The thing is that it is totally possible to run an extremely successful, multinational business that pulls in millions and millions of dollars in pure profit without dealing with China
But the thing about capitalist thought, and particularly investor thought, is if you aren’t making more money than you were two seconds ago, you’re failing. Sustained profit is failure, only growth and expansion is success. Nothing is ever enough
So we gotta give in to every bit of pressure China puts on us so we can make more millions than the millions we were making regardless
And that’s why every time this happens, it’s indefensible on multiple levels
You're not wrong but it's extremely difficult for any multinational business to decide to ignore over 1 billion potential customers.
The thing is that it is totally possible to run an extremely successful, multinational business that pulls in millions and millions of dollars in pure profit without dealing with China
But the thing about capitalist thought, and particularly investor thought, is if you aren’t making more money than you were two seconds ago, you’re failing. Sustained profit is failure, only growth and expansion is success. Nothing is ever enough
So we gotta give in to every bit of pressure China puts on us so we can make more millions than the millions we were making regardless
And that’s why every time this happens, it’s indefensible on multiple levels
It's not just making profits today, it's losing ground to competitors, too. If you count mobile gaming, China brings in more gamer money than North America. A renegade storefront banned in China could eventually go bankrupt competing against a compliant, CCP-friendly storefront who can offer bigger discounts and more free games to customers worldwide.
Brings in more gamer money for whom, though? Because from what I've read, China largely consumes Chinese media. So those "billion of potential customers" should come with an addendum of "if you're a Chinese company, otherwise you get scraps".
Brings in more gamer money for whom, though? Because from what I've read, China largely consumes Chinese media. So those "billion of potential customers" should come with an addendum of "if you're a Chinese company, otherwise you get scraps".
Sure, but investors stop listening at "billions of potential customers" and won't hear the addendums over the sound of imaginary cash registers in their heads.
Brings in more gamer money for whom, though? Because from what I've read, China largely consumes Chinese media. So those "billion of potential customers" should come with an addendum of "if you're a Chinese company, otherwise you get scraps".
I haven't heard that to be true. They have a strong base of locally made mobile games, primarily RPGs (especially MMORPGs) and gacha games, but tend to lag behind in other genres. I can't find a super current list, but this ranking of top streaming games in China, from April, shows Blizzard and Korean developers doing quite well.
A lot of them aren't Chinese media, though, and there are non-Chinese companies making money off of them. Are you arguing that Blizzard is getting "scraps" since NetEase is their Chinese publisher?
Compared to Tencent alone? Yes, absolutely. Tencent represents 50% of that list, and 4 out of the top 5 games by themselves. I'm sure Blizzard-Activision are making good money, but if you're controlling the biggest MMO on the market and that's the best you can achieve that doesn't bode well for any newcomers.
Compared to Tencent alone? Yes, absolutely. Tencent represents 50% of that list, and 4 out of the top 5 games by themselves. I'm sure Blizzard-Activision are making good money, but if you're controlling the biggest MMO on the market and that's the best you can achieve that doesn't bode well for any newcomers.
That's streaming (since I couldn't find a recent sales list), and to be honest I don't know why anyone would watch an MMO on a stream. As someone with only passing familiarity with the genre, a WoW stream sounds extremely unexciting, especially since this was March and the expansion wasn't until November. However badly WoW is doing on that list, it's completely annihilating the other two MMORPGs (Korean and Chinese-developed) on that list, combined.
As far as the top 5 list goes:
#1: Chinese-made, straight up. Wikipedia says Tencent asked Riot to make a mobile MOBA; Riot declined so Tencent made this themselves
#2: PUBG. Korean, I guess?
#3: LoL. I think Riot is a poster boy for a US company accommodating the Chinese market and making out like gangbusters. It had more streaming hours than #1, and made more in stream tips (so did PUBG, for that matter)
#4: Peacekeeper Elite is apparently a reskinning of PUBG Mobile to accommodate China
#5: Dungeon Fighter Online is Korean-developed, and published by Tencent
In 2017, the developer of Defender's Quest wrote a Gamasutra blog post describing his experience. He'd noted literature evidence of the growing Chinese market, and decided to float a partial translation as a trial balloon.
Spoiler alert: results were good.
