Slashdot Mirror
The Battle For the Game Industry's Soul
An anonymous reader writes "The NY Times has a story about the imminent release of Battlefield 4 on 29 October, as it's one of the most highly-anticipated video games of the year. The most interesting part of the article is where it highlights what a mammoth undertaking such 'AAA' games have become. There are hundreds upon hundreds of people working full time on it, and hundreds of millions of dollars tied up in its development. These number have been rising and rising over the years; how big do they get before it becomes completely unfeasible to top your last game? The article also points out that the PC platform is beginning to wane in popularity. Nobody's quite sure yet whether it'll level out or go into serious decline, but you can bet development studios are watching closely. With bigger and bigger stakes, how long before they decide it's not worth the risk? Even consoles aren't safe: 'Electronic Arts is nevertheless trying to extend franchises like Battlefield to devices, because it must. But at the same time, it has to grapple with the threats undermining traditional gaming. Though the classic consoles are getting reboots this fall, there is no guarantee that new models will permanently revive the format's fortunes.' And of course, the question must be asked: do we even want the 'AAA' games to stick around?"
Since 1898
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" There are hundreds upon hundreds of people working full time on it, and hundreds of millions of dollars tied up in its development. "
How many people do you think it took to make The Avengers? How many millions?
The video game industry is starting to mirror the film industry, with studio houses having one or two giant blockbusters every month, and using profits from those to fund the smaller "filler" films. And then, you have the even smaller, independant type films, such as what ends up at Sundance or TIFF.
The Game Industry doesn't have a soul. After all the failed DRM, the way they treat their developers and abandoning older game servers that many still use, it's clear they don't have a conscience or a soul.
Let them their respective deities sort them out.
And of course, the question must be asked: do we even want the 'AAA' games to stick around?"
I've been thinking a lot about this in the wake of the release of Grand Theft Auto V. I've been an aficionado of the series all along, and have played all of the titles but Chinatown Wars. And clearly, Rockstar's ability matched their goals best with GTA: San Andreas. This game, on the other hand, has been fairly pathetic by comparison. It's far, far buggier. Once you beat the single player campaign there's nothing to do in single player any more, so you are forced to play online in order to continue to do heists and so on. The online component is horribly buggy; some days I'll have to re-join an online session after every attempt to join one. And since there's no function for "start this job for your crew only", and most players are too stupid to change who a job is open to, you often get to join a job and then get kicked to make room for crew members. Still no iFruit app for Android, which is still being advertised within the game, because Android app development is apparently too hard for Rockstar. Probably they hired a good iOS developer and a crap Android developer.
Thing is, I still like sandbox games. And there's no third-party engine.
However, it's clearly possible to displace the competition. I haven't bought a flightsim or racing sim in ages. Maybe someone will crank out a Sandbox engine.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The creativity which went into Monkey Island, The Longest Journey or Grim Fandango, or even Curses and Zork Zero, leave me bored when I confront what is merely a technical exercise. I haven't enjoyed an FPS since Thief.
I remember watching Titanic when it first came out. It was a watershed: after this, films would not be defined by art, but by geekery. And everyone can apply an engineering technique, really.
Battlefield 3 was no fun to play. It was a real system hog, had unacceptably long map load times, had an external HTML-based server browser that sucked, and the gameplay pretty much consisted of you entering the game, and being mowed down by a higher ranking player with more unlocked gadgets in the first 20 seconds. Battlefield 2 was a lot of fun. Battlefield 2142 was also great (Scifi-themed) fun. Battlefield 3 sucked bad in terms of simple things like "overall enjoyment" and "fun gameplay". As for Battlefield 4, I personally have little hope that EA has learned anything from Battlefield 3's gameplay problems. I'm guessing that it will suck on the gameplay side like BF3 did, but that it will have prettier graphics (which of course will require a bang-up-to-date PC or laptop to enjoy properly). My 2 Cents...ü
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
I booted up a few of my fairly recent FPS purchases last night for PC just to get a sense of where the community is at. CS:S, BF2, BF3, BFBC2, TF2, Q3A, CoD (x), L4D(1-2), etc all still strong. The thing about it is, there are so many decade old shooters that just wont die. I can still play CS 1.6 and will prefer it to any new Call of Duty. But why? Is it a comfort thing? Nostalgia for a past era? Simplicity? Muscle memory? Surely some of that.
