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How Arkane Studios (Prey, Dishonored) Got Stuck Behind Two Competing Ideologies
- Thread starter DryvBy
- Start date
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Oh god! It's another one of "those" stories again. One Angry Gamer is correct. At least they don't hide and say they aren't outraged, since the outrage is right there in the website's name.
SirKicksalot
Member
Why did they even bother to pitch a Prey sequel lmao
DunDunDunpachi
Patient MembeR
Y'know, I wish the ideologies that developers were passionate about -- I know this is crazy, but stick with me -- were ideologies about game design.
i.e. Dev 1 says "I think the player needs total control over the narrative" and Dev 2 says "No, our games aim to guide the player through the narrative. Total freedom ends up being boring". Dev 3 says "action games must always sacrifice graphics for the sake of high framerate" and Dev 4 replies "Disagree. Sometimes the action is better when graphical fidelity is given top priority. 30 fps is fine."
And so forth. Why don't we see those "ideological debates" taking center stage nowadays?
It certainly cannot be because non-gamers have pushed their agenda into the market. No. We were told that was untrue.
i.e. Dev 1 says "I think the player needs total control over the narrative" and Dev 2 says "No, our games aim to guide the player through the narrative. Total freedom ends up being boring". Dev 3 says "action games must always sacrifice graphics for the sake of high framerate" and Dev 4 replies "Disagree. Sometimes the action is better when graphical fidelity is given top priority. 30 fps is fine."
And so forth. Why don't we see those "ideological debates" taking center stage nowadays?
It certainly cannot be because non-gamers have pushed their agenda into the market. No. We were told that was untrue.
Boss Mog
Member
Once they released Dishonored Definitive Edition at 1080p/30fps, I was like fuck these guys and after that I was never really interested in their current gen stuff. I did pick up Dishonored 2 for 8 bucks in the "bargain bin" but I doubt I'll get around to playing it. Their other games Death of the Outsider and Prey have been sold under 10 bucks as well but I didn't even bother with those.
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DryvBy
Member
Prey is a good game I think. Sad we probably won't get another, just like Prey original.
Red Crayon Aristocrat
Member
That's a real shame, Arkane threatened to be something really interesting.
Prey was very good and at it's best reminded me of golden age Valve, which is some high praise, the overall game felt like a blend of Half-Life and Bioshock.
On the flipside Prey had a lot of very obvious virtue signaling that stuck out like a sore thumb, the worst offender being when you find an audio diary of two gay men flirting, like that really needed to be there especially when there were other gay characters (and multiple gay characters in Prey is fine, but underwear in Dishonored 2 is sexist? lmao)
And looking at the group photo of Arkane Austin I think I can guess who the trouble makers probably are.
I tell ya man, if they don't start backing off politics will be the death of the western video game industry, it's like remember in the 80s when there all this controversy over American vs Japanese cars and bumper stickers and ads used to say "buy American"? Well today when it comes to games the opposite is true, "buy Japanese"
Not saying you have to boycott western games completely yet but we better support Japanese devs because there maybe come a day when they're the only ones making worthwhile games that aren't just political diatribes.
Prey was very good and at it's best reminded me of golden age Valve, which is some high praise, the overall game felt like a blend of Half-Life and Bioshock.
On the flipside Prey had a lot of very obvious virtue signaling that stuck out like a sore thumb, the worst offender being when you find an audio diary of two gay men flirting, like that really needed to be there especially when there were other gay characters (and multiple gay characters in Prey is fine, but underwear in Dishonored 2 is sexist? lmao)
And looking at the group photo of Arkane Austin I think I can guess who the trouble makers probably are.
I tell ya man, if they don't start backing off politics will be the death of the western video game industry, it's like remember in the 80s when there all this controversy over American vs Japanese cars and bumper stickers and ads used to say "buy American"? Well today when it comes to games the opposite is true, "buy Japanese"
Not saying you have to boycott western games completely yet but we better support Japanese devs because there maybe come a day when they're the only ones making worthwhile games that aren't just political diatribes.
