Why the video game market will crash next gen

[TheeFrogmanlego]

Why the video game console market will crash.
I firmly believe the home console video game market is going to crash hard and it's going to take place with the next gen consoles (PS 4 and XBOX 720). Outside of the COD franchise, most other franchises are struggling, devs are seeing profit losses, studios are closing. The gaming industry as a whole has been seeing sharp declines in profits. The suits and ties who don't understand gamers seem to think it's the economy and used games sales killing them and are getting ready to put harsh restrictions in place on the next gen consoles to combat that but it'll just be further alienating gamers without fixing the real problem. Here's the outline on why the console market will inevitably crash and Sony as well as microsoft have no chance to stop it from happening.

1) Arrogance- As Sony and Microsoft have grown into console giants, there has been a massive decline in them listening to their consumers feedback. They feel they know what the consumer want more then the consumers themselves. Instead of the consumer preferences dictating what the market is, Sony and Microsoft are trying to force their vision for the market on the consumers. "No, you don't want contollers anymore you want motion controls, thats what the market is now cause we say so", "No, you don't want hardcore games anymore, you want casual games that are more accessible and easy with lots of trophies and unlockables to keep you interested".

2) Casual Gaming- As popularity rises in app games and social site games such as Zynga games, Sony and Microsoft strive to abandon their directions and try to emulate what those casual games do on consoles. They try to make everything simplistic and sell you a small base game and make you pay for additional content. This is going to be a big part of their undoing. The problem with trying to copy the marketing schemes of these casual social games is that console gaming is expensive. After you buy the system, controllers, headsets, etc. you then are paying 60 dollars for each game. Then they want you to buy bits and pieces of content for it. Instead of stealing some of that casual market they are pushing more people to those cheaper app and social site games. Why should I pay 60 dollars for a low content game and then have to buy add ons when I can play many social site games for free and make out much cheaper even if I do buy some add ons for those games? Trying to compete with those games while charging an arm and a leg for it in comparison is a failed business model. The console market pays a pretty penny to play their games and expect more hardcore complex games with plenty of content then those cheap casual social site games. Your not losing sales to the casual market, your losing sales cause you're not offering anything different then that these days and so people will stick with the cheaper market.


3) The Broader Audience- When a dev says they are changing a game for a broader audience it's a nice way of saying they are dumbing a game down in hopes those Zynga and app gamers will find it easy enough to play or chasing the market of some other successful game like the COD Modern Warfare series. What this has caused is for a lot of games to be "me too" games rather then being something unique. This marketing strategy just recently destroyed Zipper Interactive studios who started ignoring it's Socom fanbase in search of this broader audience that never came. Despite fans telling them why they were losing sales and their community, they insisted their sequels weren't for the fans but rather a broader audience and all but told the fans to get lost ignoring all requests and basically taking all the Socom right out of Socom. For three straight games they chased a broader audience, and the more the overhauls failed and saw massive sales drops, the more stubborn they became insisting they had to keep changing it for some other audience that wasn't coming. It culminated in their end when Socom 4 basically turned into a cheezy third person COD knock off and destroyed the last remaining bits of their reputation. Arrogance, denial, ignoring the fans. It was an inevitable recipe for disaster which they were to blind to see as they put all their eggs into the casual market basket. You can't keep disposing of your fanbase with each iteration and expecting a new one to take it's place. You have to focus on getting your fans to return first and then build on that gameplay with some enhancement and improvements to make your audience broader.

4) Release now patch it later- Many games that release these days are often broken, games that would have never made it out of Q&A in the PS 2 and XBOX days. Now releasing broken and incomplete products is the market standard and many gamers are getting tired of it. There are some games that release so broken that it can take some games as long as 6 to 8 months after release to get patched up enough to be reasonably playable. This also will contribute to people wanting to wait to buy games used. If you keep getting bit on the butt buying things at launch that are broken you'll tend to want to start waiting on games to see how they turn out, and if you hear it's a mess you might then wait till they release patches and its worth playing. By that time the game can be found cheap at gamestop. So in many ways these devs and publishers contribute to the used games seeming like the better option. If you take that away next gen and force people to either buy broken launch games or nothing, many may just opt for nothing.

