Since I somehow got spammed by a bunch of twitter notifications from people I don't recognize calling me out because they're hyped for E3 and I'm apparently being a sourpuss, I should note that I'm not saying not to get excited. If you want to be excited, be excited. I'm excited. And I'm not saying companies will literally cease to announce games. Obviously, that's not the case. Obviously every publisher plans to announce new games and most publishers will occasionally try new IPs. Ubisoft is going to launch their open-world-ish RPG-ish swords and dragons type game (I think concept art from that leaked recently, right?)
And I'm not devaluing AAA games just because they're annualized. I play many of the franchises that release annually. I'm not saying that you won't enjoy Sony or Microsoft's conferences, or that they won't announce new IPs at their conferences. I am 100% confident that Sony and MS will announce new titles.
What I'm saying is that there needs to be an adjustment of expectations--the generational jump, the tech leap, the budget jump, these have caused very predictable business outcomes. And that's something to get used to. Of course there will be fewer announcements when it takes 300 people 2.5-3 years to make a game than when it took 25 people 6 months to make a game. And this is going to result in some conferences where you see the same few games you did before.
Square Enix is working on Deus Ex 4, Hitman 6, Tomb Raider 10 or whatever it is now, Final Fantasy 15, Kingdom Hearts 3*, Kingdom Hearts 2 in HD, Sleeping Dogs 2, Just Cause 3,a reboot of Legacy of Kain (6) as a F2P MOBA, they just released Thief 4. And yes, they just released Murdered: Soul Suspect. That kind of thing is becoming much less common. Square Enix cancelled several projects that were supposed to have been of a similar scope (ISTR that that Vampire mobile game they made was a down-shifted console project; Nosgoth was originally single player and multiplayer and got sort of shrunk when they cancelled the single player elements and expanded into what it is now). It is more likely in the future that you will see more games as a service, more sequels, and fewer original titles.
The first reply in the Sega thread is to express incredulity at how thin Sega's lineup is this year. What would you expect? Sega releases Football Manager, Total War, Sonic, and they still have the Alien license. Fewer, bigger releases. More people, fewer games. Four franchises. Outside those, they have a second tier for Warhammer and Company of Heroes, and then some Japanese curiosities like Miku and Yakuza. Don't agree with my characterization? Go to their website right now and look at how they view their output. Look at their financial reports. "We're organizing ourselves around 4 main pillars". I don't think this is going to stop them from announcing an HD update of the PSP Valkyria Chronicles games at some point, of course, but I'm saying I wouldn't expect them to be launching tons of hot new IP. I'd expect them to play it safe in the overall.
Konami has been reduced to PES, Japanese-only Baseball Games, and MGS. More people, fewer games. Why does Ground Zeroes exist? As an expression of this problem; it's so expensive and takes so many resources to make the few franchises that they feel safe putting out to market that they need to find a business model that works. Luckily for Konami they've managed to reinvent themselves making money in mobile/social stuff and running health clubs or whatever they're getting on with, but what I'm saying is that I wouldn't expect Goemon EXCLUSIVE PS4 MEGATON. That's not the industry that exists anymore.
Capcom needed Microsoft's help to launch one of their marquee franchises from last generation; their other major franchise (Lost Planet) from last generation is presumably dead after the pushed-out 3rd installment; and the closest to a third franchise (Dragon's Dogma; itself one of Capcom's most expensive games ever and yet met with middling performance) they built last generation is getting an F2P microtransactions-funded pseudo-spinoff sequel. More people, fewer games. Of their existing franchises, they're clearly having trouble making money on Mega Man, and it's telling that DmC was outsourced because they needed to grow the brand, but the outsourcing didn't work and the brand shrank. Fewer viable games.
How did BioShock Infinite sell millions of copies but still result in the studio closure? Because it had to sell millions more copies. Take 2 doesn't even pretend, they openly sell themselves as a hit-driven company. Max Payne 3 didn't meet expectations. BioShock Infinite clearly didn't meet expectations. The Bureau obviously didn't meet expectations. LA Noire may have but the studio closed down. Civilization is a performer. Rockstar can still launch, but only after long, acrimonious development periods with ultra-high budgets and massive marketing. Borderlands is a hit, which is why you're seeing them trying to get it closer to annualized. Mafia II may have broken even after the unexpected success of Mafia I. Mafia III had a terrible development and has been rebooted with a new developer. I wouldn't place my bets on Mafia IV if it doesn't knock it out of the park.
You can walk through any company and see the impacts of more people, fewer games. Why does Nintendo have droughts in their production pipeline? Why were they forced to uncharacteristically announce games far far away from completion, and even those end up delayed? Why haven't they released more little, quirky titles in the mean time? Because budgets are rising, and it's even harder when your hardware isn't working out because there's a certain baseline of software sales you miss out on.
This isn't a dire warning or anything. I'm not saying the industry is on the verge of collapse. I'm saying you're seeing the natural adaptations companies needed to make to survive. And one of those consequences of those adaptations is that you will get fewer surprises, and you will hear more about the games that do exist and hear about them more often, because marketing is increasingly important.
I replied in the thread not to "spit hot fire" about "the state of the industry", but because some people expressed disappointment that they were hearing about Destiny AGAIN (shades of "Why the hell is everyone talking about Titanfall ughhhh" complaining from last year), and because we're starting to see grumbling about how "Sony ain't got nothing". This is the new normal. Big products will get big promotion, and they will show up everywhere. More games will be delayed. Fewer games will be released. More of what is released will be sequels or annualized titles. If that's something that bothers you, it's time to start looking at other ways you can adapt--indie titles, playing older titles, not being an early adopter, paying a little less attention to games so that the news that does come out seems more exciting, whatever floats your boat.