Cliff Bleszinski: “AAA is a nearly unsustainable model”

Dominic Brehetto

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How?

All I see is succes after success. The Hit to flop ratio is just as good as it ever was.

AAA gaming is fine. These stupid companies just gotta used their brains with their decision making. Like for instance don't release TR the same week as Fallout 4. Don't release TF2 sandwiched in between BF & COD. Don't release a featureless SFV capcom. Sony don't release The Order without more action sequences etc...

We are usually on this forum spot on about failures at a pretty good rate. Hell we call it before games are even released. So if we know they should know it.
You're seeing what you want to see.


I guess you're just ignoring all the games that aren't selling? The companies going under? Big names like cliff b,Leslie Benz, Ken Levine leaving the AAA space?

I guess studios having to force dlc,micro transactions,season passes,releasing remaster after remaster is healthy to you?

The number of studios and games in general in the AAA space pales in comparison to previous gens.

Games now take 3-5 years to release,with massive budgets,and there's less of them.

Last Gen naughty dog released 4 AAA games. They will be lucky to release 2 this Gen. Less games = less revenue but the same amount (and in most cases more) of costs to create those games.

We are seeing a top heavy market. People are blinded by the big success at the top while ignoring the eroding market share.

Same way people were blinded by how fast the consoles sold this Gen at the beginning. Now we are seeing the sales go down and down and down month after month.

You can't see the forest for the trees.
 

Killigraphy

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Really, and I hate to say it, games should cost $80. They've remained $60 for so long, despite inflation. Of course they are losing money. Only a few major companies can pull off 100+ mill games.

And I gotta say this, @Prodigal Syndicate has been saying this for years. He saw this a mile away; way before anybody else

The problem being, no one is willing to shell out any closer to 100 dollar games. Especially with the practices being implemented, from half completed releases to very weak DLC, the community just isn't phucking with AAA titles unless its a grand scale or a major exclusive...and even then they tip toe around a game before anything.
 

Dominic Brehetto

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Oh and Sony and Microsoft deciding to release the pro and Scorpio is only going to further hurt the console market.

The huge advantage consoles have always had over pc is that the games were optimized perfectly for the most part because Devs didn't have to account for variables like on pc. They knew exactly what the end users experience was on what hardware and it made development smooth.

Now we are introducing variables. Making studios account for another platform that needs to be optimized. Just more resources that have to be poured into dev costs for what amounts to a niche market.

And once you start trying to break up your customer base by selling them on upgrades for resolution and frame rate you're just going to drive more people to PC.

PC is the future. The youth are gaming far more on PC than console.

The console market is shrinking.

:hubie:





:manny:
 

Dominic Brehetto

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Really, and I hate to say it, games should cost $80. They've remained $60 for so long, despite inflation. Of course they are losing money. Only a few major companies can pull off 100+ mill games.

And I gotta say this, @Prodigal Syndicate has been saying this for years. He saw this a mile away; way before anybody else
Companies should have been exploring the pay scale in an honest way a long time ago.


Games should go from $20-100 IMO.

So much of the market now is trained to just wait for a sale anyway.

They've been raising the prices anyway by doing it in a back door way releasing all these gold,deluxe,ultimate editions that don't even include season passes half the time and give you basically nothing for the extra money.
 

marcuz

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Really, and I hate to say it, games should cost $80. They've remained $60 for so long, despite inflation. Of course they are losing money. Only a few major companies can pull off 100+ mill games.

And I gotta say this, @Prodigal Syndicate has been saying this for years. He saw this a mile away; way before anybody else
this is retarded. these bubblegum games aint even worth 30. if you make games more expensive, the market for used games expands. if these games were cheap, like around 30 dollars, most consumers wouldn't mind taking risk on games we'll potentially dislike
 

Black Bolt

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Really, and I hate to say it, games should cost $80. They've remained $60 for so long, despite inflation. Of course they are losing money. Only a few major companies can pull off 100+ mill games.

