Open Letter to People Who Make Games

[SinisterGehe]

Okay, now the minimum question that is burning deep in the back of our minds: what three games were you specifically referring to? Telling us they were AAA titles and from reputable studio's is kind of like saying it was a fish from a lake. Plus, there's been a shitload of poor games out this year, so you're going to have to be very specific...

So you can't get the message he trying get trough without first hearing what games he referred to?

On topic:
He is right, I as calculating customer, I always buy my games in the after train, soon as I have heard from the community that they work. ANd I haven't been buying much games lately...
There's one company I do trust dearly, they might not be the most straight forward, ethical or moral, or what not. Neither are their decisions always the best but their games are reliable to work and get fixed really well (In my perspective) and have excellent customer support (In my experience). And that game is Blizzard. (Let the nerd rage begin, prove my own opinion wrong that is based on my own experience -.-' )

 

[Engarde]

I am afraid I am lacking major contribution, but other than that, I fully agree with this letter and article and hope to read more from you in the future.
All the best.

 

[blalien]

Had no problems with Fallout:NV
Although I did get it 3 days after the USA and there was a patch, shock horror!!

Same here. I bought the game, applied the patch, and have been having a hell of a good time since. It's sad that people feel such a strong need to scream bloody murder over such trivial issues. It's especially sad when people gripe about "buggy" games that they haven't even played firsthand.

Just wanted to say, "Great job Obsidian! I'm having an awesome time playing your newest title."

And in the end, that's all that really matters.

I would agree with you, except there is actually a large population that plays games but doesn't have regular Internet access. For those people, Fallout: New Vegas is a $60 Christmas ornament.

 

[jtesauro]

Russ, fairly good article, but you actually skimmed over the real fix. You said yourself you "could and probably should" write rants on those broken games. Absolutely you should, I would go so far as stating in no uncertain terms that as a reliable source on gaming, and the editor-in-chief of a gaming site, it is actually your responsibility to do so. I would suggest that you dedicate part of this site to naming and shaming such broken games. Currently you have to trawl through the unreliable and often rabid forums on many sites - not an ideal way of getting information. I appreciate this might mean extra work for you or your staff but I think it should be a high priority for you guys.

If Russ doesn't want to do this, I will gladly do so, for goddamn free.

For what it's worth, I think Shamus Young has got Fallout: New Vegas pretty well covered in his last blog post for this site. He gave it a good ( Deserved, I feel ) calling out on it.

Frankly, if and when I ever do buy Fallout:New Vegas, it'll be after massive patching, and I will likely buy Used.

That may not sound like a big deal, but my personal beliefs are when I buy a game, I want the guys who worked on it to get paid for it, not people running a second hand chop shop. I take this opinion with any creative venue, the artist should be paid for their work. But I've followed Obsidian for years, and I refuse to give them another dollar while they continue to have such a deplorable additude towards quality control in their work.

After four major releases of unplayable bugs, I'm just not buying it anymore, literally or figuratively.

 

[Kronopticon]

*applause*

simply put. its a terrible state of affairs.
and something i miss in games, are cheats, that you can use in game, because sometimes, cheats made a game more fun, like in goldeneye on the n64. where you could blow all the computer monitors in a room and after that, all your ammo would suspend mid air until someone walks into it.

Cheats also can make a game easier for someone who finds it simply too difficult. not always a problem, but its like the concept of an infinity mode in some online games, where you get infinite ammo and supplies, and you can just go to town, destroying anything and everything, todays games are missing these because some think its wrong, and it doesnt work with online gaming, which is fine, just remove cheats from online. but otherwise, cheats made a game more interesting. which is lost in todays market.

 

[Susan Arendt]

OMG... Games have bugs and glitches!

Check the sales numbers, then tell me if these games are hurting the industry.

Russ actually buys these games? They don't give them to him for free? Now that would be a good
story.

Yes, this may come as some surprise to you, but all of us here at The Escapist, even the EIC, have to buy games sometimes.

Sometimes I understand. But when you get these games for free a week or so in advance then wax poetic about them on a review only to, a week later, call them broken and unplayable is what has me a bit perturbed.

For the sake of argument, let's say you're dead-on right about Fallout New Vegas. That's one example out of three. Hardly invalidates the point being made.

For the sake of argument, you guys get no games for free, I can get that. But as I said in another post:
'I just reread the Civ V, Fallout NV, and Fable 3 reviews. For Fable 3 Susan did devote a paragraph to the glitches, yet never says it's unplayable. The Fallout one mentions glitches in a sentence at the end of review, following paragraph after paragraph of praise. Finally Civ V sounds like Gods gift to gamers (fans of the series at least), no mention at all of game breaking folly.'

Why would you tell us to buy these games to later say they are broken/unplayable? Fable 3, Civ v, and Fallout NV are called better than the previous versions even!

Before I answer, I want to make something clear: I'm not speaking for Russ, and I haven't played Fallout NV or Civ, so I can't personally speak to any bugs in those. I also have no idea if Russ is referring to Fable or not in his article.