Roni
Gold Member
It was a great game. We need more of it. Deus Ex, Dishonored, Prey... They're all in the bleeding edge of game design.
They're complicated however, so they're niche because of their inherent difficulty.
The bigger news here is that Bethesda might not continue to be the name we usually associate with great single-player experiences. Hence Fallout 76.
Fuck...
Red Crayon Aristocrat
Member
I'm just glad Prey works well enough as a standalone story, an "open ending" is different than a cliff hanger, if we never get more I'm fine.
Although I haven't played that DLC yet and don't know what it contributes story wise.
It is obvious Arkane wanted it to be a new franchise but they wrote the game in a way to where you still walk away feeling satisfied, this ain't a Half-Life Episode 2 situation.
Shai-Tan
Banned
yeah, seems like a lot of speculation feeding into talking points about an "sjw takeover" mirroring similar sites like campusreform which get clicks by making a hyperpartisan caricature of "the left". yes some of those people exist but it gets exaggerated by media like this trolling for clicks (as media becomes more partisan its audience has more taste for outrage peddling, conspiracy theories, fear mongering etc)
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mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Yep! The sad part is some people can't recognize when they are being played like this. You have honest gamers now thinking it was the "SJW takeover" that has ruined this dev and their games.
Red Crayon Aristocrat
Member
The fundamental problem of course is just that their games haven't sold well enough.
But when a dev is having difficult times the last thing you need is people who say stuff like “the world would be better off without white men.” making it an even more stressful environment and caring more about politics than simply making the best game they can.
But when a dev is having difficult times the last thing you need is people who say stuff like “the world would be better off without white men.” making it an even more stressful environment and caring more about politics than simply making the best game they can.
LucidFeuer
Banned
The problem is that quality single game don't sell well enough, I for one, only buy (and always do eventually) when they're at the right price, which is an attitude most single gamers do (also, piracy, DLC-bullshit, spin-off milking and pricing do not help). Multiplayer gamers however spend their money like couch potato porcs and so of course they're more profitable, that's the sad truth.
As for Arkane studio, you hire SJWs in your narrative direction, this should mean the death of your studio and I personally will never buy a single thing from them again.
As for Arkane studio, you hire SJWs in your narrative direction, this should mean the death of your studio and I personally will never buy a single thing from them again.
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Sub_Level
wants to fuck an Asian grill.
Thats a shame. Prey is legit amazing and Dishonored 2 is tons of fun.
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Alexander DeLarge
Member
Why are you blaming them for it? Dishonored is a pretty resource intensive game and I'd imagine the CPU was the bottleneck, as it always is this gen. Unfortunately Bulldozer was a dud and both consoles got stuck with it. It sucks but it happens.
It'll be different next time around with Ryzen.
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makaveli60
Member
What a shame. After the Dishonored games and Prey I thought I would buy blindly Arkane's next game. But forced multiplayer (or whatever we want to call the trend) + brainwashed delusional SJWs? No buy.
MrTroubleMaker
Member
damn 
The PS4 and XBO use Jaguar APUs. Bulldozers would have been an improvement. Intel Atoms were better than the Jaguars.
Red Crayon Aristocrat
Member
It's true, I rarely pay the full 60$ for a game, I just don't have the money, I bought Prey in last year's Steam summer sale for example.
But how much is this a game not turning a profit versus greed? I feel like single player 60$ games can still turn a profit even if they don't make as much money an online title, but companies today are greedy and want to make as much money as they can.
I don't know the exact numbers but I'd be surprised if Prey lost money.
Yeah, Prey was just about the maximum level of SJWism I can tolerate in a game, any more than that and I'm checkin' out.
Thiagosc777
Member
What was SJW about Prey? I can see why people would think that about Dishonored 2, because one of the developers said he was inspired by Anita Sarkeesian.
