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Post by Kroitz on Jan 15, 2019 2:13:10 GMT
Leaving a like for the sweet bogglin prince.
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Post by SofaJockey on Jan 15, 2019 2:13:15 GMT
noone-NOONE- asked games to go all in on graphical fidelity Doesn't 'my face is tired' suggest that developers won't be allowed to make the slightest slip in this area?
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Post by SofaJockey on Jan 15, 2019 2:31:57 GMT
And I thought this was a fascinating contribution to the topic.
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Post by lennybusker on Jan 15, 2019 3:05:16 GMT
noone-NOONE- asked games to go all in on graphical fidelity Doesn't 'my face is tired' suggest that developers won't be allowed to make the slightest slip in this area? Come on though, that didn't happen due to a stylistic choice, it was because the animations were literally unfinished placeholders.
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Post by smilesja on Jan 15, 2019 3:05:27 GMT
And I thought this was a fascinating contribution to the topic. " It's too late for EA to change their public image"
Youtube comment
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Hrulj
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion
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Post by Hrulj on Jan 15, 2019 6:57:22 GMT
Games make millions. Sometimes even billions of dollars. The games are not becoming more expensive to make. If anything there's a glut of skilled workers in the field. What isn't ever going down is the greed of large companies. EA is at the forefront, but others, like Bethesda with their recent moves to make everything as cheap as possible and charge 20$ for a freaking ingame skin is a sign of where the things are headed. Anthem will have microtransactions and ingame shop. It will start with costumes but if successful will expand to every aspect of the game. There is no doubt to that. You're right about the greed part, but wrong about the expense part. Games are more expensive to make, if you control for quality and features. And it's not like an environment artist or game engine developer is cheaper now than they were 10 years ago, whatever you may think of the labor supply. But this is neither here nor there. The expense of the game has nothing to do with the extent of recurring revenue. The irony is, the cheaper the game is to make, the much more likely the recurring revenue will be predatory. Candy Crush, anyone? I'm sorry but that's just not true. Games are cheaper to make. No one forced bioware to spend 60 million on MEA. Where did that money go? How was it invested? Skyrim made billions, made by a small team, a team so small that Bethesda games are infamous for being a buggy mess that needs to be sorted out by players. They're using the same old engine used 20 years ago on Morrowind. And they're raising prices, instituting micro, multiplayer and other crap no one wants. What game in the 90's sold for a billion dollar? Games are some of the purest profit margine projects one can make. Secondly if you can't afford to invest 20 billion in a game then don't invest it. Make a game you can afford. And that is supposing the truth in the too expensive lie. You're right about the greed part, but wrong about the expense part. Games are more expensive to make, if you control for quality and features. And it's not like an environment artist or game engine developer is cheaper now than they were 10 years ago, whatever you may think of the labor supply. But this is neither here nor there. The expense of the game has nothing to do with the extent of recurring revenue. The irony is, the cheaper the game is to make, the much more likely the recurring revenue will be predatory. Candy Crush, anyone? Like a lot more...teams are bigger, more expensive, infrastructure and associative overhead is more...yet game prices have hardly risen in the past decade. And I'll take the opposing view on greed. Consumers are the greedy ones. They expect more, better, faster without consideration for who's going to pay for it. Kind of disconnect there imo. In customer service you can offer price, quality, or efficiency. Consumers can expect to get one of those...two if they're lucky. They'll never get all three. I do agree that the effort/expense doesn't have anything to do with predatory practices...less expensive doesn't negate... What more do the customers expect? That 60$ paid for a full game gets them a full game? How horrendous. Fucking entitled brats. Witcher 3 made 1 billion $ over 1.5 year period at an investment of 81 million in total for entire game, all DLC's and marketing. And no predatory practices whatsoever.
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Post by river82 on Jan 15, 2019 7:35:12 GMT
Doesn't 'my face is tired' suggest that developers won't be allowed to make the slightest slip in this area? Come on though, that didn't happen due to a stylistic choice, it was because the animations were literally unfinished placeholders. And also because the writing was shit dodgy. But that's likely because the writing was rushed and needed an edit or two
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helios969
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Origin: helios969
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Post by helios969 on Jan 15, 2019 10:26:12 GMT
Witcher 3 made 1 billion $ over 1.5 year period at an investment of 81 million in total for entire game, all DLC's and marketing. And no predatory practices whatsoever. Well you got it all sorted so you should take your business savvy and knowledge of game development and show all those greedy b*stards how it's done. If you're going to pump out TW3-tier games, I would certainly purchase.
