Report: 95% of studios are working on or aim to release a live service game

In the survey of 537 game studios, live ops development teams want faster content releases.

[-Foxtrot]

That's so f****** sad

You get these people defending GaaS and the like by saying "Both can exist" or "what's the big deal" but the issue is they'll keep pushing this shit if we don't start doing something about it until only one thing exists and it does become a big deal. There's no half measures on this shit and it's sad people would rather blindly defend it rather than cutting tout the cancer before it spreads to the point we can't stop it.

If it has GaaS elements, just don't buy it, support another game without it. If you really want to play it for whatever story it has then you can patiently wait until it's cheap enough to buy long after release.

[Christopher]

To be fair, mass majority of those devs are on mobile.

[BrainSyphoned]

To be fair, mobile is where the only jobs we be available soon.

[Cacabunga]

yes, question is how many of these devs are console devs.

[Redemption-64]

Actually both can exist, a good balance of both is ideal. If you don't like them, don't buy, constantly crying online does nothing, especially when there are millions out there who support these type of games. If over 70% of EA's revenue comes from live-service games, that should tell you the reality of things. Companies go where the money is. A game like Prince of persia if I am not mistaken only had about 300K players, which is sad. Now imagine if Ubisoft decides to have the studio work on a live service game next. Most people who didn't support the game will be attacking them. As long as live service games are bringing in more money than single player games, Companies will always favor them. That is just the reality. If you want things to change, gamers complaining must encourage others to support them.

[-Foxtrot]

"If you don't like them, don't buy"

"constantly crying online does nothing"

Point proven

All you sound like is someone who is content of letting this happen, someone who has no issue with it and because it doesn't affect you then you just don't give a shit. I just don't understand how anyone can call themselves a gamer and allow a cancer like this to spread within the industry only to have more of a problem with people "crying" online about them then the actual GaaS issue.

Don't you think that's odd you'd rather tell people they are crying online, that it does nothing and the typical bullshit "don't like it don't buy it" excuse which is basically telling people to bury their head in the sand?

Remember when the Sonic movie trailer dropped and everyone piled on the awful Sonic design? What happened? Oh that's right they delayed the film and changed it to make a better overall product. You however would have been one of those people telling people to shut up, stop crying and it is what it is. In the end all that crying online DID SOMETHING.

It's better to speak up and try rather than doing nothing.

" gamers complaining must encourage others to support them "

Yes because you're such a supporter here, you're defending GaaS games and telling people to stop crying online, basically stop saying bad stuff about GaaS. How will anyone change that shitty opinion when you seem to be on their side from the get go.

Both can't exist, GaaS games will continue to be made until it consumes so much that non GaaS games will become a rare find. Like I said there's no half measures. Eventually it will consume everything until only GaaS remains.

[Redemption-64]

You are right fox, it doesn't affect me, that is why you will not find me crying about games that hurt their feelings. Both games can exist, for those who like live service games, more power to them, and for those wwho don't like them, more power to them. I just don't give a flying fuck. I buy and play what interests me. Got far more important things in life to be this triggered, hurt, salty over games I have no interest in. Don't like live service games, don't buy them, simple as that. If a new live service game is released that interests me, guess what I will buy and play it, if it doesn't I treat it like every other game that doesn't interest me, move on. Not cry like Naughty Dog just ended their whole life over a video game.

[shinoff2183]

Prince of Persia looked kinda whack to me at first. The demo fixed my perception of it. It still didn't look like a day one buy so I haven't even begun to think about buying it. Then add in if it's digital only I won't spend more then 20 on it.

Foxtrot,

Easy way , closed mouths don't get fed.

[Profchaos]

I just don't want the industry to crash again and lately more than ever it feels like we are heading right for a cliff

[isarai]

Looks like I won't have this hobby for long, I was expecting all digital to end it for me, not soulless live service games.

[thorstein]

Bright side. Indies who can't do this will provide a wonderful assortment of games that are far from cookie cutter.

We could enter an interesting new age to games.

EA and Activision were tiny once and loved to take chances.

[Tacoboto]

Stellar Blade
FFVII Rebirth
Avowed
Indiana Jones
Dragons Dogma 2
Rise of the Ronin
Almost anything Nintendo
Surely games in your backlog
Death Stranding 2, Silent Hill 2, FFVII Remake Pt 3, whatever ND and Suckerpunch are working on

I won't invest in GaaS products, even getting on Halo Infinite is secondary to the many single player games I've got queued up.

