More jobs for artists??
polycounter lvl 18
Do anyone think there will be a job boom whenever next gen consoles are out and more and more titles are released?
and how will that impact hiring? do you think companies will have to hire less experienced artist to make all the games?
there will be alot of systems out
ps2,ps3,xbox,xbox2,gamecube,gamecube2,psp,nintendo DS (if itsstill around) and pc
and how will that impact hiring? do you think companies will have to hire less experienced artist to make all the games?
there will be alot of systems out
ps2,ps3,xbox,xbox2,gamecube,gamecube2,psp,nintendo DS (if itsstill around) and pc
Replies
Do anyone think there will be a job boom whenever next gen consoles are out and more and more titles are released?
[/ QUOTE ]
God I hope so.
then we go back to where it started.
b1ll
I'd say the PS2, XB and GC will drop out of publisher's sights pretty early. The DS will definitely stay and possibly outlast the PSP, I'd be more worried about the PC which doesn't seem to get many games that aren't stupid FPSes anymore. However, when you're working multiplatform you need only one set of assets for every power level, which would be GBA, DS (some devs just give the DS the GBA version but that hopeflly won't last long), current gen (and PSP), next gen. The current gen powerlevel will probably be reduced down to the PSP a year after the PS3 and Rev are released. I'd say most companies will focus on one power level or platform and ignore the others or outsource the ports for them to other companies/studios.
so do you think were heading for a crash of 83'? are we gonna have a huge landfill filled with Madden and WWII games a few years from now?
[/ QUOTE ]
One can only hope.
I do predict a crash as well eventually
[/ QUOTE ]
How do you think this will happen poop? or anyone else for that matter. It's something ive been thinking about lately. Sorry JO420, I dont mean to hijack the thread or anything, but I think it is something that pertains to your initial concern.
not really the nature of the industry is that its fluctuating up and down pretty much constantly, it won't die thats for sure, as long as people keep buying games it won't die, and more people doing it also means more competition and possibly better products, but also means the successfull companies will be even more set in their ways, and ofcourse nothing is stopping a place thats really successfull and has a shit ton of $$$ to grab all the best tallent out there leaving the rest of the companies starving for tallent, which means u'll have a few very high quality games and alot of lower quality games... which is pretty much whats going on right now.
which means u'll have a few very high quality games and alot of lower quality games... which is pretty much whats going on right now.
[/ QUOTE ]
Isnt that what happend in 83'? Atari pretty much thought that people would buy crap, so thats all there was, crap. E.T. was the epitome of Licensed Crap, and the people knew it. Do you think publishers are falling into the same mindset? Underestimating the consumer and churning out licensed crap after uninspired licensed crap?? (this only pertains to the american market of course) and if so, will the consumer rebel? Will the consumer evetually lose faith like they did in 83'?
I agree that videogames are past the novelty they were in the 80s, but that may strengthen marketings resolve to put out shit.
The movie industry puts out shit but only expects us to pay 8 bucks. The game industry puts out shit and expects us to pay 40 bucks, maybe more for this next gen.
The game industry puts out shit and expects us to pay 40 bucks, maybe more for this next gen.
[/ QUOTE ]
Be prepared for the 70 dollar game.
Right now there is already a boom for artists, eventually there will be a drought again, but not for a while as the environment side of things in particular is needing to be seriously ramped up now that the next gen spec required hi poly articulation.
As always when the tech leaps forward, some people get left behind and new people step up to the plate and a bunch of people trot out the end is nigh sign.
It's best not to worry and just be aware that, as Mal mentioned, a famine tends to follow a feast. Right now its a feast for artists so work on those polygon skills folks!
r.
Publishers realizing that they have to wait longer and pay more for a game with the same amount of gameplay as current gen consoles, only to raise the price of games to 70 dollars, thus making consumers rent more instead of buying.
Then haveing a regression of technology back to ps2 / xbox technology. Thus causing games to go back down in price. That would leave more cpu cycles for things like physics, AI, drawing more polies. More stuff like that.
That would be interesting.
I for one will welcome a next gen Katamary, with no difference in graphics, just a bigger world and improved physics.
I just keep in mind all the current madness and all the past madness and that makes more more calm about how well the future madness will be accepted.
I mean, as skanker points out in his loveable way, if theres a wrong way to approach , schedule and manage a problem, odds are, our leaders will find it, everytime.
That would be a lot more worrying to me if I had not read and rationalized enough to understand that this is what our leaders have always done and we've always been stupid or fearful enough of them to go along with them
r.
why the hell would anyone really want the industry to crash?
[/ QUOTE ]
cause if it crashes then somethign will have to change in order for people to be interested again, like in 83, soon after which (i think, i just guessing cause i wasnt even alive) the nes was released.
You know what would be interesting?
Publishers realizing that they have to wait longer and pay more for a game with the same amount of gameplay as current gen consoles, only to raise the price of games to 70 dollars, thus making consumers rent more instead of buying.
Then haveing a regression of technology back to ps2 / xbox technology. Thus causing games to go back down in price. That would leave more cpu cycles for things like physics, AI, drawing more polies. More stuff like that.
That would be interesting.
I for one will welcome a next gen Katamary, with no difference in graphics, just a bigger world and improved physics.
[/ QUOTE ]
I like this! I can't think of any instance of higher polycount improving a game at all. It may look better but if it takes the artists longer for no real 'wow' factor...feh! I'm stoked about PPUs I think that will be the next jump. Polycount has been climbing steady and I don't see any reason for it's plateauing. So there will be no real suprises there. But Physics! I always loved it when a game did something unexpected(but not a glich). Real time building smashing. Oh ya!
