Look at this clown! First, they came out saying they weren’t even fans of the material. You have Henry Cavil in the lead role who is a super fan of the source materials arguing with you and the writers about the show. And then you finish it off by blaming the audience for your decisions. Mind you, the audience you have ultimately attracted is largely influenced by the decisions you have made throughout the production of YOUR show. The audience didn’t make this show, YOU did
If you're the executive producer, it's your fault that your team members fucked it up. If you cannot find a competent writer to properly express nuance on the screen, it's still your fault. You hired the wrong person to adapt the books. You are the boss, the final say, the one-ass-to-kick when things go wrong. The Witcher is not some nuanced story about regional distinctions in low-visibility communities told in short form, which seems to be his only acclaimed experience, followed by several production failures.
This entire interview comes down to "those lazy zoomers don't know how to appreciate good film." From the description of his past, massive failures it appears to be a problem with his process and ability, not an audience problem.
Absolutely. I enjoyed playing a bit of Smite at one point in time (mostly that big open area map) and some Heroes of the Storm, but I'm not a big MOBA guy. Decided one day to give League of Legends a try, why the hell not ya know?
I have never been called a 'fucking fag' and been told to kill myself more times in a 5 minutes period of time in the entirety of my 40 years on this flying shitball of a planet. Not in public school, not on Xbox Live while playing Halo, not from my abusive family, never.
Uninstalled that shit 10 mins later and went back to TF2 where I get called that only once an hour.
That's why I liked hots, the capability to block chat from the start and for everyone.
It's not really a problem in non-competitive modes, as people usually just use on-map alerts.
I enjoy League mechanically, played a lot, but it just got to be such a net negative that I can't do it anymore. I enjoy trying my best to win and I adore that feeling of a team coming together, but the toxicity was just too much.
They got more aggressive about banning people for chat stuff a long while ago. But the same people just find ways to be just as toxic with game mechanics and other more subtle communication.
Yeah, I don't know what it is about the League community, but they are some of the worst people I've interacted with in games. I've heard that apparently Riot has cleaned up their community a bit since the early days, but first impressions are tough to overcome.
When I was young a dumb, I followed the anti-feminist YouTubers that used Anita Sarkeesian as their punching bag. I loved video games and bought into their idea that she was trying to ruin them. Now that I’m older and wiser, I can see that that was a load of baloney. I watched the original Tropes vs. Women in Videogames series and it was very level-headed and rational. There were a few things that the anti-feminist YouTubers said “well what about this???” and Anita actually covered that in the video but the YouTubers cherry picked and didn’t show the response. Anita has done a lot of good and has had so much hate and harassment that I feel she deserves a break.
A review bomb is when people start jumping down the game's throat with negative reviews for shit unrelated/peripheral to the game. If they're triggered by the actual core design choices of the game it isn't a review bomb.
These reviews are because the game is a money grubbing downgrade from the game people bought and had taken away from them, and this is the first opportunity they had to publish a review on a storefront. The motivation being the actual game means it can't be a review bomb.
No, it's still a review because you're still actively dealing with whatever it is you're complaining about.
"Hey, I really like/liked the core game play loop of this game but I think that it's gotten significantly worse than it was previously. It'd be nice if they changed it back?
That's depends on the business model. For one-off payment games, it still does considerable damage, whereas they don't gain much by you continuing to play.
For subscription games, your point stands much stronger.
It's a free to play multiplayer game. If you continue playing it, you're providing value for some other player who might spend money, so just by being in the matchmaking pool, they've got you where they want you, and they won't care about your review.
Yes, I answered your question with a question because your scenario was as absurd as you perceived mine to be. So I'll answer yours directly: "yes, but not at that scale". Because at that scale, it's a review bomb.
So if General motors was using slave labour to build their cars and feeding said labour with baby kittens, would you consider it a review bomb for someone to say 'You shouldn't buy the latest vehicle from General motors because of the way it is made'?
What if general motors came out and said that they think a great start to the day is to wake up and punch a dutchman in the face?
A review is, ultimately, a recommendation of whether or not you think other people should buy this product. If you can't recommend it because of something the company who made it did, to me, it's still a review. Because recommending that product is recommending financial support of that company. Not recommending it, is not supporting them.
For me a real review bomb would occur generally only in a case where a site like 4chan might suddenly spin a wheel of mayhem and pick a random game to just go shit on or something like that.
Why would 47k people choose to play the game when it's the worst game on Steam? Literally worse than a game like Bad Rats: the Rats' Revenge that fundamentally doesn't function correctly. For reference, its peak today was about 20 players.
Before you reply with something like "marketing", you seriously think that if Bad Rats launched today, and with the same marketing budget as OW2, that it would achieve anywhere close to 47k players peak 10 months after its release?
Like I said: you're disconnected from reality if you think OW2 is the worst game on Steam.
As far as I'm concerned they do. But my opinion doesn't decide the rating of a game any more than yours that's it's supposedly a better game than bad rats.
It's a product of everyone who votes giving their opinion, and the entire steam userbase has come to the consensus that Overwatch 2 is a particularly egregious example of it.
