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Charles Randall on why game developers aren't more candid with public
- Thread starter Messofanego
- Start date
I seem to recall a lot of "flaming", "trolling", shitposting and generally bad behavior existing LONG LONG before games as a service rolled around.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Microtransactions caused gamers to become toxic? Not the normalization of racism within the game community that's been around since xbox live was still on the OG xbox? Not the willful ignorance present in the gaming community whenever devs actually talk about the nitty gritty? Not the treatment of the medium as a boy's club? Not the ridiculous justifications gamers come up with to justify the community's toxicity like blaming it or MTs?
This type of mentality makes me question whether I want to continue working in the industry constantly and it sucks. Especially because I love to share what I am doing and how I am doing it because it inspires people/helps others learn. Even when talking in person to friends who aren't in the industry but play games; If I talk about the process of how something is done or various development problems or something they will sometimes get antagonistic towards me or the industry in general. It's exhausting. Like why should I put my heart into something when people are just going to be ungrateful and antagonistic towards me or act like I'm trying to pick pocket them or some stupid shit lol. Just seems pointless.
MrRudiMentary
Member
I 100% with the thread in OP. Even talking to new recruits at game development studios you'll see them parroting "Sean Murray is immoral for lying about multiplayer", or "It's Ubisoft, so it sucks". It's only makes them look a fool.
I think the main problem is lack of exposure. Far less than 1% of game players have never seen what a working day looks like in a game development studio. How many high profile films are there that laboriously tell the story of struggling musicians, actors, writers and TV producers? That doesn't exist for games developers yet (bar that apparently ridiculous Daniel Radcliffe Rockstar TV movie) and until it does I don't think this problem will go away.
I wonder what other people's thoughts are on Game Dev Tycoon as piece of media demonstrating the day to day life of games production. Obviously it's abstracted but I think it goes at least a little way to show why delays and bugs and business decisions happen. I'm interested to see if anyone has a reason they disagree. Either way like with a lot of problems with this medium I think it'll get better with a decade or two.
I think the main problem is lack of exposure. Far less than 1% of game players have never seen what a working day looks like in a game development studio. How many high profile films are there that laboriously tell the story of struggling musicians, actors, writers and TV producers? That doesn't exist for games developers yet (bar that apparently ridiculous Daniel Radcliffe Rockstar TV movie) and until it does I don't think this problem will go away.
I wonder what other people's thoughts are on Game Dev Tycoon as piece of media demonstrating the day to day life of games production. Obviously it's abstracted but I think it goes at least a little way to show why delays and bugs and business decisions happen. I'm interested to see if anyone has a reason they disagree. Either way like with a lot of problems with this medium I think it'll get better with a decade or two.
RenderJosh
Member
Reading this confort me once again in my decision of working as a rendering engineer not for the videogames industry but the movie industry (my first passion anyway) despite the appeal of real-time rendering, but it is getting more and more important in film production so all good.
I know we are in a generation in which people think that, for God only knows the reason, they have something to say on whatever the subject, and whatever their legitimacy on the said subject. This leads, in case of the gaming industry especially, to situations that were described in this thread, where gamers, because of their status of consumers and because they gave money (or not), think they became a valuable and important source of knowledge that developers and engineers should follow. This should be obvious, but still : You are not.
What some people should quickly realize is the sheer amount of disrespect they have for the craft and the work that imply the creation of a videogame or a film, may it be on the technical of the artistic side. The problem with the videogames industry is that it is young, a lot of people are born with it, and it is often seen as a whole as a lot of clicking/buttons pushing thing. I mean, if I can create a layer in Photoshop and connect two cuts using Premiere, how hard can it be ?
One of the main reasons people are not as batshit crazy when it comes to the making of a film (and again, it depends) is that there is still today a fantasy around this craft, which is strengthened by making-ofs and reels. The camera rigs, the lens, the clapper, the actors (and the fact that this is a much older industry than the videogames one) and other symbols contribute to a certain aura around cinema and filmmaking.
And I do not exactly agree with the argument suggesting that GAF is less prone to these kinds of behaviour. It is actually the contrary because since GAF is usually considered a quality forum, a lot of people think their shit suddenly got more real than elsewhere, and do make these kinds of comments here.
