AAA Institution, Indie Devs and the Importance of 3rd Party Support

Well that is a title isn't it? So why am I talking about it and what does it actually mean? Well, I am talking about it because to understand where my game will stand in terms of genre and institution before entering a predictable response about gross profits, major companies and market share I want to explore how most games start...in a more 'indie' setup. As to what my crazy long title actually means...well we can break it up...


Modern Retro


This is a term that is used when a game is built to specifically bring back the nostalgia of the games of old, games that people would have played as children and normally harkens to the NES and more often than not to the SNES era. This can be in the form of a remake of an old game but updated with new graphics but as a rule the games that you will see labeled as 'modern retro' are ones that are totally new IP that uses all of the advantages of modern games (Like running at 60 FPS or ease of build) and uses graphics and sprite work that harkens back to the days of the SNES. 



Indie


This term is short for independent. In gaming the definition of this can be shaky but generally it means that it is a small Dev team with little to no money backing it and finally one of the larger aspects that it isn't published by a large company such as EA or Activision.



MRIG is what I am going to shorten this down to or this will get a little wordy. MRIG are popular not only with the man and women who buy them but also with the indie developers. This is because they tend to be 2D games with little to no complexity when making them.

This all means it becomes cheap, easy to build and can be made by a single Dev in just a few months. This keeps costs down and simple.


EXAMPLES:

CaveStory

Made Buy ONE FREAKING GUY

I Wanna be the Guy: Gaiden

SAME THING OMFG








Recent News...
Mojang bought out buy Microsoft (and using this to ramble on about how this really does show how the games industry works as a whole and not even in a loose way in a direct "this is how the industry is" way)
For years Mojang has been seen as the number one independent game studio success story and with its head lining game Mincraft now clocking in a total of over 54 million users across multiple platforms including PC, Xbox and the Playstation 3, this sees to only increase with the introduction of the next generation of gaming with the Xbox One and the Playstation 4 already available to the public as well as more and more updates to the mobile versions as mobile technology gets better and better allowing for a better gaming experience.
The purchase of Mojang was for 2.5 billion dollars setting up Notch the owner up for life.
There are three main opinions on this and i will be talking about the opinions of:

• "It's bad and will ruin Mojang"
• "It's good as it will allow the company to expand more."
• "Who cares?"

It's Bad

this is an understandable opinion as Microsoft does not have much of a good track record with buying game studios and this is very indicative of large games companies as a rule. However I feel that the mistrust in Microsoft buying out Mojang comes from a single insolent in 2002 in which they purchased a much loved games studio "Rare Ware Entertainment" in its entirety.

Before the purchase Rare had been seen as innovators in the industry and most people when asked what there favourite N64 Nintendo game was they would say something developed buy rare, to this day I have not seen a top 10 N64 games list without at least two Rare games on it. After 2002 Rare was purchased and every game coming out of Rare was either Uninspired, gimmicky or sometimes just plain awful. 

This sort of thing happens all the time in the games industry as companies buy other companies and this happens in no other entertainment industry to the same extent as this.

It's Good

"Bungie" was the first response from one of my close friends when I asked what he thought about it all, and well, while short and to the point and maybe a little bit stupid to answer a complicated question with as many nuances as this one but this is not an invalid answer.

So, in 1991 an okay company comes out called "Bungie" they released almost exclusively for the Mac and the PC staying away from the console market in its entirety. then in 2000 Microsoft buys it in its entirety and after the release of Oni, an okay 3rd person shooter, they released the now world famous "Halo: Combat Evolved;" a game that almost exclusively got 5 star ratings even selling over 5 million units, nothing compared to the 9 Million of Halo Reach the newest and last instalment of the game.

There are classic key reasons a game studio will send out an awful game; no time *cough* Ubisoft *unconvincing cough*, no talent or in the case of the early bungie no resources, and often that is all a studio needs to succeed.

In the argument for the Mojang buy out they use this as an argument and that with the buy out Mojang will have more money, connections and over all resources for future updates and maybe even a future game.

Who cares?

Rude but also very valid.

Studios are made, bought out and closed down so often that most of the time it makes no difference and does not make any news blog except a casual "oh so and so is buying Blank Studios." But this is just the culture of the games industry.

Third Party Support and Its Importance in Modern and Retro Gaming Consoles

In the gaming industry there are two kinds of developers, Home Developers and Third Party Developers.
Home developers are the people who made the console that the game is featured on, so for an example "Super Mario Bro's" was home game as it was made by nintendo and featured on the FamiCon a console made by Nintendo.
3rd party on the other hand is a developer releasing a game on a console they did not build, so again for example if Super Mario Bro's is home then a game like "MegaMan" made by Capcom, despite being an NES staple is a 3rd party game.



Crowd funding VS Early Access
In essence they both mean money in the pockets of Indie Game devs.
In its simplest form crowd funding is where you go on to a site like Indie Go Go and you say "I want to build a game donate money to me and you get updates or t shirts or stuff" and then lots of people give you a quid each until you have enough money to build the game.
Then Early access is where you release the game while it is in alpha or Beta and people pay for it cheaper than when its released so they give you money as well as suggest ideas and in essence Beta test it for you.

With crowd funding People pay you before the game is started and you get money regardless of how good it is in the end as well as building hype for the game itself. However compare this to early access where you have to rely on the game being good in Beta for people to buy it and in all honesty beta is the time you don't need to worry as a dev.

