Carmack and others should get a clue from Paradox Intereactive

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samduhman

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Reading the comment below in this interview I couldn't help think Carmack and Cliff B. thought this way during their early days of game developing until they strayed off the path.

"GameSpy: What’s keeping you on PC primarily, when many other publishers have skewed toward the large console audience?

Fred Wester: It’s so much simpler to develop for the PC -- you can decide everything for yourself. So even though the numbers historically have been bigger on console, the PC is very rewarding because the audience is very knowledgeable about the games, they’re very hardcore, they’re very quick with their feedback, and we have a great relationship with our customers. And being the open platform that it is, we can basically make whatever game we wanna do and then publish it."

Full interview here and highly recommended read. Hopefully other devs/publishers see it.

http://uk.pc.gamespy.com/pc/magicka/1216907p1.html
 
So basically, developing PC games is better in every way, except the fact you make less money. That's really gonna convince a lot of people! :p
 
Derangel said:
Exceptions don't make the rule. In general games sell better on consoles than PC.
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True. Fortunately, some devs do have integrity and will make great games rather than following some formulaic checklist of how to make a top selling AAA game. That is not to say all top selling AAA titles are shitty or formulaic.
 
Tudz said:
So basically, developing PC games is better in every way, except the fact you make less money. That's really gonna convince a lot of people! :p
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Don't forget the fact that if there is some incompatibilty or performance issue, they'll blame you and not the hardware/drivers/OS.
 
samduhman said:
Reading the comment below in this interview I couldn't help think Carmack and Cliff B. thought this way during their early days of game developing until they strayed off the path.

"GameSpy: What’s keeping you on PC primarily, when many other publishers have skewed toward the large console audience?

Fred Wester: It’s so much simpler to develop for the PC -- you can decide everything for yourself. So even though the numbers historically have been bigger on console, the PC is very rewarding because the audience is very knowledgeable about the games, they’re very hardcore, they’re very quick with their feedback, and we have a great relationship with our customers. And being the open platform that it is, we can basically make whatever game we wanna do and then publish it."

Full interview here and highly recommended read. Hopefully other devs/publishers see it.

http://uk.pc.gamespy.com/pc/magicka/1216907p1.html
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Paradox is a great example of what most PC developing companies used to be. They were small firms who had tight budgets but knew how to spend the money correctly and were primarily developing because they loved PC gaming. Now days most developers are in it for the money and absolutely nothing else. That's why many have huge budgets (to add fringe systems as marketing tools or schemes) as well as the attitude that profit is the ultimate goal, which in Paradox's example, is not the case.
 
bigdogchris said:
Paradox is a great example of what most PC developing companies used to be. They were small firms who had tight budgets but knew how to spend the money correctly and were primarily developing because they loved PC gaming. Now days most developers are in it for the money and absolutely nothing else. That's why many have huge budgets (to add fringe systems as marketing tools or schemes) as well as the attitude that profit is the ultimate goal, which in Paradox's example, is not the case.
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Thats the goal of everyone who wants to make money...
 
I think there's a definite difference between some companies though, shown by their attitude. One company may prioritize making games and money helps them make better and newer games, while another will prioritize money and use games as a means to that end, where they spend as little money and effort on re-releasing a game to make a 500% return over spending their money and effort into improving the game and only making a 200% return.
 
RealityCrunch said:
I think there's a definite difference between some companies though, shown by their attitude. One company may prioritize making games and money helps them make better and newer games, while another will prioritize money and use games as a means to that end, where they spend as little money and effort on re-releasing a game to make a 500% return over spending their money and effort into improving the game and only making a 200% return.
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The reality is every company makes money in they way they believe will serve them best. The only difference between a company like Activision and a company like Paradox is in the route they pick to make their money. In the end every decision comes down to its potential to make money.
 
Carmack should quit engine design for gaming in general. He spends most of his time doing dozens of other projects he's far more interested in. He only continues to work at Id because he's extremely well paid and loves to program.

After the aborted fetus that is "Rage" he can just fuck right off. That completely destroyed my respect for him , including what he said afterwards basically telling PC gamers to go fuck themselves.
 