I mean come on, may it be the DOOM Switch or the Forza monoCPU threads in the last two days or the usual #NoMoreExcusesForUnity shite, I can't help but feeling extremely embarassed by my reading.
The Unity case is especially bad, as it literally creates a gap, a rift between people who ever heard about the concept of "technical debt", and those that did not. A lot of Unity's problems come from early design decisions, when the main concern was making things as accessible as possible, that they started to regret once the engine popularity skyrocketed. As much as I know, they have to redesign/refactor a lot of core technologies inside the engine, while still being on the cutting-edge. And let me tell you this is not a fun situation for anyone.
(Highly) technical subjects should, in my opinion, only be discussed by competent people who are for example/if possible software engineers themselves or equivalent, such as Durante, Dictator93 and the likes. Hence why the "Game Graphics Technology" thread was always a good one, as it is mostly used by technical people to talk about technical subjects.
Not that other people cannot participate in these discussions, quite the contrary, but using what should be the most obvious way of communication when you are interested and want to learn : Ask questions.
Do not enforce your potentially (and quite understandable) non-existent knowledge of a subject, ask. These people will usually respond to you as best as they can, and you will not sound/look like a fool. This is an advice you usually receive early, do not talk about what you don't know. Ask.
I know we are in a generation in which people think that, for God only knows the reason, they have something to say on whatever the subject, and whatever their legitimacy on the said subject. This leads, in case of the gaming industry especially, to situations that were described in this thread, where gamers, because of their status of consumers and because they gave money (or not), think they became a valuable and important source of knowledge that developers and engineers should follow. This should be obvious, but still : You are not.
What some people should quickly realize is the sheer amount of disrespect they have for the craft and the work that imply the creation of a videogame or a film, may it be on the technical of the artistic side. The problem with the videogames industry is that it is young, a lot of people are born with it, and it is often seen as a whole as a lot of clicking/buttons pushing thing. I mean, if I can create a layer in Photoshop and connect two cuts using Premiere, how hard can it be ?
One of the main reasons people are not as batshit crazy when it comes to the making of a film (and again, it depends) is that there is still today a fantasy around this craft, which is strengthened by making-ofs and reels. The camera rigs, the lens, the clapper, the actors (and the fact that this is a much older industry than the videogames one) and other symbols contribute to a certain aura around cinema and filmmaking.
And I do not exactly agree with the argument suggesting that GAF is less prone to these kinds of behaviour. It is actually the contrary because since GAF is usually considered a quality forum, a lot of people think their shit suddenly got more real than elsewhere, and do make these kinds of comments here.
I mean come on, may it be the DOOM Switch or the Forza monoCPU threads in the last two days or the usual #NoMoreExcusesForUnity shite, I can't help but feeling extremely embarassed by my reading.
The Unity case is especially bad, as it literally creates a gap, a rift between people who ever heard about the concept of "technical debt", and those that did not. A lot of Unity's problems come from early design decisions, when the main concern was making things as accessible as possible, that they started to regret once the engine popularity skyrocketed. As much as I know, they have to redesign/refactor a lot of core technologies inside the engine, while still being on the cutting-edge. And let me tell you this is not a fun situation for anyone.
(Highly) technical subjects should, in my opinion, only be discussed by competent people who are for example/if possible software engineers themselves or equivalent, such as Durante, Dictator93 and the likes. Hence why the "Game Graphics Technology" thread was always a good one, as it is mostly used by technical people to talk about technical subjects.
Not that other people cannot participate in these discussions, quite the contrary, but using what should be the most obvious way of communication when you are interested and want to learn : Ask questions.
Do not enforce your potentially (and quite understandable) non-existent knowledge of a subject, ask. These people will usually respond to you as best as they can, and you will not sound/look like a fool. This is an advice you usually receive early, do not talk about what you don't know. Ask.
Yes, bravo, hammering down the fucking point that the dev made by a thread filled with shit comments and childish reactions.
Ive worked in the gaming industry since I was 24 years old (38 now), and I have to say that actually being a part of the industry, in various ways, has given me such a massive appreciation for making video games. It is a grueling, painful, stressful, beautiful experience. Like a Dark Souls/Bloodborne game, but real life. When you push through and complete a game youre proud of, theres nothing like the high you get.
