When all of those 400 mil dollar could be allocated for the development of a new Resistance or Killzone or Gravity Rush, Infamous, Twisted Metal, Motorstorm, Sly Cooper, Jak and Daxter and any original Sony IP out there... Or hell BLOODBORNE 2? Or at least a PC port of the OG? Or a 60fps patch for the OG?
It's not the gaming world, it's the business school graduates that are now in charge of real businesses. It's the people who know how a buisness should be run and know nothing about how any one business should be run.
Glad you said it… Concord is a perfect example of a game that was fighting uphill and decided to go full DEI anyway. DEI was not the murderer… it was just the poison gas that finished the job after the killer left the game writhing on the floor. It didn’t kill it. But it darn sure helped put the nail in the coffin.
How? What exactly DEI did to help make Concord a bad shooter? Only "woke" thing I can think of are pronouns, and I have no idea how in the world he/him, she/her, or they/them made it an even worse game. Just admit that you are all transphobes and let's call it a day
in case of Concord i would heavily argue that DEI was one of the major reasons that it failed. According to testers the game modes and performance were solid, nothing new but also nothing too bad - a clean ripfoff. But after seeing the ugly heroes and comparing them to i.e. Overwatch or Warframe i would never play it. An obese black healer, a black woman with strange clothes, a walking bin and for people who want to play something white only a sad looking male in a baseballer outfit. Who wants to play such characters? I personally don't play these games but if i would start to play them Concord would already be out of the equation just for these ugly characters. The price tag is of course another let down because most other hero shooters are F2P but if the game would offer NEW gameplay on top of it can be justified. For example Battlefield 1942 was revolutionary back in the day because it allowed 32v32 matches on big maps with vehicles (jeeps, tanks, artillery, aircrafts and even battleships) during a time where you had at best something like Counter Strike or Call of Duty 1.
I can honestly understand companies thinking that throwing money at surface-level inclusionary buzzwords is actually profitable. Because so much of social media is filled with people who would appreciate stuff like that, it can be easy to assume that this large percentage of Twitter actually speaks for most people who might potentially buy a game. There's 2 problems though. 1: Most people engaging in social media discourse aren't necessarily into the game in question. They just believe in the social politics surrounding the discussion. 2: The inner workings of social media sites make it very hard to determine how anyone feels about anything. As it allows very vocal minorities to dominate conversations. Giving off the appearance that a majority of everyone else can be trusted to think the same way. That should be a lesson these companies only have to learn once though....
Yep. Just seems an unnecessary risk to keep corporatizing/pushing what ultimately amounts to a net neutral ROI at best. Anyone who thinks it’s because THEYRE passionate about social issues is kidding themselves, it’s all about the ROI, and it looks like they’re learning the hard way that passion on Twitter doesn’t equal units sold
Sorry for replying to a month old comment, but thought you made good points. Just wanted to say, on #1, I don't think DEI is responsible for bad games, but is a symptom of a lack of creativity from subpar creators and devs. And when inclusion and diversity is done poorly, it feels like pandering, so that target audience is often put off. On #2, it's possible to cut through the noise of social media by using social listening, which is essentially buying a ton of data from social networks to get an accurate read of wider opinion. It's utilised a lot in politics, but game companies should really be using it too if they aren't already. (I assume Microsoft likely are).
Blackrock-"You want our money, you play by our rules" Dev- Yes sir 8 Years later Consumer- "You want our money, you make what we want" Dev-"RACIST BIGOTS!!!"
@@whiskeybuddha1995 Oh ok, so you will "update" your post 1 hr after I posted but never actually respond... lmao. Don't talk out of your a** or someone may call your bluff.
If Iwata was still in charge he would welcome palworld as a competitor and even encourage game freak to learn from pockpair instead of trying to sue their pants off to get rid of the competition 😢
We really need laws that hold CEOs of large companies accountable for decisions that affect the public. So many get away with not oweing anything and leaving a company broken with their bonuses.
Mass layoffs are hardly unexpected to someone who has been involved with gaming for over 20 years, and it has nothing to do with the economy. There are just way too many people working on AAA titles nowadays, something that's become increasingly more obvious over the years to anyone who paid attention. Development tools have evolved to the point where certain skills such as programming aren't even required to make a basic game anymore, the hardware has evolved to the point where the weakest console right now has the processing power of several high end PC's from a decade ago, and the budgets have increased to the point where they make Hollywood blockbusters look like school projects, and yet despite that we have more people than ever working to make games that are worse than the ones we had 15 years ago. Big companies tried to brute force game development by mass-hiring people who were either unqualified, unmotivated, or just looking for a paycheck and then further grinding their spirit into dust through crunch time and micromanagement, automating the hiring process and diversity quotas haven't helped matters either. Maybe they're finally realizing that what they need is fewer, better developers, though I think it's more likely they're realizing that even if they employ fewer, worse developers people will still buy their games.
All while also either cutting on their own older titles to prevent preservation of titles they can't monetise the hell out of and compete with their overmonetised slop, or keeping their hands on the IP they haven't touched in 20 years so no one else can profit from it, or by the off-chance when shit goes south they can cobble together a remake / remaster / whatever the hell they come up with to milk money from fans of the old title.
That's more of a publisher and executive problem then studio problem. Most studios dont want to make this kind of crap with some exceptions like firewalk they want to make a game that people will find interesting and fun like elden ring for example. But of course publishers and executives are just greedy scumbags who dont give a fuck about good just money and put people in these studios who dont have passion to make good game but make good money.
