The End For Neogaf?

[Nolan]

24 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

The main problems is, in Playstation 4 and Xbox One's manic push to high fidelity 4K gaming, games have just become insanely expensive to make. All the while, the RRP of games is the cheapest they've ever been. It makes no sense and it's the reason we're seeing big publishers hamper games in such an egregious way.

The way I see it there are three options:

1) Make games more expensive
2) Embrace lootboxes, season passes, DLC, the games as service formula
3) Lower the visual fidelity and scope of games

Option 2 is a less in your face way of doing option 1. Option 3 will never happen.

Jason Schreirer over at Kotaku wrote a great piece about how the AAA industry is unsustainable in its current form, and it's hard to disagree.

amiibo are physical objects that you can own forever, and even if they didn't have any in-game unlocks would be worth the £12 or whatever they're selling for. The fact that one amiibo can be used in 20-30 different games is also a huge factor to consider. So no, Nintendo are most certainly not almost as bad.

Bullshit. You can’t put this on PS4 and Xbox Ones push for 4K. Game development cost has been skyrocketing for the past decade since the advent of HD consoles. 

Regardless though, it’s still bullshit to blame the console makers. Publishers are the ones pushing bigger and bigger budgets that simply are unsustainable. They need to know their market and budget appropriately. Look at Hellblade, no publisher and a budget within reason. Gorgeous and well made game released at a low budget price, they made enough sales to turn a profit around 3 months ahead of projections. 

Not every game needs a 100 million budget. 

 

And Amiibo are absolutely dlc. 

[Ronnie]

7 minutes ago, Nolan said:

Bullshit. You can’t put this on PS4 and Xbox Ones push for 4K. Game development cost has been skyrocketing for the past decade since the advent of HD consoles. 

Yes, that's exactly my point? I didn't mean specifically the push for 4K, more Playstation and Xbox pushing power with each gen. And I'm not blaming them, obviously graphics will increase with each gen and costs will rocket because of it.
 

Quote

 

Regardless though, it’s still bullshit to blame the console makers. Publishers are the ones pushing bigger and bigger budgets that simply are unsustainable. They need to know their market and budget appropriately. Look at Hellblade, no publisher and a budget within reason. Gorgeous and well made game released at a low budget price, they made enough sales to turn a profit around 3 months ahead of projections. 

Not every game needs a 100 million budget. 

 

Great, so you're advocating my third option then, lower budgets and scope for AAA games to make them profitable again and cut out the need for microtransactions and games as service taking over.

Quote

And Amiibo are absolutely dlc. 

No, amiibo are plastic figurines for a tenner, that just so happen to unlock (mostly cosmetic) minor content in a huge number of games, collectively. I suspect if you ask a hundred amiibo owners why they by them, ninety will tell you "to have a cool little figurine on my shelf". I'm not saying Nintendo don't do industry wise things like season passes or DLC, but they're a footnote in the conversation.

[Sheikah]

33 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

Locking content with day 1 paywalls like racing costumes in MK8 and chests with fish in them in Zelda?

More people game as a hobby, are you sure? The PS2 sold 150 million. Mario 64 sold 12 million units. The market isn't that much bigger, especially with the advent of mobile gaming.

Witcher 3 sold an insane number of copies, making up it's huge development cost. You hear all the time about how a game needs to sell X million copies or else it's considered a failure.

That's incredibly naive. I'm not sure how you can't accept that high fidelity games like AC: Origins or Battlefront II with hundreds of people working on them and eye watering budgets don't mesh with spending the same amount of money we did for NES games. £40 which by the way, will be knocked down to £20 after a few months.

Point 1 - surprised you forgot Splatoon in your example with its significant lock-aways (or it just didn't suit your argument). How do you respond to that?

Point 2 - Yeah, definitely. Gaming has grown massively as a hobby along with its audience. Not just that, but the way people game, and the amount of games they buy (or receive as part of paid subscriptions). Just recently it was announced that Destiny 2 sold more digitally on console than physical. So we can't even get a real measure of how big it is anymore, since digital isn't tracked.