It cannot possibly be a review bomb when the reviews are legitimate opinions based on what the game is.
the previously referenced games all sit above 80% positive and yet have the exact same problems that you cite as OW2's reason for being bad
legitimate opinions
"the zeitgeist has told them that the game is bad" is not a legitimate reason for not liking OW2, hence accusations of review bombing
if you think there are legitimate reasons OW2 deserves the rating it has, by all means please provide them, but so far all you've given me are #badthings that also apply to basically all the popular F2P games on Steam.
it’s the game they gave me to replace the game i purchased.
if i bought a toyota camry, and 2 years later toyota said “sorry we can’t let you continue using your camry, here’s a corolla” you better fucking believe i’d be trashing toyota in every public space possible to warn potential customers.
in your analogy you bought a camry and mr toyota said "we're getting rid of this camry but don't worry i fought to get you a free corolla" and were fine with it and hailed mr toyota as a hero but then mr toyota left the company so the free corolla became poisonous and bad
Those games are not nearly as aggressive in their attempts to get you to buy shit. CSGO? a tiny ass fucking button to buy Prime. TF2? Don't even remember seeing a shop button.
OW2? Makes the worst, money hungry mobile free-to-play blush with how aggressive it tries to sell you shit.
tf2 drops crates every 30 minutes that's literally just an advert for the in-game store (which has a dedicated button pretty clearly labelled on the main menu)
If it does, I've literally never seen it, and I play regularly. The closest I ever got was the Halo MCC soundtrack in CSGO, and I'm pretty sure I only got that because I also have MCC on Steam.
my guy csgo crates were controversial enough a few years ago that people sued valve over them, and at no point did csgo come anywhere close to being the worst reviewed game on steam
how are you unironically out here saying that csgo doesn't drop crates?
leaving a negative review because of that would by definition be review bombing, because at that point you're not reviewing the game, but external context that surrounds it
"i liked overwatch 1" is not a valid review of the game overwatch 2, and people leaving reviews to that effect en-masse is pretty textbook review bombing
if you're reviewing specific things you don't like, that's reviewing a product
leaving a negative review because "OW1 was killed off" isn't doing that
if you want to discuss specific things you don't like, please provide some that would reasonably justify OW2 being literally the worst reviewed game on steam rn
leaving a negative review because "OW1 was killed off" isn't doing that
Leaving a review because "OW1 was killed off" and the intended transition route was a drastically inferior product, is in fact reviewing a product.
Context is actually an important part of reviews. Orcarina or Time looks like a shit game today, and needs the context of being a late 90's innovator to fully appreciate it. Likewise, a BoTW clone would look fantastic, a game changer, even...if a certain 2017 game hadn't already set the benchmark.
Calling something an inferior version of its predecessor, which was cynically shut down to push people to this inferior product, is worthy review information. It tells people that a superior product existed, and all this new product is, is the enshittification of it.
ow1 was shut down to avoid splitting the playerbase. when kaplan went on record saying that he'd fought to get ow1 owners a copy of ow2 for free everybody loved it, but now it's bad, actually? yes that makes sense
Orcarina or Time looks like a shit game today
comparing the entire landscape of gaming to a game is a very different thing to comparing it to a specific game
it would be like if somebody reviewed Baldur's Gate 3 by saying it was bad just because they liked the source powers from Divinity 2. as part of a review maybe it works, sure but as the bedrock and sole item of substance, it's useless.
your entire argument so far has been "I preferred the previous game therefore OW2 deserves to be the worst reviewed game on steam". even ignoring the fact that you've failed to articulate any differences past a vague notion of not liking that it's free-to-play, that's an almost laughably braindead take
And making comparisons between the two products is perfectly valid.
ow1 was shut down to avoid splitting the playerbase.
I'm sorry, are you an Activision/Blizzard employee?
I ask because only one of their employees could come up with such a bullshit statement. The core gameplay loops aren't different enough to cause that kind of split, and OW2 Is free-to-play. Anybody that wanted to voluntarily jump from OW1 to OW2 could have freely done so at literally no cost, if they so wanted.
They shut down OW1 to a) pump up the numbers for OW2 and b) to get OW1 players forcibly exposed to their F2P market.
when kaplan went on record saying that he'd fought to get ow1 owners a copy of ow2 for free everybody loved it, but now it's bad, actually? yes that makes sense
Definitely an Activision/Blizzard employee. Nobody else would miss the disingenuity of making such a statement about a free-to-play game.
comparing the entire landscape of gaming to a game is a very different thing to comparing it to a specific game
And my point is, taking into account the landscape, even in a macro level such as Activision's own behaviour with the series, including this very game, is relevant context worthy of being part of a review.
it would be like if somebody reviewed Baldur's Gate 3 by saying it was bad just because they liked the source powers from Divinity 2. as part of a review maybe it works, sure but as the bedrock and sole item of substance, it's useless.
Your analogy falls flat because Divinity and BG, though they share much of the same inspirations and development staff, are very different games. OW2 is basically OW1 with some minor tweaks and microtransactions.
The problem with OW2's mtx though is that the game makes it as hard as possible to ignore its microtransaction nature as possible, and they willingly hamper the user experience to do so.
