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Epic's Mark Rein Not an Episodic Fan
Next Generation reports on comments by Epic Games VP Mark Rein, a man who doesn't like the phenomenon of episodic content. At the Develop Conference in Brighton, England he railed against the trend in game design during a keynote speech. He also covered topics such as the costs of next-gen game design, and the ways in which Intel has done disservice to the game development community. From the article: "He said that episodic games could never compete will full-priced products. 'They're competing against massive marketing budgets. Distribution without marketing is worthless. You can't buy retail marketing with a wholesale price of $15.' He added, 'Full-price games have a cohesive start, middle and end.' Rein acknowledged that the game industry already has an episodic model through game sequels, such as Madden, Zelda and Final Fantasy. He said these work because they are full-price and backed by marketing."
The BBC version of this story was entitled, "Game Industry faces Serial Killer." (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5168320.stm ) For the life of me, I thought Jack Thompson had gone on a killing spree. They also had a story, "Brain Sensor allows mind-control," which was referring to controlling things with your mind, not controlling someone else's mind.
What sound do people on rollercoasters make? Hint: it's not Xbox 360.
I believe that there is room for the little episodic developer, though it is shrinking daily. Sports games (like TFA's Madden) will continue, as there is a distinct point after which the data from the old game becomes invalid (after the season). Even without massive amounts of marketing, there are still people (like me) who go out of our way to look for any promising title, not just the one's I've already heard about. I appreciate the effort that goes into these games, and I do not have time to justify paying recurring subscriptions to an MMORPG.
Information wants a fueled airplane waiting at the hangar and no one gets hurt.
Episodes are just a buzzword and we need to stop listening to it. For years PCs have had expansion packs, these usually continued the story or did a side story. How is this any different than episodic content?
And before anyone says "but this is continueing the same story, so it's new!!", Diablo 2's expansion pack did just that.
Stop buying into this crappy hype and open your eyes. It's the same thing we've had since the 80s (at least) with a new name to make the headlines.
I like muppets.
Episodic games can't compete against the mega bucks marketeers like EA can bring to the table? I had a hearty laugh! In a market as closly tied to technologies like the internet, word of mouth will always be king. It doesn't hurt that internet distribution of episodic content makes advertising cheaper too.
When I put down a game, I pick up a new one too. But with years of development between the one I put down and it's sequel, the chances are a lot less that the game I pick up is going to be one of yours. I happen to think that recycled content is a symptom of uncreative developers, something that happens is games already anyways. Maybe buyers will wise up faster in episodic and not tolerate that crap so much and then the real creative developers can increase their market share.
Demented But Determined.
"You can't buy retail marketing with a wholesale price of $15.' He added, 'Full-price games have a cohesive start, middle and end."
I usually wait about 8 months for that $49 game I want to go down to $9.99 at Gamestop. Best Buy, Software Etc, etc... And these are the (formerly) full-price games that have a cohesive start, middle, and end. Even if the end is just like John Dvorak described: when it all comes down to the end of the game, you have to fight a giant bug.
Where were you when the voynix came?
What sets my cynicism meters a-twitchin' is that episodic content seems ultimately to derive from the game companies desires to turn periodic purchases into purchase streams. I've yet to see a case where a company turns something that is naturally a periodic purchase into a stream and actually benefit the consumer more than leaving it alone. You can't create revenue streams by corporate fiat. If you want streams, you're going to need to offer products that are naturally streams, live "server access" (MMORPGS) or other such things.
Against the little problem of "I don't think they have a customer-benefitting reason to exist", all the other problems pale into insignificance.
(Note: I speak of generalities. It's great that you love episodic content, but you are not the totality of the game market. Are gamers as a whole really clamoring to be nickle-and-dimed to death, especially when that saying translates to $5-$10?)
Taking this a step further, I remember back when the original wolfenstein 3d came out, you could play the shareware (remember shareware?) version, then choose to buy the next bit of it, and after finishing that, then buy the final portion of the game. They were literally called episodes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfenstein_3D
I remember this being done for several computer games of that time.