Dgaf about woke or Anti-woke thing, just give a game that can bring people together... You have reasonable people as gamers all over the world and not just what people believe politically or even religiously...
The reason the games suck is because they prioritize the woke atuff over making the game good. For example, it doesnt matter to the devs if Dragon Age Veilgaurd is a good game. It only matters to the devs that it has trans scars in the character creator so they can huff their own farts and pretend they love transvestites.
"its more expensive to create games now" biggest lie ever especially in these days creating games is EASIER than ever look at all the tools they got and on top of that AI is getting more useful each day
I want some human like bots in MMOs though, where you can even feel sometimes it's a noob bot that requires more healing, but you know.. no rage. Just the cool friendly bot.
@@alessandrocanale6189 Sony did nothing wrong with helldivers 2, the service is restricted in 3rd world countries, so what, they can't even afford internet. in 3rd world countries they are trying to develop and survive, not play games. Grow a brain.
@@EUROCORP2027 BRUH first of all not all counrtys where playstaton network is not available are third world countys like estonia lituania and latvia and second what sony did was that when helldivers 2 came out the pc players did not need a PlayStation network account to play meaning that pc players who live in counrtys where playstaton does not operate could play the game with no problems but then they tried (and failed) to add the mandatory requirement of the psn account for pc later on meaning that if it would have passed pc players playing HD2 in a counrty not supported by psn would not have accecs on a game that they played a lot of hours and if you would have tried making a psn account using a vpn you would get banned and now they banned those countrys that are not supported by psn to rebuy HD2 on pc as some sort of petty revenge
@@EUROCORP2027 Do you have no knowledge of how the world works at all? Do you think the average Chinese person or South African or Egyptian is living in a wooden hut just barely surviving because the don't have any food or money? I cannot explain in just this comment how extremely wrong your view of the world is, so i suggest you read the book Factfulness by Hans Rosling.
This is such a good rundown of the whole sordid situation. We need more people calling it all out but doing so in a rational and articulate way. I appreciate that you call out the DEI/SBI stuff but acknowledge it's not the only thing damaging game development. Plus you made me laugh a bunch of times 😄 you got yourself a sub.
My list of reasons gaming is failing: 1: Greed 2: Wokeness (Mainly western games) 3: Lawsuits and threats (Mainly Nintendo) 4: Unfinished games with glitches, negligence to production 5: Milking trends instead of trying something new 6: Censhorship, especially in multiplayer gaming 7: Not understanding what makes games fun
Don't forget. from toon fun games to realism guns and horrors. i'm tired of seeing anime girls go RPG Mode. why doesn't anyone think of funny cartoony games like ratchet and clank? sly cooper? crash bandicoot? spyro?
After the horror stories that have come from the game development world in these past few years, I shudder thinking about what it's like to actually work in these places...
This was a fantastic video. I agree with you that companies wasting money on DEI consultants is ridiculous. Also graphics are as good as they need to be already. AAA game studios need to learn from Nintendo and prioritize fun gameplay over visuals.
Also why do these companies keep putting their studios in like the top 20 most expensive cities on the planet requiring higher pay for the devs so they don't live in a card board box under a bridge?
I don't understand what these companies are getting from ESG investors that can justify losing so much money. It's clear that people have been rejecting this en masse for a couple years now. I know that ESG money is the cheapest money in the world, but how that can intice companies to sacrifice general profitability for borrowed money is a mystery to me. There's got to be a lot of this i'm not getting.
I think we’re on the tail end of projects using it more regularly, since a lot of these games did and do take several years to make. I think they underestimated the reactions people would have to it, but you’re right, I think the initial spark was “ooh extra development money”
The industry has got so big that the money is being wasted on the wrong things. Which is hurting the games directly. It could be a failed acquisition, being associated with Sweet Baby, ballooning video game budgets. There are multiple roads to failure that really didn't exist 10 years ago. Back then you just make a good game and people would buy it. We need to rediscover that simple business model.
I love your videos man, please keep up the amazing work. of the 100s of channels I follow you're one of the few I have all notifications on for. Always excited to see another new upload,
Agreed, I hate the take that there’s nothing good anymore. Like yeah no shit stop buying corporate AAA slop, indie games are more creative and thriving than they ever have been. Same argument applies to the music industry too
I still remember how my old company laid off 200 workers on a year with record sales and plans to expend their national operation with 250 more stores. "Thanks for making me rich, now get the fuck out."
I'm not saying capatalism is bad but when you focus too much on profits instead of making good products its kinda demoraaling. I feel this type of stuff is happening everything
You’re right. Us and our money are the checks and balances for their stupid decisions, best we can do is spread the word as much as we can so even the average Joe hears about it
@@TheKingerdI feel like FOMO is definetely something affects people when it comes to games. I'm a hypocrite though I preordered the ultimate edition for sparking zero. But at least its showed good gameplay
3 місяці тому
Produces product that no one wants to buy = mUh cApItAlIsM. If you haven't noticed 99% of business owners would rather watch their business burn to the ground than make MINOR EASY changes to actually make money.
“I’m just a gamer that wears collared shirts.” (Quote of the year) I’m just a gamer that started playing video games when the original “Pong” console appeared on a shelf at a local Sears store back in 1975 which followed me home and took over possession of the family television. After making enough money to retire in 2015, I have even more time to play video games. So now I’m a just gamer that does not own a single shirt with a collar. Collars went away at the same time as my professional career.