Also:

Year	UK Population	0 to 15 years (%)	16 to 64 years (%)	65 years and over (%)
1975	56,226,000	24.9	61.0	14.1
1985	56,554,000	20.7	64.1	15.2
1995	58,025,000	20.7	63.4	15.8
2005	60,413,000	19.3	64.7	15.9
2015	65,110,000	18.8	63.3	17.8
2025	69,444,000	18.9	60.9	20.2
2035	73,044,000	18.1	58.3	23.6
2045	76,055,000	17.7	57.8	24.6

Purely on population growth alone I can make this argument. Ignoring how much more massively mainstream gaming is these days, and hence more applicable to the populace, the fact there are millions more people knocking about to game means it's you who has to make an argument why gaming is become less popular to still have, say, only the same amount of people gaming as there were 10 or 20 years ago. In other words, why are you suggesting that the audience may only be as big as it was say 15 years ago?

 

Point 3 - they released Witcher 3 with none of those dubious money-making schemes in place. Saying after the fact "but it sold dead well" is not a good response. So what? What they did with Witcher 3 is a proof of principle that you're wrong, as they avoided doing any of the things you said needed to be done to support the so called "4K push". And the games that are doing those things? They're many of the biggest games going; if Witcher 3 didn't need to do those things to thrive, why do they? The simple reason is money - it's massively profitable. They don't need to do it, but why leave money on the table?

 

Point 4 - Naive, lol. Come on, you don't think the latest furore with EA and Battlefront 2 has happened  because they "need" to do it to support the cost of development, rather than to make ridiculous bank to please shareholders?

Here's an example:

By last March, Witcher 3 made $250M in revenue: https://www.pcgamesn.com/the-witcher-3-wild-hunt/the-witcher-sales-figures-profit

By contrast, EA's micro transaction business ONLY, made $267M in revenue as of last January: https://venturebeat.com/2017/01/31/ea-fifa-17-was-the-best-selling-console-title-in-the-world-in-2016/

 

TL;DR: Integrity gets you the house; selling out gets you the mansion.

Edited November 14, 2017 by Sheikah

[Goron_3]

It's good to see people passionate about this, so thanks for the replies @Sheikah and @Ronnie

With regards to costs, the HD era from the mid-00's onwards is what made costs escalate, because games needed more staff and more advanced tools. 4K doesn't make too much of a difference at the moment as there are no 4K exclusive games - they are just games that run on PS4 and XBO that are then beefed up to higher settings. Downporting to the Switch from a PS4 is actually where the additional cost would come from for a port as you need allocate more staff members entirely to the project (or in most cases, pay a completely separate set of developers to work on it).

The cost of games has steadily risen over the years (I'm not sure how this compares against inflation and the national living wage) but the main issue from my point of view is simple:

1. The audience is willing to invest in games that have pay walls (whether that's DLC, loot boxes etc) and so developers are actively chasing this market to make more $$$

2. Developers want to succeed in this market and haven't yet found out what the saturation limit is. Eventually we'll hit a point where franchises just die out completely and there'll be a few survivors raking in all the dough, but for the EA's and Activision's of the world, it's worth the risk as they stand to make big profits. 

The biggest disappointment for me though is that it's led to the loss of single player AAA titles. Jim Stirling has spoken about this in great length but it's a real issue, as developers expect games like Dead Space to do unrealistic numbers. There needs to be a more effective way of releasing AAA/AA games at a cheaper price point to keep franchises alive and profitable.

The industry and audience have changed.

 

[Ashley]

Also worth considering the AAA industry is slowly (too slowly) adjusting their working practices to benefit their employees and that will have an impact on their bottom line and thus they'll be looking elsewhere.  I can't for the life of me remember where I saw it* but will try and dig it out, but they are slowly starting to encourage less general overtime, less crunch and to pay for overtime (It's still a measly percent that are, but its changing).  The industry has relied on people breaking their backs and young people trying to prove themselves and now it is changing ever so slightly so they will be getting less free productivity they can utilise.

*It was something marking 10 years since the EA Spouse blog post, but my Google-Fu is failing me.

[Ike]

 

5 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

I'm getting pretty sick of it to the point where I think whats the point of even playing anymore? While Nintendo don't seem to be as bad as other companies, stuff like the Xenoblade and Fire Emblem season pass being shoved down our throats before the games are even out shows that they are heading down a similar path.

 

4 hours ago, drahkon said:

I know I might get some heated responses but to be honest...Nintendo is almost as bad. To me amiibo is only slightly less shitty than microtransactions in other games. The only thing amiibo have going for them is that they can be used with several games.

And seeing season passes in Nintendo games makes me sad.