5) Hardcore games and features need to make a comeback- Developers these days cringe at the thought of having to make a game that doesn't have health regen, perks, unlockables, etc. They all want to repackage the same exact kind of game everyone else is doing and throw it on the shelf with a new name stamped on it. Where's the variety? While it's ok to have a game like COD for that market, you can't make all the games like COD and expect them all to succeed. You have to provide people with options that can't be found in COD. If it's just a COD knockoff people are going to want to just stick with COD. If it offers a completely different experience that can't be had in COD they might give it a look. Too many shooters baby the gamers, they'll have health regen and health packs to revive on top of that. It's a shooter game, it's ok to let people die when they do something stupid and get shot for it. Then instead of focusing on playing as a team and enjoying the game, they never get to appreciate the game for what it is cause they are more concerned with objectives to unlock stuff instead of objectives needed to win the match. It winds up being a hollow experience that becomes obvious when all the weapons are unlocked and gamers lose incentive to play. There's nothing wrong with having the entire arsenal of weapons available on day 1. Let people learn to appreciate playing as a team and communicating instead of lone wolfing with no real goal in mind. Games like COD and BF can co-exist with games more like the classic hardcore Socom games or the early Rainbow Six games. Trying to make games both for the hardcore and casual market in one game doesn't work. When you try to please everyone you often wind up pleasing no one. Stop copying and offer unique and different experiences so that each kind of gamer has something that offers a fully satsifying gaming experience, both casual and hardcore gamers alike.

6) Disappearance of Backwards Compatibility- One of the big draws to buying new consoles was being able to have an "all in one" unit to clear clutter in your entertainment center. Sony has decided that they can make money by forcing you to pay for games you already have if you want to continue to play them on the new console. By not having BC they think they can make you pay for the same games again. What they don't realize is most people aren't buying the games they already own. They are buying games they either sold, or maybe classics they had heard about that were great but never wound up getting them. Most people who still own old games still own the systems for them so they won't repay for a simple port. Allowing people to play the games they still have while still allowing them to buy old classics they don't have could work just fine together and allow people to keep a neat entertainment system with one console. Sony is worried if you can play your old games on it maybe you won't have as much incentive to go buy the new games for it, but that comes down to their own fault. Stop making redundant "me too" casual games and go back to the kind of variety the PS 2 and XBOX era offered us. If people are playing a lot of old games its because they think your new games and casual direction sucks.

7) Suits and Ties- Most of the people calling the shots in these companies aren't gamers. They don't understand gamers. They are completely out of touch with gamers. They make their decisions based on graphs and pie charts instead of voices and feedback from consumers. When they see that one game is successful they look at their chart and say "Ok well since this game sells well we need to add features A,B,C and D to our next sequel and according to this chart it will be a success just like that game. No consideration if those features even fit into their game, change is made for the sake of change rather then for the better. No consideration is put into the fact that their fanbase has vastly different tastes then the fanbase of that other game. It's just done because the chart said it will sell that way. So then their fanbase gets upset and leaves and the fans of that other game don't come cause they don't want a cheap knockoff of the game they love, they'll stick to the real thing. That's why the most recent batch of shooters outside of BF and COD sold some of their worst numbers ever cause they tried like hell to add as many features of the big two as they could and alienated their fanbases.

Unless these companies go back to their roots, go back to delivering solid and complete games that have hardcore elements the console market is going to dig its own grave. Stop trying to focus on making consoles like low quality PCs just so you can say "it does everything". Console gamers are people who were serious about gaming and didn't give a crap about all the side stuff otherwise they could have just stuck to PC gaming. Console gamers who don't play app games or PC games spend hundreds of dollars for a system primarily to play games. When they pay 60 dollars for a game they expect some intense and challenging gameplay. Not just some cheap gimmick game you half pay attention to while posting facebook updates. Start trying to please console gamers again and stop trying to make console games into something they are not if you want to bring console games back. Of course I know they won't cause again the suit and ties don't get any of this. They keep looking at charts telling them games need to be accessible, easy, casual cause thats what facebook games are and thats what gamers like. But those are not console gamers, they aren't the ones spending hundreds of dollars on a system just to play games. They play those games cause many are free to play and just a time killer while they wait for their friends to reply to their status updates, tweets, etc. Focus on the real console market stop trying to get the people who won't pay big bucks to game cause while you're sitting there watching them and waiting for them to come, you console gamers are starting to hang up their controllers and move on.
By a guy on the playstation forums
I remember crying when i couldn't beet a game at age 5.. now a days i feel like, come on why is it so easy =( or i cant escape the Cod styled game's GT5 is guilty of # 4
=/ imagine if they made Gt like cod and added load outs ETC.. you know why i love uncharted2 ... and warhawk =D THEY were polished FUN solid games.. not bugged out the wazzo or trying to imitate cod..
Before MW the ps3 had a large varaty of games but then MW comes along and fps' start dominating the market all other games are half made and easy.. gt5 as broken as it was had tons of content

 

[Tesla]

And this couldn't go in the Console and PC gaming subforum why... ?

