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Razor Blade Games?
Oxygen99 writes "There's a story on the BBC News website regarding the financial impact on game developers of the next generation of consoles. The article states that while the cost of producing games increases exponentially as new technology comes online, consumer prices stay approximately the same, leading to an unsustainable financial environment for many small developers. With many small development teams already hurting from the crippling costs of development for the X-Box, GameCube and PlayStation 2, what happens when the X-Box2 or Playstation 3 arrives? Are the days of small scale game development over? Will we ever see a new Jeff Minter? Will the games industry go down the route of the razor manufacturers where consoles are almost given away with the games?"
How much does it take to get started developing on these systems?
There will always be a high demand for the latest and greatest games/consoles from the pre-teen to the post-teen age groups. The thing is, we have gotten a taste, starting with Pong, and will never get enough until you jack us straight in, and get a virtual reality that is more than a messy abortion. Addiction is a word that comes to mind, and people will do anything to pay for their addictions.
"Sheep just follow the easiest path and run from scary noises and intimidating creatures." - Me
When economic pressures like this get built up, that provides an opportunity for someone to deliver a solution to some of these problems that reduces cost and/or time of development.
What you're talking about here is a GDE (Games Development Environment). It SOUNDS like a great idea, but I don't think so. It would mean that every game coming out of the pipe would be the same, homogeneous product, using the same libraries, graphics, sounds, whatever. Blech.
There never really was room for small players in the console market. Look at the old Atari days. You had Atari and Activision and them some other big compaines moved in. There where some little guys but not that many and they sort of lived in the cracks that the big boys did not want. Only home computers let little game makers live. Even then if you where a small company starting off you might do better starting with a less popular computer than the Atari, C64, or Apple. Writing for a getting a CoCo game reviewed might have been easier than getting an Apple II game reviewed.
There is room for small game companies. Just not on the Playstation or the X-Box.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Game programers should stop re-inventing the wheel and use common game engines, at least for the graphics. I realize that lots of games have been made by liscensing the Quake 3 engine or Unreal engine, this seems like a potential way for smaller developers to have access to reasonably good looking technology to drive the PS3, xbox 2 or N5.
One of the real problems is that there is little room for games with lower expectations. I'd be really happy to buy a bunch of ten hour games that had less technical wows but much heart, especially if their retail price was reasonable.
How many gamers do you know that buy the latest games at $50? Most games sold at $50 are the blockbusters that sell to the general public rather than the hardcore gamers. But it's the hardcore gamers who buy more than 1 game every few months. I buy a ton of games but I've learned to be patient and buy games a month or two or even 12 later than the release date, simply to get the game for $20 or less. There is a big market for new games at lower prices that is not being tapped.
Not everyone has 40 to 80 hours to sink into the latest rpgs and not every game needs to be Final Fantasy VII. I really love the Ikaruga's of this world. Final Fatasy VII cost $35 million to make and had a staff of over 100 people. On the other hand, 95% of Ikaruga was made by THREE people. (For instance, the music was written by the same guy who did the game's background art!)
I kinda get the feeling that the industry might be heading towards another major evolutionary period, similar to the market crashes of the late atari era... I'm just not sure what it will look like.
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...rather than games with better graphics.
Something that irks me about recent games is that many of them are unoriginal, have worse-than-average gameplay... and a huge graphics budget.
For instance, I find that WarCraft III gameplay is much, much worse than StarCraft (could just be my low-end machine with a crappy graphics card), and the heros and other additions don't make the game much more interesting.
Similarly, Diablo II was probably the most unoriginal RPG I've ever played; the graphics are excellent but the plot is thin and the gameplay is mediocre. (It's damn addictive, tho). Compare the Baldur's Gate series, which has worse graphics and decent gameplay, and a better plot.
Anyone here ever played Liero? An ancient, free 2d Worms-but-realtime shooter? That game was more fun than many of the FPS games I've played. The graphics were shit, but the controls were responsive, the weapons were balanced (and numerous, and MODable), and the modes were fun.
