Julio wrote on Jul 3, 2012, 19:28:
Devinoch wrote on Jul 3, 2012, 18:29:
Games are more complicated now than they've ever been. Team sizes have increased.
Gaming was better in the past than it is today, so I'm more than happy to move to less complicated games that have much stronger design and more interesting concepts. Bigger teams, spending money on useless frills like high priced voice acting doesn't make better games.
There's countless expensive terrible games being made, and if a shakeup is needed to see better decision making by EA, Actiblizzard etc then so be it. Smart business will make money, poorly run dinosaurs like the big gaming companies can die out.
Actually, most studios aren't spending money on high priced voice acting these days - it didn't add a lot to games, and frankly, I as a developer could spend $150k getting Samuel L. Jackson to do three hours worth of voice, or I could pay a mid-to-senior level engineer for a year. Guess what the smart money's on? You are corRECT, sah!
Like it or not, the games industry is a business, and if you can develop a great game for cheap, get in front of an audience, connect, and get them to spread the word, then great, you have a hit on your hands, and you may be raking in the money. But for every Minecraft, there's a dozen, if not hundreds, of other attempts for indie games that just never hit it out of the park, and I'm sure you'd find some amazing gameplay ideas in those games.
I want to see more interesting game concepts myself, but there's also a large number of people out there who just want the shiniest new thing. And right now, most industry execs are talking about the "free-to-play revolution," as if it's going to be the only thing left standing in a few years time, even though the indicators are that Zynga's on the decline.
Look, I don't claim to know the future of games, but I do have an insider's knowledge into the industry, having been working in it for 12 years now, and sadly, the best game does not always win. I've thrown a bunch of money at Kickstarter programs, and I think that space has a lot of interesting potential, but it's also not a guaranteed business model.
But "gaming was better in the past than it is today"? Really? Going to be yelling at kids to get off your lawn next? The grass is always greener on the other side. There's games in the past that I truly and dearly love, but there's also stuff in the future I'm looking forward to, and there's tons of innovation left to come. Please, though, don't assume that "smart business will make money." It's a numbers game, and whether you like it or not, there's a LOT of luck involved in making games....
Cliff "Devinoch" Hicks
Host of the Starlight Society Podcast
http://tinyurl.com/starlightsociety/