Where's the games at?

This article answers some of your questions. And you need look no farther than Curt Shillings Rhode Island debacle with "Kingdoms of Amular" to pretty much confirm what they are saying.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/07/30/are-aaa-hardcore-games-doomed

Most devs are working on next gen. So expect only yearly franchises for the rest of this gen. Though I'm looking forward to Last of Us and a few other new IPs as the swan song of this gen.

So you've already played every great game of this gen?

And here I am sitting with 5 on my table I need to play and a few on my list I haven't even bought yet.
This gaming drought it allowing me some time to try to catch up (though I slowed myself down by getting into NCAA13 and some Tiger Woods 09 (which I had forgotten to play way back when) and NHL 09 (cant wait for 13). Now I am slowly coming out of my all sports phase and trying to get Darksiders 1 done in time to see if I want to get Darksiders 2.

Sad, because Reckoning was superb.

You're saying pump out a new game, you use Ghost Recon as an example, but not the "crap one they just released"? That game is pretty great. Did you even really play it?

That's what I heard too. I was talking more about the company than the game itself. In fact I plan to check the game out now that it is deeply discounted. Is it worth it without the company support?

@ AHDTVDiet: I loves my Darsiders! One of my all time favorites for the XBox 360. But heads up. Be very careful in "The Dark Thrones" level. There's a serious glitch between one of the gates that can cause you to play the whole thing over if you don't have a secure save. It's where you go from one side of the room on the swinging columns to the other side. If you enter the door to the next room (the one with the collapsing floor while fighting some real badasses) and quit before finishing the first challenge...Your autosave will be outside of that room. And you will be locked between the two doors with no way to go backwards, forward or even untentionally die. Pure Hell! Don't worry...this is not a spoiler. But my advice is create a new save point at the Start of each new chapter in the game...without overwriting the previous chapter (2 save points). That way, your worse case will be just playing that chapter over again. I learned that one the hard way. It was the only glitch I encountered in that otherwise superb game. But man did it burn my chops!

I agree with other comments here. That it is a bagrgain hunters paradise out there right now on some of the greatest games of this generation. Like Batman Arkum Asylim & etc. The op should try out some of those gems.

Correction: most developers have left (or been forced out of) the console industry. Those developers aren't coming back to consoles anytime soon. The shortage in big console releases that we're experiencing right now is something that was set in motion 2-3 years ago. Not much to do with ramping up for next gen. This isn't a normal part of the console cycle.

I wouldn't go so far as to say AAA console game development is "dead." But it definitely won't look the same. Expect fewer big releases (but with bigger budgets), and more small-scale projects. And nothing in-between. All the filler is gone. Those developers have moved to mobile and PC.

That's a great story, have any data to support it? Just because some studios have been shut down does not mean the people involved have not moved to other studios. There are plenty of known studio with "unknown" projects. They are going to be next gen projects and not iCrap.

I agree. There's plenty of studios developing for this gen.
This is just the summer drought. It happens every year. Everything will start releasing later in the year (like they always do) so they are still relevant around Christmas time
And the latest Ghost Recon was really good IMO

For starters, here's a rolling list of studios that have been shut down since 2006:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=34322459&postcount=1

And, yes, many have moved onto other studios. I don't disagree with that. But the upshot is that the majority of those shuttered studios were working on mid-tier console development. Those people either get absorbed into the mega-publisher game factories or they break off and form smaller studios for small-scale platforms (mobile, indie, PSN/XBLA). Why do I think so? Because of this other bit of data that shows that the number of retail console games has been decreasing in that same period of time, mostly from the mid-tier:
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/gamehunters/post/2012/07/npd-fewer-video-game-releases-keep-monthly-sales-down/1#.UB2z60SENQA

And many consumers have already been shifting to non-traditional platforms (mobile and social). It's not as though there are so many game developers in the world that a new market can just pop up on its own in crazy numbers. Studios close, get consolidated, or get pared down, and those former employees go where the market goes. And once these separate ecosystems get set up, it's not as though those developers (or consumers) will just jump back into console gaming. We're looking at a permanent (or at least long term) shift in the industry. Too much has changed for this to be a mere passing fad.

Zynga says, "hi"

you want data.. what was epics most profitable game ever?? gears of war... nope it was infinity blade.. and as a result they are putting a lot more focus on iCrap (as you say) side of the business than they did before.. you really can't ask for "facts" considering a simple google search or really just paying attention at all would make you realize where people are spending money and where people spend money is where the market moves to..