Other than the MTX, OW2 is so similar to OW1, that without it, these reviews would be saying that they're essentially the same game. So what they're saying now, that it's OW1 enshittified, is valid.
your entire argument so far has been "I preferred the previous game therefore OW2 deserves to be the worst reviewed game on steam".
If that's what you took away from my comments, then I'm afraid you cannot read. That, or you're unable to discern from different users. All I've said was that people calling OW2 basically enshittified OW1 is not review bombing, because it's a valid review.
even ignoring the fact that you've failed to articulate any differences past a vague notion of not liking that it's free-to-play
Because there are very few differences and none of them are improvements. Like the shrinking of team sizes and available modes.
Also, F2P can be predatory as fuck, and Activision/Blizzard have most certainly been so here. they've even broken sales laws in countries like Australia.
OW2 is so similar to OW1, that without it, these reviews would be saying that they're essentially the same game
All I've said was that people calling OW2 basically enshittified OW1 is not review bombing, because it's a valid review.
Because there are very few differences
Okay so you clearly agree that OW2 doesn't deserve to be the lowest rated game on steam, since "there are very few differences", and you liked OW1.
I don't really care what semantic nonsense or mental gymnastics you have to apply to convince yourself that whatever caused it to be ranked so low doesn't count as review bombing.
Okay so you clearly agree that OW2 doesn't deserve to be the lowest rated game on steam, since "there are very few differences", and you liked OW1.
I do agree it doesn't deserve to be seen as literally the worst game on Steam. I never said otherwise. I hate, hate, HATE the MTX system...but as you said, this doesn't make it literally the worst game ever. MTX aside the game still works and the core gameplay loop is fun while you're in a match. Big Rigs: Over The Road Racing this is not.
Would I hit the Recommend button on Steam? No. The MTX strategy is a deal breaker for me. Whenever I'm not in a match I feel like a fucking product. At that point I'd rather just fire up another shooter because I straight up don't want to deal with that shit.
OW2 isn't a bad game. It is a predatory game. It is debatable which is worse (I consider predatory to be much worse than bad). Being predatory is plenty reason enough for a bad review.
You are really trying to downplay the power of marketing, but you seem to realize that gets people playing. Not only that but live service design is very effective at keeping people playing even when they are not having any fun whatsoever. Because they gotta grind the battle pass and such. Extrinsic rewards and habit-forming conditioning making up for a lack of intrinsic enjoyment.
Still, I would agree with you that it's not the worst game on Steam, but like I mentioned in the other comment, that's not what steam ratings mean. It means that the vast majority people would not recommend it, and that seems pretty reasonable.
i mean i ignored the second part because it was irrelevant
"You're entirely disconnected to reality if you think Overwatch 2 deserves to be the worst-reviewed game on Steam." doesn't say "deserves to be the worst game", so if we're playing the reading game maybe you should take the first turn
On Steam being reviewed poorly is not a matter of rating from 1 to 10, but how many people would recommend it or not. It's completely valid that the vast majority of people would not recommend this game even if it's not a 0/10.
yes obviously, and none of that changes anything about the fact that very clearly OW2 isn't bad enough to deserve the title of worst rated game on steam
You tried to argue with someone else over this, but the fact that more people played it, being F2P, means that more people can agree that they wouldn't recommend it. Given how Steam ratings work, that makes it the worst rated. There's no arguing how it is. You seem to take an issue with it as if it meant Gabe Newell personally stamped it with a 0/10, which is not how it works.
In Steam, being 4/10 for thousands of people is worse than being 0/10 for a couple people.
He was the CEO of Electronic Arts when the controversial loot box monetization was added to FIFA 09. He made news when he called developers “fucking idiots” over some developers’ reluctance to introduce monetization schemes earlier in the development process. There’s also the infamous clip of Riccitiello talking during a shareholder call about charging Battlefield players a dollar to reload their guns.
Look at this guy...I couldn't read all of the Bloomberg article due to paywall, so I don't know if this jackass actually provided proof of these "death threats."
While I don't condone them, it seems awfully convenient that an executive who's known to stir controversy with his monetization strategies received "alleged" death threats. I have a hard time believing it without proof because this guy is a sleaze ball greedy mofo.
In any group of people there will always be a tiny subset of the population who will pull this unhinged bullshit. It's unfortunate, but now the CEO gets to play the victim, and anyone who's against his bullshit gets to be painted with the same brush as the unhinged guy.
I never understand freaking out about death threats. If someone actually wanted to murder you, they’d be quiet and methodical about it, not grandiose. To be fair, I’ve never received a death threat so perhaps I’m not theeeeeeeeeeeee
I mean you are assuming the person who is trying to murder you is a rational actor but you can't really be a rational actor if you are threatening death to someone because of their shit monetization policies on your entertainment. Hell some people throw "Death threats" at people because they decide to change a reload speed by a fraction of a second. So yeah "gamers" can be quite unhinged. Hell you had idiots in Jan 6 who loudly stated their intention and beat a cop to death. Hell we have seen situations of weirdos getting close to celebrities (in their heads) then trying to kill them, and I imagine cases like that will only get worse with parasocial relationships getting a bit out of hand with modern influences and streamers.