My personal bug experience with Fable was aggravating, and in one case game-breaking, but it could be worked around. Not everyone I know who played the game was so lucky. The game saves automatically, and you only get one save slot. If the game happens to save you when your game is in a game-breaking bugged state...well, you're screwed. It's a gamble. As I said, that didn't happen to me personally - I was fortunate enough that I had only just started up the game when it broke that badly, so simply restarting was enough to solve the problem. I recommend you play it because, based on my personal experience, overall I find the good to outweigh the bad. My job as a reviewer is to give you all the information so that you can make an educated decision on whether or not to pursue the game. I've told you its good points, I've told you it's buggy. It is worth playing, certainly, no question. Is it worth paying full price for? That is very much up to the individual. My personal recommendation would be to either wait or, if you can't wait, then rent it so at least you're not out $60 should the technical issues prove too frustrating.

 

[TheXRatedDodo]

Russ, fairly good article, but you actually skimmed over the real fix. You said yourself you "could and probably should" write rants on those broken games. Absolutely you should, I would go so far as stating in no uncertain terms that as a reliable source on gaming, and the editor-in-chief of a gaming site, it is actually your responsibility to do so. I would suggest that you dedicate part of this site to naming and shaming such broken games. Currently you have to trawl through the unreliable and often rabid forums on many sites - not an ideal way of getting information. I appreciate this might mean extra work for you or your staff but I think it should be a high priority for you guys.

If Russ doesn't want to do this, I will gladly do so, for goddamn free.

For what it's worth, I think Shamus Young has got Fallout: New Vegas pretty well covered in his last blog post for this site. He gave it a good ( Deserved, I feel ) calling out on it.

Frankly, if and when I ever do buy Fallout:New Vegas, it'll be after massive patching, and I will likely buy Used.

That may not sound like a big deal, but my personal beliefs are when I buy a game, I want the guys who worked on it to get paid for it, not people running a second hand chop shop. I take this opinion with any creative venue, the artist should be paid for their work. But I've followed Obsidian for years, and I refuse to give them another dollar while they continue to have such a deplorable additude towards quality control in their work.

After four major releases of unplayable bugs, I'm just not buying it anymore, literally or figuratively.

Good on you.
As the old adage goes:
"Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice, shame on you."

 

[Effyou12345]

"You can't seriously believe that using the funds derived from the sale of a broken game to continue working on that game and hopefully make it playable at some point in the undefined future to be a reasonable way of doing business."

Preach, brother! So sick of this happening.

 

[SachielOne]

This was a great article. I wouldn't have been as nice about it as you were. Then again, I don't have a professional need to stay on amicable terms with the game industry.

 

[nipsen]

What we have now, though, is different. Reviews don't talk tech any more, they certainly don't go for story and narrative build-up, they don't explain game-mechanics, etc. Instead, they are the reviewer's opinions and instant feelings as they pick up the title. So the initial buzz on the game is typically just put down in writing and pushed.

What precisely does "tech talk" tell the reader that a forthright opinion does not? It matters little how grand the developers vision, how amazing the technology under the hood, how hard people worked on it. It doesn't matter what fortune is at stake or what lives hang in the balance. These bits of information are of academic interest certainly. They might even be worthy of being widely known. But the information a reader wants to know before buying a game is simple enough: will they enjoy it?

The only way the journalist can meet this need honestly is to give their own opinion complete with prejudices. The rest of that only tells the reader of the potential the product might have had when what they really need to know is what the product actually is.

I disagree. If I have no idea how you think, and what you base your opinion on - then your opinion isn't worth anything to me as a recommendation.

Therefore, your honest opinion needs to be qualified and explained. If it's not, then I simply know that you apparently dislike or like something - but I cannot connect to it as a reader, and have that preview of the - in this case - the game I am perhaps buying.

Let's do a less complicated example. If you stand on a corner beside a shoe-store, saying "I like it, I like it!" to anyone passing by while holding up a shoe. Then we call that "advertisement". If you take a more circumspect approach to illuminating your extremely personal opinion of a brand of shoes, colouring it in with flowery images of your walking artistry - we call that "painfully embarrassing advertisement".

But if you were to create something on your own, about the soles of shoes, the materials and the way they feel when you walk - then it might be possible for a reader to learn something and buy the shoe with the good sole.

Even if it was just about the look and appearance of the shoe - that too might be interesting to some people. But that as well would not simply be "I like it". There would be reasons, and ways the shoe appeals to you - and if you didn't describe that, then your opinion would be truly and utterly useless.

Let's go back to the shacknews example again. This writer insisted that even though he would give out blanket recommendations in a weak moment for games that were - broken, didn't play well, and certainly was not as good as advertised - this would not impact his credibility. Because he always said his opinion, at all times.

There's a reason why this credibility question comes up. And that's basically my opinion of "honest opinions" as blanket defences when it comes to game-reviews.

 

[L3D]

By releasing unfinished buggy games publishers are shooting themselves in the foot. Who wants to pay full game price to be a beta tester? Not I.