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Post by Hrulj on Jan 15, 2019 12:49:28 GMT
Witcher 3 made 1 billion $ over 1.5 year period at an investment of 81 million in total for entire game, all DLC's and marketing. And no predatory practices whatsoever. Well you got it all sorted so you should take your business savvy and knowledge of game development and show all those greedy b*stards how it's done. If you're going to pump out TW3-tier games, I would certainly purchase. Certainly would if I had few dozen million laying around. Someone though has them. And bitches how little money it makes
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Post by PapaCharlie9 on Jan 15, 2019 15:22:21 GMT
Even if the cost of making games is going up, the sheer glut of profit being made on physical and digital sales ALONE dwarf any supposed development sink, let alone supplementary monetization like MTXs and other DLCs. The problem isn't that games don't earn enough; the problem is that it's not going back into the games: It's going into the pockets of the CEOs, Shareholders/Investors, and offshore tax havens. Just like every OTHER effing industry in this country. Any one of these "Triple AAA" companies could fund the entire industry for a YEAR without so much as a dip into their own finances. Now we're seeing the crash that heralds the bursting of this monetization bubble. Unsustainable growth is self explanatory. Edit: And noone-NOONE- asked games to go all in on graphical fidelity, complex game systems, or marketing. We could have had a situation where graphics slowly but steadily climbed to meet actual customer demand and budget accordingly BUT NO. EVERYTHING now HAS to be photorealistic or it's the worst crap ever (gaming journalism that panders to this kind of graphical orgy contribute as well). Not mentioning of course the simple stylistic games that are far FAR AND AWAY better quality and more profitable like Minecraft or Stardew Valley. I was going to whole-heartedly agree with your reply, but then you had to go and add that Edit/last paragraph. "No one" asked for games to go all in on graphical fidelity? Seriously? You should see the angsting and hand-wringing over how bad the textures look in the Fort Tarsis Exploration video. You're living in a bubble if you think buying decisions for AAA games aren't strongly influenced, particularly on PC, by graphical fidelity and what other people think of it. There's also a significant "keeping up with the joneses" between developers. Anthem is already getting compared to Red Dead Redemption 2 and God of War, as two recent graphical standouts. It's not a good thing for your AAA game to come up short when a game that shipped a few months ago, or even a full year before you, looks way better. I have literally seen one-liner posts like the following: Anthem has to support 4K 60fps or won't buy. Nevermind that 4K 60fps isn't even a very good metric for graphical quality, and generally hurts quality or performance, or both. Do I believe the only thing that matters is graphical fidelity? Of course not. NieR:Automata is one of the best games ever, but it's barely AA graphics quality. That doesn't prevent PCMR from dumping all over it without even trying it, though, because "graphics look bad" is what a lot of Steam reviews say.
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Origin: helios969
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Post by helios969 on Jan 15, 2019 22:34:05 GMT
I was going to whole-heartedly agree with your reply, but then you had to go and add that Edit/last paragraph. "No one" asked for games to go all in on graphical fidelity? Seriously? You should see the angsting and hand-wringing over how bad the textures look in the Fort Tarsis Exploration video. You're living in a bubble if you think buying decisions for AAA games aren't strongly influenced, particularly on PC, by graphical fidelity and what other people think of it. There's also a significant "keeping up with the joneses" between developers. Anthem is already getting compared to Red Dead Redemption 2 and God of War, as two recent graphical standouts. It's not a good thing for your AAA game to come up short when a game that shipped a few months ago, or even a full year before you, looks way better. I have literally seen one-liner posts like the following: Anthem has to support 4K 60fps or won't buy. Nevermind that 4K 60fps isn't even a very good metric for graphical quality, and generally hurts quality or performance, or both. Do I believe the only thing that matters is graphical fidelity? Of course not. NieR:Automata is one of the best games ever, but it's barely AA graphics quality. That doesn't prevent PCMR from dumping all over it without even trying it, though, because "graphics look bad" is what a lot of Steam reviews say. If only Bio would cater to my gaming preferences...they'd be raking in the cash.
