The game industry doesn't need to change its practices...

[wulf3n]

snip

Both do, really.

The Industry needs to stop blowing budgets out of proportion and expecting [requiring] millions of sales to return a profit, while consumers need to stop encouraging anti consumer practices, e.g. Blind pre-orders.

Captcha: "High Horse"

Wait... Are you insulting me captcha? where's the report button

 

[zefichan]

The industry is fine. They are profiting well as usual.

Except they aren't. :>

 

[Caiphus]

Sorry to pinpoint just one part of your post. I know what Jim Sterling says, I saw the video. I agree with this to an extent. The ME3 ending was changed, but the game was still sold on Origin, which attracted more than it's fair share of ire from the gaming community (even more than its arguably shady ToS merited, I would wager). But Origin is still around, and EA removed their stuff from Steam to boot.

Thing is, the Origin TOS were changed because of consumer complaints, and the complaints about ME3 being on Origin weren't even in the same galaxy as those about its ending - it was a few people who mostly hadn't got the memo about the TOS change, vs a few thousand that turned the entire internet on its head for a few months. Scale is important, like with boycotts. 50 people not buying a game means nothing. 50,000 people not buying a game means something, though they'd be better off complaining vocally IMO.

I guess, although they also changed it to remove consumer rights

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/113314-EA-Changes-Origin-Terms-of-Services-Forbids-Class-Action-Lawsuits

You are right, and I'm perfectly happy for people to get angry when products aren't up to scratch. I personally didn't mind the ME3 ending - well, that's not true. I didn't like it, it just didn't cause my blood to boil - I'm just recommending that people don't set their expectations too high. Throwing tantrums is fine, and hell I encourage it . but the vast majority of shitty business practices are running strong. Diablo III and SimCity still got through, and neither company removed their DRM despite the massive outrage.

Although EA did give out free games; which makes me really wonder about their priorities. They chose to give out free stuff over turning off a DRM program that *was probably losing them money anyway*. It's just fucking weird.

But there you go.

 

[bug_of_war]

What you think?

I agree and disagree. I think both need to change in order for the gaming experience to become better and better. Gamers need to stop whinging about micro-transactions/DLC/DRM before a game is even released, and when it is they need to articulate their criticism in more ways than, "I HATE YOU! I TOLD YOU THIS WOULD BREAK! YOU'RE IDIOTS! I HOPE YOUR COMPANY DIES". As for big corporations I'd say the only 2 things that really need changing are their willingness to take risks and to stop dumping so much money into advertising. While I like most games that many consider generic or over done, I still acknowledge that it would be good to see new IPs/ideas in the future, and as for the less money on advertising, it would be good for the industry as they would not need to sell 4 million copies just to feel as though a game was good (see RE6, Tomb Raider).

Other than that I think the way the industry is going is fine. I'm loving the games I am buying, I'm looking forward to the new consoles, and I can't wait to see what next gen will be like.

 

[Woodsey]

Not giving them money but not mentioning it is a blunt force approach and is likely to have the wrong effect.

If an older series is brought back and reveals itself to be homogenised crap (oh, hello Hitman: Absolution) then not buying it en mass will just tell them no one wants a Hitman game anymore. Same goes for crappy PC ports.

Besides which, I take issue with the idea that companies are free to do whatever nickle-n-diming scheme that comes to mind without being pressured into thinking about the crap they're pulling first. Yes, inevitable quoter, companies exist to make money. But there are enough examples of companies who make plenty of money without being entirely obnoxious about it.

 

[veloper]

From a business perspective it is indeed true that aslong as it's making the publishers money now and in the long term, then the current business practice cannot be very wrong.
When customers lap your piss up, then you're obviously doing something right.

It could be merely the recession that contributed to THQ's R.I.P. and EA's heavy losses, but there could also be a more fundamental problem with the current business model. It's hard to determine.

 

[JohnHayne]

Snip.

Snip

The industry is fine. They are profiting well as usual.

Really. That is why the last 3 or so Ubisoft was it? Games have been considered financial failures, why EA just laid off more people, why THQ went broke and why, generally speaking, the AAA industry is having trouble sustaining itself. Yep, definitely seeing that as 'fine'.

The industry is fine. They are profiting well as usual.

Except they aren't. :>

From a business perspective it is indeed true that aslong as it's making the publishers money now and in the long term, then the current business practice cannot be very wrong.
When customers lap your piss up, then you're obviously doing something right.

It could be merely the recession that contributed to THQ's R.I.P. and EA's heavy losses, but there could also be a more fundamental problem with the current business model. It's hard to determine.

Could the industry be facing a new bubble burst soon, from which the indie devs are more likely to survive?

 

[Pieturli]

EA is a badly run company, full stop.


