A few weeks ago, Hi Rez Creative Director Sean McBride announced that he was leaving the company. “Unfortunately at this point in time Hi-Rez and myself are not aligned,” he wrote on Reddit. McBride was well known for his work injecting life into Tribes: Ascend, and he addressed that game’s community directly.
“As most know, the Tribes IP has been near and dear to me as a gamer and a developer and I’m greatly saddened to leave it behind. I don’t know what the future holds for Tribes: Ascend, but before I departed we planned a small patch. Everett will follow up about that in the near future. Thanks everybody for the feedback and working with us closely over the last few patches. I greatly enjoyed my time working on Tribes: Ascend both before, and after the ‘Out of the Blue’ patch.”
The so-invoked Senior Software Engineer HiRezEverett does indeed appear to have picked up the torch and collected input from McBride and the community throughout June on what ought to go into the 1.4 patch, dubbed “Parting Gifts.” The first iteration of that patch is now due to hit the test server tomorrow afternoon, so far with planned tweaks to equipment and vehicles and the outright removal of screenshake.
Whether and what patches may come after this one are less assured; SMITE’s success allowed Hi-Rez to resume patching Tribes last summer, but Hi-Rez would not make any promises about whether those patches would continue indefinitely.
We have reached out to Hi-Rez for clarity about the future of the game and will update as soon as we have it.
