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Game Developers: Stop Overpromising
Andru Edwards writes "Recently, there has been a flurry of game developers releasing games which did not live up to expectations the developers set earlier on. Due to this pratice of overhyping upcoming games, gamers have become wary of those games which have major hyoe behind them. Here is a look at which developers are falling victim to the hype, as well as why Nintendo's frustrating strategy might actually be the best approach after all."
To be fair to the developers and publishers, there exists a culture (especially online) that craves details and information about these upcoming games. I think it can be argued that they are simply filling a demand that is placed upon them. Nintendo does effectively shy away from this pressure and should be commended for it. It must be a hard thing to come to terms with when developing a game. Should they release details to generate some buzz or play it cool and let the game stand on its own merits? As a sort of related aside I think that the guys making KOTOR2 have really found the balance. They release a few details but nothing that will give the story away or stop any of the 'drama' from being played out once the game is available. The most I've heard is the names of a few planets and characters. And the basic premise. These are the sorts of things the game will reveal in the first 5 minutes of play but it has whet my appetite.
The thing about doom 3 is this. They never promised a revolution as far as the FPS genre goes. What they did say they would give us was a whole new experience in terror. Which I would have to argue they did, though in a particularly frustrating way of making us switch between flashlight and weapon. The Graphics engine for doom 3 is incredible, but it still could have used a bit more innovation as far as I'm concerned.
Scotty on the enterprise always tells Kirk that a repair is going to take 3 hours and finishes it it 2. Kirk can plan around that. Now if Scott took the same estimates, promised the job would take one hour if everything went well, and delivered in 2 he would be viewed as incompetant.
Generally when you report a fact to the buying public, the expect it to be a done deal. While they aren't surprised when it isn't, they will never believe another thing you tell them.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
I don't have the time as it is to play a lot of the big names games. So why would I pay top price for them?
I didn't get my Dreamcast until after they officially killed it off. I bought mine at Sears for $100, and it came with an extra controller, memory card, and two games. All the good games are $20 new, and the moderate games are $10 used.
I bought my N64 two years after it was released, and only because KBToys had a deal I appreciated. I only had four games until they released the Gamecube. Now I have something like 20. Problem with the N64 is that the cartridges don't allow for good prices. For instance, Harvest Moon was $35, used, everywhere. (though I eventually bought a copy that was $25)
I got my Gamecube two months ago, and that was because they had the Metroid Prime bundle. I only have five games, and I probably won't get any more for quite a while.
I'll probably get a PS2 (PSTwo?) once they drop the price again, mainly because I want to be able to play DDR. I'll probably get an XBox about the time XBox2 comes out, and with it, Halo.
Hell, I'm playing HaloPC on my laptop. Aside from the fact that I have to turn resolution way down, I love it.
Moral is, you can shell out $50 for a game that may be good, or wait a few years and pay $20 if you KNOW it's good.
Tetrisphere, on the N64, is one of the greatest game ever made. It combined all the awesome puzzle-strategy that made Tetris so wildly successful and translated into a fun 3-D environment (unlike, Wetris and Tetris3d, which just gave me headaches), with a kickass soundtrack and a collection of different play modes (including one of the best non FPS Multiplayer games, bested only by Super Puzzle Fighter II).
Nowadays you can get it for a song, and it's still just as great to play as it was when it was new. The graphics are still clean, crisp, and rendered to a modern finish. And the soundtrack just sounds killer on a good sound system.
I own both the Ps2 and the Gamecube. Except for a very few games the Gamecube is used much more than the PS2. hell I have beta-tested about 5 PS2 games as well and I still wait for a game for the PS2 that can even touch Pickmin2 or MarioKart GC, etc... It seems that nintendo is focused on gameplay and entertainment value where the Sony developers are stuck with "make it purdy" "It's gotta be a FPS!!" Ok, Grand Theft Auto was a neat idea, now it's worn out and tired, I certianly will not buy the new one that is coming out because I do not want more of the same. Even the Final Fantasy line is old and tired.