 

[Skython]

He wanted to cause a rumble in here. (I apologize, I'll just sit in the bottom right corner)

 

[photonrider]

Holy Wall of Text!

What else can they possibly add to the next-gen that's actually useful or innovative? You know, to draw people in.. get them excited!

Total Recall.

With lots of gals, guys, booze, guns . . .and cars! Lots of cars.

 

[Downhill Dino]

I'm surprised the paying for online multiplayer bit wasn't in there.

TBH - The motion controller(s) are just another gimmick & nothing new (Think Duck Hunt). I'll never buy into those types of products. I go to play video games to relax & sit down for a while, not to flail my arms around like a retard.

Well you see, these days, and for the past few years, the goal in many places around the world is to get active and healthy. So the best way to get gamers to do such things are to get them to stand up and actually do something. Nintendo did this extremely well with the Wii Fit, as an example. Unless I'm wrong and gaming companies are just messing around with technology these days...

 

[Tornado]

1) Arrogance- As Sony and Microsoft have grown into console giants, there has been a massive decline in them listening to their consumers feedback.

They listen far better than Nintendo ever has.

2) Casual Gaming- As popularity rises in app games and social site games such as Zynga games, Sony and Microsoft strive to abandon their directions and try to emulate what those casual games do on consoles.

Oh?

3) The Broader Audience- When a dev says they are changing a game for a broader audience it's a nice way of saying they are dumbing a game down in hopes those Zynga and app gamers will find it easy enough to play or chasing the market of some other successful game like the COD Modern Warfare series.

This sounds no less pretentious from you then when the Glorious Master Race people say it.

This marketing strategy just recently destroyed Zipper Interactive studios who started ignoring it's Socom fanbase in search of this broader audience that never came.

No. Zipper being an irrelevant development studio in this console generation led to their closure, and the PSN blackout absolutely decimating the little popularity MAG had didn't help.

4) Release now patch it later- Many games that release these days are often broken, games that would have never made it out of Q&A in the PS 2 and XBOX days. Now releasing broken and incomplete products is the market standard and many gamers are getting tired of it. There are some games that release so broken that it can take some games as long as 6 to 8 months after release to get patched up enough to be reasonably playable.

And how frequently does that actually happen?


Far be it from me to admit that it isn't a problem, but "broken and incomplete" products are far from the norm.

5) Hardcore games and features need to make a comeback

Like it or not, games are far too expensive to produce for big name titles to be designated to a niche market; and "hardcore" doesn't really mean anything anyway.

6) Disappearance of Backwards Compatibility- One of the big draws to buying new consoles was being able to have an "all in one" unit to clear clutter in your entertainment center. Sony has decided that they can make money by forcing you to pay for games you already have if you want to continue to play them on the new console.

Yeah... this costs money. Lots of money, to implement. Sony took it out to save costs when they were basically burning money. You wanna point fingers, again, point them at Nintendo and the Wii U.

7) Suits and Ties- Most of the people calling the shots in these companies aren't gamers. They don't understand gamers. They are completely out of touch with gamers. They make their decisions based on graphs and pie charts instead of voices and feedback from consumers. When they see that one game is successful they look at their chart and say "Ok well since this game sells well we need to add features A,B,C and D to our next sequel and according to this chart it will be a success just like that game. No consideration if those features even fit into their game, change is made for the sake of change rather then for the better. No consideration is put into the fact that their fanbase has vastly different tastes then the fanbase of that other game. It's just done because the chart said it will sell that way. So then their fanbase gets upset and leaves and the fans of that other game don't come cause they don't want a cheap knockoff of the game they love, they'll stick to the real thing. That's why the most recent batch of shooters outside of BF and COD sold some of their worst numbers ever cause they tried like hell to add as many features of the big two as they could and alienated their fanbases.

You act as if cynical knock-off games designed by suits haven't happened for decades now. 5 years ago it was Halo. 10 years ago it was Mario Kart clones. 15 years ago it was Super Mario 64 clones. 20 years ago it was Sonic clones. 25 years ago it was Double Dragon clones. 35 years ago it was Pong clones.

