Are game developers going... Backwards?

I thought I'd bring up a bit of a chat I had with Nixy on TS.

Battlefield 1942. I played that when that was released, Although I was a child, That game grew on me and I was incredibly fond of it, despite my young age. BFV, same story. BF2? God, Loved that game. I didn't get into PR until I was old enough to understand the mechanics and how good the gameplay was.. But then? Bad Company. Don't get me wrong, I didn't have a gaming PC then, but it played BF2. I was content.. I got an xbox as most children did (Or at least a console) and got the bad companies. I loved playing them.. but they never attracted me like the wide open maps, and the vehicular gameplay of older battlefields. A visual improvment may have happened but I'd rather play Battlefield 1942 than I would BC2. BF3 arrives.. And what? It offers 64 player servers for the PC, and prone returning.. AS FEATURES.

Now, PR, FH2 and even vBF2 got modded, to have 128 people on the server. That was a modification to the game, Never mind what developers could do to the actual engine to already allow that.. wow. Why don't they already add that feature? Sure, the mod hasn't worked 100%, but.. the developers would have the power to do that. Hell, even that shitty M.A.G on the ps3 got like 300 odd players on a server, yet the PC is limited to 64. The reason? Money. Money Money Mother of God Money.

Now, I know it may be a wall of text, but.. I'm 15. I can see the trend of what's happening to games, I refuse to buy into Activision to fund their horrendous milking of CoD, but most of the people my age actually enjoy this linear, boring maps with no vehicles, no realism.. Why? But what's worse, is them playing cod is giving them idea's of joining the army. They think because they can rambo round a virtual battlefield, they can rambo around afghanistan expecting an AH-64D to be available after finding some dickheads to shoot at. I'd write some more, but I can see my thread getting shot down with points and me retreating off somewhere to cry about it. Just why do these developers have the opportunity to make the best damn games ever, but they stick with the same friggin' genre and gameplay style just because they hit the sweetspot of consumer interest.

Tl;dr - Dice, Tell EA to f**k off, do your own thing, and hire black sand studio's to re-make BF3 using your frostbite engine, and then s**t all over call of fucktardation v2 moar fucktarding about.

I'm going to be bitter and twisted when I'm older.

I actually think most people on this forum agree with you. And yeah, as we discussed: it's all about money. But that's not just the gaming industry, it's the entire world.

Unfortunately mate its all about money. Its easy to think of EA and DICE as big evil corporations, but there are people working for them. Ordinary people. People with families, who need to get paid. EA/DICE need to make money to be able to pay their employees, in order to make more games.

However, I do agree with you. Innovation is dying. The bigger publishers can afford to take risks as they have successful franchises to fall back on, but they don't seem to anymore. That is the problem. I wouldn't care if activision released CoD every two years if they released something new or risky in between. But they don't. They continue to milk the same freaking game every year and it works. I suspect it won't last forever, and maybe we'll see some changes, but for the foreseeable future we're stuck with bland tried and tested modern warfare themed games.

Never thought I'd long for a new WW2 game!!!

I agree - Innovation is surely dying. ARMA 3.. Come quickly!

And honestly, I've not seen a good Vietnam game yet. Bar BF:V, but that's dated, and BC2:V isn't worth mentioning to it's "predecessor" (I say that very loosely.)

Nah, the thing we were talking about is how publishers like EA or Activision just fail in general.

I don't quite see the need for them to exist. Just like record labels and other sorts of publishers.

Why does there need to be a company that charges you money to sell your products? Why does EA have to sell a product DICE made, and why do they need to interfere with how DICE develops their product? If those man-in-the-middle companies did not exist, a lot of stuff would be cheaper.

Just look at the music industry. The artists don't make money, all the money goes to their record labels. That's why it's so stupid to buy cd's. Heck, if I could I would pirate the album, and use paypal to 'donate' the band 20 euro's for it, because that way I at least feel the money goes to the band. Buying cd's in stores or in iTunes isn't supporting the artists in any way, you're supporting the bank accounts of 2 or 3 managers that make obscene amounts of money each year for doing absolutely nothing.

Now, I'm sure people can come up with reasons of why those companies exist. Like doing the advertising, making sure your game has a big brand so people will want to buy it. And yeah, there are risks for game studio's and bands and movie producers because they might invest millions in making it but do not sell enough copies to make it worth it, etc. Companies like EA can help with initial funds.. but the way it's currently handled is just absurd.


Also, good Vietnam game: I used to play a game called Vietcong. It's very old, so it's pretty shitty compared to modern day games.. but I loved it to bits.

