@ RayanB : I am not really sure where are you going with all of those numbers... I can list probably 20 other industries that you can become RICH very quick. I don't have a job in the game industry yet but I love it even when just thinking about it. I have no idea why are you talking about becoming rich and profits after I am sure that 80 % of the people here just do it because they love it and we all know many other ways to become rich.
And let me just ask you : how much loving are you gonna give to that wire or that pipe ...?
Where did I say that skilled tradespeople would "get rich?"
Just out of interest...why does china do all the outsourceing? why cant we just set up our own little outsourcing company and get on the bandwagon instead of complaining about less jobs?
don't confuse outsourcing with "outsourcing". E.g. the massive Ubi presence in Shanghai and Chengdu, or Lucas Singapore studio ain't "outsourcing". They're just part of Ubi / Lucas as any of their other worldwide studios is. The true number of AAA grade outsourcers in China, who have western studios as clients, is still quite small.
So if you work at a AAA studio with a China studio you may want to blame your own management
The chinese actually have quite good labour laws compared to india or even the USA. Human rights have nothing to do with labour laws.
But the reason why it's so cheap there is because the government is artificially holding their exchange rate down to a low level. If they didn't regulate their currency so strictly they'd soon be costing the same amount as everyone else.
This. Probably one of the prime reasons we are in this predicament. The Yuan is tied to the U.S. dollar. It rises and falls whenever the U.S. dollar does. If it didn't then when we were in a recession, such as now, chinese labor would be much more expensive.
What is more worrisome is in 30-40 years when China taps into the 1 billion rural people that are in poverty and actually educates them. Talk about a workforce. If they're still cheap at that point watch out...
yup. they have a huge potential of people. However they're also potential customers! Chinese love things that come from the west, which includes any sort of media. This is why it's so important Chine cracks down on (c) offenses. On the same time prices for media need to fall to offer an alternative to bootlegging. Buying legal movies/games is very unattractive for people who earn below EUR 600/month (and that's a good office worker's wage!)
e.g. a bootleg DVD / blu ray at the street corner costs about 10 - 20 yuan (about 1 - 2 euros). Same with games. A cinema ticket can range from 80 - 150 yuan. For most Chinese cinema is luxury. They only go there a few times a year. Yet if the product is right even that doesn't stop them - Avatar was a massive hit in China and not only because it was 3D.
rumor goes they did it to eliminate competition for the Chinese movie Confucius. However you can still see the 3D version which is doing very well. Despite that, Confucius still hasn't managed to break even.
Another theory is that Hollywood told them they don't like Avatar to be pirated, so they withdrew the pirateable 2D version.
The truth is probably hidden beyond many layers...but that's China
the alternative to outsourcing is hiring a ton of people at the beginning of a project and then laying them off when the project is finished. It sucks to get chopped due to the old way of working, I know, I think Mythic was about 250+ people at it's peak.
When the game industry was young you had teams of 10 people or less turning out AAA games, now it looks like the industry is going back to the small sizes and instead of hiring "disposable" work forces they are using outsourcers.
Agreed. My only beef with hiring and firing a bunch of people is that it gets done under the guise of full time, permanent employee status. Horrible.
I guess they do it because it can be hard to get talent to work a contract with no chance of renewal? Or they hope that the profits that roll in will sustain the work force? Which never really materializes once they figure out they can slash overhead and come that much closer to breaking even.
At least when they outsource (which not all goes over seas) its slightly more honorable and not quite a "use em and lose em" scenario. The people involved know that they have an expiration date, which I guess at this point everyone should already know if you're project is winding down regardless of your status you should dust off the portfolio and make some new art.
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Where did I say that skilled tradespeople would "get rich?"
I save my loving for my fianc
^_^ A good number of us have!
So if you work at a AAA studio with a China studio you may want to blame your own management
This. Probably one of the prime reasons we are in this predicament. The Yuan is tied to the U.S. dollar. It rises and falls whenever the U.S. dollar does. If it didn't then when we were in a recession, such as now, chinese labor would be much more expensive.
What is more worrisome is in 30-40 years when China taps into the 1 billion rural people that are in poverty and actually educates them. Talk about a workforce. If they're still cheap at that point watch out...
e.g. a bootleg DVD / blu ray at the street corner costs about 10 - 20 yuan (about 1 - 2 euros). Same with games. A cinema ticket can range from 80 - 150 yuan. For most Chinese cinema is luxury. They only go there a few times a year. Yet if the product is right even that doesn't stop them - Avatar was a massive hit in China and not only because it was 3D.
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasnt this also the reason it was taken off the cinemas in China?
Another theory is that Hollywood told them they don't like Avatar to be pirated, so they withdrew the pirateable 2D version.
The truth is probably hidden beyond many layers...but that's China
I guess they do it because it can be hard to get talent to work a contract with no chance of renewal? Or they hope that the profits that roll in will sustain the work force? Which never really materializes once they figure out they can slash overhead and come that much closer to breaking even.
At least when they outsource (which not all goes over seas) its slightly more honorable and not quite a "use em and lose em" scenario. The people involved know that they have an expiration date, which I guess at this point everyone should already know if you're project is winding down regardless of your status you should dust off the portfolio and make some new art.