..
The new games are still fun, but they feel 'tinny', or less substantive than I'd come to expect for millions of ducats dumped in to a piece of software. With many modern shooters, I feel like they are evolving into a caricature of what a decent shooter would be.
Also, I think as the PC gaming generation gets older fewer newbies (In all due respect of course!) back-fill our ranks. I hope I'm wrong. Anybody got stats on our rate of attrition? LMGTFY yada yada
'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
There are various reasons why gamers start to turn away from those so precious "triple-A" titles.
1. Boring old game in a new cloth ... oh silly me, how could you SELL the same game again?
I think I'm not the only one who is fed up with buying the same game over and over. Battlefield is no exception to that. Lemme guess, new weapons and a few new scenarios with a few new graphics and some shiny... else, same shit as last year. Still the same game modes, still the same problems with cheaters, still the same interface, still the same options; It is simply still the same game. Yes, people will buy it because it's the new one, it's the shiny one, and some of the killer bugs that bothered you the most in the previous games are finally fixed, which only begs the question why they existed in the first place and whether it would not have been much more feasible to simply fix them instead of
2. DLC
Riiight, that way you can. The new magic of the gaming industry: DLC. Or, as I prefer to call it, "buying the last few chapters of the book extra". Because that's what DLC more and more turns into. You pay full price for a game only to find out that not only its addon, sorry, DLC was already planned, but it is actually an important part of the story which is not concluded before you bought at least 2 addons, turning a 50 bucks game into one that costed closer to 100, just to see the friggin' story of it, we're not talking about some additional storyline or actual addon content in the traditional sense, where a game is sold and if it's a success a "mission disc" gets released. These "addons", or rather, second part of the game, are already planned and developed before the game hits the stores. Your only hope is that the game bombs enough that you don't care about the end of the story.
And don't even hope that you could play multiplayer anywhere without the DLC, even if it's not part of the multiplayer game. Which leads us to
3. Planned obsolescence
With multiplayer servers being held firmly in the grasp of the game developers, and you having no chance to even play a local game, they dictate when and for how long you may play it, at least its multiplayer part, which happens to be the interesting part of those games. Rest assured, the moment the next version of the game comes out they'll turn off the old servers to force you to buy the next one (which is essentially the old one, but you can actually play multiplayer again...).
So if you wonder why people turn away from AAA titles, here is your reason. Indie games are cheaper, they offer more variety (because indies can actually dare producing anything but "tried" concepts), they usually offer complete games and they're by no means inferior to those AAA titles. They may lack a bit in graphics, but screw that, I take gameplay over shiny anytime!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The people telling you the PC is obsolete and on the way out are trying to sell you its "replacement."
The only problem is tablets and phones can't replace the PC for the same reason motorcycles and skateboards can't replace your car.
Nobody wants to do real work on a mobile device. Stop pretending they do.
... is sucking because the industry is obsessed with creating movies, not games.
To be honest, that what is marketed as 'AAA'-games is all like Wolfenstein. Walk through a maze and shoot bad guys. The humble bundle games feature original gameplay. This is so much more fun than 'the same game, requiring an even tougher graphics card' I am having a lot more fun with Cookie Clicker than I have with all the battlefield AAA-nonsense together.
You've hit the nail on the head.
The gameplay element of what the press tout as AAA titles hasn't really advanced any since Wolfenstein 3d was released in 1992.
Think about that, no original gameplay in 21 years !
Certainly the graphics are shinier and the weapons are different but the essential gameplay of run around a maze, pick up power ups and ammo, shoot enemies, rinse and repeat hasn't changed....
People don't 'not realize' how much money they're spending. Don't be so condescending of players just so you can take a perceived jab at game developers. People want to play and buy little things. It's a successful technique for expanding the game after release.
By the way, I play on a PC. My favorite game involves extensions and micro-transactions. The platform in no way affects that.
