It seems that what likely happened here was that they promised the OST with no intention of contracting Mick to do it. That the version that they had cooking internally cobbled together from the game tracks was always supposed to be the single and only version of the OST. When Mick went over their heads to get a…

Yeah, the OST thing is the thing that caused this all to go public, but the real meat of it is that they not only didn’t pay him for 11 months, but that they specifically did so because they needed to be able to retroactively reject things in order to make their sound budget ... and then used all the music they…

When there is as much documentation as there is, absolutely.

That was a long read! It’s great that everyone knows he’s not a bad composer and gives him work! it’s just sad that there’s so many flat out stupid people in the world that fall behind someone like Marty Stratton, even after all the crap those studios have been accused of. there are still people defending Marty and…

Wild that the company would throw him under the bus instead of just working together to fix the problem. I’m sure harsh words were said on both sides and toes were stepped on, but someone needs to swallow their professional pride and smooth this over.

I understand the desire to get a pot shot off, but you understand these two situations have nothing in common besides being disputes between a company and a contractor? I don’t recall Helena taking years’ worth of public character assassination on Platinum’s part before speaking out, I don't recall her providing a…

Because a company was right the last time suddenly they are always right? How lacking in nuance is that? Every situation should be judged on its own independent context. 

Can confirm. Not much to add, but everthing both you and Mick say rings true for my time at THQ and its partners (pre-revival). The game dev industry is bloated with shitty people who do nothing but “manage”, and do it poorly.

If only to hear how pathetic the company can sound when defending such a situation from their perspective?

This one comes with actual receipts.

Yes.

Forget the OST. If true, it’s fucked that he didn’t get paid for half of the music they ended up using - some of which is on the OST. 

Contractor for Electronic Arts/Mythic/Broadsword here, worked on Ultima Online, and this all rings absolutely true; the industry is absolutely riddled with sociopathic people who think abusiveness is the same as motivation, who change their minds constantly because they chafe at the idea of conforming to any kind…

Not only that, they “rejected” tons of music and asked Mick for more, and then decided to use all those “rejected” music in the final product. They didn’t pay him for those ones.

“including for an 11-month stretch without pay”

a lot of the people in the old article calling Mick a diva are looking pretty dumb right now

I doubt he asked for the duties. From reading the whole statement it’s pretty clear the producer didn’t give music the respect it deserves and just foisted it on the lead sound designer who probably had enough work on his plate to begin with.

IMO seemed less like Gordon threw Mossholder under the bus and more like he simply didn’t step in to defend Mossholder after years of abuse by Stratton. You could argue that he should have clarified that ultimately it was Stratton’s fault and Mossholder was just doing his job as ordered but I counter that it was a…

The critical part to all of this is that Mick is saying that Bethesda knowingly sold Collectors Edition DE’s with a promise for an OST, before Mick was even contracted. He also brought receipts. 

Read the whole thing earlier today and still processing it. The situation back when this all kicked off never felt right in a lot of ways, but I didn’t know how. I guess I was just really sad about the whole situaion.