That's the fallacy of trying to understand criminal acts. For the most part, if someone were as smart, logical, and thoughtful as you are when you imagine the best way to commit murder, the kind of person to actually try and commit the murder would not be as smart, logical, or thoughtful to have gotten into that situation in the first place.
There are exceptions, of course, but it's enough of a possibility that it's probably better to take them seriously than not.
Edit: typed all that, scrolled down, some other dude already said it
American test audiences literally said that for I Am Legend which combined with studios unopinionated cowardice caused them to ruin the ending, amongst many, many, many other times that test audiences have given bad artistic feedback.
His anger should probably be focused at the showrunner / studio, but I’m guessing he’s not risking burning those bridges so is instead blaming the only other party in the decision making process, the test audiences.
You do have a 20% illiteracy rate, and the response is that American test audiences have ruined very obviously good plots with their stupidity many times before.
I’m interested in playing this but I don’t own a PS5 and I’m not buying a whole console for one game. They would have gotten a day 1 sale out of me if they released it on PC.
Originally, they did plan to release it on PS5 and PC. My guess is Sony made a timed exclusivity deal with them, which Sony had done with companies before. SE shout themselves in the foot by taking it.
Ditto for me. I have all Final Fantasy games released on PC, but I can’t justify buying a PS5 for a single game. I’ve chosen to watch a let’s play of the game. Glad I did because it’s definitely not a Final Fantasy I’d play a second time.
This is a loss for consumers. Massive consolidation, lack of competition. Get ready for them to pull games from PlayStation as soon as they are contractually allowed to. Get ready for everything to be on Game Pass and possibly not on Steam. Worst case: they disable purchasing some games on Game Pass so you always need a subscription.
They (both Microsoft and ActiBlizz) pulled games from Steam before, and they're both back on Steam well ahead of this deal. I don't see why that would change.
We've now seen through court documents and transcripts what many of us suspected in that many of these games and studios that Microsoft purchased for exclusivity were Sony targets for exclusivity as well, so if we had to pick one, the company trailing in the market sounds like the better one to get them as exclusives.
I can only see this as better for competition than Sony running away with the high-end console market, because then there's realistically only one console to buy.
All that said about the above, fuck exclusivity in general.
I see a lot of people using argument #2 and it's really short-sighted to treat acquisition the same as exclusivity deals. However much I don't like either, acquisitions are clearly worse. If you had to pick one, why would you wouldn't just leave it as case-by-case exclusivity deals?
Say, SquareEnix and Atlus are fully capable of releasing games for other consoles even with all the exclusives they release for Playstation. And nothing stopped Microsoft from waving a wad of cash their way to change their minds.
There is absolutely no way such a large acquisition will be better for competition. The publishers become unable to make their own platform decisions, no matter what benefits there are. You are losing sight of the market as a whole and the independence of studios by focusing exclusively on who gets the #1 console crown.
If you had to pick one, why would you wouldn't just leave it as case-by-case exclusivity deals?
A case-by-case exclusivity deal for a big publisher like Activision is just exclusivity on about 4 franchises. Let's be real. They don't make much more than that these days, which is why those big publishers are looking to sell now that they've thoroughly un-diversified themselves. I don't get to pick which option Microsoft went with, but functionally, it's not any different.
There is absolutely no way such a large acquisition will be better for competition.
I don't know you, but there's a pretty good chance you own a PlayStation 5 and not an Xbox Series X/S. They play almost exactly the same games basically exactly as well as one another, but PS5 is running away with the market. There's no world where PS5 having so little competition from Xbox is good for anyone. We're closer to a world with zero consoles than we are to a world where another competitor can break into the market anyway, so I say burn down the way exclusives and consoles work in general (like their own little monopolies on their digital storefronts), but this will result in a more competitive console market than we have now.
I really don't see how your arguments contribute to your point. Even if Activision Blizzard only had 4 franchises, an acquisition would still be much more drastic than an exclusivity deal. It is not the same as making deals for all franchises.
For an example, as much as Final Fantasy XVI is exclusive to PS5, the new Dragon Quest Monsters will be exclusive for the Switch. SquareEnix can choose what platforms to release what games for, including all of them if they want to.
And to be clear. No, Activision Blizzard doesn't only have 4 franchises, it has a whole portfolio of franchises, plus many studios under their umbrella. Even if the argument is that they aren't making games for some franchises, Microsoft could still hire them to make games for different franchises as an exclusive, without acquiring them.
Yes it would be good if Playstation had more competition from XBox, but I have absolutely no confidence that they will get there just by acquiring publishers. They already acquired Zenimax/Bethesda and Redfall turned out to be a disappointment. Same for Halo Infinite. I also remember how pretty much every Rare franchise died, they only have a single game going. Microsoft doesn't need to buy their way into becoming competitive, and there is no good that will come from doing that, it will only come at an expense of multiplatform games. What they need is to actually fund and make good games. Sony is making God of War and Last of Us with their own studios, they don't need to buy exclusivity for that. Same with Nintendo making Mario and Zelda. What is Microsoft making? What good would it be to let them have even more publishers and franchises?