Only 25% of all early access games have actually been finished and made in to full games and finished and when you look at the sheer number of early access games out there that is a small number. now you can't compare this to crowd funded games where they start from the beginning with the money rather than having the money to continue the game as it is.

My opinion is based on the facts and my knowledge of the games industry.
Crowed funding is awesome but flawed.
Early access is a dangerous president.
Crowd Funding is amazing and some fantastic things have come from it including the now world famous and number one must have the occulus rift, however it is flawed in the fact that there is not much in the way of to hold a developer to make the game at all let alone to a good quality when they actually have your money.
Early access is dangerous. Early access makes you pay for an incomplete game and often you are paying £15-£40 for what is in essence an unfinished game. I have to ask you this "Would you buy a lobster Bisque, have it there on the table, uncooked and only somewhat assembled under the understanding that the chef will cook it at some point?" For me the answer is no, partially on principal and partially because lobster is gross.

Now for the predictable bit of this post...Major Institutions

AS you can see from these gross figures online from VGcharts.com you can see that Nintendo has dominated the market and continues to do so at the time being. other masgor player on the list include Microsoft entertainment, Sony, take two, and Activison. 

however as my earlier discussion towards major gaming conglomerates suggests indie producers have a eve growing roll in the industry and takeovers do not always end successfully, showing that intends current hold on a large portion of the market may not be infinite or secure.

In terms of my own game for this piece of course work I wish to self produce and distribute and bypass any larger companies, this is viable now a days to an indie developer unlike in the film industry due to better distribution systems online such as steam green light and GameJolt.com.

I do not wish to work as part of a conglomerate due to the comity design that has a habit of pushing aside the creativity of the individual. This area about games within a conglomerate is a huge issue within the the industry. For an example you could look at humor within a game , humor as a rule is best when you have a few writers wanting to make something funny however when a game in the industry is pushed as being a "funny" or "comedy" game you run in to a few issues, all of which being created by the fact that the millions of pounds behind the game has no way of knowing what is funny. Instead of having those few writers you find that you end up with have a whole team working on the script for the game. An absolutely hilarious example of this is during the game "Sunset Overdrive" (An Apparent "comedy" game) and the fact that it has a humor consultant in its credits. Something that you would not be able to find in games that are seen as being funny such as the infamous "Portal" or the "Binding of Issac" series of games.

 Copy-Wrong

Lately Nintendo has gotten over possessive of there properties forcing many YouTube content creators to delete videos and lately ROM's to be taken down,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38amaMunSLk&list=UU0tbk4wjH0wslopzFz7QTnw

here is a video where i talk more about it.

Why AAA Trends help Indie and Hurt AAA

The AAA industry of late has been defined by a single issue that many gamers who consider themselves a Hikikomori and that is the summer games drought (winter games drought for those in the southern hemisphere). The games drought is an issue with a few reasons and just like a man with a phobia of the daily mail resists simplicity. however the drought can be explained in enough detail with just three points. 

Firstly games have a habit of selling less during the summer months, this is due to the obvious fact that during the summer people go on holiday and go out and have social lives, going around doing whatever extoverts who play games do.

Secondly its caused by the ever increasing cycle for games, as better and better graphics are possible they become expected by the publishers of the games as well as the console owners who give out licenses to games and often if a game is not up to scratch it won't be published.

Finally we come to one point that i feel is oft overlooked by games journalists the world over and that is the money cycle. Almost all publisher companies own the companies they publish for. also the companies are public meaning the trade of stocks and shares in the company. developers owned by these companies are often expected to release one game a year, creating almost perfect yearly cycles. this means that many games are either in the "By me for your child this Christmas" camp or in the "Few coast is clear guys" post Christmas window.

So... why is this good for indie developers?

look at it logically, this fact creates a new market, one that isn't even a niche market. People who like games, even if it is summer. In fact the independent gaming scene has increased at similar rates as all three points I have made. in essence the AAA industry has locked itself out of an entire market. 

YouTube and Indie Games

Oh my god I love talking about this so much it is ridiculous.

So okay so i am going to quickly ramble on about something related that may not seem related okay so lets go.

This right here is very cool, is very swag, I like. (And if you get the reference I love you so much right now). It is what seems to be a normal bell curve but this is fantastic in its way to explain everything and yet in its simplicity be beautiful. Okay so one man on YouTube plays A game, lets call him "foo id fly"and this guy has a lot of followers like being the biggest on YouTube for subscribers lets say. now this guy plays and post a video, he is an innovator. but this guy plays like 2 games a day for his channel and a lot of them don't get anything above a glance at. well lets say this new game is unique and looks kind of cool. so others on YouTube begin to play it like lets say "Maim mumps" and "Snark-ivision", these guys are the the early adopters. soon after every game reviewer is looking at it and everyone is playing it as they fall in to the early majority, late majority and those in the tale end, laggards.

What is this even about? almost every successful indie game in existence.
 shovel knight, flappy birds, Day-Z, Five nights at Freddie's 1, 2 and 3, Amnesia Dark descent, Amnisia Machine for Pigs, surgeon simulator, Octodad, Gmod and all of its game modes, Mad father, SCP containment breach, Stanley parable the original as well as the re release, the binding of issac, Rust and even the indipendant gaming system the occulus rift where all pushed in to the popular eye by this very bell curve through the actions of YouTube, and I did no research in to those games while writing that is all just off by heart.