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Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

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Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#11

Post by Spooky23 »

maxsilver wrote: post #3

This seems like a inaccurate take from folks who are not following the gaming industry closely. Activision just had a record-setting year of high revenue (presumably they are not feeling the impact of peaking attention), in part because the quality of their products is still high-ish. They laid people off because they could, not because of any downturn in business. EA's quarterly results are down, because their produ…

I don’t have a ton of direct insight into gaming, but in general when a business that’s dependent on development is facing headwinds and doubles down on hitting the numbers, that’s a bad sign. It’s often a signal that the firm is not investing in the business.

IMO, modern business models for gaming (ie casinos for elementary school kids) are problematic and are turning kids off. There will be a harsh reckoning as more and more people figure that out.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#12

Post by debacle »

There is intense competition between these battle royale games. Possibly more intense competition than we've ever seen. Being the 2nd WoW or top MOBA pales in comparison. Of the dozen BRs I've played (including mods for existing games), all but 3 already seem somewhat dead. PUBG, which was the leader for what seems like the longest duration, now seems like a distant third, and will likely never recover.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#13

Post by tokai »

maxsilver wrote: post #3

This seems like a inaccurate take from folks who are not following the gaming industry closely. Activision just had a record-setting year of high revenue (presumably they are not feeling the impact of peaking attention), in part because the quality of their products is still high-ish. They laid people off because they could, not because of any downturn in business. EA's quarterly results are down, because their produ…

>If you build a well designed, well crafted product

Not a strong suit for triple-a developers.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#14

Post by debacle »

billfruit wrote: post #7
crsv wrote: post #4

An interesting thing that's happening right now with the release and rise of Apex Legends is seeing how these now stale numbers are already starting to move around in regards to the level of engagement that Fortnite now commands versus what it commanded only weeks ago. The pace that the market is moving is pretty incredible in direct contrast to the landscape even just 5 years ago when MOBA's owned the world. This in…

I do think Esports is let down by bad production quality of the telecasts, for eg: Most Rocket League telecasts seem show most of the match from each players camera, quickly switching from one player to another, but showing the whole action from a roof-top or sky camera or atleast traditional football broadcast like camera would make it more watchable. Even with CSGO and Overwatch, similar problems, the game designer…

Rocket League hosts both high tier and low tier events. The production quality reflects this - their high tier events are very professional and have a completely different talent lineup than lower tier events, including the observer (camera man).

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#15

Post by crankylinuxuser »

jayd16 wrote: post #8
abakker wrote: post #5

It's been years since I played any games really. I enjoyed D3 and really committed for a while to WoW. personally, I don't really like free to play as it distorts the gaming experience too much. Take WoW for example: when it started, it was legitimately slow and hard to get to level 20. Now that level 20 is the free to play cap, it only takes a few hours. All the fun that came from exploration and "play" of the game…

That has nothing to do with being free. For many expansions now,WoW has pushed players up to the latest content (usually last expansion content and 10 levels). They've been through 2 stat squishes and several expansions where you get a character boost when you buy the expansion. The MMO feel only happens when you're paying an MMO though so it makes sense to push the players into a smaller cross section of the game. T…

But with MMOs, I didn't get in early or even recent, so its incredibly hard for me to get in on the action. I'd be relegated to begging and looking for groups.

Whereas games like fortnite are "download and play". Sure there's emotes and hats, but that's not gameplay. Its low barrier for me to start whenever. I'm not missing the last 10 expansions.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#16

Post by 0xcde4c3db »

llukas wrote: post #9

I'd love to spend money on games. Most games seem to be optimized for younger audience (==dumbed down) or monetized in really dumb ways. So no buy.

Yeah, I'm feeling that. It's creeping into more traditional genres and publishers as well. I was kinda hyped for BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle until it was revealed that the base $50 game is a "starter pack"; only half the roster is included. For this kind of game it might be defensible to use DLC to negotiate the addition of more franchises contingent on initial sales, but they actually sliced characters from every included franchise, probably in an attempt to jack up the DLC attach rate. So it goes on the hypothetical "maybe I'll buy a discounted 'Complete Edition' someday" pile.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#17

Post by debacle »

falcolas wrote: post #10
maxsilver wrote: post #3

This seems like a inaccurate take from folks who are not following the gaming industry closely. Activision just had a record-setting year of high revenue (presumably they are not feeling the impact of peaking attention), in part because the quality of their products is still high-ish. They laid people off because they could, not because of any downturn in business. EA's quarterly results are down, because their produ…

> EA's quarterly results are down, And yet they posted pre-tax profits of almost 1.5 billion dollars in 2018 (their highest profit numbers in the last 4 years). That's hardly the mark of a company that's ready to go under. Growth is not the only measure of a companies health.

EA is really struggling with their Star Wars license. If they put out just 1 good Star Wars game they'd see insane revenue. I haven't purchased an AAA title in years and I would buy an okayish Jedi Knight IV.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#18

Post by ehsanu1 »

billfruit wrote: post #7
crsv wrote: post #4

An interesting thing that's happening right now with the release and rise of Apex Legends is seeing how these now stale numbers are already starting to move around in regards to the level of engagement that Fortnite now commands versus what it commanded only weeks ago. The pace that the market is moving is pretty incredible in direct contrast to the landscape even just 5 years ago when MOBA's owned the world. This in…

I do think Esports is let down by bad production quality of the telecasts, for eg: Most Rocket League telecasts seem show most of the match from each players camera, quickly switching from one player to another, but showing the whole action from a roof-top or sky camera or atleast traditional football broadcast like camera would make it more watchable. Even with CSGO and Overwatch, similar problems, the game designer…

> but showing the whole action from a roof-top or sky camera or atleast traditional football broadcast like camera would make it more watchable

I'm quite sure this is very intentional with Rocket League broadcasts. There's even a "director cam" that Psyonix built for this purpose, and it is still used often. It's just that it's not as exciting or impressive when you're not seeing it from the player's view for whatever reason. Everything looks slower and you miss all the nuances of the pros' mechanics.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#19

Post by grawprog »

debacle wrote: post #17
falcolas wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> EA's quarterly results are down, And yet they posted pre-tax profits of almost 1.5 billion dollars in 2018 (their highest profit numbers in the last 4 years). That's hardly the mark of a company that's ready to go under. Growth is not the only measure of a companies health.

EA is really struggling with their Star Wars license. If they put out just 1 good Star Wars game they'd see insane revenue. I haven't purchased an AAA title in years and I would buy an okayish Jedi Knight IV.

Just think of how many different colours of lightsabres would be available through microtransactions. I would have said grey area gambling but you did specify okayish.

Re: Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention

#20

Post by CydeWeys »

debacle wrote: post #17
falcolas wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> EA's quarterly results are down, And yet they posted pre-tax profits of almost 1.5 billion dollars in 2018 (their highest profit numbers in the last 4 years). That's hardly the mark of a company that's ready to go under. Growth is not the only measure of a companies health.

EA is really struggling with their Star Wars license. If they put out just 1 good Star Wars game they'd see insane revenue. I haven't purchased an AAA title in years and I would buy an okayish Jedi Knight IV.

My dream is a modern Star Wars/TIE Fighter space shooter. Those were some of my very favorite games back in the late Win 3.1/early Win 95 era.

I suspect it wouldn't have the same widespread appeal as an adventure/shooter/RPG like Jedi Knight, but it could be also be made at a pretty low cost, and it's not like the license restricts how many Star Wars games they can release. May as well go make a space shooter with a smaller team while they still have the license.

Why does everything have to get the AAA treatment these days?

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