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Sorry, but I'd hazard the reason that Prey and Dishonored didn't shift more units is their bland, anonymous, characterless titles and overall marketing than their single-player nature.
There has to be a hook, a thing that makes a title stand out and most importantly for Jo Public to get a handle on. For example Horizon didn't sell well because of Aloy, it sold on the strength of it being a game about hunting robot dinosaurs. Conversely something like Uncharted did well because it focused on an Indiana Jones stand-in, in an Indiana Jones-style action adventure.
The point being, simple, easily communicable (at-a-glance) ideas sell.
Whereas with Arkane's product you would have to actually look into what the game is about, who the lead is, and what their goals and abilities are in order to understand what's on offer. Now you can kinda get away with this sort of complex offering at the start of a gen when the market is relatively uncrowded and there are more enthusiast/early-adopter buyers with the time/mindset to do this... but after the first couple of years you are typically shit out of luck because the bulk of the user-base is casual and the hardcore have other stuff to think about.
I wouldn't greenlight a Prey or a Dishonoured at this point, it'd be just pissing money up the wall.
There has to be a hook, a thing that makes a title stand out and most importantly for Jo Public to get a handle on. For example Horizon didn't sell well because of Aloy, it sold on the strength of it being a game about hunting robot dinosaurs. Conversely something like Uncharted did well because it focused on an Indiana Jones stand-in, in an Indiana Jones-style action adventure.
The point being, simple, easily communicable (at-a-glance) ideas sell.
Whereas with Arkane's product you would have to actually look into what the game is about, who the lead is, and what their goals and abilities are in order to understand what's on offer. Now you can kinda get away with this sort of complex offering at the start of a gen when the market is relatively uncrowded and there are more enthusiast/early-adopter buyers with the time/mindset to do this... but after the first couple of years you are typically shit out of luck because the bulk of the user-base is casual and the hardcore have other stuff to think about.
I wouldn't greenlight a Prey or a Dishonoured at this point, it'd be just pissing money up the wall.
Red Crayon Aristocrat
Member
I went into detail about it in another post in another thread when it comes to Prey and I don't feel like repeating all of it.
But long story short the crew of the Talos I sure are a heckuva diverse bunch in a way that felt very on the nose, including multiple gay characters with no less than 3 Asian female lesbians if you play as a female Morgan Yu (dunno if a male one is gay too), on a space station crewed by only hundreds of people, what are the odds of that?
It's not a big big deal and to be fair part of the deal with the game is there are no nameless, generic NPCs, every crew member of the station is named and many have little backstories, that's cool and I can see why some might be gay just to differentiate them, but it's also weird, imagine if you knew about the sex lives of random characters in System Shock 2 or Bioshock, it's a very of the moment thing.
So don't get me wrong, I LOVED the game, but there were some subtle things here and there that took me out of the game and broke my immersion by reminding me I was playing a video game in 2017, when devs make a show of that sort of thing, like I said, contrast that with System Shock 2 and Bioshock.
I don't want to be a big ole stick in the mud, I can tolerate a little bit of SJW flavoring, but too much spoils the broth.
Revolutionary
Member
Not much at all, IMO. Maybe the diverse cast would be perceived as SJW? Though I don't think that holds any weight considering it's an international space station we're talking about.
That said, one of the related articles in the OP shows how some gaming publications (guess which ones) tried to force a message onto the game, like this one:
This image is especially funny because to someone like me (not white btw), the main character is still a bearded white dude on first glance lol.
Not like it even matters, because you can see your own character a grand total of 3 times throughout the game.
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Thiagosc777
Member
This is information from an anonymous source. It sounds plausible. SJWs are known to use shaming tactics and false accusations in order to pressure others. Some people could fear for their jobs.
It happens not only in games, but in other mediums as well. Not everyone is a sperg on twitter, some people have families and lives, and don't want to involved with it.
We know they exist in gaming companies, because many of them are loud and obnoxious on social media, like that guy from Mass Effect Andromeda, who routinely would post hateful comments on Twitter against white people.