Where are the highly addictive games? I still play frequency even though some of the songs I can probably close my eyes and still win.
i am tired of PC games remade for consoles, Movie based games, or other games where the game it's self was not the origional idea. I am also sick of games that are single player only. games are a huge blast when you have 2 or more players, 4 player games completely rock.... nothing beats trash talking your 10 year old in a fighting game or in MarioKart GC or screwing up 3 of your friends on a multiplayer game.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Sadly, marketing is hardly ever the problem in the game business. Marketing doesn't start bombing the players until between one week to five months before ship, and they generally don't make promises. There are a few obvious counter examples, Jon Romero about to make you his B*%$h being the most famous one, but for the most part marketing does a reasonable job of handing the spec sheet to the magazines and shouting about how great it will play. I don't think I've seen an example of the marketing department actually making stuff up, though I've seen them make promises based upon specs or feature sheets that got cut.
And that's really the problem. You need to cut things. Either the hyperreal evolutionary landscape was dragging down the processor, or it added layers of unnecessary interaction that killed gameplay (Masters of Orion 3), or you just didn't have time to finish a given feature properly (the extra spirit forges from Soul Reaver), but features will be cut. If you're unprofessional and blog your development cycle to fans who build up notions from your scattered information, you're going to disappoint many of them with decisions that ultimately were correct.
All developers love their fans, and want to have a personal relationship with them. But there are areas where this has to be off limits. All entertainment media know that you have to keep people quiet if you want the experience to be new and unexpected. That we're still struggling with this issue is just another sign of our relative youth as an industry. Enough info will leak out anyway to keep your fans interested. Look at Star Wars, or the LotR productions.
Don't worry. We're getting there.
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The ______ Agenda
Ever play Anarchy Online? Released *without* the thumbs up of the beta testers to much hype.
What happened? Everyone subscribed and then quit within the first month. Several months later after they finally fixed some of the problems they went back to all of the customers that cancelled and offer a free month to give them a second chance.
Blessed be he who reads this post, Cursed be he who tells my boss.
The one that comes to mind immediately is Blizzard. I mean, have they made a bad game?
To be fair, Blizzard doesn't always deliver the knock-out punch on the first try. Their games always put the playability feature first, then work from there. The main thing that separates Blizzard from their competitors isn't being innovative (they aren't), but their consistent attention to detail. If they don't get it right at first (and believe me, they don't) they'll release countless patches until they do. For example, as recently as 10/28/04, they released a patch for Diablo II, which was first released 6/29/00 (yes, over *four* years ago).
You might think their many updates and patches part of a rush-to-market mentality, but they've consistently delayed games until they were playable and enjoyable out of the box. It's their constant attention to fans (the BnetD fiasco excluded) after the sale that's made them so successful and so popular.
I think it's odd that the Gran Turismo series is such a huge seller, but when I talk about it outside of the core GT circles no one seems to care. Anyway ...
...) they take every bit of media hype as the written law - even if it doesn't come from the game publisher. A certain amount of the hype does belong to the developer / publisher, but you have to keep in mind that the majority of the hype comes from "insider" sites and game enthusiast groups. "Fanatics", if you will. Then when the developer doesn't live up to the claims of the fanatics, the fanatics are let down and the game is viewed as a watered down version of what the developer promised, when in actuality they never claimed any such thing.
GT4 is another one that hits the over promissing scenario. The said it would be online and it won't. They said it would be ready for Christmas 2003, it wasn't.
Other comments on this topic are talking about the true product being hype. I guess that's true. When you go to a group that adores a certain game (Final Fantasy, Grand Theft Auto, Gran Turismo
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
Even a bigger problem sometimes is the hype of the hardware! Look at the PSP. Sounds like it should be better than the current generation home consoles. If that's not hype, I don't know what is!
:)
That's why I've NEVER believed ANY of the hype that surrounds these new systems/games that come out unless they're from Nintendo. For example. When they announced the wavebird, every GameCube owner peed their pants in anticipation. What does Nintendo do? Give out CONSERVATIVE numbers. They said it should last 100hrs and have a range of about 20 feet. What happens in reviews?, well, turns out that 90 feet wasn't a problem and (the testers couldn't test battery life) but let me tell you from experience, I've only had to replace the batteries twice since I purchased mine.
So, when Nintendo says the DS has a battery life of 8-10 hours like the SP, I have 100% faith that it will. When Nintendo says the range of the wireless on the DS is 30 feet, I can expect at least that, and a 95% chance it'll be over 50 feet. When Sony says the PSP should be able to play current PS2 games, I say, can you even fit a game of FIFA in before you need to plug it in?!?
Have fun waiting for the overhyped PSP, I'll be with my buddies (and apparently total strangers!) playing wicked ass DS games.