All the big companies had to do is let the printer print money, but they just had to twist the dials to the point of risking their entire existence. If i had a working formula to generate Millions, (skyrim, dragon age saga, mass effect 1-3 ect) nothing will change the formula except for loss of income. "Oh let's deliver half the quality, make everything soft, modern and quirkyyyy (xd lol) and lecture our consumers!" This isn't just a few bad decisions, this is borderline self-sabotage.
this need to be said more and more but when a company fail its a reflection of its leaders yet time and time again we see this sort of bs and the people in charge are just like Oops what a shame and moves on
On the f2p Model, I'am totally fine with a game selling me cosmetics, of any kind really. One of my favorite games of all times is still Soldat, had a 7$ "registration fee" that would let you change the color of your Jetpack.
Hi-fi rush didn't sell that well...but thats because 1: they had to shadow drop it so the Microsoft suits didn't cancel or meddle in it 2: it was released on gamepass, so naturally it wasn't gonna make bank
The thing about graphics reminded me of a story from the fall of telltale games, at the end the people running the show only really cared about visuals because it was the only thing they could really understand without putting the time in to play the game.
You saw the news report about the ubisoft developer who blamed gamers for star wars outlaws bombing saying that gamers expect too much quality like wtf
These gaming corps are so focused on making AAA-games for the masses that all that they can do is make another type of “shoot ‘em up” or “beat ‘em up” game and pray for its success. At the same time gaming is so much more than this and so diverse. And I am happy to see success of the guys like Paradox, 11bit studios, Hooded Horse, THQ Nordic, Saber Interactive and other small and middle-sized publishers and devs (including those who make a game being “one man army”) while these greedy juggernauts tank.
Funny how we need foreign studios to show us how to make games again. BG3, Wukong, Space Marine 2 and Helldivers - all based overseas. Blackrock is really so drunk with power that they flushed out talent from both Hollywood and most AAA NA studios. They are also WAY too powerful and need to be checked, if only the US govt weren't so incompetent.
US government is paid off by them too. Why do you think FOREIGN "agencies" are allowed to buy land in the US? btw, China, despite relaxing their control on all businesses, still hold their businesses by the throat. They stand back just enough to fool the boomer parties in congress and the senate to let it slide.....for a paycheck. Mind you, some of the alcoholics in politics spend more on their alcohol a year than a fair portion of the averge citizen's yearly salary. They do indeed show up to the meetings drunk.😂 What a 💩show.
I don't like how every game developer is going to unreal engine. It makes every game look exactly identical. I know it's just to save money and help speed up development. I also have friends that literally shop by the graphics of the game and don't care about game play. It's sad
Just a heads up, Activision Blizzard fired thousands upon thousands of employees during their most profitable quarter ever. I believe their most profitable quarter of all times. So, with that knowledge, anybody telling you game development is getting more expensive and that's why so much corners needs to be cut, just remind them that Activision Blizzard, worth over 40 billion dollars, layed off thousands upon thousands of employees during their most profitable quarter of all time.
The gears are in motion my brothers, sisters, and dudes. Keep supporting foreign and indie games, because there are gonna be a lot of devs looking for work soon.
21:01 There is an exception to this free-to-play gamble curse and that's Warframe. The one free-to-play game that cares about the player base. It's basically Destiny... but without the eye-watering greed Bungie throws in our faces.
What I just dont understand: we have seen a TON of studios (even big ones) go under in the blink of an eye, because their games didnt perform as well as they should (Dead Space for an example). Yet here we have Sony, Ubisoft, EA, etc. absolutely tanking the freaking industry, making record losses and STILL cling on somehow. How is that even possible??? (yeah I know Sony does more then games, but my point still stands).
How the hell did he not bring up fromsoft in this thread. Basically everything he explained about bad behaviour, fromsoft was the polar opposite. Good game that was complete, good "enough" graphics, no micro transactions and no toxic culture (as far as I can tell)
I wished the people of Tango Gameworks started a new studio called "Blango Blameworks, original studio, do not steal" and just kept going without Microsoft.
It's actually probably never been cheaper to make a game if just making a game is your goal. Making a good or profitable game is another matter altogether.
AAA is going to collapse, and really soon. There is no such thing as "too big to fail", as I've seen Atari and THQ's ends across my life. Ubisoft's end is near too. Blackrock has lost a horrific and nigh-incomprehensible amount of money, and even they are on thin ice.
I see shade thrown at reactions channels, I click that like button. I'm a simple man. Joke's aside, I am completely fed up with the mismanagement of funds being paid by the invested people (Customers and devs) and not the investors.
19:50 This is exactly what MandaloreGaming said that I highly agree with. "Hyper visual realism is the root cause of many other mechanical issues". I would say it also extends to costs and time taken but you get the idea.
I haven't paid Ubisoft, Activision, or EA in years. We had more on the market. And these companies didn't have to get Black Rock funding. We need more small private companies to get a chance. The market rules need to change.
That is why I'm gonna switch to playing board games or stick to retro from now on the video game industry is heading to a direction I no longer want to be a part of
No joke, all I want is large scale RPGs and PS2 graphics, minimal voice acting is absolutely fine with me, just make an engaging game. Hopefully Gedonia 2 delivers.
As many other have noted, we who have been playing games for decades have enough games and do not NEED to buy more. If they make games we want that do not slap us in the face with BS politics we will buy more if not we quit!
Things to be excited by with AI in gaming: Greater friendly/enemy AI leading to better firefights or battles Games that specialize in text based adventures Things to not be excited by with AI in gaming: Everything else Edit: There is a reason why PS2/Gamecube - Xbox/PS3 era will always be look at very fondly and have a remaining playerbase. I honestly believe Indie games will be the last bastion of quality.
