Consumer: That game was awesome. I want more!
Developer: Ok, here you go, have some more!
Consumer: WTF?! This is just more of the same! You suck!!!
Developer: :?
Well, it's obviously not as black and white as that though. :P
To be fair, the consumer saying WTF? is usually a different person from the consumer saying they want more of the same. But yes, it is a conundrum. Personally, I'm one of those consumers that doesn't mind getting more of what they've liked before. New stuff is great, when it's good, but like many people I tend to stick with what I know I already enjoy.
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reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
Has this been mentioned before? Because it's kinda amazing.
When I saw that trailer, I first thought I accidentally clicked on some weird Sony commercial, then I thought it was a joke trailer. Turns out it's both, though the latter not intentionally.
Has this been mentioned before? Because it's kinda amazing.
This doesn't deserve to be bottom-paged, it's too bizarre. I personally love the 30-something housewife with the Vita, "this is MY world". Yeah Sony keep kidding yourself that you're catering to that demographic....
Has this been mentioned before? Because it's kinda amazing.
When I saw that trailer, I first thought I accidentally clicked on some weird Sony commercial, then I thought it was a joke trailer. Turns out it's both, though the latter not intentionally.
What the hell? How in the world do they get off using Tron Legacy music in this trailer?
I'm not kidding, it's not a sound-alike, it's literally that music:
Has this been mentioned before? Because it's kinda amazing.
When I saw that trailer, I first thought I accidentally clicked on some weird Sony commercial, then I thought it was a joke trailer. Turns out it's both, though the latter not intentionally.
What the hell? How in the world do they get off using Tron Legacy music in this trailer?
Well at least it isn't that one piece from Requiem for a Dream.
Actually, I kind of wish they did use that piece because then it sure would be one hell of a trailer.
The studio behind the Xbox Live Arcade port of PC phenomenon Minecraft believes it will be the first game on the system to see "constant updates".
As it stands, the update process on the Xbox 360 is a laborious process, as Microsoft demands to approve every single patch before it goes live. Paddy Burns, chief technology officer at Minecraft XBLA developer 4J Studios, told Edge that that's about to change.
"Microsoft knows that to do a similar thing that's on PC where they constantly update it, that's a very difficult thing to do on Xbox because you have to go through the full tests," he explained.
"But they are quite keen to move towards that - they do see it as the future, so I think we might be the first to do constant updates."
However, Burns added that gamers shouldn't expect the same frequency of updates as in the PC version.
"I don't think it'll ever come to that. I think that there will always be Microsoft testing involved.
"But the whole turnaround of that testing they're hoping to speed up, so we can maybe roll out very two months. We'll have to see how that goes... I'm really looking forward to it being updated with patches and new features after it's released."
Burns also revealed that the version of the game that will initially launch on Xbox Live Arcade later this year will be version 1.6.6 of the PC beta.
Well this'd hopefully silence a number of complaints that developers have with Microsoft. Like Valve.
I also disagree that being sequelled to death is a recent thing. Mega Man was basically the Call of Duty of the 90s, and Capcom outdid themselves by not even making true sequels to Street Fighter and just crapping out re-releases. We've had annual Madden games since, what, the early 90s?
The industry, like a lot of other industries, is also adverse to risks; sequels are just one of the more obvious low-risk investments.
Zelda comes to mind. Over a decade and a half at that point.
I'm not claiming they weren't good games (even if I don't like many of them personally). But, and this is the bitter reality for some people, sequels often have possible qualities versus their predecessors. Not always, but often, in a mulitfaceted game. Nintendo just happened to be remaking the same game, over and over, with different implementation each time.
Synthesis on
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited January 2012
Well. I don't think sequels are an inherently bad thing.
The truth of the matter is, sometimes you just get the setting right the first time and instead of just throwing away that setting sometimes its better to expound upon it.
Though really, I've never thought the situation with sequels was as dire as people make it out to be. We still get plenty of new series every gen, some fare better than others yes...but I doubt that's going to change.
If anything I would say the bigger companies will probably stop releasing as many new IPs. But that's because, like Morninglord said, they have a lot more to lose financially.
So, it seems that every day I hear about a new studio formed by unemployed developers from a large closure, who are always working on an iOS title. I figure it's probably the cheapest place to develop for with a guaranteed large market who have proven they're willing to buy games, so it's a relatively safe bet compared to places like XBLA (which was meant to be ideal for indie developers, but sadly doesn't quite seem to have that pull). Meanwhile, developing a big game for a major console is an expensive business that has contributed to a lot of the unemployment that has led to these new studios springing up. What I'm wondering is, will there be a point in the not-too-distant future where these small start-ups are growing and getting more ambitious, ultimately becoming the next generation of mainstream, popular developers?
