Consolidation is good

[SpiderMonkey]

I used to be bothered by the intense consolidation that is currently doing the rounds in the industry. Recently I stumbled upon a perspective that helps me feel that it is in fact a good thing.

See, the chat behind all of these consolidations is about competing in certain genres. Bioware was apparently a good fit for EA because it meant they could compete in the RPG genre, where they previously had no presence. Activision merged with Blizzard because they wanted a cash-printing MMO without the effort and risk of developing one from scratch.

But quite soon, these publishers will be so big and so few that they will all have all their genres filled. Then what do you do when previously you had, say, one driving game team and one driving game franchise, and now you have multiple driving game teams but you only want/need to keep one driving game franchise? You tell the other team that if they want to keep their jobs, they need to come up with something new and exciting, and you give them the resources they need to go away and make it happen. (Let's ignore the obvious Need for Speed / Burnout counterpoint here, which makes driving games a bad example to choose.)

So then, my assertion is that beyond a certain point in size, publishers will inevitably move away from risk-averse and towards innovation, because that is the only way they will be able to continue growing. And what is more, they are fast approaching that point (or perhaps they are already over that hill, with even EA embracing original IP). A lot of talented people who are currently slaving away on Overcrowded Genre Competition #32 will be off in exciting new pastures and we'll soon see a golden age of new ideas because of it.

It's like Nintendo's new business philosophy, except it doesn't involve cheaply made mini-game collections.

[Roderick]

The chilling this is, this actually makes sense. Well put! I have no way of knowing if this is a reasonable viewpoint, but it sounds perfectly logical.

[Nachimir]

I think it's correct, but the biggest companies currently in the games industry may not be able/willing to do it off their own back, so to speak. As Raigan and Mare from Metanet put it here:

Live Arcade had just came out, and they were like, “Oh, it’s new. It’s not going to be like retail. There’s not going to be all this crap. There’s going to be all these small, great, fun things.”

But now it’s exactly the same. There’s all these big-budget ones with big publishers making them, and the real problem, I think, is that the same people who are deciding what retail games get greenlit are deciding what Live Arcade games get greenlit.

Old cultures tend not to suit themselves well to new environments, or at least they adapt quite slowly.

The tendency of certain publishers at the moment is to shut down studios and consolidate developers. When people like EA get bought by even bigger non-games fish who are sloshing in money, then I think you'll be absolutely right - the amount of risk on even a large team won't mean their collective head.

[Ginger]

I think you are accrediting the publisher with too much market power, they will predominately make games that make money, and although there is a slight incentive to be innovative and create the next big thing, as long as the consumer laps up the same old game hashed together with new team sheets, a new car, a slight graphical upgrade ect... there is not much incentive to innovate.

Another problem is that too many of the people high up in games companies aren't gamers so can't tell what is good, this leads to a sort of follow the leader effect, where if one game has proven successful, WWII FPS or WoW, everyone tries to copy them and get a slice of the pie rather than baking a new pie. Man I want some pie.

[Marek]

Another problem is that too many of the people high up in games companies aren't gamers

Yes, #1 problem in the games industry right there...

[toblix]

Yes, #1 problem in the games industry right there...

Is it really? Isn't it more important to have savvy business people making the business decisions than smelly gamers?

[brkl]

What if Hollywood execs had never seen a movie?

[toblix]

What if they weren't the movie equivalent of gamers?

[Ben]

Is it really? Isn't it more important to have savvy business people making the business decisions than smelly gamers?

Yes it is; it's the one thing that everyone in the industry agrees on. It's important to have people making decisions who are both business savvy and at the very least know games. It's also important to make people understand that possessing one of these skills doesn't mean you can't possess the other.

[Thrik]

Is it actually true that many of them aren't gamers? Not that I'm accusing you of misinforming people, but I tend to not buy into facts based on nothing but someone's say-so.

It sounds a bit infeasible to me for someone to be in a high-level position and not have any idea at all about games and what works, is right, etc. Hell, I bet a lot of people here play less games overall than those executives yet consider themselves to be somewhat a voice of gaming culture, to intimately understand the medium, etc.

