THoughts on the future of the Industry.
polycounter lvl 18
Somewhat related to this thread
http://boards.polycount.net/showflat.php...;gonew=1#UNREAD
In the Halls of the Game Developers Conference (GDC), the talk this time was on "The Next Generation". Not the T.V. series, but the Next Generation of Consoles and high end game engines and shaders that ill be possible on the new Boxes. Underscoring the point was ATI's demo where they did a fairly carefully choreographed Holly wood style action movie, under Real Time engine constraints, so that the demo would run in real time. Find it and watch it if you can. But the whole "Next Generation" philosophy has had a couple of effects that are starting to become manifest.
A long time ago, at a previous GDC, back when it was called the CGDC sometime around 1993 or so, there was a lot of buzz about synergy between Hollywood and Silicon Valley. The result of this was a game called "Night Trap", which was panned critically, and sank like a stone, and led to a wild flailing away from linear plotting, minimal player control and the other associated railroading that "Story Telling game" or semi-interactive cinematics required. As such the Hollywood "model" of storytelling, with it's writing, and player uncontrollable cameras faded from the scene with the notable exception of the Japanese, who have a fondness for linearity in games, and for those domestic folks that fall for all things Japanese. What the game industry is slowly adopting, half consciously now, is not the Hollywood storytelling, but Hollywood production methods.
Game production now at a large studio, is fairly elaborate, with an estimated "burn rate" for an AAA Game title of being around 1 Million U.S. a month, This is "now". The current generation with the exception of Valve and Id, have characters still in the 2000 polygon range, and after the graphic tour de force of Id's Doom III which showed people what a "Normal Map" was, and then Valve showing the world how to use them, most game assets are rather limited, but the team sizes for any title are usually in the 20 to 30 person range. Making a Game Character usually takes 1 business week for the geometry, 1 day for UV mapping, 1 Day for skinning and weighting, 1 business week to paint the texture if you are lucky, and 3 weeks or so for the set of animations, so roughly a character a month. If you have a typical team you will have 5 character artists, and one of them is a lead, which means they have to do paperwork, means that in 12 months you would have 48 Characters done by the grunts, and maybe 4 or 5 additional ones done by the lead because they were either the hero, or Paperwork and schedules got in the way. For level Designers, 1 to 2 months for a level is a rough estimate, but that can vary especially with the type of game, if it has large outdoors, or cramped in doors, if it spans several historical or Fantastical locations, or if it's just more decks on the same space station. I have no clue about programmer's timings and schedules, because it's PFM to me, but the usual team is around 6 programmers. No more, no less. (Any more than 6 and you start getting communication problems among them and code starts to get snarled between styles of coding. Valve and Id, however have forced a recalculation.
The level of Graphic detail, depth and realism has been boosted by Id and Valve, and the most noticeable effect has been the use of the normal Maps. A Normal Map is a trick, where an image derived from a highly detailed, dense 3D model, is baked onto a similar shaped, but far less dense or detailed 3D mesh. it will still take 1 business week to create the "in game" lo resolution model, but now it may take more time to create a good High Polygon model to get the map off of. Then, the in game model, that once had one "color map" with the shadows painted artfully in, like a theater Backdrop, is now split into many separate maps to control specularity, and specular color, Standard color, and specialty maps for some engines like 3d Cube maps for metallic and glossy surface reflections, and a light scatter map to simulate the subsurface scattering of the skin. They may all (except the cube map), derive from the same model's UV coordinates, but they all need to be painted, loaded onto the model, tested in the game engine, and then corrected. Rigging a skeleton inside the model is rapidly becoming it's own specialty, needing a position called "Technical Artist, or Technical "director" filled by the company, because rigs have now surpassed what would be expected of a general "Character Artist". The handling of lights, which is part of level design, is not needing a programmer dedicated to figuring out to get the best look within the limitations of the game architecture, Also to be able to handle large environments and manipulate them, special tool are written to allow non programmers to be able to place the level and import it into the scene quickly for testing. The Environment maps also need the same sorts of texture maps that a character would, only a lot more of them, plus a few more unique to making terrain. With the new machines come new expectations, and the games on these new platforms will be expected to be jaw dr9dropping either in graphics or game play or they will be considered failures.
The good news, is that it means for those with talent and some skill can get jobs a lot easier. The undecided news is that this will mean that there will be increasing specialization in tasks, so some people will be the geometry guys, some will be the Texture guys, the High Poly Guys, the Shader Programmer, the AI Programmer, the Engine animation handling programmer, The Effects Technician, tine Technical director..ect. etc. The list now begins to read like the end credits of a Summer Effects Blockbuster. The Bad news is that with and increase in production staff, will come an increase in management needed to over4see the production staff, more "one size fits all" blanket benefits policies, and regulations, more concealment available for the incompetent, and more corporate anonymity and bullshit, as well as incredible, design by committee risk aversion in designs and projects. This will mean larger, more expensive productions, more increasingly taking the "sure hit" rather than the risks. The bar for "Next Generation Quality, may be moving beyond the "Boutique design Studio, which my employer, Castaway, is one of, but it has certainly left the garage developer far behind. Even the Mod Community for friendly to modding games such as Half life2, and Counterstrike CS have very steep learning curves and equipment requirements. Now apparently the EA Spouse has had an effect, in that EA is discussing instituting a plan where people will work only 8 hours a day, but in doing so they would forfeit bonuses, and stock. So you can have your money or your life. :-/ But the plans aren't final and the artists and programmers can't participate, because their class action Lawsuit is still pending.(see: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=5098 ) But apparently a lot of that was pissing contests between mid level EA executives making impossible promises to a senior management that did not know anything different from what they were told by the middle. Now that the senior Management knows, things also may be shaking up from the top as well as the bottom.
There, is, of course, the option of "opting out" of the "Next Generation. Cel phones now have the spare processor and graphics capability nearly identical to the Super NES< and the Sega Genesis. In many cases, old console games are being directly ported to these and other tiny platforms, introducing Marrio World to a new audience. There is also a lot of original content being done there as well. The DS, is about where the PS1 was in 1995,but seem to be a bit easier to design for, despite the proprietary storage media formats. Then you could take the path of "Alien Hominid" which started as a flash game, and a marketing plan (T-Shirts, Mugs and the like), and was ported to the platforms, without the creator relinquishing many of his rights, so that while he is making bank off of it, it's still an independant title, where the creator owns all the I.P. and the publisher just presses discs and takes their cut. once can still do games if they like games, either participating for a mod, or trying out concepts in flash. All it takes is talent, and drive. Which brings me to...
There were a lot of "Game Schools" represented, such as Digipen and the Guildhall. The noticeable thing about the Guildhall offerings is that while the game play seemed solid... the art really sucked. You would think that before someone was taught how to make a characters in 3D, someone at these schools would have at least taught them art. This is not the case, so many possibly fantastic student projects that could get the team jobs in the industry, are marred by poor quality art. Another problem with a lot of the student games is few adjust options for controls. Many of you on my friends list, do draw well, and havve a good grasp of the fundamantals. A little polish at these 2 year schools may be enough to get work in the industry of one is so inclined. The lean times of 2002, 2003, have passed and people will start hiring. The Game industry is about to go "wide".
