What's up with Amy Hennig and hot takes recently ? I get that she got the end of the stick multiple times recently but it's not because she's having a hard time that everyone in the industry does.
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Amy Hennig: ‘AAA development has become unsustainable’
- Thread starter BAD
- Start date
External. For example my buddy in Redmond helped direct and deliver Art assets for Kingdom Hearts 3 where core development ownership was based in Japan. This model is already happening but there is more to figure out.
Anthem developers I believe did industry talks on this and wanted to not only find ways to have distributed teams for art asset delivery but design as well.
You might feel that way, but after the ridicule Andromeda endured for its animations there's no way companies are going to bet on gamers being reasonable about it.
To be honest, Santa Monica spend milions on a game during 4 years without the game being close to release, that got the directer fired has well. If i was Sony, i whould have fire is ass as well.
I know I'll probably get a ton of hatred for this, but... I don't understand why a really talented creative at this point would want to work on AAA titles for (most) AAA publishers. Most of the current AAA games seem to become GAAS titles, most of the time you'll have to implement Microtransactions or Lootboxes, most of the time you'll be VERY limited as to what you'll be able to do creatively since publishers (rightfully so) are scared to take too many risks on a 70-150m USD production and worst of all, most of the time YOUR creative input will be very much diluted since there are literally hundreds of people working on the product.
If this wouldn't be gaming, but cooking, It kinda feels like there are almost no high class restaurants anymore and now working in the AAA space feels more like running a McDonalds - No risk, do the same thing everyone else does (aka, follow the recent trend that makes money), really just worry about making as much money as possible and don't even try to be creative cause higher ups are scared to take risks.
Granted, there are exceptions on the publisher side, but these exceptions seem to become fewer and fewer.
So why would a REALLY talented person sign up for that? Especially since a lot of these AAA games are 3, 4, 5+ years in production, which is a long time to commit to something in your life.
We've been pretty lucky at Moon Studios that we now get to choose what titles we wanna make, we usually get full creative freedom and our partners usually trust us to know what we're doing. Granted, our budgets are a lot lower than what AAA Studios get, but it feels amazing that we can do what we really want to do and aren't stifled creatively. So I dunno, maybe it's too daunting for experienced AAA folks to start fresh with a new team? I just know I wouldn't be up for that ride, I'd rather make smaller stuff where I can make my own luck purely by how well I'm doing as a creative.
If this wouldn't be gaming, but cooking, It kinda feels like there are almost no high class restaurants anymore and now working in the AAA space feels more like running a McDonalds - No risk, do the same thing everyone else does (aka, follow the recent trend that makes money), really just worry about making as much money as possible and don't even try to be creative cause higher ups are scared to take risks.
Granted, there are exceptions on the publisher side, but these exceptions seem to become fewer and fewer.
So why would a REALLY talented person sign up for that? Especially since a lot of these AAA games are 3, 4, 5+ years in production, which is a long time to commit to something in your life.
We've been pretty lucky at Moon Studios that we now get to choose what titles we wanna make, we usually get full creative freedom and our partners usually trust us to know what we're doing. Granted, our budgets are a lot lower than what AAA Studios get, but it feels amazing that we can do what we really want to do and aren't stifled creatively. So I dunno, maybe it's too daunting for experienced AAA folks to start fresh with a new team? I just know I wouldn't be up for that ride, I'd rather make smaller stuff where I can make my own luck purely by how well I'm doing as a creative.
i would be very glad to welcome back the AA /middle tier games but no, the industry will try to push the GaaS as a solution
Maybe they should stop paying executives absurd salaries and bonuses and suddenly there will be more money to go round.
I don't agree with her on the original quote, but this...lordy this is very accurate.
AAA development has been unsustainable for years. Games cost too much to produce, and consumers will not pay more than $60.
The solution is not to keep experimenting with unwanted and insulting post-purchase monetization methods. Instead of trying sneaky ways to raise revenues, publishers need to lower their expenses. Cut bloated game budgets. Make AAA into "AA+". You don't need to be cutting-edge in visuals, scope, and technology, all in one project, every project. Hell will not freeze over if you stop trying to do this. Consumers will still buy. Not to mention, less absurd expectations means less absurd workloads, and less "crunch". Everybody wins if the people making decisions just come to their senses.