So much blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifices get put into making games for people to enjoy. Well, we hope they enjoy the games we make. It sucks when you spend countless hours, weeks, months, years, and the game still falls short for various reasons. There are so many moving parts in making games that you cant plan for everything, but you try to mitigate massive setbacks as best you can. You try to avoid cutting content as best you can, avoid overreaching and under-delivering.
No one sets out to make a garbage game. Thats not why we got into the industry. We dont do it to scam, deceive, or nickel and dime you. Lord knows there are probably better ways to do that than making video games.
No, we got into the industry because every single one of us played a game in our youth, and fell in love with it enough to say, You know, it would be amazing if I could make my own game one day, and we collaborated with other like minded folks and tried our damnedest to make something wed love as much as that game that set us on that path so many moons ago, and hope that our fans will get that same thrill.
Its obvious we dont always succeed, but we certainly wont stop trying to be better if were blessed with another shot at it. Basically, we just love making video games. Its awesome, and soul crushing, but damn I cant imagine many other things Id rather be doing.
So much blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifices get put into making games for people to enjoy. Well, we hope they enjoy the games we make. It sucks when you spend countless hours, weeks, months, years, and the game still falls short for various reasons. There are so many moving parts in making games that you cant plan for everything, but you try to mitigate massive setbacks as best you can. You try to avoid cutting content as best you can, avoid overreaching and under-delivering.
No one sets out to make a garbage game. Thats not why we got into the industry. We dont do it to scam, deceive, or nickel and dime you. Lord knows there are probably better ways to do that than making video games.
No, we got into the industry because every single one of us played a game in our youth, and fell in love with it enough to say, You know, it would be amazing if I could make my own game one day, and we collaborated with other like minded folks and tried our damnedest to make something wed love as much as that game that set us on that path so many moons ago, and hope that our fans will get that same thrill.
Its obvious we dont always succeed, but we certainly wont stop trying to be better if were blessed with another shot at it. Basically, we just love making video games. Its awesome, and soul crushing, but damn I cant imagine many other things Id rather be doing.
Stripper13
Member
Pretty much this.
Many conversations and topics both in and out of this forum are exhausting. Even worse, the negativity is extremely predictable.
You can't go into PSN/XBL threads without negativity surrounding monthly games and console paywalls.
You can't talk about Halo without negativity on 343i (bonus for MCC).
Any discussion on big titles such as PUBG and Destiny 2 (or anything Ubisoft) seem to fall apart at record pace.
I've been guilty of it but it's so widespread that it hinders any desire I have to discuss gaming in general. For example, I am obsessed with Destiny 2 at the moment, but I'd rather go and consume bite sized pieces of Reddit content - then go into any of the D2 threads on GAF at the moment.
John Harker
Definitely doesn't make things up as he goes along.
Truth.
Ive become way more insular personally, especially here, after like 15 years it wears you down. And its gotten exponentially worse the past 2-3 years ::shrug::
Ive become way more insular personally, especially here, after like 15 years it wears you down. And its gotten exponentially worse the past 2-3 years ::shrug::
This.
JoeyJungle
Banned
Yep, Witcher 3/Watch_Dogs/FFXV "Downgrade" discussion is a perfect example of devs showing off early builds, then gamers becoming toxic once when the final build isn't a 1 to 1 match with the early in-development gameplay shown.
No Man's Sky is probably the most extreme version due to the dev keeping internal development secret and allowing expectations to soar, and had one of the the nastiest fan reactions because of the "downgrade".
No Man's Sky is probably the most extreme version due to the dev keeping internal development secret and allowing expectations to soar, and had one of the the nastiest fan reactions because of the "downgrade".
CountAntonius
Member
Absolute bullshit.
curiouscharles
Member
ding ding ding!
this just in folks, it's human nature to be cowardly pricks to one another behind the veil of [quasi] anonymity.
The reaction was hostile and overblown. But let's not get ahead of ourselves: Sean Murray really did make direct claims about his game that turned out to be false. When he was asked to comment on this, he chose not to, and instead said nothing. Despite talking to the game's community prior to release.
It wasn't "keeping internal development secret" that allowed fan expectations to soar. It was their own marketing and PR efforts.
Rickenslacker
Banned
This is something I've been pretty guilty of myself and have come to learn to let go of, or at least try. It's been a sobering realization to come to and reflect upon, and I try to recognize when I might be encroaching on that territory.