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Lionel Richie
Member
RIP Arkane you were beautiful.
Dr. Claus
Vincit qui se vincit
Agreed wholeheartedly. I enjoyed Prey and Dishonored 2 quite a bit, but there was a number of things in Prey 2 that felt VERY out of place/forced.
Scopa
The Tribe Has Spoken
Can’t believe how many game developers/publishers are willing to drive their companies into the ground in order to push their agendas. Has no one told them that companies are supposed to make money?
If customers don’t like the product you are selling, maybe it’s time to go back to what they did want? Business 101.
And no, I don’t mean games as a service or multiplayer. Games without forced agendas will do.
If customers don’t like the product you are selling, maybe it’s time to go back to what they did want? Business 101.
And no, I don’t mean games as a service or multiplayer. Games without forced agendas will do.
AprXSihezIII
Banned
Gamers ask for day one stable games, less piss taking dlc, less microtransactions, better performance etc etc
We get ignored.
The other lot ask for sexed up characters and narratives so they can live their sick little fantasies through video games.
They get it. Hell, it seems at this point they control and design 90% of games, so I guess it's no surprise.
We get ignored.
The other lot ask for sexed up characters and narratives so they can live their sick little fantasies through video games.
They get it. Hell, it seems at this point they control and design 90% of games, so I guess it's no surprise.
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moniker
Member
Like Tommy and Rebecca?
klosos
Member
We could just be honest with ourselves and say they make good games that sell like shit , thats the be all end all of it really. its not just them tho.
The Gaming industry is getting so big , the amount of excellent games coming out on a regular basis. if you make a Single Player only game which is 10-15 hours long, give me one reason why i should buy it day one ? I mean Arkane are a good studio but they are not Naughty Dog , CD Project Red so on so on . I dont need to play there shit on day one. Like someone above me said i haven't played Dishonored 2 i picked it up for i think £8 on a steam sale a few months ago , will i ever play it ? i don't know. just like alot of stuff i have bought on steam most of it i wont play.
The Gaming industry is getting so big , the amount of excellent games coming out on a regular basis. if you make a Single Player only game which is 10-15 hours long, give me one reason why i should buy it day one ? I mean Arkane are a good studio but they are not Naughty Dog , CD Project Red so on so on . I dont need to play there shit on day one. Like someone above me said i haven't played Dishonored 2 i picked it up for i think £8 on a steam sale a few months ago , will i ever play it ? i don't know. just like alot of stuff i have bought on steam most of it i wont play.
I won't deny the political leaning of the late Arkane, but I don't think their failures had anything to do with that. The politics were missing from the marketing campaigns and they didn't have a lot of weight inside the games themselves, despite being there. I really enjoyed both Dishonored 2 and Prey, and I'm pretty sure the disappointing sales of the second one were related to bad positioning. Both had pretty bad marketing IMHO.
It's better to play 10-15 hour single player games instead of 600 hour multiplayer ones because that gives you more time to play more of those excellent games coming out.
In any case, I don't think the value of games should be measured in number of hours per dollar. It's not an apples to apples comparison.
It's better to play 10-15 hour single player games instead of 600 hour multiplayer ones because that gives you more time to play more of those excellent games coming out.
In any case, I don't think the value of games should be measured in number of hours per dollar. It's not an apples to apples comparison.
It's hard to believe a multi-million dollar company would allow that crap in their company.
but then I look at my twitter....
Also I'm shocked that Zenimax would adopt that "single-player games are dead" meme. What is their bread and butter
...but than I remember Fallout 76.
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klosos
Member
agree to a certain extent , I am not a multi player gamer anyway , am excited for RDR2 single player only , the multiplayer have no interest in so single player all the way for me . I just don't think a 10-15 hour experience is worth £40-50 or $60 to me , especially if the 10-15 hour game doesn't have replay value. granted in the last few years we have been spoiled with some longer fantastic games ( Divinity 2 , Witcher 3 so on so on ).
