Harassment Against Game Devs

[Captain Cobra]

Are you sure it's not the practice of selling half of a game and then selling the other half as DLC?

[javamonsoon]

@Rayblue,

If that quote held true in the industry, we would have quite different games. There's little to no evidence that devs actually listen. This is were the culture-change in the gamer-community comes into play. Too many of us buy anything, no questions asked and will die for their raised to god-status devs. Devs rarely have to pull all the stops to deliver something worthwhile.

 

Devs in case: Obsidian. The amount of crap that this studio has unleashed after they stopped being Black Isle Studios is ungainly. I don't care that Urquarth is the man behind Fallout. I love the franchise, but Fallout by itself is in my opinion not enough to give an entire studio a free pass to start coding bullshit. No, Obsidian is the one studio who can traditionally fall back on a staunch apologist-army.., and as such have quite a 'close enough'-attitude to finished products.

(I personally call Obsidian the 'franchise killers')

 

The last dev by my knowledge to lose all respect and credibility by the community as a whole was John Romero. (Him of Dai Katana) Ever since then, devs keep getting second chances for some weird reason. If I were John Romero and would look at the industry as it is today, I would be very bitter and cynical... Urquarth is afterall still devving merrily away after Dungeon Siege III.

 

As I stated before, the change I would like to see is two-fold. Devs need to stop using the community as unpaid beta-testers and gamers themselves should learn the value of money. Gaming is an expensive hobby and I like to do my hobby right. If my hobby was carpenting, I would likewise focus on quality tools and materials. Otherwise that carpenting-hobby is just destroying money with little to show for it. Gaming is no different in that respect. I want quality tools and quality materials to enjoy my hobby. And I'm willing to pay for it too.

As it is, gaming is like destroying money.

 

@Cobra,

DLC... if it is like Assault on Dragon Keep, then I don't care. Cosmetic DLC like skinpacks I don't care about. For the rest I think that people should stop wanting to own everything there is to get for any given game. With EA's policy-change, I think it is (somewhat) safe to say that the days of zero-day DLC are behind us too.

 

If there really is something I would specifically kick against, it is the belief of devs that multiplayer-gamers are still the beesknees. I think that only with devs, the idea that multiplaying with total strangers is awesome fun still lives. Gaming can be social, but nothing beats couch-coop with a few brewskies, pizza and good company...

That's why Rockband is still actual in my household.

 

 

 

 

[javamonsoon]

Actually, EA allows for 7 days refunds on digital sales on Origin. https://help.ea.com/article/returns-and-cancellations

 

It's the only thing where they are ahead of Steam.

Wow, EA is really turning a new leaf, aren't they? Pretty soon I might have to start recommending them as a go-to publisher...

 

Seriously though, I still thought that Origin was as rigid in that respect as they were in their start-up days, but I guess that the new CEO there is making all the right calls...

[Guest]

If it's anything that needs change, it's the publishing side. All the publishers have to do is strong-arm to get what they want with the ridiculous amounts of money they earn all because they can burn the game onto some discs and pay for some ad space. There's also the predatory acquisition of smaller studios, then breaking them up or creating multiple branches under the same name to capitalize on a recognized brand (I'm looking at you, EA)

 

It's publishers who can pretty much make or break a project with all their funding. It's not the devs who push a game's intended release date forward months ahead just so it can be out by the holiday season or play the safe route by releasing only the same games with marginal differences because that's the way to pad quarterly profit statements.

 

I wouldn't recommend a single publisher out there, because all-in-all they're the same. If anything needs to change, it's their iron grip on everything. I'm not saying devs are completely innocent, because yes some are genuinely incompetent, but it's like Darth Vader and Darth Sidious. One is just a lapdog of the other that's behind the scenes pulling all the strings.

[javamonsoon]

@Nixon,

 

Where's Darth Revan when you need her? ^^

 

[illuminaughty]

dont hate the player , hate the games , most ppl on MMORPP hate me cuz i put fear on them

[Rayblue]

*sigh* I live in a country where MMOs predominate and only a few thousand actually buy legit games but they don't have the consumer-action power that Westerners possess (i.e. instigate online protests in, say, WoW). We can talk further about why the consumer-gamer should have a greater voice over a supposed monopolistic corporate entity, but until then the non-gamers and the antis sees us as a rabble and wrongly associate us with the lunatic fringe, and at the same time the hated/necessary-evil suits want to milk us over one more time. 

 

(when games cross politics, that's when I have to check out www.gamepolitics.com. Furthermore, Skyrim is the only game I have installed and still playing it, having lost interest in shooters and MMOs... and consoles.) 

[javamonsoon]

*sigh* I live in a country where MMOs predominate and only a few thousand actually buy legit games but they don't have the consumer-action power that Westerners possess (i.e. instigate online protests in, say, WoW). We can talk further about why the consumer-gamer should have a greater voice over a supposed monopolistic corporate entity, but until then the non-gamers and the antis sees us as a rabble and wrongly associate us with the lunatic fringe, and at the same time the hated/necessary-evil suits want to milk us over one more time. 

 

(when games cross politics, that's when I have to check out www.gamepolitics.com. Furthermore, Skyrim is the only game I have installed and still playing it, having lost interest in shooters and MMOs... and consoles.) 

The industry is not monopolistic. The industry is multilithic and vertical. Product, pricing and delivery are all imposed, don't follow market or demand, usage-allowances are draconic and the consumer can only either buy or not buy. Basically, the combined publishers are akin to a cartel if their economic model wasn't so unsound. It is based on flooding the market with a 100% chance of someone buying something.

That only works for so long.

 

That's my primary beef with the gaming-hobby. Buying or not buying may seem like a choice, but in realistic economic terms it doesn't make sense from a consumer point of view and towards the industry itself it leads to enivatable catastrophe. Eventually, the game-crash of '85 will repeat itself. Only this time, the community is more aware and more than ever disgruntled.