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Do Game Designers Burn Out Like Rock Stars ?
Reader Ant wrote in to mention a Guardian Unlimited Gamesblog article which asks: Do Game Designers burn out like rock stars? From the article: "The games industry is getting on a bit now, and so are many of its key 'superstars'. You may not think it, given the proliferation of sequels and movie tie-ins that clog up the charts like that sickly white glue in the veins of heavy smokers, but this is a creative business. No matter how many people are involved in the process, there must be a spark of inspiration somewhere at its core. So what happens when the spark falters, or goes out?"
[First relevant post]
When the spark goes out, you get games which are, in effect, mindless sequels, or uninnovative attempts to milk something for all it's worth [Doom 3, I'm looking at you...]
I hate to say it, but look at John Romero. There are probably others, but he's the first one that came to mind.
Daikatana
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
"The EA Syndrome" will soon be in our vocab
Is this truely a valid comparison? Most rock stars burn out from too much partying. Most game designers burn out from too much crunch time. Aside from the exhaustion presnet in both, there doesn't seem to be much of a similarity.
So what happens when the spark falters, or goes out?"
Then you make a game like Doom 3. Seriously, great tech, bad gameplay.
Ok, deciding to *publish* M.U.L.E and Archon and paying a sports celebrity to use the name in a game title does NOT constitue creative genius or even a hint of game design, and whatever Trip Hawkins ever did in that field it will pale next to his creative accounting to keep 3DO alive for as long as he did.
Will there or won't there be a Grand Theft Auto 6 from Rockstar?
Game industries can't hire real game designer talent. Good ideas for video games fall short on execs. But good artists have nice looking portfolios. I'm one of the best game designers out there and I've predicted the rise and fall of many game genres. Yet I can't get a foot in the door of any industry. Check out my game design documents if you want to see next generation gaming(ideas I've had for 10 years). www.jimsager.com
We're in a HUGE slump of video games. I haven't been this bored with the industry since 1983 when atari2600 was stagnating. 1985 is like one of my fondest memories.
I thought Harvey Smith ran that into the ground, while Spector just watched.
...got fed up with all the sex and drugs that came with designing Combat Solitaire 4.5!
There's a difference between creativity and marketing. Creativity is what spawned the ideas in the first place and led to many of the games we love today (Mario, Zelda, Final Fantasy, etc). Marketing is how something sells.
Many designers get stuck in a rut with what they've initially created. When something sells once, it's very difficult to walk away and not try to continue cashing in on it. So, the designers often get put on the same product series again and again. This leads to a lack of creativity, as their primary goal is to redesign a concept within heavy restrictions.
A developer like Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto, for instance, is constantly being put in the chair of developing his Zelda series. There's only so much he can be innovative with and still push the title as a Zelda game. As a result, the end product will tend to not have the same drastic impact upon the gaming world. It'll be a reworked, more-of-the-same type of game, if you will.
There are still creative products being put out there, it's just that the series effect tends to hinder further innovation.
Duke
Nukem
Forever.
Thank you, I'll be here all week. And don't forget to tip your waitrons!
That green slime had it coming.
I could think of a dozen styles of games that'd top charts for half a decade. Programmers may burn out, but good game designers just pick up momentum. The problem is there is no way to rate a game designer. You can point at a good artist and say,"He's a good artist, look at his art." The best game designer in the world may never get a job. I'm a world class game designer, but have never even had an interview.
www.jimsager.com
God spoke to me.
Development teams fall victims to fads... Take a look at Need For Speed.
It was getting better and better until it finally reached its pinnacle in Porsche Unleashed - I guess the hours spent with its physics engine saved my life on the road a few times. From there, it was all downhill - first, they dumbed down the physics in Hot Pursuit II (for no reason I can think of), and then succumbed completely to "console compatibility" and "teenage appeal"... HPII was the last NFS I bought.
Rest in peace.
But 'da street' is no place for our game design gods. The kids are atheists nowadays.
