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[Men_in_Boxes]

The following video (timestamped, ~30 seconds) shows David Jaffe working through PlayStations purchase of Haven Studios and it's new approach to multiplayer.




This is interesting because Jaffe understands gaming on a deeper level than most. He's a smart dude, he's worked in the industry for 20+ years, and he has a penchant for looking at topics from multiple points of view. And like the rest of the industry, he's completely flummoxed by multiplayer.

"It's like lightning in a bottle."

He goes on to list "great games" like Knockout City, Age of Ashes, Fall Guys, and Halo.

How are people still saying this in 2022?! We have access to engagement charts that, if you look at them for longer than 30 seconds, you start identifying specific characteristics the top games share.

For example, successful multiplayer games facilitate interesting + rewarding social experiences.

What happens when players say "Hey Mike, come over here and let's try this plan."

Knockout City: Everyone has a plan till they get hit in the face. (Mike Tyson quote)

Age of Ashes: Mike has no idea where you are because this is a Michael Bay action movie set to 11.

Halo Infinite: Mike got sniped 8 seconds ago. He's spawning somewhere random on the map.

Fall Guys: Mike got bounced last round. I think he's taking a dump.

Now picture someone saying "Hey Mike, come over here and try this plan" in Minecraft, League of Legends, Fortnite, Counter Strike etc... Multiplayer gamers want to play with + against other people. Why on earth would games that don't explore playing with teammates ever be considered great?

Jaffe isn't alone in this. The media hypes up specific multiplayer games all the time that end up bombing. Message boards are filled with people who type "Multiplayer is a crapshoot."

Why aren't "our people" learning what makes a great multiplayer game? Mistakes are great. They allow us to course correct so that we can get closer to the target next time. Why isn't this narrative changing?

 

[adamsapple]

David Jaffe has been wrong about a lot of things lately.

 

[CamHostage]

Jaffe isn't alone in this. The media hypes up specific multiplayer games all the time that end up bombing. Message boards are filled with people who type "Multiplayer is a crapshoot."

I don't see what the problem is (or at least, how to avoid the situation) with the media "hyping up" a multiplayer game that's of high quality?

A good multiplayer game can still bomb. Great design, strong balance, creative staging , varied tactics, ease of understanding and clarity of goals, all of those things add up to a good game, and that's what a reviewer or previewer is looking for in a release... But if players don't take to it, you can't force-feed them good medicine. Good games fail to find an audience all the time, while lesser games (usually attached to a franchise) sometimes dominate the market.

At the time the media generally attaches to a game, it's all principles and potential, and it just depends on how it finds an audience and how well the developer supports the product that determines if it ever lives up to its promise.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

I don't see what the problem is with the media "hyping up" a multiplayer game that's of high quality. A good multiplayer game can still bomb. Great design, strong balance, creative staging , varied tactics, ease of understanding and clarity of goals, all of those things add up to a good game, but if players don't take to it, you can't force-feed them good medicine.

What's the point of commentary (media) if there's no understanding of what will land with the public?

Minecraft, Fortnite, Counter Strike, League of Legends, and World of Warcraft are arguably the greatest multiplayer games of all time. Why are we listening to people who believe great multiplayer games get boring after 10-15 hours of play?

Chess, is one of the best board games of all time because you can play it your entire life and not grow bored of it. Why listen people who hype up Connect 4's all the time?

Hell, think of it from David Jaffes point of view. He seems to believe PlayStation is in a tough position because it's impossible to know what games will be played for thousands of hours and what games get boring quickly.

That's simply not true.

 

[Bernkastel]

Dunno about whether davidjaffe should be wrong or right. But when Men_in_Boxes says he is wrong, maybe he is right in this context.

 

[CS Lurker]

I'll watch it because I'm more interested about the game pass thing.
edit: oh no, 1h40min without timestamps. Nevermind
edit²: alright, I've found it. Interesting discussing.

 

[Hezekiah]

He has a point about Knockout City and Age of Ashes.

Also Halo, Infinite, half a billion and a good if unfinished campaign, and three months later it's struggling, partly due to a lack of content.

It takes a special game that really captures the mainstream to take off in this space.

 

[zeorhymer]

Jaffe lists a bunch of great multiplayer games, but after the hype died down, so did the player count. Did he explain why he considered them great multiplayer games?

Hell, think of it from David Jaffes point of view. He seems to believe PlayStation is in a tough position because it's impossible to know what games will be played for thousands of hours and what games get boring quickly.