Stop trying to focus on making consoles like low quality PCs just so you can say "it does everything". Console gamers are people who were serious about gaming and didn't give a crap about all the side stuff otherwise they could have just stuck to PC gaming.

Consoles these days are powered by PC components. By design they contain the functionality Sony and Microsoft implement, so why do you want them to not have it?


Again, far more problematic is Nintendo, who builds system that contain extra functionality and go out of their way to disable it.

Console gamers who don't play app games or PC games spend hundreds of dollars for a system primarily to play games. When they pay 60 dollars for a game they expect some intense and challenging gameplay. Not just some cheap gimmick game you half pay attention to while posting facebook updates.

I suggest you pay attention better, because there are plenty such games.

 

[Sleek Stratos]

1- Arrogance: All big business do this when they're full of themselves enough. Food chains altering their basic recipes, and most studios in Hollywood churn out whatever they feel like. We as gamers will speak as any other consumer does, with our wallets, and businesses usually learn better than that once they look at their quarter results. So this might not be THAT bad.

2- Casual gaming: Microsoft and Sony see that small and simple games are trendy so they will want a piece of that pie. Some studios branch out, like Ubisoft, releasing smaller Assassin's Creed games for social networks, but I can't see big feature games becoming so simple I'll need 2 or 3 packs of DLC to get enjoyment out of them. I do feel like we ARE getting drowned in small simple games like "Limbo" or what-have-you, but there will be some gems in there like "Journey" from time to time.

3- Broader audience. I would say most studios usually take note of what works with their games and what doesn't. EA knows the "NFS Shift" series is small fries compared to FM4 and GT5, even if they're console-exclusive, so they're not going to drop arcade street racing anytime soon. Patrick Soderlund, big shot at EA, says the Shift series has into its own, but he also says they want to reach a broader audience with the next NFS arcade game instead of going with another Shift. Which is a clever way of saying they know their place.

4- Release now patch it later. Studios can't get comfy with that notion that they can wrap it up later, I'll agree. The update system is a great way of making up for rushing to launch on time, but as Toronado said it happens seldom where a game has become nigh-unplayable because of how "broken" it is.

5- Hardcore games and features need to make a comeback. This is a lot like what you said in point number 3. Games are assimilating others. If a game maker borrows ingredients from some other recipe and they suffer for it, and STILL neglect to dig deeper for creativity, they'll die and that'll open up doors to other makers with new ideas. The video game industry is pretty big, people want in.

6- Backwards compatibility. It sucks not to have it, but it's too expensive. Sony bit off more than it could chew with it, and I was sad to see it go, but I want them to be in the market. So if scratching it saves them so be it.

7- Suits and ties. I don't think game company big shots are as out of touch as you say. Besides, they like money, and if something with their name on it isn't making money, they'll turn to those below them that are much closer to the crowds and have heard a thing or two of what we've been saying.


And even so, ironically, we'll play the same games with a different face simply because it's more. I'll buy the next GTA and the next Saints Row, I don't care, one of them will blow me away more than the other I'm sure, but I'll have fun with both.

 

[Icarus25]

TBH - The motion controller(s) are just another gimmick & nothing new (Think Duck Hunt). I'll never buy into those types of products. I go to play video games to relax & sit down for a while, not to flail my arms around like a retard.

Motion controllers are far from a "gimmick". Implementing them in games that have no reason for them or creating silly games simply for motion control is gimmicky. There are a lot of games that motion controls help to elevate the immersion factor; sports games being the prime example. I'd much rather swing a simulated golf club or baseball bat, or pretend to throw a ball instead of flicking a thumb stick. If it's a sport you enjoy in the outside world, it's a good way to enjoy it in conditions unfavorable to said sport.

 

[dan0543]

Wow, why do people think this isn't such a bad thing...?
Things like social gaming and casual games eat up the time and money of developers, preventing them from doing anything innovative. They're now on the slippery slope: some gamers are leaving because cheaper casual games are now available, console developers are trying to mimic this style resulting in even more losses.
Casual gaming is something for people who are bored, and just want a light time filler. Since the amount of content isn't overwhelming, it's a more relaxing experience. This suits some people, and has dragged them out of the console market.
Us console gamers are suffering for this, the developer doesn't realise not everybody likes this relaxed style. We miss the quality games of old, like last gen's nfs titles, GT3 & 4 and ratchet and clank. The games of this gen (most of them anyway) are boring to us more hardcore gamers, a lack of content and challenge. And the fact that they still charge £40 for this (in england) is a complete deal breaker. I only ever use the used market now. Not because i'm poor, i have a job, but because the new games simply aren't worth the money.