I think this article nicely pinpoints the problem with many games today. The graphics teams soak up all the budget, and the guys that write an actual plot into the game, balance it, and adjust the gameplay don't do anything. They add in an assload of really cool spells/weapons/whatever, but then nobody actually uses most of them because a few of them are overpowered.
Maybe I'm just like those oldtimers ranting for a return to the "good old" days, but I'd like to see creative new FPS, one with nontrivial tactics (haven't seen one since Counterstrike), and for once a well thought-out TBS game. Alpha Centauri was close, but like many games, they put in too many features. The features ended up unbalanced, buggy, and their interactions were poorly thought-out. As a result, play didn't scale well and the AI sucked.
I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
That's not what he means.
Let's say company A makes characters. Company B can either buy them or sub-contract them to create new characters for their games.
Therefore, letting the game company worry about the game itself. This is commonly done with sound effects and music. (outsourcing, more than licensing though)
What has been the trend in all entertainment venues right now? Movies? One of the worst years for movies, average drop of is HUGE. Games? Things could be better. Music? Teetering on bankrupcy.
For whatever reason (bad economy?), consumers are a *little* smarter about what they're purchasing. People are tired of mindless teen movies, boring first person shooters, and bullshit pop music. Now I'm not claiming that every last consumer has wisened up, but that enough are atleast to reduce profits to critical levels.
We are at a low low LOW for creativity on all of these mediums. Normally, companies expect a ceartin ammount of idiots will buy a shitty product no matter what. But now, people hop on the internet, talk to their friends, and now you only need to know someone who knows someone who tells you a game is bad. "Yea dude, this guy I know bought red faction, its fucking lame."
I think what is going to happen is a market is going to be created for Independant movies/games/music. independant music is already here. I'm hearing *good* new inovative music and it just takes a little work to find it. I get to reject corpratism, I get to hear *good* music cheaper then I would, and good artists get my money directly.
A few years from now? I expect independant games / movies should start to show up. However, thats just my hope. It could be that once the economy loosens up, people will go right back to buying shit. But I have hope :)
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
Actually, I think coding is far more of a problem for consoles than graphics. Graphics ARE a big deal, but a good art studio can chuck them out pretty fast. In the future we may even get around to laser scanning real objects. Hire a cheap sculpter, contract with a laser scanning company and BAM!, cheap graphics.
On the coding side tho, programmers are still expected to build 3D engines from scratch. This is made worse on consoles, because you're usually programming the hardware directly with very few APIs to help you out (i.e. OpenGL). Even with APIs, a GOOD 3D engine is expensive to develop. That's why Id and Epic are able to make a fortune licensing Quake and Unreal engines. Yet you still have very expensive debug cycles. I truly expect to see more advanced languages (such as Java) start appearing on consoles in the near future. Even if we're talking about C# on the XBox, it would be a HUGE savings in development and debugging. Get a few companies leveraging that savings by creating and licensing best of breed 3D engines, and you'll cut development time for games back down to more reasonable levels.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
DecafJedi
DecafJedi
my weblog: apropos of something
If you are looking for a handheld console that has a free SDK, can be used with any development environment on Linux, Mac or Windows then have a look at the GamePark 32 which is available in Korea and soon into Europe.
:)
I recommend looking at the GP32 site though as it has better descriptions, reviews, news and gives you a great overview of what is possible. It is the first 'Open' console that's been produced and already has quite a 'bedroom' community that has sprung up around it.
Not only it is open, it just happens to be the most powerful handheld console out there and there's ports of Doom, Heretic on it already as well as Atari ST, Gameboy, SMS, PC Engine and Megadrive emulators. It has a built in MP3 player and you can also plays DivX movies if you pay a small fee (3.50/$6) for the player. All the commerical games for it are very cheap too - most in the 7/$12 bracket.
