"If anything, the problems that occur during the creation of a motion picture stretch far beyond the bugs encountered when making a game."

I beg to differ. With a movie you are creating 1.5 hours of content (on average) seen from one angle. With a game you are creating 10 to 15 hours, or more, of content and depending on the game you are making, this content may be seen from many different angles. If an actor doesn't show up for work, you get another or you wait until they do (which wouldn't be too long after I can assure you). If an AI doesn't show up, you have to find the reason why it didn't.

Does the viewer ever get "stuck" so that they will not be able to complete watching the movie? No. If a movie has not been through too much testing and the movie fails half way through, will the viewer be thrown out of the cinema before the movie ends? No. With software both of these things can easily happen, with a bad physics routine, map design or just some obscure bug that crashes the game. What about compatibility (films you work on DVD and VHS versions)? Games have an infinitely larger list of things to take into consideration.

It can take a game in the testing phase as long as it does to shoot an entire film (not including pre-production and post of course). Games are just as hard if not more so to get out on time as the software industry shifts faster than any other.

Actually films do miss release dates & do get pushed back & do have problems with schedules. Apocolypse Now had all kinds of trouble. The upcoming movie Timeline was pushed back twice! Conan the King was a movie, then it wasn't then it was, then it was petitioned online to have a different director & they obliged the public & put in a different director & now its not a movie anymore because Arnold went into politics. Same thing with Alien vs. Predetor, only now it is a movie & you can see a teaser if you go watch the re-release of Alien on Halloween.

Futhermore, if Valve said, we're making a huge game & in 4 years you can play the 1st 1/3 of it, people would be like WTF is that????? But Lord of the Rings did exactly that & got away with it no problem.

Now Valve plainly knew that their game would be ready by September 30th. They showed us *IN GAME* movies that worked perfectly, looked complete in every way. That game is done. Half-Life 2 is ready!! There is no problem with Half-Life 2. The game is done.

Then what's the problem? STEAM. That's the problem. Steam isn't working for a huge amount of people & Valve spent 5 years on Half-Life 2 & it was supposed to be sold over Steam. This is a really, really, big deal for Valve. They want to prove that developers don't need publishers & can keep more money for themselves. They can't exactly put Half-Life2 out on the shelves & make a new game to distribute over steam. They have to fix Steam & then they can put out the game that is ALREADY DONE!

I got one thing to say about all this. FUCK STEAM! The only good thing I'll be doing on Tuesday is watching DreamCatcher on DVD. It's not even comparable to the fun I would have been having playing Half-Life 2. FUCK STEAM!! I hope someone does a DOS attack on Valve's stupid Steam. I hope a Valve employee opens up the hard-drive for the coding of Steam & shits exploding diarreah into that fucker. STEAM IS FUCKING US OVER!

Very interesting take on all this democles - and it would make sense. Is this something you came up with on your own because of the way it "usually happens", or do you have some inside information?

Still, whether it's the developer or the publishers fault, the way things are handled now are not very professional.

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~ WarPig ~ 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... Seahawks are go!

I'll say it one more time... actually finish the game, then announce the release date.

I don't think it was Valve's fault. I imagine it's Vivendi that want the game released closer to xmas. And the problem would have been that with Valve's status, they will have signed up Vivendi a while ago, long before they had an idea of when HL2 would be finished, with a design to release it when it's ready (ergo, no release date in the contract). Vivendi, obviously wanting to nab what will likely be one of the greatest games of all time, agreed to this (not normal practice for publishers to agree to titles without at least a rough release date and a maximum release date).

So come completion time, Valve assume they are going to release when it's done and set themselves Sep 30th for that day. They most likely had the game completed about 4 months ago and are undergoing final testing and polishing until the day it goes gold. When Vivendi found out that Valve wanted Sep 30th, they will have decided that they could wait another 6-8 weeks and get a release during the holiday period - a much loved time for publishers (see a previous reply of mine to this thread). Valve will have entered into negotiations with Vivendi to set the release at Sep 30th. Vivendi will tell them where to stick it.

Now here's the shitter - Valve are in too deep to find another publisher. If they cut away from Vivendi now over something small such as the release date, Vivendi could sue them for millions in lost earnings. You see, without a contractual release date there is no breach of contract and Vivendi basically have Valve by the short and curlies. I have no doubt that Valve will have argued the deal right until last week, where they realised that even if Vivendi turned round and said yes to Sep 30th, it was too late to go gold and get it on shelves by then. So now Valve are royally butt-f***ed and have no choice but to leave the release date to Vivendi - which is why their statement about the delay was very vague about the new release date.

The problem with the games industry is that developers have no power at all about release dates etc. Publishers have all the power and the developers are their bitches. And the real shit on the cake is that Valve will cop all the flak for this. Everyone blames the developers for the publishers bullshit.