Ahem, there are lots of indy game designers that keep making new games, but dont burn out. They grow up, make it a life long career, and know how to balance life and work. (Unless you work for EA which means you have no life...)
One example is the company that released Airburst Extreme, Strange Flavor. They are the largest indy game company at MacWorld releasing 6 new games. They are listed on Apple.com as the most popular game. (Before World of Warcraft came out...) How many years since the original Airburst, 10 years?
If your profession is dependent on your body, like a dancer or an actress in Hollywood, then you have a problem.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
I think we've all seen what happens when developers have big egos and major arrogance problems; Daikatana pretty much examplifies the end result in my opinion. Between the hype, the ridiculous claims and bragging, you would have thought the team was headed up by a bunch of teenagers. The end result was sad as we all know, with even the installation of the game being buggy as all hell. Another example of 'Im too good for everyone' mindset is Derek Smart. While his gameplay ideas are pretty cool and definitely worth striving for in my opinion, the attitude he brings to the table is absolutely horrendus. Again, this attitude is seen in the quality of the Battlecruiser games. I have never gotten a battlecruiser game to not crash to the desktop onload, so why all this attitude & arrogance when the product doesn't justify it?
I am interpretting burn out relative to the comparison to rock artists; a lot of these guys burned out cause they got too into drugs, promiscuious sex, and in general started making stupid decisions in arrogance. The results ranged from destroying their careers to going bankrupt, and from needing to goto a rehabilitation facility to death.
I think its nice that game developers can have a bit of a public status, but the moment they let it go to their heads, they deserve their fall because it usually means an inferior product for the real fans who got them there in the first place.
And as far as real job burnout goes, its no different than anything else in the entertainment industry. It moves fast, the deadlines are quick, and if you don't keep up, don't expect anyone else to wait up because you've already been left for dead.
"What can a thoughtful man hope for mankind on Earth, given the experience of the past million years? Nothing." -Bokonon
It's difficult for most people to top themselves. Game designers are people too.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
You get hired on at EA as a technical director.
END COMMUNICATION
I'm a heavy smoker, you insensitive clod!
You might say that the games from EA have lost a lot of their "edge," but the industry sales have only got better.
Remember, money talks. If you want to do something about the quality of games, support your "indie" developers and buy their games (first hand, not used if you can help it).
Spell cheek you've failed me four the last thyme!
Burnout 3(Ha ha), Katamari Damacy.
But there are always exceptions. Look at the Rolling Stones. I'm not even sure they should be alive considering the sex,drugs,rocknroll! lifestyle they maintained. But not only are they still touring, they are now actually back in the studio recording new material.
Some game designers might burn out (from all that mountain dew, you know) and others will flourish well into their 70s.
If you want to do something about the quality of games, support your "indie" developers and buy their games (first hand, not used if you can help it).
In many jurisdictions, such as the United Kingdom, it's a crime to buy or sell tools to develop or run an indie game on your console. How can independent developers lawfully compete with the major console studios?
(Sig note:Then you have folks like Peter Molyneax (also mentioned in the article). He has some really great game designs under his belt. But the last 8 years or so have been filled with one disappointment after another. Honestly, Pete, if you'd just keep your big trap shut until you have a working demo, you could save yourself a lot of heartache.
Then there are the Sid Meyers of game design, who, while they haven't shown a lot of innovation lately, certainly know how to please the masses by re-working their tried and true formulas into fresh masterpieces. Half Life 2 and the new Pirates were both very derivative of their predecessors, but both added enough fresh gameplay and new features to make me fall in love all over again.