This is weird. Why would Playstation be in a "tough position" just because the same aren't played for thousands of hours? What's wrong with being able to play a game for 40 or even 20 hours and still be a financial success?

BTW...of course the media "hypes" up games. They're the mouthpieces of publishers without openly admitting it.

 

[Tg89]

The biggest challenge with multiplayer games is that you're competing for far more limited time of players.

If you release a great tactical shooter, it's probably not going to be better than Counter Strike. So why would I invest time into it? These are games that take hundreds of hours to get good at and learn the mechanics of. They're endlessly replayable, there's not reason to play anything but the best.

If you release a great single player game, it's probably not going to be better than Elden Ring. But eventually I'm done with Elden Ring (at least for the time being) and I can spend time playing your great game, cause in that context the great game is worth playing.

 

[CamHostage]

What's the point of commentary (media) if there's no understanding of what will land with the public?

Minecraft, Fortnite, Counter Strike, League of Legends, and World of Warcraft are arguably the greatest multiplayer games of all time. Why are we listening to people who believe great multiplayer games get boring after 10-15 hours of play?

That's not hype though, that's derision. And are there really professional media outlets out there trying to take down Fortnite or WoW? (I know some Youtubers and bloggers get pissy about their popularity, but that's their corner, to be angry for the sake attracting other angry people... I also see the same huffy attitude a lot in NeoGAF reactions to for example new Fortnite news, BTW, so who is "the media" in this case?)

Also, were there people out saying Counter Strike or LoL or WoW sucked when they launched? I feel like people saw the promise in all those quickly (though we had yet to understand how MOBA was a possible new subgenre and not just a twist on RTS.) And Minecraft and Fortnite were not the same games at launch that they are today. (Minecraft was okay for builder fans, but it took some time before Mojang figured out what aspects to focus on rather than the day/night raid system; Fortnite was kind of a non-starter until it introduced BR and found its footing, it's basically a totally different game now from its original PvE zombie defense game concept.)

Multiplayer is a funny thing, it flowers beautifully sometimes and other times it dies on the vine...

Psyonix made a car-soccer game in 2008 (with the silly name Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars) and it did respectable but limited numbers in its PS3 release. 7 years later, they made a sequel, changed the name, improved a few things (but also intentionally cut down on some things, such as map variety at launch), gave it away on PlayStation Plus for a bit, and the rest is history...

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Jaffe lists a bunch of great multiplayer games, but after the hype died down, so did the player count. Did he explain why he considered them great multiplayer games?


This is weird. Why would Playstation be in a "tough position" just because the same aren't played for thousands of hours? What's wrong with being able to play a game for 40 or even 20 hours and still be a financial success?

Jaffe is looking at it from Sonys perspective. Sony wants their multiplayer projects to be 10,000+ hour live service games because those games are far more lucrative than multiplayer games that get boring after 10 hours.

In the end, money is all Sony cares about. It's significantly easier to extract money from users who are still engaged with your game than those who quit and move on.

 

[Hari Seldon]

When you ask players to pay money in an on-going basis for a multiplayer game, then concerns beyond just "game quality" come into play. Like, is this game going to die in 3 months because no big Twitch streamers care about it? Is this yet another BR that is never going to be able to compete with the big boys?

But in regards to Knockout City in particular, that is a game with an ultra high skill ceiling to the point where a new player stands zero chance against an experienced player, leading to it just not being fun if you didn't play it in the first couple of weeks.

 

[sloppyjoe_gamer]

Still looking for that thread title keyword feature to auto-ignore posts so i could put anything with this manbaby's name right at the top of the list

 

[MiguelItUp]

Jaffe lists a bunch of great multiplayer games, but after the hype died down, so did the player count. Did he explain why he considered them great multiplayer games?

Exactly, a lot of them were innovative and exciting. They just unfortunately lost steam be it cause of content or otherwise. But that's what I'm the most curious about.

 

[Tiago Rodrigues]

Imagine listening to what Jaffe has to say in 2022

 

[near]

He's not wrong here at all in the context of what he's discussing, which is the Haven acquisition. Sony buying Bungie for their live service know-how with Destiny 2 and how successful that has been makes sense if you want to improve your portfolio in that area. Where the Haven acquisition differs substantially is the fact that they haven't even released anything that indicates they'll make a return on their investment, furthermore cool live service games that are fun which are also designed to retain players die all the time. So arguing that the acquisition was inspired by the project that they're developing is going to be successful isn't a good one, whereas arguing that this was talent acquisition is.