Mass Effect 2 and Halo 4, along with War for Cybertron, are the prettiest games I've ever seen graphics-wise. And those games came out over a decade ago. All the improvements with graphics really didn't add anything in the past 12 years.
Games don’t have to be expensive. Devs choose to make them expensive bc it give them more interweb credz. Any generic $10mil PS2 game far trumps any $100+mil game nowadays
Good points. I guess I simply disagree on one thing: no game has ever been very successful without good graphics, since the dawn of video games. The examples given here actually have very appealing graphics. For instance it's one of the main appeals of Stardew Valley. Pixel-art is extremely successful. Just check which indie games are the most successful among the same production value and you'll see it's always pixel-art that wins. But anyway that still kinda proves the point made in the video: games don't need _photorealistic_ graphics. In fact minimalism is very trendy. It's still difficult to beat Minecraft, which is by no means realistic, but still very appealing visually thanks to its landscapes and overall design. Big budget games should definitely learn of lesson from it.
The entire from-soft Souls series usually has graphics that would look at home on last gen hardware whit only the lighting to hide the fact. And yet only a handful of people care about the graphics in a souls game and and probably dont even play the game. Honestly i think just adding better lighting to a game is enough over spending millions on photoelectric texuters and models.
I mean, not like the owners of the big game companies played at least 1 or more games b4 being some business person, so that's something. Then again, there are probably business people out there who are gamers but now just focusing on their money ego, hence the results from the big game companies like the release of concord.
I have a Larry Fibk image on my wall I throw stuff at Edit: Im leaving the typo, so YT cant say a thing. But yeah, them cutting the games is why I now play retro 2nd edit: I want a game so good, I dont give a shit that Im playing it on a Gameboy. An OG Gameboy at THAT.
60%(aka most players) only wanted infection and forge from Halo Infinite. Devs from 343 clearly were not Halo 3 players. If you can not play "FatMan" or "Ghostbusters" its not a Halo game.
if i were a game director i would've care employees and people who talks to each other where we understand. not talking to money and do nothing. i'd bring back the old toon game magic. not go to vietnam and go warmode and pay a lot of wasteful money on decorations and transactions.
400 million dollars for an overwatch ripoff, 68 billion dollars for activision... it seems the gaming world has lost its mind
Corporate has been taken over by knuckle dragging clueless activists. Who realised it’s very hard to get fired apparently…
When all of those 400 mil dollar could be allocated for the development of a new Resistance or Killzone or Gravity Rush, Infamous, Twisted Metal, Motorstorm, Sly Cooper, Jak and Daxter and any original Sony IP out there...
Or hell BLOODBORNE 2? Or at least a PC port of the OG? Or a 60fps patch for the OG?
CoD biggest fps franchise on planet, WoW biggest mmo in the world, Candy Crush biggest winner on phone, Diablo IP most iconic ARPG, Crash Bandicoot, Starcraft, Warcraft. Yes, it's worth buying Activision.
Things wont improve until the gaming world loses its investors.
It's not the gaming world, it's the business school graduates that are now in charge of real businesses. It's the people who know how a buisness should be run and know nothing about how any one business should be run.
Glad you said it… Concord is a perfect example of a game that was fighting uphill and decided to go full DEI anyway. DEI was not the murderer… it was just the poison gas that finished the job after the killer left the game writhing on the floor.
It didn’t kill it. But it darn sure helped put the nail in the coffin.
That’s a good way to put it. It didn’t light the match that started the house fire but it sure wasn’t a bucket of water either lol
How? What exactly DEI did to help make Concord a bad shooter? Only "woke" thing I can think of are pronouns, and I have no idea how in the world he/him, she/her, or they/them made it an even worse game. Just admit that you are all transphobes and let's call it a day
in case of Concord i would heavily argue that DEI was one of the major reasons that it failed. According to testers the game modes and performance were solid, nothing new but also nothing too bad - a clean ripfoff. But after seeing the ugly heroes and comparing them to i.e. Overwatch or Warframe i would never play it. An obese black healer, a black woman with strange clothes, a walking bin and for people who want to play something white only a sad looking male in a baseballer outfit. Who wants to play such characters? I personally don't play these games but if i would start to play them Concord would already be out of the equation just for these ugly characters.
The price tag is of course another let down because most other hero shooters are F2P but if the game would offer NEW gameplay on top of it can be justified. For example Battlefield 1942 was revolutionary back in the day because it allowed 32v32 matches on big maps with vehicles (jeeps, tanks, artillery, aircrafts and even battleships) during a time where you had at best something like Counter Strike or Call of Duty 1.
I can honestly understand companies thinking that throwing money at surface-level inclusionary buzzwords is actually profitable. Because so much of social media is filled with people who would appreciate stuff like that, it can be easy to assume that this large percentage of Twitter actually speaks for most people who might potentially buy a game. There's 2 problems though. 1: Most people engaging in social media discourse aren't necessarily into the game in question. They just believe in the social politics surrounding the discussion. 2: The inner workings of social media sites make it very hard to determine how anyone feels about anything. As it allows very vocal minorities to dominate conversations. Giving off the appearance that a majority of everyone else can be trusted to think the same way. That should be a lesson these companies only have to learn once though....
