On a related note, here's a detailed postmortem of the development of Luigi's Mansion, and how it was to work with Nintendo. Long story short a lot of prototyping and encouragement to try to do things differently, which seems in short supply in this biz nowadays.
On a related note, here's a detailed postmortem of the development of Luigi's Mansion, and how it was to work with Nintendo. Long story short a lot of prototyping and encouragement to try to do things differently, which seems in short supply in this biz nowadays.
This is largely why I prefer Nintendo's software output, no matter how many "Gamers" claim that they're kiddy or out of touch. In a marketplace full of shooters and other "gritty, mature" software, Nintendo's not afraid to release a game where you hunt mansions for ghosts to suck up with a backpack vacuum.
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
That bit of article about ignorant publishers reminds me of a blurb from a developer I read ages ago. Apparently they were developing some 3rd-person game, somebody with the publisher saw the HUD from Metroid Prime and was absolutely CERTAIN it would make the game better to have that exact sort of helmet-based HUD, and the dev had to spend weeks fighting with the guy because the publisher didn' understand they weren't making a first-person game.
But yeah, publishers having not a damn clue about what making a good game actually involves is, sadly, not really a new thing. Interesting that the article claims our current problems with publishers are due both to sheer blind ignorance AND people in positions they have no idea how to handle thanks to the PS2 era; hadn't considered that last bit, but it's something to consider.
There's actually a great episode from Extra Credits that goes into the problem of a lack of prototyping/pre-production. Essentially it can be very expensive, and it's what leads to so many modern games being samey or having problematic game mechanics. Most publishers just don't want to shell out for that, they want to get stuff out now. In that light it could be considered easier to just load on the graffix and cutscenes (even though it's also expensive).
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
I don't see how it could honestly be MORE expensive to spend a bit making a really low-level prototype of a game than losing insane millions on a big-budget game that ends up a total flop.
Though I have several functioning brain cells which would automatically exclude me from being able to get a job in AAA-game publishing, so obviously I'm just not qualified to understand such arcane mysteries.
I don't see how it could honestly be MORE expensive to spend a bit making a really low-level prototype of a game than losing insane millions on a big-budget game that ends up a total flop.
Though I have several functioning brain cells which would automatically exclude me from being able to get a job in AAA-game publishing, so obviously I'm just not qualified to understand such arcane mysteries.
Part of the problem, as the EC episode points out, is what do you do with the rest of the team while that's happening?
It's actually easier in a big studio where you can move the artists/programmers/etc off to another project while a few guys get together and do the pre-production work. This is, afaik, how Bioware does it. Maybe Blizzard too.
A good example of prototyping is in the development of the new Xcom game. Jake Solomon and Sid Meier basically sat down and built boardgames to work out the mechanics. The games weakest area (the 'strategy' part of the map) also seems to be the one they had the most trouble prototyping. Although trying to prototype what are basically two different games and unifying them is a tall task.
On a related note, here's a detailed postmortem of the development of Luigi's Mansion, and how it was to work with Nintendo. Long story short a lot of prototyping and encouragement to try to do things differently, which seems in short supply in this biz nowadays.
What's interesting is the different approaches going on here. This part is what I noticed:
It's kinda like, "Brian really wants this feature in the game because he thought a fan might've appreciated it in the first one." And that went in, like, four months ago. But throughout the development of the game, it was just, "Create new ideas." That's the one unique thing about Nintendo that I like -- they are always creating new ideas, but with familiar IP. It's always gameplay first.
It reminds me of boardgames and the various development ideas in that medium. There's people who come up with your theme or setting first and build a game around a simulationist paradigm, and there's people who build a mechanical system and then just slap any old theme on top of it and call it a day.
Like, a western developer would be like "Let's make a sci-fi RPG" and then work out what sort of gameplay it will have and Nintendo is like "This gameplay is fun, let's put Mario in it ... cause".
To be fair, the Australian game industry has collapsed has it not?