[Ben]

Yes it is. I know from both my personal experiences of sitting in on executive meetings where directors were making decisions about games; and from others personal accounts.

It sounds a bit infeasible to me for someone to be in a high-level position and not have any idea at all about games and what works, is right, etc.

Yes, it's depressing and absurd. The same thought would run through my mind during these meetings.

There are of course some who do know about games, but it's definitely the case that many don't.

[elmuerte]

It sounds a bit infeasible to me for someone to be in a high-level position and not have any idea at all about games and what works, is right, etc. Hell, I bet a lot of people here play less games overall than those executives yet consider themselves to be somewhat a voice of gaming culture, to intimately understand the medium, etc.

It's quite common for the most expensive suits to not have a clue about the products created in their company.

But that isn't always a bad thing. It is important to keep the company alive. But that isn't usually the thing they do. It's probably boring as hell most of the time.

[Thrik]

I understand what you're driving at, but it's just the fact that games are so widespread that baffles me. It's not like we're talking about something you could consider a niche anymore.

It seems comparable to a BBC executive knowing nothing about television to me.

[Ben]

TV has been around for quite a while longer than video games, so while it may seem comparable, it really isn't (at least not in this respect).

[elmuerte]

the major difference between computer games and TV/movies is that computer games are still considered toys for kids rather than an entertainment form.

[Thrik]

Considered by who? Just these execs?

[vimes]

I'm going to write about things, I'm not sure about, so take this with a grain of salt.

If I'm not wrong most of people who pours money into video games companies are groups of people who do are not familiar with it. Then my main preoccupation is : is it more useful to be a producer that is (a) a sharp money maker/excellent project manager ( someone who understand the industry and the medium very well.

I think, that unfortunately (a) is the more useful to keep a company afloat.

Plus, I'm worried that this situation of having a seemingly game-enlightened people handling the money of a Video game production would turn this industry into the movie industry of the 50's. During this period , producers would interfere at every step of a movie creation choosing actors, director, screenwriters because they though they were competent enough to do so. Of course, they weren't.

Don't read this the wrong way, this would be best to have people like Seamus Blackley producing games ... but let's face it, guys like him who understand business, the Video game world as an industry AND a medium very well are a rarity. So we need really good businessmen that knows to rely on creative people to take decisions from a certain level.

[elmuerte]

Considered by who? Just these execs?

The mases.

Just look at how much attention the video game industry gets when compared to other entertainment industries. But also, what kind of attention is gets.

For example, Manhunt 2, it's a mature game, not intended for kids. However, people wanted it banned because of its simulated violence. Now take football/soccer, it quite often contains real violence (usually caused by the spectators). In case of violence you won't hear anyone about banning it because it's real violence. Way more people got injured and killed because of football/soccer than with computer games. Why should kids be protected from games, even though a large part of the games are not intended for kids to be played.

Media and politicians keep associating computer games with only kids.

Why would some guy with money invest in a product for kids. Kids don't have a lot of money.

[Thrik]

I think it's just those over the age of 50 and dicks (media, politicians, overzealous censors) that constitute the masses you describe to be honest. I'm not going to dispute that games are a much smaller market, but I don't think as many people look at them in a belittling manner as you imply.

Manhunt 2 is an example that I'd say was largely the dicks trying to get exposure, and not a representation of how the general public feels. I don't think people as a whole have disdain for or a total misunderstanding of games, and most people will accept the completely reasonable stance that a game rated for adults should be treated with the same protection from kids as a film. They also realise that many games now contain very mature content.

I completely contest your assertion that games are seen as a kid format to be honest. With the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 practically being completely teen/adult-oriented, you'd have to be mad to see them as not having any appeal to adults. Perhaps it could potentially be seen as a slightly nerdy pastime by some (although this has also drastically decreased with time), but not a kiddie pastime.

[Nachimir]

They've not been seen as a kid thing since Sony and the Nineties. Similarly, I hear developers regularly talking about the British public being anti-games. Either they're getting a biased sample, or I am. I hardly ever meet people who don't like games or think badly of them.

Pretty much all of these viewpoints are true... somewhere. At some point in the past they were even dominant, but stuff changes while perceptions stay where they were.

