Jimquisition: Guns Blazing

[TheLazyGeek]

I had high hopes for Dark Souls 2...

Had...

Also I doubt publishers will ever truly learn that Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V doesn't work as well as they might think.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Don't misunderstand me. I agree with everything he said. What I meant was that he must be getting sick and tired of having to say it because Publishers refuse to listen.

The thing of it is, publishers don't usually listen to a single voice on the Internet. They've got passels of marketing folks, business grads all, who study the industry, research the consumer, tailor their product to earn the most money from the most people, and then realize that someone has already done that and it's called Call of Duty.

For the Internet to have an effect, it has to really scream and the message usually gets lost amid the raging. "Stop copying the AAA market! You're killing yourselves and ruining the medium! Stick to what you're already good at!" screams the Internet. "Stick to what you're good at!" hears the publisher and proceeds to tune out what is clearly an uninformed opinion advising stagnation. Such opinions have no place judging a highly-paid, well-educated marketing team that spent years doing costly research to advance profits. It's the Internet. There will be others out there who will offer support.

Jim's been consistent in his message and, one day, he will probably be proven right. Dark Souls 2 will crash and burn because of its hubris, taking hundreds of jobs with it, and the once-highly paid, well-educated marketing team will be out on their butts wondering how it all went wrong. There will be plenty of people to say "I told you so" but I imagine the message from Jim will be "What did you expect?" As Jim pointed out, this is where it starts. Dark Souls 2 might just become the textbook example of how not to do it, something that the video game industry apparently needs to realize that AAA business practices do not work anymore.

But surely the market has already started to show that this practice isn't sustainable. I mean isn't Battlefield and Medel of Honour's constant attempts to copy Call of Duty's success evidence enough of that? Besides, I don't know how well Dead Space 3 did, but I'm sure it failed to capture the Call of Duty audience.

 

[Muspelheim]

I really, really did just want to play Tomb Raider

You know what, I'm the sort of person Namco Bandai are marketing Dark Souls 2 to. I haven't played Dark/Demons Souls because they're not my sort of game but I played the shit out of Skyrim. But I'm so sick and tired of genre games being homogenised that I steer clear of anything that is made to appeal to everyone.

I love fantasy games but I won't support you for this Namco Bandai.

I'm in a very similar position. Being another Skyrim-phleb, I'd much rather stick to that and let Dark Souls concentrate on pleasing their own fans. Now they've added solidarity towards the Dark Soulites on my list of why I'm not picking up their Dark Souls II.

I suppose splicing in a few bits of Skyrim that I liked (Alchemy, modding kits, a furry playable race, crafting, it'd be impressive if they managed to stitch all those on, admittedly) could potentially sweeten the deal, but since it represents one of the biggest problems in the industry right now, there's not really much they could do. They've already flown their colours.

Thankfully, there's still a few pockets of rebel activity out there. Paradox is still doing alright, not to mention the distant mountain monastery where the legendary Bay12 Games brothers code away 'til the end of times.

 

[Parakeettheprawn]

I'm probably going to get burned at the stake for this but, on a tangent thread of Dead Space 2 and 3 (since they were brought up in this), was I the -only- person who ever thought "hmm, this could be neat as a multiplayer game of some kind if done right?" I'm not saying that Dead Space 2 or Dead Space 3 did it particularly astoundingly (both were fun but DS2 in particular was practically a malnourished child that Visceral locked in a cellar and never thought about again). Neither am I saying that it -needed- multiplayer. And yes, while I loved Dead Space 3 for its own merits, it isn't Dead Space 2, and never well be.

It was better when we had four weapons, there weren't human enemies, and necromorphs didn't seem to just blindly charge at you with no strategy or group variety, but I hate this mentality that's been bred as a result of publishers pushing multiplayer that multiplayer in a game that was once singleplayer (or is predominantly singleplayer) can't work and is what causes the problems. No, the problems in Dead Space 3 were there the second EA put a gun to Visceral's head with that massive quota. If a game actually puts effort into it's singleplayer and its multiplayer, they can come out on top, like Max Payne 3 and Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, which were both widely praised for their multiplayer as well as singleplayer.

Not every game needs multiplayer, certainly not. But neither does every game need to NOT have multiplayer because some people like to play their games alone. It's not like people like myself who enjoy competitive/cooperative multiplayer don't enjoy some alone time -- I wouldn't have gotten so many hours in Arkham City, Resistance 3, Skyrim, Warframe solo, Dead Space 1-3, or Deus Ex: Human Revolution if I didn't. But for crying out loud it's not as if multiplayer itself is the problem it's the motivation behind it and how it's executed.

 

[LazyAza]

I'm genuinely surprised it took me more than a second to realize what that rubber hand was for. And yet the delay made the realization funnier. haha

But yeah greed is basically slowly killing the big budget game industry. The amount of games that could have been so much better if only the devs/publishers realized that mass appeal is, and always has been a stupid goal.

 

[GundamSentinel]

I... uhm... I've nothing more to say here. This may have been one of my favorite Jimquisitions. So something good came out of the whole affair, eh? >.>

No really, this subject made me rage. Although I'm not the biggest fan of Dark Souls (personally I think a tiny bit of what was discussed in this vid was already happening for Dark Souls), I loved Demon's Souls and had a great time with both games. It's just mindboggling how stupid those publishers actually are. I just want to go over there, grab them by the shoulders, shake them as hard as I can and shout "what's wrong with you!" in their faces.

Captcha: cabbage borsht

Okay...

 

[Imp_Emissary]

I don't think what you quoted in the video was quite damning enough. You are making some safe assumptions, but they are still just that: assumptions. Skyrim is referenced many times in this video and, interestingly enough, it's one of the best counterpoints to your video I can think of. TES started off as a super niche franchise. Hell, I didn't even know about it until TES III: Morrowind debuted on the original Xbox. In every TES since Daggerfall they have worked to widen that "net" and bring in as many new fans as possible.