The link says it's part of an overall restructuring at Sega. So it sounds like just your everyday studio closing with nothing to do with sales targets or huge budgets.
Seem odd to me to stop development on a game already underway. If you wanna close the studio and they are half done, just let them finish and then shut them down once production is done so you don't lose that initial investment.
I don't see how it could honestly be MORE expensive to spend a bit making a really low-level prototype of a game than losing insane millions on a big-budget game that ends up a total flop.
Though I have several functioning brain cells which would automatically exclude me from being able to get a job in AAA-game publishing, so obviously I'm just not qualified to understand such arcane mysteries.
Part of the problem, as the EC episode points out, is what do you do with the rest of the team while that's happening?
It's actually easier in a big studio where you can move the artists/programmers/etc off to another project while a few guys get together and do the pre-production work. This is, afaik, how Bioware does it. Maybe Blizzard too.
Lost man hours are expensive.
You do it by making a part of the pre-production gantt chart with the story design and all that other junk.
I don't see how it could honestly be MORE expensive to spend a bit making a really low-level prototype of a game than losing insane millions on a big-budget game that ends up a total flop.
Though I have several functioning brain cells which would automatically exclude me from being able to get a job in AAA-game publishing, so obviously I'm just not qualified to understand such arcane mysteries.
Part of the problem, as the EC episode points out, is what do you do with the rest of the team while that's happening?
It's actually easier in a big studio where you can move the artists/programmers/etc off to another project while a few guys get together and do the pre-production work. This is, afaik, how Bioware does it. Maybe Blizzard too.
Lost man hours are expensive.
You do it by making a part of the pre-production gantt chart with the story design and all that other junk.
That really doesn't seem to solve the problem. I'm not even sure what you are exactly trying to say. What are all these people doing while pre-production is happening?
They already have a phase of the game design process where they have a smaller team working on it before ramping up (concurrent with the larger part of the team working on the previous games and the like). You just make it part of that
Sega announced its restructuring, what, a year ago?
Seems odd they'd continue on with the Castle of Illusion redevelopment when they knew full well it wasn't part of their new strategy.
Must of been far enough along in development that it made more sense financially to finish it and release then to cancel it.
Considering this is a Mickey game, they were probably either contractually obligated to finish the game, or Sega felt it was definitely worth finishing something good to maintain solid relations with Disney in the future.
Maybe contractual obligation is the reason. Canning a game (which happens frequently) is one thing, but canning it after you've gone to the trouble of shelling out for the license may be another.
At any rate, there's this:
After being dismissed for illustrating caricatures of his Ubisoft Montpellier managers, artist Alain 'Gaston' Rémy has decided to challenge the terms of the December 2012 decision.
In a report filed by France 3's news desk, the former Ubisoft employee says that the illustrations were done for humor and notes none of the caricatures were ever made public, according to a translation of the original story. Working with Ubisoft for a total of six years, Gaston's primary focus at the studio was working on the publisher's Rabbids franchise. A French labor court is expected to make its decision on the matter on July 26.
Ubisoft big dog Yannis Mallat says gamers will embrace always-on gaming as soon as they're able to stop worrying about it.
Whatever the reason, an awful lot of gamers have expressed an awful lot of concern that Microsoft's next console will require a constant connection in order to function. But Mallat said people will stop worrying about such things as soon as the industry demonstrates that there's really nothing to worry about.
"As soon as players don't have to worry, then they will only take into account the benefits that those services bring," he told the Guardian. "And I agree, these services need to provide clear benefits. It's important to be able to provide direct connections between us and our consumers, whether that's extra content or online services, a lot of successful games have that."
Someones going to have to educate me here, what exactly are the customers benefits for always on?
You can do some exciting things with an always on, always active world but outside of a few instances of really neat things in MMOs no one has done much with it...yet. The positives on the surface for your average game all come on the DRM/anti piracy end which doesn't really serve the consumer because we've never seen the benefit passed on to us.