Sorry, that turned out to be more of a rant. Well I guess it is. I guess I'm ranting on all those game devs. that like to tell me one thing, and then deliver me crap.
AirSpeak - http://itunes.com/apps/AirSpeak
Ha ha. Funny cuz it's basically true, however I'm a Product Manager (seriously, a PM that reads /.) and in our defence we are trying to compete in a vaporware market where the "100%" date is a myth and even the 90% date is always too far out for the customer and the market. So, you soft-shoe, juggle non-essential features as the development effort continues, leverage betas and release candidates, etc.
/. handle for a reason.
Not all companies are Blizzard or Microsoft and can just say "ready when it's ready" and people will wait (depending on the slice of the software market you inhabit). Shareholders, analysts, customers and competition don't sit still for it in most cases. The vaporware/due-date game is part of how companies compete... it's a damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don't situation.
Not that I like it. I have my
Just as an example, look at Anno 1503 published by Sunflowers and distributed by EA. To this day they failed to provide multiplayer, mistreated customers who inquired about the status of the "patch" that never came, yet even now the demo available online still has a nice outtro screen screaming about the best "multiplayer" experience ever. Only after I had a bout with them and created a Website http://home.fuse.net/slipstreamscapes/ in order to institute a class-action lawsuit, as well as after exposure here on Slashdot http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/13/213524 5, did they finally announce that no patch would ever be released. Ironically, they had plenty of time to create a single-player add-on in the meantime. Now they are supposedly working on a new sequel, again promising mountains and valleys...
This trend is more of a rule than exception nowadays (I can think of at least dozen games in no time where I got burned in a similar fashion but never did anything about it) and we as investors in their products should finally stand-up and fight for our rights as consumers. In this case, there is enough of evidence to institute at least a lawsuit in a small claims court demanding money back for a product that did not deliver (especially in my case where I bought the game solely for the multiplayer experience).
I used to buy at least 2 games per month, nowadays (partially because I am not so much interested in gaming any more) I do not buy games any more, mainly because I am sick and tired of the lies and misleading politics by the game publishers.
It's about time to show these corporate bullies that we will not take this any more.
but what are the long term sales going to look like? There are a few companies that actually plan for the long run. I wouldn't be surprised if in 3 years Pikmin has far out-sold Fable.
When you own a business, it's nice to sell a whole crapload of product the first month it's out, but your business is going to be around for much longer than a month. If you can successfully manage a product now that still has successful sales 3 years from now, you will never have a problem with profits.
I don't know enough about Pikmin to know if it will still be successfully selling in a few years but if it's as good as you say then I wouldn't be surprised.
I didn't play SWG, but heard lots of complaints for friends who played about missing features, and promptly quit. I've played EQ, DAoC and CoH, and they were all guilty of it to varying degrees.
I think a lot of mmorpg fanboys default response to this is "It's a work in progress, you need to be patient, they need to develop their story arc". I call bullshit on that, when I pay $40-50 for a game, then $10-15 a month subscription, I want it full featured from Day 1, not Day 180 or Day 365.
I've been watching WoW and EQ2 for this, so far from the friends in both the betas, it sounds like WoW is delivering the features promised more than EQ2 is. We'll see.
As one friend said, don't sell me a car, and then tell me the seats and tires will come later; or worse, are part of an additional package I need to pay for - when it should be standard equipment.
'The unexamined life is not worth living' - Socrates
Funny? I am perfectly serious. I think I still have that magazine around somewhere. May or June 1997 I expect.
/usr/games/fortune
The claim that stores don't take returns because they are afraid of piracy is simply a lie. I'm not saying that YOU are lying, but that the stores have lied to you.
There are plenty of ways to get your hands on the original media long enough to copy it, and when CD burners were $800, and media was $30 a pop, most stores still wouldn't take returns. Back then, the reason was that you might put a virus on the write only CD.
From personal experience, I used to work at a Software Etc. We did take returns. In fact when someone came back and told us the game worked fine, but sucked, we would tell them that they should brink it back for a refund or exchange! Funny thing is that crappy/buggy games got returned fairly often, and good games almost never got returned. I don't think a single copy of Falcon 4.0 (The best flight sim at the time) ever got returned.
In two years, only one time did I ever run across an individual that was abusing the return policy. After about the 5th return, I simply explained to the "customer" that we obviously don't sell software that is compatible with his system, so this would be the last return he would be allowed to make. Since returns required a form to be filled out (like in almost all types of stores) that contained a name, it is incredibly easy to see if someone is abusing a store return policy, even in a big Best Buy type store.
