PC Exclusives Can't Justify Triple-A Budgets, Says Brink Boss

[UnravThreads]

Weasel words. I mean, I can't think of any Triple A games that are PC exclusives, like Crysis, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Audiosurf, NOLF, Black and White, Starcraft, American McGee's Alice...

Maybe he just meant TripleA [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TripleA_%28computer_game%29] games.

...Age of Mythology, Dungeon Siege, Unreal Tournament, Starcraft, Diablo...

Lol. Lol.
Starcraft? Wasn't exclusive.
Diablo 1? Wasn't exclusive.
Audiosurf? Not exclusive anymore.
Unreal Tournament? Wasn't exclusive.

No offense, but if you're gonna list "exclusives", please, make sure they are actually exclusive.

But I'm in agreement with the developer yet I'm not. There are games out there (World of Warcraft is a prime example, but that was right time + right place) that do show you can have an exclusive that defies all expectations, but often it's just either luck or sheer ingenuity. Most games now wouldn't survive as exclusives, purely because they won't sell in the numbers publishers want. Fallout 3, Call of Duty 4... Would they honestly be as well selling as they are now if they were PC exclusive? No, they wouldn't!

 

[Kuliani]

I do hope that many developers are aware that there are voice-alikes (see: look-alikes) for famous people and actors? Find anyone with a good Sean Connery impersonation, and BAM, great voice actor.

 

[elvor0]

Even as a die-hard PC gamer I was almost with him on this, until he got to the part about orchestras in London and recording at Abbey Road. What the hell does that have to do with making a game? It might be great for some ego-stroking in pre-release interviews but does anyone really care (or even notice) whether the background music in their game of the week was recorded by the Oblivion [http://www.lpo.co.uk/], but does anyone really think that was money well spent?)

Don't be ignorant Maly, some games only reach public eye because of their voice acting. You really think half as many people would have bought Brutal Legend if Jack Black wasn't the voice actor, or it was void of any kind of Metal rock?

The answer is, before you give me some kind of ironic statement, no. It wouldn't have. The majority of love for that game came from Jack Black and the entire Metal world he revolved around.

True, but it would've been a bit difficult for it to even EXIST if there wasn't any metal, given that is the entire premise of the game.

Weasel words. I mean, I can't think of any Triple A games that are PC exclusives, like Crysis, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Audiosurf, NOLF, Black and White, Starcraft, American McGee's Alice...

Maybe he just meant TripleA [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TripleA_%28computer_game%29] games.

...Age of Mythology, Dungeon Siege, Unreal Tournament, Starcraft, Diablo...

Lol. Lol.
Starcraft? Wasn't exclusive.
Diablo 1? Wasn't exclusive.
Audiosurf? Not exclusive anymore.
Unreal Tournament? Wasn't exclusive.

No offense, but if you're gonna list "exclusives", please, make sure they are actually exclusive.

But I'm in agreement with the developer yet I'm not. There are games out there (World of Warcraft is a prime example, but that was right time + right place) that do show you can have an exclusive that defies all expectations, but often it's just either luck or sheer ingenuity. Most games now wouldn't survive as exclusives, purely because they won't sell in the numbers publishers want. Fallout 3, Call of Duty 4... Would they honestly be as well selling as they are now if they were PC exclusive? No, they wouldn't!

Shaky, few years later ports that didnt do very well hardly count, I mean Starcraft64? Are you REALLY going to mention that with a straight face. And we all know Diablo is designed for the PC, and as far as I'm aware, the iphone doesnt count as a platform in terms of ACTUAL gaming, anyway, why even mention Audiosurf in the first place, quote of guy im quoting, it's not an AAA title.

 

[mrjinx]

I have Blizzard on the phone. Guess what they said?

But really he's probably right for most developers. However I don't think PC gamers care if the game is an exclusive or not. All we care about is not getting a sloppy console port with bad Keyboard/mouse controls and bad optimization.

If you make a quality PC port you will be rewarded, release a poor port and you will experience poor sales. Don't blame piracy either.

As stated Blizzard and also Valve and whatever company releases a QUALITY PC game are obviously making a good chunk of money.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Lol. Lol.

Ah, an intellectual

No offense, but if you're gonna list "exclusives", please, make sure they are actually exclusive.

They were, but due to their sales, they were ported to other machines afterwards.

Would games sell as many copies if only on one machine? No...
Are there games exclusively for the PC that sell enough to be triple A rated? Well...yes.

He could probably make a Triple A game by putting Sonic back in a good game, or getting Valve to do a film intro. Doesn't make a difference what machine it's based on.

And there's a BIG difference between the XBox TF2 and the PC version, as I'm sure you're aware.

