Obsidian Lost Bonus for Fallout: New Vegas by One Metacritic Point

[CardinalPiggles]

Thanks for making the games industry such a shit place to be Publishers.

 

[CardinalPiggles]

I think a better we just found a reason for "omg you gave us a 8 you haters" reasoning.

better system would be:
8.5 = bonus
8.0 = 0.75 bonus
7.5 = 0.5 bonus
7.0 = 0.25 bonus
that way this 0.1 point wouldnt be such a terrible thing for them.

All or nothing is more incentive to do well.

 

[Treblaine]

What kind of backwards bullshit business deal is that? Is this common? For fucks sake gaming industry, forget about Metracritic scores! They are meaningless as many of the publications are bought off anyway (looking at you, Gamespot and IGN). This makes me sick.

Agreed. Why wouldn't you reward a bonus for sales? You know, the metric every other IP-based industry uses for success? I thought this was capitalism, not a popularity contest.

Very very good point.

Games have gotten high metascores but low sales, also low metascore but high sales, but it is SALES that is what the publishers actually want the developers to generate. Publishers have repeatedly intervened in games design to make them sell more copies or with greater returns... now it's drawing lines at arbitrary sales?

Or am I missing something. Are publishers saying:

"High metascore means it SHOULD HAVE sold well, and the only reason it wouldn't have is some non-developer factor, a screw up on our (the publisher's) side such as insufficient marketing or bad luck in timing against competition"

Still crazy to put thins much absolute value on metascore.

 

[Treblaine]

Thanks for making the games industry such a shit place to be Publishers.

Who has made things hard for publishers? If they have any hardship they have made it for themselves.

 

[krellen]

Thanks for making the games industry such a shit place to be Publishers.

Who has made things hard for publishers? If they have any hardship they have made it for themselves.

I think there's a missing comma in that sentence that drastically changes the meaning (hint: it should go before the word "Publishers".)

 

[Treblaine]

snip

Thanks for making the games industry such a shit place to be Publishers.

Who has made things hard for publishers? If they have any hardship they have made it for themselves.

I think there's a missing comma in that sentence that drastically changes the meaning (hint: it should go before the word "Publishers".)

"Thanks for making the games industry such a shit place to be, Publishers."

Yep, that makes sense.

 

[DRTJR]

WHAT! this is why we can't have nice things. Fallout New vegas is amazing, buggy as hell, never had a game crash six times in one day on my x-box like it does but I still come back to it.

 

[uncanny474]

Neither has Bethesda. All the games starting with Morrowind had to be fixed by modders. Hell, modders had to fix something as amateur as missing textures and mesh problems. Ever wonder why zombies in Oblivion had black hair? It was supposed to be white. Not to mention the HOLES INTO THE GAME ABYSS in MANY of Bethesda's games interiors and exteriors like Fallout 3 or Skyrim.

Besides, Bethesda did the QA for NV. Get over it.

Never have I seen people ***** so much about a single company. If it isn't the star wars fanboys who cant accept star wars has been milked to death decades ago, its something else.

A) Bethesda having problems has nothing to do with Obsidian having problems.

B) Bethesda makes MASSIVE games with problems. KotOR 2 wasn't nearly as big as an Elder Scrolls game, and it had ten times as many problems. We're not talking zombies with black hair--we're talking unfinished quest-lines, missing dialogue, and a thousand other MASSIVE problems.

C) Bethesda at least doesn't mind when someone fixes their games. Obsidian C&Ded Team Gizka AFTER they finished their fix for KotOR 2, and then refused to fix KotOR 2 themselves.

In Conclusion, Bethesda's not Jesus Christ, but they are conclusively better than Obsidian. Fucking Sonic Team is better than Obsidian--at least they release COMPLETED games.

 

[lockgar]

84 out of 100 is apparently shit. I hate what the video game industry has become, Jim Sterling was right....

Firing people for 1 score a metacritic... I think the guys on metacritic have gone on record for their surprise on how "important" their site has become to the industry.

 

[Stevepinto3]

What kind of backwards bullshit business deal is that? Is this common? For fucks sake gaming industry, forget about Metracritic scores! They are meaningless as many of the publications are bought off anyway (looking at you, Gamespot and IGN). This makes me sick.

Agreed. Why wouldn't you reward a bonus for sales? You know, the metric every other IP-based industry uses for success? I thought this was capitalism, not a popularity contest.

Because the publisher is in charge of sales. You never put the power to reward based on sales in the hands of someone who determines sales. You'd end up with the publisher purposely shipping a lower than threshold number to screw over the studio.

Wait, you're saying the publisher would want to purposefully lower their own sales? Seriously? Even if it means paying the developer more, more sales equals more money for the publisher. There is no reason for a publisher to intentionally hurt the sales of a game they are spending millions of dollars on. I don't even.

 

[Tireseas_v1legacy]

Wait, you're saying the publisher would want to purposefully lower their own sales? Seriously? Even if it means paying the developer more, more sales equals more money for the publisher. There is no reason for a publisher to intentionally hurt the sales of a game they are spending millions of dollars on. I don't even.

I'm not saying this is what happened in this case, but what about shovelware? Those games still cost a boat load of cash to make, but sales will be only slightly above the break-even point. If you base a bonus on a sales threshold, then you will likely create a narrow, but still possible hole between the break-even point and the bonus threshold. If it is unlikely that the publisher will be able to profit above the threshold (i.e. sales would break the threshold but will not likely be profit more beyond that once the bonus is factored in [Likely sales profit below threshold > Likely sales profit above threshold minus bonus]). This is more accounting than quality.