From the things I have seen. Future Must buys will probably Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Unreal 3 of any type, and Battlefield 2.
Scott
http://boards.polycount.net/showflat.php...;gonew=1#UNREAD
In the Halls of the Game Developers Conference (GDC), the talk this time was on "The Next Generation". Not the T.V. series, but the Next Generation of Consoles and high end game engines and shaders that ill be possible on the new Boxes. Underscoring the point was ATI's demo where they did a fairly carefully choreographed Holly wood style action movie, under Real Time engine constraints, so that the demo would run in real time. Find it and watch it if you can. But the whole "Next Generation" philosophy has had a couple of effects that are starting to become manifest.
A long time ago, at a previous GDC, back when it was called the CGDC sometime around 1993 or so, there was a lot of buzz about synergy between Hollywood and Silicon Valley. The result of this was a game called "Night Trap", which was panned critically, and sank like a stone, and led to a wild flailing away from linear plotting, minimal player control and the other associated railroading that "Story Telling game" or semi-interactive cinematics required. As such the Hollywood "model" of storytelling, with it's writing, and player uncontrollable cameras faded from the scene with the notable exception of the Japanese, who have a fondness for linearity in games, and for those domestic folks that fall for all things Japanese. What the game industry is slowly adopting, half consciously now, is not the Hollywood storytelling, but Hollywood production methods.
Game production now at a large studio, is fairly elaborate, with an estimated "burn rate" for an AAA Game title of being around 1 Million U.S. a month, This is "now". The current generation with the exception of Valve and Id, have characters still in the 2000 polygon range, and after the graphic tour de force of Id's Doom III which showed people what a "Normal Map" was, and then Valve showing the world how to use them, most game assets are rather limited, but the team sizes for any title are usually in the 20 to 30 person range. Making a Game Character usually takes 1 business week for the geometry, 1 day for UV mapping, 1 Day for skinning and weighting, 1 business week to paint the texture if you are lucky, and 3 weeks or so for the set of animations, so roughly a character a month. If you have a typical team you will have 5 character artists, and one of them is a lead, which means they have to do paperwork, means that in 12 months you would have 48 Characters done by the grunts, and maybe 4 or 5 additional ones done by the lead because they were either the hero, or Paperwork and schedules got in the way. For level Designers, 1 to 2 months for a level is a rough estimate, but that can vary especially with the type of game, if it has large outdoors, or cramped in doors, if it spans several historical or Fantastical locations, or if it's just more decks on the same space station. I have no clue about programmer's timings and schedules, because it's PFM to me, but the usual team is around 6 programmers. No more, no less. (Any more than 6 and you start getting communication problems among them and code starts to get snarled between styles of coding. Valve and Id, however have forced a recalculation.
The level of Graphic detail, depth and realism has been boosted by Id and Valve, and the most noticeable effect has been the use of the normal Maps. A Normal Map is a trick, where an image derived from a highly detailed, dense 3D model, is baked onto a similar shaped, but far less dense or detailed 3D mesh. it will still take 1 business week to create the "in game" lo resolution model, but now it may take more time to create a good High Polygon model to get the map off of. Then, the in game model, that once had one "color map" with the shadows painted artfully in, like a theater Backdrop, is now split into many separate maps to control specularity, and specular color, Standard color, and specialty maps for some engines like 3d Cube maps for metallic and glossy surface reflections, and a light scatter map to simulate the subsurface scattering of the skin. They may all (except the cube map), derive from the same model's UV coordinates, but they all need to be painted, loaded onto the model, tested in the game engine, and then corrected. Rigging a skeleton inside the model is rapidly becoming it's own specialty, needing a position called "Technical Artist, or Technical "director" filled by the company, because rigs have now surpassed what would be expected of a general "Character Artist". The handling of lights, which is part of level design, is not needing a programmer dedicated to figuring out to get the best look within the limitations of the game architecture, Also to be able to handle large environments and manipulate them, special tool are written to allow non programmers to be able to place the level and import it into the scene quickly for testing. The Environment maps also need the same sorts of texture maps that a character would, only a lot more of them, plus a few more unique to making terrain. With the new machines come new expectations, and the games on these new platforms will be expected to be jaw dr9dropping either in graphics or game play or they will be considered failures.
The good news, is that it means for those with talent and some skill can get jobs a lot easier. The undecided news is that this will mean that there will be increasing specialization in tasks, so some people will be the geometry guys, some will be the Texture guys, the High Poly Guys, the Shader Programmer, the AI Programmer, the Engine animation handling programmer, The Effects Technician, tine Technical director..ect. etc. The list now begins to read like the end credits of a Summer Effects Blockbuster. The Bad news is that with and increase in production staff, will come an increase in management needed to over4see the production staff, more "one size fits all" blanket benefits policies, and regulations, more concealment available for the incompetent, and more corporate anonymity and bullshit, as well as incredible, design by committee risk aversion in designs and projects. This will mean larger, more expensive productions, more increasingly taking the "sure hit" rather than the risks. The bar for "Next Generation Quality, may be moving beyond the "Boutique design Studio, which my employer, Castaway, is one of, but it has certainly left the garage developer far behind. Even the Mod Community for friendly to modding games such as Half life2, and Counterstrike CS have very steep learning curves and equipment requirements. Now apparently the EA Spouse has had an effect, in that EA is discussing instituting a plan where people will work only 8 hours a day, but in doing so they would forfeit bonuses, and stock. So you can have your money or your life. :-/ But the plans aren't final and the artists and programmers can't participate, because their class action Lawsuit is still pending.(see: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=5098 ) But apparently a lot of that was pissing contests between mid level EA executives making impossible promises to a senior management that did not know anything different from what they were told by the middle. Now that the senior Management knows, things also may be shaking up from the top as well as the bottom.
There, is, of course, the option of "opting out" of the "Next Generation. Cel phones now have the spare processor and graphics capability nearly identical to the Super NES< and the Sega Genesis. In many cases, old console games are being directly ported to these and other tiny platforms, introducing Marrio World to a new audience. There is also a lot of original content being done there as well. The DS, is about where the PS1 was in 1995,but seem to be a bit easier to design for, despite the proprietary storage media formats. Then you could take the path of "Alien Hominid" which started as a flash game, and a marketing plan (T-Shirts, Mugs and the like), and was ported to the platforms, without the creator relinquishing many of his rights, so that while he is making bank off of it, it's still an independant title, where the creator owns all the I.P. and the publisher just presses discs and takes their cut. once can still do games if they like games, either participating for a mod, or trying out concepts in flash. All it takes is talent, and drive. Which brings me to...
