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[Three]

Publishers responded to COVID by funding unsuccessful games which are now - two to three years later - saturating the market. In response they are cutting back on investment and shutting down studios so that in the next two years they will have less output. The pattern is the same in both cases - failing to predict the market correctly.

It's not like no games were hugely successful this year. I follow mainly Nintendo games so the easiest examples I can site are TotK and Mario Wonder which sold 20 million and 10 million, respectively, during this year. Then you have games like Palworld which are also massively successful, and I'm sure there are plenty more.

The smart thing to do during 2020 and 2021 was to realize that gaming couldn't possibly continue to keep up those years' numbers, and invest some of the extra profit in other businesses or assets. Which is what publishers are supposedly doing now, only they're two to three years behind the curve.

In addition, if they're not capable of telling the difference between games that end up sitting on shelves and games that sell in the tens of millions, perhaps they should have invested some of their extra profits in better market research rather than in publishing so many games.

Sorry to be harsh, but I don't think it's just Embracer that is the problem, it seems like a wider issue with executives failing to understand their own market. There are people earning top salaries to make sound financial decisions and they do not appear to be pulling their own weight.

I think most publishers, bar embracer who was banking on Saudi VC money that fell through, saw the market trend relatively well. They reduced output and took less projects to the dismay of people asking for more games and complaining about their output. This doesn't help the studios and devs though who end up with less money and work while the VCs and publishers kept their money in the bank or invested in less pandemic bubble industries for better growth.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

I think most publishers, bar embracer who was banking on Saudi VC money that fell through, saw the market trend relatively well. They reduced output and took less projects to the dismay of people asking for more games and complaining about their output. This doesn't help the studios and devs though who end up with less money and work while the VCs and publishers kept their money in the bank or invested in less pandemic bubble industries for better growth.

They could have spent the same budget on smaller projects without reducing output and sold more products to the consumers who were asking for it. Square Enix did this, for example. Nintendo also had a record couple of years in terms of number of releases and I don't think any of them underperformed. Sorry for repeating the same examples, but these are the ones I'm most familiar with.

 

[Three]

They could have spent the same budget on smaller projects without reducing output and sold more products to the consumers who were asking for it. Square Enix did this, for example.

Perhaps but I don't think this would have helped in a saturated market to have even more releases but with lower budgets. Devolver Digital is struggling just as much as anybody else and their games are lower price and budget compared to the publishers who decided to back up into their big budget staple games only.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

Perhaps but I don't think this would have helped in a saturated market to have even more releases but with lower budgets. Devolver Digital is struggling just as much as anybody else and their games are lower price and budget compared to the publishers who decided to back up into their big budget staple games only.

There are people asking for more games but there are also games sitting on shelves. Is it because consumer demand is fake or is it because the products being sold aren't what consumers want?

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Perhaps but I don't think this would have helped in a saturated market to have even more releases but with lower budgets. Devolver Digital is struggling just as much as anybody else and their games are lower price and budget compared to the publishers who decided to back up into their big budget staple games only.

Too many games, too high budgets, and the gaming industry pie only grows so much. Some companies will carve out a big slice, but many wont. And for some, expanding too much hurts even if the pie does get bigger because it gets carved into too many slivers.

It's like when you read about too many Starbucks or Subway sandwich shops too close to each other. I'm sure the overall revenues for the coffee and fast food industries goes up. But the chunk each store or franchise store gets smaller if customer revenue expansion doesnt keep up at the same location growth.

Its crazy when you think about it in these terms. If one Tim Hortons shop is in a location and gets $1M revenue per year and another one opens up not far away, they collectively need to double generating sales in order for each place to get $1M each. Might be doable. But if the area is kind of saturated, it might end up the pie grows, but each place only gets $700,000.

No different than my company. A brand has 20 items in it. If we launch 5 more, what happens? Will they truly grow the brand +25% more? Or does the brand only grow 10% as it cannibalizes the existing 20?

 

[Three]

There are people asking for more games but there are also games sitting on shelves. Is it because consumer demand is fake or is it because the products being sold aren't what consumers want?

I'd say it's because while complaining about the lack of releases compared to previous years they're not actually spending as much on buying the games that actually release. Whether that's because of the economy just reducing spending in general or because the releases now are genuinely something they have no interest in, I don't know.

