5 reasons why the (AAA) game industry is about to crash
polycounter lvl 14
The #1 reason listed is exactly why I am perusing my own project full-time at the end of this year!
I do not, however, believe the doom of AAA is nigh. Simply that, from a development side, it is largely self-destructive.
http://www.cracked.com/article_20727_5-reasons-video-game-industry-about-to-crash.html
I do not, however, believe the doom of AAA is nigh. Simply that, from a development side, it is largely self-destructive.
http://www.cracked.com/article_20727_5-reasons-video-game-industry-about-to-crash.html
Replies
His #1 reason describes why I left the industry almost perfectly.
As for #3, most reviews are written for the average gamer. While people might not like the truth, it's important to realize that the average gamer nowadays is an idiot who likes action, explosions, and doesn't really care too much about the story but would instead, rather have addicting gameplay. The average gamer finds a game like Call of Duty to be the best thing ever, every year, but they really hate when they play a new game that differs from the formula they have grown to know and love.
This is the reason why generic shooters like CoD and BF constantly get high scores. The user scores are only reflective of the non-average gamers, the people who care enough to actually voice their opinion on the matter (or in the case of CoD, they're written by people that haven't even played the game because hating on CoD is hip with the kids these days.)
Game reviewers, although seemingly stupid, are not all that stupid. They play a lot of games, yet some of IGN's reviews make it seem like the reviewer has never touched any game besides Call of Duty. I even recall an IGN review (I believe it was the Far Cry 3 review but I'm not certain) in which the reviewer said something like "It's basically Skyrim but with guns!"
These people are not that stupid, they're just trying to cater towards the "average gamer" simply because that would bring the most success to their own business and ultimately that is what is important to their company.
As for the AAA industry crashing, it's inevitable due to many of the things listed and also increasing standards. I think developers should start being more open about the situation in the industry rather than the "I must keep positive PR and tell gamers that they are always right!"
Games are expensive to make, if people keep increasing their standards, then gamers should be willing to give more to the devs that make them. I see this as more of an educational problem than anything else though. From reading comments on different forums, youtube, steam, etc. people seem to assume that making games is effortless and that all developers are just greedy assholes minus Valve and a handful of indie devs.
People need to realize that this isn't the case and that most of the stuff they are complaining about is most likely necessary for the game to be profitable. Seems like putting in a mandatory educational video at the beginning of every game could do something lol.
Anyway, after reading so many comments on public forums, youtube, etc., I've come to the conclusion that I REALLY hate the average gamer.
EDIT: Holy shit wall of text, +1 kitten to anybody that read more than the first few words.
The AAA game industry seems to be on a downward slope.
If a crash did happen maybe we could see the industry rebuilt into something better before it all goes to shit again.
You see the forums polluted with layoff threads. It makes me sad every time, but I just shake my head and shrug my shoulders and think "what did you expect?" I know that is a terrible thing to say, but this truth hurts a lot.
One of those points that I thought was most interesting was that game budgets are so absurd now that games are not allowed to innovate. It's just sequel after sequel to generate profits.
Some of the best games I have ever played in my life have been SNES games and indie games.
Life after the Video Game Crash
That's a good read though. Never seen it. From 2007, Shit.
also i must have missed all these years that designers can make a killing as front end experts (was he thinking specifically of UI designers/artists, by any chance?) and that 3D artists are somehow stuck in games with their boob animation skillZ.
I think #4 is the most insightful. The largest constraint when making games used to be the technology, so developers had to be really creative. Now it's budget. Ironically the solution is still the same, get creative so your budget doesn't spiral out of control.
Not that the game is bad, beta was great, but I think that goes with one point on the list!
I think a major thing is indie games lately, not exactly the typical 2-d retro ones but more of the ones that are trying to put themselves on bigger engines with smaller teams and extremely low budgets (or any budget at all). E.g games like Gone Home, which were very exploratory and did well, or even games like Routine which look great and most likely plays well too. With the rise of fast internet and free to use game engines like UDK, CryEngine and Unity, and especially "retailers" like Steam, I think it gives indie's huge opportunities, and has been for years. It allows designers/programmers/artists/etc to quickly express what they want to do, get some friends together, and just start making something in their vision, whether its full time or just that cool side project in their spare time. No need to get a huge amount of resources when a lot of stuff is easily available to use, and instead of working on some massive project where your doing about 1% of work, you could be doing something completely different where you have a huge role in its vision (along with the people around you).