While I believe Morrowind to be the best in the series, I recognize Oblivion and Skyrim are still great games that have not yet abandoned the things that make TES games great. There's a right way and a wrong way to widen the net. Yes, Bethesda's made some mistakes in this regard (over reliance on voice acting, hand-holding mechanics, etc.) but overall I would say that they're doing good work. If a niche game can garner new fans without losing its soul... more power to it.

I think it's too early to say that Dark Souls 2 will drop the ball, but I can certainly see where you are coming from. As you've sited, there are plenty of franchises who've recently done the same thing and failed miserably.

As always,

Thank God for Jim.

Fair points, Fappy. Fair points.
As Jim also said, this could go well.

That said, I think one of the more likely problems that may come up with Dark Souls 2 would be them pumping money into it without need, and thus making them have to sell even more to make a profit. Rather than them changing the games too much, and losing the game's soul.

Not a fan of the games, never played them, but I would be sad to see them get burned for trying to fly too close to the sun.

Oh, and thanks for the show today Jim. It was heavenly.

 

[irishda]

Jim, you must be getting sick and tired of having to flog that dead horse eh?

He's getting really anal about homogenization and unrealistic expectations.

Don't misunderstand me. I agree with everything he said. What I meant was that he must be getting sick and tired of having to say it because Publishers refuse to listen.

Or because publishers (in any industry) don't really listen to critiques, reviews, or video rants especially. They listen to the customers' wallets.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Jim, you must be getting sick and tired of having to flog that dead horse eh?

He's getting really anal about homogenization and unrealistic expectations.

Don't misunderstand me. I agree with everything he said. What I meant was that he must be getting sick and tired of having to say it because Publishers refuse to listen.

Or because publishers (in any industry) don't really listen to critiques, reviews, or video rants especially. They listen to the customers' wallets.

Yeah, that's the part I don't understand. Surely the market has already shown that that practice isn't sustainable.

 

[TWEWYFan]

Jim, you must be getting sick and tired of having to flog that dead horse eh?

Most likely, he would probably stop if it weren't for the fact that game developers still seem to want to climb onto the horse and ride it, to stretch the metaphor.

 

[anonymity88]

I was excited about DkSII, now I'm concerned. I don't want the series to die because Namco sunk millions into advertising and didn't see millions and millions of sales. For fuck sakes.

Jim, you must be getting sick and tired of having to flog that dead horse eh?

He's getting really anal about homogenization and unrealistic expectations.

Don't misunderstand me. I agree with everything he said. What I meant was that he must be getting sick and tired of having to say it because Publishers refuse to listen.

Yeah, it's really gotten out of... hand.

He's making a good fist of it at least

 

[thespyisdead]

that fist waving was disturbing to say the least... and the AAA game industry REALLY needs to pull its head out of its ass... better yet let it keep its head there! more room for indies, that I am actually aspiring to be

 

[MonkeyPunch]

Jim brought this up in the last Podtoid and I very much agree with most of this wholeheartedly. That Namco statement is so face-palm worthy I might have to fly to the Caribbean, uproot a tree (think of the tree most associated with that region ;] ) and whack myself in the face with it.

The end bit with Jim resting on the fist really made me laugh.

 

[Bindal]

Dead Space was a Horror game? Then my game must've been incomplete because I didn't found any horror in my Dead Space.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Jim, you must be getting sick and tired of having to flog that dead horse eh?

Most likely, he would probably stop if it weren't for the fact that game developers still seem to want to climb onto the horse and ride it, to stretch the metaphor.

Which is why he's probably getting sick and tired of having to flog it.

 

[RTR]

I like it when things from Podtoid cross over to this show

 

[irishda]

Jim, you must be getting sick and tired of having to flog that dead horse eh?

He's getting really anal about homogenization and unrealistic expectations.

Don't misunderstand me. I agree with everything he said. What I meant was that he must be getting sick and tired of having to say it because Publishers refuse to listen.

Or because publishers (in any industry) don't really listen to critiques, reviews, or video rants especially. They listen to the customers' wallets.

Yeah, that's the part I don't understand. Surely the market has already shown that that practice isn't sustainable.

Not necessarily, for instance the Battlefield and Medal of Honor games. They don't have to necessarily match the success of the original, they just have to be successful enough to make money. The very nature of publishing and even entertainment development is an incredibly risky gamble with large sums of money, even with something like Kickstarter, people are still paying through the nose to make something that will presumably be purchased enough to make that money back. Just like with any gamble, you don't want to go the riskiest way possible (i.e. focusing on a small niche market and hoping its popularity expands), you want to take the least risk, the way the market is trending. Now ironically enough, that sometimes means they'll never see one of the formulas for success: drawing in people to a niche with a well crafted niche game. But then I remember all the JRPGs I've gotten into because I've heard one was super awesome (none) and it's obvious that's not exactly a sound method of success when you're gambling with your life's savings.

 

[bunji]

Hey Jim, I thought you allready wanted to casualize Dark Souls with some shitty ez mode. This is fucking breaking my heart, but pick a fucking side and stick to it Jim.

 

[crimson sickle2]

I agree with the argument, but I can't help but feel now isn't the right time for it. The statement, while incredibly telling of the AAA industry, is from some dumbass PR guy that doesn't have to be invested in the development cycle at all to make his comment. Now I'm a little afraid there is going to be people preemptively waving Dark Souls 2 off as a sinking ship, before we even see the full game. Hopefully, I'm wrong, so far the footage and direction of the game is looking pretty good.

 

[MB202]

It's official: the gaming industry is run by idiots who don't know what they're doing.