As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/
We're funding a new Acquisitions Incorporated series on Kickstarter right now! Check it out at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pennyarcade/acquisitions-incorporated-the-series-2
To Change an Industry
Genuis
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I come with question, having just learned that Bethesda Softworks will no longer support Star Trek: Legacy I must know, what's it going to take to "help" these companies grow a conscience.
I'm serious, some games are so poorly made they are almost unplayable and certainly not enjoyable yet the companies will issue one maybe two patches then abandon the game. With no ability to return the games, that fall so painfully into this category, thanks to retail policies we need another recourse. I would like to set up a Gamers United Lobbyist and Activist Group a gulag if you will. Wherein we would actually have the power to enforce civilized behavior on those companies we felt needed to be, oh lets say, embargoed.
I'd like to say lets start with Bethesda but I'm sure some people are perfectly happy with many of their games. However, think about your brothers in arms laboring under the weight of a piss-poor Xbox to PC port will you not sacrifice for them will you not forgo that new purchase 30 days and play one of your 1700 other well loved titles instead?
Publisher sanctions aside, firstly and most importantly, what needs to be done is this: Convince our retailers that we should be allowed to return unfinished, rushed out the door games with little or no craftsmanship for a refund. I can be done. It should be done, we have steam, we have Blizzard, we don't need more games, we want more games. Now ask yourself what you really want from future games. Do you want some games that were mostly completed and half-assedly patched and some diamonds with no real way of knowing till you've slapped your pizza-delivery tips down or do want a product that the companies who made it are confident enough in it to face the possibility of mass returns and customer dissatisfaction. I know what I want, it's EB games to beat the crap out of any publisher that lets a turd get onto EB's sales floor. And here's how I'd like to do it.
Gamestop, Eb Games, FuncoLand whatever other companies they own, don't go in there for a month, lets say July, more than that stand in front of the store explain the return policy to the customers who thought they wanted to go in, no need to be rude or excitable, once they get why you're un-supporting the store they'll probably decide they didn't want to go there anyway. Of course if it's 10-year-old Jonny's Birthday then I think we can let that slide, politics should be kept from the young. They are in business because it pleases us to shop there, this is an entertainment industry and when they start to aggravate us they reduce the value of the entertainment they supply, I simply believe that their sales reports should reflect that.
Just because "z0mg it's a multi billion dollar industry" doesn't mean they can be multi jerks. I don't know about you but I don't NEED another game till SC2 (and I'd buy that from my mother's killer) so I say lets change the industry, lets take back the good old days when companies feared the customers more than the investors and their growth margins, for the month of July lets make sure EB Game's ledgers BLEED, and if they don't accept reasonable returns (most notably PC games) by August I'm sure SC2 Beta will out soon.
Well what do you think, are you for the GULAG. It has all the power you give it and they can't afford to fight it. There are many battles to be fought yet only one message will be spoken: "You were given the same rights as a human being by the government, now we demand you act like one. "
Imagine being able to explain to SOE why SW:G needs another patch, or my personal reason, to Bethesda that if they abandon Star Trek Legacy they might as well abandon their desks. I'm sure theres a long list and we will compile it and notate it and make the sound of our absence heard. Do not feed us crap for we will vomit on your shoes. No you're right it doesn't ring, but still ....
You there make a website! You! set up the forum; two sections one of retail and one of development. Let us place a black mark upon those who would besmirch our love. You! Digg this. Spread the word, after all, who isn't scared of a gulag?
Sticky this, you know you want to, your heart yearns to free its righteous hope, your hand hovers over the necessary buttons, let it fall, give in, you can set us free.
I'm serious, some games are so poorly made they are almost unplayable and certainly not enjoyable yet the companies will issue one maybe two patches then abandon the game. With no ability to return the games, that fall so painfully into this category, thanks to retail policies we need another recourse. I would like to set up a Gamers United Lobbyist and Activist Group a gulag if you will. Wherein we would actually have the power to enforce civilized behavior on those companies we felt needed to be, oh lets say, embargoed.
I'd like to say lets start with Bethesda but I'm sure some people are perfectly happy with many of their games. However, think about your brothers in arms laboring under the weight of a piss-poor Xbox to PC port will you not sacrifice for them will you not forgo that new purchase 30 days and play one of your 1700 other well loved titles instead?