To be fair, Nintendo's DLC does tend to be fairly substantial most of the time and they do tend to say what's coming in the season pass so it's not like you are buying it blind. BoTW's was a bit vague but that's probably because developement wasn't done. Was it Injustice on the Wii U were they ended up refunding people because they didn't release as much content for the Wii U version?

I think the Fire Emblem Warriors Limited Edition should have included the season pass though.

With Amiibo, I think the only thing substantial they locked content with was Fusion Mode in Samus Returns. They could have at least done an update a month after release to unlock it, or put in some cheat code (remember those?).

We're at a point where new people playing games will be more used to DLC/Microtransaction because of mobile gaming, where older players are used to having everything on the cart.

[drahkon]

I consider any kind of microtransaction, be it cosmetic only or game changing, shitty. And that's why Nintendo, in my opinion, is almost as bad as all the other devs who do this. As long as Nintendo doesn't include a mechanic that enables gambling (i.e. loot boxes) to kids they are slightly better

 

And with a lot of DLC I don't have much of a problem. Most of the DLC I have bought was well worth the money I spent. I do, however, get all the information I need to gauge whether I should buy it or not before I actually make the purchase.

Edited November 14, 2017 by drahkon

[Ronnie]

7 hours ago, drahkon said:

I consider any kind of microtransaction, be it cosmetic only or game changing, shitty. And that's why Nintendo, in my opinion, is almost as bad as all the other devs who do this. As long as Nintendo doesn't include a mechanic that enables gambling (i.e. loot boxes) to kids they are slightly better

So never mind actually taking a moment to assess context, degree and implementation and then form an opinion based on those things, you just apply a one size fits all verdict. Interesting.

[Nolan]

11 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

So never mind actually taking a moment to assess context, degree and implementation and then form an opinion based on those things, you just apply a one size fits all verdict. Interesting.

Well, I can’t think of a game yet that has benefited from microtransactions. And I mean the game itself benefiting, not just the developers or publishers. So I’d say that his verdict does indeed fit all. 

[Ronnie]

11 hours ago, Sheikah said:

Point 1 - surprised you forgot Splatoon in your example with its significant lock-aways (or it just didn't suit your argument). How do you respond to that?

I'd completely forgotten about Splatoon, mostly because I can barely remember what the amiibo offered. But ok, Splatoon. I can mention another dozen games that barely offered anything apart from cosmetic stuff. My point is the MAJORITY of amiibo unlocks are for minor things.

 

11 hours ago, Sheikah said:

Point 3 - they released Witcher 3 with none of those dubious money-making schemes in place. Saying after the fact "but it sold dead well" is not a good response. So what? What they did with Witcher 3 is a proof of principle that you're wrong, as they avoided doing any of the things you said needed to be done to support the so called "4K push". And the games that are doing those things? They're many of the biggest games going; if Witcher 3 didn't need to do those things to thrive, why do they? The simple reason is money - it's massively profitable. They don't need to do it, but why leave money on the table?

Witcher 3 is a single player game, and had two big DLC expansions.

11 hours ago, Sheikah said:

Point 4 - Naive, lol. Come on, you don't think the latest furore with EA and Battlefront 2 has happened  because they "need" to do it to support the cost of development, rather than to make ridiculous bank to please shareholders?

I absolutely do think they need to do it.

It's a very simple concept and I can't quite understand why you fail to grasp it.

AAA game RRP is the cheapest it's ever been, and development costs are the highest they've ever been. Publishers need to charge more to pay for games, but instead of raising the RRP they find alternate ways to make money: DLC and microtransactions. Gamers either play a game once then trade it so the publisher loses any additional sales, or they wait a couple of months for a big PS4 game to be sold at a bargain price, thus losing even more money.

[Ronnie]

1 minute ago, Nolan said:

Well, I can’t think of a game yet that has benefited from microtransactions. And I mean the game itself benefiting, not just the developers or publishers. So I’d say that his verdict does indeed fit all. 

So Mii racing costumes in Mario Kart 8 should be bundled in with all the shitty stuff in Battlefront 2 that actually holds back progression? That's a very ignorant way of looking at things.

[Nolan]

1 hour ago, Ronnie said:

So Mii racing costumes in Mario Kart 8 should be bundled in with all the shitty stuff in Battlefront 2 that actually holds back progression? That's a very ignorant way of looking at things.