Rellik
Member
And what do you think would have happened if Sean Murray had said something?
76 page NeoGAF thread full of child like toxic behaviour, more harassment and shitty memes.
Instead he chose to work on and improve the game.
Hardcore gamer types think they know shit about game design because they play a lot of games the same way internet pseudo-smark types think they know shit about booking because they watched a lot of wrestling.
When I have people playtest my games I make changes based on what they do, not on what they say. There is too much contention with developer vs player expectations. Players may not know exactly what they want but they can express problems through frustrations of interacting with the game. Players shouldn't worry about the smoke and mirrors; at the end of the day it doesn't matter what engine is used, what tricks the developers used or who made what. The only thing that matters is that the end product.
When I have people playtest my games I make changes based on what they do, not on what they say. There is too much contention with developer vs player expectations. Players may not know exactly what they want but they can express problems through frustrations of interacting with the game. Players shouldn't worry about the smoke and mirrors; at the end of the day it doesn't matter what engine is used, what tricks the developers used or who made what. The only thing that matters is that the end product.
Glass Shark
Banned
.
The culture has been fostered and promoted to some extent by publishers and devs (mostly publishers tho). Its not like the gaming community just recently became toxic. Its been this toxic for 20+ years now and everyone knows it but publishers and platform holders do nothing about it. Look at the steam forums. That place has been a dumpster fire for years now and Valve literally does nothing about it and apparently think its fine to have the trash that is spewed in those forums be associated with their company. So yes, its toxic but nothing is done to stop it from being toxic.
SentryDown
Member
Gotta love how some people here read a thread about toxicity and reply "yeah toxicity is bad, leave developers alone it's all publisher's fault". Again, you have even less of an idea what publishers do and why they do it, their business decisions, their communications etc.
Yep, NeoGAF ain't any good in this respect. See how many threads actively leap on companies because the graphics was slightly different between two consoles.
From a gamer turning into a developer, your perspective on games change drastically.
As a gamer you want to have the best graphics, plenty of features. That's a normal expectation.
But as a developer, you are thinking, how much budget and time do you have to deliver a marketable product. How do you not break your budget. Is that feature REALLY neccesary, does it lead to more people buying your game, how much more time is required to test and debug that feature? Do you want to spend additional time and money optimizing a game despite the current performance being perfectly playable?
Not to mention game development is one of the most worst industry for developers. Underpaid and overworked for a highly talented and varied skillset. Extremely competitive industry due to the surplus of games from all price ranges, driving prices down. A failed game easily leading to the collapse of the entire company.
And then they have to deal with gamers thinking they know what it takes to make a game.
Heck, even in my short time in game development, I question my boss's decision to force a feature on a game even though I know no one would play it, it wouldn't lead to a single additional dollar, and it costs a hell lot of time to design and implement and testing. So not just gamers, but your superiors as well.
From a gamer turning into a developer, your perspective on games change drastically.
As a gamer you want to have the best graphics, plenty of features. That's a normal expectation.
But as a developer, you are thinking, how much budget and time do you have to deliver a marketable product. How do you not break your budget. Is that feature REALLY neccesary, does it lead to more people buying your game, how much more time is required to test and debug that feature? Do you want to spend additional time and money optimizing a game despite the current performance being perfectly playable?
Not to mention game development is one of the most worst industry for developers. Underpaid and overworked for a highly talented and varied skillset. Extremely competitive industry due to the surplus of games from all price ranges, driving prices down. A failed game easily leading to the collapse of the entire company.
And then they have to deal with gamers thinking they know what it takes to make a game.
Heck, even in my short time in game development, I question my boss's decision to force a feature on a game even though I know no one would play it, it wouldn't lead to a single additional dollar, and it costs a hell lot of time to design and implement and testing. So not just gamers, but your superiors as well.
I'm a big fan of how Jeff Kaplan handles developer updates. I understand that's for a game that's out and constantly tweaked but the process feels more authentic and I'm more inclined to listen even if I don't always agree.
The way CDPR handled the witcher downgrade fiasco was pretty well done too, imo.
Toxicity will always be around to a certain degree, to use it as an excuse for a lack of transparency and to spew PR nonsense is either incredibly ignorant or incredibly deceitful.