Don't let the heavy investment in GaaS distract you from the very-healthy amount of single player titles/experiences we've got coming this year and beyond.

[isarai]

Oh this is certainly looking to be one of the best years personally since the ps5 launched no doubt, but live service BS has been creeping into everything and I'd be lying if I said it hasn't greatly decreased the amount of games I would buy. Seems like the kinda of games I've always liked are slowly dying out, and sure may never go extinct, but I'm already sitting at like maybe 3 games I actually want to buy a year, it's barely worth holding onto as it is.

[EvertonFC]

Exactly, great games out there.
I've just finished evil west, plague tale 2, the jugglers tale (highly recommend) and Roki.
All great games and it's only January and I'm looking FWD to the ones you mentioned.
Wallets going to be broke for sure.

[dumahim]

I have that feeling as well. The number of games I buy has dropped off drastically this generation. Not all because of GAAS, but it's a part of it. A lot of it just the types of games following trends that I'm just not interested in and publishers pushing games out in horrible shape is a big part of it. But what I have to look forward to gets smaller and smaller as time goes on.

I thought for a while that I was looking forward to a new Borderlands, but now with Embracer in charge, you just know they're going to push to monetize crap, which is something Gearbox resisted doing tooth and nail.

[isarai]

EXACTLY I just can't bring myself to buy anymore games that are half baked, monetized, season passed, broken, torn apart and sold in pieces, not all on disc(as in requires download to work), always online sp, and sometimes just safe bland games like most of what comes out of the big 3 AAA publishers. Pile on oversaturated genres like souls likes and open world survival crafting games and it leaves me with very little that gets my interest.

But DG2 if nothing else is going to carry this year a LOT for me personally.

[Yui_Suzumiya]

Plenty of visual novels, RPG's and indie FPS games out their.

[CrashMania]

When will they realise they aren't going to be the the next fortnite. If everyone tries to make a game that forces or makes you want to login daily for hours then it's just going to result in everyone playing little to none of them as there are too many, most of them fail.

Live service is a disease to the industry.

[isarai]

I feel like a ton of Publishers and/or dev studios are going to kill themselves off chasing this.

[purple101]

I feel like a ton already have

[Stevonidas]

BINGO.

Fortunately, all it takes these days for a studio to fail is one flop.

The sooner the better I say.

[JEECE]

If you've ever said "what's the point of playing a multiplayer game if I'm not earning anything?"; "they need to release more frequent updates"; "where is the roadmap?"; "The devs just released this game and abandoned it"; or "why did they just send this game out to die?" then you are part of the reason we are facing this future.

[shaenoide]

Yeah ! And 99% of them will fail.

[CRASHBASHUK]

That is true when most of them will run out of content

[k2d]

There's a fallacy here about chasing rainbows

[shinoff2183]

I thought it was waterfalls

[Yui_Suzumiya]

I got that reference 😅

[Barlos]

See what you did there

[XiNatsuDragnel]

It's pathetic chasing a trend when it's more like vaporware than a trend ngl.

[Chocoburger]

Thankfully we have 35 years of gaming history to play, and fan modders are translating new games all the time making once lost experiences now available for many more to play. The classic gaming scene is booming bigger than ever with Flashcarts, ODEs, HDMI / RGB mods, Retrotink and OSSC. Modern controllers and memory cards, and so much more.

These modern live service trash, and Ubi-junk style of games that are all filler no killer, they don't get my money, and more importantly MY TIME! Your time, your lifespan is the most important 'currency' you'll ever have. Use it wisely with awesome games, and not with the latest grindfest that tries to create FOMO by making you feel like you'll miss out on the 'experience' if you don't do daily log-ins to their server.

Spend your lifespan wisely, because when it's all used up, you'll regret not having done so.

[shinoff2183]

Jrpg for ps1 was just translated called Linda

[Chocoburger]

Nice, I just looked it up! Thanks for sharing.

[GamingSinceForever]

The way I see it 95% of the games releasing every year are not for me anyway. As long as I continue to get some compelling single player experiences every year I’m good. When those stop coming then it’s time to hang up the sticks.

[boing1]

The bubble is already bursting. Good luck to them.

[Stevonidas]

Good luck? Good RIDDANCE!