The guy makes a huge point with this example: "You've got one day to plan, a $50 budget, and five people to help you. Not a big deal, right? Put some balloons in the yard and hire a clown. Done. But what if that party was for a rich kid and your budget was $50 million? Do you think that makes it easier or harder?"
With 5 people you can easily go and make something that you and your friends/colleagues/whatever really want to see, shape it in your vision, and easily collaborate. The more people that come on, the more things get out of hand, the more the budget needs to go up, and the more things just because disorganized and eventually uninspired. Not saying every large studio is like that though, there's definitely plenty out there that seem great, but it seems the smaller the team the easier it becomes on the design and creativity process.
(p.s I'm not saying making indie games is this easy, it comes with alot of stuff to deal with on your own to which are a whole new set of challenges!)
Kickstarter is another thing, but kind of also goes with the 50 million budget. Alot of kickstarters out there want a decent amount of money, when there are plenty of amazing indie games out there who have made award winning games from absolutely nothing.
This was something as a mid talent guy felt early in my career and usually my gutt feelings are pretty spot on.
Hearing the crazy turn out rate of "lets hire a bunch of young kids out of college and make them work insane hours" vs the "Lets hire the guys who are older and have a bit more experience " never quite evened out with the studios out there.
and it was in both seattle and in portland with that and when I visited Cali I saw the same things happening there. That whole "unspoken" thing that was clear as day for most of us :S
But its good to see you going full indie
I think we're being a bit too dramatic here. The games industry is way too resilient to go belly up and die over a night, any changes made will be slow, much like how we've seen independent developers in the spot-light once again and a huge move to digital, none of which managed to kill off triple-a.
We'll see more non-triple-a games, we'll see people moving from triple-a to independent development, but we'll never see the death of triple-a.
I think that this became true:
"Well, now that consoles can display movie-quality graphics, video games will just become the new Hollywood."
These problems have been going on for years, and year after year, nothing changes, but games keep selling. As long as games keep selling, games will keep getting made.
What constitutes a crash? 500 laid off at the end, instead of 250? The studio will hire again within a year or two.
I don't see things crashing. I see things shifting. Shifting from what everyone is use to. From the early stages of this industry. And yes, we`re still in the early stages of this industry.
It seems to me every time I see one of these articles, it's always written by an indie who is just burnt out from AAA, which funny enough, they use as one of their points in the article.
Also, the internet is hilarious. Everyone complains. Nothing gets done. Nothing changes. You want change to happen in the industry? Do something about it that doesn't involve the internet. Don't sit infront of your computer and sign some petition. Go start a union, or create your own company and treat people right.
Tons? That's a bit generous. There were some great games, some good ones, and a whole laundry list of completely forgettable titles. When you compare, the stinkers far far outnumber the gems.
???????? What are you talking about ?
List me 5 good AAA games, that were released over past year.
I honestly, can't remember any title.
But even still, you can't think of 5 good AAA games released last year? Come on.
The hyperbole will always vastly outnumber amount of good games that release in any time-span!
the volatility of the AAA industry means you have ZERO job security right now to me No.5 is as much responsible as No.1, this industry should be recession proof, but its not mismanagement proof.
Starting my company now theres a few things, Money is tight, but thats not a issue i've never had to face before, theres a lot of pressure when you are the guy who people look to for leadership, which I think is a good thing, but you also have a sense of pride with your work and I notice that across the board with people who work in the indie industry.
I don't think triple A is dying I think its going through an adjustment phase where it will hopefully find its feet and the indie industry is rising alongside to unseen heights.
I really can't.
By good game I mean game that I remember to this day. And there is exactly zero of them.
bioshock infinite and the last of us, the two games that defined the current generation?
You can see the suffering financial state of some companies by how much monetization they implement.
I honestly think things will change for the better, even if it takes a long and painful process of removing negative development traits by simply having the larger older companies slowly disperse.
I see indie's growing stronger and stronger every day, lets hope the scene doesn't make the same mistakes as it's grow.
