Why are publishers so willing to give up their best talent?

Azureth

Supreme [H]ardness
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Take Keiji Inafune, or more recently Hideo Kojima, among others. I just don't get it, so many of these people are a very large part of the reason they got so popular in the first place yet so many have left usually due to poor treatment. If anything shouldn't these publishers bend over backwards to accommodate and make these people happy?

Konami keeping HK from attending the game awards is just downright petty and vindictive and shows the higher ups aren't at all right in the head. Not to mention it makes them look like absolute tools, do they not care at all about them leaving or their image? Why are so many publishers willing to treat those that largely made them what they are like garbage?

Even with all of Nintendo's mistakes at least they haven't been stupid enough to treat Miyamoto like yesterday's garbage.

I'd love it if Konami and Capcom went belly up and all the higher ups ended up losing everything, it would sure as hell be poetic justice.
 
A lot of people don't understand. The industry has changed. GOOD games don't make money anymore. Back in the 90s, a game was considered a super success if it sold over 1 million copies. Now, a game is a failure of it doesent break 5 million pre-orders. The cost of developing games has ballooned out so much so that the old versions of 'success' are inadequate to fund the process. That's why COD, AssCreed Madden, FIFA etc. are the most successful titles. They have tons of reused resources and come out so frequently that publishers just push pre-orders and pump 12 months worth of cut-out DLC, abandon the game after a couple of months and release the next one.

'GOOD' games don't make that kind of money. They take time, provide value, and keep the player occupied for a while. They actually hurt profit.
 
Gamers don't like change like most people. Sequels make so much money because gamers will buy the same franchise yearly rather than buying a much better title. Gamers don't want new games; they want the same thing every year as it gives them something to look forward to.
 
It probably made sense for Konami to change the director. I can picture the top Konami brass requesting Kojima make his games more like 'Assassin's Creed', annual releases with multiple teams working on different titles simultaneously. And I could see Kojima telling Konami to eat a turd at the request.
 
Personally I think that they give up talent out of hubris. A bit of the killing of the golden goose. Everyone wants things cheaper, faster, they don't bother to consider that quality takes time. That creatives, though they can work in things like budgets and do, are considering their work above all else. I can guarantee Kojima spent endless hours "off the clock" working on each of his games.

But in the end, the long and short is: arrogance and hubris.


Kojima is overrated and overpaid. Metal Gear is over hyped.

There, I said it.

It feel good to be a contrarian doesn't it? Obviously with his work being more or less universally acclaimed you realize that your opinion is the vast minority. Hopefully at some point you'll be able to appreciate what he does, even if you don't care for it yourself. Similar to criticisms about film.
 
Take Keiji Inafune, or more recently Hideo Kojima, among others. I just don't get it, so many of these people are a very large part of the reason they got so popular in the first place yet so many have left usually due to poor treatment. If anything shouldn't these publishers bend over backwards to accommodate and make these people happy?

Konami keeping HK from attending the game awards is just downright petty and vindictive and shows the higher ups aren't at all right in the head. Not to mention it makes them look like absolute tools, do they not care at all about them leaving or their image? Why are so many publishers willing to treat those that largely made them what they are like garbage?

Even with all of Nintendo's mistakes at least they haven't been stupid enough to treat Miyamoto like yesterday's garbage.

I'd love it if Konami and Capcom went belly up and all the higher ups ended up losing everything, it would sure as hell be poetic justice.

Let's be honest, the average gamer has no idea who these big name talents are. They play the game and never look at who makes it. Even with all the gaming sites making a big deal about it, very few people really care about Kojima.

Big game companies no longer care about releasing quality games, they want to release Generic Shooter XXX this year and XXXI next year and XXXII the next year. And the average gamer doesn't have a problem with that, so why change?

The only people who would hurt from Konami or Capcom going belly up would be the low level workers. The people in charge will make sure they get their bonuses.
 
Kojima is overrated and overpaid. Metal Gear is over hyped.

There, I said it.

If others enjoyed the game, then they enjoyed it regardless what any individual may feel.

If we call something overhyped just because a majority of users highly rate something above what we would, then I think it's kind of meaningless anyway. It's as if we're saying our opinion is the benchmark, which of course is ridiculous.
 
TBH, I sort of agree with them being way overrated. I stopped enjoying the story after the first, and while I didn't hate 2, it was just weird, and it just got weirder. Not exactly horrible that it's uninteresting, but it's just a whatever throwaway thing for me.