There were a lot of "Game Schools" represented, such as Digipen and the Guildhall. The noticeable thing about the Guildhall offerings is that while the game play seemed solid... the art really sucked. You would think that before someone was taught how to make a characters in 3D, someone at these schools would have at least taught them art. This is not the case, so many possibly fantastic student projects that could get the team jobs in the industry, are marred by poor quality art. Another problem with a lot of the student games is few adjust options for controls. Many of you on my friends list, do draw well, and havve a good grasp of the fundamantals. A little polish at these 2 year schools may be enough to get work in the industry of one is so inclined. The lean times of 2002, 2003, have passed and people will start hiring. The Game industry is about to go "wide".
From the things I have seen. Future Must buys will probably Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Unreal 3 of any type, and Battlefield 2.
Scott
Replies
Since we aren't developing the technology, the focus is on learning scripting languages and API's, and on the art side, we still get to use Maya, and get to generate PS1/SNES style content for mobile, and PS2 style content for Shockwave. The platform limitations are clearly defined, so we spend more time playing around and everyone still gets to contribute to the design. We work regular hours too, and still have the energy to hit the gym after work.
I don't know if this classifies as part of "the industry", but I thought it was worth mentioning.
I'm afraid turning back the clock, or retrograde development won't happen, though similar technologies like the phones and the GBA have seen ports of 8 bit and 16 bit games on them. However the general thirst in games has been towards more and more cinematic appearance, and more player freedom.
Scott
Very few people have pixel art skills in today's field. It's simply a lot easier to develope a game in 3d because the general tools/production pipeline/talent are readily available.
Porting a 2d game to current gen isn't that simple. The assets remain the same... but the coding needs to change. Things need to be loaded on/off the RAM, etc. Old 2d games were created in 320x240. Then blown up to 640x480 on TV screens. For 2d games to have less visible pixels would mean everything would need to redone to fit the native TV res of 640x480.
Same issue, more radical viewpoint.
In any case I do think that they have identified a lot of problems, but I also don'tthink things will be as dire. As broken as Steam is, I think a less intrusive method on a similar model will succeed, and cut Walmart out of the distribution loop.
Scott
Scott
Because we're getting to a point where most engines look the same and nearly everything real world you can imagine has been modeled, almost. Times this by ten and you have the content of the future, what this spells for game artists I have no idea.
Take games like HL2 and GTA for example, these could easily be patched to make a tennis simulator. So in the future you'd play some tennis by sega then step out of the court, change into your nike tracksuit and go for a jog down the beach, made by rockstar.
MMORPG's offer us something that normal games don't, and thats what the market (IMHO) will bend towards. I don't want to spend £30 on a new game that I can complete in 2 hours, it's getting more logical to make games that last for an infinate amount of time and this means leisure gaming. So consolidate all models into one engine, consolidate all phystics, rendering, ai, etc into one engine, then release add-ons - this seems to be the dream of most studios currently, whats to say we can't have one and other studios make content for it? The battle will be fought for this ground, and I don't see many studios seeing the point in modelling 30 trees when they look the same as 30 trees from another game. Or cars, books, tables, fire hydrants, cats etc. Right?
I see the future of gaming, games and games companies taking on a lot more casual and multiplayer angle. I guess Korean companies like NCsoft are already showing us this.
Hardware also has an effect on the industry and what path it might take. M$ and Sony are still battling it out for the home entertainment market, nintendo pottering along in its pure games ethic and the pc market getting more cliche'd but pushing the console market with every breath.
Nintendo have annouched that the revoloution will still be purely about games however it looks like you can serve your own multiplayer lans / servers by wifi and broadband, which makes sense. DS compatibility is dead certain, so drawing and writing while playing games is going to be a lot of fun. Sega seem to be making more toys, which also makes sense... they love to make peripherals - and are probably the best at it judging by my DC arcade sticks.
(scott I'd have to disagree with you on one point, and thats modelling time scales. Take shenmue 2 for example, that game has literally thousands of different characters, but the time spent on most of them can't be more than a day each. With the main characters a few days. Animation wise, well they all use the same skeleton so whatever time was spent there it vastly falls short of your estimates. (shenmue series still stands as one of the most ambitious titles ever realised, but you see my point) This applies to nearly all games, you have lead characters with bespoke anims, then a sea of quick to make models using the same animations)
Warren Spector
[ QUOTE ]
But I have to say something so I want to say how this business is hopelessly broken. Haha. Were doing pretty much everything wrong. This is at the root of much of what youre gonna hear today. Games cost too much. They take too long to make
[/ QUOTE ]
Jason Del Rocca
[ QUOTE ]
This pro, he doesnt make games.. and you all shake your head and say he doesnt make games, what does he know, but you know medical applications are pretty unique! If {clip}, its one of millions of examples of how we as an industry dont pay attention to other stuff just because its not called games.
[/ QUOTE ]
(me-I have heard this before here)
Greg Costikyan
[ QUOTE ]
Who was at the Microsoft keynote? I dont know about you but it made my flesh crawl. [laughter] The HD era? Bigger, louder? Big bucks to be made! Well not by you and me of course. Those budgets and teams ensure the death of innovation.
[/ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
My friends, we are FUCKED [laughter]. We are well and truly fucked. The bar in terms of graphics and glitz has been raised and raised until we cant afford to do anything at all. 80 hour weeks until our jobs are all outsourced to Asia. but its ok because the HD era is here right? I say, enough.
[/ QUOTE ]
(me-Its a great idea and all, but who is going to organize the troops?)
Brenda Laurel
[ QUOTE ]
The commercial game business is a non-consensual relationship between middle aged men and young boys. Its worse than the catholic church.
[/ QUOTE ]
{me-It certainly does seem that the majority of games do overly focus on this age group.)
[ QUOTE ]
Chris: Im pro-piracy. I want people to play the games I make. I do it because its art. I think DRM is a total fucking stupid mess. If the game industry collapses and can be reborn, Im all for it. Pirate on!
Greg: theyre not pirating the game! Someone bought a legal copy! The world is not designed in such a way that money inherently funnels its way into your wallet!?
Warren: I never minded piracy. Anyone who minds about piracy is full of shit. Anyone who pirates your game wasnt going to buy it anyway!
[/ QUOTE ]
(me- I find this TOTALLY 180 from what I constantly hear here. They are right. A pirate is a pirate is a pirate. Meaning no matter what you do to stop them. If they can't pirate it, they wont buy your game in the first place. So this lost revenue argument is schnazel.)
(me- I find this TOTALLY 180 from what I constantly hear here. They are right. A pirate is a pirate is a pirate. Meaning no matter what you do to stop them. If they can't pirate it, they wont buy your game in the first place. So this lost revenue argument is schnazel.)
[/ QUOTE ]
Well a bit of money if probably lost due to people not buying into the hype after 'testing' a game, but that is a good thing, and overall all money lost due to pirating is more that equaled by the free mouth to mouth advertisement it generates... at least that is my oppinion.
Half life 2 may have raised the bar , but only in terms of cost and eye candy. real games cant be marketed like films, because real gamers arnt interested in how a game looks , just how it plays ...