And I gotta say this, @Prodigal Syndicate has been saying this for years. He saw this a mile away; way before anybody else
You're right in principle but I'd say they've addressed that deficit with season passes, DLCs & IAPs
 

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These $50 season passes are the only way game publishers make money on their AAA titles anymore. You know big league titles like Fallout 4 and Batman: Arkham Knight are running development budgets anywhere between $100-150 million right? Compared to $50-80 million 10 years ago. That's BEFORE marketing. These are budgets we see in superhero movies and shyt. Game prices haven't changed, and the window to actually make a worthwhile profit on a game is front heavy and fizzles out after like 4-5 months. Season passes are just a part of making a profit now. And it disgusts me to even begin talking about how LONG these dev cycles are now.

Actually, come to think of it, you didn't even buy Fallout 4 or Arkham Knight... :russ:
I see you are too broke to think for yourself :wow:

You just made an excuse for these dudes to rob you of your goods. MOST GAMES DON'T COST THAT MUCH. Then they use the same engine for sequels.

But :ufdup: every game wants that extra bread and holds out content. NBA2k for example barely upgrades the games, then charges you for basic features that used to be free. I can't use alternate colors anymore without buying them :mindblown: In Madden they tried to charge people to change the colors of socks :wtf: even the chess game has dlc..you want other types of chess pieces? Buy the game then the dlc :stopitslime:

In the fps genre they sell you more in dlc than the retail, that's ass fukkin backwards no wonder you're broke :snoop:

It's gotten so bad that now most gamers have incomplete gaming experiences. You can play online but after you buy Xbox live or psn or soon Nintendo's service which them and Sony once claimed was unnecessary :merchant: then you buy the dlc so you can play on more than 4maps.

But it's ok, cuz every game now cost $150mil right? Wasn't Titanfall made by a handful of people. EA backed the marketing which it doesn't need like that.
But I digress...
 

itsyoung!!

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Damn however will AAA gaming survive!?!?!

Best selling games of 2016
  • Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare
  • Battlefield 1
  • Grand Theft Auto V
  • Madden NFL 17
  • NBA 2K17
  • The Division
  • Overwatch
  • Minecraft
  • Call of Duty: Black Ops 3
  • FIFA 17
  • Pokemon Sun
  • Pokemon Moon
  • The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
  • Star Wars Battlefront
  • Final Fantasy XV
  • Titanfall 2
  • NBA 2K16
  • Rainbow Six Siege
  • Far Cry Primal
  • Dark Souls 3


This is only physical copies.. digital download + pay scale, only Overwatch + GTA 5 off that list would make top 10 successful/"sold" games of 2016
 

itsyoung!!

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Really, and I hate to say it, games should cost $80. They've remained $60 for so long, despite inflation. Of course they are losing money. Only a few major companies can pull off 100+ mill games.

And I gotta say this, @Prodigal Syndicate has been saying this for years. He saw this a mile away; way before anybody else

couldnt disagree more :hubie: the most profitable games arent even $60 (World of warcraft and Overwatch at $39.99, Counter Strike at $19.99, most 'early access' games like Rust, Ark, Day-Z, H1z1 that went on to sell millions - $19.99 ) and even some are free (league of legends, Hearthstone, DOTA 2, etc.).. Thinking outside the box seems to bring in the big initial $ (originaly Wii, Pokemon GO, original Kinect, etc. )

the issue with the $60 price point (and mostly a console issue) is regardless of budget, most games are set at $59.99 at release. Example a game could cost $20 million to develop and another game $200 million to develop, both released at same price point. Because of this set standard, AAA cant ask for more because the set mind set of "why would I pay more than $60 for a game" , on the flip side, so many people are burnt out buying games not worth $60, at $60, that it hurts their overall sales cause they dont want to potentially more $60


AAA + $60 price point is dead :manny: raising the price point of that, doesnt help the actual issue at hand (too many garbage games released hyped up [Evolve, Battlefront , etc ] ) The real money and success comes from well thought out game play with easy to access games (no high end graphic requirements) and a sustainable $ model (chests with items in them, skins, card packs, etc. which arent requirement to improve your game play, but bought in mass due to the game being accessible to millions more of people that a general $60 AAA title brings to the table)
 
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Really, and I hate to say it, games should cost $80. They've remained $60 for so long, despite inflation. Of course they are losing money. Only a few major companies can pull off 100+ mill games.

And I gotta say this, @Prodigal Syndicate has been saying this for years. He saw this a mile away; way before anybody else
:scust: you're a terrible consumer
 

Maximus Rex

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Fools have been saying the videogame industry is gonna collapse for 10 years now and the main reason being the rising costs of AAA games

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