Gearbox Prez Calls Valve out on the PS3

jamesworkshop

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Really there is little reason for valve to make PS3 games when they have steam (98% sales increase over the previous year)
TF2 on the 360 sucks because of microsoft means the free updates the PC gets cannot be given away.
Making PS3 version isn't going to make a profit for what is actually a small development team the PS3 dev kit, licencing, certification, extra time/money on new development staff isn't free even after that Sony not charging for PSN means they charge the developer per gig for demos.
Statements are to be taken in context Naughty dog makes games for the PS3 only Valve has never touched Sony hardware and lets face it borderlands is multiplatform because of the Unreal3 engine and thus took little additional effort or expense than say to port the source engine to PS3 even John Carmack's team with rage is having trouble with the PS3.
 

Worsle

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CantFaketheFunk said:
On the one hand, it's hard to say that Pitchford doesn't have even a single point, because he does. But on the other, Valve is an autonomous developer that has the right to develop for whatever platform it damn well pleases. If Gabe Newell were to suddenly announce that all future Valve titles would be programmed for the Atari Jaguar, then would anyone have the right to tell the developer that it couldn't
While no one has the right to stop valve from doing what they want what is wrong with voicing disagreement? I mean for a professional in marketing those comments where amazingly fanish and fairly ill-considered really. Even if they hate working with the ps3 I would have expected some thing a little more professional from a company like valve.

Though I agree with him more on the steam issue than this, a company having control over its competitors like that is not a good idea. Though that might be influenced by the fact I hate steam with a passion. Really I have never had more problems with a bit of software than I have done with steam.
 

BonerMacTittyPants

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You do not question Valve.

You do NOT QUESTION it.

Now excuse me, I'll be in my cryogenic chamber hibernating till ep3's release.
 

Ashbax

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Dyp100 said:
Man, I thought those two companies used to be good friends?

What the HELL is up with Randy waging war now?

Did Gabe sleep with his wife or something? Jealousy of there successes? IDK, it's kinda odd.
Id say its jelousy. remember last month he Spazzed out because steam is really popular?

Also, he says its like when someone who likes the xbox buys one, then spends his time bashing Sony. Except, valve arent MS fanboys, nor are they an 11 year old 360 fanboy.

They are a game development company, who started out making extremely popular games for the PC then moved onto consoles last generation for a bit, then gave up, finding Ps2's too annoying to develop for, and then moving onto this gen, making the orange box for the ps3 and xbox, then finding that the ps3 is very hard to develop on (Which is true, my friend has the orange box for ps3 and its much worse than the xbox and Pc version. his cant even connect to any Tf2 matches.) so they just stuck with the 360 and PC. simple as that.

If randy wants to have a baby because hes jelous of valve, he should just be ignored. Credit to him, though, for making a good game recently - borderlands.
 

-Drifter-

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Jumplion said:
CantFaketheFunk said:
On the one hand, it's hard to say that Pitchford doesn't have even a single point, because he does. But on the other, Valve is an autonomous developer that has the right to develop for whatever platform it damn well pleases. If Gabe Newell were to suddenly announce that all future Valve titles would be programmed for the Atari Jaguar, then would anyone have the right to tell the developer that it couldn't
The problem is, though, that VALVe (more specifically Gabe Newell) badmouthed the PS3 for no real addequent reason because they never had any experience with it. And don't say Orange Box on Ps3, EA ported that.

VALVe can do whatever the hell they want, I agree with that. But ever since Gabe said "it's a waste of time", the PR Department have been desperately trying to scramble up the mess that he made. Everything from "It's just 'difficult'" to "we love you, that's why we're hurting you" to "we don't want to give PS3 owners the short end of the bone, so we won't give them a bone at all" and all that crap.

What Pitchford sees when he says "It's all very fanboyish" is that it's like an X-bot bagging Uncharted 2 when he's never played a single second of it in his life, or a Sorny guy mouthing off on how Natal is a piece of shit when he's never even waved a finger in front of it. VALVe is saying "Oh, it's too hard/complicated/time consuming to work with!" when they've had no experience with the damn platform.

If VALVe want to ignore the PS3, fine, just say "We don't have any plans to work with the PS3." That's a perfectly valid excuse. The problem is that they keep on muffin topping that excuse with more bullshit excuses like they have something to prove for some reason. And when they did say "We don't have any plans to work with the PS3" some idiot journalist brings up the damn topic again and the ride starts all over again.
Say what you like about me, but I totally agree with this guy.
 