 

[Loomy]

Having your studios working for 6 years on a project is not ok mate... thats one of the problems right now...you can and should reorganize things so they can output games in 2 to 3 years ... that means shorter less bloated maybe less ultra production values ... but something has to be done .... they are all complaining about big costs and at the same time maintaining the same mentality

New things take time. Sure, you can reuse the same mechanics and methods, etc to churn out the same game every other year. But to come up with a concept, flesh out the art, prototype, test gameplay ideas, etc before you even get into full production. Sometimes, you get to that point and the idea doesn't pan out and you have to start over. Not ideal, but it happens. It takes time.

God of War 2018 took 5 years. Ghost of Tsushima took 6. What would you cut from those games to turn them around in 2-3 years?

Like I said, sequels, assuming it's not a huge departure from the previous game, can be made in ~3 years. But creating something entirely new takes time.

The problem is if every single studio you own is working like this or working like this at the same time. You do need those smaller 2-3 year turnaround from some studios to keep things going, and that's where expansions/season passes for your GaaS games come in.

 

[Hudo]

Yeah no shit that having games in development for 8+ years is fucked up. No one can tell me that "this is totally normal". No it's fucking not.

 

[Games of Today]

AAA exclusive market as it is .. is unsustainable... time to make a change for more shorter, less blown games, more focus on gameplay and less on super eye candy and movie like achievements... make more profitable AA games to support a few big AAA games.. and change the AAA formula so you dont take 6 years to do one game...

I need my PS3 style games back. 10 hour, polished campaigns with tacked on multiplayer using the maps and assets from the campaign.

 

[Faust]

Yeah no shit that having games in development for 8+ years is fucked up. No one can tell me that "this is totally normal". No it's fucking not.

It isn’t. It is bad management and bloated budgets.

Take a look at the general dev costs of the 6th gen vs 7th gen vs now. And the “quality” of the games today compared to 20 years ago.

AAA devs are making lowest common denominator titles by and large (though there are a few that try something new). It is to get mass market appeal and not to actually create something they are passionate about. AAA is all about making something look good vs actually being good. Get those focus groups ready and make sure it is as bland and generic as they can be to be marketable to the widest demographic.

 

[Kenpachii]

Haven't bought a 70 euro game probably never will.
Haven't played a AAA game in a long long time.

AA is where it's at these days and so are the prices. AAA lost the plot.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

Yeah no shit that having games in development for 8+ years is fucked up. No one can tell me that "this is totally normal". No it's fucking not.

It's not only prohibitively expensive, it also makes the publisher's job much more difficult because nobody can possibly predict the market so far in advance!

So it's asking publishers for a much greater investment while also incurring a much greater risk. It's poor business any way you look at it.

 

[Hudo]

It's not only prohibitively expensive, it also makes the publisher's job much more difficult because nobody can possibly predict the market so far in advance!

So it's asking publishers for a much greater investment while also incurring a much greater risk. It's poor business any way you look at it.

That's a good point that I did not even think about. Of course no one can predict the market so far in advance. Makes it even more fucking stupid.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

ITT we learn that the industry should produce more AA games.

Meanwhile, the AA games of the the 5+ years...

 

[Bernardougf]

New things take time. Sure, you can reuse the same mechanics and methods, etc to churn out the same game every other year. But to come up with a concept, flesh out the art, prototype, test gameplay ideas, etc before you even get into full production. Sometimes, you get to that point and the idea doesn't pan out and you have to start over. Not ideal, but it happens. It takes time.

God of War 2018 took 5 years. Ghost of Tsushima took 6. What would you cut from those games to turn them around in 2-3 years?

Like I said, sequels, assuming it's not a huge departure from the previous game, can be made in ~3 years. But creating something entirely new takes time.

The problem is if every single studio you own is working like this or working like this at the same time. You do need those smaller 2-3 year turnaround from some studios to keep things going, and that's where expansions/season passes for your GaaS games come in.

And both are very big games with bloated content... maybe GoW could be less, because it got some side content, GoT definitely could be less since is a asscreed type of game, maybe GoW could have take 4 years maybe both could have take it 4 years... I really dont know.. but games didnt take this long to be made and maybe that is something that could be done about it.

Something has to be done.. or we will pay 100 dollars for this games pretty soon and will remain waiting 6+years to see something new.