But it's still going to be a long time and it will be a gradual change. buildings wont just fall over and we can call it then heh.
I don't play console games. And I stoped played Bioshock after.. about 1h.
Gameplay of Bioshock was so boring that I couldn't stand it.
Even if I played Last of Us, I would probably have the same opinion as Total Biscuit. As I'm extremely game mechanics/technical oriented gameer.
This is a good point. I do not believe the industry is crashing, however there are just waves of people that learn how destructive the system is.
I actually think development will become further removed. I think outsourcing will become a bigger thing, much like FX is done for movies. Outsourcing studios will place bids for large projects and the publishers will just pay them directly to make the game.
The biggest thing to me is that I have not found even a handful of AAA games released in the past 10 years that were amazing and revolutionary. Also that developing AAA games often feels fruitless with so much crunching and lay offs.
As for games released in the last year alone, there was a huge list of amazing AAA games, my personal favorites in no order were:
-Ni No Kuni:Wrath of the White Witch (next to Persona 3/4 and the older FF games, this is probably the best RPG I've ever played)
-Bioshock:Infinite
-Metro:Last Light
-The Last of Us
-Beyond:Two Souls
-DmC
-Remember Me
There is a much larger list of indie games/smaller budget "AAA" games that were also released in the last year that I loved but that is kind of irrelevant.
A lot of people always say "Games were so much better in the past!" I don't know about you, but I have just as much fun playing games as I did when I was younger. I just wish I had more time to play games *imagines finding Diablo 3 legendary items in barrels, bone piles, and other miscellaneous piles of crap*
I don't blame people for being dismayed because of the news of layoffs and such. As bad as layoffs are, the industry creates far more jobs than it loses in a year, with many coming from new, mid-sized studios independent.
We only hear about reports of bad shit happening, because the headline "Medium sized studios created 2000 jobs last year" will not receive as many clicks as "Disney lays off 700."
So while the industry IS shifting. Crash is a word sensationalist journalists use to get your click.
And then the PS4 and Xbone came out to the most successful console launches ever, selling millions of units, and they were sold within a month of each other. Not to mention GTA5 is the MOST SUCCESSFUL entertainment launch in the history of fucking anything.
Articles like this are just pessimistic bullshit from people who have gotten burned by the industry. I'm not saying that all his points are invalid, but his notion that the video game industry is going to crash is a fucking joke. Video games are the biggest entertainment medium, and it only continues to grow with things like smart phone games and indie games picking up more of the market that didnt use to play video games.
Just because your game is "indie" doesn't make your game anymore special/better than a AAA game. There are just as many shity indie games as there are shity AAA games. The best indie games and best AAA games will always shine. So AAA gaming isnt dead, neither is our industry. It just has a nice new addition of more indie and smart phone games to grow the market.
Agreed 100%
Yeah I think I'll just abandon what I was going to post and quote this, because it's pretty spot on.
The solution I'm considering is a better organized and more sustainable industry. There is a real need for the mass-level gruntwork of development to be moved out of individual studios and consolidated into companies that can provide greater stability for their workforce. The present structure of the industry isn't set up to accommodate that. There's also a need for more balance, and more mid-tier development and products. Constantly swinging between the extremes of the small-scale indie development and mega-project AAA isn't healthy. There needs to be a bit more balance.
It does however give a much better profit margin.
If you want to play the bitter, jaded gamer card - fine. That's fine and you're entitled to your opinion. However, it doesn't reflect on the larger industry.
if most indie games can actually get on the radar and even sell enough to break even is pretty rare in terms of the ammount that succeed vs the ones that fail. failure in the indie community is just nowhere near as public and in your face because unless something is a splash hit then you usually dont hear much either way.
I know lots of indie devs and almost all of them have released titles that sell maybe 10-100 copies. The phrase "fuck it im going indie" seems to be this magical bandaid people like to envision slapping on and then suddenly they will be sucessful.
not to be a negative nancy, but 90% of "indie" games that get released onto the app store or other outlets either never touch the charts and fail to make money. and then there are literally thousands of piles of shite just added every day.
I have almost given up listening to people on these boards oppinions on "business" and on how "proper" games should be made. game devs and the hardcore PC gamers are not what companies are aiming their products at. that is such a niche market in comparison to joe average, it will never be profitable.