You'll always make enemies but I think being candid will create just as many friends, if not more.
The way CDPR handled the witcher downgrade fiasco was pretty well done too, imo.
Toxicity will always be around to a certain degree, to use it as an excuse for a lack of transparency and to spew PR nonsense is either incredibly ignorant or incredibly deceitful.
You'll always make enemies but I think being candid will create just as many friends, if not more.
CecilRousso
Member
The hostile reaction to that game was and is embarrassing, despite Hello Game's mistake. Peoples inability to let go of things and just move away is so weird. So many people in seem insistent on keep building up their anger, and bring up the fight at every point, because they seem to have told themselves that they need to own the responsibility to not let the devs of the hook, for the sake of both them and others.
And considering that so many still haven't been able to let go of what Peter Molyneux said about acorns in Fable 1 before that games release, they're probably not going to let go of No Man's Sky either.
Not that it's so much different with other topics on the internet, but you still would like to think that it could be slightly better and less serious when it's about something like games. But people do love pass judgmenent, no matter what the topic is apparently.
Last paragraph here is confusing. The thing about play-testing seems to be suggesting that players don't know what they want in games or what is annoying them, while the conclusion is that players shouldn't concern themselves with the technical workings of a game.
It reads as if players play-testing can't/shouldn't express themselves because they don't understand the technical workings of games. But I'd imagine their feedback on their experience needn't be about that. If I were asked about my experience of a game it'd be about the quality of the game design, not the game tech. And that's the kind of feedback you seem to be talking about--in particular, frustrations with the design.
I get bristling at people talking tech who don't know tech but...
I think there is an experience-expression gap of some indeterminate size. I think we do create our opinions in self-"expression" alongside actually getting at our experience. It is an act of trying to understand ourselves, which, I agree, isn't entirely true to the experience and as such is an act of self-creation, to some indeterminate degree.
I also think that a game designer is going to have more of an idea of the sorts of experience they can prepare and can turn things around such as to defy the way the player sees the problem and the solution to it.
Those are two senses in which I think it is true that a player "may not know what they want."
I don't think either of these things mean that players have no potentially valuable insight into problems in game design and what they'd rather have happen in the game.
Obviously they probably cannot see all the ramifications of their proposals or how they might cause frustration themselves, but I don't think this means they can't be constructive.
And all of that is still a pebble compared to the kind of crap the community will collectively hurl at anyone who's a minority.
Think about that for a second, the community is so toxic it's pushing the industry actors to never interact with them unless they're 100% absolutely sure it's not going to explode on them.
And it's barely a blip compared to what the community throws at minorities.
And people have the gall to say that the gaming community doesn't have a problem.
Think about that for a second, the community is so toxic it's pushing the industry actors to never interact with them unless they're 100% absolutely sure it's not going to explode on them.
And it's barely a blip compared to what the community throws at minorities.
And people have the gall to say that the gaming community doesn't have a problem.
More on the Twitter thread ( https://twitter.com/retroremakes/status/912431380306513925 ), but the point is that the community has been toxic for way longer than F2P/Dumbing Down For Casuals/Loot-Boxes have been around. The more people accept that it's a recent thing, the more revisionism occurs, both in what happened, and what didn't happen.
The community needs to reassess how it approaches "bad" games. It needs to reassess how to critique games. It needs to reassess what the hell it actually knows. If you think developers want to monetise games, then sit down and think about who's paying for the game to be developed, and who needs to recoup that lost income, and why it's happening.
Developers - literally - don't get paid enough for the shit that's thrown at them. Even publishers need more understanding from the community, if it's not to remain an emotionally stunted and potential alt-right breeding ground of people who just relentlessly hate on everything.
Why not?
Mainly I take their opinions with a grain of salt. Sure it can be constructive at times, but ultimately it's how long they take to navigate menus, how much they can grasp basic mechanics and how quickly they can reach the goal that is more important than their opinions on surface level details. I'm not speaking for every developer of course, but in my opinion play testers are there to find bugs or common problems, not really for insight into design. For instance, if there is a hurdle in the game that is a frequent issue for players, it will be tweaked. It's things of that nature that play testers are good for because developers (or at least me and a few others I've met) cannot accurately gauge the difficulty of their own games because they get too good at playing them since they know all the ins and outs.