Yep. Just seems an unnecessary risk to keep corporatizing/pushing what ultimately amounts to a net neutral ROI at best. Anyone who thinks it’s because THEYRE passionate about social issues is kidding themselves, it’s all about the ROI, and it looks like they’re learning the hard way that passion on Twitter doesn’t equal units sold
Sorry for replying to a month old comment, but thought you made good points. Just wanted to say, on #1, I don't think DEI is responsible for bad games, but is a symptom of a lack of creativity from subpar creators and devs. And when inclusion and diversity is done poorly, it feels like pandering, so that target audience is often put off. On #2, it's possible to cut through the noise of social media by using social listening, which is essentially buying a ton of data from social networks to get an accurate read of wider opinion. It's utilised a lot in politics, but game companies should really be using it too if they aren't already. (I assume Microsoft likely are).
Blackrock-"You want our money, you play by our rules"
Dev- Yes sir
8 Years later
Consumer- "You want our money, you make what we want"
Dev-"RACIST BIGOTS!!!"
Step 1: Make repulsive product
Step 2: Buyers are repulsed
Step 3: Surprised Pikachu face
Gamers can’t stand to see black or gay people in video games lol. The most childish group of consumers
This is the simpleton way of looking at the actual problems. But it’s ok, just drink your chocolate milk and watch cartoons.
@@whiskeybuddha1995 Please elaborate, oh wise one.
@@whiskeybuddha1995 Oh ok, so you will "update" your post 1 hr after I posted but never actually respond... lmao. Don't talk out of your a** or someone may call your bluff.
Iwata was one of a kind
rip to the goat 🫡
Now that he is dead they have a patent on throwing shit in games.
@@nojuanatall3281 that they patented this year. Super sketchy behavior
@@nojuanatall3281Chimpanzees should sue them
If Iwata was still in charge he would welcome palworld as a competitor and even encourage game freak to learn from pockpair instead of trying to sue their pants off to get rid of the competition 😢
We really need laws that hold CEOs of large companies accountable for decisions that affect the public. So many get away with not oweing anything and leaving a company broken with their bonuses.
Mass layoffs are hardly unexpected to someone who has been involved with gaming for over 20 years, and it has nothing to do with the economy. There are just way too many people working on AAA titles nowadays, something that's become increasingly more obvious over the years to anyone who paid attention. Development tools have evolved to the point where certain skills such as programming aren't even required to make a basic game anymore, the hardware has evolved to the point where the weakest console right now has the processing power of several high end PC's from a decade ago, and the budgets have increased to the point where they make Hollywood blockbusters look like school projects, and yet despite that we have more people than ever working to make games that are worse than the ones we had 15 years ago.
Big companies tried to brute force game development by mass-hiring people who were either unqualified, unmotivated, or just looking for a paycheck and then further grinding their spirit into dust through crunch time and micromanagement, automating the hiring process and diversity quotas haven't helped matters either. Maybe they're finally realizing that what they need is fewer, better developers, though I think it's more likely they're realizing that even if they employ fewer, worse developers people will still buy their games.
All while also either cutting on their own older titles to prevent preservation of titles they can't monetise the hell out of and compete with their overmonetised slop, or keeping their hands on the IP they haven't touched in 20 years so no one else can profit from it, or by the off-chance when shit goes south they can cobble together a remake / remaster / whatever the hell they come up with to milk money from fans of the old title.
At least at dark times like this, I'm happy Nintendo banned Blackrock from buying any shares from the shares market
I didn’t know that. Good for them
The Japanese will not have their culture invaded
But I hate that Nintendo suing pal world for game mechanics.It's stupid.
Wait fr? That's a rare W for Nintendo, still screw them for what they did to Gmod and what they're about to do to Palworld.
@@stellviahohenheim BlackRock would find a loophole eventually, but still, the Japanese or the East Asians wouldn't go without a fight.
I hope this gets studios to stop trying so hard to appeal to "Modern audiences"
modern*
That's more of a publisher and executive problem then studio problem. Most studios dont want to make this kind of crap with some exceptions like firewalk they want to make a game that people will find interesting and fun like elden ring for example.
But of course publishers and executives are just greedy scumbags who dont give a fuck about good just money and put people in these studios who dont have passion to make good game but make good money.
What is this "Modern Audience" you speak of?
@@Trustypatch43 is that "modern audience" with us in the room at the moment?
The same audiences that don't care about buying your products and just b*tch about it on their social media ?
I dont care about woke agenda, I care about good gameplay, good story and they fail to deliver it.
Dgaf about woke or Anti-woke thing, just give a game that can bring people together... You have reasonable people as gamers all over the world and not just what people believe politically or even religiously...
The reason the games suck is because they prioritize the woke atuff over making the game good. For example, it doesnt matter to the devs if Dragon Age Veilgaurd is a good game. It only matters to the devs that it has trans scars in the character creator so they can huff their own farts and pretend they love transvestites.
"its more expensive to create games now" biggest lie ever especially in these days creating games is EASIER than ever look at all the tools they got and on top of that AI is getting more useful each day
I want some human like bots in MMOs though, where you can even feel sometimes it's a noob bot that requires more healing, but you know.. no rage. Just the cool friendly bot.
They gotta be laundering the money. 19:50 Graphics do make a difference as many criticized slitterhead too.
After that shit sony did with helldivers 2 i can say they deserved it
Great example of a self defeating, nonsensical, stupid decision. Imagine being a company that hates money
@@TheKingerd yeah and immagine being a cool youtuber who replies to the comments of his wiewers
You are cooking good content mate keep going like this
@@alessandrocanale6189 Sony did nothing wrong with helldivers 2, the service is restricted in 3rd world countries, so what, they can't even afford internet.
in 3rd world countries they are trying to develop and survive, not play games.
Grow a brain.