This comment was edited on Sep 27, 18:43.

Well it's not great when games take longer to make because of hardware developers decided to try something new *cough*nvidia

I say fuck diversity and bring stability and high preformance *cough*GeforceFX

Which wouldn't be necessary if all the damn hardware manufacturers would just adhere to a standard...

If they all did that, then all the great diversity of technology choices available to the PC consumer would be gone. Might as well switch to the Mac. Look, you can't have your cake and eat it too. PC's are very tough to develop for, because of all the hardware diversity. But that same hardware diversity is what makes owning a PC so cool. You can customize your box in so many ways. This diversity also lends itself to constant technology innovations, which leads to ground-breaking games like HL2.

As for the release date (is it delayed or not?), it IS DELAYED. Check Yahoo Technology News. Valve has confirmed an unspecified "holiday release".

And I agree...Valve has handled this poorly. They should not have stuck to the 30th for so long. So what's going to happen to the release party on Alcatraz? I was getting my rowboat prepared...

I agree that Valve screwed up. Everyone thinks they look stupid for acting like they were so awsome for releasing on the 30th only to miss it.

That's why companies like id don't do release dates. They're too damn hard to meet.

Had to edit this... I had nothing in the original post!

I have one reason why 'I' think Doom 3 may be better than HL2...

S..T..E..A..M

'nuff said
high five...
drop me a nine...
me out'a here...

Slippy
"You know how it feels when you have to take a leak real bad? ... Could you check and see if I have to go?"


This comment was edited on Sep 26, 18:45.

you don't know squat about game development. Why don't you take a tour of one sometime, make sure to say hi to the scriptwriters, or one of the 80 other people working at a typical (small 2 project) studio.

You're both right and wrong - games take less money than a AAA movie to make, but they often take longer if you're not doing a sequel.

As a game dev, you have to MAKE your software run on the 3 million different HW and OS configs out there...

Which wouldn't be necessary if all the damn hardware manufacturers would just adhere to a standard...

Something you have with movies: marketing strategy when it comes to release time. With games (and software in general) it's whenever you can get it on shelves. That's the way the software industry works.

I'll agree 100%. So just WHY do game developers, knowing that it's a matter of "whenever we can get it on the shelves" blurb so much about their release date? You have to admit, PsycSui, that what Valve did was just total bullshit. Remain silent on a project for five years, thereby eliminating all the hype and the expectations etc (to which I say, bravo!), then to come out with the hype, to keep chanting September 30th as if it was the day the Lord Jesus Christ would return Himself, only to deny that date a week beforehand? They knew at the start of September that they were NEVER going to make that end of the month release date. They should have just kept the release date a "When it's done" deal. It works for Id. It works for Raven (I remember when Jedi Outcast was suddenly announced as coming out six months BEFORE I expected it, which was a very pleasant surprise, and created a lot of positive spin. The only thing Valve has done is create animosity.)

I'll say it one more time... actually finish the game, then announce the release date

Amen.

Creston

Well ever I've been looking at the readme's as of late the no-support list is a long as the "supported" one, the thing is just blown out, as times goes just as movies the games need more and more people to work on them thought. But usual it's just impossible due to finance.

LOL games are more complex then movies?

Actually, in a way I think he has a point. A movie looks the same on any screen. As a game dev, you have to MAKE your software run on the 3 million different HW and OS configs out there...

Supporter of the "A fredster By Any Other Name Is Still The Same" fan club.

http://www.nin.com

LOL games are more complex then movies? hah yeah unless you compare lets say HL2 to your average everyday action movie with crap actors, crap scrip, crap everything else.

Games only have the tehnical side, rarely ever do they hire a scrip writer, movies on the other hand involve alot more then 8 guys sitting around screwing with the gameplay and/or testing/writing code.

This comment was edited on Sep 26, 12:34.

Games are much more complex and take a lot more time to develop than movies. The two aren't even comparable.

Some of you guys are taking my comments too literally. I know that there are huge differences in making games and movies - I said that the game industry could learn from the PR side of the movie business.

I'll say it one more time... actually finish the game, then announce the release date.

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~ WarPig ~ 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... Seahawks are go!

Just noticed the comment on 'good things come to those who wait'

True, mostly. Just one word - Daikatana

Tho' I somehow think HL2 might be just 'slightly' better received

Mike

Obviously, none of you have ever worked on software.

I have. But then, I agree with most of what you said.

The important point is that when you're writing new software, it's not analogous to making a movie. It's more like inventing the VCR. You must create something entirely new. There is no established proecedure, and everything must work.

