God Save The UK Developer?

Thanks to TotalGames.net for its GamesTM-reprinted feature on the alleged fall of the British game developer. The piece argues: "It all used to be so different in the Eighties. Ignoring any rose-tinted arguments about whether games back then were better, worse or more peanut butter-flavoured, the inarguable statement can be made that they were certainly more British." But now, even though "the most popular game of this new decade - Grand Theft Auto - is British, despite all of Rockstar's attempts to hide the fact", the piece laments the lack of distinctive UK games with Python-esque worldwide impact: "Of course, it doesn't cost £5 million to pick up a pen and start writing a sketch about parrots, but surely the odd very obviously British game could be smuggled through?"

Comments

Re:Being half british and half american...

[Yorrike]

I am of British decent and having English parents, I too appreciate British comedy (although most of New Zealand, my home country, "gets" it too : ).

The problem here is that the main markets for games are North America, Japan and Europe, all with cultures that don't find the constant sarcasm of British humour ammusing as we Brits, Aussies, Kiwis and (I'm guessing here), Cannucks, do.

Niche games, as one drenched in Brit comedy would be, don't usually warrent the huge investments another racer, soccer game, Madden or FPS would, simply because they don't sell as well.

It's just a shame Rare decided to start sucking really badly, because their games had me in hysterics right the way through. I mean, having a slick robot salesman offer you a dodgy motor in Jet Force Gemini was just fantastic. Banjo Kazooie had similar moments in it.

The Western development studios, have slipped into a method of providing for the lowest common denominator, which the Python fan is not a member of.

But all is not lost for we British appreciators. EA have, after all, been making Cricket Games since the 16 bit era. And here's a site dedicated to cricket sims.

Publishers don't support British games

[Operating Thetan]

Look at Startopia-British humour, social commentary, excellent gameplay, and sweet fuck all in the way of support or marketing from the publisher ( a recurring trend with all of Muckyfoot's games that would lead to them closing down last November)

How about Giants:Citizen Kabuto? Possibly the funniest game ever made, innovative genre mixing, and a marketing budget of 5 quid.

I live in Guildford, and 4 years ago it probably had more development houses per capita than any other place in the world. Now half of have gone, despite putting out good products (we'll ignore Blade 2), or disappeared up their own arses into creative limbo, and in the main IMO it's the publishers who can be blamed.

Re:Glad I'm not the only one who thinks this.

[Yorrike]

Oh come on. Rare were rich enough, but what counted was they had enough respect to get away with such things, but since Jet Force Gemini, or maybe Banjo Tooie, Rare have sucked.

Grabbed by the Ghoulies, Donkey Kong 64, Conker's BFD and ESPECIALLY Starfox Adventures (a game that actually made me angry when I played it) were all terrible games. Rare are a hollow shell of their former glory and I doubt very much they'll be producing anything of any note again. They are merely the studio Nintendo had lost confidence in, and Microsoft bought at outrageous price, for nothing more than bragging rights.

The Galapagos of game developers

[0x0d0a]

IMO, there are very few US developers (Origin at their prime, Looking Glass Studios) who can compete with the best of Britain in terms of innovation.

I really wonder. Is it because the British just happen to come up with a lot of original ideas? While it's not impossible, I'm a little dubious. I wonder if perhaps it's because you have a lot of developers that are physically isolated from the mass of US and Japanese developers, and have a chance to go their own ways.

Perhaps the real answer to game diversity is to find a couple of islands, dump game developers on them without access to the outside world for a couple of years, and see what new things spring up. :-)

Knowledge sharing is good, as it allows building upon past mistakes and god ideas. However, I claim that what is "apparently better" may not always actually be better. Someone may have to make an apparently non-ideal mental path to arrive at a better final solution. The problem is that if there are lots of ideas floating around that are "apparently better" and lead someone away from finding alternate, potentially better solutions.

Every time I see a game developer say "Has $FANCY_WELL_SELLING_GAME-style $FEATURE" on a new game's featurelist, I've seen a developer not run out and come up with a potentially better solution.

Oh, well. Honestly, people complain about the lack of innovation in games, but I can't help but think that things are better now than in the console days of the NES/SNES. Man, there were enough cloned platform games out there to choke a horse...

Re:The Galapagos of game developers

[JonnyCalcutta]

I wonder if perhaps it's because you have a lot of developers that are physically isolated from the mass of US and Japanese developers, and have a chance to go their own ways

I'm sorry, but in the UK people are actually aware that a whole world exists outside their borders.
In fact taking your suggestion and reversing it creates a more likely suggestion - that its the UK's openness to the rest of the world that creates a melting pot of original ideas. Whereas the US and Japan, in their competition to determine who can be more isolationist, tend to follow the same old well worn pathways.

Re:The national culture of games

[metroid composite]

I mean, say a game is developed in the United States. Is there really an "American feel" to it? What would an "American feel" be?

Not Japanese-feel is what I'd associate with it.

RPGs - more based off of D&D and role playing than a prescripted story
More realistic instead of anime feel
Far more likely to be a first person shooter or racing game
Far less likely to be a dance game, dating sim, or 2D Fighter
Real-time strategy is, as far as I know, almost exclusively American/European. The Japanese games tend to be turn-based.
World War 2 sims
Anything with WWE in the title

Now, telling appart Brittish games, American games, and European games is something I've never been good at; it doesn't help, mind you, that my repretoire of British/American games is fairly thin (the majority of games coming from Rare, Maxis, Blizzard, and Sierra) and that I can't remember any game I've played from Continental Europe.

Death of the Brit Developer

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the great British games industry was built on many factors, but accessiblity of development technology was a major factor. Most games could be knocked out by a couple of teenagers in their parents house. The ZX81 and ZX spectrum home computers (Dragon, Commodore 64) created a whole generation of hackers and many developers in the IT industry owe their start to these amazing machines. People now demand more from their games and development involves a multi-talented team. So the best British developers get lured to the states. The Romans grabbed their labour with chains, the US Empire grabs them with fat contracts and the California sun.

So yes the British games industry will be like the British film industry with its occassional success and a few British 'actors' starring in blockbusters but essentially the US will always have the finance and its pick of talent from home and abroad.