The Path to AAA Games

Gamasutra has up a feature discussing an E3 discussion session haunted by some illustrious names in game design. The topic of the panel was The Path to Creating AAA Games. Hosted by Carly Staehlin, the panel featured Matt Firor, Todd Howard, Tetsuya Mizuguchi, Tim Willits, and Will Wright. From the article: "'My biggest failure was Quake 3,' Willits said. 'The game offered perfect multiplayer for hardcore players. In fact, they're still playing it. But the more casual gamers, and other people who actually have money, found playing next to impossible.'"

Comments

Re:WHAT?!?!?

[snorklewacker]

Not to mention toon-ish powerup graphics so hardcore players could spot them across the map. And a dumbed-down lighting model .. Q2 had realtime radiosity lighting, and people bitched about fuzzy shadows. Well look the hell around: if there's more than one light in the room, I guarantee your damn shadow is fuzzy. Running speed in Q2 was more realistic, though I'll grant that needed to be cranked up a bit for gaming effect.

Hell, the assault rifle in Q2 even had muzzle climb that you had to fight. Not that any of the other weapons were terribly realistic, but I thought that was still a nice touch.