Thats the thing, I know games so well I'm overlooked. I've predicted the rise of MMOGs since 1992, even tried to code my own from scratch, which I would have done if it wasn't for college. I knew Final Fantasy had a long term dynasty at 1. I emailed Westwood to add regenerating spice and multiplayer to dune2and they'd have a hit(see command and conquer dynasty). I knew in 95 that FPS next evolution was to have vehicles and organized play(Planetside does it, but no FPS currently ladder ranks you which I find funny). I know what the next big things are going to be. People like you gave me flak when I gave out strategies for Starcraft, but when I was ranking #1 people started to hang on my every word. Its the same for game design, I know whats fun and what doesn't work better than most people out there, but no one will listen to me until I prove it. Yet its a catch 22, theres no way to prove yourself as a game designer. You give me flak about my ideas, yet you'll see within 10 years they'll be the next big thing.
God spoke to me.
It must be difficult having to go through life being so great and yet so unappreciated.
Tell me, is the public library where you're typing this from warm?
No battles to the death are recalled. Mumpsman can hit to attack and cause brainsmashing.
I have a degree from Carnegie Mellon, and I'm currently working for a database shop for Non-profit organizations(I do get paid). What is hard to understand, that my claims are outlandish? Yes they would seem great if you checked out my online trophy room. Yet I don't see anyone calling me a liar.
I'll say it again,"I knew I was a world caliber video game player long before I had a #1 painted on my ranking. People wouldn't believe me when I told them strategies and I wasn't #1. But when I got #1, suddenly everyone was listening."
Check out my ideas I came up with too, I've predicted things that just aren't related to video games. Its hard to pitch ideas to people when you're just a Joe off the street. So I like to come up with new ideas and see how long it takes for other people to develop them. My best idea so far is true artificial intelligence:
www.geocities.com/James_Sager2
Its not difficult to go through life with so many ideas, its just boring when it comes to video games. I know what's next, but I have to wait for someone to make it. Right now theres no games that interest me, and none have since Warcraft 3 which I also was #1 1v1,2v2,and 3v3, and was the first to 1500 wins.
God spoke to me.
So let's go through some of these:
... I think that one was obvious to anybody in the MUD scene LONG before Ultima Online came along.
... AFTER Tribes was already announced (in 1995.) BTW, Halo 2 has a ladder, although you're correct that most FPS games omit it.
You predicted that graphical MUDs would be successful after years of successful text-based MUDs.
You also knew that the next FPS evolution (i.e team play and vehicles) was going to be, basically, Tribes
But what I don't get is this: Of COURSE you can prove yourself as a game designer... just build a game. If you can't afford the time to create a graphics engine, use Torque or make a Unreal or Half-Life MOD. The difference between you and the people who won the Make Something Unreal contest is that the people who won the Make Something Unreal contest actually, at some point, sat down and designed a game.
Comment of the year
Alas, since you're so cheap or broke that you won't shill out for web hosting, none of us can see the list of your tremendously interesting accomplishments, hosted as they are on GeoCities.
Comment of the year
I sat down last year and wrote up a scratch game of what would be tekken world. I'm a game designer and not a programmer though. So while I was able to do collision detection. learn how to do animation, key in moves to joystick, have the camera follow well, and all that other basic computer stuff, I had no game. The amount of coding I'd have to put in the game to make it work would be about 15 years. I spent a full year coding it with no distractions though. And the game would be fun. Imagine Street Fighter 2 where you level up, and explore a world, and fight more than one monster at once and other players. Its like a MMORPG, but it has action. Also since I know my statistics, items and balance, the treasure system would be aluring. On top of it, would be a kingdom management system where you could hold land. Theres more about it on my website, but no one's attempted Tekken World yet, even though you see TONS of side fighter clones. Its easy to get the basics up, but its tough to do the models and levels for it all without a team. So yeah, I've spent several thousand hours trying to do it on my own, but its not enough, you need a team.
God spoke to me.
Have you played Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance or Mortal Kombat: Deception yet?
Or possibly, Mortal Kombat Adventures, Vol. 1 released on the Playstation?
How about Dynasty Warriors: Empires? Or the Story mode in Soul Calibur, Soul Calibur II, Tobal No. 1, Tobal No. 2 or Ehrgeiz?
Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
Yeah, I don't have the cash for high grade webhosting. Check back in an hour or two if you care to read about my game design documents. Since you asked, I'll post my achievements here:
This is just my virtual trophy room.
