Have you noticed a decline in the quality of content recently released? Are you left wondering where all the good games have gone every time you step into the electronics section of your local store? Do you wonder WHY it seems like we’ve been getting the same mindless, gun-fight, breast filled game, time after time?
Hint: It’s Your Fault.
While many gaming layoffs are cruel, Tango Gameworks being culled after Hi-Fi Rush doesn't even make sense.
Good read. I think the point is important. Cuz the message it sends is, make a bad game? Well shut you down. Make a good game? We still might shut you down. How the fuck are you supposed to feel any sense of job security under those conditions. The level of core incompetence at play in the upper levels of this industry is staggering. This is common sense shit. You can’t chase trends on a 2 year cycle when games take fucking 6-8 years to make. Just let artists fucking art for gods sake. They don’t understand the basic principle that they’re all haggling for the same slice of fucking pie and the market will not bear it. Find a different fucking pie.
"The sudden closure of several video-game studios at Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox division was the result of a widespread cost-cutting initiative that still isn’t finished.
This week, Xbox began offering voluntary severance agreements to producers, quality assurance testers and other staff at ZeniMax, which it purchased in 2020 for $7.5 billion, according to people familiar with the company’s plans. Others across the Xbox organization have been told that more cuts are on the way.
Speaking about the closures more broadly, Booty said that the company’s studios had been spread too thin — like “peanut butter on bread” — and that leaders across the division had felt understaffed. They decided to close these studios to free up resources elsewhere, he said.
Game Pass has not seen the massive growth that Xbox boss Phil Spencer may have been hoping for."
"Speaking about the closures more broadly, Booty said that the company’s studios had been spread too thin — like “peanut butter on bread” — and that leaders across the division had felt understaffed. They decided to close these studios to free up resources elsewhere, he said"
So what you're saying is...you bought all these studios and you guys can't run them.
Jesus.
Reports are suggesting that Game Pass will be getting a price hike soon and that Call of Duty may not be added to the day one offering. I honestly have a hard time believing this but it does beg the question why exactly did GP fail? I think the answer is that it just didn't get the growth that it anticipated. Jim was right but I wish he wasn't because at the end of the day, its gamers, devs and other front-line workers who have to absorb the blow for Spencer and team's miscalculations.
For all the armchair executives who were calling for Sony to release its big-budget AAA games on PS+, the same exact thing would have happened at PlayStation. Game Pass has killed Xbox. Congrats.
"While the 20 year anniversary edition of Nordic Game, NG24 Spring's homepage on 21-24 May in Malmö, Sweden, is getting closer, the organizers announced that more than 150 speakers are now lined up for the show." - Nordic Game.
How isn't it the devs fault for wanting a standardized engine to make games? To get them out quickly?
Gamers wouldn't be pixel counters if devs lived up to half the claims they made.
erm...
There would be NO industry if it werent for the gamers, thus meaning gamers wouldnt exist if there werent an industry, meaning the industry cant say gamers are ruining the industry, because there would be no gamers, therfeor, no industry to say gamers are ruining the industry, because....
damn, i think i just Inceptioned myself
Oh sorry didn't realise it's my fault the gaming industry is getting worse (?) because I'm spending money that I barely have on games and products for gaming. I'll stop right now.
/s
Agreed. Gamers are idiots for the most part. They want to play the same thing over and over again. Hell, look at Uncharted 2. A huge number of gamers are saying that it's the best game ever made, blah blah blah. And why? Cause it's a shooter? Cause it's 8 hours long? Cause there's long cutscenes? Cause it's a completely linear straight line game with no branching paths that doesn't let you make a single choice other than "which of these two weapons do you want to use"?
I mean, whatever, the game wasn't bad, but it was exactly the same as every other game out there. Does the fact that it had slightly more polish than some other games mean it's the best game in the world? Hardly. And don't even get me started on Halo 12 and Call of Duty 456.
It is getting worse. The only reason people are spending more money on games is because there is so much of the same shit being released over and over, and most of them you can beat in one sitting. Most gamers get bored of them after one play, and look for the next "new" and "better" thing.
I think a lot of it has to do with an emphasis on story. Lots of games are putting a great deal into their story, and a lot of people like that (me included), but the problem with that is, they usually just end up throwing some generic gameplay in the game as filler to tell the story, as something to set it apart from just watching a movie (Uncharted 2). But this means that after you finish playing the game, you don't really feel a "need" to play it again. The gameplay isn't typically good enough to drag you back into it, because it's just generic third person shooter fare you can find in any weekly release. Yes, it's partly the developers' fault because they are making them, but they are making the games that people WANT. So ultimately, the ones voting with their wallets are the ones they are going to cater to, not the ones on N4G posting bitchy comments about how bad it sucks :P
I remember the good old days of PC gaming when games were focused on gameplay and replayability, so you could play a game for a year or two at a time before you got bored of it. Now games are lucky to last you a day or two.
I got a new idea for an article....
Why articles, about how gamers are ruining the industry, are ruining the industry