I havnt played HL2 since the day i completed it, but since then i have played a load of old games, the graphics just dont bother me ...
argh , i have so much to say on this subject i cant get it all out .. but i agree whith everything said here ...
i just want to add really , in the same way you can still goto the cinema and watch the latest crap movie , you will always be alble to goto wallmart (asda) and buy the latest peice of shit game. but there will always be alternatives.
i really hope that the game industry isnt monopolised (already is probly) in the same way as pretty much every other industry in the world , and outsourced to asia to the lowest bidder, but it will probly happen , its the way capitalism works. but , the alternatives come as a bi product. Yes the mass market crap will kill creativety , but theres always hope , i hope
[the session was brought to an end by the GDC organisers who were timekeeping, to huge booing and catcalling.]
[/ QUOTE ]
dude, that was me! i was the one who had gotten booed when i interrupted the session and asked them to continue their ranting outside so the next session could setup! ha! it was crazy man, holy crap, that sucked, they wanted to kill me!
Yes the mass market crap will kill creativety , but theres always hope , i hope
[/ QUOTE ]
I also believe there is hope. The fact that we're discussing it is proof. Money makes the world go round, but only as long as the people want it to.
[ QUOTE ]
One Hit Game And Its Imitators
[/ QUOTE ]
That does seem to be the trend. And it sounds just like the Music Industry. But in the music industry, we have bands that are doing things "the way it used to be"...and it has been a wise choice. Each decade has its trademark. The 70's, the 80's. Now we're seeing ours. Things were great. Then too good to be true. Now it's time for a change...get back to basics and wait for the next trend. I haven't played Mario Bros. 3 in a long time. Hope my NES still works.
Scott
Well, from my own personal experience with Mercenaries at Pandemic, it was more like this; 1 day to model, 1 day to map and texture, and 1 day to review and tweak. I created over 80 character models and 20 weapon models in a year, all ranging from 3000-4000 polygons for the player characters and 1500-2500 for enemies. All textures were painted on multiple 256x256 and 512x512 bitmaps. I'd have to say that it just comes down to managing your resources. If you create key body types for a "polygonal library" and a "texture library" you literally cut your creation time in half.
Thing is, they really didnt plan on having as many characters being in game as we ended up with. A large part of them were vreated because of things that were suggested by myself to add more variety to the game. Hell, some resources never made it in.
Anyway, the timelines I was given were not in my control, but I managed to work 10-6pm 5 days a week, with very few weekends and barely any late nights. Management at Pandemic worked. I think that if you have the right team, the bloated schedules that you described are just plain silly. Too many people claim work to be harder then it really _has_ to be, and I'm not sure where the "myths" come from. I think what you get alot of the time, is padded scheduling, that way you look better when you beat the schedule. Sometime referred to as "Scotty's Estimate Procedure." (edit: referring to Scotty from Star Trek, hahahah)
Granted the work I am referring to here was made for content that was to be seen on the XBOX and PS2. And I know from research that Pandemic had me doing before I left that, yeah, next gen stuff is gonna be sick timewise....but is it scary? Is it the end of the game industry? HA! No way. Besides, there is always a new generation of artists/programmers to save the day.
mrrogers
I'm fearfull that 5000ft will take a nose-dive into the black depths when these new consoles hit.
It also makes me realize that I need to re-educate myself in a serious way. I've never done work with normal maps, nor do I have much high poly modeling experience. It's really going to be quite a wake up call to everyone in the industry, imo.
Scott- i agree totaly, games like katamari damacy seemed to be screeming out for more power to make the game more vast (improve gameplay) meanwhile HL2 and alike only use the power to look better or more photo real, this is great to look at as an artist , but it played the same as pretty much every other FPS. i spent more time looking at HL2 than playing it . of course there are other examples, i had a quick go on resident evil 4? (if thats the new one) and it was pretty similar to the others , ok , on the face of it, it seemed to be offering somthing diffeerent(over the shoulder view, shops etc) but it felt just the same as the others to me.
I guess i would like to see more effort going into gameplay than graphics etc. its what keeps me playing
ElysiumGX, why go back to the past?
[/ QUOTE ]
It's not so much going back to the past that I'm referring to, but remembering the past, enjoying it, and learning more from it. Were at a point were realism, physics, animation, and the toolsets are amazing, but all in all the gameplay is behind in comparison. We're at a point where most games are just simulators with a point system. Except for a few choice games like Katamari Damacy. But that isn't a graphics over achiever now is it? I think before the industry expands on new modes of gameplay, they should look to a time when it was all about the gameplay, and only a few colored pixels to help display it. And ask, what was so right that allows the games to be loved decades after their release?
I think they were right back then too in a way, but I think thats just life in general, albeit from my own skwed viewpoint.
I love movies more than games, but the same statements about the end of creativity being nigh have been touted for longer than my gaming career and the more I watch films today, the more I search further back for older films, the more I agree.
I was reading Empire (A British Movie magazine that I rate highly enough to continue to read whilst living here in America) magazines trivia booklet on the toilet the other night. Now, if you can stop your eyes from burning while picturing that, I read that there are 8 basic stories in the world and cinema sticks to this notion without deviation for the most part.
It also pointed out that mostly cinema these days sticks to only a few of the 8 great stories and I think in a way games are heading in that direction.
I've always praised Silent Hill2 for its storyline and ending as I thought that it was very brave and mature for our industry, it was at times laboured and unwieldy true, but for out industry, it was an incredible attempt and they did very well with it.
Halflife2 likewise has an incredible storyline and thus gameplay experience as a result of being part of that storyline in a way that does not heavy handedly remind you that theres a co pilot driving along the experience along with you.
There are a lot of other games I could mention that I am as impressed by and can hold up as still surprising me after playing games for 27 years.
Yes, there are more companies closing down than before, but there are more companies in general around today than when I started out too.
Yes there are a wealth of shoddy games, but even as a child I remember a lot of shoddy games.
Yes, games are taking longer and cost more, but, when I was young there were many games that too longer and cost more to innovate a particular area and allow they perhaps had 8 layers of parallax scrolling background instead of 7, the gameplay experience was the same.
I guess I'm trying to point to the notion that things have always been this way and that its easy to get caught up in the march of the flag wavers.
To my mind, the real problem is 3 fold.
1. As brought up in the Burn the house rant, our distribution models sucks ass, its win or lose on the shelves.
2.Like the music and movie industry, we no longer create ideas that make ourselves happy and then find an audience to sell it to, now we are informed by people doing market research, what the demographics indicate we should gear our attempts toward.
I think ANYTIME, you try to please a large number of people rather than yourselves collectively, you are appealing to the Lowest common denominator and then you are screwed. Monty Python did well because they were mentally fellating themselves, as they all got older and split up and tried to be funny for other people they were not as good.
Spielberg when young was amazing, later in life he admits he tries to do speilberg.