To me, the people who are buying the millions of copies of GTA 5, Madden, COD etc all those games that sell really well and are mass cosumed, they dont give a shit if there is some UV stretching, bad models and wonky assets. Joe average just got home from his shift at McDonalds/Wall-mart/Office and wants to sit on his couch, spark a phat doob, turn off his brain and sink into an unconcious haze with no responsibility or thought for a couple hours.
as long as people are making something that appeals to that person, indie, mobile, AAA console or PC, there will always be a market for games. AAA isnt going anywhere.
You are making the assumption that people define themselves through success. Perhaps people would rather spend a majority of their life on their own projects instead of others'?
Once you remove the option (which is actually encouraged by corporate pricks) for the developers to also help the industry evolve then your asking for trouble. The music industry went the same way and artists did fuck all to change it and let it be taken over by suits who know the price of everything and value of nothing!
The music, film and game industry are stuck inside a box of mirrors, they all look the same and copy each other right down the garden path straight into a shit pit, very innovative indeed :shifty:
Just watch how the wages will start to decrease over the next decade and on the flip side the wages / bonuses of CEO's and management will increase 10 fold as they have been doing so steadily from 2008 (The start of gloom for the majority and yet a golden opportunity for the rich:poly121:)
It's the entropy of the financial world, job requirements are becoming even more ridiculous by every passing decade while wages have become stagnant and in many cases decreasing.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending any bad policies that go on in AAA development but it's like, I get tired of people saying "industry is dying" and yet, where are the campaigns to Publishers telling them "hey, something isn't right?".
Starting a studio because you want to make "your ideas" regardless if they are successful seems like a recipie for financial ruin and a pretty poor business plan from the get go. Everyone likes the Idea of working for themselves or not being tied down to the man, but in reality not everyone is good at it.
How you define sucess is really up to you. Personally I would say there are varying degrees of it, yes finishing your own game could be considered a version of sucess, I would consider it personal sucess for sure, something to be proud of. the thing is.....no one besides your mom gives a shit if the game doesnt sell/no one knows about it/it sucks. Thats not going to keep you well fed, clothed and sheltered. People get into the game industry to have a career and support themselves. Personally I wouldnt consider myself sucessful for going indie until I have completed and released a product that is generating revenue and improving my lifestyle.
That would be what I would define as sucess when it comes to someone who has a career in the game industry vs a hobbiest. If making games is your hobby, then by all means who cares if it makes money, you are sucessful for even finishing a game! However, when you start an indie studio....the purpose of that should be to make money, because eventually it will probably be a few more people relying on that cashflow than just someone in their house/parents basement making the game.
I think that is the nature of working in an industry you are passionate about. We often choose to follow our passions than seek some form of legal ramification for constant, sub-optimal work-life balance.
Yes, this is true. And your previous statement of searching for success is also true. However I do not believe that leaving a studio to make your own in search of success is what should really motivate you.
I think it's about taking that passion you once had, that died out, and rekindling it.
It's never your own project when making a living comes before making the games you want to make, you suddenly find yourself becoming a slave to target-audiences and constant trial & error on overcrowded phone-markets.
This is part of what has lead us to our current situation. The average creative individual doesn't want to create a company, they want to create a product. They want to make a game. For them a company is just a means to that end.
At some point, many of these creatives gave up control over their efforts in order to get the resources they needed to create the projects they wanted to make. And thus some rather large corporations were formed.
Forming and maintaining a business is not the same as producing a creative effort. A successful company does not necessarily mean a slavish focus on acquiring money. Companies get formed for any number of reasons. However, any company that is created with the intention of persisting needs to have a business plan that involves sustainable profit.
The industry as a whole needs to learn that constant growth is not necessary for success. A more reasonable business structure focused on sustainability and long-term stability would be much more prudent.
Yeah... basically what I wanted to say.
Even if your starting a indie studio and the end goal is to make a successful business... you should still be creating what you want to, not just so it "sells". The idea to just "make money" from your game is about the equivalent of a AAA studio - while it isn't bad, it can hinder other parts of the creativity process, and it should still be about enjoying what your making.
Like Richard said, for some people "...a company is just a means to that end."