I have never had a localization pay for itself this quickly, not to mention this unambiguously.
...
So, should you localize your game into Chinese? Probably.
Some quick caveats. If your game isn't selling a whole lot already, I can't guarantee that localizing into Chinese is going to double your sales or anything, and the cost of a localization might even exceed what you could expect to earn from it. Furthermore, genre effects likely apply -- some games probably resonate with the Chinese audience more than others, and our story-heavy Tower-Defense RPG is apparently one of them.
This was before the 2018 approval freeze, so that's something to take into consideration. But it's still a data point. Are there counter experiences, from developers who tried to get into China and found it to be a waste of time and money?
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AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
Friggin West Taiwan, man I swear.
A Capellan's favorite sheath for any blade is your back.
I am curious what convinced GOG decide to try and sell Devotion in the first place. The game was removed from Steam in 2019 for this very same reaction. I'm not sure why they thought their own attempt would be different if this was going to be their reaction to it happening again.
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
Maybe they wanted to signal to China they're willing to play ball to get CP2077 released there quicker? No intention of actually publishing it, etc.
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Olivawgood name, isn't it?the foot of mt fujiRegistered Userregular
I think it's more likely some higher ups in the organization said "yeah, let's do it, good publicity, good sales, everybody wins" and then when they started to get swamped and the executive level above them got wind of it, they got told to shut it the fuck down
Maybe they wanted to signal to China they're willing to play ball to get CP2077 released there quicker? No intention of actually publishing it, etc.
The Chinese are already buying CP2077, in droves. The articles about CP2077 in China are a little coy about this, but the way people in China buy unlicensed PC games is that they go on Steam and buy them. Not through an account based in another country, not through a VPN, just go to Steam (or GOG) -> buy game. So far the Chinese authorities haven't seen fit to ban or block Steam or other foreign storefronts. Fortnite's problem is Tencent's 40% share in Epic; they have to go through the channels. Official approval means that theoretically they don't eat an arbitrary ban, but for now this gray market has probably made CD Projekt a lot of money.
Two big platforms for the game in China are Steam and GOG, the latter of which is owned by CD Projekt Red themselves. China was at one point the #1 market for pre-orders on PC and the title was the top selling game on Steam in China during Week 1. According to Niko Partners’ China Games Streaming Tracker, the game was streamed by more than 7,500 streamers on Day 1 across Bilibili, Huya and DouYu, and viewed by more than 19 million fans.
...
CD Projekt Red has built up its presence in China through social media and video platforms, such as Bilibili where it has over 1 million subscribers. To put this into perspective, CD Projekt Red’s Youtube account has approximately 240,000 subscribers while its Twitch channel has 385,000 followers.
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
Maybe they wanted to signal to China they're willing to play ball to get CP2077 released there quicker? No intention of actually publishing it, etc.
The Chinese are already buying CP2077, in droves. The articles about CP2077 in China are a little coy about this, but the way people in China buy unlicensed PC games is that they go on Steam and buy them. Not through an account based in another country, not through a VPN, just go to Steam (or GOG) -> buy game. So far the Chinese authorities haven't seen fit to ban or block Steam or other foreign storefronts. Fortnite's problem is Tencent's 40% share in Epic; they have to go through the channels. Official approval means that theoretically they don't eat an arbitrary ban, but for now this gray market has probably made CD Projekt a lot of money.
Two big platforms for the game in China are Steam and GOG, the latter of which is owned by CD Projekt Red themselves. China was at one point the #1 market for pre-orders on PC and the title was the top selling game on Steam in China during Week 1. According to Niko Partners’ China Games Streaming Tracker, the game was streamed by more than 7,500 streamers on Day 1 across Bilibili, Huya and DouYu, and viewed by more than 19 million fans.
...
CD Projekt Red has built up its presence in China through social media and video platforms, such as Bilibili where it has over 1 million subscribers. To put this into perspective, CD Projekt Red’s Youtube account has approximately 240,000 subscribers while its Twitch channel has 385,000 followers.
Right, but releasing that game would absolutely bring a conversation CDPR does not want. Theoretically, they could block the game completely.
Maybe they wanted to signal to China they're willing to play ball to get CP2077 released there quicker? No intention of actually publishing it, etc.