The stone roses first album was amazing, their 2nd was shite, they were caught up in an occurance so common place it is referred to by some as 'difficult 2nd album syndrome' which essentially, is due to the problem of becoming too aware of yourself and what others want of you.
3-We all try to match features before creating new ones, when deadlines hit, its the new features that are the first to get cut.
That said, we may just be on the long slid downhill, but if thats the case I find im able to enjoy the ride a hell of a lot more by not listening or paying attention to everyone else. I get on far better by narrowing my focus to what I am doing.
The Problems of the new tech killing companies is the same old broken record. I'm working with the new tech, I'm purely a modeller now because I think the best way to learn and make the most of the new tech is to specialise as there is so much to relearn.
I'm modelling environment assets and an asset takes me 3 days typically to make.
This includes the hipoly, the low poly, the unwrap and the process.
I started making everything modular a good while ago so that every asset splits into 6 assets so in a skewed sort of way I am working faster than I was before or certainly at a more comparable work rate.
As I continue to work I split off many of the seperate shapes such as clamps, bolts, signs, text, curves, pipes and save them in grouped construction files.
I use these construction files like lego by merging them with my new assets at certain points and apply them to the new shapes with the Advanced Painter plugin which aligns them neatly to the surface of each shape and this yields a great speedup also.
While I am doing this, Moose is handling the 2d side of the work and taking my processed normal maps, adding more detail to them with the Normal map plugins in Photoshop and he also have a page of overlay normal maps of the same construction pieces I have in 3d.
The point being, we're finding ways to keep the process going swiftly along by being openminded, cooperating with each other and our respective strengths to experiment and find new ways to do things.
Isn't that what we have always done with each new technology?
On the whole, the only thing that has truly changed over the last 10 years that I have witnessed is that I have specialised more and more.
I think that is the way that the industry is going to continue to go, its how it already is to a larger extreme in the movie industry.
These are merely my opinions, not Epic's.
I lie the blame at our own feet. We insist on going the broken route to make games. The majority of this board (myself included) want to work on huge budget games at hot name developers. We won't say screw it and pursue our own dreams by ourselves, or with a small team of likeminded people. If more people would do that, and go the route of passion instead of stability (a route I am considering in the future) We might have more games that have a little love in them, instead of these design by committee risk free Blockbusters.
I also lie the blame on the unempowerment of the little guys. I don't get any say in the games I work on. The last 8 games I've worked on, all I was is a human etch a sketch. I make concepts that I *might* have made myself, into useable characters. I get no say in the design, the art style, the story, or anything else. I don't want, and should not, have to be a designer to have that happen. I think smaller teams of empowered individuals who have a real investment in the project are the answer. Ultimately the thing that pisses me off the most, is no matter how bad a title is that comes out, go back to the developer, and you will probably find a few employees who are actually really good at what they do, and passionate about making games. Why is it that this industry hinders us instead of helps us? Better games would only make for more money for the people calling the shots.
I have a motto up on my board, "making games is fun". I love what I do, but I can see an alternate reality where I would REALLY love what I do, and I think it's an attainable goal.
I understand that the game industry has always had to conform and deal with new tech, Ror, but how many small developers have you see churn out Doom3 quality titles? I'm the only artist that works on props/enviornment art here, so it's a bit more difficult for me.
Poop - you're defineatly right about suggestion. At our studio, I've suggested a great many things about gameplay, which have always been discarded. On the flip side, I do have some input on the art side of things. Our art director really likes to hear new ideas. (except for BoBo's wacky character ideas
I'm hopefull that we can adapt to next gen, but it will be a long and rocky road for us.
Being frank for a moment, it all comes to peoples personalities right? Those in charge of design, whether qualified or not, are universally very defensive about 'their turf'.
When in a smaller company, it can even be harder to bully the people with wrong ideas into the right direction.
I don't blame the little guy, I understand the want to be frank about the whole 'we're our own worst enemy' deal but the thing I've noticed is that the senior people with the power are the one with the money and the stability and thats why they are risk averse. When you are the little guy with responsibilitys and a lack of money, you end up being the little guy out on his arse on the street more often than not because you had good intentions and spoke up in the hope of improving things.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions right?
I've likewise never really managed to impact design, regardless of the quality of my ideas, I've been punished too often for trying to do more than be an art machine that I view continuing to try to push game ideas as self destructive and damaging to my career.
I'm probably too much of a reformer with radical ideas. I don't really want to tweak things, I want to throw half of most games away and build up from the ground again and I expect thats too much to take on so I work on my own ideas for myself in my limited spare time and that alone keeps me going
Now my point here is that - as a creative, working on the final shots that will be seen in the cinema is cool, but not really creative. When you have 15-20 (or more!) people working alone on the 3D side of a shot day in and day out, because of budget constraints, there's simply not much room to be creative. However, on the previs side of things, there's such a huge realm of creativity that you can play in. You are given a set of story boards, or maybe only a script, or maybe only one sentence! And then from there, you just crank, as fast as you can, as many ideas as you can, in constant dialogue with the lead designer/supervisor/director.
I enjoyed both ends of the process, but I felt a lot more excited working on the pre-vis side of thing. I'd rather be part of the small team spending a week designing the bullet time shot in the matrix for example, then part of the post team working on the shot for months.
As the game industry continues to evolve and learn from other business models, I think theres a huge wide open field for doing pre-visualization for games to get those initial ideas out. Who's to say you couldn't have a group of 3 artists, 1-2 programmers, traveling around the country, working with different developers and actually be the driving force behind tomorrow's next blockbuster.
My 2 cents
Bree
Things change when they pay you for your talent. The idea that you will get to do what you want to do and when you want to do it is sold for a few pieces of silver.
As far as games as a business goes its just starting to come of age. What was once looked on as a form of art is now starting to generate dollar figures that exceed any other form of entertainment combined. With launch titles (Halo2) exceeding 100 million on its release date those in the suits are starting to take gamming as a serious commercial product and as their nature will be looking for ways to increase production and to take advantage of emerging technologies in attempt to create the next great title.
My prediction is with in the next five years the role of such talent like texture artist, modeler, animator, level designer will change into a something resembling an assembly line worker (let the flames begin).
Jody
My prediction is with in the next five years the role of such talent like texture artist, modeler, animator, level designer will change into a something resembling an assembly line worker (let the flames begin).
[/ QUOTE ]
No need for flames. I think you're a little behind the times though. To address your first point, to suggest that 'the suits' are only just beginning to take notice in how much revenue can be made in this industy is a little too obvious. I think that's been clear for 4 or 5 years now.
To address your second point, in what way is it like an assembly line worker? At many many games studio, roles are becoming highly specialized now yes. I get a concept from one guy, make a model and paint it and hand it off to a rigger for example. So in that respect yes, I'm on a production line. But do I feel like I do the exact same monotonous task day in day out, over and over like a factory worker? Of course not. It's still a highly skilled job, and I'm still making new stuff every day. Factory workers make the same thing every day.