I'm not going to buy into the idea that every single company's ultimate goal is to be filthy rich. I think there are many who are doing it just because they love what they are doing, or at least at one time there were some like that. If you walked up to the guy who started Paradox, do you think if you ask him "why did you start this company" that his answer will be "to get rich"?
 
bigdogchris said:
I'm not going to buy into the idea that every single company's ultimate goal is to be filthy rich. I think there are many who are doing it just because they love what they are doing, or at least at one time there were some like that. If you walked up to the guy who started Paradox, do you think if you ask him "why did you start this company" that his answer will be "to get rich"?
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The goal of every for profit company is profit. I'm not saying they all want to rule the world or whatever, but at the end of the day profit is the ultimate goal. When companies lose sight of that they die. That is the nature of capitalism.
 
Derangel said:
The goal of every for profit company is profit. I'm not saying they all want to rule the world or whatever, but at the end of the day profit is the ultimate goal. When companies lose sight of that they die. That is the nature of capitalism.
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Especially in a competitive world. Its not enough just to make things for the sake of love and roses when you have other competing companies who will more than happily take your potential sales. We're living in a time now where there's more games than people have time to play and by a long shot. If I were a developer/publisher I'd be almost depressed to hear comments from people who like their games but aren't willing to shell out more than $5 for them.

There's only so much you can make things for the love of it before you realise you also have to be competitive and keep your eyes on making money if you don't want to be eating out of the trash can in a dark alley.
 
Producing a successfully launched, well supported PC game should be a personal benchmark for game developers.
 
Derangel said:
The goal of every for profit company is profit. I'm not saying they all want to rule the world or whatever, but at the end of the day profit is the ultimate goal. When companies lose sight of that they die. That is the nature of capitalism.
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I disagree, I think people who don't need money and who makes things because they love doing so provide ultimately better services/games.

Look at Valve, a great many of their employees could retire now and never work again, in fact Gabe could have back when he founded the business, but they don't, they want to make good games, they don't have financial worries so the quality of their games is always top notch.

Indy developers are the same to some degree, they're not usually burdened with financial worries such as repaying investors, they work on their own time and build their games the way they want them, sure they have far less resources and so they aren't making AAA games, but the quality of design and gameplay is often far superior to AAA games, which is why they sell.

Back when gaming on the PC was more niche and it was proper gamers who played games that's what drove the industry to make good games because there was more correllation between good games and good sales.

Now a days the whole gaming scene has boomed and become "casual", what sells now is not quality because casuals don't respond to quality, they respond to social trends and peer pressure, they're more likely to buy the thing advertised the most and not what is actually better, which is why games like CoD have 50% or more of the total budget spent on marketing.

If there's anything thats ruining games these days it's the vast swaths of casual gamers who have no concern for quality of the games, who demand the greatest attention simply because of their numbers and collective wallet size.
 
PrincessFrosty said:
I disagree, I think people who don't need money and who makes things because they love doing so provide ultimately better services/games.

Look at Valve, a great many of their employees could retire now and never work again, in fact Gabe could have back when he founded the business, but they don't, they want to make good games, they don't have financial worries so the quality of their games is always top notch.

Indy developers are the same to some degree, they're not usually burdened with financial worries such as repaying investors, they work on their own time and build their games the way they want them, sure they have far less resources and so they aren't making AAA games, but the quality of design and gameplay is often far superior to AAA games, which is why they sell.

Back when gaming on the PC was more niche and it was proper gamers who played games that's what drove the industry to make good games because there was more correllation between good games and good sales.

Now a days the whole gaming scene has boomed and become "casual", what sells now is not quality because casuals don't respond to quality, they respond to social trends and peer pressure, they're more likely to buy the thing advertised the most and not what is actually better, which is why games like CoD have 50% or more of the total budget spent on marketing.

If there's anything thats ruining games these days it's the vast swaths of casual gamers who have no concern for quality of the games, who demand the greatest attention simply because of their numbers and collective wallet size.
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Yeah, gaming was good when no one else was interested in it. :p Unfortunately, I don't see things changing, gaming has gone from a life style of a few nerds to general entertainment for many, and the gaming industry is just that, an "industry".

If you don't like the mainstream, you'll just have to stop buying mainstream games and stick to indie titles and the couple of developers who aren't in it for the money, like Valve, seeing as how they're all stink'n filthy rich thanks to Steam.

Why would mainstream publishers and developers cater to a minority of enthusiasts who probably won't buy their game until its in the bargain bin, a $5 Steam sale or will just pirate it. In some ways its sad for gaming that this is the way its going, in other ways its good, it means gaming is becoming a more standard form of entertainment for more people.
 
Tudz said:
Yeah, gaming was good when no one else was interested in it. :p Unfortunately, I don't see things changing, gaming has gone from a life style of a few nerds to general entertainment for many, and the gaming industry is just that, an "industry".