Even if the argument is that they aren't making games for some franchises, Microsoft could still hire them to make games for different franchises as an exclusive, without acquiring them.
They aren't making games for most of the franchises they own. Current market forces certainly aren't inspiring them to do so. Contracting them to make a new Metal Arms, for instance, means they're allocating personnel away from their money makers, which raises the price of that contract to make up for the opportunity cost.
Yes it would be good if Playstation had more competition from XBox, but I have absolutely no confidence that they will get there just by acquiring publishers.
I have absolutely no confidence that they'll get there without it. And to be clear: I hate that. I hate that when Sony gets an exclusive game, it means I have to wait two years to play it on PC. I hate that my friends hate the new PS5 controller but have to use it because that's where you play God of War. But exclusives dictate a console's success, as much as I wish they didn't. So even if Xbox has quick resume and doesn't arbitrarily make its old controllers incapable of working on newer games that don't use the new controller features like Sony does, two friendlier features in the Xbox camp that would influence a purchasing decision in a perfect world, the customer is hardly ever going to pick Xbox, because the market decided exclusives matter that much.
They already acquired Zenimax/Bethesda and Redfall turned out to be a disappointment.
A game that was in production for a long time before it became a Microsoft product.
Sony is making God of War and Last of Us with their own studios, they don't need to buy exclusivity for that.
There is no functional difference between this and buying other studios, especially since Naughty Dog was also a studio acquisition. Given enough time in the rearview mirror, Activision-Blizzard and Bethesda games will be treated the same way as you just treated that one.
What is Microsoft making? What good would it be to let them have even more publishers and franchises?
We just saw a ton of games that they're making. And games these days just take so much longer to make, at least at the scale that Microsoft, Sony, and very few other companies insist on making them. Rocksteady has been working for 8 years on one game. The average AAA game has a 5+ year dev cycle now, which is absurd. The next game from Sony Santa Monica likely won't come out until there's a PlayStation 6. The likes of InXile, Obsidian, and Double Fine will have quicker turnaround times than most, and even those will take 3+ years. So with that perspective, the Microsoft acquisitions are fairly recent and are only soon going to start bearing fruit like Hellblade; not even Starfield counts in that discussion.
I have absolutely no confidence that they'll get there without it.
They already have Zenimax and we haven't much to show for it. It was releasing more games before it was acquired. But I'll grant that not enough time has passed, though I'd say if Redfall wasn't up to shape they could and should have changed the release plans.
But for Rare plenty of time has passed. What do they have to show for it? Sea of Thieves and a Killer Instinct game for the whole of the last decade. Banjo has been declared dead, Perfect Dark keeps getting postponed, and nothing else new. It doesn't bode well.
We just saw a ton of games that they're making.
It wasn't all that many, and most of it likely came at expense of what would previously be multiplatform games. Zenimax would still be releasing games if they hadn't been acquired. Sure, exclusives benefit them but this "competition" was really a net loss for players who don't have Microsoft platforms. It came at expense of the third-party market.
There is no functional difference between this and buying other studios, especially since Naughty Dog was also a studio acquisition.
There is a marked difference in scale. If they just bought Treyarch or Toys For Bob that wouldn't be a big deal. But they are bulk buying publishers along with all their studio subsidiaries. Activision Blizzard by itself is the 6th largest publisher. This is not just getting a studio. The comparisons being made to excuse Microsoft's tactics are really glossing over what a drastic sweeping takeover they are doing, All the while they whine about how tiny and feeble they are, because this massive company doesn't dominate the gaming market also.
But for Rare plenty of time has passed. What do they have to show for it? Sea of Thieves and a Killer Instinct game for the whole of the last decade.
Killer Instinct was a Rare property but not developed by Rare. And you're underselling how hugely successful Sea of Thieves has been. (Not that I understand it; the game seems incredibly shallow, but it found a huge audience.) We have a pretty thorough accounting of what Rare's been doing, and Sea of Thieves happened under new management at Xbox that wasn't running the show post-Nuts-and-Bolts.
It wasn't all that many, and most of it likely came at expense of what would previously be multiplatform games. Zenimax would still be releasing games if they hadn't been acquired. Sure, exclusives benefit them but this "competition" was really a net loss for players who don't have Microsoft platforms. It came at expense of the third-party market.
The same is true of Sony's acquisitions.
If you want to talk about scale, the industry in general, especially the type of game that sells these consoles, is so much bigger than it was in the 90s. If you're buying a studio in an attempt to compete with a console outselling yours 5:1, you're not buying a studio with a few dozen people who sold a few hundred thousand copies of a game. You're buying a company with hundreds or thousands of people who sell millions of copies and a large percent of those customers buy DLC and microtransactions, because that's what moves the needle. A large portion of those customers, by the way, only bought a PlayStation for that game, because that game was associated with PlayStation in the marketing, even though it was also available on Xbox.
Did we, though? Or maybe FTC could prevent further consolidation that will eventually result (and is already) in anticompetitive practices?