It's still a highly skilled job, and will for many years to come. The last time I checked, not every Tom, Dick or Harry on the street can do this stuff, and that's only going to get progressively more apparent as we move into next gen.
You make some good points, I just think it's a question of how one looks at things. You know, the ol' 'is the glass half full or half empty?'.
Jody
improvements ahead of us until we get to a point where the public and the developers
become apathetic to it.
I've thought, for the last few years that eventually, graphics technology has to plateau
because at some point it will just be so good and so cheap that the only restriction will be
time and tools right?
Eventually, that has to happen. When I was younger I thought that when the tech race
was over, we would realize realism is a dead horse and start being inventive about game
play and art direction more again.
However, I've since reconsidered, I suspect once the graphics tech race is over, we will
move on to the AI race for a decade or so because its another pointless magic number
race that developers can pit themselves against in an easily quantifiable competition that
the press can report upon.
My point is, that as long as there is a way for the simple mindedness of the press to latch
on to a number, whether it is polygons/ texture resolution or number of strategies the AI
can choose between in any given circumstance, they will always do that and developers
will always fall in behind that.
The reason this will continue to happen is that these things are measurable and
quantifiable. To express, absolutely, what makes a good game is not, so we will always
focus on the facade as that's been the trend so far in the games industry and still is the
trend in the movie industry.
How many times have you heard the latest line of spectacular coverage on how many
explosions and rendered scenes of CGI have been used in the next imminent Sci-Fi film...
as if that was some way to measure its quality.
We all know that its a combination of elements that make a good game great, but much
like a good meal, our tastes change and there is a constant need for experimentation with
different elements to excite our taste buds again.
As far as the workplace goes, there is already a drive toward better toolsets to aid teams
in handling the increasing demands of the technology races which insist that we have
higher skilled workers in larger numbers. Better tools are one way in which we MUST
deal with the changes we are going to go through for the next couple of decades.
I think there will also have to be a deliberate push towards better preproduction and
management needs to go through some specialization shakeup in the way the grunt
workforce already has in the last decade. I think this is an area that is being overlooked
atm, but then history will support me when I point out that this has ALWAYS been the
way of things in all walks of life right?
While I admit it is idealism to think so, I am still optimistic about a large part of the
games industry, there is no problem so large that we can no triumph over through time
and pressure. I think often we want change, only on our terms and we want it overnight
when in reality it takes a long time and constant work to change things.
These 3rd party developers will be quick and nimble, and will tend to need very versatile and skilled artists. Their business model will demand that workers have a broad skillset, so that they can take on whatever jobs come their way. This type of developer will become much more common in the the western world, but even more so abroad, where the cost of labor is cheaper. Many developing nations have skilled artists, and a strengthening technological base. Outsourcing companies in countries such as India and China will start gaining ground. This will decrease the number of production art jobs for some of the larger western developers, but more management jobs will be born.
And then I can finally put my darn International Relations degree to work, and become rich beyond my wildest dreams.
It took me an hour to read over everything. I find out we really don't know where we are going and we will figure it out when we get there. We can guess all we want but in the end we don't know until it happens. So I guess we sit down buckle up and as a general rule of thumb don't listen to the chicken littlest around us. Because even if the sky is falling lets make sure it's not because of us and our work. Do the best you can so you are proud of the effort you put forth and if it all goes to hell, you are not left shaking your head but proud of the work you did.
I think games will become more like production lines. They already have in the short time I have been exposed to the industry. I also think wages and benefits will start to drop or at least freeze where they are at. In the US workers in every industry can't afford to be picky or demanding as the rest of the world threatens to under cut the American work force, do the same job for cheaper. Hopefully we can learn from the past and that sometimes tossing more hours and more unskilled labor at a problem isn't going to help the end product. But like I said lets wait and see, its a crazy ride and the only thing you can count on is change
I think back to one of the latest "the sky is falling" threads of recent times and everyone was all spun out about out-sourcing how it was going to doom the industry. I think to some extent there is truth in what the chicken littlest are saying on any given subject. But really there is a point you have to drown them out and work on making things better instead of joining in and preaching the end is neigh!
People play what is fun, not what always looks the best. We as artists tend to judge a game more strongly based off of the cool new technology that we can use to make art, than does the average game player. I've heard gameplayers say some silly stuff when comparing the quality of game art between older and newer titles. Sometimes it's ridiculous, when they say, "Tribes 1 looks just as good as Doom 3!" And we as artists get to chuckle at their naivete. It's silly, but I often just translate this as "Tribes 1 is more fun than Doom 3!", knowing that the fun factor definitely alters people's visual perceptions.
I've got a feeling that some small developers will catch on to this, and just start focusing on making fun games, that are a bit more limited in scope, technologically. Shoot, with all of these shiny new engines with all of the bells and whistles, they'll be able to license older engines for next to nothing. And they'll also cut down on production time, as you don't need to spend as much time shining all of those fance chrome bells and tin whistles. So, they end up focusing on doing what they do well artistically, and really focus on the gameplay, which is what really gives a title good legs.
The value of art in any product has always been in the hands of the individual helping to produce the product. In any occupation, be it building cars, making movies, flipping burgers, making games, it has always been the individuals ideals, their ideology so to speak that adds the value of art to the final product that is designed to do one thing, to entertain or has value to those that are willing to pay a price for those efforts.
Someone who buys Madden football for example is not looking to play with art, they buy the game to play football. In most cases they are the ones that understand how the game is played and as such have certain expectations as to how it should play, how it should look and to some degree sound. Now if any element is missing that can be found in the reality that is football then no matter how good the graphics or sound track it will fail because it did not meet those expectations that defines the game of football in the first place. So in large part what drives the industry, and others involved in the entertainment industry, is the expectations of those that buy into those products.
The other part of the equation is the advancement in technology that has taken place in the last four or five years and the ability of the developer to take advantage of those advancements. Microsoft for example has changed the rules regarding development scheduling in regards to the gamming consol. Instead of the normal four year development cycle they are now shooting for two. Needless to say Sony and Nintendo are bit more than pissed.
The good side is consumers will have access to better and more improved gamming systems but the down side is the game developers development window will be cut virtually in half if they wish to stay current and up-to-date and take advantage of the available technology . If they dont then their efforts will fall into the category of mediocrity and the also ran (can you say Doom3).
To do that they need two things. First an engine that can take advantage of the new, or even expected new features and the content that will be driven through the engine. The engine part is pretty straight forward the content how ever is dependent on the efforts of the individual that contributes assets towards the completed product. Now look around the room and ask yourself can you complete what is expected of you based on a four year development cycle in two years?
Now as a developer you only have a few options. Either outsource the additional assets required or develop a new workflow as part of the pipeline (ie production line values). Sounds a lot like the same situation that Henry Ford had to go through hu? Now Im sure we all know about the outsourcing that is taking place but there is the question as to why. Is it being done in an effort to save money or is asset requirements to the point where there is no longer the option, or the infrastructure to do it on a local level with in a shorter development cycle?
