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Epic: About 1/3rd as many AAA games in dev this gen, but each with 3 times the budget

Sounds like a good thing to me. Theres too many half assed games flooding the market. The bigger budgets don't necessarily mean games will be better, but publishers focusing their sights on a smaller number of projects should help. Quality over quantity. Worst case scenario we may not get more good games but we'll get less bad games.
 

TrutaS

Member
The whole system will have to reach rock bottom before people realize they need a change. Overall I am confident that games will never stop being popular, but indies and lower budget experiences will take over (especially when each publisher starts to publish 3-4 ultra-AAA games per year).
 

Yagharek

Member
I'm not really seeing it...to me it seems like we get as many or more AAAs than ever. What did the first year after 360's and PS3's launch look like?

This year we get:
-Destiny
-Watch Dogs
-Assassins Creed
-Battlefield
-Call of Duty

-The Order
-Sunset Overdrive
-Batman (Does this one count?)
-Dark Souls II
-Titanfall
-Infamous
etc...

And then of course got our delicious indies. Seems like more variety than ever, across the whole spectrum.

That's not even remotely close to variety
 
That's not even remotely close to variety

none of the ones you bolded play like the other. Closest would be Battlefield and CoD, and even those two are different from each other. Not sure why Infamous wouldn't count as variety either, there aren't other games like it.

Not to mention that almost half that list is cross-gen.

so? they are still being developed for the current gen, thats how it is at the beginning of new console cycles.
 

KingFire

Banned
The only "safe" investment AAA at the moment are franchises that have met critical acclaim. At this point, innovation or no innovation is just as likely to not meet sales expectations this gen. Gamers are a finical bunch and they are now more spend conscious this gen compared to the last. You think games like The Order:1886 will reach the audience it expects to match? They have it all: Graphics, TPS mechanics, QTE gameplay and focus on cinematically to boost. Clearly the "safe" game to release, right? I'd wager they'll sell at least 2-3 million copies. Tops. Considering the reception recent shooters (including the legendary Titanfall) impact this gen.
Innovative games are much riskier. Sales expectations are a function of total costs, and innovative design is more costly assuming every other variable is kept constant. Gamers are not more spend conscious. if it they were, MGS5's demo would have financially flopped.

Titanfall suffers from the fact that it was marketed as an AAA even though it does not look like an AAA, and it does not play like an AAA. Titanfall is an enjoyable experience, but I bet if it looked much better, and had a more cinematic experience, it would have sold much better.
 

Calabi

Member
Innovative games are much riskier. Sales expectations are a function of total costs, and innovative design is more costly assuming every other variable is kept constant. Gamers are not more spend conscious. if it they were, MGS5's demo would have financially flopped.

Titanfall suffers from the fact that it was marketed as an AAA even though it does not look like an AAA, and it does not play like an AAA. Titanfall is an enjoyable experience, but I bet if it looked much better, and had a more cinematic experience, it would have sold much better.

Making the same game over and over again in a sea of similar games is just as risky.
 

Wensih

Member
I think that's broadening it a bit much, especially on the 100k end (and Suda51 or a lot of Xseed titles can probably swing -lower-.) Mid-tier to me says something in the million range, say, enough to pay 50ish guys for two years (envelope math: 60m gross becomes 30m net to pub becomes 15m to developer becomes 300k a head becomes $150k direct compensation and $150k benefits, taxes, office space, utilities, etc becomes $75k a year.) At 500k units sold, it's high-30s average salary, which is entry level across the board. That's still nowhere near the thousand-man Ubisoft armies, but there's still the potential for a vast difference in scope compared to the five or ten guys for two years a 100k seller supports.

And commercial success has everything to do with whether they exist longterm. Critical acclaim only pays the bills as long as there's a pool of publishers who want to convert money into street cred rather than money into more money, and that's not an endless list.

I see what you're saying; again it's hard to really judge this sort of thing or have a set standard when the measurement for "AAA" or any of those other classification systems is qualitative and more of an on feel basis. There's no real clarity to the meaning of the word although that's usually what happens when a buzzword used for marketing PR becomes accepted as a genuine term in an industry.

