What Is Happening To The Gaming Industry? | State of the Arc Podcast

[@ResonantArc]

Here is the link to the video Mike was talking about at the end with the developer from Starcraft 2: kzbin.infoIHZru-6M8BY

[@silenthillfreak156]

I had a feeling you were talking about Thor. The dude is awesome!

[@jonathanhearn9359]

He also talks about this subject a lot. An is a indie dev/publisher now

[@maxderrat]

Warren Spector (creator of Deus Ex, developer of the Ultima games) once said (and I'm paraphrasing) that the most important thing a developer can do is find something original - something no game developer has done before - and put it in your game. That is why, as Casen alluded to in the latter half of this episode, the AA and Indie scene are going to carry the games industry forward over the next decade. That's where the innovation is going to be because the big corporations are largely (though not entirely) wedded to massive IP and trends, and find innovation as too risky given how expensive AAA games have become.

[@Beardmo]

I'd honestly say they've been the best source of innovation for well over a decade already. I constantly harp on about people playing more indie games, because there is no shortage of absolutely amazing games out there that get next to no attention over this AAA slop.

[@xani666]

Just making great version of something that exists is good enough, hell, it's entire blizzard's history

[@Kain5th]

hopefully nintendo doesn't keep suing every indie developers over patent infringment like with palworld. i soo want nintendo to lose that

[@budafuka]

While it generally is AA and Indie games that are innovating with original ideas, it is also the scene that iterates the most. Not that it's a bad thing, though. It's how the industry prospered to begin with. Being able to take someone's idea and add your own flair or innovate on it is something you can do in those scenes since the overhead is relatively low to begin with and the expectation isn't astronomical.

[@alanlee67]

While i see that logic, the real magic of videogames has always been the marriage of absolutely bleeding edge tech with the art. It's the feeling of playing the future now. The nes made games more than one screen...doom let us step into a believable 3d world....grand theft auto 3 expanded that world and let us do whatever we want...final fantasy 7 had literal movies in the game...halo 2 and world of warcraft had us go online and play with each other. Games have to be big triple A productions. I think cyberpunk is the only worthwhile game since maybe battlefield 4 let us go into giant 3d worlds with 64 other players. Problem is, where do we go from here...

[@ando336699]

This was a fantastic idea for the direction of the channel i havent been able to watch the vids for a while now , the 2 episodes a week is great. 👍👍

[@mattsully2238]

Less focus on graphics, more focus on fun

[@mattsully2238]

For example, TMNT shredders revenge. Simple approach and graphics, super good time

[@Its_Drifta]

Nail on the head. Theres definitely more issues lol but this one always stands out to me.

[@renatoramos8834]

Nintendo never stopped.

[@Postumeartist]

I think AI is actually going to give us the graphics in the near future, but we'll still need to supply our own fun or else videogames will become addictive, but awful. If AI is allowed to make gameplay choices, it'll choose addictive over fun and we'll be in an even worse place than before. But as much as AI makes me nervous, I think it might be good for the gaming industry... if it's used properly.

[@Beardmo]

This is a common misconception. 2D graphics are not inherently cheaper to produce than 3D. it's more about scope and level of detail. They don't need to focus on worse graphics, but less scope.

[@jeremymcandrew8068]

Wow, this conversation is surprisingly intellectual coming from a video game podcast. Referencing The Tower of Babel, Ayn Rand, and Keynesian Economics, and the Dunbar number? Def was not expected. Keep up the great work and looking forward to another episode!

[@razmeanie4519]

You must be new here.

[@Paul-to1nb]

If you like any of the games or movies they've covered on their podcast over the last 3 years, I highly recommend watching. FFX, VI, VIII, Xenogears, Outer Wilds, LOTR, etc. So many amazing discussions.

[@acaciastr4in]

This is a good example of why I respect Falcom(Ys, Trails, etc.) so much. They have been around for 40+ years just making what they love and have stayed as a private business through it all.

[@Fami_Salami]

Love the podcast, glad to know it'll be more frequent

[@rdrouynriv]

I don't think gaming as a hobby will ever collapse, but AAA gaming is sure heading for an 80's Atari level of collapse. The focus has shifted from making games that the gaming audience will enjoy to lets make a game that appeals to people who currently don't play games. On top of that they try to milk their players for so much money with microtransctions and gacha. Its pretty toxic how pervasive lootboxes and gacha has become. Edit: Chasing the games as a service model never made sense. It is a market that gets saturated rather easily as one player cannot realistically play multiple of these at the same time. They demand too much time and money.