Has this been mentioned before? Because it's kinda amazing.
When I saw that trailer, I first thought I accidentally clicked on some weird Sony commercial, then I thought it was a joke trailer. Turns out it's both, though the latter not intentionally.
Um, wow. I could kind of see where they were going with this, but turning the whole "hey, the future is going to be great!" part of it into a Sony commercial just wrecks the thing.
Eh...I don't know if Uncharted counts since NaughtyDog already had a proven track record at that point.
Hmmm, perhaps you're right, I should've gone with the Jak & Daxter series instead.
Heh, talk about a game series that bowed down to industry trends.
First game: happy platformer.
Second game: GTA clone that smolders with generic rage.
So, it seems that every day I hear about a new studio formed by unemployed developers from a large closure, who are always working on an iOS title. I figure it's probably the cheapest place to develop for with a guaranteed large market who have proven they're willing to buy games, so it's a relatively safe bet compared to places like XBLA (which was meant to be ideal for indie developers, but sadly doesn't quite seem to have that pull). Meanwhile, developing a big game for a major console is an expensive business that has contributed to a lot of the unemployment that has led to these new studios springing up. What I'm wondering is, will there be a point in the not-too-distant future where these small start-ups are growing and getting more ambitious, ultimately becoming the next generation of mainstream, popular developers?
Very likely. Then again some of them are already mainstream, popular developers by virtue of selling well to a broad audience.
What the hell? How in the world do they get off using Tron Legacy music in this trailer?
I'm not kidding, it's not a sound-alike, it's literally that music:
I know... I noticed that first thing as well...
The Daft Punk: Tron Legacy soundtrack and the remixed Tron Legacy: Reconfigured albums are so good though... I've listened to each of them hundreds of times in the last year.
So, it seems that every day I hear about a new studio formed by unemployed developers from a large closure, who are always working on an iOS title. I figure it's probably the cheapest place to develop for with a guaranteed large market who have proven they're willing to buy games, so it's a relatively safe bet compared to places like XBLA (which was meant to be ideal for indie developers, but sadly doesn't quite seem to have that pull). Meanwhile, developing a big game for a major console is an expensive business that has contributed to a lot of the unemployment that has led to these new studios springing up. What I'm wondering is, will there be a point in the not-too-distant future where these small start-ups are growing and getting more ambitious, ultimately becoming the next generation of mainstream, popular developers?
Very likely. Then again some of them are already mainstream, popular developers by virtue of selling well to a broad audience.
Yeah, I'm just wondering if we're at a point in the cycle where things are starting to reboot, so the companies that have grown too large and expensive to run will (mostly, but not entirely) die off over the next few years, and the industry will push towards making things cheaper and easier for the small studios to flourish again.
Here's another analyst reacting to the Star Wars thing:
Analyst group Macquarie Securities has released a new report which states that, while there are clearly concerns in the industry that EA and BioWare's recently released Star Wars: The Old Republic isn't selling as well as first hoped, these outcries are "overdone."
Star Wars: The Old Republic was released last month, and surpassed 1 million paid subscribers in just three days, the fastest any MMO has achieved that milestone.
Yet despite this strong start, publisher EA's stock is down 30 percent compared to its 52-week high price on November 4 last year, thanks in part to "speculation" regarding sales figures for the game from outside parties, suggests Macquarie's Ben Schachter.
Schachter notes that many of the issues which are being brought up are based on conjecture -- for example, the fact that EA has not yet given sales figures for the game does not automatically mean that numbers must be bad.
He also explained that, while retail sales of the title, as tracked by NPD, were weak, he expects that the majority of initial sales occured through the Origin digital distribution service, and therefore have not been accounted for.
In light of this, the company has stuck with its "Outperform" rating, and believes that the game may achieve initial sell-in sales of 1.5 million -- although Schachter was quick to note that long-term sustainability of subscribers to the game is currently unclear.
Analysts had previously said that the game may potentially sell 3 million units in its first year on sale.
Yeah, I'm interested in where it is too, since previously the only way to cancel was to call up customer service.
Meanwhile, analysts really aren't big on Zynga.
Analyst firm Sterne Agee has reported that social games giant Zynga spent more money on pulling in new paying customers over the last nine months than those players paid back into the company's games.
Speaking to news website Benzinga, Sterne Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia explained that Zynga lost $150 on average for each new paying customer during the current fiscal year, as the marketing costs outweighed average customer spending.
"They've given us the sales in marketing dollars for the first nine months - $120 million," he explained. "Almost all of that is for acquiring customers."
"We also know that they had 3.4 million unique payers in the September quarter, which is up from 3 million at the end of December 2010. In other words, they added 400,000 additional payers and they spent $120 million to acquire them."
