120°

Parting shots: how six celebrity developers met their demise

OXM UK: "It's heart-breaking when a development studio responsible for a game or series that you love closes down. Often, you'll remember them for the good times - the stand-out, stellar high points of their career - and not the decisions or titles that ultimately doomed them. Inevitably though, some studios come to be defined by their final release."

brettyd3944d ago

One of my favorite games this gen.

SilentNegotiator3944d ago

Is Team Bondi really a "celebrity developer", though? Granted, they received the automatic extra-enthused approval that anything remotely Rockstar-related seems to get from the press, but they only created ONE game before falling apart ~5 months later.

IDK, that just seems a bit hasty, calling them "celebrity developers"

MikeyDucati13944d ago

I guess that title was given because Brendan.

3944d ago
Geovanny3944d ago

I miss Pandemic studios. They had good titles.

3944d ago
Dfooster3944d ago

La noire was soulless, and the interrogations were deeply flawed.

140°

Most tone-deaf statements and quotes in gaming history

From Xfire: "Executives, would-be auteurs, marketing departments; sometimes they are oh, so out of touch with the realities of gaming."

polarbeard800d ago

Don Mattrick has to take the cake... almost killed the Xbox!

Tetsujin799d ago

I watched the whole 8-9 min video, and you can tell D.M. was talking just to hear himself talk. The submarine comment also made Xbox look bad because of his ignorance involving the military.

anast800d ago (Edited 800d ago )

EA has two of them. Nice...It was a joy to read about all these train wrecks. For me, a Diablo fan, Mr. Cheng and crew already ruined Diablo by turning it into WoW, then they come out and attack us for not wanting more WoW on mobile.

These people 100% think they are better and smarter than the public. They feel that this gives them the "god-talent right" to insult their customers on a daily basis. The funny thing is that people will defend their right to be insulted and suckered, so, I guess all is fair.

Michiel1989800d ago

how did Diablo turn into wow? I would rather make an argument for the opposite. Mythic+ is basically rifts, Titanforging is random gear rolls from Diablo, legion legendaries felt more like diablo legendaries than previous wow legendaries, The artifact power(azerite and anemo) were basically paragon levels from D3.

tbh that dont you have phone statements i cant help but feel sorry for the guy. He probably didnt even wanna announce a mobile diablo game at blizzcon in front of a 99% pc audience. He is probably not even in charge if the game could be ported to pc or not. The blame is on blizzard higher ups for making that one of their main announcements at blizzcon.

purple101800d ago

Exclusives Are ‘Completely Counter To What Gaming Is About,’ Xbox’s Phil Spencer Says

Phill Spencer: proceeds to spend 88 billion to secure exclusives

MasterChief3624800d ago

I looked that quote up just to be sure you weren't taking it out of context, but wow... yeah he actually said that.

"He added that he believes 'gaming is about entertainment and community and diversion and learning new stories and new perspectives, and I find it completely counter to what gaming is about to say that part of that is to lock people away from being able to experience those games'." is the full quote, found on NME

JEECE800d ago

I can't believe they disrespected Adam Orth like this.

80°

Video Games Are a Labor Disaster

Why do game studios keep imploding?

Dysfunction is baked into the video game production process, as it currently exists. The big-budget games industry is dominated by a few large companies, the publishers. Like book publishers, they are responsible for distributing and marketing games (much but not all of this is entirely digital now, but most of the publishers established themselves when game distribution meant getting physical discs and cartridges on retail store shelves). Games are actually made by studios, which are generally either owned directly by the publishers or independent. Making big-budget video games takes an enormous amount of highly specialized labor. It is possible for one person to make a game, and even for that game to be a hit, but the biggest, most profitable games released each year are nearly always made by enormous teams of people, working directly or indirectly for those publishers.

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newrepublic.com
isarai1028d ago

Devs really need to unionize asap

Minute Man 7211027d ago

Create their own studio ala Activision but never forget where they came from ala Activision

Dixiedevil1027d ago

Unions breed garbage product no matter what’s being made. Passion and drive to make awesome stuff goes out the window and it’s replaced by laziness, seniority over skill, office politics and all around horseshit. As a welder of 23 years, I’ve seen it first hand, over and over again.

lipton1011027d ago

I’d say there’s a time and a place for unions. If work conditions have gotten so bad because the company is run by tyrants, unions will help.

But, on the contrary, I work for one of those rare companies that is better for the employee than a union is. Family owned, we purchased a new facility in Jersey and the workers voted the union out based on the offer (pay, hours, benefits, etc). Now we have UNION scabs, hired by the union, to protest against us at various locations.

franwex1027d ago

An interesting case study. I thought it was worth a read.

70°

L.A. Noire 7 Years Later

David from BagoGames writes: Seven years on, Team Bondi’s development troubles color L.A. Noire‘s perception. Knowing what we know now about its development and working conditions, many of its blemishes make sense. While the facial motion capture still holds up, most of the game falls a little flat. Investigating is entertaining, but cases play out in such a linear fashion that success or failure doesn’t impact anything. You could mess up every question and still make the story progress just the same as a more eagle-eyed detective. The only difference would be the star rating delegated at each case’s end. L.A. Noire was a technically ambitious last gen open world adventure game, but development hell inhibited its vision.

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bagogames.com