The Chinese are already buying CP2077, in droves. The articles about CP2077 in China are a little coy about this, but the way people in China buy unlicensed PC games is that they go on Steam and buy them. Not through an account based in another country, not through a VPN, just go to Steam (or GOG) -> buy game. So far the Chinese authorities haven't seen fit to ban or block Steam or other foreign storefronts. Fortnite's problem is Tencent's 40% share in Epic; they have to go through the channels. Official approval means that theoretically they don't eat an arbitrary ban, but for now this gray market has probably made CD Projekt a lot of money.
Two big platforms for the game in China are Steam and GOG, the latter of which is owned by CD Projekt Red themselves. China was at one point the #1 market for pre-orders on PC and the title was the top selling game on Steam in China during Week 1. According to Niko Partners’ China Games Streaming Tracker, the game was streamed by more than 7,500 streamers on Day 1 across Bilibili, Huya and DouYu, and viewed by more than 19 million fans.
...
CD Projekt Red has built up its presence in China through social media and video platforms, such as Bilibili where it has over 1 million subscribers. To put this into perspective, CD Projekt Red’s Youtube account has approximately 240,000 subscribers while its Twitch channel has 385,000 followers.
Right, but releasing that game would absolutely bring a conversation CDPR does not want. Theoretically, they could block the game completely.
I agree. I absolutely believe GOG dumped Devotion because of lost sales if the CCP put the kibosh on CP2077. I just don't believe they're thinking in terms of some nebulous approval that might or might not happen; they're looking at all the Chinese pre-orders they've already cashed, and all the money coming in now. It's not imaginary money.
People think you can't sell in China if you don't have approval, and that's true for Chinese companies and Epic, and for mobile apps, and I think for console games, but not for Steam or GOG, which don't have an official Chinese presence yet.
Hey with how 2020's gone already I wouldn't question if some big authority figure came out and said "Okay, this is trecember. We got 4 more months to go"
Just played through the main campaign of Outlaws, the LucasArts title. Interesting game. The GOG release works well enough to play (there's a small amount of mouse lag, the game is constantly changing resolution going through the menus/saving even when setting the nGlide resolution, stuck with ancient bind methods so can't use some buttons). I only had to look up 2 small things to progress (one part in the Saw Mill level to progress and one part in the last level), but otherwise I was able to figure out everything, even though it has the same problems for activatable objects that Jedi Knight has where some look like they are a wall texture but can actually be interacted with. The main campaign didn't take long to beat and now I'm starting the add-on missions.
Originally, I had started the game on the hardest difficulty, but it was way too hard out of the gate. Even the middle difficulty could be tough as sometimes enemies drain nearly all your health in a couple shots. For weaponry, I settled on the single barrel shotgun nearly the entire time once I got it. It does a ton of damage and can be shot again before the reload animation is finished. The game also gives you a chaingun on the very last level in practically the last part of the last level (unless you can get it earlier via secret) and you can't move while holding it. Seemed like they should've given it to you a little earlier...And yes, the music is pretty good although it felt weird that one of the tracks had semi-singing in it.
Outlaws is fucking ruthless difficulty-wise. For me even the GoG release is nigh unplayable stability-wise, unfortunately. Keep hoping someone will make a new engine for it.
Outlaws is fucking ruthless difficulty-wise. For me even the GoG release is nigh unplayable stability-wise, unfortunately. Keep hoping someone will make a new engine for it.
I accidentally clicked an old archived bookmark yesterday and it led me down a hole until I got here: https://theforceengine.github.io/
Well, a couple months or however long ago, GOG started allowing external selling of keys to GOG games. They had a survey you could fill out, where I asked if this meant we could get gog keys for humble monthly games. And now today, all my dreams have come true, humble monthly choice has a game you can (only) register on GOG, Encodya. I'm going to accept all the credit for this development.
I hadn't heard of this game until today but it actually looks right up my alley, a point and click specifically inspired by monkey island type games.