An appropriate example is the movie industry and their history. If I was to compare the time line as to the two as an industry I would say game development is probably running somewhere in the late forties and early fifties. At the time everything was done in house and the talent where signed to contracts (NDA) that basically told them how they should run their lifes, how to act in public and basically told what project they can work on. Its also about the time when due to the large demand for entertainment the studios started to for look outside help (outsourcing) in the development of their product.
Something else that took place was the refusal of the talent to continue working under the ideology of the studio system. They started to refuse to work under the impression that their lifes where controlled by in large part what up to that point was considered a necessity and a requirement to their art (can you say EA)
Now if you consider that movies was the natural transition from what is consider the classical stage then history wise that form of entertainment goes back hundreds of years as compared to games which more or less started with in my life time. This is why I say that gamming is coming of age, its starting to make inroads into the mainstream of what can be consider entertainment and serves the needs of those that buy the product.
To that end developers are being forced to make changes to their process on how they develop their titles. In the future a developer will be more of a producer where they decided what asset they wish to work on, assign a director whos job will be to assemble all the require parts and those parts will be assembled (editing) into the final product. The roles of the various artists will be working for a clearing house that might be working on five or six projects at any given time. Their efforts will be more broad based rather then being confined to a single project.
Even though it might sound manufactured the art has and will always be the effort and pride that the individual puts into their creation. Is putting a front end onto a car on an assembly less an art form to the person who is helping build a product that others will enjoy?
Anyways thats just my option but the one thing that is clear is that there are changes a coming and the question is not will it happen but rather can you adjust to the change when it does arrive?
Scott
Good job fella's. I'm still putting my thoughts together to contribute (although not being in the biz makes it hard).
Art sells games, with art, you can look at a game and judge how good it might be based upon the art and because of this there are mechanisms in place by console companies to ensure your art (as well as other things ) is of a certain level so they can continue to blow their 'next gen console' horn.
I agree that there will always be individuals that invest more into their personal area of art, but thats a small incidental point to my previous point about quantifiable statistics always being something marketting and the press can rely upon to hype a game, or indeed, any product.
You cannot look at a gamebox or magazine review or 10 second video clip or internet screenshot and gauge how good a game it will be. A Demodisc does serve as a powerful indication and thanks to ID Software popularising the shareware demo as a means to allow us all to sample part of a full product, some games can be more realistically weighed up beforehand without relying on hyperbole.
I'm also unsure as to the amount of weight I can lend to our following the movie industry too closely outside of their effects departments. There's always going to be the fundamental difference that a movies momentum is fuelled by a bankable star.
I don't beleive we are ever going to have that. I've heard talk about our industry maturing enough for the public to be shopping around for the next game by Director X but I think that's unrealistic.
For the Director approach of 1 person with the power and clout to draw together a team of talented creatives for each new project, we'd all need to consider giving up fulltime employment and go freelance to ensure we were available.
I likewise think that all the recent historical references to Ford in relation to our industries work practises are a bit unworkable because Ford's workers were not designing and creating a different car that ran on different fuel and operated on different roads every couple of years if you see my point.
Going back to the movie industry again, on the effects side of things, James Cameron was always an experimental film maker in that each project he undertook he partially or totally invented a new technology to make it possible and as a result his projects ran over budget, overtime and there were always shocking stories about the treatment of the workers ( such as the actors on the Abyss referring to the project as the Abuse).
Now this to me sounds much more like the typical cautionary tales about the games industry.
These are the types of stories that get a lot more common in the movie industry when directors are heavily reliant on new technology like we are in the games industry so I don't think we should overlook the fact that most films dont rely on new technology very heavily and thats where part of the movie industries stability as a whole rests.
I think we can eventually achieve part of that stability when technology and tools are much more established and tried and tested.
I think I may have read some of the same articles about the early studio system in hollywood that you have, again I'm not sure how much of a comparison I can draw.
They seem so close to us and a useful yardstick sometimes don't they? Other times, it just seems like such a fundamentally different industry because its such passive entertainment.
Shigeru Miyamoto. Sid Meier. Will Wright. Peter Molyneaux. Hideo Kojima. Hironobu Sakaguchi. These names sell games (or at least build up the hype).
No offence taken.
Art sells games, with art, .
Not necessary an omission but rather a lack of an option as I have more questions than option as to this being a valid statement from my prospective. Not to long ago the catch phrase was to have a great game you had to have great game play. Was this a case of, to make up for the lack of graphics ability, for a game to be declared a success your game had to hit some type of intangible?
Is art a selling point or an expectation based on the current abilities of the hardware to support it? I know the abilities and limitations of the hardware that I own and have a certain level of expatiation of what I want to see in the games that I buy.
I have purchased what others have declared to be a good looking game only to be disappointed. To even confuse more what seems to be the next battle cry is you have to have story and character development. So yes art sells but does it automatically make it a great game and will it hold up once the cellar dwellers catch up?
P.S. This is nothing more than my rant as someone who buys games.
and because of this there are mechanisms in place by console companies
Ok this I find interesting. Can you expand on just what mechanisms are in place? Im reading two things into it.
1) The console companies are offering support and tools to ensure that the products that you are developing have a chance of using the maximum abilities of their hardware
2) The console companies are forcing the developers to abide by terms, conditions and outlined expectations.
A Demodisc does serve as a powerful indication and thanks to ID Software popularising the shareware demo ..
Agreed the demo is a very powerful media by which to present (in general) the developers product. How ever the method of distribution is outdated. For that matter in a lot of ways the demo places too many barriers that prevent those that might be interested in it in the first place from playing it. Given there is the hardcore player that would be willing to climb a mountain for a peek but in my world the moment you place any type of inconvenient barrier in the path of a prospect they will loss interest. Myself for example Im not interested in having to find the site that has the demo, downloading it, installing it, playing with it and deciding that I dont like it and having to go through the trouble of having to uninstall it and worrying that some uncertified driver is going to mess up my system.
On the other hand if the demo came in the mail next to the beloved AOL demo and I can just drop it into my X-Box or PC with out having to install it, get right into the game demo, decided that I dont like it (or love it) and make a decision with out having to work for it so much the better.
I'm also unsure as to the amount of weight I can lend to our following the movie industry
For the Director approach of 1 person with the power and clout to draw together a team of talented creatives for each new project, we'd all need to consider giving up fulltime employment and go freelance to ensure we were available.
I was not following but rather drawing a comparison between the two, at a point in time where the movie industry was experiencing the same growth curve that required them to make adjustments in their business model as to how they produce movies. A similarity can be drawn if you take into consideration that like the movie industry, at a point in time, game producers are attempting , with a few exceptions, to keep every aspect and every element of the development in-house.
With out getting into a bunch of mumbo jumbo a large part of the expense of a game being produced today is spent on the process that is required to produce the title. Hire more talent, buy more and advance hardware, purchase seat licenses just to name a few off the tip of the iceberg. The only way that I can see to decrease the production cost of a title is to either cut out the process or cut back to the point that it is no longer a consideration as part of the bottom line.