In short it is superb and runs on standard Smart Media Cards so once you've bought the console you aren't tied to buying proprietry hardware like the Gameboy.
So, you have no excuses now - buy one, start developing and make money!
There is little doubt that we are coming closer and closer to a "market correction" (and not just in the US, see the "What's Wrong with the Japanese Gaming Industry" series at tokyopia.com). The hows, whens, and whats of the issue, however, are really rather hard to predict. There are a few developments I predict for the future of the "gaming industry", which may or may not directly result from said market correction:
1) Shorter games at cheaper prices - This has already been brought up several times, but I think this will be one of the major themes in the future. If gamers truly are searching for "cinematic experiences", then why do many modern games promising to deliver on this account run 40 hours, when the average movie runs around 2? Shorter games will be the perfect forum for testing the new ways of telling stories that have yet to be developed (and which will most likely be pioneered from smaller and/or open-source independent development houses).
2) A resurgence of older games - Say a big industry powerhouse suddenly finds itself publishing games for a market that is no longer investing in the big-budget rehashes that said powerhouse has been investing, well, big-budgets in. It won't take too many $20 million dollar investments to flop before the company starts hemmorhaging. The answer? Tapping into the incredible backlogs of intellectual property that the company has at its fingertips, possibly stretching all the way back to the 8th bit generation. What better way to recoup on failed development investments than by re-releasing older products with little development investment required? This would mean that we finally see legal emulators released on new-generation consoles (what a major coup for Nintendo, if they were to suddenly to gain a huge chunk of Sony's marketshare simply by releasing an official SNES emulator and working with developers to ensure quality re-releases!)
3) Gaming will find its Voice - Maybe not directly related to the Crash, one development that is certain will be a rising interest in looking at video games from an "academic" perspective. Institutions such as the IGDA and publications such as Game Studies are heralding a new age of vdeo gaming discussion, criticism, and theory. And as we well know there have been several calls-to-arms among the video game journalism crowd (which the quality members of will also help to fuel the desire among gamers to get their hands on some of the older games through their nostalgic advocacy of previous classics). It is only a matter of time before a common language for game theory is developed. After that, the sky won't even be a limit!
4. Innovation based on older technologies - If you were thinking this category is just an excuse to throw out some links to Tenebrae screenshots, well, you were right (and stop reading my mind already!). Do yourself a favor and feast your eyes on some of these (Tenebrae) and these (Tenebrae2). These engines are based off the GPL'ed Quake 1 source, people! I mean, OMFG! T2 could be on par with Doom3 (in terms of capability, if not performance...yet), and it is _open-source_! Under the _GPL_! Which means it can only keep getting better! Alright, I better stop here or else I'll exceed my quota of exclamation points...
5) Convergence of Media - Check out this excellent article from gamesindustry.biz that contains speculations about Sony's long-term plans. Better believe the PSP will be my "Walkman" once it's released!
Okay, I think that is all I have to say for the moment. I am very excited fo
This is not as true as you think. There has been some code sharing in the Doom / Quake series, usually it goes in pairs (Doom -> Doom 2, Quake -> Quake 2, etc).
Quake was basically made from scratch, Doom code was not used. Quake 3 was basically made from scratch, Quake 2 code was not used (much). Doom 3 was basically made from scratch.
What you say is only now starting to be true (from here on, we probably won't be doing all so much "start from scratch" programming work). But it's not the reason why you can't make something of the quality level of Quake 3 or Doom 3.
The thing that *is* getting re-used, built and improved upon, is Carmack's (and other peoples') understanding of and experience with 3D. If you can't just sit down and write Quake 3, you just don't have enough programming experience yet. Quake 3 is actually not hard to write these days. The challenge in making a game that looks at least as good as Q3 is in getting people to do good art.