The design process is much more difficult than any other type of creative endevour because it is totally unforgiving. In other arenas, if you make a mistake, you simply have something not quite as good as it otherwise would have been. But when designing mechanisms, most mistakes will result in your whole design not working at all. These mistakes must be fixed, and there is no way, literally no way at all, to predict how long this will take, especially early on in the process. Not only that, but unlike a film or other such project, the Mongolian Hordes Technique simply doesn't work. (Read "The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering", if you'd like to know more.)

All the same, long before their delay announcement, Valve should have known if stuff worked or not. The later the stage of the project, the easier it is to give estimates.

Obviously, none of you have ever worked on software.

Something you have with movies: marketing strategy when it comes to release time. With games (and software in general) it's whenever you can get it on shelves. That's the way the software industry works.

When building movie schedules, directors and producers plan for problems based on past experiences. Ptoblems in the movie industry are predictable. In software, there are so many variables, there's no way in hell you can account for all of them. It's just plain impossible.

Software timetables look like this:

Code, code, code, release code.
Build content, content, fix code bugs, content, code bugs, content, code bugs.
Testing, fix content bugs, fix code bugs, more tetsing, fix, test, fix, test, fix.

You can write up a 5 billion page manual on how to make your release date, and you still won't make it. Why? Because bug fixes aren't always five minute syntax changes, they sometimes take days or weeks to fix because of faulty architecture.

In the movie industry, you have a story that is set, a video camera that you know works, and a crew of digital special effects people who make models and textures and computer animations with software that they know works.

When coding software, you're dependant on stuff that hasn't even been created yet. You have to create your own level editor, your own scripting language, your own 3d renderer. And once you have that all done, you have to build your own levels, which uncovers problems in your rendering engine, which leads to bug fixes and architecture changes.

With movies, you have a solid base of working tools to get you through. With software, you're developing your own tools, often from the ground up.

I know this because I write software for a living, and I can tell you that the best way to estimate when you're going to be done is to say what you think, add 50%, and then expect to slip, because you will.

Half-Life 2 has a brand new engine working on brand new technology being driven by brand new video cards that use brand new drivers. They're not working with pixar to create a couple models and animate them through a movie. They're creating a 3D world that is interactive. A world where YOU have control. The only control you have in movies is fast forward, rewind and play.

Games are much more complex and take a lot more time to develop than movies. The two aren't even comparable.

Alright kids, let's a have a talk about this release thing, specifically in regards to movies as compared with games. Why can moives ALWAYS make their releases? Have you ever, ever heard of a movie being delayed because it "just wasn't done?" I sure haven't; maybe because the studio didn't like the final cut, because the political climate was bad, whatever. But the films are always completed in some form or another, in fact, a final cut is done weeks, even months before the wide release date for press screenings, test screenings, festivals and the like. Why is this? Films are just as hard to make as games; organizing a huge group of people to show up on time, getting film permits, getting rights, contract negotiations, setting up, tearing down, pre and post production. Making a film is a MASSIVE undertaking, it's absolutely daunting. Beyond the raw logistics, things can and always do go wrong on just about any film shoot you can think of. The weather sucks (look at set damage that occured during a sandstorm in Episode I, yet they still got that out on it's original release date) on the day you're sopposed to shoot, someone doesn't show up, the film gets processed incorrectly, you have to reshoot a scene after looking at it in post. Shit happens; don't tell me that "games have bugs, films are smooth sailing" that's simply not true. If anything, the problems that occur during the creation of a motion picture stretch far beyond the bugs encountered when making a game.

So why can movies always make their releases? Dates that are set sometimes YEARS in advance? It's simple: the way movies are marketted today puts huge emphasis on the release date; look at gross figures from any of the recent large blockbusters, they all follow the same pattern: Huge openings, followed by steep drop offs. Movies nowadays make the majority of their earnings in the first week of their release and then fade into obscurity soon after, so it is imperitive that both the public is aware of the release date, and the studio releases the movie on time.

The point to my ramblings? This: there is nothing keeping developers from setting a realistic release date for their game, and then hitting that date on the nose, first try. The film industry manages to get all of their big titles out exactly when they say they will, game developers, given a realistic timetable and a little more dedication, can do the same.

and while id's games have always been pretty...they've been lacking in gameplay/storyline.

From the recent previews it would seem that id are making profound attempts at changing that perception. Remember that they did hire a writer, ran it through a storyboard, etc.

I still have my doubts, since there have been plenty of recent games that promised a "good story" but ended up with something about as engaging as watching TV commercials (TRON 2.0) Then there are games like Mafia... 'nuff said.

On the other hand, from screenshots alone I have no doubt that DOOM 3 will be able to capture the dark, brooding atmosphere of the originals. Any one who has played them will remember how that simple graphical aspect drew us into the DOOM universe like moths to a candle, and how it etched into our heads those powerful images of torture and dispair.

Well whenever it comes out, as long as the reviews don't all start with "In case you've been living under a rock"

I'll be happy