I'm really not an expert on business, but it does slightly irritate me how so many people have this idea that the big publishers "keep shoveling crappy games down our mouths, like call of duty". It's true, they do make an inordinate amount of games that are basically just re-hashes of the previous title in that series.


But, the thing that people forget is that the reason why they keep making them is because we keep buying them. That is a fact. If CoD didn't sell like crack, they wouldn't make them anymore.


And don't give me any of that shit about "oh, if we had more choice, we wouldn't buy games like that". I agree that more variety would not hurt sales, people absolutely would buy the games that differ from the norm as well. But the point is, if people didn't like games like COD so much, they would not keep buying them. I'm so tired of people acting like someone is forcing us to buy modern military shooters. The consumers are not some kind of rabid mob who have to play something, even if its crap.

 

[veloper]

From a business perspective it is indeed true that aslong as it's making the publishers money now and in the long term, then the current business practice cannot be very wrong.
When customers lap your piss up, then you're obviously doing something right.

It could be merely the recession that contributed to THQ's R.I.P. and EA's heavy losses, but there could also be a more fundamental problem with the current business model. It's hard to determine.

Could the industry be facing a new bubble burst soon, from which the indie devs are more likely to survive?

There won't be a bubble, like the crash in the 80s, that I'm sure of. It's not Atari or nothing nowadays.
Not everyone is doing badly. It's still great to be Activision for example.
Heavy competition also plays a role. For every publisher following THQ, the other publishers will probably breathe easier.

 

[JohnHayne]

I said that we have to stop preordering and giving shitty publishers money.

No more pre-ordering. Pre-ordering gives you menial benefits at best, and really it's not that hard to wait 1 or 2 days longer before you can play.

(...) while consumers need to stop encouraging anti consumer practices, e.g. Blind pre-orders.

Pre-orders don't help either - they make it so that the devs/publishers can rest on their laurels a bit if they earn a good pre-order amount.

Sometimes it feels as if the whole pre-ordering nuisance is like a crowdfunding, except it's done by the 'big ones' and we are getting breadcrumbs as reward... I don't understand how people seem to rationalize it with "oh, this time it will be different, the game won't suck" or "OOOooo, look at this neat skin/gun/skill! It totally justifies throwing my money at a project I don't know if it stands up to what they promised it would be like" kind of thoughts.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Just because the majority of people seem to be too apathetic to do anything about it doesn't mean there isn't a problem. The industry needs to change, and we need to tell it how and why.

 

[ntw3001]

Yeah, the AAA side of the industry doesn't seem to be on an upward trajectory at the moment. Games machines are all going online, and the companies are increasingly assuming that their players will be online, yet they don't appear to believe that their customer base could be in any way a connected entity. A lot of them are still struggling to understand that their consumers now have access to a huge amount of information and are more and more difficult to hoodwink. Suddenly the best advertising strategy is making a good product which people will want to buy, and an awful lot of the entertainment industry is reeling.

It seems that high-level financial decisions are being made by people who don't understand their product from a consumer perspective at all (Diablo 3 sold hugely, so it must be popular! No, Diablo 2 was popular). The management of big companies get out of touch with the consumer, put all their faith in forecasts and predictions and fail to respond when the environment changes; it's not new.

 

[TrulyBritish]

First of all, welcome aboard! Try to have fun and remember kids, stay away from those topics on gender issues!
On to the actual thread and whether I agree...... yes and no. Both need to change.
As you and so many other have said, people need to actually know what they're buying and "vote with their wallets" foremost. Although I do think there is some potential danger in this method as well.
However, if we're in a period of time when a game can sell literally millions and still be considered a failure, then there's something wrong more than just the customers. If business' don't change how they are spending on development and production they're going to f*ck themselves about despite the wishes of the fans. And it certainly doesn't help with business' like the much hated EA alienating their customers with unnecessary practices like the infamous DRM in Sim City.

 

[Joccaren]

Could the industry be facing a new bubble burst soon, from which the indie devs are more likely to survive?

That's what people have been saying for the last few months, a few for the last year or more.
The AAA industry can't sustain itself as it is presently going. It focuses on making 1 game for $100 million that needs to sell 5 million copies to turn a profit [$100 million is a rough estimate, 5 million is where most game publishers want their games to sell], instead of spending a lesser amount on a game that won't need to sell so much, largely in the hope that they will become the next big hit and make big money by pumping a lot into a game. In videogames it works like this, IRL it doesn't. Jim sums it up pretty well here; http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7161-Perfect-Pasta-Sauce

Does this mean the industry will hit this 'burst' where all the AAA studios die and indie devs survive? No, not necessarily. It might, but then again the industry could right itself at the last second, and devs like Acti-Blizzard will be fine for ages thanks to WoW and CoD. I am somewhat hoping they crash, so it encourages more studios to go independent, but if it does crash it'll be a few more years yet. AAA devs aren't quite so ruined that they're all in the gutters presently.