Im no developer, maybe a person with better understand in this process (a developer) can come here and say its impossible to make games under 5-6 years nowdays ... or they can come and say that a smaller game less bloated can be done in 3 to 4 years ... who knows.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

ITT we learn that the industry should produce more AA games.

Meanwhile, the AA games of the the 5+ years...

Let me make it more simple. Nintendo seems to be doing things right, and what they're doing best can be boiled down to the words "healthy engagement with their consumer base".

By that I mean not only the Directs, but the surveys they send out, the market research they do, the way they experiment with marketing and scheduling and different types of releases in order to better understand their consumer. It's a matter of building a healthy relationship, based on frequent communication.

The feedback cycle is like this: the company makes a move (could be by releasing a game or even just a trailer), consumers react, company gauges reaction and plans the next move accordingly. Rinse and repeat. That's how you build healthy engagement and that's also how you build brand loyalty in the longer term.

When you rely too heavily on AAA and your games take forever to release, you reduce the frequency of communication, which makes it much more difficult to gauge the reaction of your audience in a timely manner, which diminishes the quality of communication and ultimately hurts engagement and brand loyalty.

One way to tighten the feedback cycle is with live service games, but if you rely on them too much you limit your audience and fail to get a feel for other changes in consumer preferences.

As a big publisher, you want to have as many opportunities to form new hypotheses about the consumer and to test these hypotheses in a timely manner. That's the only way you can remain one step ahead of consumer preferences. And having regular, smaller, frequent releases in your lineup is an important way to keep this information coming at a brisk pace.

This is especially important in an industry centered on entertainment - i.e. a nonessential product with a fickle user base.

 

[DeepEnigma]

ITT we learn that the industry should produce more AA games.

Meanwhile, the AA games of the the 5+ years...

People are being conditioned to wait for them to go on the sub services, me thinks.

 

[Loomy]

And both are very big games with bloated content... maybe GoW could be less, because it got some side content, GoT definitely could be less since is a asscreed type of game, maybe GoW could have take 4 years maybe both could have take it 4 years... I really dont know.. but games didnt take this long to be made and maybe that is something that could be done about it.

Something has to be done.. or we will pay 100 dollars for this games pretty soon and will remain waiting 6+years to see something new.

Im no developer, maybe a person with better understand in this process (a developer) can come here and say its impossible to make games under 5-6 years nowdays ... or they can come and say that a smaller game less bloated can be done in 3 to 4 years ... who knows.

It is entirely possible to make a AAA game in under 5-6 years. People do it all the time. Look at It Takes Two. That game was done in less than 3 years. Death Stranding took less than 4 years to make. Miles Morales was about 2 years.

But then you have Elden Ring, which took 5 years. Same with Forbidden West. You can throw more people at it, but only up to a certain point. And, video game prices have not gone up much, relative to development costs and other economic changes.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

People are being conditioned to wait for them to go on the sub services, me thinks.

I think they were dying well before that.

The following pattern has been obvious for a long time and almost no one in this industry has bothered to understand it.

Pattern:

1. Almost all "traditional" games earn the bulk of their revenue near launch, when FOMO buzz is at its highest.

2. Most people dont complete games despite most of them being sub 40 hour experiences.

Game developers + publishers have leaned on that unhealthy pattern for decades. The result is a cancer that has destroyed the AA industry and is now moving onto AAA.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Let me make it more simple. Nintendo seems to be doing things right, and what they're doing best can be boiled down to the words "healthy engagement with their consumer base".

By that I mean not only the Directs, but the surveys they send out, the market research they do, the way they experiment with marketing and scheduling and different types of releases in order to better understand their consumer. It's a matter of building a healthy relationship, based on frequent communication.

The feedback cycle is like this: the company makes a move (could be by releasing a game or even just a trailer), consumers react, company gauges reaction and plans the next move accordingly. Rinse and repeat. That's how you build healthy engagement and that's also how you build brand loyalty in the longer term.

When you rely too heavily on AAA and your games take forever to release, you reduce the frequency of communication, which makes it much more difficult to gauge the reaction of your audience in a timely manner, which diminishes the quality of communication and ultimately hurts engagement and brand loyalty.

One way to tighten the feedback cycle is with live service games, but if you rely on them too much you limit your audience and fail to get a feel for other changes in consumer preferences.

