Earlier quoted context omitted.
$100 is a normal (Xbox One/PS4) game price in Australia.
100 AUD is 71 USD.
Wow. That's really expensive.
Is it a 95% fun tax?
The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
71–80 of 213 posts
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
$100 is a normal (Xbox One/PS4) game price in Australia.
100 AUD is 71 USD.
I don't believe the exchange rate alone is the explanation. Here the Canadian dollar is very low versus the USD right now, yet on Steam I rarely ever see $100 games.
With the DLC and "Season passes" and other nickel and dime schemes they have, sure, but usually it's around $70-80 for AAA titles. I have an Aussie friend who I'd often gift games, then she'd pay me back on a 3rd party service what I paid, and end up saving money.
Australia really does just get screwed for whatever reason.
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#73Some amazing takeaways from the article:
- 5 weeks development time, one person.
- 5 mio 1980-USD marketing budget.
- 4 mio units produced
- 1.5 mio units sold
The units probably listed at 15-20 USD (corresponding to 50-60 USD at today's prices) and cost around 5-6 USD to produce.
Amazing facts if you have any idea on how the game industry work today.
In particular the little resources spent at development stands out. Showing that video game development back then probably was more akin to making a board game or a toy than the huge software development projects it is today.
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#74No, the man who made the worst video game in history was Hideo Kojima with Metal Gear Solid 2. Hardcore fans of prior game(s) felt a combination of let down, shock, and anger at the details. Imagine my surprise when I find out it very well could've been an ingenius plot to screw with the players. As others noted, the games overall plot against the protagonist was what he was doing to the players. Start here on a nice…
MGS2 is quite possibly the best example of a postmodern video game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-2YuPGYabw
Postmodern is a word I heard a lot but didn't understand. That was a pretty good explanation. You could say I do post-modern INFOSEC here and elsewhere. :) The video was really good esp with its fake ending and vindication of Hideo's predictions via social media. Today, they call those echo chambers.
Altogether very interesting stuff that kept me up longer than I wanted to be. Thanks for the link and lack of sleep. :)
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#75Custer's Revenge has to be the worst Atari 2600 game ever created. Overt racism and sexism combine with bad game play in one rape-y package.
Except that it was never really distributed per se and mainly became available via illegal ROM downloading channels. So whatcha been up to?
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#76I only recently watched the episode of Code Monkeys that tells this story. I did not know this was based on a true story. (I would not have suspected that a company would only assign a single programmer to such a big title, and on such a crazy schedule. Although, now that I think of it, I guess game industry veterans can tell lots and lots of these stories...)
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#77If we're going to rate Atari games adjusted by the level of effort and time put into them, I'd say this is one of its better games. This is one developer coding non-stop for five weeks straight, and he had the temerity to push back on Spielberg's ideas. I wouldn't say he caused Atari's demise, but rather he almost saved the company.
Yes, I'm not blaming someone with a limited time and very limited hardware for not putting up an all-star game
Of course, not all of the time was coding, there was a lot of hand-drawing stuff, converting it to numbers, paper calculations, testing, etc
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#78Anyone who is in to Atari 2600 knows that ET is verrrrrry far from the worst game available on that system! And it's so sad making it a great game would have take so few tweaks! http://www.neocomputer.org/projects/et/
"A few tweaks" is easier said than done when you've compressed a normal several month development cycle to 5 weeks.
I'm amazed that he shipped anything.
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#79It's a cool story. I'm actually really amazed he managed to make a game that sold 1.5 million copies (@ $40 per unit that'd be $60mil) in _5 weeks_. As the sole programmer. In an era when programming was far more tricky and low level. It isn't his fault the managers were being unreasonable in the timeline, and the company grossly over-manufactured the cartridges. If I made something in just 5 weeks that sold 1.5 mill…
> As the sole programmer. In an era when programming was far more tricky and low level.
In the same era, early 80s, kids across the UK were single-handedly writing games packed into 1-16k, some of which (Manic Miner being a prime example) sold in their hundreds of thousands in the UK market alone.
There was some pretty amazing programming skill going on back then.
Re: The man who made 'the worst video game in history'
#80I would like to read the story of "Big Rigs"!