I can only see this as better for competition than Sony running away with the high-end console market, because then there's realistically only one console to buy.
So now your choices will be: 1) pick the console that has more of your favorite games, or 2) now you have to buy BOTH consoles.
The “pick one” mentality may come from the inherent freedom of Activision’s owners. They don’t see any further way for the publisher to grow, so they seek the next logical outcome for themselves: Acquisition. That’s always going to come from a company large enough to be a major force in video games.
“Pick neither” is telling them they are not allowed to do anything with their company.
They could grow by making more games that sell well. More offshoot studios so they can have more parallel production.
If the ONLY way they can grow is to consolidate, then they are as big as they are going to get then. Tough titties. They have a minor duty to shareholders to turn a profit, not to grow at all costs. That's the problem with current capitalism and will lead to effective monopolies.
I'm opposed to this acquisition but let's be clear: Activision doesn't have a "minor duty to shareholders". They have a fiduciary duty to shareholders.
Yes. But the duty is to put the best interests of the company first. This is ambiguous because it can mean long-term health and stability, or as is more common lately, companies have decided that short-term profits over all else.
So there is no duty to "grow at any cost". They can be profitable and stable and define that as the best interests of the company.
Competition means there's choice. Segregating titles that were once across multiple platforms (choice) into individual platforms (no choice) is anti-competitive.
I can't really break it down more than that and I thought this was obvious...
You do have choice. You have choice between group of exclusives A and group of exclusives B. It's better for competition but worse for the consumer. In order for it to be better for the consumer and competition, you'd need to eliminate the concept of exclusives entirely. And I'm all for that, but I don't know how to make that happen.
Well since exclusives will continue to exist, imagine if, hear me out here, third party titles remained cross platform and group B developed their own set of games at worst through infant studio acquisitions instead of, idk, acquiring the second largest third party publisher in the world (and thus all their studios).
Yeah the poor trillion dollar company couldn’t possibly compete with the billion dollar company by organically building an attractive portfolio. It’s not like they did it before and only lost their position due to their own mishandling of studios and misunderstanding of the market.
They seemingly can't compete, so this is how they're making up for the ground that they lost, because right now the console market is not particularly competitive.
Not when there was a whole ecosystem of platform neutral third-party publishers and additional exclusives are taken out of that. You are not getting more and new games, you are just being required to buy an additional device for the same games. How could it be more competitive if the market is consolidated into less companies?
Because a third party publisher is a supplemental actor to a console market when they make games for both platforms. If the one getting its ass kicked makes those games more scarce on its competitor's console, it becomes more difficult for you, the consumer, to choose one, which means the market got more competitive. Or you buy both, which means both competitors (Nintendo doesn't really count here) are healthy for each getting your sale. If your default answer was to buy a PlayStation and to hell with Xbox, that's less competitive.
The third party video game market is in no danger of monopolizing, on the other hand. Ubisoft/EA/ActiBlizz/Take Two all put their eggs in fewer and fewer baskets, and now the Devolver Digitals, Anna Purnas, TinyBuilds, Focus Homes, Paradoxes, and Embracers of the world are growing to fill the market voids those big publishers left by putting out fewer games.
If the one getting its ass kicked makes those games more scarce on its competitor's console, it becomes more difficult for you, the consumer, to choose one, which means the market got more competitive.
Absolutely not. Splitting up the market between mutually exclusive options is not competition, it is cartel tactics. Competition doesn't happen only at the console-maker level, it involves all gaming companies.
Before if I wanted to play certain games I could choose to buy from ActiBlizz and Microsoft or ActiBlizz and Sony or ActiBlizz and Nintendo. Now I can only buy from Microsoft period. There aren't even more games. There is less choice, less competition.
You shouldn't get too comfortable with what Microsoft is doing this just because as a game company it's in third place. Don't forget that in size, overall, Microsoft is larger than Sony and Nintendo combined, several times. It's not even the first time they do it, they did it to Zenimax/Bethesda too.
Sure I do hope that other smaller publishers grow to take that space, but will that space even be available, considering your suggestion that people might choose to buy a XBox and play those same games?
Absolutely not. Splitting up the market between mutually exclusive options is not competition, it is cartel tactics.
It's how everyone in the market is competing in a bunch of different spaces, like streaming services. It's still increased competition, even if it sucks. And I do think the market would be worse with one high-end console than two.
You shouldn't get too comfortable with what Microsoft is doing this just because as a game company it's in third place.
I'm not comfortable with it. I'm just less comfortable with Sony having such a wide lead in a market with only one other competitor, and given that exclusives are how Sony made that lead, exclusives are how Microsoft is closing it. It doesn't matter how much bigger Microsoft is. Their success comes from other markets, and they're one of only three companies making a console, so that market can't really afford to lose a company in that race unless we're willing to lose consoles altogether. (The way PC gaming is trending, one day we might be, but that's optimistic.)
Sure I do hope that other smaller publishers grow to take that space, but will that space even be available, considering your suggestion that people might choose to buy a XBox and play those same games?