"what was epics most profitable game ever?? gears of war... nope it was infinity blade.."

Nope. Try again.

You just made the same mistake that every retarded gaemz jernalist made when that news hit. Gears makes more money than Infinity Blade, hands down, by miles. Infinity Blade had a larger return percentage on it's initial much-smaller cost.

Let's make some numbers! Gears cost $1000 to make. It brought in $10,000 in cash money. Infinity Blade cost $100 to make. It brought in $2,000 in cash money. Your statement very clearly says that $1900 is more than $9000, which is obviously wrong to even the most casual of observers.

Epic is an enormous studio. They can not support their enormous size on iOS titles alone. As such, they are currently making a PC exclusive title, another Gears title, another Infinity Blade, and another engine. In other words, nothing has changed from their last decade of operation.

ADDITIONAL: Oh, and this "most devs are working on..." that everyone is throwing around? No. Stop it. A bunch of different devs are working on a bunch of different things. There is no "most are doing X".

I have never met anyone that has played every game ever made. Congrats!

You're not quite right either. Tim Sweeney's statement was that "the most profitable game we've ever made, in terms of man years invested versus revenue, is actually Infinity Blade. It's more profitable than Gears of War."
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/173072/Epics_Sweeney_Platform_convergence_freemium_the_inevitable_future.php

This doesn't mean it had a "higher percentage return on investment." It means that it had a higher return per man hour invested. This means that for every hour they invested in Infinity Blade, they made more money than if they had put that same hour into making Gears of War. If it were just about a higher percentage return, he could be talking about Ubisoft's outsourcing model (where employees get paid less in other countries). But he's talking instead about a fundamental change in industry pricing models. He wasn't claiming that mobile is more profitable than console development. If you read the interview, his point was that freemium and microtransactions are more profitable than traditional pricing models.

exactly!! what is the better route to pay someone 10 dollars an hour and get 100 profit or pay 10 per hour and get 70 profit..

huh??? confidence is right. efficiency is one thing, and bang for your buck makes you giddy from a value perspective. but the bottom line is how much you make in total, not how efficient you were at making it. a blockbuster movie that costs $200 million to make but brings in $600 million is far better than a movie that costs $50 million and brings in $250 million.

You're forgetting the time factor (which was Tim Sweeney's point). Taking your example, if it takes you four years to make that $200 million movie and only one year to make that $50 million movie, then for the same time (1yr x 4 = 4 years) and financial investment ($50m x 4 = $200m), you would make $1 billion ($250m x 4) with four cheaper movies instead of $600 million for one expensive one.

In other words, he is in fact suggesting that smaller, cheaper games (like Infinity Blade) may indeed be capable of being more profitable than big games (like Gears of War). I don't think that means that AAA games will disappear, but they will continue to become more scarce.

"You're forgetting the time factor"

And you're forgetting that in software development, man hours and dollars are interchangeable. Everything outside of labor is a fixed cost. Labor hours, being the only variable cost, directly correlates to dollars spent.

Time equals money spent. It is not the separate measurement that you keep referring to it as.

How about just the fact it's the middle of the summer? AAA games just don't come out this time of year, though that's less of a rule the past few years.

Precisely my point. Which is why I said that Epic CEO Tim Sweeney is effectively contradicting your claim. He's saying (in a roundabout way) that smaller games have the potential to be more profitable than AAA games when looked at from the long view.

Ordinarily, you'd be right. But this drought has been longer and more pronounced. Total retail releases are down nearly 25% for all of 2012 compared to 2011. And compared to 2008, we're down much more than that (35-40%). And I'm just talking numbers of titles being released, not sales figures (which are even worse).

Part of the issue is that it's summer, like you say. But part is also that we're now a year past the point where we'd ordinarily have seen a new console generation. And part is that the industry has massively shifted its priorities (digital and mobile). And part is that we're still in the midst of a global recession. Etc. Etc.

There are many reasons. But taken together, none of it is normal.

"He's saying (in a roundabout way) that smaller games have the potential to be more profitable than AAA games when looked at from the long view."

And now you're reading far too much in to what is a simple statement. Stop reading your chicken bones and read what was actually said.

It is indeed a "simple statement." I thought it was pretty straightforward myself. No prognostication necessary. He's saying there's potentially bigger profit potential in smaller scale games than in big ones. Not sure what's confusing.
Edited by confidenceman - 8/6/12 at 10:35pm