Sure, Nintendo never overhypes and underdelivers! /sarcasm
Like the time they promised Perfect Dark to Goldeneye fans and instead made them wait years for a game that was plagued with choppy framerate and (unsurprisingly) lackluster sales. All we wanted was another Goldeneye engine game in 1998! Not an overhyped game in 2000! There's a reason this game quickly got dumped to $10 in bargain bins.
Like the time Nintendo hyped GBA as a handheld SNES (or better) and instead delivered a machine missing 2 buttons, a large chunk of the resolution, with worse sound, and the darkest-yet-most-glary reflective LCD screen ever. Prompting harsh criticism from portablemonopoly.com and others.
Like the time Nintendo promised "pixel-perfect" (to quote Ken Lobb) home conversions of the Cruisn USA and Killer Instinct games for N64. Years later, we are still waiting. The ports were met with harsh criticism. Censorship (Cruisn), blurry textures (Cruisn) and sprites (KI Gold) and missing frames (KI Gold) and video (KI Gold). For years Nintendo-owned Rare *made fun* of people asking for a new Killer Instinct game in their "uncle tusk" section of their website! What kind of gratitude is that?
How about the teaser footage of a realistic Zelda game on GameCube, only to get a silly cartoony Zelda game that was also met with harsh criticism and lackluster sales. Years later they still aren't done making the realistic game they probably now realize they should have done in the first place.
How about "Mario 128"? People just wanted a sequel to Super Mario 64 and instead they got a tech demo with 128 Marios running around. The Mario and Luigi games have both been quirky and widely criticized gimmicky games that both rely on *cleaning*! Cleaning is not fun. Not surprisingly, no one is asking for sequels to these.
Nintendo's flirtations with censorship are now quite infamous.
Don't forget Virtual Boy. Before that disaster they hyped it alot in their own magazine, too.
Speaking of which, what about all of the hyped games and machines that they advertised and then got canned? Riqa for N64? CD-ROM for SNES?
64DD for N64 was years too late and then made Japanese-only. Insult to injury for the rest of us.
What do these guys want developers to do? Tell us the truth? That would make every video game press release look like this:
"xyz Software announced , a knockoff of that adds two new features, five hundred new bugs, and a graphics slightly prettier than in the game just like it that you bought LAST year!"
Video game hype is like pr0n models: you know that the body parts are (mostly) fake, and that they'll probably OD or commit suicide within five years, but hey, it's fun to get off on until the real thing comes along.
On the checkbook front, remember N selling Rare? The rumored number was in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Rare had done some incredible games (Goldeneye, Banjo Kazooie) and a good number of good games too. N was surely sunk without them, right?
Heck no. N seems to have got the good end of the deal. Rare has struggled to release anything. And their premiere title, some multiplayer Conker game has been delayed over a year and is still terrible (it is playable at E3 each year).
Meanwhile, what has poor old Nintendo done? They've hooked up with Intelligent Systems (Paper Mario GC, Advance Wars I and II for GBA) and Retro Studios (Metroid: Prime). Surely they got in the ground floor with these companies too, and so didn't have to pay a mint for them.
Nintendo may not have the splash of MS, but they seem to execute the best of any company in the business. Perhaps the GC has too few exclusive games, but those they do have rarely fail to impress.
Note to parent poster: to see how unexceptional Halo is, you really want to look at Marathon 2, Bungie's first online title, not Quake 2.
Marathon created the move with keyboard, point-with-mouse controls that made real 3D FPSes work. Quake 1 didn't have them on by default. And the level designs showed it. The levels didn't use the vertical axis at all, since it was so cumbersome on the old controls.
Marathon had these controls. It also introduced capture the flag, kill the man with the ball and teams to network play.
I'm not putting down Quake 2, I like it. But Bungie came up with this stuff, JUST NOT WITH HALO. Halo is just Marathon Infinity with better graphics and cars. Add in the poor level design and it really fails to impress.
Halo 2 looks good though.
When we whine, the developers sometimes respond by doing better next time... but mostly they just laugh all the way to the bank.
That'll almost certainly be down to the publisher, not the developers themselves. I don't know many games devs, but I know a fair few programmers, and I can't think of any who don't want to do the best job they can.
It's official. Most of you are morons.