Epic Pres: PC A Primary Platform Again
- Thread starter Capt.Toilet
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This Space For Rent. Please Don't Disturb The Current Occupants
They need to starve a little to get back on track.
I say:
1. Get rid of the offices. Put all their desks and PC's in a garage next to a Ford Pinto.
2. They have to give-up their fancy cars, and can only drive cars that cost $1500.00. And they can't have AC in them.
3. They can only eat out. If they buy it off the dollar menu.
4. No one gets paid more then twice the minimum wage.
5. They can not play any video games, but the one they are working on right now.
6. Must not over engineer the game.
7. Game must be playable on a $1000.00 laptop.
8. Can not change their under pants, till the game is finished.
9. Must not give any hints on the game they are making. Just surprise us.
10. No internet for any employees, till the game is done.
They need to starve a little to get back on track.
I say:
1. Get rid of the offices. Put all their desks and PC's in a garage next to a Ford Pinto.
2. They have to give-up their fancy cars, and can only drive cars that cost $1500.00. And they can't have AC in them.
3. They can only eat out. If they buy it off the dollar menu.
4. No one gets paid more then twice the minimum wage.
5. They can not play any video games, but the one they are working on right now.
6. Must not over engineer the game.
7. Game must be playable on a $1000.00 laptop.
8. Can not change their under pants, till the game is finished.
9. Must not give any hints on the game they are making. Just surprise us.
10. No internet for any employees, till the game is done.
KDR_11k
[make art]
How about going into portable game development? You've really boxed yourself in with those high-end engines. Portable game systems have MUCH lower development cost requirements to be competitive while offering nearly the same revenue opportunities (some DS games sold over 20 million copies!). The Wii was meant to offer that low cost market but since third parties were more interested in soiling their brand names on that system it's not viable anymore.
I think we're going to see one of the big publishers go under in the next 5 years. Indie and small studios seem to be in a boom right now while the likes of EA, Activision are playing a lot more conservatively because the production costs are prohibitively high for the blockbuster style they're known for.
The real problem is that the industry has failed to grow the customer base for the average AAA game, and there's nothing they can really do to fix that at this point.
Smaller, innovative games with a small team that ship for $20 on the high end are a lot lower risk for established studios than a $60 blockbuster which requires a small army of developers and artists. They're still a risk for those companies which are just starting out or don't have a proven set of developers, but $20 is always going to be a lot more palatable than $50+ games.
Except id already said that QLive isn't making money, although that might be due to MS buying Massively and then shuttering it.
Based on Valve's recent Counter-Strike announcement, I'm thinking we're starting to see a lot more non-CoD style shooters aiming for the pre-Hats TF2 model. $20 shooter, a handful of maps for 1 or 2 game modes, and you continue to iterate on the game after launch if people buy into it. This is pretty much how Valve, Blizzard, CD Projeckt and others operate and people are a lot happier with their products than say the EA model which is to push out a game, update a few times over 6 months and then shut down support before the sequel arrives the following year.
There's easily 8 or so iconic UT maps, so that part is covered. Throw together some new character models and they could easily get a budget priced UT4 off the ground in probably under 6 months if they wanted.
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I agree with what you're saying, but the fact that id hasn't been able to make QL profitable is neither here nor there. They haven't used or determined the only available business model for free to play PC shooters.
That said, I would rather see what you're talking about. An inexpensive UT game with a limited set of maps, rolling engine releases, frequent and small updates, and first-party published (so they control everything from how patches are made to when they are released). It would also be a nice gesture to have UnrealEd in there.
Trailing off a bit here, but something to consider.
I think Carmack stated that the lack of profit from QL also for a large part has to do with the game itself being very much a competitive and not a casual game.
This is in contrast to the other end of the spectrum, say Farmville, where cooperation and social media play a major role.
I think Carmack stated that the lack of profit from QL also for a large part has to do with the game itself being very much a competitive and not a casual game.
This is in contrast to the other end of the spectrum, say Farmville, where cooperation and social media play a major role.
I think with a small official map pool they'd be required to include UnrealED just so the community can add content to the game (hey free labor) between content drops (and so Epic can take the best of the best and roll them into the official map pool like Valve does). First-party publishing would be nice and should be doable with a downloadable title (at this point you really only need a large publisher for marketing and physical distribution). I don't think the timing of patches is usually a publisher issue. What's moronic is things like Gearbox deciding to synchronize their patches so all 3 platforms were updated at the same time. Which is a problem when someone *cough*Microsoft*cough* decides to sit on the patch for a month when Sony and 2K have signed off on the PS3 and PC patches respectively.
Rolling engine updates is a good question though. Do the regular UDK updates increase the system specs required when they add new features? I could see that being an issue for people with older hardware and no budget to update. Obviously, any additional eye candy should be optional, but after UT3's initial state I'm not sold that's something they'd think of out of the gate.
If Epic were to go ahead with something like this, I'd love to see a good amount of community involvement to guide development. Feedback on returning teams/characters, game modes, and maps should be community decisions I think.
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The biggest thing is that in engine updates they often optimize or drastically improve the performance AND the looks. I mean, even on older crap hardware, the UDK UT3 levels look so much better and PLAY so much better (because of improved performance). The stuff that kills performance is optional, and I think they'd be wise to either leave that out of updates, or release specific packs of levels/characters that actually make use of it.
Totally agree. I'm really disappointed that, after Steve Polge asked for feedback from the community for community features in UT3, pretty much none of them were ever incorporated and they integrated a middleware that is scorned by PC gamers, probably most particularly within the UT community.
I really need to try this. Is there a guide on getting UDK up and running just for botmatch?
Festering Anus
Cheeto Hans
Kyllian
if (Driver == Bot.Pawn); bGTFO=True;
If they were to go that route I'd say have them talk to Timegate or Uber in regards to mouse control
UT3 felt screwy as hell regardless of tweaks
Section 8, S8
rejudice and MondayNightCombat it's smooth and precise(all 3 are UE3 based)
Yea, that surprised me. Just look at the Assault gametype. Popular in UT, missing in UT2003, returned in UT2004 after much griping from players, missing again in UT3 and again much bitching from players
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