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Post by rras1994 on Jan 15, 2019 22:47:19 GMT
Well you got it all sorted so you should take your business savvy and knowledge of game development and show all those greedy b*stards how it's done. If you're going to pump out TW3-tier games, I would certainly purchase. Certainly would if I had few dozen million laying around. Someone though has them. And bitches how little money it makes A few dozen million? A new IP in the AAA space costs minimum 100 million dollars and I don't even think that's factoring in the marketing costs which would bring that figure to double. The industry average costs about $10,000 dollars a month per employee and staff per AAA game is 100s and that's excluding the contract work. TW3 cost $80 million to make and that's being in a low cost country while not paying their staff particularly well, being a crunch constant studio. Also CDPR has the funds from GOG to help keep them afloat plus got a grant from the EU for Cyberpunk (I think it was cyberpunk but I also think due to the conditions they were meant to have released the game by now). Seriously, you going to cry "greed" and how costs haven't gone up, at least use some accurate figures/
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Post by river82 on Jan 15, 2019 22:50:23 GMT
Certainly would if I had few dozen million laying around. Someone though has them. And bitches how little money it makes A few dozen million? A new IP in the AAA space costs minimum 100 million dollars and I don't even think that's factoring in the marketing costs which would bring that figure to double. The industry average costs about $10,000 dollars a month per employee and staff per AAA game is 100s and that's excluding the contract work. TW3 cost $80 million to make and that's being in a low cost country while not paying their staff particularly well, being a crunch constant studio. Also CDPR has the funds from GOG to help keep them afloat plus got a grant from the EU for Cyberpunk (I think it was cyberpunk but I also think due to the conditions they were meant to have released the game by now). Seriously, you going to cry "greed" and how costs haven't gone up, at least use some accurate figures/ TW3's total budget was 80 million which includes marketing. So probably only half that to just develop, or make.
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Post by rras1994 on Jan 15, 2019 22:55:10 GMT
A few dozen million? A new IP in the AAA space costs minimum 100 million dollars and I don't even think that's factoring in the marketing costs which would bring that figure to double. The industry average costs about $10,000 dollars a month per employee and staff per AAA game is 100s and that's excluding the contract work. TW3 cost $80 million to make and that's being in a low cost country while not paying their staff particularly well, being a crunch constant studio. Also CDPR has the funds from GOG to help keep them afloat plus got a grant from the EU for Cyberpunk (I think it was cyberpunk but I also think due to the conditions they were meant to have released the game by now). Seriously, you going to cry "greed" and how costs haven't gone up, at least use some accurate figures/ TW3's total budget was 80 million which includes marketing. So probably only half that to just develop, or make. Roughly the same as Andromeda then. still doesn't change the fact that TW3 was developed in a low wage country and doesn't even for that standard apparently pay it's workers very well and is a crunch studio which means it bassically uses it's employees. That's kind of the definition of greedy.
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ahglock
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Shattered Steel, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR, Anthem
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Post by ahglock on Jan 15, 2019 23:28:53 GMT
f only Bio would cater to my gaming preferences...they'd be raking in the cash. Liar, it’s my tastes that will bring in the dough. Bring back turn based combat. 😄
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Post by Deleted on Jan 15, 2019 23:48:31 GMT
Even if the cost of making games is going up, the sheer glut of profit being made on physical and digital sales ALONE dwarf any supposed development sink, let alone supplementary monetization like MTXs and other DLCs. The problem isn't that games don't earn enough; the problem is that it's not going back into the games: It's going into the pockets of the CEOs, Shareholders/Investors, and offshore tax havens. Just like every OTHER effing industry in this country. Any one of these "Triple AAA" companies could fund the entire industry for a YEAR without so much as a dip into their own finances. Now we're seeing the crash that heralds the bursting of this monetization bubble. Unsustainable growth is self explanatory. EA's net income in 2018 was just over $1B (after over $0.4B subtracted for tax) … which is a lot, but then again, they are a big company.
Their R&D budget (you know, putting stuff into their games) was over $1.3B.
Their studio and admin costs were over $1.1B.
Their cost of revenue (expenses associated with selling their products) was nearly $1.3B.
So of the nearly $5.2B in revenue for 2018, about 20% was left after expenses.
EA's profits peaked in 2016, then dipped in 2017, regained some ground in 2018, but still lags behind 2016. Revenue grew from 2016 to 2018, but so did expenses, more so than profits.
As far as shareholders … EA doesn't pay a dividend. So the only way a shareholder makes money is if they buy EA stock at a lower price, have the stock price appreciate, then sell the stock at a higher price. Otherwise, it's all unrealized gains … or loss if the share price declines. Most of their shares are owned by "institutional investors" … folks who run mutual funds that live within 401k, IRA and individual accounts … you know, the stuff that helps "the little people."
EA's CEO, Andrew Wilson's salary is a lot, ~$20M … about 2% of EA's annual net profits. But it would take three years of his salary to fund one AAA game … his complete salary, every year, to fund a AAA game from start to finish.
Off shore accounts … please provide examples.
The notion that any one of the AAA studios could fund the entire industry for an entire year is laughable.
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Finished Dissertation long ago lol. Now happily employed :D
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Post by biggydx on Jan 16, 2019 15:29:59 GMT
I believe CDPR also got a grant for $7M to work on a seamless multiplayer feature for Cyberpunk 2077. wccftech.com/cd-projekt-red-gets-7-million-government/Probably only amounts to roughly 10% (or less even) of the budget costs they plan to expend with Cyberpunk, but its worth noting.
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