Ranked #1 in 1v1,2v2, and 3v3 in Warcraft3 at the same time.
First player to 1500 wins in Warcraft3, Blizzard even gave me a shout out on their main web page.
Ranked #1 in Starcraft and BroodWar.
Beat StreetFighter 2 classic with all perfect rounds on hardest AI.
Beat Zelda 1 without using the sword until Gannon's Level.
Beat Dracula on CastleVania 1 without dying.
Ranked #1 worldwide on 3 different characters in Diablo 2 hardcore.
Beat Wolfenstien 3d on Death Incarnite without saving.
Beat Doom 1 & 2 on nightmare with alot of saving
Beat Angband Ironman mode(no taking up stairs)
Gained 30 lives in Contra 1 the hard way:earning them by beating the game repeatedly.
God spoke to me.
So get a fucking team. When are you going to stop making excuses for your pathetic self and go out there and change the world?
Those MOD makers in the Unreal contest I talked about? They put together teams to get their games made. What the hell's stopping you?
Comment of the year
You are one of those rare few here on Slashdot I just have to follow. I would say you were a troll, but a part of me wants to believe that people like you exist. It seems to me that you lack the ability to truly assess your own abilities and reality. Just like with your religion, you try to argue some form of logic with people...but your logic is so flawed it is impossible to take you seriously. So you claim to be the best RTS player in the world (or at least with a few games). I'll play along and pretend this isn't just another delusion. Being really good at video games has nothing to do with being a good designer. You see, you are using messed up logic by saying that as if it matter. If you were #1, of course people would look at your strategies and try to learn from them. But just because you say you can predict the future of games, when other people have validly pointed out that stuff have existed before you thought it up, does not make you a world class designer. You have to do something. What separates you from world class designers is that you have yet to design anything, yet to really show any skills (I mean, in something as important as God, you have an awful looking page with spelling errors), and basically just say a lot of bs that everyone can see through.
I can't get to your pages because you somehow managed to overwhelm the server with your text. But I don't even need to read it, since we are not even close to true artificial intelligence in any form. I have a Master in CS, I took plenty of AI courses. No one is close yet. But the generel concept of having good AI has been around for a long time...like in HL where the troops will shoot at you and then flush you out with grenades if you hide. Saying you want true AI is like a 4 year old saying he wants a giant robot with lasers to shoot people. It sounds great, but let's see you do it. If you were smart enough to actually create something truly AI, you would be a rich, rich man. The only way you will be rich is if some sucker is pulled in by the garbage you spew out.
But good trolls so far...I am having fun...I will keep an eye on you.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Nah, I haven't played any of those. I guess I'm so focused on a fighter being an online world that I hadn't considered people may have had single player RPG worlds out of Mortal Kombat genres. I'll check them out. Last game I played that'd be anything like my game was the bouncer, but the controls were very shoddy without a lot of options to switch targets, or go free form fighting.
God spoke to me.
You have the really good bands and singers that often go unrecognized except by the hardcore (Intelligent Systems, Treasure) and the mega-stars who are, er, less than impressive (EA, Take Two). Too often though, the megastars are one-hit wonders. Here EA is more of a Jive Records than an actual boy band. The concept lives on, they just put new faces on it. E.g. in the 90s it was shoot aliens, but now you have to shoot nazis to be popular, so WWII FPS is the star of the day. However, Treasure and other amazing studios are consistently creating amazing new titles every year, and there is a growing indie games scene which is just waiting to explode (the recently posted Darwinia, Moonpod's upcoming Mr. Robot and Battlescape titles, Alien Hominid and their publisher O3, and more). Things keep on ticking, but to expect the games industry to somehow become dramatically less crap-filled than other commercial industries is unrealistic. Can we bolster our indie gaming community more? Hell yes! But not without a little industry support (e.g. Fox Searchlight - where is the EA Underground studio???).
Soul Calibur II WAS online...in Arcades.