I've been programming for many many years on many different platforms, I'm an expert in C and x86 assembly and I've done a lot of stuff with OpenGL and a good amount with DirectX not to mention being proficient in just about any area of programming you could think of. The problem is that a game engine like DOOM 3 is not a stand-alone work. It is rather the evolution of the first DOOM engine through all the iterations of Quake. I could write the first DOOM engine. I could probably even write something like Quake 2. But as a small developer, I cannot possibly break into this market when I'm competing with people who are evolving and reusing code that they've had for years. They just keep making it a little better. I can't do that because I don't have years and years of succesful 3d projects to draw from and improve upon.
The Doom 3 engine isn't an example of code reuse, though it is an example of learning from past projects. It's also an example of most of the code being done by one person in a fairly short amount of time. Oh, and of the slow shift from C and x86 assembly to C++.
No small developer can jump 6 levels of technology to get to the current state-of-the-art and compete with large developing firms.
There's far more information available to developers today than when these people started. Furthermore, the Doom, Quake, and Quake 2 source is all available as well. Many people have already taken the Quake engine beyond Quake 2's capabilities from a graphics standpoint. Id isn't a large development team, either, they have more artists than developers by far, and if you want decent artists for your game the nearest community college can supply a never-ending group of people that will work for next to nothing.
Programming, like everything, is an iterative process; so as games get larger(code-size) and more complex with more and better technology packed into them, it will be harder and harder for small developers to break in the market. Most of them end up buying a decent 3d engine from someone else.
and being able to license technology allows small developers to break in more quickly, as well. Valve broke through by licensing id's technology and then rewriting a large amount of the code. Once they had their first game shipped, they started their own engine in-house, and licensed code for the physics engine. I'm sure if there's a Half-Life 3 some day, we'll see that Valve developed their own physics engine after Half-Life 2 shipped, as well.
And with faster graphics cards and games like Warcraft 3 and PlanetSide, all games are beginning to rely on evolved technology.
What's the evolved technology in WarCraft 3? I'm not even sure if PS has any evolved technology, either.
A small developer's game (whether its an FPS or an RTS or an MMORPG) can't compete with the beauty and speed of a large company's engine that has been revised and rewritten and composed of a multitude of high speed algorithms and computing tricks that have been drawn from a large code base. Which relegates us all to the realm of shareware...or, on the bright side, perhaps open source community projects.
Where do you think companies like id got their start? Unreal and Quake were both developed by companies that started in the shareware business. Blizzard started as a console developer, and is pretty much wholly owned by a much larger company. Valve was started by an ex-MS employee with a good amount of money in the bank. 3D Realms has been developing Duke Nukem Forever, well, forever, on money they earned as a shareware developer.
Design good games and worry about making it pretty with later iterations if you really have problems making Quake 3 or Doom 3 quality graphics on your first time out. Hell, I'll build Pong clones if that's what it takes to make sure my physics and graphics are accurate.
-PainKilleR-[CE]
Having looked into starting a gaming company personally, it's already really, really hard to do. Especially for consoles.
It requires millions of dollars investment to produce the first game. Our estimates were $3 million of the game we had in mind (for the PS/2 using a from scratch engine).
There are a variety of ways to get money, but it's definatly not possible to do it nights and weekends, or in a garage. A lot of this is the control that the console makers have over every aspect of the game release.
They get to decide if you CAN release, and they get a big chunk of every game sold (bigger than the developer). The result is that you are forced into only doing blockbuster style games with heavy development costs. No $10 cheapies that are simple but fun are allowed. Nothing that doesn't fit into the model they are working with.
The most common way to get funding (and distribution) is to go through one of the big game labels. You sign contracts similar to the record industry. They fund your development, and you have to pay them back out of your sales. They are also conservative on what they will back, and don't like it when you try something new. After all, if you are trying something different, you might fail and not be able to pay back the 3 million you owe them.
Development companies often lose money. They are usually happy to just pay everyones salary during the development cycle, and then break even. Only with a mega-hit can you hope to really make money on the game.
Low end independant PC games on the other hand can be totally different, and are much more interesting to me.
plus-good, double-plus-good