I remember at the start of the generation using AAA in the context of a highly rated game; I guess PR found that large budgets inherently meant a good game and wanted to entice people with their product by claiming it was indeed highly rated (before release).

EDIT: The way I was defining AA market -- and what seems to be the way many are defining it in this thread as -- was a middle ground between extremely small budget independent titles and exorbitantly high budgeted "AAA" titles.
 

Wensih

Member
Making the same game over and over again in a sea of similar games is just as risky.

Not if it has been established as the go to fishing spot in that sea. Activision might be making Skylanders and Call of Duty on an infinite loop, but those are the go to games in a saturated market. It is possible that if you're planning on entering the market with a game similar to, for example, call of duty it is just as risky.
 

legacyzero

Banned
Would really love to see a new UT, though.

....what

I have to admit this is why I am relishing the indie games hater patrol. They are going to be so miserable this gen.

edit: Oh I think I see. You are saying you think the midtier will be more populous instead of AAA. I think it is more likely AAA is just depopulated and indies fill in the rest and no one makes anything else due to the costs and risk.

Yep. Loving it.
 
It's kinda sad considering they are also SAFE as hell and completely unappealing for me.

The only AAA games that I've bought since 2013 have been Dark Souls 2, Metal Gear Rising, and TLOU(and many Nintendo games that are also AAA).

So outside of Nintendo the AAA industry just seems boring for me, aside of one or two amazing titles that come out every year.

I think we should play the Safety Dance song in "tribute" to the industry at E3 just to mock them.
 
I'm not really seeing it...to me it seems like we get as many or more AAAs than ever. What did the first year after 360's and PS3's launch look like?

This year we get:
-Destiny
-Watch Dogs
-Assassins Creed
-Battlefield
-Call of Duty
-The Order
-Sunset Overdrive
-Batman (Does this one count?)
-Dark Souls II
-Titanfall
-Infamous
etc...

And we're still getting the "mid-tier" titles too, that don't quite seem to count as indie. Obviously not all are priced at a "mid tier" level.
-Wolfenstein
-Evolve
-D4
-Lily Bergamo
-Plants vs Zombies
-Thief
-South Park
-Ninja Gaiden
-Bound by Flame
-Lord of Fallen
etc...

And then of course got our delicious indies. Seems like more variety than ever, across the whole spectrum.
Some of your classifications confuse me. You place Sunset Overdrive as a AAA and yet Ninja Gaiden isn't? Even tho Gaiden has a bigger fanbase? Dark Souls is AAA now?

Whatever; personally I think most of the classifications are stupid and AAA in particular needs to wither off. Or step up and deliver experiences that mean something again (and that means not diluting everything so it appeals to the LCD). The former will probably happen however.

Titanfall suffers from the fact that it was marketed as an AAA even though it does not look like an AAA, and it does not play like an AAA. Titanfall is an enjoyable experience, but I bet if it looked much better, and had a more cinematic experience, it would have sold much better.
It's a good thing it doesn't play like generic shit.
 
Some of your classifications confuse me. You place Sunset Overdrive as a AAA and yet Ninja Gaiden isn't? Even tho Gaiden has a bigger fanbase? Dark Souls is AAA now?

well you could be right about sunset not being aaa, but how big is ninja gaiden anymore? NG3 and Yaiba were terrible.
 
Some of your classifications confuse me. You place Sunset Overdrive as a AAA and yet Ninja Gaiden isn't? Even tho Gaiden has a bigger fanbase? Dark Souls is AAA now?

Whatever; personally I think most of the classifications are stupid and AAA in particular needs to wither off. Or step up and deliver experiences that mean something again (and that means not diluting everything so it appeals to the LCD). The former will probably happen however.

It's a good thing it doesn't play like generic shit.
AAA = Budget. It's Money spent on making & marketing the game; Not the popularity or size of fanbase.
 
We can start by not shunning games like Oddworld being released at $30, hm?

