Mario Maker 2 is still selling very well (at full price) and there is a constant flow of new content and new players.
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'Dreams' Is Hurting From A Lack Of Players (Kotaku)
- Thread starter PSOreo
- Start date
Making meh versions of good games is always one of my main issues with this style game. I love the creativity etc, but between that and curation there's just 0 way to keep it compelling.
I have to say though, it BLOWS my mind that with roblox being so gigantic that this didnt make more of a splash - but maybe no monetization or difficulty with tools has more to do with it.
I have to say though, it BLOWS my mind that with roblox being so gigantic that this didnt make more of a splash - but maybe no monetization or difficulty with tools has more to do with it.
i mean yeah, but also they knew what they were making was gonna be a tough sell outside of a niche. Im sure sony knew this too, hopefully their sales expectations were realistic
Yes, a 3 hour campaign made in Dreams itself and it's called "Art's Dream"
I do find it strange that MM didn't create a "mascot" or theme around. This helped tons with LBP. I know they wanted to do something different, but I can't really tell the difference between Dreams content and anything else. Its visual identity is lacking.
Yeah, made in Dreams, of course. Its super good.
And this game needs to be on PC, that would breath a lot of new life blood into the game.
Pre installing wouldn't have made that big of a dent. Probably would've been a big negative considering the size of the ssd.
It's just difficult to get folks to learn something this demanding when they know the outcome will still be worse off than most other games they play.
It's just difficult to get folks to learn something this demanding when they know the outcome will still be worse off than most other games they play.
should be free to play with the Media Molecule stuff sold separately and creators being able to sell their games too if they choose to. ps5 and pc versions would help, too + regular content updates.
i'm guessing they'll abandon it and Sony makes them create traditional single player games in the future.
i'm guessing they'll abandon it and Sony makes them create traditional single player games in the future.
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Either that or come pre-installed with a player only portal.
I think simply pre-installing the game on PS5s/giving it away with PS+ would help to an extent... but it'd also just raise the percentage of basic/made for trophy creations. Dreams is complex and requires a hell of a lot of hours spent in tutorials and learning the craft. Just widening the playerbase and trying to get anyone through the door isn't ever going to be a golden goose to improve the community creations.
You need to engage the right audience. Keep them playing it through regular events. Keep marketing the hell out of the most inspirational creations and keep running accessible masterclasses with concrete rewards for players who take the time to master the creation suite.
I love Dreams and it's 100% in the top half of my GOTY list. But I strongly disregard the idea of 'just give it free to everyone' being the shot in the arm that it needs. That just increases the amount of people giving likes to shitty 60 second long Green Hill Zone demos.
I think, mostly, I feel that (and I've been saying this since EA launched in 2019) Dreams isn't the 'YouTube for games' or 'game creation for everyone' that everyone wants it to be. It's a programming/modelling suite and it's going to appeal to a set crowd. It is absolutely not for everyone and that's ok. We aren't going to get the next God of War made in Dreams. We're more likely to continue to get mad, psychedelic art pieces that don't really have much worth to 90% of PlayStation players and that's a-ok with me. They're the best stuff.
You need to engage the right audience. Keep them playing it through regular events. Keep marketing the hell out of the most inspirational creations and keep running accessible masterclasses with concrete rewards for players who take the time to master the creation suite.
I love Dreams and it's 100% in the top half of my GOTY list. But I strongly disregard the idea of 'just give it free to everyone' being the shot in the arm that it needs. That just increases the amount of people giving likes to shitty 60 second long Green Hill Zone demos.
I think, mostly, I feel that (and I've been saying this since EA launched in 2019) Dreams isn't the 'YouTube for games' or 'game creation for everyone' that everyone wants it to be. It's a programming/modelling suite and it's going to appeal to a set crowd. It is absolutely not for everyone and that's ok. We aren't going to get the next God of War made in Dreams. We're more likely to continue to get mad, psychedelic art pieces that don't really have much worth to 90% of PlayStation players and that's a-ok with me. They're the best stuff.