I remember the first time I found I was able to shoot glass out of a window - Counter-Strike. I spent ages doing just that, because of the novelty value - here was a substance in game that reacted the way it would in real life. I recognised it as a limitation of the medium, way back in the day, but it always used to annoy me when I couldn't shoot out a window in Half-Life. Or any game where a locked door impeded progress because I didn't have the key, although I was toting 6 lbs of explosives at the time.
Try shooting the farmer at the start of Halo Reach. Your gun goes bang, and there's a damage splatter appears on the other side of his head, but he won't stop talking. If you keep shooting him, after 10 shots, you die, not because your squadmates have realised that you're shooting civilians and gun you down, but a vengeful god just smites you down.
It'll be interesting to see how far the new engines go in terms of world design. Obviously there won't be civilians, or women, or children, but it'd be nice to be able to shoot out the legs of a water tower and have it collapse, because that's what the objects would do under real-world-conditions, and not just because it's a pre-programmed set-piece and the only way to complete the level. It's be nice to see enemies who weren't Terminators - combat robots who have to be completely destroyed to kill them, that can take all but 1 HP of damage and still be at 100% combat effectiveness. Maybe sometimes some of them could realise that you've just killed everyone else in their squad, and simply decide to run away.
It's also interesting to see how narrow their definitions of 'realism' are - they'll model stubble, sweat, and the texture of equipment webbing, but nobody ever bleeds, or screams, or goes mad. They'll model the correct serial number on an 21st century assault rifle, yet it'll deliver a target grouping that would shame a musket.
And I think Just Cause 2 was the last game I played where you really seemed to have a huge amount of freedom over the order you did the missions in, and there was a whole lot to do if you didn't want to do a mission. I hate purely linear games, where you have to do one thing, and until you do that to the game's satisfaction, you're not getting to do anything else. As soon as you reach a situation where you *have* to do something, rather than *want* to do something, that's work, not play; and if I'm working, I expect to be getting paid, not paying for the privilege.
And of course, the question must be asked: do we even want the 'AAA' games to stick around?"
No, we don't have to ask that question. We already have the answer. GTA V sold over eleven million copies in the first day of sales. It's grossed over a billion dollars. Only a complete fucking idiot would doubt that there's a market for good, high-quality AAA games.
And of course Slashdot seems determined to put those complete fucking idiots' thoughts on the front page.
PC Games are doing just fine. PCs themselves are going down in popularity due to white collar workers switching from cumbersome laptops to tablets. But games have nothing to do with this. Steam is running strong and with Valve soon releasing a dedicated gaming OS for PCs (yes, Steambox is a PC too) things are only going to get better. What's quickly becoming a third class citizen is the publishing industry, putting their faith in the gaming toys (consoles and mobiles) instead of a one, true, open, stable gaming platform.
But things will work out. What media will soon call "a re-emergence" of PC gaming will in practice be just another day for PC gamers, and a catastrophe for other platforms. But that's how the industry works - it follows the loudest one, not the smartest one.
Cloud Imperium's opus-in-progress broke $23 million in crowdfunding this week: AAA independent production and PC-focused development. Works like this are injecting a renaissance of fresh air into the stale industry dominated by bug-dollar myopic publishers.
Games in the nineties were innovative because the creative developers were calling the shots; garage operations flourished. Crowdfunding is making that model viable again with modern production values and PC gamers are in for a hell of a ride over the next decade.
Long live disintermediation!
I think he's right. People don't add up the $2 charges to a grand total. It isn't just these games, it's convenience stores, Starbucks, etc. People don't realize that the $2 Candy Bar after work costs them ~$500 a year or that the Starbucks in the morning costs them ~$150 a month.
Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
Publishers are killing gaming on the PC through ever escalating levels of DRM. The PC has pretty well always been the better platform for gaming from a technical sense for hardware capability. You had the ability to upgrade your system, patch it and customize it at levels that a console could never match. A console is only updated every so many years, patching is a logistical pain if is even possible and the only customizations you can do are typically to the outside of the case.