 

[Green]

It's the same with any market things consistantly change, people will always play games there fore there will always be companies making them. If your unhappy with the product's or action's by certain company then don't but their products, It's up to the companies to provide a service/product you want to pay for.

 

[Tornado]

Wow, why do people think this isn't such a bad thing...?

Wow, why do people think that saying what the OP is saying isn't accurate is the same thing as saying what the OP is saying is a good thing?

 

[Sureboss]

Toronado has made some excellent replies to those arguments, I agree with all of his points. Buggy games are not new, indeed the facts are that games are less buggy than they used to be, QA is a considerably more professional and efficient part of the process than the previous generation of games. More people are noticing them because more play them and they are more exposed due to the expansion of the internet as well as games getting bigger. It's simply not feasible to eradicate a game of all bugs before release, prioritisation exists for that reason, it's still a business and many genres rely on a specific release date for the survival of the business. The current gen patch system benefits everyone.

£40 for a game is reasonable, they aren't cheap to produce and develop and I swear everyone thinks that devs get all of that £40. That's a more than reasonable price point given the costs going in to making it and the history of prices in games, I remember some N64 games costing £50-60, take in to account inflation, etc.

Not sure where the OP is getting the idea from that the gaming market is in decline, it's doing pretty well considering the global situation and the US and in particular Canada are doing very well, though the UK has had some tough times, those have been mostly caused by government and educational difficulties rather than industry specific problems, technophobes in government NFTW. The global economic crisis has been a boost to the games market in some aspects, with people wanting more and more for their money, many games provide exceptional value for money compared to other entertainment forms, even the short (10hr) games provide a similar or better value for money compared to films/cinema/music, though reduction in investment has hurt it like any other industry.

 

[Luminis]

Why the video game console market will crash.

Hasn't that been claimed, like, every generation?

The gaming industry as a whole has been seeing sharp declines in profits.

The video game economy has grown from a rough 10 billion $ in 2004 to roughly 65 billion $ in 2011, despite recession. Sharp decline in sales, compared to what? An industry that has seen growth like no other? I mean, really, the movie industry would have to be entirely dead, by comparison.

1) Arrogance- As Sony and Microsoft have grown into console giants, there has been a massive decline in them listening to their consumers feedback.

You are making one huge mistake here. You're assuming that you are the market and that your opinion is that of the majority of potential customers. Let's face it, you are not. You may want hardcore games that are challenging (like, say, Demon's Souls and Dark Souls), but is that what the large majority of Sony's and Microsoft's and Nintendo's customers want? You don't actually believe that the Wii was such a huge success because everyone hates motion controls, do you?

2) Casual Gaming- As popularity rises in app games and social site games such as Zynga games, Sony and Microsoft strive to abandon their directions and try to emulate what those casual games do on consoles.

You are getting carried away by your dislike for casual games. A very simple thing that those app games are not going to deliver, are eye candy and scope. The simple fact is that micro transactions are working very, very well, despite the initial cost. Is it cool for us gamers? Probably not, not all. However, this is what Activision has to say on the matter:

The publishing giant stated in a conference call, after releasing its Q2 2011 financial results, that it has generated significantly more income through digital means than Farmville creators, Zynga.
“Last year, our digital business alone generated about double the revenues and operating income than Zynga did,” said the publisher’s chief financial officer Thomas Tippl.

It seems that you are basing your theory on facts that are, well, not so factual after all.

3) The Broader Audience- When a dev says they are changing a game for a broader audience it's a nice way of saying they are dumbing a game down in hopes those Zynga and app gamers will find it easy enough to play or chasing the market of some other successful game like the COD Modern Warfare series.

You are, again, getting carried away by the thought that your tastes are that of the whole video game market. You should try to understand that that isn't the case. This is like the automotive industry: Cars like the Subaru BRZ (equivalent to hardcore games) might be appealing to enthusiasts such as you and me, but the majority of people will drive around in Toyota Corollas (casual games). Deal with it, you are not the yard stick for a game's success. The mass market is.

Also, why would you use the developer of SOCOM as an example? I've never even heard that namee before and I doubt they released anything that had a large impact, ever. Now, if you were able to say the same about, say Sony's Santa Monica Studios or something similar, it would be a different story. But, if you're being honest, you'll notice that opening games to a broader audience usually helps to generate more profit. Case in point: World of WarCraft. Blizzard created the first 'casual' MMORPG and their success was breath taking.