I agree with this. I played a LOT when I first bought it, but I seemed to run out of cool games to play (in Dreams) pretty quickly, only to realize it's the "browser" in the game that's to blame. I don't really want to be spending gaming time on a browser looking for new dreams to play though.
PS5 plus being free on PS+ one month could hopefully give it a second wind as others have pointed out.
I've only played a little bit on PS4 but it's a cool thing. I have to wonder if the console audience is even interested in these creation engine games at large. Project Spark never got off the ground and Dreams isn't doing great.
I've only played a little bit on PS4 but it's a cool thing. I have to wonder if the console audience is even interested in these creation engine games at large. Project Spark never got off the ground and Dreams isn't doing great.
Definitively adding my voice on "it should come to pc". Would probably explode. And maybe a little campaign/rerelease on PS5 to help revitalize. There's some AMAZING things done in Dreams. Having also maybe a small youtube series of creators to push on what's possible. I think for this kind of stuff, you need to encourage people's creativity more regularily. It's a really sweet tool from what I've seen
If ever there was a game that would have benefited from a freemium business model, it's this one. Alternatively, they should have just made it a PS5 game and made it a free pack-in.
Dreams biggest barrier is imo the motion control required when dualshock 4 and ps move tracking is super outdated. You have to do constant recentering your imp to do anything.
Dreams need to either have a much better motion tracking or come up with mouse and keyboard control scheme.
A pc version would also helped a lot if it can integrate with social media like twitter, make it so when you see a twitter post about dreams on pc, a single click will bring you right to that creation
Dreams need to either have a much better motion tracking or come up with mouse and keyboard control scheme.
A pc version would also helped a lot if it can integrate with social media like twitter, make it so when you see a twitter post about dreams on pc, a single click will bring you right to that creation
this shouldnt be a full priced game IMO
if you arent interested in playing other games, or arent interested in making your own, half the games appeal is gone.
if you arent interested in playing other games, or arent interested in making your own, half the games appeal is gone.
It is though, there's plenty of fun content made already. The game has no monetization to be F2P as far s I'm aware and no way to really monetize it for that model, given the everything is player created , it'd not make any sense being F2P and probably just get shut down.
Not only preinstalled, but integrated into the ui with daily recommendations, please.
These media molecule games always sound amazing in presentation but they suffer from the same thing every time I try them. A bunch of mini experiences that can't hold my attention. Which means it's not worth the price of admission. Now if it was free with Plus? I wouldn't feel the sting of buying it outright and won't feel as bad if I don't put more than 2-3 hours into it.
Yea i think i mentioned this in a previous thread a while back, but i fail to see how dreams doesnt end up in the same boat as project spark. Im sure you can do more with Dreams than you ever could with Project Spark, but in my mind they seem like fundamentally the same concept.
IMO too much. Maybe letting people play games free but to build is a cost? Idk it seems like the wrong model currently.
Mario Maker 2 has done fine but not especially well, which isn't much better than how Dreams has done. Both have found themselves in the same vicious cycle where sparse new content, whether made or promoted by the devs, leads to less people opening the game which leads to less people making new content and so on. They both suffer from many of the same problems
The article is saying that the problem is that too many people are using it to create, not enough people are playing the games.
Yeah I bought in Day 1 of Early Access and after spending 2-3 hours with a fraction of the tutorial realized that creating wasn't compatible with my lifestyle or gaming habits. It's a brilliant achievement, though. Hopefully the inevitable PS+/Collection and PC releases will grow the community in a way that sticks.
I do think that, as great of a job as Dreams does of being an end-to-end controller-friendly game development tool, it's still a massive ask when there's no avenue to sell your work. Without even having that, a lot of the people that would put time into game development would sooner opt to use more powerful and more universal tools on PC, even if Dreams is a great learning tool/stepping stone.