If Bouncer is what you were thinking of, Jet Li's Rise to Honor is basically an upgraded version of that.
A different example of something like this is Initial D, Arcade Stage. You have a car you can upgrade after winning credits via racing the computer or other drivers, and it saves your progress onto a purchaseable 100 yen card. You can then take that card to any Initial D machine and carry your car upgrades with you, to challenge others across the nation/world.
Basically, I'm telling you what others are saying. You don't have "revolutionary" ideas, you have "evolutionary" ones. Your ideas are minor, but completely predictable upgrades to current concepts, which all evidence points to as having been envisioned by someone else before you.
Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
You have a LOT of free time for someone who can't actually make an actual game.
Comment of the year
You're right, my ideas are as you mentioned, incrimental upgrades on a good thing, refinements. Yet I think these refinements will resonate so strongly that they will form monopolistic vortexes where its the ONLY game people will want to play. You see some artificial monopolies being formed around sports already, but I think these new monopolies will occur because of the players. Its an old concept:player driven content, but it hasn't been executed very well. Even a minor execution with a huge player base and rating system to sort out the drivel will result in 'everyone' wanting to play the game. So in that way its revolutionary, but you're right I mainly focus on enhancements rather than anything spectacularly new. I'm not original, I'm a game player. I play a game into the ground and see what's missing.
God spoke to me.
Since you asked, I'll post my achievements here:
This is just my virtual trophy room. Ranked #1 in 1v1,2v2, and 3v3 in Warcraft3 at the same time. First player to 1500 wins in Warcraft3, Blizzard even gave me a shout out on their main web page. Ranked #1 in Starcraft and BroodWar. Beat StreetFighter 2 classic with all perfect rounds on hardest AI. Beat Zelda 1 without using the sword until Gannon's Level. Beat Dracula on CastleVania 1 without dying. Ranked #1 worldwide on 3 different characters in Diablo 2 hardcore. Beat Wolfenstien 3d on Death Incarnite without saving. Beat Doom 1 & 2 on nightmare with alot of saving. Beat Angband Ironman mode (no taking up stairs). Gained 30 lives in Contra 1 the hard way: earning them by beating the game repeatedly.
One of your greatest achievements is that you beat Doom 1 on Nightmare mode? This HAS to be a joke. Who are you really? Warren Spector has a good sense of humor. Romero's too full of himself to recognize the irony. Aha! John Carmack, is that you?
I've been designing and programming on a myriad of projects over the years. Creativity, to me, is something I view on an individual basis and not a generalization (as this article has portrayed). Games, like many artforms, are extremely diverse. The project cycles can be short or long, but you'll always have an opportunity to move on to something new and different to keep you fresh. Even on the same genre of project, an individual designer's roles can vary in such a way that the work is not tedious or repetitive.
I'm sorry, I would have liked to believe you up until the point that you said that true AI was your idea. That could not possibly be your idea, it has been around since the early days of Science Fiction. I want to create true A.I. too, however I am actually doing something about it. If I do succeed in my goal of creating true A.I I will not make absurd claims about it being my idea.
Do they look like rock stars? No. More like 1980s rap stars. Who looks like rock stars then? Kernel hackers. OS hackers look like church music stars and hacker anthropologists look like movie stars. As you see, all of the hackers look like stars, but only kernel hackers look like rock stars, except those who look like sport stars. If you have any other "Ask Slashdot" questions, you know where to find me.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
All the old greats worked in a different industry - a smaller one, with smaller teams, smaller budgets, and more risk-taking.
It should come as no great surprise they've ended up going back to their roots and doing work as indies or for portables. I know *I* wouldn't want to put up with the crap that goes on at EA or Atari or whatnot.
No - they just invent projects to compete for the X-prize.
I'm sorry to get into this flame war, but I just couldn't resist...
CrazyJim, you first start off by claiming "I'm a world class game designer", then mention you never actually finished any work, then finally admit "my ideas are [...]upgrades on a good thing, refinements [...] I'm not original, I'm a game player. I play a game into the ground and see what's missing".