@@EUROCORP2027 BRUH
first of all not all counrtys where playstaton network is not available are third world countys like estonia lituania and latvia
and second what sony did was that when helldivers 2 came out the pc players did not need a PlayStation network account to play meaning that pc players who live in counrtys where playstaton does not operate could play the game with no problems but then they tried (and failed) to add the mandatory requirement of the psn account for pc later on meaning that if it would have passed pc players playing HD2 in a counrty not supported by psn would not have accecs on a game that they played a lot of hours and if you would have tried making a psn account using a vpn you would get banned
and now they banned those countrys that are not supported by psn to rebuy HD2 on pc as some sort of petty revenge
@@EUROCORP2027 Do you have no knowledge of how the world works at all? Do you think the average Chinese person or South African or Egyptian is living in a wooden hut just barely surviving because the don't have any food or money? I cannot explain in just this comment how extremely wrong your view of the world is, so i suggest you read the book Factfulness by Hans Rosling.
This is one of the best videos on the topic so far, well done.
"Forced behaviors" that doesn't sound dystopian at all. 🤪
The problems with digital games can be solved through piracy. It's hard to take away my games if I have a copy of the files on my pc.
"If Buying Isn't Owning, Then Pirating Isn't Stealing".
@@legiran9564it's not pirating it's archiving dude
@@legiran9564 Great quote lol
This is such a good rundown of the whole sordid situation. We need more people calling it all out but doing so in a rational and articulate way. I appreciate that you call out the DEI/SBI stuff but acknowledge it's not the only thing damaging game development. Plus you made me laugh a bunch of times 😄 you got yourself a sub.
Thanks King
I’m honored
My list of reasons gaming is failing:
1: Greed
2: Wokeness (Mainly western games)
3: Lawsuits and threats (Mainly Nintendo)
4: Unfinished games with glitches, negligence to production
5: Milking trends instead of trying something new
6: Censhorship, especially in multiplayer gaming
7: Not understanding what makes games fun
probably another reason would be games being made by inexperienced people or non-gamers at all, and not really the "by gamers, for gamers'' thing.
Don't forget. from toon fun games to realism guns and horrors. i'm tired of seeing anime girls go RPG Mode. why doesn't anyone think of funny cartoony games like ratchet and clank? sly cooper? crash bandicoot? spyro?
@@alexmaxwell3708 Ratchet and clank got woke and died
I like how Nintendo here essentially occupies entire spot of the list.
Congratulations....
You just made the 7 deadly sins of game Devs
After the horror stories that have come from the game development world in these past few years, I shudder thinking about what it's like to actually work in these places...
I have worked for bosses like this, i used to be an extrovert but now i just keep to myself and have trust issues
Its funny how quickly it all fell apart in the last decade.
Hey there Sony, I identify as 400M... Wanna bl0w me 😂😂😂
11:24 so goddamn lore accurate
This is a well made video, put to words all the thoughts I’ve had with the modern industry
This was a fantastic video. I agree with you that companies wasting money on DEI consultants is ridiculous.
Also graphics are as good as they need to be already. AAA game studios need to learn from Nintendo and prioritize fun gameplay over visuals.
That bad dragon toy on your desk is wild
Also why do these companies keep putting their studios in like the top 20 most expensive cities on the planet requiring higher pay for the devs so they don't live in a card board box under a bridge?
I was not ready for the evolution of "you don't say" in this video :D
I don't understand what these companies are getting from ESG investors that can justify losing so much money. It's clear that people have been rejecting this en masse for a couple years now. I know that ESG money is the cheapest money in the world, but how that can intice companies to sacrifice general profitability for borrowed money is a mystery to me. There's got to be a lot of this i'm not getting.
I think we’re on the tail end of projects using it more regularly, since a lot of these games did and do take several years to make. I think they underestimated the reactions people would have to it, but you’re right, I think the initial spark was “ooh extra development money”
The industry has got so big that the money is being wasted on the wrong things. Which is hurting the games directly. It could be a failed acquisition, being associated with Sweet Baby, ballooning video game budgets. There are multiple roads to failure that really didn't exist 10 years ago. Back then you just make a good game and people would buy it. We need to rediscover that simple business model.
8:56 Wow, he just said it point blank. Pure hubris and megalomania on display...
This is your best video. Keep driving the point home.
I love your videos man, please keep up the amazing work. of the 100s of channels I follow you're one of the few I have all notifications on for. Always excited to see another new upload,
Hot take: games have never been better. Just avoid corporate slop.
avoid studios owned for publicly traded companies
Agreed, I hate the take that there’s nothing good anymore. Like yeah no shit stop buying corporate AAA slop, indie games are more creative and thriving than they ever have been. Same argument applies to the music industry too
@@maofria1452Private companies can have greedy investors too you know. It's not a public company exclusive thing.
lol I’ve always believed that people will literally play broken shit or the same live service for years then complain how gamings “trash”
@@Garcia1995 yet this is the best bet to get good and complete AAA games without excessive monetization. Larian is a example.
Really interesting video, thanks. Subsribed!
Excellent video. Subscribed 👍
I still remember how my old company laid off 200 workers on a year with record sales and plans to expend their national operation with 250 more stores.
"Thanks for making me rich, now get the fuck out."
Was it publicly traded?
@@xXYannuschXx Yes, still is.
I'm not saying capatalism is bad but when you focus too much on profits instead of making good products its kinda demoraaling. I feel this type of stuff is happening everything
Polticial correctness sucks ass.