The problem is that publishers have been cranking up the DRM to higher and higher levels of entitlement. What originally started as nothing more than deprivation of the product quickly became deprivation of your computer. Games would do things like replace hardware drivers and interfere with your ability to burn CD's or DVD's. The DRM measures were typically not disclosed and worse not uninstalled upon removing the game.
Gamers could spend hours upon hours trying to figure out why their computer wasn't working correctly only to discover that SecureROM or another product had done something like replacing drivers for their hardware. Nobody appreciates having a product sabotage their computer and the DRM companies refused to cooperate with disclosing anything about what they were doing to peoples computers. The result often required hours of troubleshooting at best to a complete rebuild to restore a computer. You also had the loss of the original software that caused the problem to begin with and were typically out at least $50.
Add in stunts like mandatory activation, registration and serial numbers and you end up with something that cannot be used anonymously and forced the disclosure of marketing information. Even when activation worked many companies would then self destruct the ability to use software if you made certain undisclosed changes. Things escalated to the point where simply changing a piece of hardware in your computer would be enough to ruin your game as it then refused to play.
Self entitlement furthered to the point where you had to be online to check in your serial number just to start a game. Publishers were oblivious to the fact that that most of the world does not live in Silicon Valley and for many people this was not reasonable. Once publishers started requiring players to be online in order to play at all they really burned the last of the bridges.
For a regular user, even one who has purchased the software it has become a situation that simply isn't worth it anymore. Countless millions of people have purchased a piece of software only to turn around and then download the pirated version just to get something that worked and didn't break their computer.
Are computers technically superior in just about every way? Absolutely, but the computer gaming industry is imploding from self entitlement and the publishers will have a future of paying higher and higher royalties to Sony, Nintendo or Microsoft.
It's not that PC game sales are dropping: Heck, no we can find Japanese companies releasing their games on PC, which is something that would have never happened 10 years ago. Valve is not having any trouble selling games, and neither do indies.
Now, It'd not surprise me if EA sales on PC were dropping. They decided to build their own ecosystem, one that is not just separate from anything else you can buy on PC, bun one that is drastically overpriced. EA sales can't compete with the sales you can get on anything else. Their console-oriented shooters can't compete with PC-centric ones. Sim City was an unmitigated disaster. They are failing on PC because they've been working very hard at it, and all that work is finally bearing fruit.
The gameplay element of what the press tout as AAA titles hasn't really advanced any since Wolfenstein 3d was released in 1992.
Yeah, no real advances beyond multiplayer, team-based multiplayer, destructible scenery, dynamic maps (as in L4D2), new weapons mechanics (such as Unreal Tournament's bio rifle), emphasis on stealth (such as Metal Gear Solid and Deus Ex), dynamic AI that sends swarms based on player progress and performance (the L4D Director), modding support that allows anything from minor skinning to complete remakes, RPG elements blending in to the FPS, and the aqueducts. Aside from those things, what have the Romans done for us?
And what about dungeon crawlers? They haven't advanced since Nethack. Diablo was better graphics and nothing more.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
The reason to wait is price discounts. You can find significant sales all the time for PC games, which isn't really the case with console games.
If you can't convince them, convict them.
Plus, PC gaming is being described as "dying" each and every console cycle. It never has. It may not have the size and scope of consoles, but unlike them, it endures beyond any overlord's whims.
Try playing your PS2 games on your PS4, or your NES games on your Wii U. If you're lucky, you'll be allowed generously to pay for them again so that you can play them on your new machine... and pay again come the next console since the games never carry over. Isn't it amazing? Meanwhile, I'm playing games from 20 years ago just fine on my PC.
I think you made the GP's point.
Whoopee-doo. I get to splatter the bad guys with goo rather than shoot them with a mini-gun. That's incredibly innovative.
When they're not making you sit through tedious, unskippable cut-scenes and canned dialogue, games are still mostly just following the only corridor available and shooting things, except these days you don't even have to worry about collecting health packs because your health magically regenerates after ten seconds. Even the 'open world' games are still mostly just running around a few streets in a world that's dead when you're not around.
