Major Games Publishers Are Feeling the Impact of Peaking Attention • Hacker News Board

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

#31

Post by learc83 » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:29 PM UTC

debacle wrote: post #12

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.

I think it might have something to do with a combination of free to play and no matchmaking.

Once a BR has saturated the market, the percentage of new to experienced players starts to drop. I think most players will reach a skill peak and the game starts to get harder faster than they are improving. This can be frustrating, and since newer BRs have a higher percentage of less skill players they feel easier. With no money barrier, the players switch.

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

#32

Post by qmarchi » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:33 PM UTC

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…

> Also most esports telecasts have too much fluff and too little gameplay, hours of pregame chats and pettifloggery for very short actual gameplay, they should take a hint from football(Soccer for Americans), esp EPL broadcasts, very less fluff.

With Football and Basketball, the rules determine that the game is `x` minutes long, but because people are adapting games like Rocket League which were built for 'short' 5 minute matches and then a player is on to the next round. Where you see most of the time, like with League of Legends' LCS is that they can string multiple matches right after another on the same day. There's plenty of pregame and postgame talk and fluff, but you get that with other sports as well.

A great example of Football having the pre game coverage is the Texas GameDay team, which will start broadcasts at 6:30 PM and end at 8:45 with the beginning of game coverage.

Disclaimer: I play Rocket League semi-professionally, and was previously a technical director for a Football team's live cast (radio, TV, livestream).

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

#33

Post by Macha » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:35 PM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #11

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 mor…

Or even accelerating the rate at which players age out of their target market. There's only so many games you can be subjected to the loot box marketing spree before you start turning away from major publishers all together. I like to sit down and enjoy my video games, not have carrots dangled to open my wallet after every chunk of gameplay.

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

#34

Post by 1123581321 » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:36 PM UTC

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…

The best reporting on Activision I’ve seen has been from outside the games industry and games journalism (I’ve preferred writing from this link, Variety, Bloomberg, etc.)

Activision is not concerned about whether they are making money now. They are concerned about whether they can continue to make money. They have profitable, mature lines but nothing in the battle royale genre that is quickly growing and a threat to both Call of Duty and Overwatch, not to mention what’s next after that. They need to invest heavily in acquisitions and development of new titles using their existing brands. The layoffs came from areas of the company that wouldn’t be able to help with that.

The morality of layoffs can be debated, of course, but analysis of the reasoning has been too absent from close followers of the games industry.

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

#35

Post by falcolas » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:37 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #20

debacle wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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

The same thing that causes companies who are making record profits to be considered underperforming: growth at any cost. For EA and Activision/Blizzard (and their big name kin), if a game doesn't have the potential to make significantly more money than its peers, it's not worth making.

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

#36

Post by 0xcde4c3db » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:38 PM UTC

tokai wrote: post #13

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.

I'm not sure developers are really the problem. It seems like over the past 10-15 years the video game publishing industry has adopted Hollywood turd-polishing tactics (late review embargo dates, extremely frontloaded marketing blitzes with almost no useful/accurate information) to try to sell troubled productions as-is instead of overhauling them. Anthem absolutely reeks of this, for example.

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

#37

Post by cwyers » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:38 PM UTC

I feel like I'm way out of touch with what I read online about game prices, and I don't think that I'm looking at things wrong. Games still cost about what they did when I was a teenager -- which is to say game prices haven't kept price with inflation. Meanwhile, games have added big increased in graphical quality, in the amount of voice acting and mo-cap involved, in the size of maps and whatnot. Meanwhile, for instance, I got Assassin's Creed Odyssey for myself for Christmas, and I've been putting 5-10 hours a week into it ever since and I'm still only about 2/3rd of the way through the main story campaign. There's almost no other entertainment medium where I can go spend $60 and get that much time spent out of it. And by just waiting for the holidays, I didn't have to spend $60, I spent like $30. And yet online I see complaint after complaint about how big AAA games aren't delivering value for the money because of all the DLC available that they feel "should" be part of the base game. I don't get it.

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

#38

Post by jayd16 » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:40 PM UTC

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #15

jayd16 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Like I said. This is why wow gives out character boosts for every expansion now. You can jump in pretty easily. You could drop in and be level into the end game gear loop in a couple weeks.

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

#39

Post by falcolas » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:43 PM UTC

1123581321 wrote: post #34

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…

The best reporting on Activision I’ve seen has been from outside the games industry and games journalism (I’ve preferred writing from this link, Variety, Bloomberg, etc.) Activision is not concerned about whether they are making money now. They are concerned about whether they can continue to make money. They have profitable, mature lines but nothing in the battle royale genre that is quickly growing and a threat to…

> but nothing in the battle royale genre that is quickly growing and a threat to both Call of Duty and Overwatch

This makes the assumption that if they make it, the market will obviously move to their product. The genre has a fairly fixed market, and taking away players from their previous investments (time and money) will take an exceptionally good game.

Ironically, making good, interesting games is the one thing that Activision/Blizzard are/have been shifting their focus away from, ever since the iconic "I want to take the fun out of making video games" statement from their CEO.

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

#40

Post by pnw_hazor » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:44 PM UTC

qmarchi wrote: post #24

debacle wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

To follow up on it, EA isn't even terrible on having the studios make relatively great games. A quick look at the skyrocketing success of Apex: Legends, announced _at the EA call_ on Feb 5th, has already surpassed 25M accounts and 2M concurrent users. They need to focus on what's made them most of their money over the past years, game sales for series games (FIFA, NASCAR, etc.) and great first-party titles that aren'…

Though from what I read, EA allegedly had zero input into Apex. That might be why it is becoming popular. I just tried Apex a few days ago, it was pretty fun.