Multi-outsourcing and contracting, as Amy suggests, would certainly help to lighten the load on individual studios as well. But, I think the main thing that is unsustainable is budgets and project scoping [or lack or thereof].
The solution is not to keep experimenting with unwanted and insulting post-purchase monetization methods. Instead of trying sneaky ways to raise revenues, publishers need to lower their expenses. Cut bloated game budgets. Make AAA into "AA+". You don't need to be cutting-edge in visuals, scope, and technology, all in one project, every project. Hell will not freeze over if you stop trying to do this. Consumers will still buy. Not to mention, less absurd expectations means less absurd workloads, and less "crunch". Everybody wins if the people making decisions just come to their senses.
Nintendo realized this 20 years ago, btw...
Given fucked work culture is brought up all the time in off-topic threads this is a pretty odd whataboutism, and that doesn't mean games can't try and improve themselves
Lol you think she only worked on Uncharted don't you?
lol at her saying the games industry needs to be more like the film industry. Film vfx is so much more fucked than games, studios lay off hundreds of workers at the end of every major project still and are constantly shutting offices and chasing tax breaks. Just because you're contracting the work to someone else that has to fire their employees doesn't mean you're not still doing it.
If anything that would make gave dev more volatile, as the contract studios don't get profit share and have much thinner margins.
If anything that would make gave dev more volatile, as the contract studios don't get profit share and have much thinner margins.
We had a lot of high production value big budget music videos later in the 90s though. And more styles than just grunge. Trends change, just saying both the 80s, 90s, poppy and garage-y, good stuff everywhere.
That's why I am saying she should go back to Sony because first party is the exception to what you're saying.
I don't think everyone can follow the Nintendo route, it's their style and everyone expects it from them, but most publishers already set pretty high standards of productions and if they downgrade a beloved IP from that standard they will likely get shaky reviews and a lot of community hate...
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AAA is sustainable anybody that think other wise is fooling there self .
Just that we will see more and more contract work and they will be less and less companies doing it .
Gaming is just moving to the Hollywood \blockbuster model .
Just that we will see more and more contract work and they will be less and less companies doing it .
Gaming is just moving to the Hollywood \blockbuster model .
It's almost as if those kind of hours and specifically the American and Japanese culture of workaholics are toxic to begin with, and shouldn't be accepted in general. This "it's the way things are" mentality is part of how we got here, giving excuses to certain industries wholesale. Things like medical you just aren't going to get around but that's a disingenous comparison anyhow, ain't nobody's damn life on the line wrt game development. These toys aren't that important for the toll it takes on many devs despite what publishers and shareholders think. This industry needs unionization badly. I mean...maybe you should start caring about the health and well being of the people that make the hobby you enjoy possible, just a thought.
Yep.... there are very few AAA games I even want. I love what Nintendo does not sure if they are considered AAA. That is mostly third party associated word.
I think that's a crazy thing to say. It's all about quality, if any dev out there can make a game at the quality level of Odyssey or BotW, they'll do just fine. Who cares that Anthem has nice visuals if the game sucks? Most people out there really don't care about the tech porn - they care much more about good art direction.
They already receive hate for broken products with bare content and poor monetization. Other cheaper titles seem to avoid this. Maybe there is a lesson in there.
This is what we call a perpetual employer's market. It's been that way since the 2008 financial collapse and, lest some major policy changes enacted via government benefiting labor, things will never go back to the more equitable distributions we used to see.
'Styles' have to start somewhere. When Nintendo first backed-off the graphics race in the GameCube/Wii era they were criticized for it, and they did indeed lose some fans in the short-term. But it worked out in the long-run. Some of those "disappointed" fans eventually even came back. The games were still high quality, just lower tech. And they saved a helluva lot of money and potential layoffs with their new strategy.
Wow, I'm glad you agree. Love your work btw :)
The proposed new model with a heavily modularized project and teams composed of contractors and in-house personnel, sound a lot like what the rumours were saying about the scrapped Metroid Prime 4
Agree. Most people don´t give a shit about high end graphics and just want the games to look good. BotW is the living proof that you can make amazing looking games on relatively weak hardware. People bought the Wii in droves, the Switch is selling like hot cakes and both are nowhere near what you would call a technical powerhouse. It´s all about the quality of the games.
This here is part of the problem.
Gamers aren't happy unless they have their pretty and pretty costs money.
