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I'm not sure if I'm the only one who feels this way, but can anyone else sense a new videogame crash heading our way with the coming of the next generation of consoles. I can't put my feelings into statistics or foresight, but something doesn't smell right with the coming future of gaming.
All of my favorite developers shriveled up and died early on in the PS2 era. The crash has already happened.
Hmm, a "crash" sounds a bit too dramatic, but I do think a major shift in priorities will be necessary for the industry to remain healthy. More and more effort is needed nowadays to produce a triple-A title, which means budgets are getting bigger and risks for publishers are getting greater, which in turn means publishers will only prefer more safe dime-a-dozen titles. Right now the market is getting saturated with those dime-a-dozen games, and that cannot keep on going forever. With the next generation of hardware, the average required budget to produce a game might grow too large and at that point something has to happen. I think the future lies with what we're currently calling indie games, i.e. smaller games with lower budgets and more creativity.
That quote from 2010 is slightly ironic, considering they released a new Deus Ex last year and it was actually quite good. Legacy of Kain on the other hand, *sigh*, how I miss that series.Quote:
Originally Posted by sheath
Yeah I do wonder since games prices have shot up to 59.99 since 05 and have stayed that way since, well we be paying 69.99 for the next gen?
I think this gen maxed out what development costs can realistically be by reaching parity with hollywood production costs. I don't see many companies being able to make nothing but $100 million dollar games, which is why the Unreal 3 engine has been used so much to cut that down to $10 million per game. Next generation consoles are already being designed around next generation middleware, so I expect this trend to continue.
Then again, Sega reputedly spent $70 million on Shenmue, and aren't there hollywood movies that cost $1 billion to make?
I can see us losing a couple major third party developers in the Next Generation if things don't change, but I think some of the older Japanese based developers will probably be able to stick around.
For example, I can see EA and Activision tanking if they don't start creating some new titles. If the price of games does go up again this generation I don't think people will put up with getting the same game over and over again each year for full retail price. However I think companies like Nintendo, Sega, and Capcom will be just fine. Their games are still unique and good enough to warrant buying them. Plus they all have fanatical fanbases that would rally to keep them from going under at the first sign of trouble.
Nah there has been no film so far that has come close to having a budget of 1 billion dollars. I'm looking at Avatar and i'm seeing between well here it is:
Determining the final cost of this film is a trick in itself. Wildly different reports have been published, ranging from $230 million (The New Yorker) to nearly $500 million (The New York Times). Avatar’s official budget lies somewhere in between, probably closest to the figure the Los Angeles Times’s John Horn and Claudia Eller cited earlier this month—$280 million for the production, plus marketing costs. “It is the most expensive film we’ve made, but now, having the luxury of hindsight, it is money well spent, so I’m not concerned about it,” James Gianopulos, co-chairman and C.E.O. of Fox Filmed Entertainment, told CNN in early December.
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/osc...ar-really-cost
It should be interesting to see how much Avatar 2 is going to cost.
Wait, they're making an Avatar 2? How can they do that? There's no Dances With Wolves 2 to copy off of.
I most have been thinking of how much blockbusters have grossed in recent years. I wish the video game industry wouldn't aim at such bloated figures, it is only going to make games more corporate.
True, but there's a Pocahontas 2.I don't think a crash will happen, but a lot companies are going to eventually start losing serious money.The whole high risk, high return thing is starting to run its course.Quote:
Originally Posted by TrekkiesUnite118
Since people dont wanna pay for cds or dvds anymore, the standard process of going down to your local Gamestop, Best Buy, Target, etc to buy the psychical copy of the lastest, hottest, game, seems kind of outdated. Downloadable/Streaming games is the future I'd say. Another thing that hurts is that in the old days you could clearly notice the leap in graphics and technology fom one console generation to the next and thats pretty much gone. How much better are the graphics on the successors to the XBOX 360 and the PS3 really going to look than how they are now
No, whilst video game budgets are getting bigger and bigger, XBLA and PSN remain a viable platform for smaller/indie developers to flex their creative muscles, and regardless of what anyone says, they sell.
A decent gaming PC built now looks considerably better than 360 and PS3, a logical step would be to stop rendering natively @ 720p on the new consoles, and make the jump to 1080pQuote:
Originally Posted by DarkDragon
The crash will be coming but it will hit certain genres one by one. The dead gerne at the moment is for instance racing arcade games... absolutely nothing new to give to players... even Flopza on Xcrap 360 is struggling to sell... the only exception is probably GT5 as a simulation...
A very bleak future i might add.Quote:
Originally Posted by DarkDragon
Not really, it gives smaller developers a chance to get their games out there and make money.Quote:
Originally Posted by Soulis