a week or something?

@august said:

Referring to Darksiders 2 as "interesting" when it hasn't come out yet and it's your job as President of the company to sell the thing seems kind of totally fucking insane.

This is precisely what I was thinking. Sure, his quotes may be "out of context", but his choice of words when making these statements has thus far been very... odd. I don't care what he says by way of damage control after the fact, you can't refer to something like Darksiders 2 as merely "interesting" and not sound like you're talking around the fact you dislike it.

Jason Rubin should kick Brian Crescente's ass for his terrible journalism is all the sheer idiocy that's beeing attributed to him is a result of a butchered interview. Or he should just fall into a woodchipper if he plans on messing with Vigil and Volition's work on their golden franchises.

These are my favored scenarios

If this guy messes up my Saints Row, there's going to be hell to pay! Hell, I say!

It's a shame he never got to work on another CTR game.

@Brodehouse said:

@zeekthegeek said:

A lesson was learnt here: don't take interviews with Brian Crecente.

God, yes. Everyone was too busy throwing shit like it was the Goddamn monkey house at the zoo to actually notice Brian Crescente generating this controversy out of nothing. God, I just wish he did this to someone like David Jaffe. He would've driven a Volkswagon bus into Crescente's house at 4 in the morning, dragged him out of his bed out to his lawn and beat him half to death with a lawn gnome.

I would pay good money to watch that on PPV. I may not always agree with him, hell, I may not always LIKE him even. But the way Jaffe put the verbal smackdown on the hacks at Kotaku after they called him a mysoginist was glorious.

http://soundcloud.com/ben-kuchera/jaffe-confrontation

Ugh, internet why do you have to complain about everything? God forbid we create something new.. What's wrong with the team taking a break for a new IP? That doesn't mean there will never be another Darksiders.

This guy sure hasn't had a great month. Insult two of your biggest, most well-received, and best-selling IPs, implying that the company should change or shift focus away from them. As though Darksiders and Saints Row are the reason the company is doing terribly.

@Joey2683 said:

Ugh, internet why do you have to complain about everything? God forbid we create something new.. What's wrong with the team taking a break for a new IP? That doesn't mean there will never be another Darksiders.

They've made ONE Darksiders game, which had a fantastic ending making you clamor for more from that universe. And they've been slaving away on making the sequel now for years and are finally seeing it come to fruition. And the best thing their boss, the guy who's supposed to be championing them and their ptoduct to do is call it "interesting" and then say he would like to see them to focus on something else, even though they've specifically shown future plans for this series AND earned a lot of goodwill simply because the first game was damn good. People ahve every right to be wary of this guy now.

And forgive me if I'm wrong, but has he made any public apology of sorts to Volition for throwing them under the bus? Or called out Cresecente properly for being a shit interviewer.

It's gotta suck when some interviewer takes your words and spins them to create a controversial news article. I think Rubin handled it well enough. His explanation makes sense too because wasn't some of Vigil working on that Warhammer 40k MMO for a while. With new management I hope they're better used on a new creation of their own.

What it all comes down to is sales anyways though. If Darksiders II is well received then they'll make more. I hope it does do well because I loooove Darksiders. It's just so video gamey. Fun as hell. If they are able to pull off the 4 games, 4 horseman thing it would be one of the best things in video game history.

@Anwar said:

@MordeaniisChaos said:

@Anwar said:

@MordeaniisChaos: Okay, GORRAMNIT! Just be aware that you're spouting gibberish.

What are you fucking talking about? I'm pretty sure you'd have to be thick not to get what I said. Granted, that wasn't the most developed statement, but I don't have much to say beyond "Fuck the people taking that shit out of context and without a second of thought"

You not giving enough of a fuck to type something without stupid typos makes me not care one second what the fuck you want to say and your shitty attitude doesn't help.

I'll remember that next time I see yet another typo from you, I guess? Also, who's mad now?

Oh no, he made some typos. How dare he use informal methods of communication, at me, an anonymous community on the internet, and not his professor/ employer.

Here, if you care so much, why don't you return a proofread and annotated copy of my comment so I know what I did so terribly wrong that you couldn't understand it.

I like this guy.

It's still an asinine statement.

Poor THQ.

@xombi242 said:

This man has to stop speaking publicly. He can't say anything that can be taken in it's proper context.

But he can get people paying attention to THQ and making publicity over nothing but statements.

@Smokey_Earhole said:

@PrintedCrayon said:

Rubin seems to have a terrible way with words.

No, Crecente has a terrible way with words. He was the one responsible for the biased interview on the verge. Kotaku asshat.

@TeflonBilly said:

@Brodehouse said:

@zeekthegeek said:

A lesson was learnt here: don't take interviews with Brian Crecente.

God, yes. Everyone was too busy throwing shit like it was the Goddamn monkey house at the zoo to actually notice Brian Crescente generating this controversy out of nothing. God, I just wish he did this to someone like David Jaffe. He would've driven a Volkswagon bus into Crescente's house at 4 in the morning, dragged him out of his bed out to his lawn and beat him half to death with a lawn gnome.

I would pay good money to watch that on PPV. I may not always agree with him, hell, I may not always LIKE him even. But the way Jaffe put the verbal smackdown on the hacks at Kotaku after they called him a mysoginist was glorious.

http://soundcloud.com/ben-kuchera/jaffe-confrontation

This should be the story that is given on all of this shit. It's been so pathetic. Everything coming out of the situation sounded so ridiculous because we have pretty good reason to believe Rubin is a trustworthy guy that respects the industry and the developers at his company. Why people are just eating this stuff up without thinking "Huh, that seems awfully out of character for him" is just so frustrating. Dude said nothing wrong, and at most he wasn't as clear as he could have been. I would argue that even that isn't the case but I can see that point of view. But the guy never said "Man fuck the devs, they be stupid, lets burn em to the ground and make em make the games my wife said I should make!" Not even close to that, in fact.

I'd also watch Jaffe confront anyone on PPV. Jaffe's awesome.