Now, from that, one could extrapolate either that you have no clue about what you're talking about OR that you spend too much time lamenting and not enough doing something.
Anyway, until you actually ACCOMPLISH something (pitch your ideeas to some game studios ; heck, start an open source project if nobody else wants to do it), you have no right to claim being a "World Class Game Designer". A "World Class Game Player" yes, but that's still a long way from "Designer".
This is under no circumstances meant as a personal attack - it's just stating some facts, and giving you a harsh, but friendly advice.
Almost nobody remembers the second person that claimed inventing the radio, now does it ?
By reading this signature you agree to not disagree with the post you just read.
Thats the thing, I know games so well I'm overlooked.
I'm only telling you this because I hope you'll listen. You're not being overlooked because you're really good at playing video games. You're being overlooked because playing video games has absolutely zero bearing on software development, and because nobody starts in game design.
What you're doing is saying "I have this neat idea for a jet engine that eats peroxide to keep itself clean, put me in the cutting edge lab at SkunkWorks," and all the while, your resume shows no experience in aeronautics, physics, materials engineering, mechanics or math.
If you want to be a game designer, first you have to become a programmer; no successful artist can work in ignorance of their tools. I say this with firmament having read your web page; not to be rude, but some of the things written there seem to be an indication of total ignorance of machine limitations.
You suggest things like that once we get machine vision going, suddenly AI will just jump into our laps, with neither any fortifying argument nor any evidence, and seemingly without realizing that many non-intelligent creatures can see. Belay any discussion of the watershed level of the intelligence level of a deer, please; we're well past the level of the intelligence of cockroaches already, and many far simpler creatures than cockroaches have sight.
Your progress in AI page contains things like logs of the crashes of MS Windows, frustration with image blending algorithms and compilers, photographs of rooms, but nothing actually about artificial intelligence beyond a rant filled with points like "okay, so, we need it to imprint like a duck, that'll be good, that way our computer will trust us and obey us; one way to teach it would be to put stuff on disk, but better would be voice recognition; you can use verbal commands to teach it, as long as they're in terms of objects and actions it's already familiar with." Maybe this'll be a shock to you: we don't have any computers which even have the concept of familiarity yet.
Making a list of loosely-related speculations about what might work well is not research, and it is most certainly not invention. If you want to be taken seriously, get rid of the list that says "my best invention is potential AI, the reason Cyc fails blah blah blah." Nobody's interested in bare speculation; it's useless.
Write functioning code, or stop pretending to be more than you are. This is hardly even up to the level of armchair quarterbacking.
StoneCypher is Full of BS
Here's the thing. Under your definition, there are about a zillion World Class Game Designers. By which I mean, people like you who have a few good ideas for things they'd like to try.
But that's not what makes a world class game designer. A real world class game designer actually goes out and puts the ideas into action. When you say things like "it's hard to make a game without a team" welcome to part of the job of a game designer: corraling a team!
Ideas are cheap. At our last pitch meeting (where we go over potential game ideas and narrow the focus down to one or two games that we will actually make) we had over 50 ideas any one of which could have made a pretty good or even really great game. We only have time to work on one of those. I guarantee you that every other game company in the world is in the same boat. For every game that they publish they have dozens of really great ideas that they don't have the time or resources to make. So when you come up to them and say "I have some really great ideas" don't be surprised if they kind of laugh at you. They already have too many great ideas. Why would they want more?
Game design is not coming up with great ideas. Game design is taking great ideas and then hitting them until they bleed pages and pages of technical specifications that tell the programmers, artists, sound engineers, writers and QA team exactly what to do to make the game really great. Then going and cutting half of your great ideas due to time constraints. Then going back and rewriting half of what's left so that it'll fit within current hardware limitations. Then testing the ideas on real people and finding out that some of your solutions to problems don't work and fixing them. And doing this over and over again.