On a complete aside: As an actual Taiwanese person, I find the thread title hilarious. Though admittedly, I find a lot of American hot takes on China deeply hilarious, especially indignant Righteous-Gamer hot takes. :tell_me_more:
More relevantly, as there isn't necessarily a better thread on this thread for these purposes, you can still buy X-Wing Alliance on GOG, which is (albeit with some work) fully compatible with this:
On a complete aside: As an actual Taiwanese person, I find the thread title hilarious. Though admittedly, I find a lot of American hot takes on China deeply hilarious, especially indignant Righteous-Gamer hot takes. :tell_me_more:
More relevantly, as there isn't necessarily a better thread on this thread for these purposes, you can still buy X-Wing Alliance on GOG, which is (albeit with some work) fully compatible with this:
On a complete aside: As an actual Taiwanese person, I find the thread title hilarious. Though admittedly, I find a lot of American hot takes on China deeply hilarious, especially indignant Righteous-Gamer hot takes. :tell_me_more:
More relevantly, as there isn't necessarily a better thread on this thread for these purposes, you can still buy X-Wing Alliance on GOG, which is (albeit with some work) fully compatible with this:
Given the state of modern politics, I'm not really comfortable with their attempt at historical revision to pretend that TIE Fighter was a morally ambiguous game. The Empire are always bad, and in the game it is clear you are fighting for the bad guys. That mod looks really cool, but I have to wonder what 'reimagined campaign' means if they're trying to promote the idea that the genocidal, pro-slavery, speciesist, & rigidly authoritarian Empire is a morally grey faction.
Keep in mind, TIE Fighter is one of my all-time favorite games.
On a complete aside: As an actual Taiwanese person, I find the thread title hilarious. Though admittedly, I find a lot of American hot takes on China deeply hilarious, especially indignant Righteous-Gamer hot takes. :tell_me_more:
More relevantly, as there isn't necessarily a better thread on this thread for these purposes, you can still buy X-Wing Alliance on GOG, which is (albeit with some work) fully compatible with this:
Given the state of modern politics, I'm not really comfortable with their attempt at historical revision to pretend that TIE Fighter was a morally ambiguous game. The Empire are always bad, and in the game it is clear you are fighting for the bad guys. That mod looks really cool, but I have to wonder what 'reimagined campaign' means if they're trying to promote the idea that the genocidal, pro-slavery, speciesist, & rigidly authoritarian Empire is a morally grey faction.
Keep in mind, TIE Fighter is one of my all-time favorite games.
If this is your concern, it's possible you might be taking the word "re-imaging" too literally: none of the "plot", as much as there is a "plot", is rewritten or redesigned, because the re-imagined singleplayer retains the original mid-90s Totally Games voice-over mission dialog (as far as I can tell; there was no attempt to rewrite/revoice the element that is 95% of the story of TIE Fighter (or for that matter, X-Wing) supplied in the later releases of the game (I don't think the original game allowed for full voice-over sequences; I could be mistaken here, it's been more than 20 years).
As far as I can tell "Re-imagined" refers to escalating the engagement sizes and distances (on top of all the model swaps; this wasn't called re-imagined because it's been an option in X-Wing Alliance upgrade mods for more than ten years now), to include more ships. That means objectives may in some cases be technically different, but I don't really think dramatically different (in the literal sense). It also means one expansion episodes is missing because it wasn't done (as far as I know), and that the tutorials have been changed to reflect, for example, faster rates of fire from some ships posing certain dangers. If you missed that expansion episode, you would instead select the original missions--which are described as unchanged (aside from being placed in XWA, and model replacements; in the end of the day, you're not playing any of the three major releases of TIE Fighter). That's a technical aspect I'd say.
I don't think this is, well, "creeping fictional fascism." It is, of course, what TIE Fighter was 25 years ago, which is "creeping fictional apologism for NATO in the Yugoslav Wars", though that's actually quite mainstream in a lot of circles. Poorly-aged political humor aside, I think this might be a case of people applying their own apprehensions onto something that actually isn't that different (or more or less reflects a technical, rather than literary, endeavor). If there is, for example, an optional objective added to a mission to inspect a neutral ship for banditry or organized crime, or to rescue your side's P.O.W.'s--these were in the original game. Is increasing their occurrence a decidedly political act? That's potentially interesting debate to be had. The claim of "reimagined individual missions", given the aforementioned constraints, seems to reflect harmless self-promotion by the creators involved in an unpaid pet project, and something of an exaggeration. I don't think there's very much new here, it's a case of trying to make everything grander in scope (then again, there are purists who don't like that change, which is probably why keeping the original campaigns is actually the default option).