If the only people who can comment on the industry's woes are hard-up developers no one has heard of, you'll never hear about them.
In almost every industry, the ones able to exert influence and illuminate problems are the ones who have been successful enough for long enough to have a platform.
Without AAA Games though, how many publishers want to keep hundreds or thousands of devs in their employ?
It's sustainable, just to less and less companies.
That is a natural cause of capitalism.
Company A makes mega hit -> Company A uses profits from mega hit to raise budget for next game -> Company B didn't have mega hit, so can't follow budget wise -> Company A makes mega hit -> ...
What has happened/is happening to AAA development has happened/is happening in every other industry in the world.
This effect has been strongly intensified in the last gen with a few titles (GT, Forza, GTA, CoD, FIFA, ...) representing a huge part of the overall sales of their entire genre.
That is a natural cause of capitalism.
Company A makes mega hit -> Company A uses profits from mega hit to raise budget for next game -> Company B didn't have mega hit, so can't follow budget wise -> Company A makes mega hit -> ...
What has happened/is happening to AAA development has happened/is happening in every other industry in the world.
This effect has been strongly intensified in the last gen with a few titles (GT, Forza, GTA, CoD, FIFA, ...) representing a huge part of the overall sales of their entire genre.
Why would you get hatred for this post? It makes sense to me. I think Moon Studios is MS first party, right? I guess that's why you guys have creative freedom, first parties generally are the exception to the rule because the higher-ups trust their first party studios to put out quality titles. Bigger AAA third party studios survive based on each games they put out so taking a risk is synonym of hurting your product/ROI down the line, while the owners of first party studios have a lot of financial cushions to land on in case the risk proves to be impacting a product negatively.
Love Ori btw. :)
I'm sure we'll have plenty of people saying she's wrong like we did in the last topic about publishers not greenlighting short linear AAA games. Because I'm sure so many people on Era know more about AAA development than she does.
Developers have to be more efficient again. I am totally okay with semi-sequels like Uncharted: Lost Legacy, Fallout: New Vegas or Far Cry: New Dawn. Reuse engines and assets to make new games.
If that was true Nintendo hardware wouldn´t sell and most people would be playing on high end PC´s and the Xbox One X (which couldn´t be further from the truth).
Time will tell but we have hearing that AAA is not sustainable since last gen .
Here were are going into next gen and it's still here and the industry making more money than ever .
Of course certain thing change like most big AAA companies doing Gaas , upgrade price version etc etc .
Still it don't seem to be going any where even if changes happen to the industry .
The AAA industry definitely needs a shakeup and said shakeup isn't "Raise the price of games and always push for new hardware as fast as possible". If we're having issues on cost/profit, what is raising that across the board going to do? Seems like it just puts us even more in to the whole.
I think a lot of people do care about giant productions and those people showed it with their wallets. It is one of the reasons that made AAA gaming get to the point that it is now. Everyone wants to make their own GTA...
Going with your Avatar Pic, something like DMC 5 is definitely considered AAA. But I guarantee you, Capcom isn't needing 5-6 million on that game to break even. That's what most of the talk is, you can offer these AAA experiences without going so far down the path that missing your 7 million sold mark is actively hurting your bottom line.
While Japan isn't void of this (From the rumors on FFXV and Luminous, Square wasted all kinds of money). They seem to be finding their footing these days a bit more than western devs.
We're talking about sustainable development friend. Crunch is not sustainable. Know any CPAs who crunch extra hours for over a year straight? Without making OT for it? Just flat out working for free for an extra 20% + hours for over a year?
I won't really say that is the case .
Japan has less AAA games coming from it so it might look that way .
Capcom for eg only really come back with MHW which some say was big risk .
Western side have few missed lately but i say things will even out by years end .
Did anyone ever come up with an explanation why blizzard laid off 800 people even with record profits?
As long as your profits are increasing why not keep who you have?
As long as your profits are increasing why not keep who you have?
"Thank God' when DLC became a thing, because there might be this huge dip of downtime where you might need 10 people but you have 300, so what are you going to do? They're employees. Now we can shuffle those people onto DLC content, but even then that creates this crunch churn on the staff." "
Never thought about this.
Never thought about this.
But those same pubs don't just churn out hit after hit. They're coasting on a few big successes a year and that's not something you can count on.