2024 may not be kind for game developers.

Scott_Arm said:
I think games with micro transactions and skins are inevitable, just because of the financial situation, but that's quite a bit different than promising roadmaps of big content dumps post release. I'm pretty sure Alan Wake 2 is getting DLC with modes and content expansion, but does that make it a live service game?
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Guess what, if you define every game as a GaaS game then the industry is obsessed with GaaS games. Rumor has it that Alan Wake 1 is now a GaaS game because it got an FPS boost patch 2 years ago.
 
Silent_Buddha said:
That's a red herring. GAAS aren't why so many developers and publishers are laying off people and re-evaluating how AAA games are developed and released. It's part of the the reason, but it's not by any means the only reason or even the major reason.

www.forbes.com

A $300 Million ‘Spider-Man 2’ Budget, Sony’s Future And AAA Unsustainability

The cost of Spider-Man 2's development raises larger questions not just about Sony, but the wider industry pumping out expensive AAA games.
www.forbes.com www.forbes.com

The Insomniac hack gives us a window into one of the major reasons Sony are re-evaluating how their studios will do AAA game development.

Spider-Man 2 was the fastest selling Sony exclusive in the history of PlayStation. It cost 3x the cost of the first game. By the end of the Holiday season that it released the first game had already broken even and was making a profit. Spiderman 2 had not. Unless Spider-Man 2 has incredible PC sales once it hits PC, it's highly unlikely that Sony will make as much money on Spider-Man 2 as they did with the first one made by Insomniac.

And that's not even counting the impact of inflation on the revenue that it generates. For many years the console gaming industry could rely on expanded consumer spending to keep up with game development costs. That's assuming your game sells well.

And even if your game sold well, it may not sell well enough to actually generate a profit. Remember all those Eidos games that sold a lot of copies but still sold under expectations leading to loss generation for Square-Enix?

And if your game doesn't sell well? What then? There's a serious potential for bankruptcy and then having to have a fire sale of your IP to try to pay off any creditors your development house or publishing house might have.

IIRC - one slide from the Insomniac hack showed Spiderman 3 tentatively expected to be 450+ million USD to develop. Unless something changed that likely meant that would make even less money than Spiderman 2, not to mention the first one.

It's why the AAA industry is so incredibly reliant on proven IP in hopes that proven IP will generate enough interest that the game "might" sell enough copies to generate a profit.

GAAS was seen as a way to mitigate the incredibly high stakes risk (risk is now generally higher than reward for much of the AAA gaming industry) of AAA game development. Try to get a successful GAAS game out in hopes that it can then allow you to continue funding AAA single player games.

Sony is evaluating how they are going to proceed in the future. If they do not have a tentpole GAAS game generating revenue to help offset the high cost of the increasing costs of their studios AAA gaming development budgets, then they needed to re-evaluate how their internal studios were going to develop AAA single player games going forward.

In other words, they needed to figure out how to reduce development costs so they could continue to make AAA games. The first part of that is reducing as much staffing as possible, hopefully, without impacting too heavily the ability of internal studios to make and release games. After that, I'd expect there to be more budget reviews, stricter release deadlines, possibly even reduced scope of games.

I do wonder if Sony will push some of their internal studios to make something other than open world games. Open world games are very expensive to make. I would not at all be surprised if Sony started to reject open world game proposals from some of their studios and only greenlight cheaper to make streamlined gaming experiences.

Regards,
SB
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This is where most Sony accountants don't get it. Many people are buying PS5s (and spend money into their store) because of Spider-man 2! Without Spider-man 2 PS would had basically nothing special in 2023 and until who know when.

Sony make the most money from third parties royalities from their store. And their store is only available on PS5. They should not need to directly make big profits from their own 1st parties! They are currently failing because they are trying to make billions from their own IPs. Before that they were making only millions from their IPs, but overall (record) billions from their store.
 
Globalisateur said:
This is where most Sony accountants don't get it. Many people are buying PS5s (and spend money into their store) because of Spider-man 2! Without Spider-man 2 PS would had basically nothing special in 2023 and until who know when.

Sony make the most money from third parties royalities from their store. And their store is only available on PS5. They should not need to directly make big profits from their own 1st parties! They are currently failing because they are trying to make billions from their own IPs. Before that they were making only millions from their IPs, but overall (record) billions from their store.
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This.
 
Johnny Awesome said:
Half? Sounds like they're not chasing GaaS anymore then.