I'm probably repeating myself, but gampelay in 5 is good. Controls is eh.... so-so, story is meh. And I prefer David Hayter's voice over Jack Bauer, but I seem to be against a lot of people on Voice Acting, as I like Symphony of the Night's voice acting and lines. No one else seem to though. =(

If MGS TS is remade with the mechanics of MGS5, I'd probably buy real quick. Loved that game to death.
 
We hear the bad. Remember there's still miyamotos and the like out there plugging away making games we love.
 
As the CEO of my company put it a few years ago: "Everyone is replaceable".
 
A lot of people don't understand. The industry has changed. GOOD games don't make money anymore. Back in the 90s, a game was considered a super success if it sold over 1 million copies. Now, a game is a failure of it doesent break 5 million pre-orders. The cost of developing games has ballooned out so much so that the old versions of 'success' are inadequate to fund the process. That's why COD, AssCreed Madden, FIFA etc. are the most successful titles. They have tons of reused resources and come out so frequently that publishers just push pre-orders and pump 12 months worth of cut-out DLC, abandon the game after a couple of months and release the next one.

'GOOD' games don't make that kind of money. They take time, provide value, and keep the player occupied for a while. They actually hurt profit.

Yep, big publishers are publicly owned companies that need to make money. 'Good' games cost too much these days and a publisher would rather put out Call of Duty 57 Grenada Ops 6 Doritos edition rather then fund a real game.
 
Games today are too over sexed, too over hyped, have lost real game play.
Most games today are turning into ether Microtransactions, pay to win, soft core hentai I.E. metal gear's latest game, or interactive movies with single button control like the crap from the last three final fantasy games.One of the reason I still love playing my old pre-xbox 360/ps3 consoles.
 
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Also...... if their best talent is like Tim Shafer, I can totally understand why they are treated the way they are treated.
 
Yep, big publishers are publicly owned companies that need to make money. 'Good' games cost too much these days and a publisher would rather put out Call of Duty 57 Grenada Ops 6 Doritos edition rather then fund a real game.

The next call of duty doesn't cost less than a new game would. But there is less risk involved. And it's all about minimizing risk to them. You could start a new franchise for the cost of COD, but it's not tested. They don't know if it will be successful. Especially if they focus group the shit out of it, and make it pc, and I don't mean windows version.

What is cheaper is multiplayer only crap. That has no real content, only an empty arena and bots at most. And it fucking sells. And it makes me mad as hell.
 
Personally I think that they give up talent out of hubris. A bit of the killing of the golden goose. Everyone wants things cheaper, faster, they don't bother to consider that quality takes time. That creatives, though they can work in things like budgets and do, are considering their work above all else. I can guarantee Kojima spent endless hours "off the clock" working on each of his games.

But in the end, the long and short is: arrogance and hubris.

Couldn't agree with you more. I'm not that old but I've seen this scenario play out way too often. It is what it is.
 
In many cases companies would rather start over with cheap, unproven talent than to pay real talent what it deserves. It's short sighted and stupid, but it makes the "right now" money look better.

If you are in IT, you know this problem all too well :(
 
That's why there is a non-compete clause in the employment contract.

Which by and large are not enforceable in many jurisdictions. Those clauses are mostly there to annoy the employee knowing they'll have expenses in court to get that clause thrown out.

Still not a big deal if you budget court costs in your startup.
 
Kojima is overrated and overpaid. Metal Gear is over hyped.

There, I said it.

I agree...he's not BAD but he's definitely not as amazing as some people claim him to be, definitely not anymore at least.

Always thought the dude was a bit of a tool to plaster his name all over the place in his games 1000x.

You can't play a hideo Kojima game without seeing his name 100 times...like. seriously? Imagine watching a movie where the directors name pops up in a credit every 5 minutes all through the whole thing.
 
Let's be honest, the average gamer has no idea who these big name talents are. They play the game and never look at who makes it. Even with all the gaming sites making a big deal about it, very few people really care about Kojima.

I came to basically post this The video game industry as a whole doesn't revere individual talents like the movie industry. Hideo Kojima was very much a rarity being a well known name in video game development, and quite frankly the only reason I think people know it so well is because when his name is on something, it's on fucking everything.

Most people just don't care. For the vast majority of games, the names that roll in the credits have zero impact on peoples desire to play the game.
 
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