Does it benefit the game? No? Then it isn’t something that should be charged for, and sets poor precedent for our hobby. 

 

One of my favorite games used to be Team Fortress 2. About the time I quit playing was when they began adding in Hats and Crafting and loot boxes, and becoming free to play. Those additions were actively detrimental to most servers because of how obsessed people became. Add in Steam marketplace and people are buying and selling this shit....

It was sort of the beginning of publishers figuring out how to fleece consumers with cosmetic shit. They realized they needed some finesse and couldn’t just do Bethesda Horse Armor. Microtransactions have evolved and worked into games and twisted our perception. People just aren’t in it for the long fight. What once caused outrage doesn’t get a response. So they add more and go further. That’s all EA did, pushed the bounds a little and saw the current limit. In a few years it’ll be the norm, people won’t have the energy to care to be mad about a $60 pay to win situation. 

And your fucking Mii costumes are a part of that scheme no matter how harmless. Pretending they aren’t is what is ignorant. If you like them fine, if you buy them good for you and great for the publisher. 

[Hero-of-Time]

Wow. Lots of interesting responses in here. I've no idea where to start.

17 hours ago, drahkon said:

A lot of games just don't feel like they are made with the thought in mind to bring joy to gamers. With many games I've played this year it felt like it was me who had to change how I play a game to make it fun, instead of the game just being fun on its own...if that makes any sense...it's difficult for me to describe these thoughts in English.

The absolute most fun I've had in recent years was with Titanfall 2. The campaign was brilliant and with every mechanic I could feel how the developers intended it to be fun. Fun to play, fun to experience, fun to get wrecked on higher difficulties, fun to wreck on the easiest difficulty. Everything was enjoyable from start to finish. It's sad that this has become a rarity.

Then there's Destiny 2. What I've played I've enjoyed. The shooting is great, the campaign was cool, but everything else...it was simply a matter of: Can I make it work? Can I get enough people together to take on the Raid? Can I manage to get this one weapon even though I don't need it? I set out goals for myself which isn't necessarily a bad thing but when you had to keep doing this for years now...it's getting stale.

I know what you mean. You described it well.

I enjoyed the campaign for Destiny 2 ( wasn't a patch of Titanfall 2 campaign though ) and I agree with everything else who said. To be fair, I have no one to blame but myself when it comes to Destiny 2. I should never had bought it. It seemed to be just more of the same and, just like the original game, I got bored of it very quickly.

I play a lot of games and do enjoy most of them but very few bring me a true sense of joy. Off the top of my head only 2 have managed to bring me that feeling and those were Mario & Rabbids and Mario Odyssey. Both games nailed their core mechanics and the games were a delight to play. Both 10/10 in my eyes.

17 hours ago, Sheikah said:

I have also heard people praise lootboxes in games like Overwatch because they benefit from them on a personal level (e.g. "I don't buy the lootboxes, other people do and because of them spending money it means I get to enjoy future content for free"). It's fine for people who never buy a box, but on a more human level it isn't really, since a model dependent on what is essentially gambling and 'whales' isn't really ethical and leaves a bad taste.

I've always been able to justify buy games with loot boxes. I say to myself " I'm not buying them so it really doesn't effect me " but that really isn't the case. As soon as I bought the game, regardless if I spent money on the microtransactions or not, i'm still supporting what they are doing by giving them money. I think I need to take a look at what purchases I am making and how it could effect the industry as a whole. While I may miss out on games I would genuinely like to play, its not as if they is a shortage of other games to play.

@Ganepark32 nothing really to add to your post other than it's a cracking one. Well said.

16 hours ago, Nolan said:

Publishers are the ones pushing bigger and bigger budgets that simply are unsustainable. They need to know their market and budget appropriately. Look at Hellblade, no publisher and a budget within reason. Gorgeous and well made game released at a low budget price, they made enough sales to turn a profit around 3 months ahead of projections. 

Not every game needs a 100 million budget. 

The big publishers are the ones that push for higher specs and the console makers are happy to accommodate them to keep them happy and on board. I remember reading an article a while back now about how much pull the big publishers have and how many of them keep requesting that they have more to make bigger games. I was listening to a podcast recently ( think it was an episode of EZA ) and they were discussing the death of the AA developer. It was suggested that the likes of EA pushed for higher spec consoles in an effort to kill off their competition. There are very few publishers who would have been able to keep up with the rise of development costs and as such many would die out, leaving only the likes of EA to mop up. This is pretty much what has happened over the past 2 generations.