 

[Altorin]

Or is he just clouding his otherwise-valid point by saying something really stupid in order to distract us all from the fact that Splash Damage has never actually made [http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/splash-damage-ltd/offset,0/so,1a/list-games/] a triple-A game, or any game at all for that matter? Brink might turn out to be absolutely brilliant but if it does, it won't be because Wedgwood hired Sheena Easton and Mitch Pileggi to do voice work.

thanks for putting everything back into perspective.

That being said, his premise is probably right, but I love how he focused on Sound being the deciding factor between a triple-A game and chaff. You can use Wilhelm Screams and still make a triple-A Game. In fact, I fully suggest doing so, as they're awesome.

 

[Arbitrary Cidin]

A message to everyone siding with Wedgewood about games needing to be high-budget to be successful...
I completely hate myself for saying this, but if that's true, why has the Wii been able to dominate the gaming market?

Don't get me wrong, a good budget's important, but to assume that gamers will only be enticed by the caviar of the industry is ignorant.

On another note, this really is the time to be investing in PC games. The PC gaming community is in the middle of a massive popularity boom right now.

 

[comadorcrack]

yeah makes sense. I just think games should be released on all 3 platforms (being PS3, Xbox360 and PC) and certain games be exclusive for the wii and its unique system.

 

[Captain Pancake]

You make a good point about Patrick Stewart. It was ultimately to the game's detriment that they hired a top-grade actor for such a brief amount of work (and likely a hefty fee), while letting down other aspects of voice acting because of it.

 

[Terramax]

Big name voice actors is not the same thing as quality voice actors. The point I believe Malygris is trying to make is that many other developers achieve very high levels of quality without feeling the need to hire the London Symphony Orchestra or renting out Abbey Road. You can make a great game without going balls to the wall as far as budget is concerned.

Very good point but either way you need excessive amounts of money to achieve both which cannot be achieved if your game is exclusively for PC.

Furthermore I think he was taking Paul Wedgwood's comments a little too literally. I think what Paul was trying to say is exactly that, you need quality of everything to make a triple A. The last PC exclusive to achieve that was Crysis, but did it sell as well as EA and Crytec hoped? No.

 

[Enai Siaion]

If PC games don't sell enough copies to justify their development costs, unlike 10 years ago, this means:

- Games have gotten too expensive for no gameplay reason. If I wanted to watch a movie I'd watch a freaking movie. Diablo 2 wasn't popular because it had amazing voice actors or cutscenes.

- Games have gotten too heavy. I said it before and I'll say it again: there are many more PCs in the world than consoles, but few of those are gaming PCs. How about making a game that doesn't require a transdimensional PC to play? Like, hey, World of Warcraft. Even garbage like Runescape hits a huge market. But no, it all has to require a GForce832421093912 Turbo and then they're surprised that nobody has one.

- Multiplayer! It's free, everyone has it, but oh so few games are multiplayer oriented. World of Warcraft again, but also games like Trackmania. Look it up, it's the most popular PC racing game. Think about the hype surrounding Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3. If you don't connect people to each other as soon as they log in, you decimate the multiplayer community and nobody is going to buy a game for 5 hours of gameplay, they'd rather pirate it.

 

[KSarty]

Big name voice actors is not the same thing as quality voice actors. The point I believe Malygris is trying to make is that many other developers achieve very high levels of quality without feeling the need to hire the London Symphony Orchestra or renting out Abbey Road. You can make a great game without going balls to the wall as far as budget is concerned.

Very good point but either way you need excessive amounts of money to achieve both which cannot be achieved if your game is exclusively for PC.

Plenty of developers have managed to do it. I will use one of my favorite developers Relic as my example. As of yet they have only one game that is not a PC exclusive and are definitely in the top tier of developers if you ask me. Homeworld, Dawn of War, and now Company of Heroes are all wildly popular and have had great sales without investing in any over the top expenses that our dear Mr. Wedgwood would consider a "AAA" budget.

EDIT:

- Games have gotten too heavy. I said it before and I'll say it again: there are many more PCs in the world than consoles, but few of those are gaming PCs. How about making a game that doesn't require a transdimensional PC to play? Like, hey, World of Warcraft. Even garbage like Runescape hits a huge market. But no, it all has to require a GForce832421093912 Turbo and then they're surprised that nobody has one.

I somewhat agree with what you are saying, but I rather enjoy seeing the PC used as testing grounds for the tech of next-gen consoles. PCs will always be ahead of consoles in that regard because of the length of time between console generations. I remember being thrilled that Company of Heroes required 1GB of ram in order to install because the minimum had been 512mb for so long that I felt the developers were getting lazy and not pushing forward with their tech at all.

