How the hell has the gaming industry still not embraced extras in games?

[bartholen_v1legacy]

I've been playing God of War 3 again recently, and something that's been bothering me for a long time surfaced again:

Why are extra materials in games still so rare?

By which I mean extra materials like movie extras: videos, galleries and such about the creation of the game. To this day they seem to be very very rare. Of all the games I've ever played, only the God of War and the Arkham series and Valve games (well the Orange Box anyway) have embraced this to the extent I'd imagine to have become industry standard years ago. Elsewhere it's still restricted to extraneous $40 artbooks and... game guides? As games and their creation become more and more complex, expensive, and take longer and more manpower to produce, one would think throwing in some extras would be par for the course to give the customer some more hours out of the game. So why the hell isn't it?

Graphics have become so detailed that I can't help but feel sorry for the visual artists who painstakingly render all the environments, enemies and locations, every pore and drop of sweat, every texture and fabric, yet the full detail of it can never be appreciated by the gaming public. This was what bothered me massively in Castle Cainhurst in Bloodborne: the location is unbearably gorgeous, and I dreamed of having a noclip mode, or just free zoom of the camera, to see every nook and cranny in its splendor. Throw GOW3 and Ascension into this category as well: Ascension could perhaps be the best looking game I ever saw on PS3, yet I could only see what the game let me see and nothing more.

And that's not even going into everything else games include extras about. The potential is unmatched by any other medium: since gaming has more elements that have to be crafted than anything else, the amount of extras one could get out of a game is nearly limitless: visual design, core mechanics development, voice acting and casting, character design, level design, translating designs from 2D to 3D, sound effects, sound mixing, modeling, score, optimization with the hardware, animation, story development, writing, developer commentary, characterization, playtesting, 3D galleries like in Arkham City etc. etc. etc.

Honestly, why is this? We all love (or at least enjoy) gaming, so why are we still let in on all the facets of their creation so little? Giving players extras to unlock upon completion would give audiences a heck of a boost in wanting to finish the game.

Thoughts?

 

[aba1]

I agree actually but then i am the type to go and buy the artbooks. I can't help it I am professional artist I love just going through and looking through all those techniques in all the art. Dark Souls and by extension blood borne really does have some AMAZING visuals though they make me weep (in joy) as a dark fantasy artist too.

 

[DefunctTheory]

A movie is a fairly straight forward process, and by the time the 'behind the scenes' cameras are rolling, its all been planned out, damn near to the hour. They know exactly whats happening, where everyone needs to be, and how much time they can spend doing whatever and what not. Add to that the fact that 90% of the people involved are naturally charismatic (Half of them are actors, and the other half's positions rely not only on skills, but being well connected and liked), and, unsurprisingly, they have camera and sound stage skills already, and it's easy to see why they do it - It's cheap, easy, reliable, and they were probably doing it for themselves anyway.

Contrast that to the video game process, which is 90% chaos and hell from beginning to end. Art, story, and gameplay take far longer to hammer out, and are subject to change at the drop of a hat. Much of the development time is spent in dark rooms staring at screens for hours at a time. The suits drop in every once in a while to dick around with everyone. There are no interesting locations. Most of the people involved are just regular folks, unused to having a camera pointed at that. Most of them wouldn't know what to do with a decent camera if their lives depended on it, so they have to pay someone else to deal with it - Probably 100-300 thousand dollars if you want to record the entire thing. It's time consuming, expensive, and simply less interesting to watch.

If you like, you can kickstart something and get monthly updates and insight into game building. It's fairly dry stuff, though.

 

[visiblenoise]

I think it's very niche. I can't think of any game where I would really get into extras like that (maaaybe Metal Gear Solid) - I might be interested in having a look, but I certainly wouldn't obsess over it. Maybe it's because I'm not a game developer. Or graphic artist.

Also, at the end of the day, everyone involved in these extras would just be regular people doing their jobs. The only time I've ever really cared about seeing a video game behind the scenes is when there's a high profile director behind it, like Hideo Kojima or Ken Levine, people with a bit of a celebrity status. I'm interested in their though process, their philosophy. Not the nitty gritty details that some rank-and-file artist had to iron out in order to satisfy some team lead.

 

[Gennadios]

Browse most games with 3 tier purchases on PC, and you will find Standard tier with the bare bones features, Deluxe tier with a piece of DLC content, and Collectors tier with the DLC content and art books/making of vids/soundtracks.

In other words, much like everything else that can be considered 'extra' in AAA, they're selling it to us.

 

[Pirate Of PC Master race]

You mean those interviews, making of the game and etc they do to supercharge hype train when the pre-orders begin?

Why would they charge for those things... when they on youtube? For Free.

 

[Vigormortis]

A movie is a fairly straight forward process, and by the time the 'behind the scenes' cameras are rolling, its all been planned out, damn near to the hour. They know exactly whats happening, where everyone needs to be, and how much time they can spend doing whatever and what not. Add to that the fact that 90% of the people involved are naturally charismatic (Half of them are actors, and the other half's positions rely not only on skills, but being well connected and liked), and, unsurprisingly, they have camera and sound stage skills already, and it's easy to see why they do it - It's cheap, easy, reliable, and they were probably doing it for themselves anyway.