I totally agree that not every game needs a stupidly high budget. Publishers really need to get their expectations in check. If a game can't turn a profit even after something like 4 million sales then there is something seriously wrong with how they've gone about making and advertising the game. 

15 hours ago, Goron_3 said:

The biggest disappointment for me though is that it's led to the loss of single player AAA titles. Jim Stirling has spoken about this in great length but it's a real issue, as developers expect games like Dead Space to do unrealistic numbers. There needs to be a more effective way of releasing AAA/AA games at a cheaper price point to keep franchises alive and profitable.

The industry and audience have changed.

 

Yeah, this is a big loss for me, as well. It saddens me to read how a lot of the big publishers are now chasing the GaaS model. The mobile market has a lot to answer when it comes to how the industry has changed.

13 hours ago, Ike said:

To be fair, Nintendo's DLC does tend to be fairly substantial most of the time and they do tend to say what's coming in the season pass so it's not like you are buying it blind. BoTW's was a bit vague but that's probably because developement wasn't done. Was it Injustice on the Wii U were they ended up refunding people because they didn't release as much content for the Wii U version?

I think the Fire Emblem Warriors Limited Edition should have included the season pass though.

With Amiibo, I think the only thing substantial they locked content with was Fusion Mode in Samus Returns. They could have at least done an update a month after release to unlock it, or put in some cheat code (remember those?).

Yeah, the BotW season pass was pretty vague and it's something i'm not a fan of. If a company is going to advertise and then sell the pass right out of the gate then they should have to tell the consumer what exactly they are getting. Saying stuff like more story content doesn't really tell me anything. Is it to be set before the main story? After? How long will it be? It's all up in the air but they are quite happy to still sell it to people. They've also been pretty vague about the Xenoblade 2 DLC.

I think it was Batman Origins on the Wii U that forced Warner Bros. in to refunding people due to the cancelled DLC.

With Amiibo I always come back to Splatoon ( as already mentioned here ) as a fair bit of substantial content being locked behind the figure.

Seeing as i've commented on amiibo, I may as well say a few more things about them, as others seem to be discussing the subject.

I think amiibo have other issues as well. Many don't want the clutter but would like the costume or item the figure dishes out. Said person is then forced to pay for a piece of plastic that they don't want. The stock issues for amiibo is still a thing. If you did want the content that the figure unlocks but they happen to be a popular character then you may be out of luck and have to either wait months for it to get a reprint or pay a scalper on Ebay. 

The implementation of amiibo isn't as innocent as people may think. Just look at something like Mario Kart. The game shows you exactly which costumes you have unlocked but also shows you which ones you haven't. It essentially creates an in game checklist system which is the kind of thing that can trigger or manipulate people into buying the other amiibo just so that they have a screen that is 100% complete.

13 hours ago, drahkon said:

I consider any kind of microtransaction, be it cosmetic only or game changing, shitty. And that's why Nintendo, in my opinion, is almost as bad as all the other devs who do this. As long as Nintendo doesn't include a mechanic that enables gambling (i.e. loot boxes) to kids they are slightly better

 

It could be argued that they've already signed off on such practices. Fire Emblem Heroes is a gatcha game. Granted, it's a mobile game and the market is a very different beast but it does go to show you that they have no issue with these kind of things being in games that use their IPs. It's going to be interesting to see just how far they go with this kind of thing once Animal Crossing Pocket Camp arrives.

[Sheikah]

 

 

 

 

 

 

I absolutely do think they need to do it. It's a very simple concept and I can't quite understand why you fail to grasp it. AAA game RRP is the cheapest it's ever been, and development costs are the highest they've ever been.  

 

 

 And I don't understand after giving you the example of Witcher 3 why you still seem to insist that these practices are needed to support the costs. Clearly they aren't, or Witcher 3 wouldn't have existed without them. There are plenty of games as big, and even bigger than Witcher 3 in terms of game sales, so there's no reason why they couldn't have adopted Witcher 3's model of game plus DLC and made loads from sales. Hell, Destiny and Destiny 2 follow the exact model of Witcher 3 yet they also have loot boxes and other microtransactions. It's extra cash on top. The original Destiny didn't even introduce microtransactions for over a year so to say that they were needed to support development (long after the game released) just isn't true.  