As a big publisher, you want to have as many opportunities to form new hypotheses about the consumer and to test these hypotheses in a timely manner. That's the only way you can remain one step ahead of consumer preferences. And having regular, smaller, frequent releases in your lineup is an important way to keep this information coming at a brisk pace.

This is especially important in an industry centered on entertainment - i.e. a nonessential product with a fickle user base.

What you have done here in your excellently written post, is identify the many advantages of the AA model WITHOUT identifying any of its shortcomings.

We have 20 years of reciepts showing companies attempt to leverage those advantages into commercial success and we've gotten a graveyard.

I'm not even sure you're Nintendo example is all that helpful because Nintendo is swimming in their own ocean being a family centered company and do we know how much their games cost to make?

Telling a 60 person studio with budget limitations to "Just do a Nintendo" doesn't seem realistic to me.

I do think you're right about GAAS being the correction here. We'll see that philosophy rewarded more and more over the next few years.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

What you have done here in your excellently written post, is identify the many advantages of the AA model WITHOUT identifying any of its shortcomings.

We have 20 years of reciepts showing companies attempt to leverage those advantages into commercial success and we've gotten a graveyard.

I'm not even sure you're Nintendo example is all that helpful because Nintendo is swimming in their own ocean being a family centered company and do we know how much their games cost to make?

Telling a 60 person studio with budget limitations to "Just do a Nintendo" doesn't seem realistic to me.

I do think you're right about GAAS being the correction here. We'll see that philosophy rewarded more and more over the next few years.

What are the shortcomings you believe I should have mentioned?

 

[Nydius]

Folks just do not have the disposable income they once did. Insurance premiums have risen because medical bills have went up, educational costs, heating and air as natural gas has doubled in price in just a year and a half, groceries have skyrocketed, auto and home insurance has went up, gas prices are climbing and will continue as we start changing our oil to warmer weather which costs more to refine, all goods and services have went up because everyone in the chain has had to raise prices ending with the consumer.

On the gaming side folks are looking closer at the games they purchase, because most of the time the game is looking to take more money from you constantly causing people to buy less as they know that the purchase price of the game isn’t going to be the end of it and it will cost more to get the full game from the item.

This is definitely our situation, especially since my family lives on a quasi-fixed income because my wife is fully disabled and draws disability income. We have to be extremely picky about where we spend any disposable income. We've both had to significantly curtail our hobbies to make ends meet. Trading in, or third party reselling, of physical media is one of the few ways I've been able to keep gaming but even with that I usually end up waiting for sales to buy games I want.

The only game I'm buying at full price the first half of this year is Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. As much as I want Rise of the Ronin and Stellar Blade, those are games I can wait a few months for until they're on sale or I can find them cheaper on eBay, Mercari, et cetera.

One of my friends recently tried getting me back into Destiny 2, especially with their current Mass Effect crossover, and I admit I was tempted. Until I realized that to be "current" means spending $50 just to get the barebones expansion, only to have to spend another $50 in a few months for another barebones expansion, and then more if I want the rest of the content, on and on and on. I just don't have the money (or desire, to be honest) to keep paying full price for "forever" GaaS games.

HFW is even longer with almost 100 hours of content. Why the fuck did it need to be that big? Mass Effect 2 was made in 2 years. Had 20 hours of main content with 10 hours of side quests. One of the greatest games ever made.

Interesting point bringing up ME2. Whenever the topic of AAA gaming bloat and expense comes up, I always think back to Mass Effect. From initial release to the final DLC was a grand total of 7 years. Three games, multiple DLCs, one of the most respected single player trilogies in gaming: 7 years. We will never know the full budget for all three games but best estimates are around 30M for ME2 and 40M for ME3, so if we figure around 10M for ME1, the total cost of the trilogy was under ~$100M. As opposed to, say, Cyberpunk 2077, whose total budget ended up ballooning to almost half a billion ($436M).

AAA game bloat and budgets are undeniably out of control and, by and large, games aren't better for it. Some are, most aren't.
Two of the most memorable games I've played so far this generation have been Evil West and Robocop Rogue City.

 

[Faust]

ITT we learn that the industry should produce more AA games.

Meanwhile, the AA games of the the 5+ years...

I would argue the biggest issue of AA games is marketing. You don’t see them quite as often being in the spotlight compared to a CoD or Spider-Man. If people don’t know about them, they can’t buy them.

