CliffyB: Microsoft Tried to "Have it Both Ways"

[Dragonbums]

After the last article quoting Cliffy B., Why the hell are we still giving this dude the time of day?

Maybe becomes he was an industry insider for almost two decades and has developed more then one wildly successful game. Might be he my know something about the industry. Just sayin.


He has a point the only way to change is to offer gamer abetter deal and digital. Obliviously, brute forcing a change by take something away and not offering anything in return is not the way to go.

There are plenty of people in the game industry who have made financial success off of many games. That doesn't mean that they are smart or say the best of things.

EA makes millions, and we don't trust a word that comes out of their mouths.

It seems, as far as the Escapist goes, half the things he says are downright laughable, at worst ignorant.

 

[RoBi3.0]

After the last article quoting Cliffy B., Why the hell are we still giving this dude the time of day?

Maybe becomes he was an industry insider for almost two decades and has developed more then one wildly successful game. Might be he my know something about the industry. Just sayin.


He has a point the only way to change is to offer gamer abetter deal and digital. Obliviously, brute forcing a change by take something away and not offering anything in return is not the way to go.

There are plenty of people in the game industry who have made financial success off of many games. That doesn't mean that they are smart or say the best of things.

EA makes millions, and we don't trust a word that comes out of their mouths.

It seems, as far as the Escapist goes, half the things he says are downright laughable, at worst ignorant.

I don't take anything anyone says as gospel truth, but when CliffyB says day one digital needs to be cheaper then disks then I think his words have merit. When he says more micro-transactions are coming, I say thanks, but I didn't need you to tell me that. That trend is on the steady rise.

CliffyB likes to troll people. This is a fact. That doesn't Change the fact that what he has said in this article has merit.

 

[SecondPrize]

Bleszinki makes a big deal about Gamestop pushing used sales over new, but there's a reason they do that. Game retailers make so much more profit from used sales because they only make a buck or two from selling a new title. If you're going to set it up so you reap the lion's share in new game sales, don't be surprised when retailers push used sales.

 

[samwise970]

and affirming his belief that the changes the Xbox One would bring to used games might be a necessity for AAA titles to survive.

I was unaware that the Xbone was going to drop development costs and stop the companies from wasting money.

Then you are unaware of how the videogame industry works. Games are, by definition, a loss leader. Millions of dollars are spent on development, but publishers only recoup their losses and hopefully make a profit when new copies are sold. The massive used games market is REALLY bad for anyone who makes their living developing games, because they see no money from the huge portion of the market that can only afford to buy most of their games for used prices. Digital distribution is a really good solution for this that removes the middle-man and actually allows for competitive sales. In the end, gamers end up with a system like Steam that occasionally gives us really great games for insanely low prices, and devs actually get money for those sales, so they can keep making games!

Most gamers don't realize this, but the traditional publishing model is in a really bad way with the current brick-and-mortar used games business. When you go to GameStop and get a used copy of, lets say, The Witcher 2 for 360, you are giving GameStop 100% of that money, and although you're enjoying the work of an amazing dev studio, they won't see any profit from your purchase. With digital distribution, they can sell that AAA game for six freaking bucks (right now on gog.com), and actually come out ahead!

If the Xbone had come out as announced, and publishers were allowed to 'block' used games, you wouldn't see a gamestop filled with nothing but $60 new titles, you would likely see close to the same prices you see now, the only difference would have been that publishers and devs would have actually seen a share of profit from their hard work. If anything, giving publishers price control would be good for gamers, finally allowing for competitive pricing of console games, rather than what we have now.

 

[sturryz]

AAA Titles can't survive because they are generic and stupid, it's not gamers fault that companys are splurging on the graphic's budget (which to be honest, seems to be where most of the budget is going.) CliffyB doesn't seem to understand how damaging his comments are to his reputation.

 

[Something Amyss]

Or it could be that the games, no matter what people on the Internet say, just are not good or they do not sell at all because of being too niche or for some other reasonable explanation.

Nahh. Has to be executives.

Yeah, that's why the last Gears of War didn't sell so hot. Too niche.

...I mean, seriously? That's what you're going for, dude?

 

[Something Amyss]

Maybe becomes he was an industry insider for almost two decades and has developed more then one wildly successful game. Might be he my know something about the industry. Just sayin.

So might Peter Moore and John Riccitiello, but people don't treat them as though their word is gospel.

Incidentally, he does have a point. It appears to be accidental, because the point he's trying to make is USED GAMES ARE KILLING THE BUSINESS. Yeah, better digital and netter deals are an actual solution. Except his solution has been to blame gamers for refusing to stop buying used, because surely that's the reason games that can sell 5 million copies and be considered failures aren't making enough money.

In any other industry, people would be all "maybe we should sell a reasonable product with production costs within the means of the market." Well, any other industry but the American automotive industry, who saw high gas prices and a recession and thought "you know what Americans want? Nothing but SUVs and monster trucks!"

And in the end, they needed to be bailed out, so maybe there's a lesson here.