Seriously, what Sony GaaS titles were in development? The only one I remember is TLOU one.
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Canceled Fractions and layoff also target ND, Twisted Metal gaas game, multiplayer game that was in development by London Studio (by closing studio) and its seems that thas gaas craziness they started few years ago bring not only waste of development time but also result in massive lay offs.
 
Nesh said:
I know some people will hate me but that's one of the reasons I enjoyed the first MGS games so much. They were short, but the content that usually spreads to 30 hour of todays games was creatively dense and varied into fun, packed into a short game duration. Every section of the game was treated with special care and designed as an event. That's why every section was memorable and intense and had huge replayability. It also added a lot of variety and experimentation with NPCs (friends or foes) that is usually found in open world sandbox games.

And I think it may have either borrowed, or coincidentally followed the formula of the first Resident Evil games. The game structure is somewhat similar. Few highly varied areas, culminating to the ending.

Resident Evil 1 and 2 were very short. But as we progressed, things were changing and happening making each section memorable.

This counts for the first Devil May Cry too. It was the most memorable with the highest replayability game of the series in my book.

The game would pitch you with the same tools you had or new ones, but will require you to approach the game differently or give you freedom to mix and match your gameplay to every new discovered area, pitching you to new enemies with different defenses and offenses. Every new enemy was an action puzzle.

Remember how many ways we could approach bosses in MGS games, or be required to be creative. Or remember how in DMC each boss was significantly different, required different playstyle against but gave you the freedom to mix your moves. Fucking spectacular.

These days I finish games and barely remember large sections of the game and often miss and/or forget huge chunks of the story since they get over complicated. In Forbidden West there were so many dialogues and explanations, I barely remember much.

I m pretty sure Death Stranding would have left a bigger impression and we would have remembered a lot more if it was shorter and packed all the content more densely and more substantially, just like MGS.

The Uncharted games and God of War 3 were also some of the last highly memorable games I played because they were shorter and sections were divided and designed with specific events.

Most games today are depleting our attention span and infesting us either with chores or with repetitive gameplay.

I don't remember ever actually enjoying any of the Assassin's Creed games for this reason.

I think developers would be better off making shorter games with more meaningful density of events and gameplay.
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now that you mention it, I gotta say that I've been playing Elden Ring -great game- but I have to play it and rest a few months and then continue where I left until completion.

As of late I am playing A Plague Tale Requiem for the first time. Got it day 1 and didn't change nor it added DLC etc, I'm playing as it it was launched yesterday.

I am having more fun than in Elden Ring. The controlled environments, the shorter step by step approach, works really well for me nowadays and for what the game wants to offer. A focused gorgeous experience.

I think more games should follow this approach, great quality but it's just an AA game for which I am happy I paid 49€ or so.
 
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Shifty Geezer said:
Nowadays it's all data driven but he psychology of engagement is not the same as the psychology of fun. Instead of people playing when they are having fun, they are playing to stay on top of the battle-pass etc.
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many AAA games bombard players with content. Players are just overwhelmed. We just have one life, one chance.

If you start a game they always end up taking a lot of time with lots of stuff that aren't that fun, probably. i.e. Diablo 4. Diablo 2 worked really well because it didn't pretend. Magic Find kept the core players engaged for years but you could end the game in 2 or 3 days, even less.

There are lots of games with infinite content, that could convert players into anxious robots. We live in a very good time now 'cos there are a lot of good free games, emulation, mods, etc, but there is always the next big thing waiting, Season this Season that.

Let games die and hope for the community to keep them alive, they would come up with brilliant ideas. You'd probably win an extra sale later on without "forcing" the hardcore base of your game to play it forever when the game is already programmed and finished.

Wish there were more games like Vampire The Masquerade Redemption -most fun (specially in the medieval times) and intelligent dialogues I've seen in a game, cinema material, or Alien Isolation, an AA game, but the script would be a great one for a Hollywood movie. A game of medium duration but one you never forget if you engage into it.

Or just games like Age of Empires, which, as the game says in the intro, "your empire survives the test of time". An almost perfect idea, greatly expressed, it makes sense to keep an old game alive 'cos it didn't need much than a great base, it's like Tetris. Or Divinity Original Sin 1 or 2, which I completed with mods first rather than the original experience.
 
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www.eurogamer.net

Children face social pressures to spend money in games, study suggests

A study conducted by Norwegian researchers has suggested children feel increasing social pressure to spend money in gam…
www.eurogamer.net www.eurogamer.net

This is also in line with what we have been discussing earlier.

The business models of many games are diminishing the positive experience of gaming by betting on psychological and sociological impulses to make money.

Unfortunately as there is more pressure to be profitable companies will be finding new ways at doing so that are not in line with quality and fun.