The main problem there is that some people feel that if a game is download only then it must be cheap to develop, so the price should match that ($10-20). But New 'n' Tasty has a 5m budget. So, it's by no means cheap to develop and very much fits into the mid-tier definition. I don't think you'd see many people questioning the cost if it were being released at retail. But it's a downloadable game, so the devs have to deal with the perception that those games are supposed to be cheap to develop and cheap for the consumer. It's bullshit but hopefully the quality will end up showing people and other developers that it's okay to release mid-tier games digitally.

I think the game shows for the rest the year will be very telling as far as what the AAA outlook will be like going forward. If we don't start to see more first party and third party AAA games announced, then it's probably safe to say that it's going to be on the light side compared to previous gens. Starting with E3 it's going to be very important for publishers to start showing some of their big guns, or at least announcing them. New consoles are selling very well, so there's no reason not to commit to them at this point.
 
Thanks for trying to predict the direction this generation will go in, 6 months in.


So firstly it's early days yet - there isn't the install base to justify AAA investment - and last gen developers went in massively blind to the costs.

Secondly the developers Epic partner with may have moved away from AAA development. It's not to say that others won't pop up that Epic have no idea about.

So really, the idea that Tim Sweeney knows definitively, the direction the industry is headed in is incorrect. But I guess he's probably more in tune with it, than I am. It's just not the first time, and exec who should know, has got it wrong, because it's hard to predict the future, afterall.
 
Secondly the developers Epic partner with may have moved away from AAA development. It's not to say that others won't pop up that Epic have no idea about.

I think one major factor is that many developers built their own engine. EA is a good example of that. Many of their games from last gen ran on UE3, but all of their developers are now using Frostbite. Sony Online built most of their games last gen on UE3, but they're now using Forgelight. At this point Microsoft is the only major publisher with a AAA game announced for UE4. That's a huge shift from last gen.
 

Fafalada

Fafracer forever
bigboss370 said:
And we're still getting the "mid-tier" titles too
That's an interesting definition of mid-tier, you might want to inform some of those devs/publishers they're doing it wrong with the amounts they are spending.
 
I think one major factor is that many developers built their own engine. EA is a good example of that. Many of their games from last gen ran on UE3, but all of their developers are now using Frostbite. Sony Online built most of their games last gen on UE3, but they're now using Forgelight. At this point Microsoft is the only major publisher with a AAA game announced for UE4. That's a huge shift from last gen.

Exactly what I feel. I don't think Epic are the best judges of the direction of the generation.

They're also opening themselves up to indies more this generation, so of course they'll see more independent/AA developers.
 

Zarx

Member
I'm not really seeing it...to me it seems like we get as many or more AAAs than ever. What did the first year after 360's and PS3's launch look like?

This year we get:
-Destiny
-Watch Dogs
-Assassins Creed
-Battlefield
-Call of Duty
-The Order
-Sunset Overdrive
-Batman (Does this one count?)
-Dark Souls II
-Titanfall
-Infamous
etc...

And we're still getting the "mid-tier" titles too, that don't quite seem to count as indie. Obviously not all are priced at a "mid tier" level.
-Wolfenstein
-Evolve
-D4
-Lily Bergamo
-Plants vs Zombies
-Thief
-South Park
-Ninja Gaiden
-Bound by Flame
-Lord of Fallen
etc...

And then of course got our delicious indies. Seems like more variety than ever, across the whole spectrum.

Let's quickly fix up this list

AAA:
-Destiny
-Watch Dogs
-Assassins Creed
-Battlefield
-Call of Duty
-The Order
-Batman: Arkham Knight
-Infamous
-The Elder Scrolls Online
-Dragon Age: Inquisition
-The Crew


?
-Alien: Isolation (Seems to be pretty high production values and they certainly seem to be marketing it heavily probably end up AA somewhere between AAA and mid tier)
-Sunset Overdrive (haven't seen enough from this game yet, high chance it will be another mid tier game like Fuse)
-Thief (Big team with a long ass dev cycle, only question is the marketing spend I would probably lean towards AAA)
-Dark Souls II (Namco Bandai claimed that they were going to give it a AAA marketing campaign but it's production values don't quite rank with modern AAA standards)
-Titanfall (Actually a pretty small team, and not a huge dev cycle once you take into account having to rebuild the studio from scratch. Clearly lacking in many areas)
-Dying Light (Seems to have a lot bigger budget than Dead Island could end up being pretty AAA)