Contrast that to the video game process, which is 90% chaos and hell from beginning to end. Art, story, and gameplay take far longer to hammer out, and are subject to change at the drop of a hat. Much of the development time is spent in dark rooms staring at screens for hours at a time. The suits drop in every once in a while to dick around with everyone. There are no interesting locations. Most of the people involved are just regular folks, unused to having a camera pointed at that. Most of them wouldn't know what to do with a decent camera if their lives depended on it, so they have to pay someone else to deal with it - Probably 100-300 thousand dollars if you want to record the entire thing. It's time consuming, expensive, and simply less interesting to watch.

If you like, you can kickstart something and get monthly updates and insight into game building. It's fairly dry stuff, though.

Let's not forget that films often recoup much of their budgets with theater ticket sales. Only a portion of their recouped costs come from home video sales. And, what's more, you tend to pay more to purchase the home release of a film than you do to see it in theaters. (there are exceptions, of course)

Realistically, it's not that surprising that video game "extras" tend to include an ancillary cost on top of the price of the core game.

 

[Something Amyss]

Elsewhere it's still restricted to extraneous $40 artbooks and... game guides?

That people buy.

There you go.

 

[Neverhoodian]

I seem to remember the sixth generation of console games (PS2/Xbox/GameCube) containing lots of stuff like this. If I were to hazard a guess, I'd say it had something to do with the level of technology at the time. Developers had a ton more space to work with with DVDs compared to previous generations, yet your typical game didn't contain enough data to fill anywhere near the entire disk. I know lots of LucasArts titles from the early-mid 'aughts had all manner of extras, including "making of" videos and blooper reels.

Spoiler

I suppose with the rise of things like Youtube developers figured there wasn't enough incentive to put time and money toward such things. After all, why go to all the trouble of making an extra video as a reward for beating the game if someone can just look it up on Youtube within minutes? Besides, in this day and age of the industry wanting to nickel-and-dime us to death we'd probably end up paying extra for them as DLC or some other bullshit.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

Extras are a nice bonus if done right. Behind the scenes unlockables on how different aspects of a game were made are tough to argue against for any fan. Maybe throw in something like unlocking a dev mode for anyone who Platinum's a game. Sure, something like that is available from the get-go on PC, but the whole point of games is challenge, immersion and reward for one's efforts.

 

[OpticalJunction]

there probably just isn't enough consumer interest. The majority of gamers don't even finish their games, and even those that do, only a fraction buy official DLC, let alone other related content.

 

[Saelune]

Not a must-have thing, and probably not good for every game. Mortal Kombat does it though. Really liked the ones in Deadly Alliance.

I'm not against more games having it, but I'm not critical of anyone for not doing it...except Koei. I need my galleries and encyclopedias.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

Extras are a nice bonus if done right. Behind the scenes unlockables on how different aspects of a game were made are tough to argue against for any fan. Maybe throw in something like unlocking a dev mode for anyone who Platinum's a game. Sure, something like that is available from the get-go on PC, but the whole point of games is challenge, immersion and reward for one's efforts.

I'm gonna be that guy again...

I think you'd need to have a pretty high opinion of yourself to lock "making of" stuff. To make yourself a reward that the player has to work for. I don't support it. I'd rather have it be accessible from the beginning and make the unlockables things that impact the game, like items, rewards and modes. That's assuming the game even needs unlockables and the gameplay/story isn't rewarding enough by itself.

I never saw it as an ego thing to show what went into making a game, whether unlockable or not. "Making of" stuff to me falls into the rewards category as much as anything affecting gameplay itself. The Krypt in MK for example is filled with a variety of unlockables, and that process is another layer of enjoyment added to the game.

 

[Guffe]

I had a Halo2 box set which had a very interesting 7 or 8 hour DVD about the creation of the game.
But yeah, stuff like that seem very rare indeed.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

There was this cool little museum in Bioshock Infinite that was just a bunch of concept art and statues and OST. It was pretty cool.

 

[aozgolo]

I would argue they haven't really gone away so much as they've moved off the disc. Tons of content can be found now via the internet, interviews, behind the scenes, concept art, etc. and it's become far cheaper to offer that alternative than produce it on the actual media.

 

[FPLOON]

Hey, yo! That's some pre-order shit you're talking about! I mean, why even have that on the GAME disk, let alone a separate disk on the physical copy of the game? It's not like gamers(?) would pay extra for EXTRAS marked like BONUS FEATURES on a Blu-Ray/4K disk or anything...

Honestly, at this stage of my gaming life, I seriously want access to that shit! And I don't just mean watching behind-the-scenes YouTube/Vimeo videos... I want to replay a game with audio/visual commentary from the programmers, designers, animators, mixers, and directors popping up throughout that playthrough! Fuck, even make that shit a trochievement as a ploy to get completionist(?) to check that shit out, alone...

Other than that, if Matt and Trey can showcase the stress of making a new episode of South Park in the span of a [Japanese school] week, so too can we know the stress of making a A[AA] video game only while playing said video game... Besides, it could be super-optional and does not deter from those that could care any less about that shit if they did care out of sheer curiosity... (Also, at this point, just an art concept spread ain't gonna cut it for me, but I digress...)

 

[Vykrel]

frankly, as someone who is rarely interested in extras, i dont want that stuff taking up space. videos and stuff could add to several more gigs of space being taken up, with most people not bothering to watch them. id rather just watch extra content online, like the behind the scenes stuff for Halo 5.