Why are bad games made?
- Thread starter gamer416
- Start date
Recommended Videos
Because the developers don't put in enough time or are simply bad at making games. Most terrible games are things like movie tie-ins where they have to release to a specific deadline and rush the production. I honestly don't know why they can't make a half decent Sonic game though, I think most of us here could make a game better than the combined effort of the last 10 years of Sonic games.
Bad games don't come from a developer wanting to make a bad game, it's the developer not caring about the fanbase/quality of the product. If they aren't passionate about what they do, they won't try to make it the best it can be, is what I'm trying to say.
A few reasons for this:
A: They don't try to make a bad game, but either through lack of skill/experience they just pump one out.
B: Because they know that certain games have an installed fanbase, therefore don't see anything wrong with what they're doing because people keep buying them.
C: Because some people don't know any better and will buy shovelware, leading game companies to assume they're doing something right.
D: Because they simply don't care about gamers, and are looking to make money. Truth be told, this is most game companies, the thing is, some companies know that if they make a bad product with a well established name, the jig is up for them. Smaller companies, where the majority of shovelware and other bad titles typically come from (that's not say bigger companies don't make bad games) don't really have to worry about it, they're basically free to make the games they want, unfortunately, this often leads to letter A.
A: They don't try to make a bad game, but either through lack of skill/experience they just pump one out.
B: Because they know that certain games have an installed fanbase, therefore don't see anything wrong with what they're doing because people keep buying them.
C: Because some people don't know any better and will buy shovelware, leading game companies to assume they're doing something right.
D: Because they simply don't care about gamers, and are looking to make money. Truth be told, this is most game companies, the thing is, some companies know that if they make a bad product with a well established name, the jig is up for them. Smaller companies, where the majority of shovelware and other bad titles typically come from (that's not say bigger companies don't make bad games) don't really have to worry about it, they're basically free to make the games they want, unfortunately, this often leads to letter A.
Well, think of games like sonic, mario, zelda, halo, FF and so forth, these are games that waaaaayyy back when established a loyal and devoted fan base. So much so that now whenever these games are released, it's a given that long time fans are going to buy them. No matter how good or bad they may be. The loyalists want them, so they buy them, and the companies (sega is especialy guilty of this with sonic) leads them on by promising it'll be better this time around. Basically, brands have fans, those fans buy those brands. It doesn't matter to them whether it's good or bad.Nazulu said:
sonic games are made on a very cheap budget, yet sell very well...gamer416 said:
money is money regardless of whether it comes from parents being screamed at by 6 years olds, or idiot fanboys who somehow still like sonic...
and well... segas not been doing well for years... its easy to see why they would take this option.
this is not true... perfection is a problem, so it can never be attainedManji187 said:
think about it... if everyone buys it, itll become generic and people wont like it for that...
or perhaps it will spawn thousands of copies... by which time its become boring...
many people complain about things for just being perfect...
perfection tarnishes itself, so nothing can ever really ever be perfect...
That's a fairly loaded question.
Though the simple umbrella like answer is that a lot of bad games are simply cash cows, almost always with a well known character / brand name / licence behind them and they are designed and made cheaply and quickly to be pushed out during the time the franchise is still popular.
Even though they get hammered by reviews people who don't know any better (parents looking for gifts usually) will see the well known name, for instance 'Terminator Salvation', know what it is and instantly it becomes a more viable purchase than say 'Call of Duty Modern Warfare'.
The most simple rule in business, if there's no money in it stop doing it... and obviously there is money in it.
Obviously anything that isn't a well known franchise doesn't sit under this nice umbrella of blame.
Though the simple umbrella like answer is that a lot of bad games are simply cash cows, almost always with a well known character / brand name / licence behind them and they are designed and made cheaply and quickly to be pushed out during the time the franchise is still popular.
Even though they get hammered by reviews people who don't know any better (parents looking for gifts usually) will see the well known name, for instance 'Terminator Salvation', know what it is and instantly it becomes a more viable purchase than say 'Call of Duty Modern Warfare'.
The most simple rule in business, if there's no money in it stop doing it... and obviously there is money in it.
Obviously anything that isn't a well known franchise doesn't sit under this nice umbrella of blame.
Because most developers are given a limited budget and harsh deadlines to get the game finished. I doubt anyone in the dev team wants to make a bad game - if you're devoting months of your life to something, I like to think you would want to make it worth something.
Of course, there are some dev teams who just don't care, such as whoever made Big Rigs or Plumbers Don't Wear Ties, but for the sake of optimism I'll say these types are relatively rare.
Of course, there are some dev teams who just don't care, such as whoever made Big Rigs or Plumbers Don't Wear Ties, but for the sake of optimism I'll say these types are relatively rare.
Allow me to explain: When making a video game- or any work of art, at that- it's often very difficult to figure out what the final product will look like from the beginning.gamer416 said:
You come up with an idea. The idea sounds really fun. By the time you've gotten far enough along to test it and see whether it actually works or not, you've invested millions of dollars into the project. Whoever is funding your game usually isn't willing to just throw it away and start completely over, so you have to make do with what you have. A few developers will- Blizzard pitched Warcraft Adventures, and Bungie threw away the original Halo 2 build because they didn't like it and started over. Very few developers are in a position to do that, though.
I read an article once that described making video games for EA (old EA, before they started actually producing decent stuff). They talked about how they had to lay out what the game would be like at the beginning of the project, and how EA was too inflexible to let them change things that didn't work. They described it as watching a locomotive slowly derailing and not being able to do anything to stop it.