I very rarely buy day one anymore , only on rare occasions now and that's just for my most anticipated games. Truth be told i am more concerned about my financial situation then i am the financial situation of a games industry that see's people like us on this forum as cash cows and nothing more.
Arimer
Member
Prey was fine, fell apart at the end but other than that it as an overall good game. I know they were trying to make the main character nondescript so you could insert yourself but I think that's a detriment in a game like that where the lore is part of the experience. I want to know my character, not be my character. Tommy from the original prey was way better than Asian guy that I played in this one. And whoever decided to make unending security bots at the end should be drug out in the street and beat with pillows until they are mildly uncomfortable.
Thiagosc777
Member
Honestly I don't remember any mentioning of gay characters there. There could have been, but it wasn't enough for me to take notice. And the diversity thing I always considered to be a sci-fi trope, like in Star Trek. I thought Prey was pretty good.
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ROMhack
Member
I'm inclined to agree with this. It might be the result of too much difference in the company ruining creativity but both Prey and Dishonored are series seriously lacking in personality. I can't even begin to name anything specific because it's all lacking, from the music to the fonts, through to the characters, stories, and even the enemy designs.
Arkane games have solid, fun gameplay but you'd expect that in a sandbox style game. I'm also not convinced that either has any original ideas on that front.
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ROMhack
Member
Most of them still are in fairness.
DeleteriousObnoxious
Member
Man politics should just not be part of gaming Or movies, not in the degree it is being pushed, this is a terrible new trend. I also want to second that prey and dishonored were really not that creative in story department.
But the guys that designs the levels and were doing the gameplay were making up for the lack of World details and creative lack of unique expressions. As a consumer you never know What could had been and so We only judge What We have. But i mean compare the character of cyberpunk with deus ex and prey and you see that some companies and developers are not ambitions enough in expressing there feelings its all a bunch of junk food being produced with safety rails on. Absolutely disgusting. I think prey won me over because it was unique in design and unique in streamlining often complicated systems but not dumbing down said processes to such a degree it would hurt creativity of input from consumer.
But the guys that designs the levels and were doing the gameplay were making up for the lack of World details and creative lack of unique expressions. As a consumer you never know What could had been and so We only judge What We have. But i mean compare the character of cyberpunk with deus ex and prey and you see that some companies and developers are not ambitions enough in expressing there feelings its all a bunch of junk food being produced with safety rails on. Absolutely disgusting. I think prey won me over because it was unique in design and unique in streamlining often complicated systems but not dumbing down said processes to such a degree it would hurt creativity of input from consumer.
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Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Maybe it is. Most people won't bother to check it out in the first place though for the reasons I stated.
Any studio wanting millions of dollars in corporate funding, better have a damn good hook to drive sales or expect to get their pitches rejected. Its really that simple. Especially if they hope to be allowed freedom to insert political messaging, as that will be considered sales-neutral or worse, sales-negative elements.
DonF
Member
I agree with you, but I would say its 100% on the marketing for the game. The characters, at least from Dishonored, are far from bland. Marketing is to blame. They are the ones responsible for communicating to the costumers the "value" of the game. Dishonored is a very unique and characteristic game. It has awesome and fresh gameplay mechanics (StealthGamerBR ™ became famous cause of it), a really cool and unique setting, serviceable story. I mean, what else can you ask for? Prey is also distinguishable. The demo is quite something, but it ran like shit on my ps4 pro. That why I didn't get it til now (still, I think that the Pro patch made it worse, can't recall if they fixed it).
And about the easily communicable ideas, you are right. That's why I blame once again the marketing. StealthGamerBR's videos were, to me, better than everything bethesda and arkane showed. Same with Prey, I saw some dude speed run it and I was blown away.
Zeusexy
Member
For now...
astroglide
Member
Far left ruins everything. Sucks. I liked prey and diahonored. This is why you have to support single player games. Not buy used. Buy new
