You know how when you get
a new computer and it's pitched to you like this new revolutionary
technology that's going to change your life forever and makes
everything easier and then it breaks down and gives you a million
and one problems? Games are kind of the same way. Imagine paying
sixty bucks for a game bringing it home all excited to play it, and
then it's buggy as all shit. There's lag, it's glitchy, and maybe
even the damn thing is freezing on you. You just paid sixty bucks
for this thing! It's brand new and it's not working properly! What
the hell is going on!?
I mean, people pour
millions and millions of dollars into making these games. There are
thousands of people working on a single development team. Not like
before when it was either one guy or a handful of people, and
technology is the best it's ever been. Before, it was
understandable. Less resources, more restrictive technology, and a
lot of trial and error. It was understandable if there was a glitch
or two in the game. What's the reason now? Well, I'm going to get to
the bottom of this once and for all! Let's start with developers.
Just another
day at the office.
There are a
lot of development teams out there now, some even doubling as
publishers. But what does it really take to make a game? We'll start
with the basics: the development process includes pre-production,
high concept, the pitch, concept, game design document, prototype,
production, design, programming, level creation, art production,
audio production, testing, milestones, first playable, alpha, code
freeze, beta, code release, gold master, crunch time,
post- production, and then finally maintenance. Holy shit that's a
lot of phases. Some of that is overtime. Unpaid
overtime! They're not getting paid a dime just to stay at work and
finish a game before its deadline. I'm starting to feel like an
asshole!
Can
you imagine how frustrating it would be to put all that time and
effort into a single game, having to work overtime on the damn thing
not getting paid just to find out that after you shipped the fucking
thing it has a bunch of bugs you missed and now you have to work on a
patch so the game community won't fucking riot!? I get mad enough
when this blog doesn't want to upload my pictures and I have to use
Imgur just to post them. That would drive me insane! Maybe it's not
as simple as we thought. Some developers don't even get a couple of
years to work on the next game. Just look at Call of Duty, we've
gotten a COD game almost every year. They go through this process
year after year after year with only a few months in- between. No
wonder a lot of the COD games have felt like expansion packs. That
would get old real quick. But why is there such a rush to get
certain games out so fast? Let's look at publishers.
Publishers
are largely in charge of manufacturing, marketing, all that nice
stuff. They also like to have people overseeing development and
critiquing ongoing work since they're paying for everything. Imagine
a person looking over your shoulder who's never played a game in
their life telling you how to make said game. Meanwhile, said
publisher is rushing you to completion to reach the deadline they
set because they announced a release date and want to keep a mob of
angry gamers from barging down their door to set everything on fire.
Pretty soon your artistic vision is going to be mangled and you're
not going to recognize your own baby anymore and both your bosses
and fans are blaming you for incompetence.
Now
the waters are getting muddled a bit. Obviously, my example above
doesn't count for every single experience ever, but there are enough
recollections of creators having to do things a certain way because
of who they work for. A writer for a screenplay can be asked by the
director to change their entire script if their vision doesn't fall
in line with their own. Do we solely blame the development team when
things go wrong or the publishers? Does both share responsibility
and if so how much each? How do we decide? We're not there at the
meetings when these things are being made. We don't know the
circumstances, and unless they come straight out and say it we never
will. While you're mulling over that let me ask another question:
why the deadlines? Why do these guys feel the need to pump out
titles so frequently? Supply and Demand. Now we've come full circle.
When
we as the consumers wants something then there's a company somewhere
that'll give it to us to make a profit. That's the foundation of our
economy. With creations like Netflix where we can watch a movie or
an entire Television series in our own time instead of having to wait
weeks, months, or even a whole year (I'm looking at you Game of
Thrones) for the next episode. We want our movies now. We want our
shows now. We want our games now. We don't want to wait for however
long it may take to create a meaningful sequel to our favorite game.
We want it as soon as possible. Hence the yearly schedule for a lot
of high budget games that sale the most and then we wonder why the
game doesn't work to perfection when we bring it home. I'm not
trying to look down on anybody. I include myself in this. It's our
own damn fault the industry is what it is today.
We
buy the games that are best marketed, therefore leading to higher
budgets, therefore leading to publishers trying to be number one by
pouring more money into their product and creating bigger risks for
themselves to compete because if they don't make back what they owe
they're fucked. This is why some focus on sequels to big budget
games that sell well. I'm sure there are plenty out there who say,
“We want more original games!” But how many of them actually go
out of their way to buy something original from a game store? Why
should they take the risk or the time to make better quality games
when people are just going to get angry at them for taking so long
to make the next game? There are exceptions to this rule, of course.
People are giving money to Kickstarter projects for more original
titles, the independent games market is getting more attention, but
the AAA titles are still getting the most attention and therefore
suffer the most amount of problems because there's more pressure on
getting these games out to the general public.
At
the end of the day we have nobody to blame but ourselves. I'm not
saying you have to like every single game that comes out because the
developers/publishers worked hard on it. If you don't like a game
then you don't like a game. Plain and simple. I'm just saying the
next time a game fucks up don't be so quick to pass the blame.
People are human and mistakes happen. Game not working properly?
Turn it off and do something else. Want more original titles? Go out
and play an original game and then share it with others. If you're
happy with the way things are now then more power to you. I'm not
going to pretend doing these things is going to change anything
overnight, but you may find yourself a lot happier in the long run.
This
is ToriJ signing off.
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