 

[mckmas8808]

Jaffe is looking at it from Sonys perspective. Sony wants their multiplayer projects to be 10,000+ hour live service games because those games are far more lucrative than multiplayer games that get boring after 10 hours.

In the end, money is all Sony cares about. It's significantly easier to extract money from users who are still engaged with your game than those who quit and move on.

No, Sony wants their fingers in both spots. With 1,000 hour live service games and 20 hour single player games.

 

[kyliethicc]

Read the OP.

Have no idea what the point is.

 

[mckmas8808]

He's not wrong here at all in the context of what he's discussing, which is the Haven acquisition. Sony buying Bungie for their live service know-how with Destiny 2 and how successful that has been makes sense if you want to improve your portfolio in that area. Where the Haven acquisition differs substantially is the fact that they haven't even released anything that indicates they'll make a return on their investment, furthermore cool live service games that are fun which are also designed to retain players die all the time. So arguing that the acquisition was inspired by the project that they're developing is going to be successful isn't a good one, whereas arguing that this was talent acquisition is.

How do you know how much Sony spent in buying them? What if Haven cost $40 million to buy? And they just wanted to be apart of a bigger corporation for security?

 

[near]

How do you know how much Sony spent in buying them? What if Haven cost $40 million to buy? And they just wanted to be apart of a bigger corporation for security?

Those questions have little to do with the point I made. The discussion isn't about whether this is a smart investment financially, it's about whether the acquisition was about banking on a live service project or if this was largely talent acquisition.

 

[mckmas8808]

Those questions have little to do with the point I made. The discussion isn't about whether this is a smart investment financially, it's about whether the acquisition was about banking on a live service project or if this was largely talent acquisition.

Oh, my bad. I think it was 80% about acquiring that talent. And 20% about acquiring lighting in a bottle with this up and coming project. So, I guess I agree with you.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

No, Sony wants their fingers in both spots. With 1,000 hour live service games and 20 hour single player games.

Right, but what they don't want is for their live service games to get boring after 20 hours.

The idea that Knockout City was not able to hold player interest for 1,000+ hours, and multiple years, should not come as a shock to anyone.

It's not really a crapshoot if you pay attention to what sticks and what doesn't.

 

[CuteFaceJay]

not sure what the issue is tbh.

 

[tmlDan]

it's incredibly difficult to get right because, not only do you have to make a game that has systems that are enjoyable ( et la Good gameplay, a decent story, convenience) you have to innovate on current systems used across all live service games.

1. Daily Quests
2. Constant rewards to keep players playing
3. MTX that don't make you stronger but add cosmetic value
4. Hard group conquests that give legitimately unique and strong rewards, whether that be great or weapons

A lot of these are standardized and something Destiny does, Genshin Impact does, COD WZ does to an extent.

You should still try to innovate in those categories.

One that I think of is making dailies more unique, apart from kill 6 people in crucible - make it a random NPC in your RPG that needs help in some way and it changes daily or weekly to some new side quest. Make the world feel lived in.

Even then, Jaffe has a point - it doesn't mean a large player base will stick to it even if you have all the bells and whistles and constant updates.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Jaffe lists a bunch of great multiplayer games, but after the hype died down, so did the player count.

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of multiplayer.

Go and Chess have had zero hype for a centuries. They're still some of the most played games on earth because they don't get boring to play after 10 hours.

Where is the hype for Counter Strike?

Knockout City, Age of Ashes, Halo Infinite, and Fall Guys lost player counts because they're fundamentally boring games after a relatively short length of time. Boring = Bad.

The collective "us" can't seem to recognize what makes a game fun to play after 10 - 20 hours.

 

[mckmas8808]

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of multiplayer.

Go and Chess have had zero hype for a centuries. They're still some of the most played games on earth because they don't get boring to play after 10 hours.

Where is the hype for Counter Strike?

Knockout City, Age of Ashes, Halo Infinite, and Fall Guys lost player counts because they're fundamentally boring games after a relatively short length of time. Boring = Bad.

The collective "us" can't seem to recognize what makes a game fun to play after 10 - 20 hours.

I think all those games in bold are perfect for the subscription world that MS has created in GamePass. But long-term multiplayer gaming.....clearly it doesn't work.

