4 ms·

Are you saying the pervasive DRM which degrades performance, day 1 DLC practices, and sectioning up content that used to come with the $60 game I bought are not

Are you saying the pervasive DRM which degrades performance, day 1 DLC practices, and sectioning up content that used to come with the $60 game I bought are not problems with the game dev industry? Yeah there are some people who want exactly what you said, but the majority just want a complete experience. I'm perfectly fine with a 20 hour game with no DRM(or at least no denuvo) and DLC after a few weeks of the game being out. I'll pay full price for it too. What I don't pay for is a game that costs $60, has 10 hours of content that are riddled with bugs, a "beta" two weeks before release, day 1,2,3 patches because it is broken, runs at 3/4 of the fps it should because of Denuvo, and has day 1 DLC and a $30 season pass (which doesn't cover all the DLC from that season, just some), and content walled off by pre-order.

sidlls 7y ago
Consumers bear the brunt of the blame for this. I worked at a few AAA game shops when DLC was just starting to be a thing. Consumers drove that by their habits: they demanded add-ons and extras that took enormous effort to develop but didn't want to pay as much as a third or half the original purchase price, so we tinkered with smaller releases at much lower price points and consumers ate it up. Then as mass development by indies offering free apps took off the "problem" got worse. Consumers now expect apps, including games, to have a tiny purchase price or be free and to pay a-la carte for things they want.
- magduf 7y ago
  This is absolutely correct. If this stuff didn't work, then consumers wouldn't buy it, and the game companies would go out of business or change their practices. Game companies are highly profitable, therefore this strategy, as horribly as it sounds, is apparently a successful one which consumers are happy to fund with their disposable income. Games are a luxury; this isn't something like ISP access or cellular service that you basically need these days to fully function and participate in modern society. If people really didn't like the practices of the game companies, they could easily just not buy any games and do something else with their free time. The consumers are absolutely to blame here.
  - sidlls 7y ago
    I don't think it's that simple: there was a feedback loop involved in which game (and app) developers share some of the "blame" for what has happened. A few could have differentiated themselves by continuing to offer high-end gaming and app experiences at a premium, but chose short-term, easy money. I don't blame them entirely, but someone in a position of power with even reasonable patience and foresight back then could have kept enough competitive share of the market to profit well without going into the race to the bottom we've seen.
    - magduf 7y ago
      But if there's more money in doing it the way they're doing it now (leading to you calling it "short-term, easy money"), and switching back to the old way isn't more profitable, then that's really down to the consumers, because without them there would be zero revenue for these game companies. The game companies aren't really in a position of power here; the consumers are. If they stop buying, then the entire industry goes under immediately. As I said before, games are purely a luxury, though it seems like gamers refuse to believe this. But apparently there's no shortage of people willing to throw their money at these companies and buy into these business models of buying broken games and paying extra to "unlock" content to keep playing. I have coworkers like this. They complain a lot about the state of games, about how buggy they are and how they're entirely broken when they're first released, yet they keep buying them anyway. I ask them why and they don't really have an answer. Personally, I have much better things to spend my time and money on than entertainment products that disrespect me: I can go on a hike or bike ride, I can go on a date, I can go to cultural events, I can go to the gym, I can work on one of the languages I'm learning, or if I want to kill time at home doing something "mindless" I can just watch stuff on YouTube for free, watch Netflix, or play an old video game in an emulator even. Why so many young men insist on spending all their free time playing buggy games that aren't even complete when you buy them, I have no idea; there's many other things to do with your time.
      - Konnstann 7y ago
        I don't buy them. One of the many hobbies I enjoy, alongside coding, rock climbing, and a host of other activities, is gaming. You can turn your nose up at people's hobbies as much as you want, but playing games is no less mindless that most sports. My complaint is that game series that I enjoy playing turn into micro-transaction-ridden garbage. Street fighter 4: great game, some netcode issues, DLC expansions released every year or two. Street fighter 5: buggy mess that didn't even work for the first 3 days after release, even after two(!) betas, with half the content locked behind a paywall, and literal advertisements put on costumes. That was probably the last AAA game I bought. I pretty much only play games from devs/publishers I respect, my problem is that list is ever-shrinking. A lot of consumers are not like me: the hype is too much and they don't care about the actual game as much as getting to play it with other people.
Causality1 7y ago
Don't forget the "90 day roadmap" that tells players when the game will be worth playing and then gets blanked out like Anthem's when the players give up.