If you don't like the mainstream, you'll just have to stop buying mainstream games and stick to indie titles and the couple of developers who aren't in it for the money, like Valve, seeing as how they're all stink'n filthy rich thanks to Steam.

Why would mainstream publishers and developers cater to a minority of enthusiasts who probably won't buy their game until its in the bargain bin, a $5 Steam sale or will just pirate it. In some ways its sad for gaming that this is the way its going, in other ways its good, it means gaming is becoming a more standard form of entertainment for more people.
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Valve isn't in it for the money? Oh really? Then why pray-tell did they force all DLC to be sold through Steam? Why do they make sure their games have low requirements? Why did they release L4D2 a year after the original? Why have they put so much focus on paid downloadable items like TF2 hats or the Portal 2 co-op items? All them seem very much like profit oriented decisions. You are a fool if you don't think Valve cares about profit or if they're not trying to make the most money they can through the means they believe are best. Every for profit company in the world cares about making a profit. If they didn't they would charities.
 
LOL, honestly, I was just going off Frosty's comments, I don't pay a lot of attention to Valve as a developer, they haven't made and aren't making any games that interest me in recent history :p I'm probably one of the few people who has almost no Valve games on their Steam account, except HL2 which someone kindly gifted to me.
 
Tudz said:
Yeah, gaming was good when no one else was interested in it. :p Unfortunately, I don't see things changing, gaming has gone from a life style of a few nerds to general entertainment for many, and the gaming industry is just that, an "industry".
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Exactly, I don't see it changing much unless it's a bit of a bubble that will eventually burst or unless the casuals eventually get bored and start to get tastes more sophistocated than the yearly Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed releases.

I used to think consolization was down to the greed of developers, which it is, but for the past year or so I've been talking about this really being more of a specific effect of a more general thing I've come to call casualization :)

Derangel said:
Valve isn't in it for the money?
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They are business savvy when it comes to making money because they need money to continue to work on games, however there is a difference between being mindful of money and letting it lead your every business decision. They're a privately owned company who don't owe money to investors, so they have literally no pressure to generate revenue other than to float the business to the next game and they're already cash rich so that's not a concern. As Gabe has said in interviews, many of the people working there don't need the pay cheque they're rich already and come to work because they like working on the stuff and building great products along side like minded people.
 
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There are very few people these days who make games with a passion for video games, the way an artist paints an art from their own passion and creativity. Most gaming companies today makes generic games because they come from a financial standpoint, rather than the desire to make video games.

Not saying its wrong either way, but it is these passion driven developers that will make a truly good game. And as someone posted earlier, indie devs tends to lean towards being passion driven as they do not have any investors to answer to, no any profit target to restrict their creative process.
 
Can anyone tell me how Valve seems to have gotten this 'saintly' image as the all-good and 'for the gamer' attitude? I've just noticed that anyone trying to imply Valve is a business rather than a charity just gets hammered for it.
 
Splinter24 said:
Can anyone tell me how Valve seems to have gotten this 'saintly' image as the all-good and 'for the gamer' attitude? I've just noticed that anyone trying to imply Valve is a business rather than a charity just gets hammered for it.
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I'm not sure but I think they are the lesser evil, if that makes sense?
 
PrincessFrosty said:
As Gabe has said in interviews, many of the people working there don't need the pay cheque they're rich already and come to work because they like working on the stuff and building great products along side like minded people.
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Maybe that's why they can't get any new games out the door.
 
PrincessFrosty said:
They are business savvy when it comes to making money because they need money to continue to work on games, however there is a difference between being mindful of money and letting it lead your every business decision. They're a privately owned company who don't owe money to investors, so they have literally no pressure to generate revenue other than to float the business to the next game and they're already cash rich so that's not a concern. As Gabe has said in interviews, many of the people working there don't need the pay cheque they're rich already and come to work because they like working on the stuff and building great products along side like minded people.
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Having a strong sense of profit is PART of being business savvy. Being mindful of what will generate the most profit and keep your company running is all part of it. Stop pretending being highly profit driven is a bad thing. It is not. Capitalism is not a dirty word. Valve is capitalist. Generally they're an example of a company not "corrupted" by huge amounts of cash, but that doesn't mean profit isn't their end goal. You can love what you do and still want to generate a lot of cash. Loving your job and customers and wanting high profit are not mutually exclusive.
 