Agreed Nixy! I mean, Look at Mojang. Sure, they created Minecraft.. but they're just a small swedish indie company who've struck it big without any aid of any large publishers, simply through viral social media like youtube etc. Most of my viewing history is either

a) Music
b) Fails/Virals
c) Game videos (Gameplay, Let's plays, you know the drill)

Honestly, as much "Good" you can think of what these publishers do, there's so much countering the good they do and the detrimental affect of masking up the little companies. I love little companies (Shouldn't really say that, but they aren't the biggest) like Mojang.. I mean, they only JUST hired a consultant about where to take their company.

http://www.minecraft.net/

Just look at the stats underneath. Minecraft was a risk, and look how that turned out.. these Big Publishers are just bullies if nothing, muscling their way through to make the money with idiotic ideals about what "Good Gameplay" is as to them, Good Gameplay is what makes the most money.

Minecraft was never a million dollar risk though.. it started as a past time hobby thing that happened to be great. I doubt Notch invested millions in it

That's the only drawback I can imagine. No games coming because no one can/will take the risk of developing a game for millions of bucks, and then going bankrupt because there's not enough sold copies..

Not to mention that Mojang is getting sued by Bohemia for their new game. Only 40.000pounds and the right for the name of their new game.

Anyway the more veteranry games, don't apply to the main target media sadly. This means that to secure the cash they need to bet on the kids and people with little free time.

Greeny it's not Bohemia it's Bathesda. Bohemia got ARMA, Bathesda got Elder Scrolls (Hence they think they own "Scrolls" as a word)

Arh yes, Bethesda, i just remembred B and thats it.

It warms my hart to see a fifteen year old with brains and the ability write properly and coherently.

Anyway, like someone wrote. It's got a lot to do with EA and similar s**t-stained names being greedy to the point of actually working.

I fullheartedly blame CoD for these travesties. I remember someboy defending peer-to-peer hosting for CoD because he thought it was newer and thus better than servers. The funny thing is that peer-to-peer came first and then servers.
I actually got scared when development studios were actually experimenting with peer-to-peer hosting after CoD.
Bobby Kotick is just milking CoD and yes it is actually working because these fanboys think CoD is realistic and awesome. All my friends think CoD is the best game ever made and that consoles are better than a computer because "they were developed for gaming unlike computers, how can you use a keyboard using the arrowkeys and aim with a mouse anyways?". They buy all the DLC for full price and are going to buy the next itiration of the game. *le sigh*

It seems like games are being tuned to the lowest common denominator. Where are the games where you actually had to think about your next move? Or what about genres like space sims(Freespace 2, Freelancer) or turn-based games(JA2)?

Though after all this writing I remember that we still have some Easter-European games that bear the name; Stalker, Men of War or Arma 2 that still challenge us and actually are rewarding to play.

Gaming is incredibly mainstream these days. Back in the day, when PC was the lead platform and gaming was much more of a niche (read:nerdy), devs/publishers would try new things becuase they weren't expecting millions of sales...since CoD4/MW2 hit MASSIVE and sold ridiculous amounts, they are all seeing it and thinking, hmmm, I want a piece of that pie.

Can you imagine a space sim or turn based strategy appealing to the guys who have an xbox and 2 games (CoD and FIFA)? It just never would. But these guys are the biggest market for games now, not 'gamers'.

The average cost for developing games in the UK for the most popular platforms:

• Nintendo Wii: £1,722,000
  
• Sony PS2/3: £1,940,000
  
• Xbox 360: £4,655,000
  
• PC: £3,189,000
  
• Social games/Facebook: £320,000
  
• Flash-based games: £83,000
  
• Nintendo DS/DSI: £785,000
  
• Sony PSP: £956,000
  
• Mobile/PDA (not Apple): £1,648,000
  
• iPhone: £335,000
  
• iPad: £347,000
  

Source: Tiga 'State of the UK games development sector' survey, 2011

This is just in the UK and is from a news article about how the UK is increasingly crap for devs, but just look at the average costs for making a game. With the increasing costs of development and more complex technology, publishers are less likely to take a risk as they need to make that money back. Why do you think so many studios have been shut down by their publishers in the last couple of years - because the dev costs are so high, they don't make a profit.

Gahhhh. This world already angers me to no end. And I'm glad I warmed your heart J - There ARE some intelligent 15 year olds about, fortunately.

If I had the power that EA holds over developers.. I'd honestly push the boat out. Look at each collective product they've bought out - Battlefield, Burnout, Spore, Fifa.. Add those all together, and there's your revenue to piss about with. Operation Flashpoint (as much as a flop as the last one was) is the closest thing to PR that i've seen.. supposedly 'Mainstream' (You get my drift, simple pick up and play) but that'd put me OFF pr if I played it. I just wish Innovation didn't die, as some may already know, we've lost one hell of an innovator this week.