 

[Dr. Wilkinson]

Iwata was trying to warn about this eventuality as far back as 2004.

"Many games already offer fairly photo-realistic expressions. Simply beefing up those graphics will not allow most players to experience a difference. New machines must offer something new."

But more than that, unless the market expands, the modern cost of AAA development only works for the ultra-popular games. The ones that sell 10-25+ million. The Elden Rings, Pokemons, Marios, Zelda, CoDs, etc. Otherwise your only option is to make something on a smaller scale, or take an enormous gamble like with BG3 and spend a ridiculous amount of money on game that *might be a break-out hit. Not to say Larian doesn't deserve all the success in the world. They certainly worked hard for it. But how many other modern examples are there of that?

I think we're back to sort of where we were 20 years ago, in 2004. The console market we are in is stagnant. Prices are high, software development costs are outrageous, the current & next-generation platforms are very, very unlikely to have an install base that exceeds the Switch/PS4 generation. It's weird, it's sort of like deja vu.

But honestly, good on Xbox for seeing this and saying, ya know, why not put some of our exclusives on other platforms? They make more money, more people get to play them, the developers get to see their games succeed more, and what is the downside? I don't think there is one. But Nintendo will never do it. Not unless something drastically changes on their end with the next hardware. There's no specific input difference in hardware across any of the consoles, other than joystick placement and a & b button swaps. It's just you go with the version for the console you own, or you go with the version that looks & plays best, if you happen to have two consoles that play the same game.

 

[bender]

I actually think staying flat after the pandemic is...impressive? I would have expected a decline after people returned to work and got out and about more.

 

[Last Hearth]

This is not that hard to understand, even on this forum the backlog for most people just keep growing. Because while this are plenty of games that are worth the price ($40-$70 depending), I'm constrained by how much time I have to play.
The amount of entertainment is pushing against everyone's fixed available time, even the streaming networks, I think they numbers are inflated by the amount of time a show is running but the person is not actually watching, as it's just running in the background and they are doing something else. You can't do that with games because they require interaction.

 

[hybrid_birth]

How many times does this need to be deboonked before people stop regurgitating it?

You know what they say. A dog returns to it's vomit.

 

[Deerock71]

Studios like Nightdive and Saber should be feasting on remakes for the Switch. That and THQ Nordic.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

What are the shortcomings you believe I should have mentioned?

I think you have to look at the results of the last 20 years...observe that AA has increasingly struggled over that time...and ask yourself why.

Traditional games earn the bulk of their sales at launch, and most go unfinished by the people who buy them.

That means you have to think about the psychology that's rewarded in the old model.

AA has a hell of a time generating FOMO buzz. If you can't generate FOMO buzz in the old model, you're going to flounder.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

I think you have to look at the results of the last 20 years...observe that AA has increasingly struggled over that time...and ask yourself why.

Traditional games earn the bulk of their sales at launch, and most go unfinished by the people who buy them.

That means you have to think about the psychology that's rewarded in the old model.

AA has a hell of a time generating FOMO buzz. If you can't generate FOMO buzz in the old model, you're going to flounder.

AA has struggled because the bulk of the western industry has decided that power is what sells. Meanwhile in Japan, and on Nintendo consoles, and on billions of smart devices, this axiom is false, and AA is a perfectly viable, even thriving, business model.

Perhaps it's time the western industry woke up from their own delusions and realized that they have only themselves to blame for the predicament they are in. They made a conscious decision to condition their audience to expect only the most technically demanding and expensive to develop games, knowing full well that decision would sooner or later come back to bite them in the ass.

They focused on FOMO buzz, as you say, instead of focusing on creating sustainable brands that consumers can develop healthy attachments to.

 

[Alebrije]

Videogame market has not grow at the same level debelopers and publishers. SO we have tons of games released every month but the same core market. This Will implode soon or later.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

AA has struggled because the bulk of the western industry has decided that power is what sells. Meanwhile in Japan, and on Nintendo consoles, and on billions of smart devices, this axiom is false, and AA is a perfectly viable, even thriving, business model.

Perhaps it's time the western industry woke up from their own delusions and realized that they have only themselves to blame for the predicament they are in. They made a conscious decision to condition their audience to expect only the most technically demanding and expensive to develop games, knowing full well that decision would sooner or later come back to bite them in the ass.