Is it possible, though? As I see it, there's three main problems to overcome:
1. It takes less time to move my finger than my arm, or even my wrist. This means that that a motion controller has less time precision than a button controller. The problem can be lessened by makign the control more sensitive to small movements, but that gets us to the next problem:
2. A button press is less likely to be triggered by accident than a motion control. I dunno about the rest of you, but I can't stay completely motionless except when I want Mario to spin.
3. I'm not a ninja. That means that a game that has me control a ninja can't use one-one mapping of my movements and character movements. This, in turn, means that the control is really using gestures to trigger pre-defined action sequences - in other words, it's imitating pushing buttons, but with me having to devote far more of my attention to coordinating my body rather than the on-screen events. Not only does this kill immersion, but it also poses a potential danger to my surroundings with all the distracted arm-swinging.
But you are not a jedi, thus you can't actually use a lightsaber (problem 3 above). You don't have the Force, and can't sense incoming projectiles and swings in time to block them. The game could block them for you, but then you lose synch between you and the game character. Which also happens if someone blocks your blade.
It's a hard problem.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
there is no car analogy to be made here because the phones of today have more cargo area-equivalent than the PCs of not so many yesterdays ago. It's truly not that long since my desktop PC was less powerful than the phone I'm carrying around now. It doesn't have video out, so it's not suitable as a desktop replacement by any stretch, but many modern phones do.
To be useful for "PC" tasks, a smartphone would need a large monitor (which you mentioned), a Bluetooth keyboard, and an operating system with a multi-window window manager. (The phone itself would sit next to the keyboard and become a trackpad.) It's as if someone made a motorcycle that could pull a trailer, but you end up using the trailer most of the time because you have to carry the tools to do your job to each job site. At that point, you could just buy a car (an Ultrabook laptop) or a truck (a desktop or desktop-replacement laptop).
Not one game ever has ever failed to be pirated.
At launch, consoles are pretty much piracy-free. Several arcade games are still undumped. How long must a work go without piracy before it "fails" in your estimation? The full 95-year copyright term?
What AAA really means is that a lot more money has been spent on details of graphics and sound, not that so much extra effort has been put into the gameplay. As a result, a lot of so-called AAA titles are no more fun to play than the games from the $20 bin.
Like movies, the advertising and hype budget for a AAA title makes it different from the "average" game. And like the movie industry, that big advertising budget brings in the buyers. Unfortunately, much like an overhyped movie, it also results in a lot of disappointed potential fans who expected more from the game after all the buildup.
Do we need AAA titles? Of course not. But as long as there is the lure of winning the "big gamble" by producing a half billion dollar sales hit title, there will be those who'd rather invest in that gamble than focusing on a handful of lesser titles which would cost the same amount.
However, one should never make the mistake of thinking that these trivial little games on cell phones are going to decimate the hard core gaming market. Just because "Angry Birds" has millions of dollars in total sales doesn't mean it's competitive with something like "Half Life." They're totally different styles of games, and satisfy different audiences.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
and even DRM is merely an obstacle to be overcome to get to the Game . That . You . Must . Play . Now .
The problem is that the games suck. Right now in the 'AAA' space we have an orientation something like:
85% production values
5% compelling and entertaining story and writing
10% gameplay
0% replay value
Show me a game like this, and I'll spend rather a lot, and even suffer DRM for it:
10% production values
20% compelling and entertaining story and writing
50% gameplay
20% replay value
When the technology didn't allow for production values to matter, everything was tied up in gameplay, writing, and replayability. Games had to be entertaining to sell.
Now, particularly given the ways that games are marketed (and the synergy between this kind of marketing and the marketing that happens on the hardware side), everything is about jaw-dropping renderings. It feels like the late '80s and early '90s, when everyone in CS departments were printing out raytrace scenes at 24x36 and hanging them on the wall.
At first, it was "omigod thassocool" to see a bunch of floating cones and spheres and rendered bolts with clearly articulated threads reflecting the image of the chessboard on the other side of the picture. But by the mid-'90s, it was like, "humf, what else you got, I am no longer amazed by the fabulousness of this technology."
