I feel scammed by Speed.
I sent him 300$ to aid the search for developers, and he hasn't done anything at all.
I really hope not, I didn't get the impression Speed was a scammer so maybe he's had an accident or is sick and that's why he has disappeared, but not good that you lost 300 for a donation, sorry man, hopefully he surfaces again and refunds your money.
Looks like Syksy is our best chance for CK revival now so there's still hope, Syksy is a good man!!
Hmm, I definitely cannot be a one-man show
developing any kind of MMO is one of the most if not the most ambitious game development venues to pursue, with a notorious fame for being the classic "trying to bite more than one can chew"... My opinion is that as a group effort it can be done, especially if/when focusing it on a specialized aspect such as in-depth economics (and omit fancy graphics / hack'n'slash / whatever). Still, it's a great challenge.
I've been committing to
https://github.com/Syksy/cipher as an open-source game engine prototype project. It's far from even "pre-alpha" type of stage, but I have a basic structure of the map complete and rendering of an isometric view to the world, albeit highly simplistic in terms of what is being represented. There are others working on more front-end orientated stuff, while I've been putting most of my thoughts into back-end stuff (such as this engine in Java that I've so far dubbed
Cipher). Hopefully we can effectively merge these efforts in near future. I'll try come up with a proper showcase for the engine - I know I already promised this couple weeks ago, but there's only so little time and so much to do...
I think one of the main lessons of CK could be, that in general paying in advance is a very risky practice in software development. Some other reward system (e.g. milestone related game-bound monetary unit) that gives a more dynamic, over-time incentive, would be in my opinion a much more natural motivator for anybody to drive onward in a long-term project such as this. I'm not saying Speed ran off with 300$ (this hardly sounds like a sum worth scamming anybody over, and it could've legitly been lost in exploring options or practical arrangements), but giving anybody crypto or fiat for anything in advance especially in this context (unless you really know them) sounds like a very risky practice. That's also why I'm very hesitant to be on the receiving end in agreeing to any advance payments, wages, promised commitment or whatever, for developing any particular flavor of CK or a more generalized engine. This is mostly because I'm not entirely convinced whether I'd have the capability in terms of full-stack development skill or the required time, mental stamina and focus to drive forth a project as ambitious as this. I'm an inherent pessimist though, so don't let me put anybody down