I'm not sure why the west, which has grown to dominate the industry, would take notes from Japan, who's place in the industry has fallen considerably.

Again, "Just do a Nintendo!" isn't helpful to the AA team who has 58 employees and a strict 3 year time allotment to get their next game out.

The moralizing over these strategies isn't helpful either. Everyone is trying to make a good, successful game.

 

[gothmog]

I think this is largely manufactured nonsense used to justify layoffs. I watched them do it with a straight face after record profits in other sectors. I just wish it wasn't parroted by everyone as being real.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

I'm not sure why the west, which has grown to dominate the industry, would take notes from Japan, who's place in the industry has fallen considerably.

Again, "Just do a Nintendo!" isn't helpful to the AA team who has 58 employees and a strict 3 year time allotment to get their next game out.

The moralizing over these strategies isn't helpful either. Everyone is trying to make a good, successful game.

If it bothers you to give credit to Japan or Nintendo (for reasons I completely don't understand besides arrogance, but that's a different issue) give credit to Apple and smartphone gaming for building a huge AA gaming ecosystem.

Or go back 10-15 years and read what the same western devs who founded this industry in the 80s and 90s had to say about development costs spiralling out of control and team sizes becoming too big to manage. People like Will Wright, David Perry, Peter Molyneux, Ron Gilbert, Tim Schafer etc.

 

[Hudo]

Remember when R* pushed out GTA3, Vice City, San Andreas, Manhunt 1, Manhunt 2, Midnight Club 2, Midnight Club 3, Red Dead Revolver, Bully and The Warriors in one fucking generation?

 

[NEbeast]

100% agree. It kills me that there are quality AA games and dip shit gamers are like, "this is like a PS3/360 title, it's trash!"

Why is it so bad to have these types of games on modern consoles? Same people are big mad over lack of BC to play games from that gen. It's all so incredibly dumb.

It used to be that studios went under because they were chasing the COD MP market. We still see that with GAAS but it will absolutely happen to more studios solely due to chasing production values. These risks can be easily avoided.

We see it with horror movies, they are generally a safe bet because many aren't expensive to film and there's less risk if it doesn't pack theaters for weeks on end. The exact same principle can be applied to game development.

Not everyone had your tastes. Being a "dipshit" has nothing to do with it.

 

[Facism]

Haven't bought a 70 euro game probably never will.
Haven't played a AAA game in a long long time.

AA is where it's at these days and so are the prices. AAA lost the plot.

for real I'm never paying £70 for a game. Got over that nonsense during the n64 era.

 

[Ozriel]

Remember when R* pushed out GTA3, Vice City, San Andreas, Manhunt 1, Manhunt 2, Midnight Club 2, Midnight Club 3, Red Dead Revolver, Bully and The Warriors in one fucking generation?

Gamers complain about time spent making AAA video games these days, but will giggle hysterically while watching a YouTuber criticize the latest open world AAA game because NPCs aren’t eating bacon realistically.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

If it bothers you to give credit to Japan or Nintendo (for reasons I completely don't understand besides arrogance, but that's a different issue) give credit to Apple and smartphone gaming for building a huge AA gaming ecosystem. Go back 10-15 years and read what the same western devs who founded this industry in the 80s and 90s had to say about development costs spiralling out of control and team sizes becoming too big to manage. People like Will Wright, David Perry, Peter Molyneux, Ron Gilbert, Tim Schafer etc.

It doesn't bother me because I don't have an attachment here.

I just try to observe the industry from an objective point of view and notice what works and what doesn't. I think when emotions are involved, it becomes harder to see the forest from the trees.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

It doesn't bother me because I don't have an attachment here.

I just try to observe the industry from an objective point of view and notice what works and what doesn't. I think when emotions are involved, it becomes harder to see the forest from the trees.

I'm emotional because people who've been with this hobby long enough (either as consumers, developers, or both) saw these problems coming from miles away and have been talking about them for the better part of two decades (and in some cases longer!). The emotion comes from watching the irrationality around you and not being able to get your rational message through.

 

[ProtoByte]

You should try to be more vague, dismissive and condescending next time... poor effort

Nothing vague about it. Every point you're making about AAA games, graphics and "bloat", thinly veiled insinuations about "gameplay focus" and "movie" stuff has been repeatedly shown not to be the case.