Ubisoft big dog Yannis Mallat says gamers will embrace always-on gaming as soon as they're able to stop worrying about it.
Whatever the reason, an awful lot of gamers have expressed an awful lot of concern that Microsoft's next console will require a constant connection in order to function. But Mallat said people will stop worrying about such things as soon as the industry demonstrates that there's really nothing to worry about.
"As soon as players don't have to worry, then they will only take into account the benefits that those services bring," he told the Guardian. "And I agree, these services need to provide clear benefits. It's important to be able to provide direct connections between us and our consumers, whether that's extra content or online services, a lot of successful games have that."
Someones going to have to educate me here, what exactly are the customers benefits for always on?
You might want to read the whole sentence there:
As soon as players don't have to worry, then they will only take into account the benefits that those services bring. And I agree, these services need to provide clear benefits.
The second part is kinda important.
He's not wrong either. As soon as (or if) online gaming provides benefits with little to worry about, gamers by and large won't have a problem with it.
He's not wrong in that always-on will need to provide benefits.
Of course the thing I'm hoping gets through their thick skulls needs to be that these benefits need to be for the consumer, not necessarily the company. SimCity sure didn't give the players decent benefits.
The more industry people talk about this, the more I suspect this will actually be a thing.
He's not wrong in that always-on will need to provide benefits.
Of course the thing I'm hoping gets through their thick skulls needs to be that these benefits need to be for the consumer, not necessarily the company. SimCity sure didn't give the players decent benefits.
The more industry people talk about this, the more I suspect this will actually be a thing.
Well, he is talking about benefits to the consumer. Though perhaps not the kind of benefits some of us may care about.
I think the larger point is also that it needs to be not-inconvenient. That is, I think, a big lesson from Simcity and Steam and the like. Online requirements only seem to piss the masses off when they are really annoying or down all the time.
I suppose one big benefit would be the ability to buy and download games rather than going outside.
Though you don't have to always be online for that - just long enough for the download to finish.
Hmm. Instant patching for the game you're playing the moment they become available? The billboards in the game you're playing having real up-to-date advertisements for upcoming games from the game's publisher?
No. I can't see it. Nothing that would justify always on-line.
Yeah, it's really going to be an uphill battle to truly make the online requirement seen as something awesome for Joe Customer.
I mean, if the SimCity thing got bad enough to kill sales of that title, just thing what'll happen when the mainstream media get a hold of a console that requires a connection.
Still, it's all just conjecture at this point (though with worryingly high amounts of participation from industry officials). We should probably wrap this up quick.
Switch: 3947-4890-9293
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HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
I really don't want to do the "always online" dance again just because another company / person is weighing in on how it's somehow a good thing. Not in this thread at least. And since the thread we had for it was locked down we should probably ease up on the topic for a while until an event happens.
Kotaku's got a long rant from an anonymous game developer/publisher on why the publishing thing is broken. We know a lot of this stuff already, but there's still plenty of great insights in there:
The orgy of cash publishers enjoyed in the PS2 era made the majority of the management in games publishing complacent. A lot of people at the publishing companies made it into positions they wouldn’t normally have achieved. They were carried there by those large profits. Basically, they failed upwards.
These days, the market is much more fractured in terms of platforms. Games cost even more to make. And something has had to give.
Metacritic Matters: How Review Scores Hurt Video Games
Bugs in Fallout: New Vegas might have eaten your save file. Maybe they took away a few hours of… Read…
Unfortunately, due to the fact that we have a large number of idiots in publishing management, this means that when they’re unable to manage budgets properly—most often the result of their own interference inflating costs—they hit the panic button and shut down the studio that just tried to make a game for them.
Publishers control the narrative of how games are made. So when a large studio goes under, it’s assumed that’s down to the studio making bad creative decisions. Over the past few years, this meme has become worryingly widespread, especially as multiple studios have gone bankrupt.