 

[Keihart]

What's the point of commentary (media) if there's no understanding of what will land with the public?

Minecraft, Fortnite, Counter Strike, League of Legends, and World of Warcraft are arguably the greatest multiplayer games of all time. Why are we listening to people who believe great multiplayer games get boring after 10-15 hours of play?

Chess, is one of the best board games of all time because you can play it your entire life and not grow bored of it. Why listen people who hype up Connect 4's all the time?

Hell, think of it from David Jaffes point of view. He seems to believe PlayStation is in a tough position because it's impossible to know what games will be played for thousands of hours and what games get boring quickly.

That's simply not true.

All of this examples (WoW could arguably be an exception) are accidents.
All of this games became huge without any real planning to be great, LoL? just a mod of a warcraft 3 mod that people already liked? CS ? almost the same story. Minecraft? a small java game that didn't even consider multiplayer when it was being developed, Fortnite? a completly diferent game to the current iteration that just piggy backed on the trends and got lucky, WoW? this could the only one you could argue was manufactured carefully, by learning from all the previous MMO's and bring experts from casinos and shit to make the loop as addicting as possible (you may argue, rewarding instead of addicting).

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

I actually agree with you on this. Just need to look at Ubisoft. They might miss sometimes but they understand the elements needed to create a multiplayer game with longevity.

 

[Keihart]

I actually agree with you on this. Just need to look at Ubisoft. They might miss sometimes but they understand the elements needed to create a multiplayer game with longevity.

R6S was an accident by the way, Ubisoft sent that game to die.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

All of this examples (WoW could arguably be an exception) are accidents.
All of this games became huge without any real planning to be great, LoL? just an upgrade of a warcraft 3 mod that people already liked? CS ? almost the same story. Minecraft? a small java game that didn't even consider multiplayer when it was being developed, Fortinete? a completly diferent game to the current iteration that just piggy backed on the trends and got lucky, WoW? this could the only one you could argue was manufactured carefully, by learning from all the previous MMO's and bring experts from casinos and shit to make the cycle as addicting as possible (you might argue, rewarding instead of addicting).

How many great inventions were created due to accidents? Humans study accidents, attempt to understand what made them work, and design future concepts based around those accidents.

H1Z1 was a moderately successful Battle Royale despite being the jankiest playing game on earth.

People studied what made it work, and it spawned like 7 insanely successful Battle Royale games in less than 5 years.

The idea that multiplayer is just an accident, and that we can't identify what makes certain ones great, is simply not true. We gain a deeper understanding with every new release. What flummoxes me is why the industry stays ignorant to new knowledge.

 

[davidjaffe]

Jaffe lists a bunch of great multiplayer games, but after the hype died down, so did the player count. Did he explain why he considered them great multiplayer games?


This is weird. Why would Playstation be in a "tough position" just because the same aren't played for thousands of hours? What's wrong with being able to play a game for 40 or even 20 hours and still be a financial success?

BTW...of course the media "hypes" up games. They're the mouthpieces of publishers without openly admitting it.

Some of the biggest MP games have the very problems you mention, including one you specifically cite: Counterstrike and COD (Mike Tyson's quote).

And League and DOTA are hard as fuck for newcomers to get into (for a few key reasons).

And COD is almost literally Michael Bay turned up to 11, so much so that this is what the CALL OF DUTY brand manager said about the comparisons about 8 years ago: 'I think Call of Duty delivers epic scale, so the single player does amazing stuff. It effectively puts you in the heart of a movie that Michael Bay directed, and it’s just… explosions everywhere. It’s that experience that really resonates with people. They love it.'

As for the games I list, they were games that I subjectively enjoyed for a time and that got some really good press/reviews/feedback from Players. Short of that, I dunno how you determine if a MP game is great. Can't be sales cause I'm sure 90% of the NEOGAF folks would say FORTNITE is NOT a great game.

So I stand by it: magic in a bottle. I'm not saying that to be defeatist, I'm just saying some of the biggest game co's in the world swing for the fences these days with GaaS MP and more often than not, they miss. And sometimes there's no logic- until AFTER the fact (and by then, the trend has moved on)- why something hits or misses.

 

[Keihart]

How many great inventions were created due to accidents? Humans study accidents, attempt to understand what made them work, and design future concepts based around those accidents.

H1Z1 was a moderately successful Battle Royale despite being the jankiest playing game on earth.