I'm also not buying that the fact these games being multiplayer accounts for this shortfall and need for microtransactions. For one, Halo 3 last gen topped something like 1.3 million players simultaneously online and did fine without ever introducing them despite that kind of server load. And as mentioned by another poster, TF2 didn't add microtransactions until years after release, and only when the game went F2P. In the case of EA games, a lot of people question the inclusion of such microtransactions in games that also cost £50.

 

I also do not buy your comment about AAA being the cheapest it has ever been. For one, I find many games to generally (but not always) be about £10 more expensive at launchcthan 10 years ago (often closer to £50 now compared to £40). Second, what you're paying for now is often the base experience, with content sometimes being locked away as DLC (e.g. as done with Splatoon - Nintendo must make ludicrous amounts of profit on amiibo).

 

The biggest tell for me is that EA can make more revenue than Witcher 3 made in total just from microtransactions. Clearly it is so profitable that there's no reason why they wouldn't want to do it that way. What are your thoughts on EA making more revenue from microtransactions than CDPR made from the entirity of Witcher 3?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Hero-of-Time]

13 hours ago, Ashley said:

Also worth considering the AAA industry is slowly (too slowly) adjusting their working practices to benefit their employees and that will have an impact on their bottom line and thus they'll be looking elsewhere.  I can't for the life of me remember where I saw it* but will try and dig it out, but they are slowly starting to encourage less general overtime, less crunch and to pay for overtime (It's still a measly percent that are, but its changing).  The industry has relied on people breaking their backs and young people trying to prove themselves and now it is changing ever so slightly so they will be getting less free productivity they can utilise.

Strangely enough, i've just read this article this morning.

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/exclusive-how-a-culture-of-crunch-brought-telltale-from-critical-darlings-to-layoffs

It shows how having these kind of working conditions can be detrimental to your overall business...as if that needed pointing out.

This quote from the article says it all really and highlights how I imagine many gaming companies are ran.

Quote

One source told USGamer that, "At one point, there was a quote (printed on paper) on one of the creative director's doors that read something to the tune of, 'It's not about how much time you need to make a good game, it's about how good of a game you can make with the time you have.'" Several other sources confirmed they had also seen this sign.

 

[Jimbob]

The number of season passes available for games is stupid.  And more so, the price of them and the content offered.  Looking at games like DriveClub and Witcher 3, both offered similar priced season passes and threw in so much content it was unreal.  Then you look at games like Arkham Knight, which offered a £40 season pass and content which was extremely poor.  In terms of games offering loot boxes and microtransactions, well them costs for producing games needs to be covered.  And as much as i really dislike the idea of them altogether (in fact, i avoid games that have this "pay to win" idea (Battlefront II)

Just looking at Battlefront II for a moment, i was watching some YouTuber's really rip into EA for doing what they are doing.  If you don't get any loot crates, to unlock Darth Vader or Luke Skywalker it's about 40 hours of gameplay, then another 40 or so to power them up.  Then they had that starcard situation, basically EA just ruined the game.  And it led to the most disliked Reddit post for quite some time (if all time).

This isn't limited to what companies like EA and Warner Bros do (and games like Destiny 2, all of which appear on Xbox, PC and PS4).  Nintendo are getting them with these Amiibo.  Locking a difficulty mode behind a £15 piece of plastic isn't a good idea, and it's one reason i'm not buying Samus Returns.

[drahkon]

2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

It could be argued that they've already signed off on such practices. Fire Emblem Heroes is a gatcha game. Granted, it's a mobile game and the market is a very different beast but it does go to show you that they have no issue with these kind of things being in games that use their IPs. It's going to be interesting to see just how far they go with this kind of thing once Animal Crossing Pocket Camp arrives.

Never played Fire Emblem Heroes so I didn't know that. Well...they become shittier each day

I'm very interested to see what the AC mobile game will be like. I fear the worst.

[Goron_3]

3 hours ago, Sheikah said:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 And I don't understand after giving you the example of Witcher 3 why you still seem to insist that these practices are needed to support the costs. Clearly they aren't, or Witcher 3 wouldn't have existed without them. There are plenty of games as big, and even bigger than Witcher 3 in terms of game sales, so there's no reason why they couldn't have adopted Witcher 3's model of game plus DLC and made loads from sales. Hell, Destiny and Destiny 2 follow the exact model of Witcher 3 yet they also have loot boxes and other microtransactions. It's extra cash on top. The original Destiny didn't even introduce microtransactions for over a year so to say that they were needed to support development (long after the game released) just isn't true.  