Splinter24 said:
It seems that way. And I'll admit, even I consider them one of the 'good guys'. But I have absolutely no fucking idea why.
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IMO, in Valve, Gabe Newell runs everything, and from what I can tell from his interviews about piracy and stuff, Gabe does have the right idea on approach for a gaming company. He's in tune with the gaming community and this is an important thing.

Compared that to those big publishers, they have those board of directors to answer to, and these people who have the final say are so out of tune with the gaming community, they probably don't even know what gamers wants. These people probably runs the company using outdated approaches that no longer works today.

Hollywood is a great example of this. Instead of changing with times, these large corporate continue to resists modern technology, going against legit online streaming but at the same time complaining about online piracy.
 
my take is that the trend/developers are asking for too much, they want the money AND all the control. It does not work that way.

I will tell you right now, I'd continue paying 50 or 60 dollars for a game if I knew I didn't have to install extra spyware, if I didn't have a limit on how many time I can install it on my OWN damn computer. If you strip out all the DRM not only do you save space, remove the source of a lot of problems, and cut down the time it takes troubleshooting/coding the extra layer of "protection" -- its win win.

Take off DRM - knock off 5 dollars from the "normal" price and then just watch what happens. I can tell you I've downloaded more than a few games that were total crap, and happily deleted them after 1 hour. If I pay 60 dollars I'm going to do what i want with it, if it's a worthwhile engine/game let me mod the hell out of it.

if you want to lock it down like everyone is doing these days, well then of course it only becomes "worth" 5 dollars to me. Until companies realize this, they are screwed.
 
Tudz said:
If you don't like the mainstream, you'll just have to stop buying mainstream games and stick to indie titles and the couple of developers who aren't in it for the money, like Valve, seeing as how they're all stink'n filthy rich thanks to Steam.
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LOL. What a joke. I suggest you save that post and re-read it in 10 years so you can share in my laughter.
 
bodan said:
LOL. What a joke. I suggest you save that post and re-read it in 10 years so you can share in my laughter.
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Having a strong sense of profit is PART of being business savvy. Being mindful of what will generate the most profit and keep your company running is all part of it. Stop pretending being highly profit driven is a bad thing. It is not. Capitalism is not a dirty word. Valve is capitalist. Generally they're an example of a company not "corrupted" by huge amounts of cash, but that doesn't mean profit isn't their end goal. You can love what you do and still want to generate a lot of cash. Loving your job and customers and wanting high profit are not mutually exclusive.
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This is what people are saying, don't be naive.
 
bodan said:
LOL. What a joke. I suggest you save that post and re-read it in 10 years so you can share in my laughter.
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I don't think people really understood what I meant when I said that. Read what I said again and notice the "because they're stink'n filthy rich" part :p Its very easy to not be in it solely for making money when you're already making it hand over fist, its much harder to do that when you have a team of 100 people making a game and you're wondering how you'll scrape together the money for their next pay cheque.

Hell, I recently played LOTR: WITN, which for all intents and purposes was a shit game, quite disappointing because it felt like it had potential but didn't have the drive and passion to make it great. But then I read much of the studio got laid off almost straight after the game was released.

You hear people talking about indie developers still having passion for games, but personally I think that's an easier thing to achieve when you're only a few people working on a game your passionate about and don't have a hell of a lot to lose. Compared to when you're a large development studio paying $100k a year to 50-100 employees and it takes years to develop a game and you're looking down the barrel of millions of dollars just to pay your employees, let alone publish and market the game and turn it into something profitable... I don't see how you could possibly NOT have money as a primary focus. That's why I think if you don't like the way mainstream games are going, stick to indie, because mainstream studios are big, expensive and have to cater to making the most sales to stay alive.
 
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bodan said:
LOL. What a joke. I suggest you save that post and re-read it in 10 years so you can share in my laughter.
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I'm actually not sure if Valve's primary pursuit with game development — at this point — is to profit. Given the way the company is structured, I think the main focus is to actually make good games, exploring different avenues which seem interesting to everyone, and to have those games be accessible to people. Granted, profits are definitely focus, but I don't think the chief concern with their development efforts is profitability. I think that, perhaps, it's more the idea of profit — finding what works and what doesn't work, and getting satisfaction over seeing certain kinds of numbers from that — but I'm not sure to what extent there is direct concern over profitability. It's a bit like Valve is playing "Developer Tycoon", seeing if they (Gabe) can get their shop to a certain place as far as the financials are concerned, but it's a game they're playing for the sake of getting enjoyment out of it.

Valve is, in effect, just an elaborate experiment in game development that's managed to pan out into a successful business model.
 
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