The only difference is you couldn't download the episodes, and if you were from a small town you had to order them and have them sent to you.
There is room for blockbusters, and Episodic content. I think Rein is wrong, there. But, the episodic content will be built on engines like the Doom, Source, or Unreal engine. The blockbusters or bigger games, that come from Epic or iD or Valve, will have the time and money invested in an engine AND a game. While, a small publisher, like Ritual will take the engine, and develop an episode on it. I DO kind of find Valve jumping into Episodic content, odd. I think it is a good fit for Ritual.
Where Episodic content reigns surpreme, is to create a more constant revenue stream for smaller developers. Spending 3 or 4 years building a game can REALLY tax resources. If you can divide that by 2, or even 4, all of the sudden you have a shorter development time, and can start making money. The other advantage I think that episodic content gives you, is the ability to have a nimble storyline. Developers can add cool new "features" to test the water. If it goes well, future episodes can get that feature. If it falls flat on its face, well, they don't have to include it in the next release. Ultimately, as consumers, we ALL win, with multiple styles of game creations. Think of episodic content as those short summer run TV shows on the cable channels. They are entertaining, and short. That is a good thing.
I DO think that Mark hit the nail on the head, when it comes to marketting though. Valve can get away with producing an episode, and realsing it retail. I don't think a lot of that type of content will be distributed on physical medium. There are a LOT of people that do not like "virtual" assets. It also makes it more difficult to sell a "used" game, if you just downloaded it. Episodic contnet is in its infancy. I think it is an exciting concept, and I expect more innovation to come from that type of content, than I will from EA/Vivendi/Activision, and their much more costly (in terms of time AND money) blockbuster hits.
He also accused Intel of killing the PC games market ...
with its integrated graphics laptops and desktops.
"Intel is evil, we need to kick its ass.
The difference in price in offering better graphics
chips is negligible. You couldn't buy a meal for
that price [difference]. We're talking five bucks."
Episodic gaming is BAAAD as I have previously discussed in detail in my previous posts here, here and here.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
I see nothing wrong with episodic content as long as its applicable to the game. I don't think that most games would do well in an episodic format, but for some games it might work, depending on the genre, cost, and time between releases. Graphic adventures are probably the best suited to this.
Small developers certainly can use episodic releases to their advantage. For example, if a small developer waited to release the whole thing and the game was releases with a ton of bugs or other issues that gamers don't like, the company is dead, and the customer is pissed that he spent $50 on a bug-ridden piece of shit, e.g. Ultima: Ascension. (I'm not saying that U:A would have worked in an episodic format, mind you. NOTHING could have saved it from the completely irresponsible ways that EA managed that project.)
At least with episodic content, the developers can get a bit of money up front to keep them going and the gamers get the opportunity to say, "Well, here's where you had problems" or "I didn't like..." and the developers can fix the issue or make changes based on user feedback into the next episode. Meanwhile, the customer only spent $15 or so. So the remaining episodes could be tweaked to implement the fixes/changes with less egg on the developers' faces than if they released the whole game with the same bugs and problems for 3x the price or more.
Personally, the anti-episodic attitudes that I read about seem to stem more from a selfish "I want it and I want it ALL NOW!!!" attitude that doesn't help anyone.
And need I remind you that PJ's Lord of the Rings trilogy was episodic with two books released in movie format every year. (LotR was actually six books, not three.) Yet no one seemed to bitch about how that was handled. I never heard anyone complain that PJ should have finished all three, then released them. But video games, which are no more or less of an entertainment medium, are held to a completely different standard. Interesting.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
You market the original title extremely well, then the rest is all gravy. If your game is good, gamers will flock to the next episodes until it gets bland. Regardless, he doesn't have a leg to stand on. He assumes by default that episodes won't be properly marketed. Whose to say a company can't market each episode well?
Read my short stories - You won't regret it.