[ QUOTE ]
mmm, a crash as soon as I graduate seems likely...
[/ QUOTE ]
/looks at IT degree
[ QUOTE ]
why the hell would anyone really want the industry to crash?
[/ QUOTE ]
cause if it crashes then somethign will have to change in order for people to be interested again, like in 83, soon after which (i think, i just guessing cause i wasnt even alive) the nes was released.
[/ QUOTE ]
yeah..who needs a job or money to pay the bills.
ILM can use game engines for pre visualisation and Lucasarts can use ILM's models etc.
Since game art is moving more towards the direction of movie CG (not quite there yet but with the normal map stuff using high poly models and such) there can be a great benefit there.
I wouldn't be suprised if more will follow this path where game dev's hook up with movie houses for licenced games where there is an exchange in assets, joint marketing and publishing. Licenced games are nothing new but I don't think this can be taken to a next level.
Since game dev budgets are moving towards movie budgets I can also picture it going the other way where movie houses will fund games as a base for a movie.
There sure are big turnover benefits from linking these 2 entertainment products.
For every job that is eliminated by progressing technology it seems 2 are created. They might be very different; but as a whole art teams are growing and evolving, not shrinking and evolving.
...but before that happens we'll have a long season of bloated art teams.
Personally I think it's a mistake to have a huge system of subdivided tasks when producing a creative product. 2 reasons:
1)Our industry is already plagued with poor managment and schuduling, especially on our side. The last thing we need are more bodies.
2)Creativity, cohesivness, developer satisfaction is compromised with each new body involved in the production of a creative entertainment product. these arent oil refineries or chicken rendering plants, this is a subjective, living breathing product. EA doesn't get this (accroding to some chatracter artosts I met the other weekend at Redwood), and Ubisoft had a 4 to 7 step pipeline for assets as simple as a lamp post in Spolinter Cell: Chaos Theory...so they don't get it either.
I finnally work at a place that is figuring this out...I'm glad :P
I bet the art pipe for those gorgeous characters in the unreal demo's we're all so impressed with didn't involve a person to man each task.
-R
We divide the tasks up as much as we can here into people specialized in hi poly, in texturing ,in animating, in rigging, in materials, in FX.
This move to subdividing the process is vital to ensuring we continue forward as an industry because technology is becoming incredibly complicated and time consuming.
The resistance to this forward progress comes mostly from the oldschool thought that we will be giving up freedoms and our pioneering spirit , this is backwards.
When you get to the point where you have to take perhaps a full month to model a hi poly character, then you have to take a week to texture it, then a day or more to come up with some fancy new material to simulate the organs pulsing and throbing by creating a sine wave that calculates the highest part of the normal and the lowest part and pans and wobbles based on their respect height on this scale... and its still not even running around ingame or rigged or has effects attached... sheesh!
Trust me, splitting the job up is the way to go, it keeps people motivated, it makes a big job seems smaller and it allows people to more ably get to grips with the terrain in this huge new sandbox.
I can't argue the point that we have bad management, and I will also say that most programmers have made the point to me over the years that it is impossible to schedule software.
So to a certain extent, it is the nature of the beast for our industry to be unorganised.
Anyway, this is why we are in the midst of a feast right now, we are all needing more artists and a wider variety of artists beyond those that can simply draw.
r.
Do anyone think there will be a job boom whenever next gen consoles are out and more and more titles are released?
[/ QUOTE ]
As much as i think the PC as game platform is going to die.
There's more work involved and [insert what ror said], but if you look at the xbox360 lauch titles, they all look horrible. Epic's gears of war and i think a rainbow 6 or similar game (forgot the real name) are the only ones that actually look like something.
So, while more people will be needed it's gonna be a rather slow process over the next 2 years or so. You can't just hire 20 new artists at once and waste a half year production filling them in. You also have to be more carefull when hiring and make sure the artist can do more than plain old fashion modeling and skinning.
Tasks are already being split here and there, level designers work on level design and gameplay, artists build the level itself, texture and lit it. HL2 and Halo2 were done this way already and it's becomming more and more common for new projects.
Hoping for a crash is stupid and counterproductive to helping people here find jobs.
According to EA, there won't be any independent development studios left in 2 years, they will all die or get eaten by EA, Ubi and the like. Which would mean, that a lot of people would be looking for jobs again.
If there's any kind of crash, there will be lay offs on all ends too. Why keep this mediocre lowpoly artist and texturer when there's so many good artists looking for new jobs.
It will for sure get harder to get into the industry, but the bar has always been raising slowly over the years, nothing new. Some jump into the train, others sit back on their laurels and watch it pass.
I sure hope they mean independent studios competing with the big boys. There are literally thousands of indies out there and for every one dying two new ones pop up. Few of them are big players, many simply release their games on the internet only and few people buy them but those few are enough to keep them alive as these games have budgets insignificantly higher than Atari 2600 games.
Will nextgen consoles provoke a job boom in the videogame industry? Probably in India, Pakistan, China and Eastern Europe yeah. But in North America? I highly doubt it. The cost of game production is just getting too high. I work in a studio where there are 200+ people working on a game right now. I dont see that model holding water. Next time around, a big chunk of that work will be outsourced. I think the industry in California in particular is going to run into problems eventually. EA are allready starting to shift stuff over their Florida studio because it's cheaper.
There will always be jobs in interactive entertainment. It's where they are that I think is subject to change.
Although with the onset of 3d mobile gaming there will be some smaller studios popping up to fill the need for those games. Places like Ready at Dawn, Planet Moon, and a few others are starting to focus just on portable gaming.