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This is from the GamingLiberty's interview of Mr. Bateson
Retroplayer- What kind of relationship do you have with IO interactive?
David- A good one I believe. Though I was rather surprised to having to audition for my own role this time round, that is, for the next long awaited installment. It seems that with company buy outs and global power shifts in the world of computer gaming and the Hitman franchise, there is now a LA based caster on board, who is responsible for voice casting, and I had to audition along with the rest of the planet for the right to play Agent 47. However, I have been informed by IO Interactive, that I still have the part. I won’t even bother to describe how gutted I would have been if they went for a sound-a-like. But that is the nature of my profession and you just have to accept it, so definitely no ill feelings there. I am just looking forward to it.
This. If you can read this and then claim "it guarantees he wasn't fired" there's no point in responding to any argument you make because those pesky "facts" apparently don't really matter. Although one little note I'd like to make: you can tell the truth and still spin it in a positive light without lying about anything. That is all.
There is, sadly, a lot of truth to this. Someone said something I found to be pretty brilliant in an earlier thread: Absolution's target audience was probably 10 years old when BM came out. When stores look to be anticipating demand in order to secure their certain quantity of games, they're probably going to be looking at those numbers primarily, and relegate franchise fans to second place. I don't blame them; it makes sense. When a franchise (that doesn't have the word "Zelda" in the title) goes for six years with no new game, chances are good that many gamers who dabbled in the franchise have moved on. Sure, they may get around to picking up Absolution eventually, but it's not necessarily the top priority on their list. In the meantime, though, a whole new set of little hitboys and hitgirls have grown up and will be interested in the game, and will probably constitute a good portion of the sales. At this point, the number of potential new fans is too large to ignore, since IOI knows the majority of us old diehards will pick up the game anyway.IO doesn't loose nothing if you or 100 people wont buy Absolution.the money for absolution comes from markets and store that buy big quantity of the game, and sale's it at their one price to us. So, if you don't buy the game IO doesn't loose nothing.and I think they don't give a sh..t if you don't like their game or not
That doesn't mean that IOI shouldn't tell us why Bateson was dropped. They should be interested in customer goodwill. At the very least, they should step out of the way of the speeding train that is Bateson himself. I have a feeling they eventually sat down and told him why he was dropped. On his official statement on his website, he says, "For legal reasons, I cannot comment further at the moment." Sounds to me like he knows why he was let go and was issued a gag order for a certain amount of time. It's interesting that he legally can't say anything...is he still under some sort of contract? Was he issued some sort of severance pay and in return promised not say anything for the time being? Who knows. All I know is that , from the sound of that last sentence, he will be speaking up about this sooner or later. From what we know about him, he's a very standup guy who doesn't hold a grudge, so I seriously doubt he'll attack IOI or anything. He'll simply lay out the facts. But if IOI hasn't said anything by then, who do you think is going to look more sympathetic?