I thought my first mobile game was easy enough to play, but when I let a few 40+ year woman play it (my main demographic I was shooting for), they couldn't really grasp it. So I had to spend a few weeks tweaking and tweaking it until they could play it pretty easily. They couldn't tell me what was the issue, only that they "didn't get it". Ultimately the game doesn't really have much difficultly to it anymore so I re-branded it as a relaxation and meditation game.
I'm kinda rambling at this point but I'm not trying to say that players deserve to be denounced for things they do not know, but sometimes the knowledge gap is too large for any meaningful conversation to happen between the two groups. But one thing I will say is that I have zero respect for people who go out of their way to harass developers.
Because the entire point behind twitter is the character limit (which was considered ridiculously small even back when it was first created). Twitter is geared towards quick little messages, not essays. You shouldn't need to post 36 different times in order to say one thing, no matter how well you say it. It would've been more appropriate to make a blog post somewhere and then use twitter to link to the blog.
Well, yes and no. That's how Twitter was created, yes, but it's not how Twitter is used now. Plenty of people write multi-tweet threads - mostly journalists and people in politics-related fields - and whilst a blog-post might have more depth, it wouldn't have as much impact or immediacy as a multi-tweet thread. Almost 5000 likes and 2000 retweets, plus all the people who have read it without either liking or retweeting... I doubt a post on Wordpress, Tumblr or Medium would get that many impressions. *shrugs*
Karsticles
Member
I think it's on a case by case basis. I am still upset about changes to Roadhog in Overwatch. Why? I bought the whole game for that guy. Blizzard basically deleted a game I loved. Why wouldn't I be upset and "toxic"?
Or consider Hearthstone. People invest a lot of time and money into that game. I've put a few hundred in. So when decisions are made, I am involved. I can't just walk off and say "well I will just go play something else", because that is walking away from an investment.
Edit: that said, I appreciate the explanatory angle Blizzard has been taking. I just wish they would bring back Roadhog and Dreadsteed.
Or consider Hearthstone. People invest a lot of time and money into that game. I've put a few hundred in. So when decisions are made, I am involved. I can't just walk off and say "well I will just go play something else", because that is walking away from an investment.
Edit: that said, I appreciate the explanatory angle Blizzard has been taking. I just wish they would bring back Roadhog and Dreadsteed.
Wow that was a bunch of bs. Thanks for sharing.
TatteredHat
Member
The gaming community as a whole has always been trash, filled with socially regressive idiots.
All the publisher bullshit certainly doesn't help, but even without them the community would still be a cesspool.
I say this as someone who probably has more knowledge about game development than the average joe, and it's really a shame that developers can't talk more openly about the reality of game development, but the truth is that a lot of people just have no idea what's being said.
All the publisher bullshit certainly doesn't help, but even without them the community would still be a cesspool.
I say this as someone who probably has more knowledge about game development than the average joe, and it's really a shame that developers can't talk more openly about the reality of game development, but the truth is that a lot of people just have no idea what's being said.
I move on frequently from bad games or games I don't like. I could go on and on about how I find uncharted to be boring , but I don't care enough to actually vocalize that. I don't think people harassing developers because a game is bad , or an aspect of the game is bad is good.
However, I think dwelling on art that something that captured you enough to dwell on it is totally fine. If its like... incasing your life in negativity and all you are is spewing shit. Then please don't do that.
But I talk about old movies I think are shit all the time, and old comic books, and old cartoons, and books. I talked about how shitty the Judas Contract is again, to someone yesterday. And we had the fun every prevalent conversation of how much a fucking weirdo deathstroke is. I think its totally ok for to revisit why you think shit is bad, I think people have been doing with other mediums. And video games aren't special in that regard. Should it take over your life? No, Should it be forces into unfitting professional material when you are reviewing newer works, probably not.
But if you think sonic 06 is shitty, and you wanna talk about why sonic 06 is shitty 10 years from now because you were a dumb 13 year old at that might have been your first moment of disappoint because you spent your own money on that shit game. You have every right to do that and its fine.
I think it's on a case by case basis. I am still upset about changes to Roadhog in Overwatch. Why? I bought the whole game for that guy. Blizzard basically deleted a game I loved. Why wouldn't I be upset and "toxic"?