He continued, "We know that, on average, these people are spending about $150 or so. Our concern is [whether or not it's worth] spending $300 to get these customers when people are spending $150. That math won't work for very long."
Bhatia was quick to point out, "That's our math; that's not what the company says." He also noted that this shows "a slowdown in social gaming in general... I don't think it's just Zynga."
"But Zynga clearly has tried many games, and they're finding that the interest level isn't necessarily going up," he continued. "We've seen many games launch and then fade within a few weeks."
"Not immediately, but down the road this is going to catch up with them - whether it takes three quarters or four quarters is hard to say. But our projection for the next 12 to 15 months is that growth is slowing significantly. That's with us giving them a lot of credit for the possibility that they will add more payers and that [each payer] will pay more," he concluded.
When Zynga listed its IPO last month, Sterne Agee initiated coverage of the company with an "Underperform" rating, noting that Zynga's growth has slowed down rapidly in recent months.
That's what I've done minus the CC the last 3 years. Always buy cards for 35-40 bucks online. I think there's a checkbox on your profile page at xbox.com b but don't quote me on that. I remember it being a super hassle to turn it off, same with getting a CC removed (which I still can't do)
Personally I think it is a little odd we haven't heard any chest-thumping about subscriber numbers yet.
But they did. Back before Christmas, with the announcements about sales and reaching 1m subscribers in the fastest time ever, etc.
And, as I mentioned earlier, their 3Q 2012 investor's call is coming up soon (1 Feb). I would expect them to hold most news close to their vest until that point, at which point I expect a flurry of news and press releases.
People accusing Bioware/EA of hiding the Unsubscribe button so that they could charge fees to people like it's some sort of new thing.
Microsoft's done it for years.
Pretty sure it wasn't intentional on BioWare's part. vsove mentioned hearing something about a glitch the with page the button is on causing it not to display. People are only noticing now because the free trial period is ending. (At least I think he said that, I don't remember/am too lazy to skim the past few pages)
Everyone has a price. Throw enough gold around and someone will risk disintegration.
I also disagree that being sequelled to death is a recent thing. Mega Man was basically the Call of Duty of the 90s, and Capcom outdid themselves by not even making true sequels to Street Fighter and just crapping out re-releases. We've had annual Madden games since, what, the early 90s?
The industry, like a lot of other industries, is also adverse to risks; sequels are just one of the more obvious low-risk investments.
Zelda comes to mind. Over a decade and a half at that point.
I'm not claiming they weren't good games (even if I don't like many of them personally). But, and this is the bitter reality for some people, sequels often have possible qualities versus their predecessors. Not always, but often, in a mulitfaceted game. Nintendo just happened to be remaking the same game, over and over, with different implementation each time.
I am specifically referring to franchises that get sequels to the point of being farmed out. Nintendo, while relying heavily on sequels, at least restrains itself far more than any other publisher. We generally get one Mario game per console. It was a big deal to actually get two 3D Marios and a 2D sequel in one console's lifespan. I'm sure Nintendo could release a Mario Kart or Smash Bros. every year or two and make serious bank. Instead, it's been nearly four years since the Mario Kart before 7 and six years since the last portable Mario Kart since 7.
I also disagree that being sequelled to death is a recent thing. Mega Man was basically the Call of Duty of the 90s, and Capcom outdid themselves by not even making true sequels to Street Fighter and just crapping out re-releases. We've had annual Madden games since, what, the early 90s?
The industry, like a lot of other industries, is also adverse to risks; sequels are just one of the more obvious low-risk investments.
Zelda comes to mind. Over a decade and a half at that point.
I'm not claiming they weren't good games (even if I don't like many of them personally). But, and this is the bitter reality for some people, sequels often have possible qualities versus their predecessors. Not always, but often, in a mulitfaceted game. Nintendo just happened to be remaking the same game, over and over, with different implementation each time.
I am specifically referring to franchises that get sequels to the point of being farmed out. Nintendo, while relying heavily on sequels, at least restrains itself far more than any other publisher. We generally get one Mario game per console. It was a big deal to actually get two 3D Marios and a 2D sequel in one console's lifespan. I'm sure Nintendo could release a Mario Kart or Smash Bros. every year or two and make serious bank. Instead, it's been nearly four years since the Mario Kart before 7 and six years since the last portable Mario Kart since 7.
Isn't "Zelda" basically it's own genre these days?
Case in point: Darksiders and Okami.
Posts
CoD breaks sales records year after year because it is the best multiplayer FPS you can get on consoles.