Now, if you didn't like the original TIE Fighter, you wouldn't like this for much the same reason. And I say this as someone who completely believes TIE Fighter is the best Star Wars game.
On a complete aside: As an actual Taiwanese person, I find the thread title hilarious. Though admittedly, I find a lot of American hot takes on China deeply hilarious, especially indignant Righteous-Gamer hot takes. :tell_me_more:
More relevantly, as there isn't necessarily a better thread on this thread for these purposes, you can still buy X-Wing Alliance on GOG, which is (albeit with some work) fully compatible with this:
Out of some overdue modesty, I'm going to limit myself to one high-grade real-fact truth bomb per post and offer to elaborate further later, but suffice to say, when I saw "West Taiwan" towards the top of this thread, like any of my ESOL-fluent countrymen, I knew this is gonna be good.
Posts
You're not wrong but it's extremely difficult for any multinational business to decide to ignore over 1 billion potential customers.
you need to get ALL the money
It's not just making profits today, it's losing ground to competitors, too. If you count mobile gaming, China brings in more gamer money than North America. A renegade storefront banned in China could eventually go bankrupt competing against a compliant, CCP-friendly storefront who can offer bigger discounts and more free games to customers worldwide.
Sure, but investors stop listening at "billions of potential customers" and won't hear the addendums over the sound of imaginary cash registers in their heads.
I haven't heard that to be true. They have a strong base of locally made mobile games, primarily RPGs (especially MMORPGs) and gacha games, but tend to lag behind in other genres. I can't find a super current list, but this ranking of top streaming games in China, from April, shows Blizzard and Korean developers doing quite well.
A lot of them aren't Chinese media, though, and there are non-Chinese companies making money off of them. Are you arguing that Blizzard is getting "scraps" since NetEase is their Chinese publisher?
That's streaming (since I couldn't find a recent sales list), and to be honest I don't know why anyone would watch an MMO on a stream. As someone with only passing familiarity with the genre, a WoW stream sounds extremely unexciting, especially since this was March and the expansion wasn't until November. However badly WoW is doing on that list, it's completely annihilating the other two MMORPGs (Korean and Chinese-developed) on that list, combined.
As far as the top 5 list goes:
#1: Chinese-made, straight up. Wikipedia says Tencent asked Riot to make a mobile MOBA; Riot declined so Tencent made this themselves
#2: PUBG. Korean, I guess?
#3: LoL. I think Riot is a poster boy for a US company accommodating the Chinese market and making out like gangbusters. It had more streaming hours than #1, and made more in stream tips (so did PUBG, for that matter)
#4: Peacekeeper Elite is apparently a reskinning of PUBG Mobile to accommodate China
#5: Dungeon Fighter Online is Korean-developed, and published by Tencent
In 2017, the developer of Defender's Quest wrote a Gamasutra blog post describing his experience. He'd noted literature evidence of the growing Chinese market, and decided to float a partial translation as a trial balloon.
This was before the 2018 approval freeze, so that's something to take into consideration. But it's still a data point. Are there counter experiences, from developers who tried to get into China and found it to be a waste of time and money?
PSN ID : DetectiveOlivaw | TWITTER | STEAM ID | NEVER FORGET
The Chinese are already buying CP2077, in droves. The articles about CP2077 in China are a little coy about this, but the way people in China buy unlicensed PC games is that they go on Steam and buy them. Not through an account based in another country, not through a VPN, just go to Steam (or GOG) -> buy game. So far the Chinese authorities haven't seen fit to ban or block Steam or other foreign storefronts. Fortnite's problem is Tencent's 40% share in Epic; they have to go through the channels. Official approval means that theoretically they don't eat an arbitrary ban, but for now this gray market has probably made CD Projekt a lot of money.
https://nikopartners.com/cyberpunk-2077-off-to-a-strong-start-in-china/
Right, but releasing that game would absolutely bring a conversation CDPR does not want. Theoretically, they could block the game completely.