Or consider Hearthstone. People invest a lot of time and money into that game. I've put a few hundred in. So when decisions are made, I am involved. I can't just walk off and say "well I will just go play something else", because that is walking away from an investment.
Edit: that said, I appreciate the explanatory angle Blizzard has been taking. I just wish they would bring back Roadhog and Dreadsteed.
I think there's a distinction between being upset at things in a game and expressing your frustration about something by personally attacking developers. You can disagree with a decision while attempting to understand that most developers are people who are trying their best to make a good game and not being spiteful to developers as if they didn't have feelings. Basically it's about how personal you decide to make things when you express your frustrations.
i.e. Don't be an asshole.
I agree, but also, the language we use for games isn't fantastic. The critical vocabulary for films, TV, books, painting... There's a lot of room for nuance, and a lot of room to delve into the reasons why something is good, bad or shitty. I can probably rant about how awesome Hannibal is - or how bad Velvet Goldmine is - for 10 minutes, without interruption, deviation or repetition. Camerawork, photography, script, acting, art-direction, music, direction. There's so much that can be talked about, examined, interpreted...
But in games, what is there? What vocabulary can we use to push deeper into why something is good, bad or shitty. The mechanics? The writing? The art-direction? Some of these things help us explore how we feel about a game, but others aren't relevant, or don't have any depth beyond the surface... So I think maybe there's a tendency to lash-out at developers/publishers - ad hominem style - because there's intense dislike, but no ability to put that intense dislike into a useful critical form.
(Note: This is all generally speaking about the community and gaming publications. No doubt there's good writers out there, but I also think a good amount of stuff written about games that just shouldn't be printed.)
Renegade Frost
Banned
Video games need to be profitable if you want to have more videogames
Dont be a cunt over this man
Huge Succeeded
Banned
Are you new to the internet or just astoundingly ignorant?
Huge Succeeded
Banned
Tearing apart a design director for decisions that were very likely outside of his control or even desires, however...
Renegade Frost
Banned
Check the gears of war multiplayer threads
But game developers do tell, the average joe fails to listen.
Huge Succeeded
Banned
I swear some of you have obviously never seen gamers go crazy outside of Downgradegate
It's pretty funny to see the whole "gamers are dead" thing go again with the same misunderstanding going on again and again and again.
King Tubby
Member
I think it's on a case by case basis. I am still upset about changes to Roadhog in Overwatch. Why? I bought the whole game for that guy. Blizzard basically deleted a game I loved. Why wouldn't I be upset and "toxic"?
Or consider Hearthstone. People invest a lot of time and money into that game. I've put a few hundred in. So when decisions are made, I am involved. I can't just walk off and say "well I will just go play something else", because that is walking away from an investment.
Edit: that said, I appreciate the explanatory angle Blizzard has been taking. I just wish they would bring back Roadhog and Dreadsteed.
There is a difference between being upset and offering a reasoned criticism about a game, and sending death threats, making personal insults to developers, or blaming all the problems of the game on the women or minorities on the dev team.
Well... Just take a look at the Star Citizen case.
Yes, the game is late in it's originally planned schedule (understatement), feature creaping (understatement) and with a debatable way of self funding (understatement). No arguments here.
But the devs try to be as transparent as possible in how they make the game. The hurdles they are facing (and they had a bunch), the bugs, the challenges and the necessary (or not) changes they decided to do from the original plan. And the result is ? Very high toxicity (understatement) from the community at every thing they do or say.
Weirdly, one of the loudest voices of this toxic waste surrounding SC is from a alleged video game developper who should be able to understand what they are going through.
I'm glad i'm just a web developper : nobody really gives a damn about the websites i make.
Yes, the game is late in it's originally planned schedule (understatement), feature creaping (understatement) and with a debatable way of self funding (understatement). No arguments here.
But the devs try to be as transparent as possible in how they make the game. The hurdles they are facing (and they had a bunch), the bugs, the challenges and the necessary (or not) changes they decided to do from the original plan. And the result is ? Very high toxicity (understatement) from the community at every thing they do or say.
Weirdly, one of the loudest voices of this toxic waste surrounding SC is from a alleged video game developper who should be able to understand what they are going through.
I'm glad i'm just a web developper : nobody really gives a damn about the websites i make.