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It's the Economy, Stupid
This Sunday's political column on Joystiq gets into the economics of games, and why Canada's encouragement of game developing may have a very positive impact on the industry of the future. In the same vein as France's declaration of games as art, the 'Great Canadian Videogame Competition' may just mean more great games for gamers, more jobs for game makers, and the chance for a new EA or Ubisoft to emerge. From the article: "While the nanny staters trip over one another in their rush to legislate games, they are missing an opportunity to embrace an industry that grows bigger every year, one that could brings jobs and educational opportunities to their constituents. ESA boss Doug Lowenstein talked about the economic benefits of the video game industry at this year's E3, pointing out that U.S. sales of games for all platforms surpassed the $10 billion mark in 2004. But more importantly, the game industry stimulates another $7.7 billion in related spending, bringing its net effect to $18 billion."
And that will get the nannies and do-gooders off our backs? No thank you. Gamers need to assert themselves politically and demand their freedom. Let the gaming industry make their billions without my tax dollars (they get enough from me directly).
And let's stop subsidizing oil companies to make money and subsidizing farmers to lose money.
So can I expect "Doug and McKenzie's Beer Bash" soon?
...and the chance for a new EA or Ubisoft to emerge.
Whoa, whoa...back up the wagon train, Hoss, I think we missed a turn - it would be a good thing to have another EA?!?
Reality has a conservative bias: it conserves mass, energy, momentum...
that number would probably be even higher if you include pen and paper rpg's and other such games (magic, DnD, Rifts, Warhammer 40k, etc.).
Enjoy Multicultural Non-competitive Curling '07!
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
In the same vein as France's declaration of games as art, the 'Great Canadian Videogame Competition' may just mean more great games for gamers, more jobs for game makers, and the chance for a new EA or Ubisoft to emerge.
EA messes up so much of its product out of stupid policies like high programmer turnover and insisting on long-running franchises like Madden 20XX and others.
What the game industry needs is for the PC to reemerge, which wont happen until there's an OS for PCs that 'just works'. People use consoles over PCs because their PC is splorked full of viruses and spyware so all their games run like crap, even on expensive hardware. That's in addition to the constant battle over whose responsibility it is to get the game to work: the video card company or the game company.
EA messes up so many PC games it's surprising they still make them. Bugs galore, lack of optimization, and console-like limitations all end up in the final product. It ends up ruining otherwise excellent games such as Global Operations.
That's one reason Valve kicked so much ass--they release games when they are DONE (yeah I know EA helped distribute hard copies of HL2, but valve sold most of the copies themselves through downloads). I'd put half-life 2 up against any single player game EA ever produced.
Latewire
10 + 7.7 = 17.7, not 18.
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
Am I the only one here that thinks Governmental interference into the market is generally a bad thing? I really don't want to see government subsidized games.
You can talk all you want about market failures, but I seriously doubt that video games qualify as one.
Youths of today are spending less and less time watching TV, and more time gaming and browsing the web
National TV of various nations have a long history of state subsidized programming to further said nation's cultural values.
So, now they have the choice of subsidizing games to do the same thing, or watching the upcoming generations fed with even more US "propaganda" (as most game companies are american, and thus reflect american values).
And with the current state of US moral(s/ism), I can't say I'd blame anyone for wanting to expose the children to something more appropriate.
Also, I think exposing everyone to different cultures is a good thing. The various cultures of the world is a treasure chest - do we really want them overrun and wiped out, when a small investment could be all it takes to save them in this new world?
I'm a dreamer, the world is my playpen. But hey, I'm a serious person, I can't dream all the time.
The article is not about subsidizing game makers. The article is about the economic impact a very large company like EA or Ubisoft could make to an area. Game makers provide numerous jobs in not only software development but also in IT, any business discipline and if the company manufactures on-site, there are skilled labor jobs and even unskilled labor jobs available.
Providing incentives for a company to a move a plant of any kind into an economically depressed area is almost always a boon to the area. Even if the tax hit is taken in the incentive, the tax revenue goes up because more people are working than before and that is a constant source of revenue. There doesn't have to be any tax revenue expenditure to make that happen. However, it does need the support of the law makers and government to make it happen.
In the same vein, having another company the size of EA or Ubisoft is a good thing, regardless of anyone's opinions about the quality of the product they produce. A large company provides a large environment, full of resources and experienced people that can support many entry level positions. Those entry level positions are filled by entry level candidates that have a vast environment to learn in. Once they learn, they either move up the ladder and make thier own impact on that company or they go elsewhere to try and do better than that company. Either way, it provides choices to consumers. Give consumers choices and they will go for what they like. That drives competition which drives advancements and yields a more enjoyable gaming experience for teh consumer.
Just because Madden 2007 isn't the Slashdot communitiy's cup of tea doesn't mean that there aren't a million other sports fan out there who love the thought of being able to play NFL Coach on thier couch at home and see how well they will do. EA and Ubisoft are large and incharge because no matter how poor anyone thinks thier games are, the bottom line is that they sell games and that is what drives any business, profit.
"which wont happen until there's an OS for PCs that 'just works'."
When it comes to a PC for games, I don't want something that just works: I want something to play, too. The virus thing you mention has little impact on this: stand-alone consoles were kicking the PC's A$$ in the game department long before the big era of spyware and viruses.
Advantages the consoles have over PC's? Load time and UI. If you want to play a DVD game on a playstation, chances are you will already be playing the game (power on to play time) BEFORE your PC is even booted to its desktop. And then on the PC, if you have never played the game before, you have to spend 20 minutes or so just to install it: a hassle that you don't have on Playstation and other consoles. And then there's the hassle of having to dig into the PC game's configuration to get it so the arrow keys work for directions like they should. Then there are other matters: console games are typically played on your nice big TV instead of the little computer monitor, and you can plug 4 joysticks into a console game without having the hassle to do the same on the PC (getting USB port-multiplier dongles, unplugging less-used USB devices, etc).
Finally, a PS2 is a PS2. It's not like in the PC workd where you have some current machines that are 1/10 as fast as other current machines and won't run the PC games nearly as well.
Sure, PCs have spyware and viruses, but that has always had little to do with the console advantage over the PC.
Where were you when the voynix came?
The point ------->
Your head
The idea is that rather than trying to pass "Won't someone please think of the children" type legislation, gov't's should be boosting growth of the industry in their region. It fuels the economy, creates jobs, etc... instead of blowing money on constitutional non-starters.
economics? you know i submitted a request for an economics section for slashdot and it got rejected. just because this article was gaming related then it gets a mention on slashdot? is economics really not-geeky-enough for this crowd?
Presumably it encourages competition by lowering the barrier to entry into the market. No idea whether that actually happens.
http://outcampaign.org/
I'm more interested in the idea of support for small games. It would be wonderful to give budding talent-- which might otherwise have to suck up and get a job at Wal*Mart --a chance to be seen.
In today's climate of games with multi-million dollar development, I think this is something we need. The small projects could be downloaded on any of the modern platforms, and the online services get a nice tax break for 'supporting the arts' (everyone's a winner).
Canada is world famous for their "subsidized" short films and excellent animation. IMHO, this news very exciting!