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Games don't need venture capitalism

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Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#41

Post by kyriefh »

klik99 wrote: post #11

5 years ago I would have agreed, VCs invested in games, rather than studios and most games never get released, let alone be successful if they are released. Rovio is a good example of that time period. But so many games people have exited and formed their own VC studios, or hired people who get games, and the focus has switched to investing in teams which is way better. So while it's true that "games don't need VC",…

>there is also a place for large VC funded teams

that's a good point. i was at a large dev for a while myself and a fair number of coworkers have gone on to start their own studios, taking VC money in the process. a second dinner or theorycraft does need deep pockets, and the teams themselves bring most of the execution expertise needed

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#42

Post by fwsgonzo »

HideousKojima wrote: post #17
Gigachad wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you actually can reduce a lot of it to a formula. Most major games that come out are basically a modern remake of something that already exists and was popular. Just rehashing the same concepts and improving them is a pretty solid strategy. This strategy won’t create the Minecrafts and Stardew vallies, but it covers the bulk of game development.

Even Stardew Valley was basically just improving on the existing, popular concepts found in the Harvest Moon and Rune Factory series (among others).

Indeed, if you play Harvest Moon, it's quite interesting just how much Stardew Valley copies.

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#43

Post by kyriefh »

larsiusprime wrote: post #3
kyriefh wrote: post #2

hiya, author here. Palworld is a wild, wild game (think pokemon meets ark:survival evolved, or simply pokemon with guns), and it follows a number of other super-successful indie games that got made with no VC funding. i myself work heavily within the VC ecosystem, so it got me thinking about how games and VC tie together. while the article is written in an opinionated manner, i don't mean to present it as fact - more…

Having worked in games for 10+ years, and having recently joined a more traditional VC-backed startup outside of games, I think you are 100% on the money. The VC model doesn't make a lot of sense for games. So many outsiders come into games thinking they know what they're doing and they learn some hard (and expensive!) lessons fast. Thanks for writing this.

thanks for reading and sharing your perspective! i'm arguing against my own interest here as VCs indirectly pay most of my income, but as you also observe the standard playbook doesn't quite seem to copy paste well

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#44

Post by dumpsterlid »

jokethrowaway wrote: post #36
hresvelgr wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My inspiration for the idea was VicScreen[1], an Australian Victorian state government agency that funds film and interactive media projects. In the past they have funded half of a project's development budget but I'm unsure of their procedures as of now. Cult of the Lamb[2] was partially subsidised by VicScreen as an example. There is a selection process but the money comes with few strings attached, mainly attribut…

Art is a sort of enjoyable endeavour for the artist and I certainly wish I would be paid to paint or make a videogame - but the world has way too much art being produced and it doesn't need another one - so I can keep writing crap react app for 300k and my soul or make a game for 50k (or go indie and likely starve). In particular I think fiat currency and inflation drives the industry to stupid investments trying to…

yawn another libertarian blaming things on too much government.

I could sure use some more government right now cracking down on industries with oligopolies that feel no threat of consequence for completely undermining the quality of their products while raising prices.

Who says way too much art is being made? There are a dizzying array of video games outs there but there is still clearly plenty room for more.

The problem is the exploitive way we set up these industries. Right now we have most of the big game companies seemingly poised to try to fire all the bulk of their artists/employees in favor of ai and it goes going to fail spectacularly but the damage to human workers in the industry will be long lasting all the same.

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#45

Post by gamblor956 »

minimaxir wrote: post #32
TillE wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen a couple people refer to BG3 as if it's some out-of-the-blue success. Larian has a strong history of consistent success, and reached another level by licensing an extremely popular franchise. Similarly, nearly every AAA franchise game will do very well. Maybe there are some ups and downs, but overall it's boringly predictable. I can absolutely guarantee that GTA6 will be one of the best-selling games of all…

BG3 was an iteration into a niche genre (CRPGs) where previous iterations in that genre underperformed (Pillars of Eternity and Divinity: Original Sin). Everyone, including Larian, was surprised.

Pillars of Eternity sold well enough to save Obsidian from bankruptcy.

D:OS sold 500,000 copies in 3 months, making over $10,000,000 on a development budget of $4 million. Not AAA numbers, but Larian more than doubled their investment.

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#46

Post by gamblor956 »

jmyeet wrote: post #24
wodenokoto wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure I agree. Disney and Pixar lives and dies on being able to repeat success. And both have lived for quite a while now. Rovio was extremely conscious about not building an empire on top of angry birds, as that dad would eventually fade and they needed a new thing. They were aiming to be the next Disney, but of games and smartphones, not cinema and tv. I’m surprised they took $40 million in VC as that sounds…

Pixar is a perfect example. They had a focus on technological prowess, pioneering animation and storytelling under Steve Jobs that became part of their DNA. There was huge cultural inertia. Since the Disney acquisition it’s mostly been recycling old IP into sequels.

Everything you gave Jobs credit for was actually the work of John Lassetter. Pixar was floundering under Jobs' leadership. Lassetter had the Disney connection that saved the company. Jobs nearly killed the Disney deal many times, and due to his abysmal negotiating skills Disney ended up owning the rights to all of the films and characters made by Pixar (i.e., essentially everything of value).

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#47

Post by pjmlp »

fbdab103 wrote: post #19
tasn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just sharing, as I just looked it up: Rovio was bought by Sega last yeae for $776m. They've had over $300m yearly revenue in 2022, though not profitable.

That is wild to me that they could not be profitable. That is so much money stemming from some mobile games. Games from the outside have limited production values vs AAA titles. Do they spend it all on promotional material to not get out competed by the next mobile venture? Or is it just ever increasing team sizes? M&A gone wrong?

The top 1% are the lucky ones. That is it, game development is as hard as any other artistic form, and or even worse, given how many titles are launched per day.

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#48

Post by meheleventyone »

This article is a bit stating the status quo because games have largely not been funded by VC for most of their lifetime. Although saying that I’ve worked at three venture backed studios in two decades. Although these have all been focused around ‘bigger ideas’ rather than a single game.

I would say the days of crowdfunding being a sensible strategy for early stage funding isn’t true anymore. Rather it’s a great way to spend money to help build a community early on. You need a lot of work and good production value to attract attention.

Games funding itself feels like it’s in a tricky place. Even “indie” titles are getting up into budgets of $1-2 million and obviously on the other end of the scale there’s non-stop complaining about how AAA costs are out of control versus the money consumers are willing to spend. Then there feels like a scattershot of smaller publishers that are to an extent preying on starry eyed kids making their first game where budgets offered are unsustainably small and promises to help with discovery never happen.

From a developer perspective VC seems a lot more attractive as well. Typically less onerous to get, different kind of working relationship, doesn’t eat into revenue and the numbers are higher! But you have to be making something very specifically interesting to the people investing and have a team pedigree they recognise.

Re: Games don't need venture capitalism

#50

Post by ImprobableTruth »

hresvelgr wrote: post #18

Games in this day and age ideally need generous government subsidy to be successful. I feel we're a long way off universal basic income worldwide so at the very least, something like an artist's living wage provided by the government is a necessity to produce good independent video games. Most professional indie developers tend to survive rather than thrive, barely kept afloat by money from publishers who also have t…

Why would you want it to be divorced from success? Seems like popularity/commercial success is the best measure of "being good" societally that we have for art.

People making art/games only for themselves is fine of course, but I don't see why society should subsidize it (as long as we have finite resources - beyond that everything goes of course).

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