Yes, games companies need business skills. Understanding games is not enough. A whole load of UK developers went under in recent years due to a lack of business and management skills. Like advertising in the 80s, games in the 90s were going through a period with massive expansion, everyone was excited, and as a result there wasn't a great deal of accountability. Bedroom programmers ended up running big companies, and a bunch of them failed.

Skip to the early 00s and publishers are sending in external management, creating the perception that such types don't get games. And indeed, at that time they didn't, because games were new and not on the radar of many business graduates, let alone old hands. Business acumen and understanding of games will merge though; they aren't mutually exclusive.

[Ginger]

I think it is more that they are seen as a thriftless waste of time by those people, an immature hobby rather than a childish hobby much as I imagine they would see skateboarding. From my experience of meeting 50+ people who work in the city this is a widely held assertion.

[Ginger]

Business acumen and understanding of games will merge though; they aren't mutually exclusive.

I think you'll have to wait at least another 10 years or so for that to be norm.

[Thrik]

I'm not sure how much merit the opinion of a bunch of city workers (I'm one) has though, Ginger. They are, after all, people who'd probably see spending your evenings watching Eastenders or Big Brother as equally lame/wasteful. I know more people who have utter contempt for those kind of programmes than I do those who dislike games.

Some people just see a lot of entertainment as a waste of time — I wouldn't say it's specific to games.

My view is that games are no longer some niche fringe form of entertainment that the majority of people have never experienced. The products sell millions, there're big shops dedicated to them in practically every town nationwide, and even the casual players have been won over thanks to Nintendo's marketing efforts. In my opinion the days of expecting to get vibes of "wot an immature dik" when you say you play games are fading fast.

[Marek]

I don't want to seem to be suggesting that execs need to know more about games because then they'll be greenlighting just the artsy or innovative stuff that people like of us on a forum like this will appreciate, or anything like that. This is not a "creativity versus business" argument as far as I'm concerned.

Many execs aren't truly in touch with gaming, which is the root of many problems... problems that are actually hurting sales potential, even of games that we here would never play. There's a lot of dumb money being thrown around due to a lack of understanding what makes certain games successful with certain audiences beyond just the standard matrix of genre/platform/IP that informs most greenlighting decisions. I think the industry is still a long way from proper portfolio management and concept incubation and for a large part it's due to a lack of vision at the higher levels. As time goes on, it will slowly get better... for instance, I think we're now beginning to see increasingly influential creative directors who really know their stuff. But it'll take a while to go all the way to the top.

It's fascinating to me how Shigeru Miyamoto is actually not a game designer. Not on paper, anyway. His business card says something like Senior Director of Marketing. I believe this is largely what's behind Nintendo's enormous fortunes as of late. Nintendo is a company that has people at the top with a very good understanding of the medium, who are in a position to recognize new opportunities like Brain Training, the Wii, Nintendogs, etc. as well as manage their portfolio of core products/franchises effectively. Nintendo is perhaps an extreme example, as Miyamoto is kind of the John Lasseter of the games industry, but there's obviously more subtle examples of this too.

I have gotten absolutely sick of comparisons to movies, but anyway, I'm sure guys like the Weinsteins are not just shrewd businessmen but also have at least a basic intuitive feel for the medium and know what will make a successful movie beyond its genre or premise or the amount of money invested in it. They'll read scripts or have people read scripts for them, they'll know directors and other key talent or have the right people in charge of getting them involved, and will meet with them. I'm sure there's a lot to bitch and moan about Hollywood but honestly I think they're ahead in understanding how this works.

Now, what Nachimir said is sadly also very true. I don't think programmers or game designers generally make for good execs as evidenced by what happened in the UK and elsewhere... But I do think execs need to have at least some degree of vision informed by actual personal appreciation of the medium.

Erm, yeah. I hope that made sense.

[Ginger]

In my opinion the days of expecting to get vibes of "wot an immature dik" when you say you play games are fading fast.

I still think there is a lot of this sentiment around, especially when people find out you are quite serious about games, my negative experiences could be amplified by being a MMOer, which triggers reactions of lifeless loser and that I am an "immature dik" so warrant this reaction regardless of my gamer status.