I don't follow you. Smaller third party publishers are thriving and growing, and they're multiplatform. The larger publishers are shrinking their year-on-year offerings and looking for buyers, of which there are few that can afford such a purchase.
It absolutely matters how much bigger Microsoft is, that's why it can pull moves like this to begin with. It's also short-sighted to think that it's healthier for Microsoft to approach Sony in such a manner when it comes at expense of the options customers have. The competitiveness of a market is not solely defined by how close the head-to-head is between the 3 biggest console makers. Seems like people are confusing market dynamics with the Console War, which is itself just a marketing gimmick that got ingrained into gamers' heads.
Good for you though that there are two high-end consoles. I don't see why you talk like there would be just one. Microsoft is not going bankrupt. But maybe, rather than letting Microsoft buy their way to the top as if that was any semblance of healthy competition, maybe you should question why they aren't making more appealing games with the studios they already had. Nintendo doesn't need to buy Ubisoft to be competitive, and in fact they can make games alongside them without any acquisition.
Comes to mind now. Why did you even bother couch that mention of consoles with "high-end"? Underpowered as it may be, Nintendo is competing in the same market. We know that there are people who forgo Horizon to buy Zelda. Sure it's better to have three console-makers competing than two, but here we have proof that there are ways to compete without acquisition, even when by all accounts your offering is the "weakest".
I don't follow you. Smaller third party publishers are thriving and growing, and they're multiplatform. The larger publishers are shrinking their year-on-year offerings and looking for buyers, of which there are few that can afford such a purchase.
Frankly I don't see what you are getting at with this. That there are other third-party publishers doesn't change that the third-party market is diminished by ActiBlizz's acquisition. Devolver and Annapurna may be lovely, but they don't have the size and output to replace it. Sounds like you are just downplaying ActiBlizz's importance as if we didn't just have a massive, long-awaited multiplatform release that is Diablo 4.
And so what if large publishers are looking for buyers? They shouldn't be allowed to sell, consolidation is bad for the industry. They can just deal with it and keep making games. even if Nintendo were to go and buy Ubisoft, it would still be bad for us.
Microsoft isn't in danger of going bankrupt, but they won't stay in a space where they don't make any money.
I separated them into high end consoles because if Xbox leaves the market, there would only be one console capable of running the latest Assassin's Creed or Street Fighter or what have you. That would effectively be a monopoly in that space.
I mentioned other third party publishers because you seemed to be under the impression that the third party space is under threat for losing one player. It's a large player, for sure, but that space is very healthy.
If you're concerned with the size of Microsoft just in general, which absolutely makes sense, because they're enormous, what happened in today's news is that the FTC failed to prevent the acquisition based on the evidence for this market. Their next course of action will be to see if Microsoft should be broken up after the fact under anti trust, and if that happens, as a non expert, I'll wager the gaming department stays together as one entity.
Microsoft creates demand for their system largely by buying up publishers and turning all their future games exclusive, that would otherwise have been multiplatform.
Sony and Nintendo create demand for their system largely by making great games in house, that otherwise never would have existed.
So yes you’re right but one is much shittier than the other.
The games made in house are functionally identical to buying a studio that already existed. It's a game that can't be played anywhere else for arbitrary business reasons. I'd consider Sony's shittier, because I have to wait two years for a PC port, and Nintendo's shittier still because those games will never legally leave their platform.
They (both Microsoft and ActiBlizz) pulled games from Steam before, and they're both back on Steam well ahead of this deal. I don't see why that would change.
There's a lot of tangible reasons for Microsoft to pull the plug on Steam game sales.
They want to focus Microsoft products as "Cloud-First" wherever possible, and selling copies on Steam hurts this initiative.
They would probably prefer to not give Valve 30% revenue on every game sold for IPs that they own and have their own means of distribution (and even more now that they own Battle.Net) For all businesses, this is simply a case of maximizing profits.
They aren't happy that Valve are essentially letting people run native windows applications on non-windows platforms.
They view the Steam Deck as a potential competitor to the Xbox or other mobile game initiatives they might have.
They would still love it if we all used Windows Store for downloads wherever possible, which is why they have lately been streamlining the process of getting products on that storefront.
Those are reasons. I don't know if they would actually follow through and there are reasons for them to not do it, but every decision is a case of weighing the negatives and the positives. It really depends on if Microsoft cares about the public perception of forcing people to use their own store or not. Currently, they do care about forcing people onto clients, but that might not always be the case forever.
They did care about people using their own store, and it was an undeniable failure, which is why they're back on Steam, where they make more money. They'd have to decide to unlearn those lessons to take their games back off of Steam again.
There are people who would be okay if it were Sony making the acquisition, but I want to believe that most people who are against it feel that no large company should be allowed to buy another large company.
It’s like, does no one remember what Microsoft did in the 90s? They were literally forbidding PC manufacturers from not selling any systems that didn’t include windows.
This deal is bad. It rewards shitty individuals and shitty companies, and hurts consumers and employees. This deal will be a calendar marker of when the gaming industry started to fall. Like when Disney bought Marvel and LucasArts.
If they are truly a pile of shit, then they should fail. MS just wants 2 things: 1) big name games to drive purchase of their console, 2) that sweeeeet MTX money from CoD and King.