Jason Scheier himself has noted that indie games are taking too long and costing too much.
Spider-Man 2 is lean to the point of some people calling it short, reusing assets from 2 prior installments, and cost more than TLOU Part II and GOW 2018.
Callisto Protocol.
Immortals of Aveum.
ZA/UM (Disco Elysium studio)
Embracer's entire library of studios, with is almost nothing but AA Eurojank sweatshops.

This isn't about graphics or "lack of gameplay focus" whatever the hell that means, or as if the most holistic game design would be cheap or quick, or any of that. This is an issue of economic background and organizational structure.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

The moralizing over these strategies isn't helpful either. Everyone is trying to make a good, successful game.

If you've been following this industry for decades, you know for a fact this isn't true. Yearly sports releases that are little more than roster swaps are not good games, and even the people developing them don't believe otherwise.

Games that are mainly meant to be technical showcases or have to hit the launch dates of their respective hardware make conscious compromises in other areas, including scope and even quality.

Sometimes this works out for the best, sometimes it doesn't. And don't even get me started on games that have to release in a particular quarter, quality be damned, because management demands it.

This is a business, and just like any other, there are conflicting interests. If you give the creatives too much control you end up with monstrosities like Star Citizen. Give the execs too much control and you end up with whatever the hell Microsoft does to their studios that kills them inside.

If there's one thing you can be sure of it's that not everyone on a given team is trying to make the same thing or achieve the same goal with their product.

 

[WitchHunter]

How many times does this need to be deboonked before people stop regurgitating it?

Debunk what, that on avg 50% of the people do not finish AAA games? That most of them do not even finish the third of said games? What does that tell you? And why don't AAA game makers see the achievements numbers and change their process?

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

If you've been following this industry for decades, you know for a fact this isn't true. Yearly sports releases that are little more than roster swaps are not good games, and even the people developing them don't believe otherwise.

Games that are mainly meant to be technical showcases or have to hit the launch dates of their respective hardware make conscious compromises in other areas, including scope and even quality.

Sometimes this works out for the best, sometimes it doesn't. And don't even get me started on games that have to release in a particular quarter, quality be damned, because management demands it.

This is a business, and just like any other, there are conflicting interests. If you give the creatives too much control you end up with monstrosities like Star Citizen. Give the execs too much control and you end up with whatever the hell Microsoft does to their studios that kills them inside.

If there's one thing you can be sure of it's that not everyone on a given team is trying to make the same thing or achieve the same goal with their product.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

Which part? Conflicting interests between publishers and developers? Surely you don't mean that...

 

[Luigi Mario]

Remember when R* pushed out GTA3, Vice City, San Andreas, Manhunt 1, Manhunt 2, Midnight Club 2, Midnight Club 3, Red Dead Revolver, Bully and The Warriors in one fucking generation?

They turned basically all smaller studios that were responsible for games like Bully and Manhunt into support devs.
The GTA series used to be solely a Rockstar North production, GTA VI is now a Rockstar Games production.

 

[RoadHazard]

I like a good cagr.

 

[GigaBowser]

mort piscartolla 2023 wet fart?? haha

 

[FunkMiller]

It’s a good indicator of how fucking stupid these executives are that they thought the good times would continue to roll when Covid was over.

Yes, you coke snorting genius. Everyone going out and about again was not going to affect profits from a business solely dedicated to inside, at home entertainment. Well done.

2024 is going to suck, because they’ve realised the gravy train has finally run out, and now they’re going to do everything they can to maximise their own personal profits, before running away.

 

[LavitzSlambert]

It's funny how the fat guy Matt is clamoring to GTA6 to save them. As if GTA6 selling 40 million will benefit anyone but one publisher and select number of shareholders and investors. In fact, its release will most likely cannibalize sales of smaller games. Piscatella talks about a problem and then hopes the cause of said problem (consolidation of market buying habits) will save it. Completely clueless like he's always been.

I don't think that's what Matt is getting at, more so that GTA6 will be a good barometer to see if growth is still in the cards for the industry overall. If GTA6 can't reach a certain mark despite its mass appeal, that will set a kind of financial ceiling for other large games. Since costs are rising faster than sales growth, it will be a good leading indicator to publishers and dev teams whether they can afford to keep building bigger and better (and more expensive) games.