That's how I feel about games now. A decade or a decade and a half ago, game engines and triangle count and an asymptotic approach to "photorealistic realtime" rendering were enough to make a person shell out $$$ just to "have the experience."
But now it's old hat. Someone else posted in this story about games being all about showing you sliding your car sideways into a flock of sheep. That pretty much sums it up—how many hours do they spend on tableaux like this? It's plots of shiny raytrace scenes on department walls all over again. I had occasion to play a few games (Silpheed, a few Sonics, etc.) on someone's Sega CD setup not so long ago. I was like "Shit, this is fun!" and then shortly after I realized why I had abandoned gaming in the early 2000's. I just preferred to spend my money on more entertaining things.
I find crossword puzzles to be as fun as many of the 'AAA' titles of the last half-decade.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
I don't think I've ever played a AAA title. Well, ok, Skyrim. Lots and lots of Skyrim. And Civ V, if that counts; I don't know that it does. I've seen my friends play games like...um...I don't even know the names of them. Call of Duty: MW was the last one I remember seeing. Oh, and Left 4 Dead. I read a lot about GTA5 on Reddit too.
I regularly purchase games from the Humble Bundle. I recently got Fez and fell in love with it. So clever and so brilliantly designed. I think that game was made by one person, wasn't it? I understand that "AAA" titles look amazing and realistic and everything... but does that really make the game THAT much more fun to play? Serious question. Is the gaming experience, say, *actually* 1000x better if the budget is 1000x more?
I don't disagree that AAA titles push the boundaries of technology w/r/t video gaming, but one of the big criticisms I've seen of these titles is that they essentially become interactive movies, and lose a lot of the "game" aspect; ie. less mentally challenging, more mentally stimulating. I do not know whether or not this is the case, but do people who like AAA titles prefer that sort of game? Hyper-realistic interactive movies?
Plus, PC gaming is being described as "dying" each and every console cycle. It never has. It may not have the size and scope of consoles, but unlike them, it endures beyond any overlord's whims.
Exactly. Tech reporters (who continuously fawn of the latest and greatest gizmos) notice that "sales of new PCs are falling rapidly", while "phone and tablet sales are growing each year", and thus conclude that PCs are "dying" and that smartphones are going to replace them. Smartphones will likely replace a PC for the type of user who just wants to check the occasional e-mail and browse the web a bit while waiting for the bus. In other words, they're great for people who will only *consume* light content.
Most everyone who wants a PC (or laptop) has one already, and they're so insanely powerful we can hang onto them for a good half-decade or so now before replacing them, unlike the 1 or 2 year upgrade cycle of a decade ago. PCs excel at *creating* content, so people who are writing, painting, coding, designing, etc will still be buying PCs for the foreseeable future.
Meanwhile, the smartphone and tablet markets are in a growth period while the market expands and the technology matures. And these new smartphone owners suddenly discover they can play games on these phones! Woo! Another growth market. What do we think will happen when the market for phones and tablets become saturated? Well, they'll drop off just like PC sales are now - essentially going into a "occasional new buyer and replacement" rate instead.
I had the same reaction when pundits and tech writers declared that we'd probably only see one more generation of console ever, because smartphones were the hot new bling, and everyone has one, so why would anyone need a console anymore? The answer is the same as why the PC will never die out: Because consoles and PCs can easily do specific things much better than a smartphone can. Consoles excel at *consuming entertainment content* - far better than any other platform. I don't see the entertainment market dying out anytime in the near future, so I suspect consoles will also be with us for a while.
PC: Type lots of text very quickly.
PC: Precision input with mouse or pointer
PC: Complex content creation of nearly any sort
PC: Open development platforms and distribution / zero or low-cost development
Console: High-end visuals and audio for immersive gaming and entertainment experience
Console: Grab and play gaming - few compatibility issues.
Console: Great for party games or multi-user gaming
Console: Standardized game-optimized input and accessories.
Smartphone: Ultimate in portability
Smartphone: Simple usability with touch interface
Smartphone: Location aware
PCs, consoles, smartphones and tablets will all likely be with us for some time to come, because they all have different strengths and weaknesses.
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.