CliffyB Thinks Used Games Are Bad, Sony is "Playing Us"

[Nowhere Man]

Bleszinkski went on to explain his stance, saying that games have gotten so big that there is just no way the next generation can survive if the used game and game rental markets keep taking a cut. "The visual fidelity and feature sets we expect from games now come with sky high costs," he says, "Assassins Creed games are made by thousands of devs."

GOOD. Then let the next generation DIE for all I care anymore!!! Let it burn to the ground into a pile of ashes and let smaller independent houses take the place of the bloated corrupt money grubbing creatively bankrupt non risk taking piece of shit bastards.

I'm so tired of these companies trying to take away my right to own, my right to buy a used product, my right to sell a product I purchased with my hard earned money, my right to use a product without having to be mainlined like a heroin addict 24-7 to the internet to keep tabs on me. I'm tired of it all. And I know this will only get worse and stem out to other products if we let it go unchecked. I'm just sick and tired and disgusted at these foul disgusting deceptive people.

Hey Cliffy. Why don't you go grab an XBone and jump off a cliff. ok?

 

[jpoon]

Good thing I (and the rest of the sane consumers) don't give two shits what this tool thinks.

 

[RJ 17]

There's only one Dude whose words we should pay attention to:


Seriously, CliffyB can kiss the fattest part of my ass. I find it quite hilarious that small-time companies and indie devs can make a game at a fraction of the cost of a AAA game and have it sell like gangbusters. That fact alone disproves the entire basis of his argument. Massive Budget most certainly does not equate to Quality Game. Look at Portal. You go through a series of rooms based around a single game mechanic and the various things you can do with it...and it was one of the greatest games most of us had ever played. Simplicity has its merits, and injecting more and more money into something just so "holy fucking shit the water looks so REAL!" is actually a very poor way to expect to make money. You could make the most stunningly beautiful game in the world, but that doesn't mean jack shit if the game itself is total crap...just means you wasted a crap-ton of money on a big shiny piece of shit.

Case in point, I'll point to the example he brought up. Yeah, the AC games are expensive as hell to make. Seeing as how the credits go on for an hour and a half after each one of'em, that certainly is a LOT of paychecks going out. It's just too bad the last 3 of'em have been complete and utter shit.

 

[Eric the Orange]

"You cannot have game and marketing budgets this high while also having used and rental games existing,"

Well then you should lower your budgets. Seems obvious to me.

 

[Triality]

Gee, with all these crippling triple-A budgeted games trending the industry towards the drain, us poor consumers will be forced to buy more Triple-B or C games such as XCOM, Mark of the Ninja, The Swapper, Lone Survivor, Amnesia, or Thomas Was Alone!

What ever shall we do with these poor choices?!

 

[Boggelz]

I generally don't mind Cliff but he seriously needs to consider what he says before he says it sometimes. Perhaps if devs quit putting all their eggs into one basket it won't have to nickel and dime us. Seriously, Jim Sterling makes a great point. Don't put high budgets into games that aren't a guaranteed sell.

 

[Lovely Mixture]

Does this guy just like being contrary to what people are thinking?

I mean, he says SOME reasonable things at times. But the stupid shit he says just makes him look like an egotistical nutjob.

"Assassins Creed games are made by thousands of devs."

And they're still shit Cliff.

"The visual fidelity and feature sets we expect from games now come with sky high costs,"

Uhh. Cliff didn't you say that Microsoft and Sony should open up their consoles to users and independent game makers? [http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-02-25-industry-turmoil-worst-since-80s-crash-says-bleszinski] The indie developers who DONT REQUIRE large costs? Oh you know what, nevermind, you said this also:

"It is up to Epic, and [Epic CEO] Tim Sweeney in particular, to motivate Sony and Microsoft not to phone in what these next consoles are going to be. It needs to be a quantum leap. They need to damn near render Avatar in real time, because I want it and gamers want it-even if they don't know they want it."

 

[seditary]

I think CliffyB would fail at Game Dev Tycoon.

