The Rising Indies
While interviewing Richard Hutnik about Dark Games, we also discussed the reality of gaming companies going under. He listed many articles discussing the issue with me. The basic premise is that the money making games are now all the big over the top blockbuster games, and the big time companies are only looking for that. As the companies work to have the best AAA quality, there is less and less chance of making money over all. Many companies are going under because of this. If this continues, there will not be any more videogame companies left.
Hutnik mentioned that another poster calling himself Bad Genome had described the problem very well. When I approached Bad about the subject, he informed me that yes, he agreed about the big companies destroying themselves. Genome disagreed that this would destroy the industry.
[The big Companies] found that a particular formula is popular and has a large audience, and they don't want to deviate from that formula. They have convinced themselves that nobody buys survival horror anymore or stealth games anymore, so they turn Dead Space into a shooter and Splinter Cell into Uncharted. Much like the film industry, they are trapped by the blockbuster business model. At a certain point both industries learned that hugely expensive thrillrides full of explosions were surefire hits, and it does work for a while. The problem is that people invariably become bored with the Michael Bay approach, and then there's really nowhere else to go. You can't just turn it to 11 because people are inured to the whole thing.
That's the reason why publishers are eschewing mid-tier games now. They are all chasing Call of Duty money, I think because they have to answer to shareholders who expect everything make that kind of money. Unfortunately, they're doing it by turning every game into something that feels like COD - they are very literally trying to make another COD - which only makes people get bored that much more quickly. They could diversify their software portfolios, but it seems like only Ubisoft really does that these days. The rest would rather make NO money than make a little money.
And the higher the financial risk, the lower the creative risk. That's why this generation has seen such a homogenization of games in the AAA space. Publishers understandably aren't willing to do anything that's not tried and true with that kind of money on the line.
The No Money over little money is how Bad’s thesis begins.
I'm not actually sure if I understood Richard's point, because I thought I was disagreeing with him! I don't think games like GTA6 are destroying the industry. I do think that mindless copycatting and trend chasing and out of control budgets are just destroying certain developers and publishers, but that will just make way for more competent companies that will replace them.
Mid level games haven't disappeared. Sure, the established publishers no longer push them as much as they're all trying to come up with the next Call of Duty, but these AAA games require multiple hundreds of very talented people to make them. And these are people who largely got into game development because they wanted to make games that they are passionate about but who, because they have to make a living, work for large companies making other people's games instead. But eventually they get fed up or laid off, and many of them go on to form their own studios and make the games they've always wanted to make.
So more and more of them do wind up making their own games. Some of these games are simple and small at first, but as they find success they will grow like any other company and be able to afford to make increasingly ambitious titles. A good example would be Mike Bithell, whose first game, Thomas Was Alone, was a very simple looking platformer where all the characters were differently colored rectangles. But it went on to sell over 700,000 copies, allowing him to fund his next game, Volume, which is a 3D stealth action game that looks like Metal Gear Solid with Tron style graphics. It's the sort of crazy, stylish thing that, say, Sega or Capcom might have published some years ago.
Looking at games like Volume and The Witness and Amnesia and Outlast and Payday and H-Hour, I'd say mid-tier games are alive and well, at least on PC. And with Sony and Nintendo pursuing indie developers so heavily by opening their platforms, forcing Microsoft to do the same in order to compete, they will continue to have a strong presence on consoles as well. I honestly think we're just in a transitional period, and people like Richard Hutnik who expect to buy their games from the same old familiar companies are missing out. The industry is much more diffused than it used to be, but that also means there is no way for a few large companies fixating on making the next COD or GTA to kill the entire industry. Any such fears are completely unfounded.
As we discussed it further, I asked about getting funding for these new Indie companies.
Indies, thanks to things like digital distribution and Kickstarter, are able to circumvent the traditional publishers and bring games in genres that publishers insist are dead, such as survival horror and point and click adventures and traditional isometric PC-style RPGs, straight to a willing audience. If you are concerned, as Richard Hutnik is, that gaming is being swallowed up by COD and GTA... well, there's the solution. I'm not sure how anyone can ignore this or what the reluctance is to embrace it unless you absolutely have to see an EA or Capcom logo slapped on the games you play.
So what is next for Indies?
I suppose the next big step for indies is to stop being thought of as "indies". There is a certain level of pretentiousness or amateurishness that is expected of them, but it's largely undeserved. Hopefully in the years to come people will stop focusing so much on useless labels or worrying about who made the games they play and appreciate them for what they are, whether the games are "indie" or not. One of Richard's complaints is that being indie means being flawed, and I strongly disagree with that. No indie could get away with releasing games that are as unplayable as a lot of Bethesda's acclaimed RPGs, or as mechanically broken as the smash hit Assassin's Creed series where you can counter kill your way through the entire game which renders all weapons upgrades completely useless. Smaller developers tend to make games that strongly focus on one hook, be it a mechanical or narrative one, and they can't distract you from their game's imperfections with all the bombast a multimillion dollar project with state of the art graphics can muster. I think having the kind of budgetary limitations that they have to deal with is very good for creators. It's where the best truly thrive. Look at what George Lucas achieved when he was a youngish guy who wanted to make Hidden Fortress in Space with a comparatively modest budget and limited technology, and look at what a mess he made of things when he had all the money and CGI he wanted at his disposal.
I asked about his favorite indie company.
I've played all of thatgamecompany's games, except for Cloud. Flow was cool enough, but it never could have prepared me for something as mind shatteringly great as Flower. Journey was amazing on every level and is probably the most memorable co-op experience I've ever had. What makes it really special is that it wasn't scripted and is something that, if I were to play Journey a thousand times, would never happen again. The way my game unfolded and the timing of how other players came and went was almost poetic and perfectly conveyed what Journey was intended to convey.
Both Flower and Rez have artsy aspects, I guess, but they're wildly different games. Flower is a meditative experience that, even in its most "challenging" levels, is more like an interactive poem whereas Rez starts off simply enough but becomes a pretty crazily frenetic shooter by the end. So I guess I don't see too many similarities. They're both excellent at what they do, but I give the slight edge to Flower because it was one of the first art games that really struck a chord with me and it's always an incredibly emotional experience.
The world according to Bad Genome is that the older companies are getting set on only a specific type of game. These companies will likely not be around soon enough, but that is ok. As old companies leave, new companies come in, and introduce us to new ideas, and gameplay.