Stardock's Elemental: War of Magic is a good example what happens when "we will fix it after the release" mentality defeats common sense.

Releasing a game unfinished gives it bad reviews, which makes public less interested to buy it.

After getting burned few times by unfixed games, people will just start buying the games later. After when they are updated or maybe even released as GOTY version, can be found from the bargain bins or used games shelves. Publisher gets less revenue and the money spent on advertisements is wasted or is at least less effective.

Sometimes the bug fixes and updates never get released, either the publisher tells the game maker to focus on something else, or they just go belly up due to bad sales.

 

[Slash47]

I call bullshit Mr. Pitts.
If you're looking for someone to blame look no further than yourself.

Don't blame the people trying to make a dollar when they take advantage of an all to eager and spoiled fan base.

Minecraft is a perfect example of this, people are more than willing to buy a game that's still in the alpha phase of it's development.
The only difference between say Civilization 5 and minecraft is that 2K isn't willing to admit that they're selling a barely beta version of their game.

Who to blame is the consumer who pays for games and supports the diseased industry letting it continue on as it has.
Every copy of Madden 2011 people buy is a nail in the coffin of gaming industies creativity and honesty towards its customers.

I dare say it's your job as a gaming journalist to help the consumer make a educated purchase.
The industry is dying because everyone is interdependant on each other consumers on reviewers, reviewers on advertizing that publishers use to sell games to consumers.

The industry will only fix itself when people STOP BUYING THE GODDAMN CRAP THAT IS BEING PUBLISHED!

Indeed.

It's a very easy problem to help solve. People will keep buying Civ or COD or whatever really just because of the franchise, but that's OK. It's the same as with the food or car industry.

This letter to me looks like an annoying attempt at being smart. Everybody knows... (And that picture, dude...)

 

[Folio]

Or in short: *slap* Don't fuck it up next time, douchebag!

Seriously, it sounds like another 'chrome coated' threat. If I were a game developing company and read this, I'd check my recent games right away. In fear that more of these letters will come before they crumble the company into dust.

Also I'd go like: AAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWW!~ We need to get to that game AGAIN! We've done that so many times already! I wanted it to be finished!

 

[CitySquirrel]

Well spoken, sir,

 

[Russ Pitts]

This was a great article. I wouldn't have been as nice about it as you were. Then again, I don't have a professional need to stay on amicable terms with the game industry.

Professional considerations had very little to do with the tone I took for this piece. The fact is, you get to know people in this business. Which is why a lot of people who review games might not have written this kind of letter, or said some of the things I have said. I very genuinely know and like a great many of the people who might read this, and consider them friends. But sometimes you have to say things to friends that they don't want to hear. That's life. For that reason I wrote it as I would write to a friend. Because I was, in fact, writing to friends.

 

[Tanki]

I don't know about you guys but, I haven't touched a published game this entire year, since their equivalent to a pile of crap. I've been playing fan made mods and remakes, which are 100 times more fun than anything out on the market right now. http://www.mechlivinglegends.net/ - http://ufotts.ninex.info/ - http://ufo2000.sourceforge.net/

 

[Rattler5150]

1. Microsoft should get out of the gaming industry. period!

2. Games for windows Live sucks

3. Steam sucks

4. DRM sucks

 

[Raithnor]

*snip*
It's not just games either, the Movie industry has the same problem and any line of business where the barrier to entry is so high there is very little competition usually operate this way.

Maybe this has been said already but when you buy a DVD/Blu-Ray/VHS/Cinema ticket/what ever you get the full film you bought. You sit down and baring any major manufacturing defects you get to see the whole movie start to finish, and if there are major defects with the disk you take it back they give you a new one. You might not enjoy the film but you get to not enjoy the whole thing.

If you buy a game with bugs that make it unplayable then you don't get the full experience you pay for and you can't take it back for a refund, you can't exchange it, you are stuck with a broken unfinishable game and a large sum of money no longer in your pocket.

Although New Vegas has no excuse to be as broken as it is, it is based on the engine of Fallout 3 and seems to use most art assets yet still has the same bugs that Fallout 3 had at launch and more. It's appalling.

I'm referring to the notion that if your sales are large enough then failure becomes irrelevant and the incentive to produce a quality product slips. For a movie the quality is reflected in the writing/directing/acting of the film. The process of distributing that film has become standardized (usually after an obligatory format war).

I get what you're saying though. My point is "If X property can make us 300 million dollars no matter how stupid the story is or how bad the acting they're not going to make it a priority for the movies to do better, they're going to make them cheaper." This is something that happens to companies that don't think they can grow their customer base and at the same time take that customer base for granted.

 

[Communist partisan]

I find it very hypocritical for the industry to complain about piracy and the like when it can't even release a finished product. If the industry doesn't care about gamers, then why should gamers care about them?

exactly they can't make a propper game and bubble bath (laugh) at us than we buy'em and than they ***** that peapole don't wanna pay for'em