 

[Snotnarok]

And most of these statements are counterable.
Use games and rentals eat up sales. Well if games came out priced vs 60 dollars every time then maybe people would be willing to buy the games new.
When pubs kick out unfinished games at 60 dollars to take advantage of the ignorant is THAT good business practice? Quick cash in games with no replay value, length and half assed effort 60 bucks.

Want your game to sell better? Offer nicer incentives instead of removing them, like online passes, eco-boxes that damage games, removing manuals.

 

[Seracen]

Honestly, he should just go work for EA, I think he'd be a perfect fit.

Out of control budgets are never to blame for a game's shortcomings, perish the thought...

Online passes are online passes, but they are a damn sight better than a complete lockout of used games altogether.

$60 price points aren't viable anymore? Fine, make the games cheaper. Feel free to charge me for DLC, but I'll be damned if I let Capcom and EA charge me full price for a game and then charge another 10-20 bucks for held back content.

Just don't spend as much money on stupid Superbowl adds that aren't necessary to sell your game. Audience amounts aren't going to change noticeably anyway, not with such unfocused, bloated strategies.

Everytime this jackass opens his mouth, I wish Jim Sterling had never apologized. I'm willing to bet the apology was never even acknowledged by this bro-dude.

Hey man, remember a few years ago when you couldn't afford that Ferrari? What would that version of you say about you today?

 

[frizzlebyte]

I know he's worked in the games industry a long time an all, but he's still managed to some how NOT know what the fuck he's talking about.

it's admirable in a way, and sad in another.

the only reason costs are so high is because of one thing they have control over, marketing, pretty much every one save a few devs have let it get so out of had we hear things like 'Dead Space needs to sell 5 million to stay viable' and this asshole is part of that problem.

If they didn't spends millions upon millions more then they needed to on marketing, for games most people have already made up there minds on no less, no one would even care about 'the evils of used games'

Actually, I don't find it admirable at all, just sad.

It's not just marketing that makes it overly expensive. Among other things, it's the idea that you need "top-tier" graphics in order to make a successful game. If a game were kick-ass in the first place, it wouldn't matter if each character had physics calculations determining where each bloody *strand* of hair should fall on their shoulders when they walk or fire a gun.

I knew I was forgetting something when I hammered that out, so thanks for the correction.

Not sure if sarcasm? Sorry if my post seemed hostile. I wasn't intending to be.

At any rate, I agree with your marketing argument as well. After all, if the overall budget were lower, it would be a lot easier to sustain the games industry. But we have so many publishers thinking that "more money spent = more profits gained, as long as every freaking game moves 5 million units," which is a completely broken idea, that we are seeing a painful learning period for the industry as a whole, I think. Ultimately, it may be the indies who benefit the most from it though, because they can tailor the requirements to a bunch of different PC systems, and nobody thinks indies have to go balls out on graphics to make a good game.

It's the same argument in a lot of ways to the one I hear that says we can't have truly meaningful, truly engrossing game narratives until we have something akin to the holodeck. What they don't get is that quality and immersion is not really dependent on superficial things. Sadly, those superficial things have been driving the games industry nigh-on forever, and we are hitting a point that it's going to kill the industry (or eat up consumer rights, a la Xbox One) if something isn't done.

 

[Frezzato]

snip

Unfortunately, Mr. Bleszinski seems to have bought into the mainstream gaming industry's primary equation: (budget x hype) = sales. There's no room in there for understanding how customers think, no comprehension of stories like yours; in their minds, even if gamers buy and hate GenMilShoEMU (Generic Military Shoot-Em-Up) 2, if GenMilShoEMU 3 comes in a slick-enough package with enough whiz-bang commercials and Mountain Dew / Doritos contests, those gamers will buy it anyway. And they believe that, without the ability to buy the game used or rent / borrow it, those same gamers will buy it on release day for full price.

These beliefs are wholly divorced from reality- sorry, Cliffy, but if I think your $60 is only worth $20, I'll either wait until it goes on sale or just not buy it at all- and another sign that the mainstream gaming industry is bound and determined to dig its own grave.

The thing that blows my mind is that, arguably, if all games cost the same price all the time (say $60), then people would buy less games, and nobody seems to understand that. Less games equals less variety, less involvement with a franchise, less investment of time and familiarity/trust of a developer.