There is just to much overhead, time and abuse spent on feeding the process that it is fast becoming difficult even for the large production companies to manage or even afford .
God help the independent who is even considering playing in that ballpark.
In the movie industry when this occurred instead of taking on the burden it spun off companies like ILM, SkyWalker Sound and Winston studios to handle the logistics and upgrade requirements that allowed the studios to directly focuses more on the story telling aspect and requirements of their product. Also by having independent suppliers the studios where able to save money by having a supplier bid for the work or develop a non aggressive indirect working relationship with a supplier who understood the requirements but was free to improve their own product.
At this point I do have a question. Do you feel that you have job security now? Seems to me that when a project ends a large part of the production team is let go if nothing is planed in the immediate future.
By spinning off various aspects of the process into a supplier mode similar to an ILM then the game developer will save a ton of bucks that other wise would have been wasted on just feeding the machine. It also means that positions of the various disciplines required to produce the games will become much more stable for the fact that they will probably be working on more than one project at any time and will only be required to produce assets based on a specification.
This is also an advantage to the independent as they can now budget for only the components that they require rather than having to invest in the total infrastructure required to compete at the same level as an AAA production house.
The movie industry became stable not because of longevity but rather by diversifying and not taking on the total logistics and financial responsibility required to improve the value of their product when it was not really required or beneficial to them to do so in the long run. Sure they get a large bill but its nothing compared to what it would have cost..
I likewise think that all the recent historical references to Ford in relation to our industries work practices are a bit unworkable because
Point taken. Bad example.
.
Going back to the movie industry again, on the effects side of things, James Cameron
Typical case of abuse of the system when an individual had the ability to do so. On the other hand after his success on low budget who was going to tell him no
Now this to me sounds much more like the typical cautionary tales about the games industry.
Actually I see nothing but hope and possibilities. If someone was to ask me if they should consider a career in the gamming industry I would have to say that now is the best time to start thinking about it than any other point in the history of the industry. As the saying goes ,buy low sell high.
A lot of the stuff coming out of GDC leads me to believe the industry is finally taking a long hard look at its self and the first point of order is the understanding that there is something fundamentally wrong and if the industry continues to follow the same pathology as it is currently it will eventually imploded.
What Im impressed with is even a few short years ago these panel sponsors, whose options we respect, would have been dragged out into the courtyard and hung for even uttering one critical word about the industry.
"I think we can eventually achieve part of that stability when technology and tools are much more established and tried and tested."
God help us all when a 16 year old kid can walk into Wal-Mart and for $49.99 buy Game Production in a box
I think I may have read some of the same articles about the early studio system in hollywood that you have, again I'm not sure how much of a comparison I can draw.
They seem so close to us and a useful yardstick sometimes don't they? Other times, it just seems like such a fundamentally different industry because its such passive entertainment.
My option, entertainment is the key. Regardless of the bullshit we all have to go through on a day to day bases in the end what is produced is designed to serve one purpose and one purpose only. To be a media or a device by which those that buy into it are entertained. Everything else is a just matter of perspective.
Anyways sorry for running on so long, I have a tendency to do that from time to time.
I was at work the other day showing a coworker UC2s website. He didnt care for the all the Flash put into it and would have better liked the site if it were all HTML. I told him that it really didnt matter. The whole point to the Flash site is to sell the game. It catches the eye and a good web designer would take note of that. It would have seemed odd to see the site not have flash. You can also look at a Las Vegas casinos floor and ceiling in the gambling rooms; the carpet and floor patterns are very colorful and eye catching while the ceilings are boring. This is meant to keep people from looking up and trying to overlook the gambling room and keep their eyes on the floor where all the slot machines and card tables are at (the areas of the casino that make the most money). The point is that eye candy is used to hype up something enough so that it can return a profit. Most everything else is secondary, but give yourself some congratulation if your team can finish the core features of your game title and have enough time to include a new groundbreaking feature that other games do not. That is what I believe makes any game with a new feature innovative. It really is easier to match features with what another developer has done because it is a sure way to show some form of measurable progress that the suits can understand. A groundbreaking game may be a game that can match all the features of another title or a group of titles in a genre and then throw in another extra feature or two because there is enough time to do so. One great example of this is WoW. There are a lot of features that seem to really make it stand out in comparison to other MMOs, except that Blizzard seems to have for the most part, just taken every other good feature from almost every major MMO out there and brought them into the game (which I think is a really good way to gather a large player base btw and a very successful design decision). It seems very different because no other game had previously done that and it appeals to a larger audience because those features are easily understandable by many, and it was successful.
However, throwing lots of money and eye candy tech at a project doesnt necessarily mean that is the way to go.
I dont know if you all have read GDC Report: Will Wrights The future of Content Lecture over at Gamasutra; http://www.gamasutra.com/gdc2005/features/20050315/postcard-diamante.htm . It seems very exciting what possibilities may come of this if enough time can be spent on researching its abilities more. When I read about Spore on the threads here and after seeing that 64kb game from Assembly (http://www.assembly.org/asmorg , but I forgot which group actually did the demo) it seemed really cool to create things that were so small and efficient (right now anyway). When I heard about Wrights presentation of Spore from people that went to the GDC I could only get the visual of what it could and not the concepts that it can do. Most people in general tend to be pretty visual about things, and literal I dare say. Thats not necessarily right, as most innovation stems from conjuring an idea from a different point of view and it doesnt always mean creating something new and different, but doing something differently. I talked to Poop a bit on the article (or tried to, as I have a hard time formulating whole groups of words into anything cohesive) and he noted that there were some things in the Spore demo (the dinosaurs) that he thought couldnt have been procedural. While I wasnt at GDC to actually watch the demo I certainly dont that a procedural anything cant be done well, even if it what supposed to represent has a structure to it. As with most other tech, the concept has been around for quite a while and has only recently either become mainstreamed or can now be easily supported. It just has to be given a chance, and a high profile name such as Will Wright can give that chance.
While I did veer off from I was saying at the beginning of this post, Id like to say that there are measures of understanding that people have to be aware of and not all people in any dev team or company hold the same ideals and concerns when it comes to a games development. One unifying theme to note is that everyone wants it to be successful and make money, enough so that the company can still be around to make another game. Id also like to add that most game features design are either evolutions of old concepts or are conglomerations of existing ones. In doing so game elements become refined and every now and then a new feature or element is added to enhance the genre, which is good, but also bad because many games become clones in order to make a quick buck. But it is expected. Most consumer products on the market are offshoots of pre-existing themes or technologies anyway, just streamlined to match the times (that can easily be referenced to nature and the evolution of animals, as most animals within a kingdom share fundamentally similar characteristics with a few [Key] features here and there that make them look or function differently). While the norm insists that lots of money must be thrown in to make a project look and play successfully, it is not always necessarily the case. Innovation usually takes a long time to happen anyway. Every year brings in more potential to create new things.