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Amy Hennig: "Triple-A development an arms race that is unwinnable"

J1M

Arcane
Joined
May 14, 2008
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14,616
This made me look up the doll Ubisoft hired over ten years ago to keep adolescents from straying from their PR efforts on the internet, because I was hoping she didn't waste her fertile years. Ironically enough she's working for the same company as old Amy Hennig now. I guess the latter didn't take her into her confidence to explain her the crucial parts of female biology.

Jade, sweet honey babydoll, modern medicine can perform miracles but the clock is ticking!
Jade Raymond was pregnant when she was starting up a studio in Toronto for Ubisoft. That was a while ago.
 

Wirdschowerdn

Ph.D. in World Saving
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https://www.polygon.com/2018/1/12/16880484/amy-hennig-sean-vanaman-interview-year-in-review

This is what Amy recently had to say:


I think we’re in an inflection point right now. Obviously what happened with our Star Wars project didn’t come out of the blue. A lot of too-dramatic articles were written about it — the death of linear story games and all that kind of stuff — but look, there is a real problem: this line we’ve been running up to for a lot of years, which is the rising cost of development, and the desires, or the demands even, of players in terms of hours of gameplay, fidelity, production values, additional modes, all these things. Those pressures end up very real internally. If it costs you, say, $100 million or more to make a game, how are you making that money back, and making a profit?

And the $60 price point can’t change, right? There’s a lot of negative press around monetization, loot boxes, games as a service, etc., but these things are trending now in the industry, especially for larger publishers, as an answer to the problem of rising development costs. Budgets keep going up, the bar keeps getting raised, and it starts making less and less sense to make these games.

There is also this trend now that, as much as people protest and say, “Why are you canceling a linear, story-based game? This is the kind of game we want,” people aren’t necessarily buying them. They’re watching somebody else play them online.

Oh there's always a craving for story-based games. The trick to make them also profitable and Youtube/Twitch-resistant is in the name.

Hint:
Gameplay niggas. Put some effort into it.
 

Grimlorn

Arcane
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Jun 1, 2011
Messages
10,248
Wasn't the whole rising development costs debunked recently? Someone made a video showing development costs have leveled out for awhile now, while publishers have put out less games and are reporting record profits, likely due to microtransactions and DLC?
 

vonAchdorf

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Joined
Sep 20, 2014
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13,465
Wasn't the whole rising development costs debunked recently? Someone made a video showing development costs have leveled out for awhile now, while publishers have put out less games and are reporting record profits, likely due to microtransactions and DLC?



(Can't comment of the veracity of the video's claims.)
 

Walty Warner

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Jan 19, 2018
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It's not so much games being expensive to make as much as marketing. It's easier to sell 1 game that cost 100 million dollars to make that you then sell additional content for, and make your money back. Than it is to sell 100 games that cost 1 million dollars to make each. It's why a lot of these companies bank on just a single game they push out that year and market the hell out of it because there's an enormous amount of competition in a digital space. Not just in other video games but you also have to compete with other digital products that might come out around that time.
 

Drakron

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May 19, 2005
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6,326
Hint:
Gameplay niggas. Put some effort into it.

True, I cannot watch a LP of a game with multiple choices because I would go into a different path ... but games these days just play themselves, they are linear and I get the same experience watching someone playing then as I would by playing myself.

Its not a surprise when you make a movie people will watch it and not play it because there is nothing to play.
 

Perkel

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I think Nintendo constantly shows everyone that AAA race is meaningless. All of their games are usually generation behind everyone graphically and they still shitload of copies to critical acclaim.

Thing about AAA is that huge companies treat AAA as sort of marketing tool. Instead of selling game because it is cool they sell it as feature list. Instead of selling gameplay they sell screenshots. Instead of selling good story they sell what story has in it.

And this is why you won't see any hits from them that are similar to minecraft, terraria or whatever. Because their marketing department rule what they do and minecraft is not something PR guy can ever sell.

This is why they either focus on linear games with narrative or those online multiplayer dumpster fire of time waste and asking yourself if is it even fun in first place.

They build those monsters that are so well rounded to appeal to everyone that doesn't really appeal to anyone that wants actually fun game to play.