sidlls 7y ago

Consumers bear the brunt of the blame for this. I worked at a few AAA game shops when DLC was just starting to be a thing. Consumers drove that by their habits: they demanded add-ons and extras that took enormous effort to develop but didn't want to pay as much as a third or half the original purchase price, so we tinkered with smaller releases at much lower price points and consumers ate it up. Then as mass development by indies offering free apps took off the "problem" got worse. Consumers now expect apps, including games, to have a tiny purchase price or be free and to pay a-la carte for things they want.

magduf 7y ago
This is absolutely correct. If this stuff didn't work, then consumers wouldn't buy it, and the game companies would go out of business or change their practices. Game companies are highly profitable, therefore this strategy, as horribly as it sounds, is apparently a successful one which consumers are happy to fund with their disposable income. Games are a luxury; this isn't something like ISP access or cellular service that you basically need these days to fully function and participate in modern society. If people really didn't like the practices of the game companies, they could easily just not buy any games and do something else with their free time. The consumers are absolutely to blame here.
- sidlls 7y ago
  I don't think it's that simple: there was a feedback loop involved in which game (and app) developers share some of the "blame" for what has happened. A few could have differentiated themselves by continuing to offer high-end gaming and app experiences at a premium, but chose short-term, easy money. I don't blame them entirely, but someone in a position of power with even reasonable patience and foresight back then could have kept enough competitive share of the market to profit well without going into the race to the bottom we've seen.
  - magduf 7y ago
    But if there's more money in doing it the way they're doing it now (leading to you calling it "short-term, easy money"), and switching back to the old way isn't more profitable, then that's really down to the consumers, because without them there would be zero revenue for these game companies. The game companies aren't really in a position of power here; the consumers are. If they stop buying, then the entire industry goes under immediately. As I said before, games are purely a luxury, though it seems like gamers refuse to believe this. But apparently there's no shortage of people willing to throw their money at these companies and buy into these business models of buying broken games and paying extra to "unlock" content to keep playing. I have coworkers like this. They complain a lot about the state of games, about how buggy they are and how they're entirely broken when they're first released, yet they keep buying them anyway. I ask them why and they don't really have an answer. Personally, I have much better things to spend my time and money on than entertainment products that disrespect me: I can go on a hike or bike ride, I can go on a date, I can go to cultural events, I can go to the gym, I can work on one of the languages I'm learning, or if I want to kill time at home doing something "mindless" I can just watch stuff on YouTube for free, watch Netflix, or play an old video game in an emulator even. Why so many young men insist on spending all their free time playing buggy games that aren't even complete when you buy them, I have no idea; there's many other things to do with your time.
    - Konnstann 7y ago
      I don't buy them. One of the many hobbies I enjoy, alongside coding, rock climbing, and a host of other activities, is gaming. You can turn your nose up at people's hobbies as much as you want, but playing games is no less mindless that most sports. My complaint is that game series that I enjoy playing turn into micro-transaction-ridden garbage. Street fighter 4: great game, some netcode issues, DLC expansions released every year or two. Street fighter 5: buggy mess that didn't even work for the first 3 days after release, even after two(!) betas, with half the content locked behind a paywall, and literal advertisements put on costumes. That was probably the last AAA game I bought. I pretty much only play games from devs/publishers I respect, my problem is that list is ever-shrinking. A lot of consumers are not like me: the hype is too much and they don't care about the actual game as much as getting to play it with other people.

Causality1 7y ago

Don't forget the "90 day roadmap" that tells players when the game will be worth playing and then gets blanked out like Anthem's when the players give up.