- Multiplayer! It's free, everyone has it, but oh so few games are multiplayer oriented. World of Warcraft again, but also games like Trackmania. Look it up, it's the most popular PC racing game. Think about the hype surrounding Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3. If you don't connect people to each other as soon as they log in, you decimate the multiplayer community and nobody is going to buy a game for 5 hours of gameplay, they'd rather pirate it.

I'm not really sure why you brought this up at all. I can't seem to find the article now but I remember reading earlier this year that the PC still had a fairly overwhelming lead on consoles as far as their online user base was concerned.

 

[Terramax]

Plenty of developers have managed to do it. I will use one of my favorite developers Relic as my example. As of yet they have only one game that is not a PC exclusive and are definitely in the top tier of developers if you ask me. Homeworld, Dawn of War, and now Company of Heroes are all wildly popular and have had great sales without investing in any over the top expenses that our dear Mr. Wedgwood would consider a "AAA" budget.

I'll take your word for it. I don't play RTS games, and I don't think it's a question of quality, but the fact that the PC is the only system that has a big enough market for RTS games (which looking at Wiki is all that they specialise in).

In other words, bad example.

 

[Pimppeter2]

Even though I'm a PC gamer, you have to admit this is kinda true

 

[Worgen]

Plenty of developers have managed to do it. I will use one of my favorite developers Relic as my example. As of yet they have only one game that is not a PC exclusive and are definitely in the top tier of developers if you ask me. Homeworld, Dawn of War, and now Company of Heroes are all wildly popular and have had great sales without investing in any over the top expenses that our dear Mr. Wedgwood would consider a "AAA" budget.

I'll take your word for it. I don't play RTS games, and I don't think it's a question of quality, but the fact that the PC is the only system that has a big enough market for RTS games (which looking at Wiki is all that they specialise in).

In other words, bad example.

its only partly a bad example, there are instances of console rts games but they are few and most are crap, and even the good ones arnt really rts by pc gamer standards, pikmin comes to mind

 

[Enai Siaion]

I somewhat agree with what you are saying, but I rather enjoy seeing the PC used as testing grounds for the tech of next-gen consoles. PCs will always be ahead of consoles in that regard because of the length of time between console generations. I remember being thrilled that Company of Heroes required 1GB of ram in order to install because the minimum had been 512mb for so long that I felt the developers were getting lazy and not pushing forward with their tech at all.

I'd prefer to see the cutting edge graphics on consoles where there are no issues with drivers for that 1 month old video card and the price can be reduced through volume. There could be a midterm system upgrade, sold separately like the old 64 memory upgrade, to keep up with current technology.

PC gaming can be 'for the people'. Games like World of Warcraft have very low requirements and just about any semi-recent PC or ?300 netbook can run it. Instead of mega graphics, you get the game community effect from having everyone online, with a keyboard and with the internet an alt-tab away.

This would have nothing but advantages. Epic single player games with short lifespans can be on the platform that is cheaper to push to the technological limit: the console. Multiplayer oriented, community oriented games can be on the platform that everyone has.

And by backing off in terms of supporting Direct X Fourteen just because it's been released a month earlier, PC developers avoid compatibility hell, too. Installing a PC game used to be as simple as running setup.exe and waiting 10 minutes, there is no excuse for a contemporary game to require the very latest specific drivers or else crash.

I'm not really sure why you brought this [multiplayer] up at all. I can't seem to find the article now but I remember reading earlier this year that the PC still had a fairly overwhelming lead on consoles as far as their online user base was concerned.

Exactly! And because of scale effects, the general short lifespan of console games and the subscription cost, it makes the PC the primary multiplayer platform. Which is why the PC doesn't really need any 'triple-A' titles with more cutscenes than gameplay. It just needs the good multiplayer titles, which usually don't have or need stellar graphics or Abbey Road sound.

 

[hansari]

Even as a die-hard PC gamer I was almost with him on this, until he got to the part about orchestras in London and recording at Abbey Road. What the hell does that have to do with making a game? It might be great for some ego-stroking in pre-release interviews but does anyone really care (or even notice) whether the background music in their game of the week was recorded by the Oblivion [http://www.lpo.co.uk/], but does anyone really think that was money well spent?)

Don't be ignorant Maly, some games only reach public eye because of their voice acting. You really think half as many people would have bought Brutal Legend if Jack Black wasn't the voice actor, or it was void of any kind of Metal rock?

The answer is, before you give me some kind of ironic statement, no. It wouldn't have. The majority of love for that game came from Jack Black and the entire Metal world he revolved around.

And yet there are dozens of games that became phenomenons with absolutely no big name voice actors attached to it.

I disagree! Voice acting and compelling dialogue was integral to Half life's success!!