People studied what made it work, and it spawned like 7 insanely successful Battle Royale games in less than 5 years.

The idea that multiplayer is just an accident, and that we can't identify what makes certain ones great, is simply not true. We gain a deeper understanding with every new release. What flummoxes me is why the industry stays ignorant to new knowledge.

your example proofs it, no one , not even the biggest companies that figured out that battle royale mode is popular (hardly figuring out how to make a multiplayer hit) haven't become consistent about creating MP games.
It's not that hard to see why if you take a step back, the target audience and time of this audience is not infinite, one game goes in, maybe one or two goes out.

The only way to grab a new audience without having to basically steal an audience is to create an actual "new" experience, which usually just happen by accident when devs are prepared to experiment.

The ones copying each other are just basically fighting over the same pile of cash, like battle royal games do now and at a time, MMOs, MOBAS and FPSs did.

 

[CamHostage]

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of multiplayer.

Go and Chess have had zero hype for a centuries. They're still some of the most played games on earth because they don't get boring to play after 10 hours.

Heh, I'm not sure what papyrus-based media you're saying missed the boat on the early days of Go or Chess, but...

There's history written about the perseverance of these games, and I'm sure there are some equivalents of what you'd consider "hype" in how these board games came into the courtyards of Kings and Emperors and migrated around the world. Both ebb and flow in popularity, often times with appearances in media (which is separate from "the media", but the media sometimes has influence too in tournament or trend coverage) boosting interest. They're old, old games, but they still find the spotlight every now and again. Chess itself had a boom recently thanks to The Queen's Gambit, and that show doesn't even teach you how to play chess, it just makes the game look alluring again.

 

[MudoSkills]

Well done, you have successfully summoned Jaffe.

 

[ManaByte]

Well done, you have successfully summoned Jaffe.

 

[Bernd Lauert]

Jaffe is right. There are plenty of good dead (or near dead) multiplayer games out there.

 

[ManaByte]

Jaffe is right. There are plenty of good dead (or near dead) multiplayer games out there.

 

[CamHostage]

The idea that multiplayer is just an accident, and that we can't identify what makes certain ones great, is simply not true. We gain a deeper understanding with every new release. What flummoxes me is why the industry stays ignorant to new knowledge.

??
I'm confused what your point is. Are you asking why developers don't just clone ideas that are working?

They do, all the time. Look at the mobile industry. It's packed to the rafters with clones of successful other games, and some of the clones have actually usurped their originals, while countless other corpses lay at the bottom, and very few of them have great claim to innovation or higher quality in determining which succeed and which fail.

Citing post-mort examples of titles that rose above the fray while pointing towards others that failed and saying "Ah ha, see right there!!", that's not really a fair assessment of the situation. It's not intuition, it's cherry-picking examples that prove a single point while ignoring all other factors as well as the wealth of other titles on the market at that time which don't cleanly fit the thesis. (And BTW, you blame the media for hyping some games and not hyping others, but I'm not sure where your evidence is of what's gotten hyped and what hasn't? Like, you went in on Splitgate vs Nakara Bladepoint, which aren't really similar games, but okay, one kept strong and one flailed, so that happened... doing a blind look, the one that got the better review from one media outlet was not the one that slumped, so where's the disconnect?)

Hindsight is fuckin' easy. Being right when the money is on the line and the wheel has yet to be spun, that's the real challenge.

...You're here on GAF regularly, Men_in_Boxes, so if you honestly think all is obvious and the industry is ignorant of what will or will not make a great multiplayer game, you can put your knowledge to the test right here. Pick the next great muliplayer game and start a prediction thread of it here on GAF. Don't make it easy and choose a franchise title or one that's already riding on hype; you should really take this challenge on and pick the game that everybody else is ignorant of. If you're right, you may be onto something; if you can do that again and again, you should make a business of it. So pick one and lock it in, and let's see what happens.

 

[AJUMP23]

I wonder what MP game davidjaffe made himself that is his favorite. Calling all cars had some fun ideas. There was the notepad one and Twisted metal reboot.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Some of the biggest MP games have the very problems you mention, including one you specifically cite: Counterstrike and COD (Mike Tyson's quote).

Counter Strike gives players a ton of downtime to facilitate socialization and coordination. The buying weapons+armor phase, spawning with your team, and running to only a small number of checkpoints (with one life) allows players to say "Mike, buy more grenades and let's see if we can take checkpoint C together next round."