Amnesia isn't great looking game, doesn't have great story or great game-play but it scares out completely people. In AAA version of it you would have amazing looking game that barely scares you out and cinematics that completely takes you out from the game and combat because we can't market game to people who like combat etc.
 
Last edited:

Cross

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I think Nintendo constantly shows everyone that AAA race is meaningless. All of their games are usually generation behind everyone graphically and they still shitload of copies to critical acclaim.
Nintendo games sell well for the same reason sports games sell well: brand recognition. Nintendo has the most iconic properties in all of gaming. They can offer shovelware at full price and it will still sell millions. For example:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link's_Crossbow_Training
By September 2008, the game had sold 2.75 million copies worldwide. It was in the Top 10 on the best-selling Wii games list for nearly two years until being surpassed by Wii Sports Resort, Wii Fit Plus, and later New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

A better example of what you describe would be Bethesda. Their games have more primitive graphics and animations than even the lowest budget titles, are filled with glitches and other technical problems, have awful gameplay and atrocious writing and voice acting, yet they outsell almost anything else on the market.

Amnesia isn't great looking game, doesn't have great story or great game-play but it scares out completely people. In AAA version of it you would have amazing looking game that barely scares you out and cinematics that completely takes you out from the game and combat because we can't market game to people who like combat etc.
Amnesia is the very definition of a cinematic triple-A experience. No wait, survival horror games made by triple-A developers tend to have actual gameplay.
 

Rahdulan

Omnibus
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To be fair, most players go selectively blind when judging Bethesda games on release or soon after. It takes months for the honeymoon to end and people to acknowledge bugs and design flaws that would get any other game torn apart by those very same people. Bethesda has enjoyed this double standard for a very very long time.
 

Endemic

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It's not so much games being expensive to make as much as marketing. It's easier to sell 1 game that cost 100 million dollars to make that you then sell additional content for, and make your money back. Than it is to sell 100 games that cost 1 million dollars to make each. It's why a lot of these companies bank on just a single game they push out that year and market the hell out of it because there's an enormous amount of competition in a digital space. Not just in other video games but you also have to compete with other digital products that might come out around that time.

That's true to a large extent for the major publishers cited in the video, but as the comments discuss, other types of businesses have diversified instead. R&D costs are not included in cost of goods sold, because they can't be attributed to single products. Other indirect costs like marketing are also excluded by that definition. There have been constant mergers and buyouts in the corporate world which reduce competition as well, and that's especially true in the videogame industry (the meme about EA swallowing\killing studios is one common example).

It's easier to get numbers for listed companies like EA and Activision since they're legally required to report them, so I don't know if the financials hold true for independent developers or non-listed publishers.
 

Nano

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Grab the Codex by the pussy Strap Yourselves In
Amnesia is the very definition of a cinematic triple-A experience

Except for the fact that it was made by 20-something people at an indie company with a restricted budget. Totally triple-A.

No wait, survival horror games made by triple-A developers tend to have actual gameplay.
Amnesia was considered revolutionary at a time when most horror games had the player character chop through the enemies as if they were some sort of superhuman. Removing the combat aspect increased the horror factor for a lot of people then.

Penumbra was better though. Amnesia got the credit for what Penumbra: Black Plague did before it.
 
Unwanted

MI.Tex

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likely due to microtransactions and DLC?


Nope, the kids from 20-30 years ago grew up and have money to buy games,,,,, it had nothing to do with dlc or microtransactions.
 

Endemic

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Nope, the kids from 20-30 years ago grew up and have money to buy games,,,,, it had nothing to do with dlc or microtransactions.

DLC and microtransactions provide long-term income for a small additional investment, whereas the sales of most AAA games peak within a month. This is also why business software is shifting to a service model (pay X amount per month for ongoing support).
 
Unwanted

MI.Tex

Unwanted
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Messages
118
Nope, the kids from 20-30 years ago grew up and have money to buy games,,,,, it had nothing to do with dlc or microtransactions.

DLC and microtransactions provide long-term income for a small additional investment, whereas the sales of most AAA games peak within a month. This is also why business software is shifting to a service model (pay X amount per month for ongoing support).

Good luck having microtransactions in a singleplayer game. (see shadow of war)

DLC is nothing new, there were 'expansions' before, DLC is basicaly the same thing on a smaller scale which you pay less for but there are more DLC than usualy 1-2 expansions.
 

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