You’re right. Us and our money are the checks and balances for their stupid decisions, best we can do is spread the word as much as we can so even the average Joe hears about it
@@TheKingerdI feel like FOMO is definetely something affects people when it comes to games. I'm a hypocrite though I preordered the ultimate edition for sparking zero. But at least its showed good gameplay
Produces product that no one wants to buy = mUh cApItAlIsM. If you haven't noticed 99% of business owners would rather watch their business burn to the ground than make MINOR EASY changes to actually make money.
battlefield did die.
the diversity FTW was a Mckinsey thing and it turned out to be pretend, the data didn't show any improvement it was bias
Love your videos/ Editing 👍
Thank you!
“I’m just a gamer that wears collared shirts.” (Quote of the year)
I’m just a gamer that started playing video games when the original “Pong” console appeared on a shelf at a local Sears store back in 1975 which followed me home and took over possession of the family television. After making enough money to retire in 2015, I have even more time to play video games. So now I’m a just gamer that does not own a single shirt with a collar. Collars went away at the same time as my professional career.
All the big companies had to do is let the printer print money, but they just had to twist the dials to the point of risking their entire existence.
If i had a working formula to generate Millions, (skyrim, dragon age saga, mass effect 1-3 ect) nothing will change the formula except for loss of income.
"Oh let's deliver half the quality, make everything soft, modern and quirkyyyy (xd lol) and lecture our consumers!"
This isn't just a few bad decisions, this is borderline self-sabotage.
this need to be said more and more
but when a company fail its a reflection of its leaders
yet time and time again we see this sort of bs
and the people in charge are just like Oops
what a shame and moves on
On the f2p Model, I'am totally fine with a game selling me cosmetics, of any kind really. One of my favorite games of all times is still Soldat, had a 7$ "registration fee" that would let you change the color of your Jetpack.
Hi-fi rush didn't sell that well...but thats because
1: they had to shadow drop it so the Microsoft suits didn't cancel or meddle in it
2: it was released on gamepass, so naturally it wasn't gonna make bank
Holy crap!! You used a wkuk clip!!!
I love thise guys!!!😂😂
Wokeslop
The thing about graphics reminded me of a story from the fall of telltale games, at the end the people running the show only really cared about visuals because it was the only thing they could really understand without putting the time in to play the game.
This is such an underrated channel
I heard a good response to the “well I’m having fun”. Good! We want you to have fun! We just want you to be treated better.
Ubisoft is an example of AAA graphic that worse than their own 10 years old games.
They cut everything.
You saw the news report about the ubisoft developer who blamed gamers for star wars outlaws bombing saying that gamers expect too much quality like wtf
These gaming corps are so focused on making AAA-games for the masses that all that they can do is make another type of “shoot ‘em up” or “beat ‘em up” game and pray for its success.
At the same time gaming is so much more than this and so diverse. And I am happy to see success of the guys like Paradox, 11bit studios, Hooded Horse, THQ Nordic, Saber Interactive and other small and middle-sized publishers and devs (including those who make a game being “one man army”) while these greedy juggernauts tank.
I think Starfield had AI voice in dialogs. It was lifeless.
what song is in the background at 2:43 🥲
Black Ops 2 menu theme
Funny how we need foreign studios to show us how to make games again. BG3, Wukong, Space Marine 2 and Helldivers - all based overseas.
Blackrock is really so drunk with power that they flushed out talent from both Hollywood and most AAA NA studios.
They are also WAY too powerful and need to be checked, if only the US govt weren't so incompetent.
US government is paid off by them too. Why do you think FOREIGN "agencies" are allowed to buy land in the US?
btw, China, despite relaxing their control on all businesses, still hold their businesses by the throat. They stand back just enough to fool the boomer parties in congress and the senate to let it slide.....for a paycheck. Mind you, some of the alcoholics in politics spend more on their alcohol a year than a fair portion of the averge citizen's yearly salary. They do indeed show up to the meetings drunk.😂 What a 💩show.
I don't like how every game developer is going to unreal engine. It makes every game look exactly identical. I know it's just to save money and help speed up development. I also have friends that literally shop by the graphics of the game and don't care about game play. It's sad
Spot on analysis brother.
19:23 Brother, I'm replaying Oblivion right now, that should tell you everything
Just a heads up, Activision Blizzard fired thousands upon thousands of employees during their most profitable quarter ever. I believe their most profitable quarter of all times.
So, with that knowledge, anybody telling you game development is getting more expensive and that's why so much corners needs to be cut, just remind them that Activision Blizzard, worth over 40 billion dollars, layed off thousands upon thousands of employees during their most profitable quarter of all time.
The gears are in motion my brothers, sisters, and dudes. Keep supporting foreign and indie games, because there are gonna be a lot of devs looking for work soon.
Free market’s in such a good position to prop up the indie games that deserve it, keep spreading that good word 🤝
Games are more expensive is a delusion made manifest by higher ups getting more and more money from the company for doing nothing.
Adam West Batman and even WKUK references?! Holy shit, let me hit like and that bell.
21:01 There is an exception to this free-to-play gamble curse and that's Warframe. The one free-to-play game that cares about the player base. It's basically Destiny... but without the eye-watering greed Bungie throws in our faces.
Nobody with 400 million to expend on anything can complain about costs reasonably.
What I just dont understand: we have seen a TON of studios (even big ones) go under in the blink of an eye, because their games didnt perform as well as they should (Dead Space for an example). Yet here we have Sony, Ubisoft, EA, etc. absolutely tanking the freaking industry, making record losses and STILL cling on somehow. How is that even possible??? (yeah I know Sony does more then games, but my point still stands).