[anast]

Tons of wasted money. Investors a playing this thing like a slot machine, just hoping they strike it big.

[VincentVanBro]

Let em, the lesson will just be that much more painful.

[jimb0j0nes]

Larian Studios' CEO said it best: "I’d call that an opportunity for the remaining 5%"

[DivineHand125]

This is not good news at all.

[Hedstrom]

Live service games doesn't necessarily have to be bad. But 95% of those games will fail because there aren't room for a massive amount of live service games.

[NotoriousWhiz]

Headline looks incredibly misleading. Just because 95% of studios are working on live service games doesn't mean that 95% of studios aren't also working on non live service games. Studios can work on more than one game at a time.

[PRIMORDUS]

The best way to actually try to make game companies lose money is to have every single game reviewer give any live service game the lowest score. They have influence so, any lost sale would hurt them. This is probably the best way, as I don't know if PC pirates can try to crack live service games, they did with Diablo 3 but that did not last long.

[shinoff2183]

That's atleast 90 percent of studios that are gonna be super disappointed.

Personally 95 percent I don't believe that for a sec. There's way to many indie devs for that to be true.

[Good-Smurf]

Live service games are like picking a poison, no matter which one you picked you're going to be suffering from its support one way or the other.
The only way to break the cycle is to stopped cold turkey not playing any of them.
Market saturated with these time sinkers and stinkers, and they wonder why people felt burnt out from current gen gaming in general.
We really are in the era of games that are soulless very shallow and too grindy and costly to keep playing and when you have 10 other carbon copy tries to take little of your free time away from each other it's a damn chore tiring and borderline torture not gaming.
Kids nowadays won't feel it yet but eventually they will feel why they can't play 15 games that are basically the same that needs 300 hours to get to the good stuff anymore.
Shit just thinking about all these studios all doing them even makes me feel tired and dull about my hobby.
I'll just stick to the other side of the industry that still values my time money and passion, not treating me like living ATM.

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

I almost play none of these live service games as it is, if they cut back too much on every other type of game, I'll just lean harder into my backlog until the situation self-corrects (I hope).

[gold_drake]

ugh

[Barlos]

I guess that's 95% of studios that don't want my money then.

[Profchaos]

I'm reminded of 2005 where everyone was working in a MMO and from that whole period one remains dominant wow and maybe like 2 survived lotr online and star wars old republic.

Such a sad state of affairs all the suits think gaas will lead them to the land of milk and honey but it's more likely to end in the studio shutting down.

The article even talks about live service games having longer Dev times than traditional games so it's double disappointing.

The last two generations this trend chasing thing that occurs needs to stop executives need to stop thinking they know where the industry is going and focus on what today's consumer wants

[Nacho_Z]

Boo.

[northpaws]

It is very normal for studios to chase trend that makes a lot of money, when they were releasing normal games it was because of the money too. The biggest problem right now is they just copy and paste each others to make quick money, instead of being creative. That's why for me, I pay for creativities and fun factors, it is ok to be a GaaS game but show me why it should be one, how does it makes the game more fun for me.

Just like there are good and bad normal games, there are also good and bad GaaS games. If they chase it just for the sake of easy money, then the mentality is all wrong.

[OhReginald]

I hope ALL of them fail. And put companies out of business

[PhillyDonJawn]

Games take more time and money to make. It seem gaas is becoming the new norm to give devs more long term money for the investment and or allow the game to release sooner and update over time rather than a longer development time.

[z2g]

Cuz they make more money when successful. And the ones that are successful, prove ppl will play them. The only ppl that seem to have a problem with these games are purists and elitists. I personally don’t really play any seriously (tho the finals is pretty good), but I don’t necessarily have a problem with them. I actually like competition with other ppl.

[JEECE]

"The only ppl that seem to have a problem with these games are purists and elitists."

This is the problem. For every person who recognizes how the live service model has degraded the quality of multiplayer games (this is without even getting to how it has even damaged some singleplayer games now) there are probably 100 people who are "gamers" who spend 90% of their time gaming playing live service games and who aren't even aware they are controversial in any way.

[Psychonaut85]

GaaS are literally a fucking plague. Suicide Squad is evidence of that.

[Dandizzle]

This number came straight out authors ass. 100% click bait

[SimpleSlave]

Meh! I'm ok with this. It was time to downsize anyways.

[babadivad]

Oh goodie...