Publisher sanctions aside, firstly and most importantly, what needs to be done is this: Convince our retailers that we should be allowed to return unfinished, rushed out the door games with little or no craftsmanship for a refund. I can be done. It should be done, we have steam, we have Blizzard, we don't need more games, we want more games. Now ask yourself what you really want from future games. Do you want some games that were mostly completed and half-assedly patched and some diamonds with no real way of knowing till you've slapped your pizza-delivery tips down or do want a product that the companies who made it are confident enough in it to face the possibility of mass returns and customer dissatisfaction. I know what I want, it's EB games to beat the crap out of any publisher that lets a turd get onto EB's sales floor. And here's how I'd like to do it.
Gamestop, Eb Games, FuncoLand whatever other companies they own, don't go in there for a month, lets say July, more than that stand in front of the store explain the return policy to the customers who thought they wanted to go in, no need to be rude or excitable, once they get why you're un-supporting the store they'll probably decide they didn't want to go there anyway. Of course if it's 10-year-old Jonny's Birthday then I think we can let that slide, politics should be kept from the young. They are in business because it pleases us to shop there, this is an entertainment industry and when they start to aggravate us they reduce the value of the entertainment they supply, I simply believe that their sales reports should reflect that.
Just because "z0mg it's a multi billion dollar industry" doesn't mean they can be multi jerks. I don't know about you but I don't NEED another game till SC2 (and I'd buy that from my mother's killer) so I say lets change the industry, lets take back the good old days when companies feared the customers more than the investors and their growth margins, for the month of July lets make sure EB Game's ledgers BLEED, and if they don't accept reasonable returns (most notably PC games) by August I'm sure SC2 Beta will out soon.
Well what do you think, are you for the GULAG. It has all the power you give it and they can't afford to fight it. There are many battles to be fought yet only one message will be spoken: "You were given the same rights as a human being by the government, now we demand you act like one. "
Imagine being able to explain to SOE why SW:G needs another patch, or my personal reason, to Bethesda that if they abandon Star Trek Legacy they might as well abandon their desks. I'm sure theres a long list and we will compile it and notate it and make the sound of our absence heard. Do not feed us crap for we will vomit on your shoes. No you're right it doesn't ring, but still ....
You there make a website! You! set up the forum; two sections one of retail and one of development. Let us place a black mark upon those who would besmirch our love. You! Digg this. Spread the word, after all, who isn't scared of a gulag?
Sticky this, you know you want to, your heart yearns to free its righteous hope, your hand hovers over the necessary buttons, let it fall, give in, you can set us free.
Genuis on
0
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
Game demos for PC, and game demo discs and rentals for consoles help make this unecessary. Also, game reviews and word-of-mouth is also a good remedy.
"Lets throw money into projects that don't make any profit anymore! Yay! That'll keep us in business!"
No, but seriously -- I remember we tried this here, once. A pretty good website was made. It went nowhere.
Edit: probably because we continue to buy their products, and every attempt, even the good ones, to boycott a gaming company has ended in abject failure. They've got what we need.
Steam BoardGameGeek Twitter
Make it so.
It is going to be so awesome.
Or should I say, delicouis?
debatable
Seriously, just rent a game before buying it.
gilrain: Reputation doesn't make a bad idea good, nor the opposite.
august: i dunna' think she can take much more!
-re: post #11 Use some lube
Cardboard Tube: Yeah that worked great! You not buying ST:L totally saved the thousands of people who did from a miserable experience and put the money back in their pockets, well done. What about retail store policies? What about events like SW:G patches? Come on man you know it's possible and you know it's right, have hope. Disdain feeds not the soul.
Monaro: Thank you for noticing!
Edit:
rayofash: You can't win a war defensively.
What you get is sequels.
Loads and loads of them.
Either that or shit.
when i worked as technical support for activision value i had to deal with a lot of disatisfied customers, its not fun being yelled at for a game you didn't have anything to do with, point being bitching at people isnt the answer, do a little research.
They should have exercised their right to vote with their collective wallets. Not my problem. I looked the game up, it's reviews were SPECTACULARLY terrible. I don't think people should be protected from their own shitty purchases.
"Troy sucked! Make a better version of Troy and let us all see it for free!"