Previously, the worst idiots in game publishing could make catastrophic fuck-ups, but the profit margins would protect them. These days, there is no profit margin buffer. Instead, publishers now resort to human shields.
To give you an idea about how bad publisher influence can be, consider this: during production meetings, publishing execs often have someone—often the developer—“drive” a game so they can see how it is coming together. The publishing people all watch and then make passive, aesthetic appraisals of active, functional aspects of a game. This is because the bulk of execs can’t and don’t want to play or understand how games work. They don’t want to play. This would be akin to editors in literary publishing being unable to read or write.
Having film as a touchstone for gaming is very much a thing that comes from publishers. It’s harmful to games, but this is what many of them want.
Not only does the framing of games as film excuse this habit of making high-level decisions based on aesthetics instead of in interactivity, but it also affords a modicum of prestige via an association with a medium that’s more established. This is what goes through their heads, but, in reality, this is absolutely killing games and developers dead.
The kind of ruinous top-down publisher decisions that I’m talking about often involve how a game looks and flows. The design changes that result tend to involve the creation of rigid and extended animations, ill-placed cutscenes and, at its worst, the functional simplification of core mechanics in favor of something that looks nicer to watch. The game that we all wind up with usually plays far worse because of those requested changes.
You know, publisher desperate to emulate film could explain why we keep getting blockbuster games loaded with graffix and cutscenes and other expensive crap.
David Jaffe punches that editorial and takes its lunch money.
I agree with a number of AGD's theories about why modern games are tough to get right (i.e. AGD's write up on game's desire to be film vs. games was pretty spot on) but I reject the tired accusation that it's the publisher keeping game developers down. And I reject that accusation because of the classic line that I am sure you've heard before: you are worth what you can negotiate.
Period.
Don't like the way a publisher treats you?
Don't sign a contract with that particular publisher. Or if you do, make sure you have what you will and won't tolerate written into the contract.
And if your studio is not good enough to demand better deals and is not clever enough to secure alternate forms of financing (thus allowing you to bypass the publishers all together) then you deserve what you get.
I am very sympathetic to the article's core (it can suck being a dev when you feel your failure stems from forces out of your control)** but that is very much the whole 'every kid who plays gets a trophy even if their team loses' thinking.
AKA: This is business.
You want to be treated better? Sign a contract demanding it.
You are not able to get such a contract? Then improve your team until you can demand in the real world what you think you are really worth in your mind.
Because at the moment the real world is making something very clear to you. And that is this:
For the time being anyway, you are not as good as you think you are.
The people who fight against this and complain that the world is not fair are spinning their wheels and wasting their time. The people who embrace this truth can then decide to either get out of the business or put the effort into getting so good that they can pretty much write their own ticket.
Kotaku's got a long rant from an anonymous game developer/publisher on why the publishing thing is broken. We know a lot of this stuff already, but there's still plenty of great insights in there:
The orgy of cash publishers enjoyed in the PS2 era made the majority of the management in games publishing complacent. A lot of people at the publishing companies made it into positions they wouldn’t normally have achieved. They were carried there by those large profits. Basically, they failed upwards.
These days, the market is much more fractured in terms of platforms. Games cost even more to make. And something has had to give.
Metacritic Matters: How Review Scores Hurt Video Games
Bugs in Fallout: New Vegas might have eaten your save file. Maybe they took away a few hours of… Read…
Unfortunately, due to the fact that we have a large number of idiots in publishing management, this means that when they’re unable to manage budgets properly—most often the result of their own interference inflating costs—they hit the panic button and shut down the studio that just tried to make a game for them.
Publishers control the narrative of how games are made. So when a large studio goes under, it’s assumed that’s down to the studio making bad creative decisions. Over the past few years, this meme has become worryingly widespread, especially as multiple studios have gone bankrupt.
Previously, the worst idiots in game publishing could make catastrophic fuck-ups, but the profit margins would protect them. These days, there is no profit margin buffer. Instead, publishers now resort to human shields.