What Cliff Blurty is saying is technically correct: something's gotta give. But if you look at his tirades against usd games, it's the not the prices or the online model. Except, evidently, if the online model is too permissive.

 

[songbird15]

We didn't mess this up MS messed this up. If you want to change the world you don't give it to MS PR to sell, worse bit of PR I have ever seen.
You really can't at this point stop physical media, unless ofc you don't want to sell you product. Many ppl's data caps won't allow them to download anywhere from 20-50 gigs.
Nothing about these changes stops MS from promoting digital sales. But it is up to them to SELL IT to ppl.

And they are awful at that.

They had to make this argument, and they didn't.

The message was lost and so was the battle, but maybe not the war.

 

[jericu]

If a game can sell 3-5 million copies and be considered a failure, the problem isn't used games, it's development costs. Forcing the consumer to never buy used copies isn't going to help much. It's treating a symptom, not a disease, so to speak. If games go all digital, and prevent people from buying used games (the only reason I can think of where anyone would legitimately want an all-digital future), we might see some improvements in sales. A little bit. But eventually, no matter what happens, the costs either need to go down or the whole system is going to collapse. Probably the latter.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Cliff, Cliff, Cliff. I thought we'd covered this before, so I'll make this as simple as possible.

If the system is so broken that millions of sales still isn't enough to save a game, then you don't break the customers to conform to the system- you fix the system.

Go talk to the guy who made Gunpoint. Total investment of $30, made enough money to become an independent developer.

 

[CardinalPiggles]

Real [Enthusiastic] gamers read about new developments themselves and are going to buy good and interesting games.

Agreed. That's pretty much what I was going to say.

The Witcher 2 made a ton of money without dumbing down the game or shelling out tens of millions in marketing alone. And so did Dark Souls.

And yet Tomb Raider sold 5 million in a month or whatever and it "Failed to meet sales expectations".

Developers and publishers need to take a good look at such examples. Only one game can be Call of Duty, and that's Call of Duty. Only one game can be WoW, and guess who that is?

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

I bet Cliffy B is taking it both ways from Microsoft. HIIIYOOOOO. Can I get a high five? *hand up*

*high five*
OP: Some people just don't get it. They can't be bought or reasoned with. Some men just want to watch the industry crash.

 

[FalloutJack]

HELLO, FLIP-FLOP!

Wow, can you believe this guy? He's already a certified politician and everything!

Quick! Someone ask him about the war on terror! The WORLD must know his well-considered opinion!

(So much funnyness...)

 

[weirdee]

While...I won't say "apologists"- proponents of the xbone's digital transition claim that we should have had faith in the new system, the overall way they handled it was largely a breach of both expectations and trust. Granted, all the marketing in the world won't cover up the downsides to the system, but I daresay they could have at least tried to appeal to their primary target market first, instead of alienating most of them.

In any case, unless Microsoft is willing to actually take the first step towards shedding the excesses of the past without burdening it with crazy sounding conditions, there won't be a future for them any time soon.

 

[EvolutionKills]

Whatever, just let it ride out. So what if we're approaching the end of sustainability for the AAA games market? Either adapt and survive, or do something else.

In the 70's, the US got hit with the oil and gas crisis, and the sustainability of America's gas-guzzling cars was put into the spotlight. It killed muscle cars, and Detroit spent a decade playing catch up with emissions controls. But you know what else happened? We saw the birth of the American golden age of motorcycles, which gave rise to classics like the Honda CB750K (the founder of the moniker 'superbike'). We also saw the influx of foreign auto manufacturers, such as Datsun (now Nissan), Totota, Honda, and Volkswagen. We saw a new direction of cars, and we got new models we wouldn't have seen otherwise, like the Datsun 240Z and the Honda CRX (the founder of the 'pocket rocket' hatchbacks). Yeah, it basically neutered the Corvette and Mustang until Detroit learned to adapt to the new environment, but so be it. We got smaller, safer, and more fuel efficient cars because of it.

The AAA games market will figure itself out, or morph into something else. Not everything can, or needs to be, the next Call of Duty or Madden. Likewise, not everything needed or could be a classic Corvette or Mustang. Others will rise to take their places, to fill new or existing niches.

Hell, my most anticipated game this year (barring a surprise holiday release for Fallout 4), is the pseudo-sequel to Terraria known as Starbound. No seriously, go check it out. Development team of about a dozen people. I'm also psyched for the Wasteland and Shadowrun games coming out of Kickstarter. It'll be a good year for gaming, even sans the AAA market. They're not the only 'game' in town, and if they collapse under their own weight, others will fill the gap. They always do.

 

[Dr. Octogonopus]

I personally think that used games can be helpfull to game developers. Case in point: When Arkham Asylum first came out I completely ignored it as to me superhero games are generally pretty poor. But when I saw a second hand copy selling for dirt cheap I decided to give it a bash. Turns out it was one of the best games I own on PS3 and I ended up buying arkham city on launch day for about 3 times the price of my second hand asylum. But now thanks to day one dlc I've lost interest in the series.