The socialization experience in the 4 games you listed is (comparatively) terrible.

And League and DOTA are hard as fuck for newcomers to get into (for a few key reasons).

Right but why have League and DOTA made 20+ billion dollars each over the last 10 years and why has Knockout City made their developers nervous?

And COD is almost literally Michael Bay turned up to 11, so much so that this is what the CALL OF DUTY brand manager said about the comparisons about 8 years ago: 'I think Call of Duty delivers epic scale, so the single player does amazing stuff. It effectively puts you in the heart of a movie that Michael Bay directed, and it’s just… explosions everywhere. It’s that experience that really resonates with people. They love it.'

Traditional CoD multiplayer has lost a lot of relevance over the last few years, losing most of the spotlight to CoD Warzone (the BR).

Game designers can't view this as luck. They've got to be asking themselves "What does BR do that our old game doesn't, that resonates with so many more players?"

As for the games I list, they were games that I subjectively enjoyed for a time and that got some really good press/reviews/feedback from Players. Short of that, I dunno how you determine if a MP game is great. Can't be sales cause I'm sure 90% of the NEOGAF folks would say FORTNITE is NOT a great game.

Here's how to determine what's great...Does the gameplay experience resonate with players? It's not what critics say. It's not what GAF thinks. It's what games are people coming home to after work and saying "This will provide me with the most amount of fun."

Sony wants their 10 live service games to be "mini Fortnites", which I agree with. They don't want their 10 live service games to be the 4 games you listed, performance wise. So Sony, and all publishers/developers, have to be studying the "mini Fortnites" that already exist on Steam and asking "What makes these different?"

Why is Rust and Ark (mini Fortnites) still so popular after all these years whereas Age of Ashes can't fill lobbies 6 months after release? Ark and Rust pull significantly different gameplay levers than the 4 games you listed.

So I stand by it: magic in a bottle. I'm not saying that to be defeatist, I'm just saying some of the biggest game co's in the world swing for the fences these days with GaaS MP and more often than not, they miss. And sometimes there's no logic- until AFTER the fact (and by then, the trend has moved on)- why something hits or misses.

Successful games leave clues. The companies who correctly identify these clues have a distinct market advantage over the one's that don't.

I'm assuming that Sony went from 0 percent multiplayer investment during the PS4 era, to ~50 percent multiplayer investment during the PS5 era because Jim Ryan + Herman Hulst believe they've identified the right clues.

 

[zeorhymer]

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of multiplayer.

Go and Chess have had zero hype for a centuries. They're still some of the most played games on earth because they don't get boring to play after 10 hours.

Where is the hype for Counter Strike?

Knockout City, Age of Ashes, Halo Infinite, and Fall Guys lost player counts because they're fundamentally boring games after a relatively short length of time. Boring = Bad.

The collective "us" can't seem to recognize what makes a game fun to play after 10 - 20 hours.

Go, Chess and CS had zero hype for a long time and yet still is very popular. If that was the only metric, then Knockout City, Age of Ashes, etc, which had huge hype, would be global phenomenon. It's not. You can't compare the two.

What sets Go, Chess, and Counterstrike is that they have been made "defacto." That's why they're so played throughout the world. Go and Chess have thousands of years ahead of their competitors. People outside of their respective origins know what they are.

To make a multiplayer a "hit" where people sink tons of time into you need at least 2 things. 1) Be the leader of the genre and 2) make it easy to pick up.

Being the leader doesn't mean being the first one out of the gate. Take WoW for example. It's not the first MMO. Meridan came out in 96, Ultima Online 97 and then Everquest in 99. Everquest was the most played mmo until WoW came along in 04. Because of innovations and graphics, they were the leader of the pack. There were vast improvements on how "easier" it was to play WoW compared to EQ such as mods, mini maps, hotbars, etc which not only helped transition from EQ to WoW, but for new players to dip their toes into it. There's been countless hit pieces saying WoW is dead etc for over a decade.

Honestly, I don't think there's a "fundamental misunderstanding." We as a community, both normies and gamers, can tell what a "fun" multiplayer is after 20 hours and if the game is "worth" our time to invest in.

 

[TIGERCOOL]

Read the OP.

Have no idea what the point is.

glad someone said this cause I thought I was having a stroke reading OP

 

[BigBooper]

Battlefield 2042 was a disaster even though EA had decades worth of Battlefield examples to draw from. The studios changed over time, and you can't force people to stay, and people don't want to stay unless they are treated well.