Nah, I don't see things this way. Microsoft has been generous with its IP, in contrast to Sony, which keeps its games (and third party games, as was the case with Street Fighter 5) exclusive. Microsoft has licensed its biggest titles to the Switch and even the Playstation 4, and it has a history of cross-platform publishing that goes back decades. For instance, games in the Banjo-Kazooie series were released for the Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS. There's no reason to believe Microsoft will change that strategy, especially with the Xbox Series lagging so far behind its competitors in sales.
If Microsoft suddenly tightens the reins on its IP, consumers will spite them for it. After the Xbox One debacle, they know better than to force unwanted changes to the status quo of this industry.
Nintendo is not a competitor for MS or Sony. They operate in different spheres of gaming and Nintendo has no intention of competing with them.
Is Halo on Playstation? Of course not. MS has already said future Bethesda games (not Starfield, it has a contract) will NOT be coming to PlayStation. MS has even "lamented" that exclusivity is how you compete in current console markets.
I don't think that's correct. Sure neither of the others is making something Mario, but they are making open world action games and JRPGs, something that Sony also does. The perception of the Switch as a casual device compared to the PS5 and XSX is something that only exists in small hardcore gaming communities, it doesn't represent the general console-buying public.
A mobile game maybe doesn't compete with MS or Sony. Nintendo absolutely does.
Eh. Can't say I had fun watching my higher end weapon break on the stronger, bullet sponge enemies later on, and replacing it with a crappy short swords that do barely any damage. ToTK though was certainly better thanks to fusion.
That it kind of the thing tho, if you just violently smash your sword around, it's gonna break. Like katanas are pretty flimsy and a german greatsword for example could just snap it off. Let's take elden ring for example and you use your sword to find an invisible wall, that's terrible for a sword and it would go to shit really quick. So i guess in a way it's realistic. But i really don't like it when games do that. All it does for me is that i'm never going to use the nice things in the game, because they break, then you need a new one or repair it or whatever.
I'm fine with encumbrance... especially in these Bethesda games. All they do is litter the world with garbage for the player to pick up and carry around for no reason other than make the game longer.
They "apologize" about "confusion" and "angst" that us stupid peasants have? That doesn't sound very apologetic to me. That sounds like they're doubling down.
Heck, this worse. We wouldn't lose massive amounts of money when posting on Reddit. This is about the existance and viability of development and companies.
All signs point to that program being a failure for them, which is why the exclusivity offers and announcements started drying up, but I guess this is them trying a revised strategy.
Nobody really expects RPG's to be as big and deep as BG3, they just want a complete game that works without shitty microtransactions everywhere and always online for no reason. Plus, having interesting characters and storylines, quests that can be solved in more than one way, and gameplay that's actually formed by taking player feedback and listening to it is what people reacted well to, among other things. Baldur's Gate 3 doesn't even have Denuvo!
If there's one thing that I hope competitors learn from Larian and BG3, it's that respecting your players and giving them what they want leads to success. Similar to Elden Ring and from software, like that video mentioned. Now compare BG3 to Diablo 4 and Immortal, or the upcoming Starfield and you'll see why people love it. It's not about specs or scope, it's about designing a game to be actually FUN.
It's not about specs or scope, it's about designing a game to be actually FUN.
This is the key point that these publishers and studios are trying to avoid.
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on designing microtransaction psychologically manipulative money sinks (dark designs)?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on creating addiction in the player-base so that they keep playing the game (and spending money)?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit DLC (not actual new content)?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit to satisfy shareholders?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on shit the devs don't want, but executives do?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit padding for marketing purposes?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit DRM?
And keep in mind, by budgets here, I mean both the dollar amount AND time spent by devs that could be spent elsewhere (which is part of the dollar amount since salaries, but I wanted to make it clear that time spent is also important).
Some of the absolute best games in the industry have literally none of that, and people still want to play and buy them years after release because gasp they're actually fun, but these publishers and devs don't want to compare to those, because they WANT the industry to be a bunch of "GAAS" bullshit that's basically a vacuum pushed into people's wallets, cause hey, if it worked for Candy Crush....
Honestly, better to pirate the game because ZA/UM fucked over the original devs and now they don’t get any money from the game’s sales - and it ruined any potential for a sequel.
I don't normally do this, and I'll go do some searching of my own, but any chance for a tldw on the video? What's the background? 2.5 hours is a bit much and the intro was sort of wandering and more or less.just repeated that yes, the game was stolen from them.
I’m always baffled when I see people post links to the Fandom site for Skyrim rather than UESP my beloved. Community-run, for passion and not for profit. The internet of yore, today.
Simpler “digital newspaper”-type interfaces beat all the video-auto playing nonsense any day of the week. Fandom’s interfaces are genuinely baffling to use, who approved all of this visual cramming of information I didn’t ask for? You know I won’t randomly start enjoying any of it right?
Fandom’s Steam key store, Fanatical (used to be called Bundle Stars), is still pretty good, although I wish I didn’t feel like spending money there directly funds those autoplaying cancer videos.
gaming
Top
This magazine is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.