Is the game industry fundamentally flawed? Has it mutated into a strange evolutionary dead-end, where people slave away in sweat-shop conditions to crank out derivative products with better graphics, sponsored by publishers terrified of taking any risks on creative ideas?
Depending on their paycheck, some people in the industry think that the current creative rut is just a natural part of the industry's evolution. Others see this as a crisis point. This year at the Game Developer's Conference, a special panel was set aside toward the end of the show, specifically for industry veterans to rant about the problems that they feel need to be addressed.
Let the ranting begin!
"Rant" seems like too sterile a word. What transpired was an emotional catharsis, a spewing of pent-up rage. Like Ahab facing Moby Dick, if their chests were cannons, these developers would've shot their hearts upon the white humps of Sony and Microsoft. Judging by the packed auditorium and occasional standing ovations, the sentiments expressed were views widely held. I was surprised the lecture didn't end with the passing out of pitchforks and torches. People were angry!
Heading up the panel was a group of people moderator Eric Zimmerman described as "Illustrious Curmudgeons," with something like a combined total of over 100 years in the gaming industry. You had: Warren Spector, creator of Thief and Deus Ex, struggling to start a new development house. Jason Della Rocca, the Director of the IGDA. Greg Costikyan, who's been in the industry since the pen-and-paper days and has dozens of games, board games, and RPGs under his belt. Brenda Laurel, an industry consultant and commentator since 1976 who's written several books and sits on the advisory boards of the Berkeley Institute of Design and the M.I.T. Comparative Media Studies program among others. And Chris Hecker, from the GDC Advisory Board, who heads up the GDC Experimental Gameplay Workshop every year, and is a frequent contributor to industry publications like Game Developer Magazine and The Journal of Graphics Tools. What did they have to say?
Warren Spector: "This Business is Hopelessly Broken."
Spector stepped up to the podium with a huge stack of notes that ultimately he ended up tossing over his shoulder, having far too little time to get into all of the problems he saw with how games were made and sold today. First and foremost? Games cost too much, and there's not enough outlets to sell them.
Look at the movie industry, for example: After the domestic box office, movies are then sold overseas, then they go to Pay-Per-View, then to the cable companies, then they're sold to the rental places, and eventually maybe to Network TV. A movie has a million channels through which consumers might pay for it. But games? They appear on store shelves, and then within two months they disappear due to limited retail space. That's the ignominious end of up to four years of development!
As a result, games have to hit big and they have to hit quick. "Every game has to be a blockbuster or a student film," grumbles Spector. In such a climate, Wal-Mart ends up making design decisions. "We have a flawed funding and distribution model!" he called out, thumping the podium. He asked the audience to support online distribution, any mechanism that'll work alongside of retail to get games out to people.
Spector says that he was once told that 4 out of 5 games lose money. This is despite all the ridiculous focus-testing and market research. With those odds, he says, can we do any worse if we trusted the creatives?
Ideally, game publishers would ask more than one question. They wouldn't ask which products would "generate maximum profit." The movie industry, with distributors like Miramax or Fox Searchlight, has found ways to be experimental. The games industry needs to do the same.