Heh, I just remembered that I bought DiRT used, which led to me buying DiRT 2 & 3 new.
And F.E.A.R. used led me to buy F.E.A.R. files and F.E.A.R. 2 & 3, all new.

At the end of the day, it's just sad and pathetic how tech companies with the brightest, most talented minds JUST DON'T GET US.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

Nintendo's stance on used games: make games that are so good that people will want to keep them forever.

It's just that simple. That or try not to spend so much money making a game where fishes move out of the way when you swing close to them, or dogs look so realistic you want to pet them. It's nice, but making something pretty isn't enough to keep people interested. A good story, multiple endings, various paths and choice, etc. Of course there's always making games cheaper so people don't sell them to buy a new one each time.

The problem is that making good games is HARD. There are no tricks when it comes to level design or game design unlike with presentation. There is no other way to do that other than sheer WORK. Furthermore, too many studios are obsessed with showing of their beloved tech porn projects and thus it bloats budgets. Take that away and you'll get a bunch of self-involved auteurs throwing tantrums because apparently they forget that limits are needed.

 

[lacktheknack]

But here's the thing, Cliff.

Game production quality is plateauing. It's just what happens when things get more advanced.

It's not worth pushing forward into new graphic and presentation tech at this point. It would be better for everyone - customers AND developers - to start focusing on cost reduction. You know, getting things to work faster on current hardware.

You know full well, my dear Cliffy, that gaming is going in an unsustainable direction... you said so yourself.

 

[Frezzato]

Honestly, this is the primary reason I buy used. And oddly enough, I don't buy used in competition with new titles. That is to say, if I'm buying a game used, it's probably not a new title to begin with (and might not even still be on shelves in the new section).

And further agreement: do you know what I don't buy? Gears of War games. Why don't I buy them? Used games? No. Rentals? No, though the fact that you can beat them in a rental period is probably why Cliff hates rentals. No, the reason I don't buy them is they're BORING, borderline unenjoyable experiences. I had fun with the first, but...Four games? No. Just...No.

Actually, he's probably lucky people remember him for Gears and UT, because when he steps off the tried and true....Yeah. Not pretty.

It's amazing just how little these companies understand the people they're selling their products to. Sometimes it seems that the business majors are calling the shots in terms of game play--and the game developers are pretending to be finance majors.

Meant no offense about Gears by the way. Six million customers for Gears 1 is pretty impressive.

 

[UberNoodle]

I'm sorry, I just don't understand why the video game industry thinks it should have some special exemption from used sales. When I buy a used car does the original manufacturer get a cut? When I sell an old tv to a friend does samsung get a cut? Besides, I fail to see why we are responsible for the budgets and costs of any game.

Do yourself a favor, dont ever use that argument again, you will just end up looking foolish.

Your average modern TV has a lifespan measured in maybe single digit years, and your car requires gas, parts, ect and will eventually just fall apart on you, a game will work forever if you have even two braincells to rub together when it comes to handling the things.

As for the OT: Used games are the same as piracy. They are a big bad boogy man but in reality they effect very little.

You should lead with your reasoning rather than your obnoxiousness.

The average game also has a lifespan in the single digit years. When the next consoles come out and that game is long out of print, second hand is the ONLY means to obtain it. The hardware which plays it is defunct. whether a person plays that game every day or once a year is irrelevant. People drive cars daily, watch films over and over, listen to CDs again and again and read books multiple times. The number of times you use a product and for how long is irrelevant to the issue at hand. If games are to be a subscription service, then make them so, or make REASONABLE aspects of game use that model.

As for the car requiring gas and spare parts: gas sales are certainly not providing income to the car manufacturer. Neither are the spare parts half the time, especially as a significant number of people purchase used and reconditioned parts. Either way, a great many parts are universal across all makes of car and aren't necessarily manufactured by those companies.

And games are NOT the same as piracy. That is a poor equivalency for obvious reasons that at least one sale to the manufacturer was made. Subsequent reselling and trades are also generally via stores and shop fronts online. Thus legal income is being made by various parties involved, which is only made to appear criminal because of the industry's huge non sequitur.