Publishers are also trying to force the studios to chase hot new trends when the developers may not have experience in those types of games. For some reason they can't be satisfied with making good games.

Look at Counterstrike, which has been polished and had little tweaks, but is close to the same game every time. They have a very successful player base, because they gave their customers what they want.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

...You're here on GAF regularly, Men_in_Boxes, so if you honestly this all is obvious and the industry is ignorant of what will or will not make a great multiplayer game, you can put your knowledge to the test right here. Pick the next great muliplayer game and start a prediction thread of it here on GAF. Don't make it easy and choose a franchise title or one that's already riding on hype; you should really take this challenge on and pick the game that everybody else is ignorant of. If you're right, you may be onto something; if you can do that again and again, you should make a business of it. So pick one and lock it in, and let's see what happens.

I was off the Halo Infinite train when the media was raving about it. It was as if I was in an episode of the Twilight Zone hearing everyone praise it so highly. I vividly remember saying "All these arena shooters fail and then we have to hear arena shooter fans say it only failed because of (insert foolish reason here).

Cliff Bleszinski said Lawbreakers failed because his fans associate him with XBox. In reality, he made a game that was popular in 1998 for 2017 audiences.

I suspect the next multiplayer phenomenon will score well in the majority of these areas...

https://www.neogaf.com/threads/creating-the-rubric-how-to-identity-the-next-multiplayer-phenomenon.1632518/

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

glad someone said this cause I thought I was having a stroke reading OP

Media says single player game good. Public generally agrees.

Media says multiplayer game good. Public rarely agrees.

 

[Keihart]

I was off the Halo Infinite train when the media was raving about it. It was as if I was in an episode of the Twilight Zone hearing everyone praise it so highly. I vividly remember saying "All these arena shooters fail and then we have to hear arena shooter fans say it only failed because of (insert foolish reason here).

Cliff Bleszinski said Lawbreakers failed because his fans associate him with XBox. In reality, he made a game that was popular in 1998 for 2017 audiences.

I suspect the next multiplayer phenomenon will score well in the majority of these areas...

https://www.neogaf.com/threads/creating-the-rubric-how-to-identity-the-next-multiplayer-phenomenon.1632518/

I wonder if one of the big multiplayer games now was famous around 1998? hmmmm
You are all over the place with your arguments dude, saying that devs don't chase the trends and then citing old games that are still relevant?
Your are arguing something that most devs and big corpos wish was true, "that making games is formulaic and repeatable." wich to some extent they can be, but those games are not extactly the ones setting the world on fire and surviving decades, those are usually only the ones riding the waves.

I mean, if you have some secret knowledge to predict the industry that you know it'll work 100%, you are gonna make bank pretty easy.
The industry tries to predict what is going to be hot all the time, with data, analists, and everything you can imagine as a resource and yet, against all odds, the ones making it big are those little trains that could (which are then copied by the big corpos)

 

[Unk Adams]

Does he get anything right? I even remember him complaining about used games in an old issue of EGM. People ignored him making douchey comments back then because the games he was involved in (GOW) were so good at the time. Now that he puts out nothing noteworthy anymore it's hard to ignore stupid comments.

 

[ReBurn]

Does he get anything right? I even remember him complaining about used games in an old issue of EGM. People ignored him making douchey comments back then because the games he was involved in (GOW) were so good at the time. Now that he puts out nothing noteworthy anymore it's hard to ignore stupid comments.

This is a really dumb take, sorry. It isn't a matter of right or wrong. It's just perspective. You seem to want to just badmouth the guy for no reason.

The most hyped multiplayer games released lately have been burning hot and bright and then they just burn out, seeing player numbers drop with the drop media coverage they're getting. Only a handful have had real staying power over the years and those are getting to the point where it's hard for newcomers to get into them.

Like, OP is disagreeing with Jaffe and saying there's no luck to it. "The formula is there, you just have to mine it from the engagement metrics and do what the most popular games do and you'll be successful." is what I get from the OP. But it sure does look a lot more like luck than science with how rarely a new multiplayer game actually hits and sticks.

 

[Bragr]

Imagine listening to what Jaffe has to say in 2022

Dude, you can't utter that and have a Kratos avatar.

 

[Tiago Rodrigues]

Dude, you can't utter that and have a Kratos avatar.

From the game rebooted without him? Why not?