To give you an idea about how bad publisher influence can be, consider this: during production meetings, publishing execs often have someone—often the developer—“drive” a game so they can see how it is coming together. The publishing people all watch and then make passive, aesthetic appraisals of active, functional aspects of a game. This is because the bulk of execs can’t and don’t want to play or understand how games work. They don’t want to play. This would be akin to editors in literary publishing being unable to read or write.
Having film as a touchstone for gaming is very much a thing that comes from publishers. It’s harmful to games, but this is what many of them want.
Not only does the framing of games as film excuse this habit of making high-level decisions based on aesthetics instead of in interactivity, but it also affords a modicum of prestige via an association with a medium that’s more established. This is what goes through their heads, but, in reality, this is absolutely killing games and developers dead.
The kind of ruinous top-down publisher decisions that I’m talking about often involve how a game looks and flows. The design changes that result tend to involve the creation of rigid and extended animations, ill-placed cutscenes and, at its worst, the functional simplification of core mechanics in favor of something that looks nicer to watch. The game that we all wind up with usually plays far worse because of those requested changes.
You know, publisher desperate to emulate film could explain why we keep getting blockbuster games loaded with graffix and cutscenes and other expensive crap.
David Jaffe punches that editorial and takes its lunch money.
I agree with a number of AGD's theories about why modern games are tough to get right (i.e. AGD's write up on game's desire to be film vs. games was pretty spot on) but I reject the tired accusation that it's the publisher keeping game developers down. And I reject that accusation because of the classic line that I am sure you've heard before: you are worth what you can negotiate.
Period.
Don't like the way a publisher treats you?
Don't sign a contract with that particular publisher. Or if you do, make sure you have what you will and won't tolerate written into the contract.
And if your studio is not good enough to demand better deals and is not clever enough to secure alternate forms of financing (thus allowing you to bypass the publishers all together) then you deserve what you get.
I am very sympathetic to the article's core (it can suck being a dev when you feel your failure stems from forces out of your control)** but that is very much the whole 'every kid who plays gets a trophy even if their team loses' thinking.
AKA: This is business.
You want to be treated better? Sign a contract demanding it.
You are not able to get such a contract? Then improve your team until you can demand in the real world what you think you are really worth in your mind.
Because at the moment the real world is making something very clear to you. And that is this:
For the time being anyway, you are not as good as you think you are.
The people who fight against this and complain that the world is not fair are spinning their wheels and wasting their time. The people who embrace this truth can then decide to either get out of the business or put the effort into getting so good that they can pretty much write their own ticket.
All I got from that is they need to unionize, because everything he said is just absurd. How can you improve your team, if your team is measured by success, and success is hindered by publishers?
How can you negotiate a better deal, if you're company will close if you can't secure a deal? And the publishers know this?
Clearly the kid who keeps getting his lunch money taken from him just needs to work out more, that's really getting to the root of the problem there, not the asshole abusing him. Nope, nope.
Edit: Huh, I made the same bullying analogy Automaticzen did without even realizing it.
David Jaffe? The guy who has been making Twisted Metal over and over for 15+ years? The guy who has had two companies involved in exclusive deals with Sony? Yeah really treading rough water. There's very few developers in the position to make a deal with anyone, and it doesn't really have much to do with quality. Considering this is a market where you can put out a critically awarded game, sell multimillion copies, and STILL get your development co. shut down, how does one negotiate?
It ultimately circles back to the same employment issues that the industry suffers from, people are chewed up and spit out so fast that it can't really sustain an elite of seasoned developers. You just have more bodies to throw into the meat grinder.
So since EVERYONE gets crunched, then EVERYONE is not good enough David Jaffe? Or did you just, perhaps, make a stupid argument?
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AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
As has been noted, Jaffe's comments would mean more if this was a seller's market. No, the gaming industry is a case where there are tons of "jobless" out there - and if a publisher finds one who won't take the shitty deal, then the'll just go to the next.