I'm also not buying that the fact these games being multiplayer accounts for this shortfall and need for microtransactions. For one, Halo 3 last gen topped something like 1.3 million players simultaneously online and did fine without ever introducing them despite that kind of server load. And as mentioned by another poster, TF2 didn't add microtransactions until years after release, and only when the game went F2P. In the case of EA games, a lot of people question the inclusion of such microtransactions in games that also cost £50.

 

I also do not buy your comment about AAA being the cheapest it has ever been. For one, I find many games to generally (but not always) be about £10 more expensive at launchcthan 10 years ago (often closer to £50 now compared to £40). Second, what you're paying for now is often the base experience, with content sometimes being locked away as DLC (e.g. as done with Splatoon - Nintendo must make ludicrous amounts of profit on amiibo).

 

The biggest tell for me is that EA can make more revenue than Witcher 3 made in total just from microtransactions. Clearly it is so profitable that there's no reason why they wouldn't want to do it that way. What are your thoughts on EA making more revenue from microtransactions than CDPR made from the entirity of Witcher 3?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well put.

And yes, gaming has never been so expensive. The cost of a AAA title at launch now is absolutely ridiculous. Even when the HD era started you could get a new game for £30 and it was the complete experience from day one. 

[bob]

I see what Ronnie is saying. Back in 1996, it cost £50 to buy Mario 64 (and many other games).

Adjusted for inflation, that is £83. So games are generally getting cheaper, but the cost of production will go up.

[Sheikah]

27 minutes ago, bob said:

I see what Ronnie is saying. Back in 1996, it cost £50 to buy Mario 64 (and many other games).

Adjusted for inflation, that is £83. So games are generally getting cheaper, but the cost of production will go up.

No the N64 was the anomaly due to the costly cartridges, rather than anything else (as in the developers weren't getting more money, it was going to cover that cost). Look at the competitor games (PS1 games) which were mostly around 30 pounds and you got all the content on the disc.

PS2 games were usually around the 30-40 mark as I recall. They weren't the 50 quid they are now for the "base experience".

Cost of production has no doubt gone up but like Ronnie you've overlooked the increasing size of the audience as time has gone on. A game can cost more to make but if there are more people to buy it (and DLCs) and at a higher price versus the past then that's enough. Which indeed, was the case for Witcher 3. Like I've been saying, if developers absolutely, unquestionably needed microtransactions to fund development of their "AAA"  scale game then a game on the scale of Witcher 3, which had no microtransactions simply could not have happened. It could not have been made and the company still be in business if microtransactions were a necessity to develop a AAA-scale game.

Edited November 15, 2017 by Sheikah

[dazzybee]

I paid £60 for Mortal Kombat 2 on the SNES. prices for full price releases are relatively cheaper, that's fact. Now the argument about "base" product is interesting, is the base product of Mario Kart 8 weaker than previous entries which is then being moved to DLC? I don't think so; I don't know the full spectrum of DLC on most games, I presume it is EXTRA content though and not cut content. That's a debate I guess; but gaming is cheaper for us then it has ever been. Never mind the fact that so many digital games would've been full price in previous generations (look at Stardew valley, picos, rocket league etc).

Not going to get involved in the Nintendo and amino are as bad as the very worst articles. Preposterous to me and theres no discussions - just immovable opinions.

I do find it interesting about the whole direction in the industry is moving in. This is why I've moved away from Xbox and PS to be honest. Not for me. I think this is why I love Indies so much; have an increasing desire to play retro games and love Nintendo more than ever for providing what I feel are more pure, fun gaming expeircnes. I mean Nintendos roll out of constant free content for splatoon and arms should be applauded, not lumped in with being almost as bad as EA because of a hair grip you get for splatoon 2 with its amiibo.

But, like with films and Hollywood, I feel completely turned off to most of the "big" games and new practices. Inevitable I guess. Luckily there's always be passion and creativity to give us what we want!

 

[Ronnie]

1 hour ago, Goron_3 said:

And yes, gaming has never been so expensive. The cost of a AAA title at launch now is absolutely ridiculous. Even when the HD era started you could get a new game for £30 and it was the complete experience from day one. 

I genuinely don't understand how anyone can think this way.