A large corporation (let's call them FB) could create a clause with a fairly large hole like this for a shovelware game (let's call it Pony Paradise) by a small studio (let's call them Endemic). Endemic, thinking that they've got a cult hit that will sell like wildfire, opts to agree to the threshold bonus set by FB. FB, having more resources to study demographics and determine the likely number of sales for such a title as Pony Paradise, knows full well that they will likely not hit the threshold. However, in order to insure that they don't get caught in a bad faith violation, FB creates and ships the bare minimum number of copies to meet the threshold, many of which will likely not be sold and will be below the threshold. After Pony Paradise ships, as FB planned, the number of copies sold is above the break-even threshold necessary to turn a profit, but below the threshold for Endemic to receive the bonus. FB adheres to the contract, screws over Endemic out of their bonus, and walks away with a larger profit.

I stand by my opinion of creating a contingency clause where the party who would be at a detriment to the benefit of the other party should the contingency come to pass has the power to effectively control whether or not such an event were to happen is a terrible idea. You want to put such contingencies out of their control in order to insure that they do not act in a way such as my example.

 

[theultimateend]

Do you think that there was some backdoor deals to keep the score down to not have to pay the bonuses?

Probably not.

Had the game not been so crashy it would have been probably one of the best games I've played in my entire life.

Sadly it was flimsier than a wet noodle :/.

Shame too, I wish they'd rerun it through the Skyrim engine or some kind of updated engine. I'd love to play that game without fear of crashing.

Obsidian lost my vote with NWN2 but easily got my looking their way with FNV.

84 out of 100 is apparently shit. I hate what the video game industry has become, Jim Sterling was right....

Firing people for 1 score a metacritic... I think the guys on metacritic have gone on record for their surprise on how "important" their site has become to the industry.

If i had gotten 84 out of 100 in all my classes in school I would have gotten through college for pretty much free.

Remarkable how exceptional performance in one avenue is considered valueless in another.

I blame AAA being a mark of cost and not quality. That has skewed everything. Would be weird if A grade meat was just what you called expensive meat.

Actually...IS it? Holy crap I kinda want to google that now.

 

[Lordpils]

What kind of backwards bullshit business deal is that? Is this common? For fucks sake gaming industry, forget about Metracritic scores! They are meaningless as many of the publications are bought off anyway (looking at you, Gamespot and IGN). This makes me sick.

It's bullshit scores which can be affected heavily if a critic has a grudge against a developer or franchise. I wish more critics would give detailed reviews to games without an arbitrary number so this bullshit would be less likely to occur.

 

[gombie]

what?! FO:NV was the best in the series :/ felt like a dense RPG world with a lovely ending (glares at ME3)

 

[AdmiralCheez]

I really enjoyed playing New Vegas. I got it a few months ago when it was on sale on steam for $5 (with all the patches accumulated over the years). I stopped playing it because I never once stopped a session by clicking the "quit" button. A devastating crash would freeze the program, cut mouse and keyboard functionality, and forced me to hold down the power button until it did a hard reboot. EVERY TIME.

I would be more disappointed by this news if I could actually play it without fear of horrible crashes. I'm still disappointed, but if publishers wouldn't rush deadlines and actually did some debugging, good games wouldn't fall victim to tech issues.

Besides, why do people look at scores as the ultimate authority anyway? I can't understand why a number tells you more about a game than a written review with pros and cons weighed in, with a recommendation based on what you might like or dislike about a game.

 

[Darkmantle]

*SNIP*

Right, I feel like we may have gotten a little off the point of what I intended, so I'll be clearer this time.

First: I think using metacritic as a scale to give out bonuses is wrong.

second point: It's only off by one, That's just a dick move. It's like well, it's MARGINALLY less successful than we wanted, no money . It just seems greedy

 

[Sucal]

*SNIP*

Right, I feel like we may have gotten a little off the point of what I intended, so I'll be clearer this time.

First: I think using metacritic as a scale to give out bonuses is wrong.

second point: It's only off by one, That's just a dick move. It's like well, it's MARGINALLY less successful than we wanted, no money . It just seems greedy

First point, I'm going to disagree with you, but its been covered enough already.

Second point: Its off by one, using the average scores of some 30 or so reviewers. Betheseda are not in the wrong here, in any way shape or form. You sign a contract, you stick to the contract and you get paid. Obsidian, more then most developers today know this, especially since as its been mentioned ALL their games are developed under similar contracts, except maybe Alpha Protocol.

One whole point can be a massive difference in the industry, especially when your shipping millions of games. In addition, as I staed and you likely ignored, the 85 cut off mark for the contract was already incredibly genious. If the number in question was unreasonable, something like 91 or 92 I'd agree with you. But by the standards of a triple A game, especially for a franchise like Fallout, you score 80 just by giving them review copies. The 85 should have been in the bag for sure.

Its not Bethesedas fault if they don't preform to contract when they agreed to the contract, and if you constantly make exceptions in contracts, then your contracts become completely worthless in the eyes of the law. Which is when useless companies like EA and Activision start getting involved.

It's bullshit scores which can be affected heavily if a critic has a grudge against a developer or franchise. I wish more critics would give detailed reviews to games without an arbitrary number so this bullshit would be less likely to occur.

You sir, have just lost permission to complain for failing statistics forever. A single critic, over the number of scores used for the average, will not drive the score up or down enough to make that much of a difference. That's why Metacritic is useful in the first place, as it provides a far large grasp of the general opinion, without major bias.

Its people like you, who do not understand how statistics work that are response for the 8.5 scale, NOT sites like MC.

Have a nice day.

 

[aashell13]

That's pretty ridiculous. I can't fathom why Obsidian would agree to that, given how notoriously unreliable and easily manipulated metacritic and the like are.