4) Release now patch it later- Many games that release these days are often broken, games that would have never made it out of Q&A in the PS 2 and XBOX days.

While I generally agree with that notion, there's also the fact that the market is growing more and more impatient. And that this seems to be a very valid strategy, as it has been going on the PC for far longer than on consoles and still hasn't changed. Last but not least, and I am sure that you have noticed this: The complexity of games increases with every single generation. Development gets more expensive and more complicated. What do you expect? Developers so make as little "mistakes" as they did oon the Super Nintendo, while the customers seem to not know the meaning of the word "patience" anymore?

5) Hardcore games and features need to make a comeback- Developers these days cringe at the thought of having to make a game that doesn't have health regen, perks, unlockables, etc.

The whole point of your post seems to be about games not catering to your "hardcore" taste anymore. Hardcore games will make a comeback as soon as the hardcore market makes a comeback. Customers are voting with their money, and, if you haven't noticed, the market, as a whole, has been voting for those casual games - which is basically proven by the hugely impressive success of these games.

6) Disappearance of Backwards Compatibility- One of the big draws to buying new consoles was being able to have an "all in one" unit to clear clutter in your entertainment center.

While I agree that backwards compatibility would be quite important, I do doubt that this is actually a thing that will gain them much money. Adding backwards compatibilty can easily increase the development cost and, as such, the retail price of consoles. The sales lost due to that could easily outweigh the sales gained by adding backwards compatibilty - especially considering the money made off of the sales of the re-released games.

7) Suits and Ties- Most of the people calling the shots in these companies aren't gamers. They don't understand gamers.

They are out of touch with you. I won't go into explaining it yet again, because, frankly, if you haven't understood the point that your taste has little meaning when the mass market is shifting in a different direction yet, there's no benefit in repeating it again.

Console gamers are people who were serious about gaming and didn't give a crap about all the side stuff otherwise they could have just stuck to PC gaming.

You do realize that you are also talking about the console gamers who bought the 95 million Wii consoles - which could largely be considered the epitome of casual gaming.

The way I see it, you are on a personal crusade against casual gaming. That's all well and good, but you shouldn't use your personal opinion as a basis to make such claims.

 

[Spagetti69]

Well I'm fed up of seeing Zumba fitness in the charts every week and in every shelf in the supermarket.



.......Just dance 3 is much better.

 

[theotherspongey]

Don't forget the blockage of used games.

 

[sesselpupser]

I think the OP is trying to say that real gamers aren't being catered to any more, and to an extent I agree. You often hear people compare videogames to other media, and I think as time goes on that comparison will become less and less abstract, but as it is there's one pretty large stumbling block, which is this: A piece of music can be produced for very little money these days, so if it doesn't sell well it's not a huge problem. A film can be made on a smartphone and released on DVD or shown at private screenings on a digital projector, which is also cheap. A book can be hand written, photocopied and stapled together... Videogames require so much more than that. It would be great if someone could make a game in a few months in their spare time and it be some highly polished, bug-free AAA title, but that will never happen, as technology evolves it costs money to be on the forefront of the development of it, but unlike games, no other media have to be on that cutting edge to be relevant. The best we get is often 2D indie games and the occasional first person game that looks like it came out in 2005, with a few exceptions (Hard Reset being one). If I'd been shown Minecraft, the biggest indie hit ever, and told it was a PS One game, I would've believed it (of course it's deceptively strenuous to run, but it looks simple, which is my point).

All this is why I hope Kickstarter-funded games become more and more common in the Indie scene, but at the same time I don't want it to dominate to the point where traditional labour of love type indie titles are Kickstarter projects simply because it's the only way to be noticed. Check out Takedown, Wasteland 2 and The Dead Linger for some good examples of what Kickstarter is being used for, I think you'll agree when I say I hope the success some projects have had motivates some developers to turn to KS for funding rather than publishers who may trample all over the initial concept in favour of casualisation in order to guarantee financial success.

Also I'd like to point out that I'm not the sort who believes that graphics > gameplay, but every now and then I do want to play things that push the expensive hardware I run my games on. If I'd bought a GTX 580 just to play Minecraft and Terraria on (I rarely play either, but as examples), I'd be certified clinically insane.

 

[Luminis]

Uhm, you can't make a movie like Avatar in your spare time in a shed, either. So I totally don't get that point... I actually believe that the indy game scene is far more alive than that for indy movies...