The cost of a AAA game at launch nowadays is the same price that an NES/SNES/N64/Gamecube game used to cost, WITHOUT adjusting for 10, 20, 30 years of inflation.

Assassin's Creed will have its price slashed in half in a couple of months.

Gaming is cheaper than it's ever been, that's indisputable fact.

59 minutes ago, bob said:

I see what Ronnie is saying. Back in 1996, it cost £50 to buy Mario 64 (and many other games).

Adjusted for inflation, that is £83. So games are generally getting cheaper, but the cost of production will go up.

£83!! Yes the N64 cartridges were more expensive, but the difference isn't £40.

[Sheikah]

43 minutes ago, dazzybee said:

I paid £60 for Mortal Kombat 2 on the SNES. prices for full price releases are relatively cheaper, that's fact.

And what about PS1 games that were 30 quid, PS2 games that were 30-40 quid, and PS4 games that are around 50 at launch? At worst you could say prices were inconsistent with time, at least when it comes to Nintendo. When it comes to anyone who isn't Nintendo and doesn't use cartridges then I'd say there has been a trend for increasing price over time.

That's before you even factor in that for that 50 quid, you're often not getting the full experience, unlike in the past. There have been many occasions where launch content has seemingly been paywalled for extra revenue. Then you're also paying for Plus to play online, and some of that money goes back to the developers who host the servers no doubt. You're paying in more ways than you know, for less than you think.

 

Quote

The cost of a AAA game at launch nowadays is the same price that an NES/SNES/N64/Gamecube game used to cost, WITHOUT adjusting for 10, 20, 30 years of inflation.

Compare costs of launch PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4 games, none of which use cartridges.

I'd also like to bring the whole point of this "cost of games over time" argument back to why it was raised, because it now seems like you're trying to score a point without realising why. Ronnie, I can assume you're making the point "SNES/N64 games cost way more" to point out that games are comparably cheap today, which means developers aren't getting enough money to make more expensive games.

I would counter this argument and suggest that those heinously expensive games were probably partly due to cartridge cost, the smaller number of sales they would generate (and therefore lower return), and also due to whatever Nintendo was charging developers to put out games on their system.

Edited November 15, 2017 by Sheikah

[Ronnie]

1 minute ago, Sheikah said:

And what about PS1 games that were 30 quid, PS2 games that were 30-40 quid, and PS4 games that are around 50 at launch? At worst you could say prices were inconsistent with time, at least when it comes to Nintendo. When it comes to anyone who isn't Nintendo and doesn't use cartridges then I'd say there has been a trend for increasing price over time.

That's before you even factor in that for that 50 quid, you're often not getting the full experience, unlike in the past. There have been many occasions where launch content has seemingly been paywalled for extra revenue. Then you're also paying for Plus to play online, and some of that money goes back to the developers who host the servers no doubt. You're paying in more ways than you know, for less than you think.

INFLATION.

At release, on average:

N64: $70 at release = $110 now
NES games: $50 at release = $100 now
SNES: $60 at release = $100 now
GC: $50 at release = $70 now
Switch: $60 at release

PS1: $40 at release = $65 now
PS2: $50 at release = $65 now
PS4: $60 at release

360: $60 at release = $70 now
XBO: $60 at release
 

[dazzybee]

11 minutes ago, Sheikah said:

And what about PS1 games that were 30 quid, PS2 games that were 30-40 quid, and PS4 games that are around 50 at launch? At worst you could say prices were inconsistent with time, at least when it comes to Nintendo. When it comes to anyone who isn't Nintendo and doesn't use cartridges then I'd say there has been a trend for increasing price over time.

That's before you even factor in that for that 50 quid, you're often not getting the full experience, unlike in the past. There have been many occasions where launch content has seemingly been paywalled for extra revenue. Then you're also paying for Plus to play online, and some of that money goes back to the developers who host the servers no doubt. You're paying in more ways than you know, for less than you think.

 

 

 

Compare costs of launch PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4 games, none of which use cartridges. Report back on your findings.

Were ps1 and ps2 games that cheap? I don't remember them being that cheap in comparison to cube and n64, I had all 4. Maybe they were but not in my memory. 

But even if they were, I still feel that with inflation, that the digital shops have reduced the price of a whole range of genres/Indies it feels like gaming is a lot cheaper than it was. The consoles themelsves too.

Either way though, it's probably not that important a factor is it? Cant remember why it came up now