Edit: Here's a good article on why the market's in the state it's in today: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/8/3
Video games are a luxury item. They are not required to survive.
It's not about making smarter purchases, yes that is the obvious answer but that does nothing to raise the quality of the games, there will always be people who buy games as presents. think of the junior gamers who get saddled with the crap. The fact is a developer and a publisher know when a game is terribly made and we can dissuade them for letting that get to the market.
Pata: would you not benefit from a Games industry that only releases quality games? Who loses? What game is there coming out in July that you can't wait till August for?
Companies can now seek revenue where no avenue existed before.
Hellgate London's taking another approach but it's a gamble whether or not they'll be able to stay afloat being a new company with a single IP.
Us as individuals will have little to no impact on making companies realize how to effectively make money in the current marketplace.
What if the screen went black throughout 15% of the movie and the dialog sometimes switched to spanish?
Oh wait... It'd still be better than Alexander.
Meiz: Us in a group however.... could DICTATE to the companies. Not that I think thats necessary, they know what to do they just sometimes let themselves not do it.
Sure, I'd also benefit from the ability to levitate. I'm pretty sure if we both start working on our goals now we'll achieve them at roughly the same time.
Unforunately SOMEONE has to play the shitty games before they can report to the rest of the world that they're shitty.
Thankfully most of the time it's not me, though.
www.ign.com
www.gamespy.com
www.gamespot.com
www.gamerevolution.com
Sure, that would be nice. But it's never going to happen. There is always going to be crap because of people who don't research before they buy. And sometimes people don't care if they're getting what use gamers would call crap Heck, I know for a fact that there are two crappy shovelware games in my house right now. Why? Because my little brother wanted some Spongebob games, and he likes them, even though I would never touch them.
Unless you can somehow convince every single person on the planet to do detailed research into the games they want to buy (not going to happen, cause most people are too lazy for that) then it's never going to change. The best you can do is personally avoid crap so that the people who make good stuff get supported.
Say if we were to try our very best at this plan of yours, even quit our jobs, the change will probably have already happened by the time the ripple from the pebble we tossed into that lake arrives at its mark. It's already in motion, it's just going to take a little patience.
CT: Are you saying it's impossible? because it's either impossible or you have a better suggestion. And it sure doesn't seem impossible to me. I've got friends, time, and passion what are you offering?
Nothing, which is exactly the same as what you are offering.
How about you don't buy shit. Tell your friends not to buy shit. If you get it and you know it is shit, leave it the hell alone.
It's a capitalist society if you buy something that's shit you are telling the company that sells that product that it is good enough for you.
If you buy something and don't like it maybe you need to do a little research before you happily blow sixty dollars.
Satans..... hints.....
Sucks to be them
Seriously though, I usually rely on the opinions of certain friends who understand my tastes and have similar tastes to my own.
I mean, God Hand was pretty awesome after all, despite what the corporate reviews would have you believe.
There are these massive invisible stone walls everywhere, see. You can't just up and have a retailer change the opinion of the publisher who then changes the opinion of the developer by standing around in protest. Especially not to something as evanescent as content.
Honestly, your whole post seems to be a reaction to a single bad purchase: ST:L. Man, that sucks -- but play some cheap, good, XBLA games, drink a G&T or three, and get over it.
Steam BoardGameGeek Twitter
Tomatoes work rather well.
People tend not to stand around anymore when they're covered in tomato paste.
Seriously, this is no different than any other industry. Do your homework if you want a better product. Yes, i can appreciate that some games are near-unplayable. Guess what? Reviews will all slam them for that. And it isnt THAT common for a game to be in so poor a state : generally the game simply isnt very good, and its up to you to do some homework, or risk being an early adopter. This is no different than going out and buying pretty much anything and being less than completely satisfied with it.
I kind of agree with the general point you're trying to make, but at some point you have to take responsibility for your own decisions.
It's called the free market for a reason. You can't demand something be made better when you've already deemed it worthy of a purchase. You can never buy a game based solely on the hope that online support will be there. In fact it always states explicitly on the box that online play is supported by the publisher for as long as they deem, that it is arbitrary, and that it is not guaranteed.
Considering the vast amounts of info available for you to make an informed purchase (be it videogames, cars, TVs etc), you have no one to blame but yourself if you buy a dud.
Steam BoardGameGeek Twitter