 

[sesselpupser]

Uhm, you can't make a movie like Avatar in your spare time in a shed, either. So I totally don't get that point... I actually believe that the indy game scene is far more alive than that for indy movies...

And your point is...? I never said you could, and I'd like to challenge your latter point; you're presumably a gamer so how can you prove you're as clued up on the indie film scene as you are on the indie game scene? Of course the indie gaming scene seems more alive to you because you presumably follow it more closely.

Anyway, of course there are high budget games and high budget films, I meant that there are certain things a game dev NEEDS to make an objectively good game but a film can be anything, it can be a smartphone recording of an argument in the street or a collection of hand-drawn cats animated to a soundtrack consisting of spoons in a washing machine. Testing, for example, all devs need to test their games and to do so they need access to all sorts of hardware and software combinations to test for bugs, and if that testing doesn't happen, the game will be defined as bad. A game that doesn't work is a factually bad game, regardless of opinion, but you can't have a factually bad film as films are completely and entirely subjective, they just have differing levels of appeal. Games do too, of course, but... Well, now I'm just labouring my point.

So, yeah, I can't even remember what my point was now beyond this: 'Yay Kickstarter'. Posting from my phone makes it difficult to remember what was being said. With that I might as well admit I'm now ducking back out of this debate, but seeing as your response had little to do with what I was saying I presume it's already over anyway.

 

[Sanji Himura]

Hasn't that been claimed, like, every generation?

This is true. One gamer out of ten thousand will claim that a second Gaming market crash is coming with little to no factual numbers or facts to back up his claim like the OP is doing. I have been around gaming nearly 30 years, and that is a long time, but I don't think that would make me any more qualified to say that there is a crash coming, but it does, instead, makes me qualified to say that gaming is getting bigger than ever before. There isn't anywhere that you wouldn't hear of Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo showing off their latest products or games that would play on said systems. Add to that Social platforms like Farmville and the like, and you have a nearly $100 billion industry.

The video game economy has grown from a rough 10 billion $ in 2004 to roughly 65 billion $ in 2011, despite recession. Sharp decline in sales, compared to what? An industry that has seen growth like no other? I mean, really, the movie industry would have to be entirely dead, by comparison.

This information is according to Forbes.com, but Sony, as a whole, is expecting a loss of $7.3 billion while Microsoft is expected to profit $23.4 Billion as of right now. I couldn't find anything on the site about Nintendo.

You are making one huge mistake here. You're assuming that you are the market and that your opinion is that of the majority of potential customers. Let's face it, you are not. You may want hardcore games that are challenging (like, say, Demon's Souls and Dark Souls), but is that what the large majority of Sony's and Microsoft's and Nintendo's customers want? You don't actually believe that the Wii was such a huge success because everyone hates motion controls, do you?

To remove any doubt about the Wii's profitability, as of December 31, 2011, Nintendo has shipped 94.97 million units of the Wii world wide. This isn't some hocus pocus number that I am making up here. This is by Nintendo's estimates.(PDF WARNING!)

 

[Luminis]

And your point is...? I never said you could, and I'd like to challenge your latter point; you're presumably a gamer so how can you prove you're as clued up on the indie film scene as you are on the indie game scene? Of course the indie gaming scene seems more alive to you because you presumably follow it more closely.

Anyway, of course there are high budget games and high budget films, I meant that there are certain things a game dev NEEDS to make an objectively good game but a film can be anything, it can be a smartphone recording of an argument in the street or a collection of hand-drawn cats animated to a soundtrack consisting of spoons in a washing machine. Testing, for example, all devs need to test their games and to do so they need access to all sorts of hardware and software combinations to test for bugs, and if that testing doesn't happen, the game will be defined as bad. A game that doesn't work is a factually bad game, regardless of opinion, but you can't have a factually bad film as films are completely and entirely subjective, they just have differing levels of appeal. Games do too, of course, but... Well, now I'm just labouring my point.

You are right in the regard that movies can be basically anything - if we're taking things like Youtube videos into account. I thought we were talking about the video game industry, and, as such, about stuff that was intended to be used commercially from the get go. There are a lot of indy games that fit these criteria, made by small teams on a low budget, as well as movies.

For example, there are websites with hundreds of flash games... Which don't need testing as much as a lot of other games, as they are running in the same environment, anyways.

You are right, though, I don't follow the indy movie scene very closely, but I think the point I was trying to make is pretty clear. Just look at Neagrounds.com, for example, and tell me that the indy game scene is alive and kicking.