Mid tier
-Fortnite
-Wolfenstein: New Order
-Civilization: Beyond Earth (Seems to be more of a spinoff of the main Civ games)
-Evolve
-D4
-Total War: Rome II (in terms of it's genre it's probably close to AAA status)
-Hellraid
-Lily Bergamo
-Plants vs Zombies
-South Park
-Ninja Gaiden Z
-Bound by Flame
-Lord of Fallen
-Trails Evolution
-Fable Anniversary
-Age of Wonders III
-War of the Vikings
-Wargame: Red Dragon
-Daylight
-Child of Light
-Murdered: Soul Suspect
-Divinity: Original Sin
-Sniper Elite III
- Sacred 3
-The Evil Within
-Project CARS
-Bayonetta 2

etc
 

Servbot24

Banned
1366985769698.jpg


I would really like a situation like this. There are too many AAA games out there. I hope we see a rise in quality and a decline in quantity

High budget =/= high quality gameplay. High budget = low risk gameplay.
 
Maybe if they use unreal engine ? But on a serious note i think if the API style and level is the same as building a pc game as with both consoles then the cost should actually come down not go up right ?
 

Havoc2049

Member
Don't forget the high end of the indie market which is creating some amazing looking games with deep and rewarding gameplay, such as Shroud of the Avatar, Star Citizen, Wasteland 2, Elite Dangerous, the already released Shadowrun, etc.

It's kinda funny, but during the last "console crash" in the mid 80's when I was a kid, I was still playing amazing games on my Commodore 64 computer, such as Ultima III, Wasteland, Elite and many other great games.

One good thing about the death of the "mid-tier" games is that half, if not more of those games were shovel-ware crap anyways, that will be missed by brick and mortar retailers, but not by enthusiast gamers.

As a gamer, if you have a next gen console, a mid-range to high end computer and one or more of the handhelds (3DS, Vita, tablet/phone), you should have plenty of awesome games to choose from. More good games than time to play them all.
 
I dunno why people always cry out for the mid tier game. They didn't sell when they made them.

Think the indie guys are filling the void left by the mid tier games anyways. Some of the most fun I had last year was with indie games.
 

wbEMX

Member
If that should be the truth, then it's really depressing. What if a really good game has an insane budget, which just can't be grossed back? Then the studio gets closed and there are even less bigger studios, although the quality was there.

You just can't expect a huge success like GTA V every year from AAA titles. Sinking hundreds of millions of dollars into AAA titles is what is going to kill the AAA market in the long run. Yeah, there are indies, and I love the hell out of them. But a blockbuster every now and then doesn't hurt either.
 

molnizzle

Member
I'm cool with indies taking over now that they have access to real graphics engines. I'm sick of 2D side scrolling indies. If they start amping up the production value then great.

I fucking hate the "early access" or pay-for-beta model though. Finish your fucking game and then sell it to me, don't charge me money for the priveledge of doing the job of your QA team. Such bullshit.
 

Mr. X

Member
Higher budgets mean safer "design by committee" projects. Zzzzz.

Looking forward to all the more adventurous titles.
 

saunderez

Member
I fucking hate the "early access" or pay-for-beta model though. Finish your fucking game and then sell it to me, don't charge me money for the priveledge of doing the job of your QA team. Such bullshit.

I'm the opposite. I enjoy seeing how games come along. I've been part of the Prison Architect alpha for a hell of a long time now, its been really interesting seeing new mechanics being implemented and the game start coming together as a final concept. But each to their own.
 

patapuf

Member
I'm cool with indies taking over now that they have access to real graphics engines. I'm sick of 2D side scrolling indies. If they start amping up the production value then great.

I fucking hate the "early access" or pay-for-beta model though. Finish your fucking game and then sell it to me, don't charge me money for the priveledge of doing the job of your QA team. Such bullshit.

i really doubt the majority of indies have QA teams.
 
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