Bat Vader

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Perhaps Pitchford should let Valve do what Valve wants to do and leave it at that.
 

Citrus

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This sounds a lot like jealousy to me.

EDIT: And hey, look at that. Borderlands is on Steam anyway. Huh.
 

level250geek

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Okay, once more with feeling and all together now:

Gabe Newell never said that it was "too hard" to develop for the PS3. He said that in order to develop quality products for the PS3 they would have to spend way more money and manpower, and the end result would be a game no better than on the PC or 360. Valve is not scared of the PS3. If they wanted to develop for the PS3, they could. They just looked at the system architecture and thought "No thanks." Kind of like how you hit on the kinda-cute girl instead of the knockout; you'll go further with the former using less effort than you will with the latter using everything you've got.

Just wanted to put that out there.

As for Randy and Gearbox: I have to agree with everyone who says "What's your problem?" Seriously. There is no reason for you to pick these petty fights with them. If you're scared that Valve is going to use Steam to put a stranglehold on your sales then DON'T SELL YOUR GAME THROUGH STEAM. By the way, I've been seeing ads for Borderlands on Steam for weeks and that whole four-pack thing couldn't have hurt. Just sayin.'

If you think that Valve is wimping out by not developing for the PS3, then make a PS3 game that absolutely blows us all away--and then produce the same game at the same quality on the PC and 360. And use equally sized and skilled dev teams--and equal budgets--on all three formats. Then you can call Valve out for wimping out.

And no, Borderlands is not that game. Sorry.
 
Feb 13, 2008
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swaki said:
"People Who Live In Glass Houses Should Not Throw Stones"

Fix the multiplayer for borderlands on the pc before criticizing Valve, screwing over all the pc gamers in such a degree is no better than what valve did whit the ps3.
Exactly what I was gonna say. Say what you like about Valve but TF2, L4D, L4D2 are a lot easier to multiplay than Borderlands.

I read it the same way I read fanboys. Like there's a guy who bought the Sony platform and he's a Sony guy, so he decides he's going to spend a certain percentage of his time bashing Microsoft. And there's a guy on Microsoft doing the same thing. Those guys are childish and narrow minded, it's the same kind of thing."
So's taking a certain amount of your time to bash Steam, Randy.
 

Pendragon9

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It's nice to hear that not every single person and company in the world supports Valve and hates the Ps3.

I may not be a big fan of Borderlands, but this guy has a point. Valve is starting to become way too snobbish for their own good, making online services and practically platforms just for their games because they can't be bothered to settle for inferior consoles, or whatever excuse they have.

Then again, this fits the whole "PC crowd who would rather rape their own mothers in horrible ways then see their god tier games get ported to consoles", so Valve is catering to their fanbase perfectly. Snob company goes hand in hand with snob fans.
 

MuddShark6

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At least Valve didn't just port bad copies of their games just so they could make a buck. It's called quality control. Gotta respect that at least.
 

Caliostro

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Jan 23, 2008
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When asked for comments Pitchford simply replied with "dhlawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwrghhh..." and then he drooled on a journalist's shoes... before trying to eat them.

Mr. Pitchford is now at the hospital waiting examination on the half of his brain that has not yet been lobotomized.
 

-Drifter-

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gothaggis said:
Having developed a game for both the 360 and PS3, I can assure you that it is way more of a pain in the ass to develop for the PS3 - and yes you need to throw more resources at it.
While that may be true, even indie developers can develop for multiple systems. A big, long running company of professional coders with lots of money like Valve saying "it's too hard to code for!" sounds a little off.
 

MarsProbe

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Dec 13, 2008
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hansari said:
WTF is Randy's problem?

Valve's expansions were the first games Gearbox Software ever did? Seriously
That's the first thing I thought of. We obviously don't know what would have happened otherwise, but if Gearbox hadn't worked on Opposing Force, who is to say there would have actually been a Borderlands? Perhaps there is a parallel universe out there where the only difference is that Gearbox never developed any Half-Life expansions. If anybody finds a way to visit it, let me know.

I'd view this differently if Valve had atcually attacked Gearbox personally themselves, but as it stands, turning round and having a go at valve for something that wasn't even directed at them in the first place seems a bit off if you ask me.
 

saregos

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Jul 7, 2009
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Valve stated that PS3 was a ***** to develop on. They're hardly the only ones to do so. Singling out Valve as saying "PS3 is difficult to develop for" and then claiming they're completely wrong seems silly. What they've said is simply that they'd have to devote a lot more time and resources to making a PS3 game and polishing it to the level they prefer, and that they don't see that as a profitable/worthwhile move.