The game execs NO ITS IMPOSSIBLE bit got a great chuckle out of me
Excellent video
How the hell did he not bring up fromsoft in this thread. Basically everything he explained about bad behaviour, fromsoft was the polar opposite. Good game that was complete, good "enough" graphics, no micro transactions and no toxic culture (as far as I can tell)
I wished the people of Tango Gameworks started a new studio called "Blango Blameworks, original studio, do not steal" and just kept going without Microsoft.
It's actually probably never been cheaper to make a game if just making a game is your goal. Making a good or profitable game is another matter altogether.
AAA is going to collapse, and really soon. There is no such thing as "too big to fail", as I've seen Atari and THQ's ends across my life. Ubisoft's end is near too. Blackrock has lost a horrific and nigh-incomprehensible amount of money, and even they are on thin ice.
I see shade thrown at reactions channels, I click that like button. I'm a simple man.
Joke's aside, I am completely fed up with the mismanagement of funds being paid by the invested people (Customers and devs) and not the investors.
Oh hey Kingerd, was wondering when you might upload.
I have returned from my slumber. Thank you for being so quick to check out the new upload 👍🏻🫡
@@TheKingerd Hope to hear more from the big circus show that is the modern gaming industry.
19:50
This is exactly what MandaloreGaming said that I highly agree with.
"Hyper visual realism is the root cause of many other mechanical issues". I would say it also extends to costs and time taken but you get the idea.
I think he said it in his System Shock 2 review, how fidelity can get dated, but art direction is forever.
I haven't paid Ubisoft, Activision, or EA in years. We had more on the market.
And these companies didn't have to get Black Rock funding.
We need more small private companies to get a chance. The market rules need to change.
That is why I'm gonna switch to playing board games or stick to retro from now on the video game industry is heading to a direction I no longer want to be a part of
No joke, all I want is large scale RPGs and PS2 graphics, minimal voice acting is absolutely fine with me, just make an engaging game. Hopefully Gedonia 2 delivers.
Nice vid
As many other have noted, we who have been playing games for decades have enough games and do not NEED to buy more. If they make games we want that do not slap us in the face with BS politics we will buy more if not we quit!
"dog ate my homework" is out. Its old. Now, "i have concepts of a plan" is the new excuse.
Things to be excited by with AI in gaming:
Greater friendly/enemy AI leading to better firefights or battles
Games that specialize in text based adventures
Things to not be excited by with AI in gaming:
Everything else
Edit: There is a reason why PS2/Gamecube - Xbox/PS3 era will always be look at very fondly and have a remaining playerbase. I honestly believe Indie games will be the last bastion of quality.
Mass Effect 2 and Halo 4, along with War for Cybertron, are the prettiest games I've ever seen graphics-wise. And those games came out over a decade ago. All the improvements with graphics really didn't add anything in the past 12 years.
What is your source on the 400 million dollars cost ?
Games don’t have to be expensive. Devs choose to make them expensive bc it give them more interweb credz. Any generic $10mil PS2 game far trumps any $100+mil game nowadays
*I get angry just thinking about the billions of dollars flushed down toilets because developers don't know how to innovate* 👎
Gawd I love this guy
Complaining about DEI when company profits are the main concern is definitely something, a reactionary type of something
i feel bad for the concord devs. i really hope they don't go homeless or anything because they don't deserve that
Love your editing style and channel. I hope to reach your level with my channel one day.
Good points. I guess I simply disagree on one thing: no game has ever been very successful without good graphics, since the dawn of video games. The examples given here actually have very appealing graphics. For instance it's one of the main appeals of Stardew Valley. Pixel-art is extremely successful. Just check which indie games are the most successful among the same production value and you'll see it's always pixel-art that wins. But anyway that still kinda proves the point made in the video: games don't need _photorealistic_ graphics. In fact minimalism is very trendy. It's still difficult to beat Minecraft, which is by no means realistic, but still very appealing visually thanks to its landscapes and overall design. Big budget games should definitely learn of lesson from it.
If they made a New SNES RPG today I would buy it day one.
Wow 400 mil for what exactlly ?? This is so depressing man .. the industry is in deep hole 😢😢
The entire from-soft Souls series usually has graphics that would look at home on last gen hardware whit only the lighting to hide the fact.
And yet only a handful of people care about the graphics in a souls game and and probably dont even play the game.
Honestly i think just adding better lighting to a game is enough over spending millions on photoelectric texuters and models.
Wait are you telling me that giant megacorporations aren't telling the truth?!
I mean, not like the owners of the big game companies played at least 1 or more games b4 being some business person, so that's something. Then again, there are probably business people out there who are gamers but now just focusing on their money ego, hence the results from the big game companies like the release of concord.
I have a Larry Fibk image on my wall I throw stuff at
Edit: Im leaving the typo, so YT cant say a thing. But yeah, them cutting the games is why I now play retro
2nd edit: I want a game so good, I dont give a shit that Im playing it on a Gameboy. An OG Gameboy at THAT.
60%(aka most players) only wanted infection and forge from Halo Infinite. Devs from 343 clearly were not Halo 3 players.
If you can not play "FatMan" or "Ghostbusters" its not a Halo game.
if i were a game director i would've care employees and people who talks to each other where we understand. not talking to money and do nothing. i'd bring back the old toon game magic. not go to vietnam and go warmode and pay a lot of wasteful money on decorations and transactions.
They could have released a Wild Arms HD collection with all the games for less than 2 million.
Destiny was the end of the ten year story so most people i know bought the dlc but not the year pass so they knew player numbers were about to crater.