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Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
61–70 of 149 posts
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
This reminds me of a couple of games I had on the Commodore-64. One had a helicopter, but the other was Lunar Lander, which has a very similar mechanic. I can recall a few others with similar play style - Star paws and Zaxxon come to mind.
Zaxxon! That's a blast from the past, and the only reason I ever knew for someone to be jealous of a ColecoVision.
There were some decent ColecoVision games like some of the arcade ports. The joystick was murder on your hands though if you played long enough.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#63The first title of this type I recall playing in the arcades was Scramble, but you had lasers and bombs. Of the non-increasingly difficult type, they're a dime a dozen. We did one at MTV with SpongeBob and I think AddictingGames did one for Potty Racers. Pretty common, still fun if the controls are done right.
And that's the hitch.
The controls in the Potty Racers version were poor, to give it a compliment. Getting things in any game exactly "right" is what makes one game better than another. Lots of physics games before Angry Birds, none got the physics exactly right.
I'm sure some of your remember Doodle Jump. There was a game before that, that was the exact same type. Same controls, same type of character. But the controls, and what was expected of the character were both off, so no huge hit.
In the game industry, we'll continue to learn this rule over and over as long as accountants tell us what is a good game and what isn't.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#64My kids had this game on their ipad. They asked me to have a go at it, I had a look, started playing... 30 minutes later "Dad can I have my my ipad back". Seriously I was hating that game, but the desire to beat my kids score outweighed my frustration at some of those issues (hitbox of the pipes etc). I HAD to beat my previous score, I HAD to master the delicate touch required to precisely navigate those pipes. It's…
Actually, the game mechanic is deceptively different. It looks and feels like those previous helicopter games where you hold to accelerate up. But it's very different, in that, you top to give the bird a sudden impulse. This is much harder to control with precision. That's where it's addictive nature comes from... It's deceptive as in "oh I know how to play this kind of game, I can do this!" but in reality it's way m…
Jetpack Joyride has the exact same control idea when you're controlling the "Profit Bird" vehicle. So it must be a bird thing.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#65This story is incredibly reductionist to the point of being false. Flappy Bird tells you nothing about what the 'People' want. Today they want a single button physics game, tomorrow they want hardcore shooters. Some people want RPGs, others want micropayment sandboxes. They problem is that everyone is trying to copy the dumb luck of developers who happen upon the right mix of categories at the right moment in time. O…
Not to mention a certain Youtuber with a bazillion subs put it in front of a lot of kids who love to share it with their friends.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#66"The big players in the AAA sector believe the people want military shooters and open-world games full of the old ultra violence."
A lot of people do want those things, which is why "Call of Duty" and "Grand Theft Auto" make billions of dollars every sequel.
"The indie community believes that what people really want is experimental games with heart and a unique visual sensibility. And puzzle platformers. And roguelikes."
Some people do want those things, which is why these genres have dedicated followings.
At the risk of sounding glib: Flappy Bird's success doesn't prove or disprove anything about the gaming industry. It certainly isn't some sort of paradigm shift, and it's hardly an indication that "no one knows what the audience wants."
To put it more directly: there is no "the audience," in some monolithic and homogenous sense of the word. There are audiences. When an outlier comes around every now and then, offering novel gameplay and a unique sensibility, that's awesome. But it doesn't mean everyone else is somehow wrong. The only ones who will get it wrong, in this case, will be the legions of publishers rushing Flappy Bird clones to market in the hopes of catching some of its halo effect. (Upon last app store search, it seemed there are already many dozens of these in the market.)
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#67"The big players in the AAA sector believe the people want military shooters and open-world games full of the old ultra violence." A lot of people do want those things, which is why "Call of Duty" and "Grand Theft Auto" make billions of dollars every sequel. "The indie community believes that what people really want is experimental games with heart and a unique visual sensibility. And puzzle platformers. And roguelik…
I also think, with indie games, you get things like "heart" and "unique visual sensibility" simply because those are the most easily available ways for an indie developer to add value to their game.
And similarly with Zynga/facebook games- I don't think it's necessarily their opinion that they are making the "right" game, it's just that they are making the game most likely to draw in people from social networks and keep them.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#68First, they want games about birds. What kind of conclusion is this? It's a 2-d side-scrolling game with basic sinking/gravity dynamics. There are only a few ways to make a game with those rules. (1) use a flying object/animal (2) put the level underwater (eg Super Mario Brothers, 1985) (3) make the game entirely abstract.
Who doesn't love birds? Add video games and you have a winner!
except Larry Bird vs Doctor J by EA. That one wasn't so good.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#69I've just discovered that 'Another One Bites the Dust' provides a good rhythm for maintaining a roughly constant altitude. You're welcome.
Re: Flappy Bird is proof that no one knows what the audience wants
#70"The big players in the AAA sector believe the people want military shooters and open-world games full of the old ultra violence." A lot of people do want those things, which is why "Call of Duty" and "Grand Theft Auto" make billions of dollars every sequel. "The indie community believes that what people really want is experimental games with heart and a unique visual sensibility. And puzzle platformers. And roguelik…
I don't disagree with most of your post, but I still think the basic message of the blog post is valid.
Obviously, if developers in AAA or indie sector knew that this kind of huge success could be had with a game like this, they would have made it. But it's humbling to consider that no matter how long people make games, nobody knows the formula for the making next big hit. I don't think he's trying to say that AAA or indie developers are dumb.