Platform exclusion is par for the course. There are plenty of developers who work on only a single console, and plenty of others who exclude one of the major three (counting PC as a console). I don't see that Pitchford really has the right to criticize here, especially since Valve's decision to develop (or not develop) for PS3 really has no impact whatsoever on him.

Whether or not you agree with Pitchford, the two major points are that
1) Nobody really asked him, and he doesn't have a personal stake. In fact, he should be HAPPY that Valve excludes PS3, that's more development space for him to try and claim.

2) What the hell is he talking about when he says they're "reliant on the rest of the world"? Aren't ALL developers reliant on the rest of the world, and on publishers? This is kinda a "duh" comment, to me. If anything, Valve has made major steps in both becoming more self-reliant and in helping other developers do so. Last I checked, Gearbox still needs publishers too, and are far more reliant on 2K (and Valve, for that matter) than Valve is on EA.

3) I think we can all agree that Pitchford has been pretty liberal with the unsolicited criticism of Valve lately. Whether you think he's right or not.
 

shial

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I would point out Sony themselves claim the PS3 was made hard to work with so there would be a constant improvement as devs got a better grasp on how to work things. End result however is the same as the Xbox360 which companies end up wasting less money and come out with a better quality product now rather than crappy ones now and decent ones latter. PS3 also dropped the ball completely on getting their network gaming up and running. Xbox has always had a consistent online strategy which features big with Valves offerings.

Borderlands itself has issues that show big time that its a crappy console port. Control schemes optimized for a small number of buttons, item text that doesn't fit (For those that don't know what I'm talking about did you know that weapons have stats that are not shown? It only shows 4 bonuses but gear can have 6 or 7 and with some tweaks or through a dev console you can actually see it). Borderlands also uses gamespy for matchmaking rather than steam which means unless you know your friends gamespy aliases its very hard to get together with them.

Steam doesn't control the market, there is impulse and direct2drive out there. Steams big advantage comes from the excellent social tools, big indie market and support they give. http://www.neoseeker.com/news/12017-tripwire-steam-does-not-exploit-indie-developers/


Gibson specifically addresses the who exploitation business. He talks about his past experiences with Valve and how the Steam service has aided his studio's growth. Additionally, he claims that Steam offers indie developers a better chance at success compared to "traditional brick-and-mortar" publishers, whose proposals seem to leave devs high and dry.

As a small independent developer that has released multiple games on Steam, we are exactly the type of studio that Randy believes is being exploited by Valve. Additionally, as president of Tripwire Interactive, I've personally been involved in all of our business deals with Valve and have experienced firsthand how they treat independent developers.

So, is Valve exploiting independent developers? In short: absolutely not. Without pulling any punches, I can say with certainty that if it weren't for Steam, there would be no Tripwire Interactive right now.

In the early days, when we were shopping our first game Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45 around to traditional brick-and-mortar publishers, we were shocked at how terrible their proposals were. We were getting pitched offers like, "We'll give you a 15 percent royalty rate, take the IP rights to your game, and slap a $1.5 million administrative fee on top of your recoupment costs." And deals like this were being offered for a game we funded ourselves!

With deals like those, we were wondering how any third-party developer could be successful in the game industry. Under the terms of that deal, we would have needed to sell hundreds of thousands of units before we would have seen one cent of royalties. Enter Steam.

Gibson goes on to say that "Randy's statements" are unfair in their assessment, suggesting that smaller devs are being ripped off through Steam with crappy royalty rates. This just isn't true, according to Tripwire boss, who vaguely refers to their own deal with Valve. After pointing out other examples of indie games that have benefited from Steam, like Audiosurf and Zeno Clash, Gibson ends it all by advising:

... next time someone wants to say that small developers are getting exploited by Valve, I suggest they talk to a few first. Ask Garry Newman, creator of Garry's Mod, or Dylan Fitterer, creator of Audiosurf if they feel exploited. Ask the Tripwire Interactive employees if they feel exploited, as they move into their new offices paid for by the money the company has made on Steam. Or me, as I drive away from the company that was built from the royalties we made on Steam, in my sports car paid for by the royalties we make on Steam, to the home that I pay for with the royalties we make on Steam.