Re: Are 'we' too negative?

On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 09:49:29 +0100, JAB <noway@nochance.com> wrote:

So first up is 'we' in this context refers to gamers in general and not
this group. So with that out of the way, this comes from Spall's
'Favourite Era of Gaming' thread and something I watched (don't worry
about the video as most of it is irrelevant). Something that was talked
about was is the current gaming industry really that bad or is our
perception of games skewed by information available to us.

My two cents:


I don't think that the gaming public is too negative. Rather, I think
it's a negative reaction to some awful trends in the industry. There
are lots of examples of gamers being extremely positive about games,
after all. Gamers WANT to love their games, but they're too often
being disappointed by the people selling those games.


Because the industry has a problem. It is an issue recognized not only
by its customers, but many of its developers too. Too much of the
industry is focused on money making part and not enough on the
creation aspects.

I get it; video game development is a business, and at the end of the
day you need to make a profit to keep the lights on and get your
employees paid. The traditional way of solving this problem was to
create a product _so awesome_ that people throw money at you because
it's just _that good_. But these days, publishers seem more interested
in releasing a half-assed product and then milking its customers for
more and more money with the promise that if they just keep paying
more they'll actually get something worth playing. Sometimes the
publishers even follow through on this promise; as often as not,
though, they do not.

And frankly, people are getting sick and tired of this approach. They
don't like being essentially lied to by publishers who promise the
world and then release half-finished games, or games with content sold
seperately, or games that are just rehashes of what was released a
year ago.



    [To be fair, the publishing industry has it tough too.
     Costs are going up, consumer expectations are through
     the roof (although those expectations are partly to
     blame on the publisher's own hype), and competition is
     fierce. Publishers are fighting not only against other
     new retail games, but a plethora of free games and a
     HUGE library of old games that are still available for
     sale. Not to mention the horrid sickness of modern day
     capitalism where "the line must go up" stock
     valuations pre-empt any sort of rational thought.

    [But knowing WHY the publishers release the schlock they
     do doesn't make me want to play that schlock, and
     doesn't make me any happier when -having stupidly paid
     for some of that schlock- I don't feel like I've gotten
     my money's worth.]



All the more so when there are some developers who actually manage to
'do it right', and push out a game which is not only fun to play, and
not only lacks the greed-induced monetizations, but also makes a
profit. "You're a multi-billion dollar organization, EA (or
Ubisoft,ActMicroBliz or whomever)," we cry. "Why -with all those
resources- are you putting out worse products for higher prices than
Larian (or Hello Games or CDProjectRED)?"


Calling publishers out on this behavior isn't negativity. It's a
justified review of their shitty practices.


Because when a game comes out _without_ all those bad traits, people
can't help but praise it. If games like "Star Wars: Outlaws", pumped
out by one of the big-four publishers, coupled to one of the biggest
licenses attached to it, and made with a budget in the hundreds of
millions is getting slagged, maybe it isn't the gamers who are the
problem?