As has been noted, Jaffe's comments would mean more if this was a seller's market. No, the gaming industry is a case where there are tons of "jobless" out there - and if a publisher finds one who won't take the shitty deal, then the'll just go to the next.
That's missing his point entirely. The point is that it's up to you as a developer to build up your brand to the point where publishers are willing to work with you on even footing.
As has been noted, Jaffe's comments would mean more if this was a seller's market. No, the gaming industry is a case where there are tons of "jobless" out there - and if a publisher finds one who won't take the shitty deal, then the'll just go to the next.
That's missing his point entirely. The point is that it's up to you as a developer to build up your brand to the point where publishers are willing to work with you on even footing.
How does one build up their brand without publishers in the first place?
Create Indy games and hope for a hit? Isn't that kind of an extreme edge case?
As has been noted, Jaffe's comments would mean more if this was a seller's market. No, the gaming industry is a case where there are tons of "jobless" out there - and if a publisher finds one who won't take the shitty deal, then the'll just go to the next.
That's missing his point entirely. The point is that it's up to you as a developer to build up your brand to the point where publishers are willing to work with you on even footing.
How does one build up their brand without publishers in the first place?
Create Indy games and hope for a hit? Isn't that kind of an extreme edge case?
No, I'm saying that when you're starting off, you take the "crummy" deal because you're brand new and any deal is better than no deal. But you make the best of the crummy deal and use that to help make your next deal a little better, and so on until you're in the position that you want to be in. Or you just keep taking work-for-hire assignments to pay the bills and work on what you really want to be doing in your extra time until you manage to make a game that's a big enough success that you can stop looking for assignments & work on your own projects full-time.
Posts
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/190322/luigis_mansion_making_a_game_the_.php
This is largely why I prefer Nintendo's software output, no matter how many "Gamers" claim that they're kiddy or out of touch. In a marketplace full of shooters and other "gritty, mature" software, Nintendo's not afraid to release a game where you hunt mansions for ghosts to suck up with a backpack vacuum.
Switch: 6200-8149-0919 / Wii U: maximumzero / 3DS: 0860-3352-3335 / eBay Shop
But yeah, publishers having not a damn clue about what making a good game actually involves is, sadly, not really a new thing. Interesting that the article claims our current problems with publishers are due both to sheer blind ignorance AND people in positions they have no idea how to handle thanks to the PS2 era; hadn't considered that last bit, but it's something to consider.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/the-pre-production-problem
Though I have several functioning brain cells which would automatically exclude me from being able to get a job in AAA-game publishing, so obviously I'm just not qualified to understand such arcane mysteries.
Part of the problem, as the EC episode points out, is what do you do with the rest of the team while that's happening?
It's actually easier in a big studio where you can move the artists/programmers/etc off to another project while a few guys get together and do the pre-production work. This is, afaik, how Bioware does it. Maybe Blizzard too.
Lost man hours are expensive.
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http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8114/8640620427_143df969e6_h.jpg
http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2013/16/1366043604-2.jpg
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But I thought this wasn't a general game announcement thread! What's the point of this post?
Well, here's how you know the game studio closings are getting out of hand: Edge reports that the studio making it is already closing.
What's interesting is the different approaches going on here. This part is what I noticed:
It reminds me of boardgames and the various development ideas in that medium. There's people who come up with your theme or setting first and build a game around a simulationist paradigm, and there's people who build a mechanical system and then just slap any old theme on top of it and call it a day.
Like, a western developer would be like "Let's make a sci-fi RPG" and then work out what sort of gameplay it will have and Nintendo is like "This gameplay is fun, let's put Mario in it ... cause".
I was just about to post that.
So now we're closing studios BEFORE they release the game they can blame for the closing because it didn't sell 4.7 bazillion? Sheesh.
-thoughts from my publishing studio
The link says it's part of an overall restructuring at Sega. So it sounds like just your everyday studio closing with nothing to do with sales targets or huge budgets.
Seems odd they'd continue on with the Castle of Illusion redevelopment when they knew full well it wasn't part of their new strategy.