From experience, as I have quite some friends who are trying to get a band going, I can tell you that creating music on a level that you will sell it and not just get some meager donations here and there takes quite a bit of funding, as well. Getting a recording session at a studio isn't cheap, and neither are the instruments needed to do so. Getting big without a decent budget is nearly impossible in either industry. Both are, as far as sales go, dominated by mass-market stuff that enthusiasts usually don't care about. It's just that the gaming industry is becoming mainstream now. It's not the industry that doesn't play by its own rules anymore, it's nothing special, just another branch of the entertainment industry as a whole.

This information is according to Forbes.com, but Sony, as a whole, is expecting a loss of $7.3 billion while Microsoft is expected to profit $23.4 Billion as of right now. I couldn't find anything on the site about Nintendo.

I agree with your post, I just wanted to elaborate on this. A lot of Sony's losses are, from what I've read, caused by non-gaming related issues. The mobile phone market, for example. Sony as a whole has been losing money for, I believe, four years in a row now.

On an unrelated note, since this topic is largely about the state of the gaming industry:

It hink people are getting way too worked about how the industry is becoming worse and worse. Sure, the amount of sucky games is increasing and the percentage of excelent games may go down, but since the overall amount of games released seems to be increasing, I'd take a wild guess and say that we are still receiving a lot of great games.

The reason why I think that we are not worse off then we have been ten years ago is rather simple: We remember the good games, the true gems of our past, and we do so with a lot of nostalgia. But we're not remembering all the crap we had to go through in order to find these games.

I've been very busy playing old games as of late, some of my favourite games for the SNES and the original PlayStation - and guess what, there's roughly half a dozen games per the systems that I enjoyed to the point that I want to play them again. By the end of the current generation, though, there might very well be as much games out for the Xbox360 or PS3 that I might be as fond of, too. I know that I can come up with as many awesome games for the PS2 as I can for the PS1 as I can for the Super Nintendo, and I see not indication that it would be different with this generation.

 

[Sprite]

I think people forget allot about the history of gaming, it's been the same for avert long time, since the suits saw the potential for cash money to be made. I see the same thing in the industry I work in. I work for a big gas and electric supplier, 4/5 years ago people were not bothered by the size of bills that much and just kept living beyond there means. Then every penny counts and what they saw was actually they were wasteful and need to cut back, but they instead decided that the cost of what they were paying for was too much, when in fact the price has gone up because of a global market and people who waste it think it's the price and not the fact they use twice the national average.

I see the same thing with games, the cost has gone up but people want more for their buck because of what you can do so now the limitations due to cost of production, time and hardware people complain. Games have always been buggy, try waiting 30 minutes for a spectrum game to load only to be told on the splash screen it's crashed and start over again, play PS1 games with glitches galore. Yes there were glitches and graphical problems but that was charm when you could buy the game and not worry too much, now every penny counts and a £35/£50 game is allot, but you forget games like GT5 while had bugs would have been left alone back in the fray and you would have to cry about it for ever more, now people on forums cry directly to the top guy on twitter and via forums and then a patch is release and people still complain.

I agree companies and developers don't seem to have a clue what to do these days, and allot will suffer, but there are glimmers of hope too, look at Journey, it's cheap to buy compared to disk titles and it's so well made and such a great game it's worth every penny. As far a gimick hardware is concerned, the manufactures will do stuff like this if they chase money, and I'd people keep buying them then it will continue, if you follow this logic then people must be buying them. I don't really care if they do or don't as long as only a couple of games I really want to play come out a year, because I have other things going on in my life other than gaming, and if someone says this I ruining their life or it's a major deal for them they need serious help, I know for a fact allot of people here on GTP have lives beyond gaming and share it in other parts of th forum, gaming isn't life its a hobby,pastime or bit of fun real people are by life restrictions casual gamers, those who call themselves hardcore gamers have an addiction and need help.

Ohh and cost of hardware isn't that expensive, to be honest it's retivly cheap compared to say PC gaming. £1000 on hardware for console over 10 years is £100 per year isn't bad, again if you go through 6 consoles like some of my friends have is an issue, you are paying too much, get outside and interact with real people. There are some people who don't play too much and have hardware issues that is not good but it's the way of electronics. I play on my PS3 maybe 2 hours a week at the very most, some weeks not even that, and touch wood our PS3 hasn't had any issues hardware wise since launch, I also have a slim too and have had that over 2 years and still no issues.

Rant over.