To be fair, the consumer saying WTF? is usually a different person from the consumer saying they want more of the same. But yes, it is a conundrum. Personally, I'm one of those consumers that doesn't mind getting more of what they've liked before. New stuff is great, when it's good, but like many people I tend to stick with what I know I already enjoy.
When I saw that trailer, I first thought I accidentally clicked on some weird Sony commercial, then I thought it was a joke trailer. Turns out it's both, though the latter not intentionally.
This doesn't deserve to be bottom-paged, it's too bizarre. I personally love the 30-something housewife with the Vita, "this is MY world". Yeah Sony keep kidding yourself that you're catering to that demographic....
What the hell? How in the world do they get off using Tron Legacy music in this trailer?
I'm not kidding, it's not a sound-alike, it's literally that music:
Well at least it isn't that one piece from Requiem for a Dream.
Actually, I kind of wish they did use that piece because then it sure would be one hell of a trailer.
Well this'd hopefully silence a number of complaints that developers have with Microsoft. Like Valve.
Zelda comes to mind. Over a decade and a half at that point.
I'm not claiming they weren't good games (even if I don't like many of them personally). But, and this is the bitter reality for some people, sequels often have possible qualities versus their predecessors. Not always, but often, in a mulitfaceted game. Nintendo just happened to be remaking the same game, over and over, with different implementation each time.
The truth of the matter is, sometimes you just get the setting right the first time and instead of just throwing away that setting sometimes its better to expound upon it.
Though really, I've never thought the situation with sequels was as dire as people make it out to be. We still get plenty of new series every gen, some fare better than others yes...but I doubt that's going to change.
If anything I would say the bigger companies will probably stop releasing as many new IPs. But that's because, like Morninglord said, they have a lot more to lose financially.
Well, we can always look at how Activision started..
But I guess getting lucky 3 times in a row would help anyone.
Um, wow. I could kind of see where they were going with this, but turning the whole "hey, the future is going to be great!" part of it into a Sony commercial just wrecks the thing.
Heh, talk about a game series that bowed down to industry trends.
First game: happy platformer.
Second game: GTA clone that smolders with generic rage.
Very likely. Then again some of them are already mainstream, popular developers by virtue of selling well to a broad audience.
Also Zynga was started by an autistic child I believe and now they're publicly traded.
I know... I noticed that first thing as well...
The Daft Punk: Tron Legacy soundtrack and the remixed Tron Legacy: Reconfigured albums are so good though... I've listened to each of them hundreds of times in the last year.
Nintendo ID: Incindium
PSN: IncindiumX
Then again they're starting to get sequels of their own (the Angry Birds spinoffs, the 47 "ville" games, etc.).
Yeah, I'm just wondering if we're at a point in the cycle where things are starting to reboot, so the companies that have grown too large and expensive to run will (mostly, but not entirely) die off over the next few years, and the industry will push towards making things cheaper and easier for the small studios to flourish again.
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/39759/Analyst_The_Old_Republic_sales_concerns_are_overdone.php
Personally I think it is a little odd we haven't heard any chest-thumping about subscriber numbers yet.
They're still counting all their money. The stacks keep falling over.
PSN: Beltaine-77 | Steam: beltane77 | Battle.net BadHaggis#1433
So, I could purchase sub cards on Amazon at a discounted rate, but still have my CC info on file for Arcade game purchases and stuff?
Meanwhile, analysts really aren't big on Zynga.
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/39747/Analyst_Zynga_is_losing_150_per_new_paying_customer.php
People accusing Bioware/EA of hiding the Unsubscribe button so that they could charge fees to people like it's some sort of new thing.
Microsoft's done it for years.
PSN: Beltaine-77 | Steam: beltane77 | Battle.net BadHaggis#1433
But they did. Back before Christmas, with the announcements about sales and reaching 1m subscribers in the fastest time ever, etc.
And, as I mentioned earlier, their 3Q 2012 investor's call is coming up soon (1 Feb). I would expect them to hold most news close to their vest until that point, at which point I expect a flurry of news and press releases.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Pretty sure it wasn't intentional on BioWare's part. vsove mentioned hearing something about a glitch the with page the button is on causing it not to display. People are only noticing now because the free trial period is ending. (At least I think he said that, I don't remember/am too lazy to skim the past few pages)
Indeed it is.
I just bought Just Dance 3.
Switch (JeffConser): SW-3353-5433-5137 Wii U: Skeldare - 3DS: 1848-1663-9345
PM Me if you add me!
// Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //
Thus it is the superior franchise.
I've only tried the JD demo but hey... lemme quickly fire it up and then tell you!
Long and the short of it? DC is more accurate, JD is more fun.
Isn't "Zelda" basically it's own genre these days?
Case in point: Darksiders and Okami.
// Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //