JeffCross
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Post by JeffCross on Jun 26, 2015 9:08:54 GMT -6
Is it me or are we in an era where video game producers just don't know or don't care what gamers want?
I know the bottom line is money... but is there another reason too? like all the higher ups just don't play games and their the ones who decide what gets made?...
this is just a flimsy theory based on nothing (lol) so what do you guys think?
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緋月エリ
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Post by 緋月エリ on Jun 26, 2015 12:14:55 GMT -6
I am guessing that video game companies had evolved a lot over the times, no longer are dev. teams working in a small intimate group, and with the ever expanding marketing elements and corporate pressure, it is difficult for dev teams to develop a video game that pleases all demographic. And yes, money is a huge factor, that why DLC's are a thing and we are not sold a game with all of its contents, and certain "premium" content like costumes and weapons just to name a few, required purchasing. It is a sad reality.
As for answering to the fans... our suggestions do not directly reach the game devs in larger companies like Square Enix, it goes through marketing channels and our ideas get filtered. Not only that, larger game companies also have to follow the latest marketing "trend" (ex: going mobile), some companies do it with moderation, maintaining console/PC presence. Some companies completely missed the mark and attempted to go full mobile and abandoning the console scene. Also, the integrating of cultures (western/eastern) is proven to be a challenge for both the game devs and fans... I am going to use our beloved Castlevania as an example... we love Igarashi-sama's (eastern) interpretation of the series, and when Lords of Shadow became a thing, some of us are fine with it, and some of us are not, because of the western style of design, and then there are the new-comers to the series who started by playing LoS, and they would interpret that as the Castlevania standard.
Overall, this issue is very complex... I could be completely off the mark with this, but that's what I am seeing, just many layers of government within a huge gaming company causing our ideas get filtered, the changing gaming trend and company agenda is impacting what gets developed, and the every expanding gaming demographic makes it difficult for game devs and please everyone.
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Arcueid Brunestud
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Post by Arcueid Brunestud on Jun 26, 2015 12:50:38 GMT -6
This tidbit from the Gamasutra interview should answer your question: " Right now, Shenmue is on Kickstarter; you were on Kickstarter; Mighty No. 9 was on Kickstarter. And if you look at Western games, there are many popular rebirths of '90s PC IP. There's clearly a thirst for the games people grew up with, but publishers clearly do not want to address it. Can you talk about the mismatch there?BJ: Games that you and I probably played when we were younger, it was a much smaller thing, a much smaller world. KI: Ever since then, it's become a massive market, mass-consumer, and games have just grown to be this massive thing. It's put publishers into the position where their internal teams have gotten bigger and bigger, and the spends have gotten higher and higher. So they've naturally gravitated toward the Hollywood model, as far as "shoot for the blockbuster." So they're looking for triple-A, 50-million, 100-million dollar productions. What that means a lot of the time is that something in the middle, or on the smaller side, isn't as appealing to them. That's one of the disconnects that I think is occurring. BJ: While yes, it's true, some publishers are going into the indie space, a lot of times their forays involve something that is sub-million. So his game, or a game like Mighty No. 9, or certainly like a Shenmue, finds itself in an awkward middle ground, where the publishers just aren't excited for it, because it doesn't cover their internal high expense of cost for marketing and internal sales teams and etcetera. It's also not so cheap that if it does really blow up, it's going to make 'em a decent amount of money. KI: I also feel that when you talk about Mega Man, or a Shenmue, or a Castlevania game, these are games that have been around for a long time, and they've had multiple installments, and the people who feel nostalgic for them are going to be 30-somethings or 40-somethings, people that have been playing games for a long time. Those people want what they want, and they're very passionate for those games, up to the point where they would spend $100, $200, $300 on a collectors' edition, or something like that, which totally fits within the Kickstarter scheme of things -- "less people, more money" helps cover that budget. BJ: Whereas a publisher has to look back to mass-consumer, mass-market. They can't go to the retail chain and put out a $300 version of the game and expect it to sell to their traditional 500,000-unit, 1 million-unit, 5 million-unit sort of goalpost that they're after. So unfortunately they're in two different directions: One is a specialty core group of consumers who have money to spend to show their excitement in the project; the other is mass-market, going for two million in sales, five million in sales -- but you're going for a fixed, lower price-point. Again, those are just disconnects that are naturally happening between what a big publisher does and what a mid-sized development needs. KI: By that rationale I'm very happy that Kickstarter exists, because it fills a role that a traditional publisher can't." |
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Post by ghaleon on Jun 26, 2015 14:21:41 GMT -6
I posted awhile back in another forum that I think publishers need to go in general, but not exactly. Now I know developers generally can't afford huge budgets without publisher support but I think it's time they start working with lower budgets for their games. It's getting easier and easier to make quality games with lower and lower budgets, in fact I think the whole doujin circle game development model in the east is pretty much the way to go.
Fact is I think publishers are just kinda getting obsolete. I'm not saying they are all bad 100% of the time, I understand a publisher isn't something people would be a fool to say no to, just like I recognize the publisher we will likely enjoy the support of for bloodstained. But I think publishers are kinda like movie rental stores in modern days. With digital purchases, netflix, etc, they just kinda don't have the same need as before, but yet they still retain the same level of control, and lack the 'purity' in their products for the actual gamers. Now that the internet is a thing, and that development software is more common, and much of it being open source and free, and all that. A major job of having a publisher hunt for a box artist, a music arranger, a game manual writer, an editor, etc, etc for joe programmer to make his game is just not as important. Any old shmoe can easily find people with those talents now, or even the software just by doing some online networking. I think it's kind of ironic now however that publishers have kind of recently 'won' their own agenda, when they have failed in the past when they were more neccesary before.
Back up to the time when SNES and Sega Genesis were the main gaming platforms of choice, there was a sudden push for bigger, and more holly-wood esque...with the 3DO, and the CDI, and the sega CD, and publishers trying to shove weird live action videos into every game like that's the thing gaming needs to become a massive market, it didn't work out. But now, that's kind of exactly the kind of stuff that is taking over the market. Maybe not live-action per say, but the movement towards making games about less gameplay, and more about watching heavily scripted for full FMV scenes with hollywood-levels of drama, it's definately there all of a sudden, and people are eating it up.
But I don't think things are really looking low for the 'old gaming purists' (which has nothing to do with gender anything, ugh). While it's true that the heavily advertised and high budget games seem to be losing their gameplay value inf favor of these publisher-oriented tastes, there are still more than enough games that cater to the actual game itself for us to sink our teeth into. The only real tragedy IMO are old classic series owned by companies that still worship the publisher, or by publishers themselves, being neglected or ruined because their charm to gamers was not built on publisher-oriented demands. For example, Final Fantasy...while it's very possible for people to enjoy both the old games and the new, I'd find it hard to believe for anyone to claim they enjoy both with the same mindset. Nobody enjoyed Final fantasy one because they were gripped by the touching story of 4 nameless heroes searching for 4 crystals. It was about surviving challenging encounters with frugal amounts of gold that they had to budget wisely around, and prepare to dive into unforgiving dungeons...now it's about hot damn squareenix are really good at particle effects and camera manipulation as they tell a story about god knows what.
So TLDR... Publishers just aren't needed for game devs hoping to make games of the same vein as before. Use the internet, find the talent needed yourself, make/join a doujin circle (I'm no expert but I think they are different than indie devs in that they tend to have larger 'staff', but they don't all necessarily work on the same game, merely a group of like-minded individuals who are happy to work on the same projects together but pool their talents into where they are needed, if they are at all for said project). Publishers are still there for those of you who ENJOY the high budget AAA style games, and they are NOT killing off other games, they just are making their own thing in unison. It's up to the players to pick and choose for themselves which they buy and play.
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