This tendency is expanding in general in many parts of society. Especially the younger generations who are exposed to "social" media from early ages. These people are experiencing new kinds of anxiety, higher predisposition to depression and mental challenges than ever and these are opening up business opportunities. These increases have been observable and measured. They are betting on those impulses by measuring heat maps of engagement, memes and trends even if they are toxic in nature.

Just like trendy overpriced garbage products like Prime. I was shocked at events when I saw kids going crazy about it, because it is a "social" media "trend".

It is very similar to the fast food industry. They have huge marketing departments gambling on addictions, taste enhancers and social and family needs, while the quality of food, especially in loose regulated markets, is some of the worst and health-risking.
 
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Nesh said:
www.eurogamer.net

Children face social pressures to spend money in games, study suggests

A study conducted by Norwegian researchers has suggested children feel increasing social pressure to spend money in gam…
www.eurogamer.net www.eurogamer.net

This is also in line with what we have been discussing earlier.

The business models of many games are diminishing the positive experience of gaming by betting on psychological and sociological impulses to make money.

Unfortunately as there is more pressure to be profitable companies will be finding new ways at doing so that are not in line with quality and fun.

This tendency is expanding in general in many parts of society. Especially the younger generations who are exposed to "social" media from early ages. These people are experiencing new kinds of anxiety, higher predisposition to depression and mental challenges than ever and these are opening up business opportunities. These increases have been observable and measured. They are betting on those impulses by measuring heat maps of engagement, memes and trends even if they are toxic in nature.

Just like trendy overpriced garbage products like Prime. I was shocked at events when I saw kids going crazy about it, because it is a "social" media "trend".

It is very similar to the fast food industry. They have huge marketing departments gambling on addictions, taste enhancers and social and family needs, while the quality of food, especially in loose regulated markets, is some of the worst and health-risking.
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It was always that way and way before services games or even videogames. Sure the phenomenon increased and became toxic with GAAS games though.
 
Nesh said:
www.eurogamer.net

Children face social pressures to spend money in games, study suggests

A study conducted by Norwegian researchers has suggested children feel increasing social pressure to spend money in gam…
www.eurogamer.net www.eurogamer.net

This is also in line with what we have been discussing earlier.

The business models of many games are diminishing the positive experience of gaming by betting on psychological and sociological impulses to make money.

Unfortunately as there is more pressure to be profitable companies will be finding new ways at doing so that are not in line with quality and fun.

This tendency is expanding in general in many parts of society. Especially the younger generations who are exposed to "social" media from early ages. These people are experiencing new kinds of anxiety, higher predisposition to depression and mental challenges than ever and these are opening up business opportunities. These increases have been observable and measured. They are betting on those impulses by measuring heat maps of engagement, memes and trends even if they are toxic in nature.

Just like trendy overpriced garbage products like Prime. I was shocked at events when I saw kids going crazy about it, because it is a "social" media "trend".

It is very similar to the fast food industry. They have huge marketing departments gambling on addictions, taste enhancers and social and family needs, while the quality of food, especially in loose regulated markets, is some of the worst and health-risking.
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Maybe if you're in a 3rd world country or something, but generally large fast food franchises have very high standards for food safety, and the quality is largely 'fine'(whether you like the food or not is not the same thing).

Just thought it was a weird example in an otherwise really good post. Even in my generation(Millenial), the level of 'consumerist culture' is pretty stark from my parent's generation, and it absolutely seems even worse for younger people. I hate the 'avocado toast is why young people cant afford to buy a house' claims, but there's absolutely more than a grain of truth that more and more people seem to lack any sort of discipline when it comes to spending money. And it doesn't help that people are bombarded by a greater range of luxuries and opportunities to spend their money than ever before, and the gaming industry is absolutely a part of that. Combined with social media and better psychological understanding of consumer habits, it's quite a trap that people are being asked to navigate these days.

The pandemic especially opened my eyes to how rabid consumerism really is, and how most all predictions of reduced spending turned out quite wrong, and no, it wasn't all just stimulus checks by any means. There seemed to be this widespread fever of people needing to fill in holes in their life through 'buying stuff', and the gaming industry absolutely profited immensely from this. And now they are handling a return to normal very poorly, which was entirely predictable.
 
Seanspeed said:
Maybe if you're in a 3rd world country or something, but generally large fast food franchises have very high standards for food safety, and the quality is largely 'fine'(whether you like the food or not is not the same thing).