Must of been far enough along in development that it made more sense financially to finish it and release then to cancel it.
You do it by making a part of the pre-production gantt chart with the story design and all that other junk.
That really doesn't seem to solve the problem. I'm not even sure what you are exactly trying to say. What are all these people doing while pre-production is happening?
Considering this is a Mickey game, they were probably either contractually obligated to finish the game, or Sega felt it was definitely worth finishing something good to maintain solid relations with Disney in the future.
At any rate, there's this:
http://www.joystiq.com/2013/04/12/ubisoft-montpellier-artist-challenges-dismissal-over-caricatures/
They should have never expected an artist working on Rabbid games to make silly drawings.
Tsk tsk, have ye already forgotten? Two weeks prior, Deadpool's team got canned as well.
Someones going to have to educate me here, what exactly are the customers benefits for always on?
You might want to read the whole sentence there:
The second part is kinda important.
He's not wrong either. As soon as (or if) online gaming provides benefits with little to worry about, gamers by and large won't have a problem with it.
Sounds about right for the public at large.
Of course the thing I'm hoping gets through their thick skulls needs to be that these benefits need to be for the consumer, not necessarily the company. SimCity sure didn't give the players decent benefits.
The more industry people talk about this, the more I suspect this will actually be a thing.
Well, he is talking about benefits to the consumer. Though perhaps not the kind of benefits some of us may care about.
I think the larger point is also that it needs to be not-inconvenient. That is, I think, a big lesson from Simcity and Steam and the like. Online requirements only seem to piss the masses off when they are really annoying or down all the time.
Though you don't have to always be online for that - just long enough for the download to finish.
Hmm. Instant patching for the game you're playing the moment they become available? The billboards in the game you're playing having real up-to-date advertisements for upcoming games from the game's publisher?
No. I can't see it. Nothing that would justify always on-line.
I mean, if the SimCity thing got bad enough to kill sales of that title, just thing what'll happen when the mainstream media get a hold of a console that requires a connection.
Still, it's all just conjecture at this point (though with worryingly high amounts of participation from industry officials). We should probably wrap this up quick.
David Jaffe punches that editorial and takes its lunch money.
http://criminalcrackdown.blogspot.com/2013/04/you-are-not-as-good-as-you-think-you-are.html
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/
I write about video games and stuff. It is fun. Sometimes.
All I got from that is they need to unionize, because everything he said is just absurd. How can you improve your team, if your team is measured by success, and success is hindered by publishers?
How can you negotiate a better deal, if you're company will close if you can't secure a deal? And the publishers know this?
Clearly the kid who keeps getting his lunch money taken from him just needs to work out more, that's really getting to the root of the problem there, not the asshole abusing him. Nope, nope.
Edit: Huh, I made the same bullying analogy Automaticzen did without even realizing it.
It ultimately circles back to the same employment issues that the industry suffers from, people are chewed up and spit out so fast that it can't really sustain an elite of seasoned developers. You just have more bodies to throw into the meat grinder.
That's missing his point entirely. The point is that it's up to you as a developer to build up your brand to the point where publishers are willing to work with you on even footing.
Zeboyd Games Development Blog
Steam ID : rwb36, Twitter : Werezompire, Facebook : Zeboyd Games
How does one build up their brand without publishers in the first place?
Create Indy games and hope for a hit? Isn't that kind of an extreme edge case?
No, I'm saying that when you're starting off, you take the "crummy" deal because you're brand new and any deal is better than no deal. But you make the best of the crummy deal and use that to help make your next deal a little better, and so on until you're in the position that you want to be in. Or you just keep taking work-for-hire assignments to pay the bills and work on what you really want to be doing in your extra time until you manage to make a game that's a big enough success that you can stop looking for assignments & work on your own projects full-time.
Zeboyd Games Development Blog
Steam ID : rwb36, Twitter : Werezompire, Facebook : Zeboyd Games