Game design, like just about any difficult creative tasks is not about the inspiration that starts it but about the hours of stubborn persistence that gets it done.
I have a lot of opinions about Cyborgs and Architects
Beat Doom 1 & 2 on nightmare with alot of saving
You might want to skip this one when listing accomplishments...
So yeah, I've spent several thousand hours trying to do it on my own, but its not enough, you need a team.
Assuming "several thousand hours" >= 2000, I find it amazing that you spent at least 50 work weeks @ 8 hours/day and didn't come up with something that was at least playable.
Btw, there are several remarkable games and mods out there done by a single coder.
One final question: Are you Derek Smart?
Isn't the proper carrer path for game designers Tester -> Level Designer -> Game Designer?
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
>One final question: Are you Derek Smart?
:-)
He can't possibly be. He hasn't used the word "fuck" or attacked any vending machines yet.
Maybe John Romero and Sid Meier's illegitemate love child though...
Erotic is when you use a feather. Exotic is when you use the whole chicken.
None exist, except for people who write games like grandtheftendo.
For those burn out types, you are working in a narrow field.
So you might say, do novelists burn out? Directors? Actors? Art designers?
I want to know does a mother of 3 children ever burn out. A true mother is one of the most impressive and respectable things in this world.
Feminism is evil.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
Personally I don't think that Creatively fades with time, I think it gets better, and rock stars (nearly) always produce better music later in their careers, but as some stars don't change their output significantly from their orginal work, it just doesn't seem as orginal and therefore appealing.
It also has a lot to do with the right time and place. Nirvana was in the right time and place, if they had appeared on the scene 5 years earlier or later, they would have been noone. Imagine if Kings Quest came out now (with better graphics and such), hardly anyone would notice, but 15 years ago it was amazing...
Why are people linking to some person's blog, as if they are valid, reliable journalists? This "article" is just a glorified troll posting.
Let's face it, if "Black & White" had been released without hype and it had some other designer's name on it, we'd all have praised it without the microscopic scrutinizing the media ended up doing. Everyone WANTED to find fault with it because of the hype it had. In the end, it was a brilliant game!
And secondly, why the comparison to "rock stars"? Please! Wishful thinking from geeks who want to be famous. Everyone in every field can and do burn out. So don't compare these guys to rock stars, just cuz their names occasionally appear in game magazines.
In theory. However, there are two factors which may impact on that:
1.There's a lot of game dev programs at various colleges now, and a lot of dev houses are pulling folks from there.
2.There's still a lot of designers with shipped titles under their belt who are looking for work.
Yes, it may still be possible to claw your way up through the ranks, and it's easier at a smaller dev house (where the rest of the team gets to know you better), but it's not automatic.
http://www.apa.org/journals/psp/psp7761121.html
It's time to get your head out of your ass dude...
For one, as mentioned before, you seem to have your head stuck up your ass.
Secondly, with a nice premium Geocity account *cough* you don't really seem to be going for it.
Third up, I am still hesitating if you're simply a troll... or worse.. That you actually belive the fantasy world you are living in.
If the first : Nice trolling attempt ; If the second : Wake up and smell the f*cking coffee.
I'll take the liverty to answer that question for him :
"Reality"
Crazy Jim,
Good name, because you are crazy. I went to your website and your games are terrible. If you are world class, I must be galaxy class because I am so much better. My game idea is to make a online RTS FPS MMORPG. its called empires of pac-Craft!1!! It is so good. You control armies of pacmen that battle ACROSS TIME! Pacman is still a top selling game! I'm making it even better. alsoyou get Tetris-based inventory. If you cant make your stuff line up like tetris blocks you lose it. Ha ha ha. Awesome! It's for hardcore gamers, not girls or boys! Seriously, everyone talks about massives,, but no one has this great idea of mine. When you buy the game you are teamed up with some other player. Maybe the President of USA or an angry chinese kid. Whoi knows it doesn't matter. That is the only person you can play against so my game makes high scores and world peace because you get to know each other and differences and stuff. I don't know how to program yet, but I've written codes for big head mode and free lives in m$word so I just need some help. I'm looking for artists because the game will be in 2ds and 3ds and maybe 4ds if we have time. ha ha ha. seriously!!! It will hopefully come out on the PS3 because I should have the money to make it by then. My grandpa is going to die soon and hes rich! So um, yeah, Crazy Jim I'm gonna hire you to fire you when I'm rich. ha ha ha! seriously.