Just thought it was a weird example in an otherwise really good post. Even in my generation(Millenial), the level of 'consumerist culture' is pretty stark from my parent's generation, and it absolutely seems even worse for younger people. I hate the 'avocado toast is why young people cant afford to buy a house' claims, but there's absolutely more than a grain of truth that more and more people seem to lack any sort of discipline when it comes to spending money. And it doesn't help that people are bombarded by a greater range of luxuries and opportunities to spend their money than ever before, and the gaming industry is absolutely a part of that. Combined with social media and better psychological understanding of consumer habits, it's quite a trap that people are being asked to navigate these days.

The pandemic especially opened my eyes to how rabid consumerism really is, and how most all predictions of reduced spending turned out quite wrong, and no, it wasn't all just stimulus checks by any means. There seemed to be this widespread fever of people needing to fill in holes in their life through 'buying stuff', and the gaming industry absolutely profited immensely from this. And now they are handling a return to normal very poorly, which was entirely predictable.
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The so called "High standards of safety" exist in unhealthy food products and junk food. In addition, the standards in EU are stricter compared to those in the US. It doesn't constitute them suitable for high or frequent consumption.
 
Do I seriously have to remind people that this is a thread about the state of the games industry and the quality of fast food isn't a topic that should be discussed here?

Know when to drop a subject, please. ;)
 
Shifty Geezer said:
Yes. I feel in the past, devs made games just to be fun. That was it. Making a fun game resulted in it generally being successful. Nowadays it's all data driven but he psychology of engagement is not the same as the psychology of fun. Instead of people playing when they are having fun, they are playing to stay on top of the battle-pass etc. This helps drive 'popularity' and helps with megasales of those games that are megasuccesses, but the motives behind game design have warped to business and dollar led, not end user emotion led.
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This is why I predominantly play indie games now-a-days. AAA games have to be "data driven" to an extent just because the risk is so high with development costs so high and publishers of AAA games are trying to find some way to expand the video games market in order to continue making high budget AAA games.

You need to have extremely expensive cutting edge graphics. You need to have expensive voice acting. You need an expensive script. You need an expansive game world (open world especially expensive). Etc. In some cases you need to divert some of your funding to chase political messaging (part of the script writing and story making process) by hiring the right types of writers.

It's not so much about fun anymore for a lot of games. It's about chasing demographics or trying to push gaming on demographics that typically aren't interested in gaming. Chasing demographics that aren't traditionally into gaming risks pushing away existing traditional gaming demographics. High risk (going after typically non-gaming demographics) with high reward if it works, but as we're seeing a lot of that work to try to attract demographics that traditionally haven't been into video games has mostly fallen flat as they sacrifice too much WRT pure game play.

I just love the indie games that go for pure gameplay, and if they want to push a societal issue, it's no big deal because they aren't investing tons of money into it so if it only draws a small audience that wants to see those issues in their game, no big deal.

Regards,
SB
 
snc said:
Canceled Fractions and layoff also target ND, Twisted Metal gaas game, multiplayer game that was in development by London Studio (by closing studio) and its seems that thas gaas craziness they started few years ago bring not only waste of development time but also result in massive lay offs.
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So "half" turned out to be 3 games out of 20 studios, one of which was a rumored game. Hmm...
 
Silent_Buddha said:
It's not so much about fun anymore for a lot of games. It's about chasing demographics or trying to push gaming on demographics that typically aren't interested in gaming. Chasing demographics that aren't traditionally into gaming risks pushing away existing traditional gaming demographics. High risk (going after typically non-gaming demographics) with high reward if it works, but as we're seeing a lot of that work to try to attract demographics that traditionally haven't been into video games has mostly fallen flat as they sacrifice too much WRT pure game play.
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This. Same with movies, but we'll save that discussion for later. :)
Silent_Buddha said:
I just love the indie games that go for pure gameplay, and if they want to push a societal issue, it's no big deal because they aren't investing tons of money into it so if it only draws a small audience that wants to see those issues in their game, no big deal.

Regards,
SB
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Yes. I also love indies, but I also love big budget games as well, depending on their quality. I played more Vampire Survivors than Starfield last year, but I enjoyed both.
 
Ouch, even signing a contract to produce an exclusive for a platform holder won't necessarily protect a developer from going under anymore.

www.gamesradar.com

PlayStation-partnered studio from former Black Ops devs shuts down after saying its Sony collaboration would bring "complete financial security"

Deviation Games had yet to reveal its debut game
www.gamesradar.com www.gamesradar.com

Deviation Games, the new studio partnered with PlayStation, has shut down just a few years after saying its Sony collaboration would bring "complete financial security."
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Regards,
SB
 
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