I agree. I absolutely believe GOG dumped Devotion because of lost sales if the CCP put the kibosh on CP2077. I just don't believe they're thinking in terms of some nebulous approval that might or might not happen; they're looking at all the Chinese pre-orders they've already cashed, and all the money coming in now. It's not imaginary money.
People think you can't sell in China if you don't have approval, and that's true for Chinese companies and Epic, and for mobile apps, and I think for console games, but not for Steam or GOG, which don't have an official Chinese presence yet.
That's what you think
And the clocks were striking thirteen.
Steam | XBL
April Fools!
https://shop.redcandlegames.com/games/devotion
Red Candle is now selling it directly from their site, GOG and DRM free.
XIII is currently free on the website.
Originally, I had started the game on the hardest difficulty, but it was way too hard out of the gate. Even the middle difficulty could be tough as sometimes enemies drain nearly all your health in a couple shots. For weaponry, I settled on the single barrel shotgun nearly the entire time once I got it. It does a ton of damage and can be shot again before the reload animation is finished. The game also gives you a chaingun on the very last level in practically the last part of the last level (unless you can get it earlier via secret) and you can't move while holding it. Seemed like they should've given it to you a little earlier...And yes, the music is pretty good although it felt weird that one of the tracks had semi-singing in it.
I accidentally clicked an old archived bookmark yesterday and it led me down a hole until I got here:
https://theforceengine.github.io/
Seems real early though.
I hadn't heard of this game until today but it actually looks right up my alley, a point and click specifically inspired by monkey island type games.
More relevantly, as there isn't necessarily a better thread on this thread for these purposes, you can still buy X-Wing Alliance on GOG, which is (albeit with some work) fully compatible with this:
I can't remember if I found said thread. Need to go look now.
Steam: betsuni7
i need you to elaborate on the first part
Given the state of modern politics, I'm not really comfortable with their attempt at historical revision to pretend that TIE Fighter was a morally ambiguous game. The Empire are always bad, and in the game it is clear you are fighting for the bad guys. That mod looks really cool, but I have to wonder what 'reimagined campaign' means if they're trying to promote the idea that the genocidal, pro-slavery, speciesist, & rigidly authoritarian Empire is a morally grey faction.
Keep in mind, TIE Fighter is one of my all-time favorite games.
If this is your concern, it's possible you might be taking the word "re-imaging" too literally: none of the "plot", as much as there is a "plot", is rewritten or redesigned, because the re-imagined singleplayer retains the original mid-90s Totally Games voice-over mission dialog (as far as I can tell; there was no attempt to rewrite/revoice the element that is 95% of the story of TIE Fighter (or for that matter, X-Wing) supplied in the later releases of the game (I don't think the original game allowed for full voice-over sequences; I could be mistaken here, it's been more than 20 years).
As far as I can tell "Re-imagined" refers to escalating the engagement sizes and distances (on top of all the model swaps; this wasn't called re-imagined because it's been an option in X-Wing Alliance upgrade mods for more than ten years now), to include more ships. That means objectives may in some cases be technically different, but I don't really think dramatically different (in the literal sense). It also means one expansion episodes is missing because it wasn't done (as far as I know), and that the tutorials have been changed to reflect, for example, faster rates of fire from some ships posing certain dangers. If you missed that expansion episode, you would instead select the original missions--which are described as unchanged (aside from being placed in XWA, and model replacements; in the end of the day, you're not playing any of the three major releases of TIE Fighter). That's a technical aspect I'd say.
I don't think this is, well, "creeping fictional fascism." It is, of course, what TIE Fighter was 25 years ago, which is "creeping fictional apologism for NATO in the Yugoslav Wars", though that's actually quite mainstream in a lot of circles.
Now, if you didn't like the original TIE Fighter, you wouldn't like this for much the same reason. And I say this as someone who completely believes TIE Fighter is the best Star Wars game.
EDIT:
Out of some overdue modesty, I'm going to limit myself to one high-grade real-fact truth bomb per post and offer to elaborate further later, but suffice to say, when I saw "West Taiwan" towards the top of this thread, like any of my ESOL-fluent countrymen, I knew this is gonna be good.
Ultima Underworld 1&2, Syndicate Plus and Syndicate Wars all free on GoG until September.
Lot of fond memories of Ultima Underworld.
Steam | XBL