Games have become derivative because its cost have risen so this has to be weighed vs. profit potential.
I dont think game designers have gotten worse, they just have enormous pressure to make a product thats going to get someone to fork over $50. So it better damn well be good enough to get that $50. You see the prices of games haven't changed all that much but the cost to produce them has skyrocketed so this necessarily reduces innovation and risktaking because now when you make a game and it flops you are out a shitload of resources that would have been better spent elsewhere and not "wasted" on a niche game.
I thought at first that this was a "Joe Job" type post, where some AC was trying to discredit the jimsager web site by coming across as an arrogant bastard in the parent post.
Then I visited the site.
My god, my god.
Compared to his site, the parent post is a paragon of modesty.
This guy's head must be the size of Jupiter.
I wrote a doc like this when I was 9, which i suspect is close to your age...mentally at least.
Has been trying to learn Esperanto for eight years. (Still useless)
Rimmer has failed his astronavigation exam on no less than 13 occasions
.
Captain's Comments from the crew's confidential reports
Arnold Rimmer, Technician, 2nd Class.
Captain's remarks: "There's a saying amongst the officers: If a job's worth doing, it's worth doing well. If it's not worth doing, give it to Rimmer.
"He aches for responsibility but constantly fails the engineering exam."
Astoundingly zealous. Possibly mad. Probably has more teeth than brain cells.
Promotion prospects: comical.
Arnold J. Rimmer
How many designers get stifled or told what to do by markteting? Interesting to see that folks like Mat Genser, Greg Johnson, the Gollop brothers, John Freeman and Anne Westfall, were not interviewed. How many game reviewers have killed innovative new games because they weren't the newest prettiest shooters? What happens to game design when there is no more technological innovation? (the end should be real-time raycastracing) Hopefully, company will return to innovative new game play. EA the Microsoft of the gaming world
I have never promoted someone whose skillset was artistic and tool-use oriented into a software development position. In fact, going through the people I know, I can't think of almost anyone which has come into game design this way; it is my opinion that this is the "farm boy makes good" myth of our profession.
If you want a software development job, get a junior software development position. You'll be paid and treated like any other entry job, but at least it'll be in the right market. Also, don't follow these myths that small houses are easier to climb up the ranks through; it's the big houses like EA and Take Two which have the resources to hire unknowns and take risks on individuals. A five man operation which is hiring a sixth person will not risk 16% of their workforce on an unknown. EA, however, sees cheap labor; if you can do well there for a year, then the small houses will snap you up like gold.
Ask a lawyer, a surgeon, an architect. What you have to do is break your back with ridiculous hours for no pay for a year as a faceless minion of some gigundous corporation, because in those places you can make your name. Once you have the ability to say something like "yeah, I did the physics system on FIFA 2006, and I have a game design I'd like to implement," you will be taken far more seriously than if you just said "Hi, I have this GDD, hire me please."
Tester is a maybe-in; they're semi-code-oriented. If I were you, though, I would be sure to attempt the junior positions.
StoneCypher is Full of BS
You predicted that graphical MUDs would be successful after years of successful text-based MUDs
Actually, his prediction postdates the first successful graphic MMOs, too. Have a look at the early histories of GEnie, Delphi and Compuserve; they offered massive online games whose game mechanics, if not whose quality of graphics, frequently rivalled or bettered those available today.
StoneCypher is Full of BS
I wish i was a world class game designer like you.
Come to think of it...never mind, i like not being full of myself and trying to make people think i have a lot of information to offer.