On the player's side of things, I know everyone has been saying it forever but it really should be included with the PS5. I'm also surprised at how many of my PS4-owning friends hadn't heard of the release at all.
On the player's side of things, I know everyone has been saying it forever but it really should be included with the PS5. I'm also surprised at how many of my PS4-owning friends hadn't heard of the release at all.
Marketing this type of content as a game is overrated IMO. Creativity is hard. Most people will get bored soon because all they can create is very basic boring stuff even after spending lots of time.
Instead make it cross platform and sell it to indie game developers.
Another option that I think works for mass audiences is what Bethesda did with Fallout town builder. Create proper game using these tools and provide some incentive to create inside the game as part of gameplay.
Instead make it cross platform and sell it to indie game developers.
Another option that I think works for mass audiences is what Bethesda did with Fallout town builder. Create proper game using these tools and provide some incentive to create inside the game as part of gameplay.
I'm pulling this out my backside, but I'll venture to guess that like 99% of gamers would rather play a game than spend hours trying to create one.
Yes you do. Lol
It was too ambitious. More people would be on board with doing level editors than making something from scratch.
I was so hyped for Dreams up to release.
Unfortunately i just dont have enough free time to create the things i want to, and while spending hours upon hours sculpting is fun, its not the same kind of fun i get from playing other games. After a long day at work i will inevitably start up other games rather than dreams..to the point i havent played it since the month of release.
The lack of new curated content doesnt have me wanting to keep logging in the way the level packs for Little Big Planet did either. IF anything it seems they made it too powerful to be able to monetise effectively. It needs a creation pass type of thing with real developers getting involved to create interest but that flies in the face of what it is supposed to represent.
Unfortunately i just dont have enough free time to create the things i want to, and while spending hours upon hours sculpting is fun, its not the same kind of fun i get from playing other games. After a long day at work i will inevitably start up other games rather than dreams..to the point i havent played it since the month of release.
The lack of new curated content doesnt have me wanting to keep logging in the way the level packs for Little Big Planet did either. IF anything it seems they made it too powerful to be able to monetise effectively. It needs a creation pass type of thing with real developers getting involved to create interest but that flies in the face of what it is supposed to represent.
It's the Era bubble. Where things are overhyped, and under-represented to what is happening in the real world.
The kind of players that have the skill, time and passion for dreams are probably studying to be game devs honestly.
I bought it with the intention of creating "something", but I never finished the tutorial 🤷♂️. I do pop in the disc every now and then to see what's new. Still a shame though. I agree with the posts here. It should definitely become a PS Collection game. Forget making it free for one month. Or just make it F2P and slap some micro-transactions in there.
It's too complicated. I got frustrated in the tutorial for creating character models. I was expecting something very simple the way they talked about it but nothing seemed to work the way I wanted.
Also most of the games I played in it were bad. I remember during the beta all these games looked so cool but there ended up being so few and mostly bad.
Also most of the games I played in it were bad. I remember during the beta all these games looked so cool but there ended up being so few and mostly bad.
This game feels like it was destined to fail without more substantial content updates from MM. The game releases with just one 3-hour experience, after that the community content is going to be the worst it ever is for a number of months. No additional MM creations, no marketing, no twitter/youtube presence. It's an interesting set of tools for the people that are into that sort of thing, but ultimately without an effective post-launch marketing campaign & support I don't think this game was going to really find a substantial audience.
Too many comments here about people wanting to play rather than create, when that isn't the audience issue the article is focused on. The article is predominately concerned with lack of engagement from people playing games and lack of engagement with quality creations (choosing instead to engage with the memes or things featuring familiar properties). With that issue in mind, it seems freemium would be the perfect fix to that solution. Maybe lock game publishing features or the creation tools behind a paywall so that you don't have an influx of bad creations in the market to go along with it. It seems like there are good creations there, it's just a matter of increasing the amount of players to engage with them.