[@diegosotomiranda4107]

It's a model that would fail for múltiple reasons, anti consumer decisions being one of the most common, and live services games...that bs shouldve never left just a Niche on pc

[@jacobmonks3722]

I hope for a massive downscaling of projects from big publishers. Nintendo has the right idea, making no more than 1 or 2 huge AAA games each year, but filling out the rest of the year with smaller projects that sell modestly well and have dedicated fanbases.

[@omensoffate]

And they sue people

[@jacobmonks3722]

@@omensoffate I never said they were an ethical business, just that they understand how to be sustainable.

[@renatoramos8834]

More specifically, nintendo know that most games don't need to be larger than life and must actually invest in game design to be good.

[@themeangene]

​​@@omensoffateokay. Nintendo has always been litigious and it's not always bad. Part of the reason the 83 crash happened is because there were 50 clones of every type of game and periphery. Lawsuits can help an industry

[@RetroFrito]

And many of those smaller projects age really well.

[@AceBadguy]

Really cool to have your general podcasts back again. I"m a big fan.

[@patrickholleman9323]

As someone who is inside the games industry, I'd like to add that one of the reasons for publisher contraction is signing games imprudently. Most of a publisher's game scouts are looking for the most marketable game possible. These scouts are trained in business and media, not game production. Therefore, they often find very marketable games that are in the concept phase or small demo phase, but these game productions aren't viable. That is, these "highly marketable" games are never going to get finished. If a good producer or designer looked at the production of these games, they'd turn around and tell the publisher "Hey, this game has no GDD, the demo is woefully incomplete, their development tools and engine have major flaws. This game will never get finished, or will be badly delayed with most of its features cut. This is not a safe investment." Alas, in the age of cheap credit (up to about eight months ago), publishers were investing millions into games by teams that had no experience, no GDD, no demo, nothing. Just a really good pitch. That's a terrible way to do business, and Publishers are paying the price for it now.

[@Sono_1337]

The point about corporate decision making from Mike was pure truth. ❤

[@neil4692]

This is why the CEO of Larian Studios said the company will never become publicly traded while he is in charge. The thing about the guy from Ninja Theory is that it is more that I think he received a massive payout and left but just picked a weird time to go since he only helped during the preproduction of Hellblade 2 and got it off its feet but never was hugely involved in it.

[@ignitioncore]

I think the problem with most of the solutions proposed here is that they fly directly against collective human nature. People who will do the harder thing because it's right are the highly uncommon exception, and not the norm. Especially when faced with the dilemma of "I can work overtime for two years to make X, or I can release Y overnight and make vastly more money". Also, people will cheer an indie game studio all the way to launch, complaining about big AAA all the way, and then still give the majority of their gaming dollars to the big company. I have experienced this first hand as an indie developer in the tabletop gaming space. It's cool to hate on Games Workshop and Wizards of the Coast, until they release the (often uninspired) new thing.

[@thetrin]

The point of big money getting involved and everything becoming make or break reminds of Falcom's philosophy: They've remained under 70 employees their entire existence. It's both allowed them to make what they want, and do daring things like the long form storytelling of the Trails series, and its allowed them to weather multiple financial storms over their 40 years.

[@dickking9373]

Yeah, I recall watching videos saying Falcom messed up and could have been as big and Square Enix. Looking into their history it does seem an intentional decision to remain small and allow their games to retain their specific appeal.

[@dasaen]

Sharing this everywhere, amazing to me how you both have got so educated on the topic of games from your developer history segments that you can make such a spot on opinion.

[@tacobales]

Resonant arc podcasts on Monday ?🥹🥹 earth is healing

[@dasutin]

I love Casen diving for cover at the end after saying something that probably every single person can agree with to some extent.

[@Omnicloudx13]

Thank you for covering this topic. It's a sad state of affairs when passion and love for making video games has taken a backseat to giant corporations regurgitating ideas for their new cash cow and the constant need for live service games that are full of microtransactions to appease shareholders and the executives at these companies.

[@AlainSTO]

My own opinion (being only a literal minute into this podcast) is that it's been VERY corporatized. From CEO's laying off so many people while having a multi-million car collection, to looking at games as profit-machines rather than that *and* an artform. It's feeling like Hollywood with just continuing old IPs instead of making new ones, remaking on old games rather than creating new ones, and the staff feeling completely burnt-out with the unreal demands and deadlines. [edit] Other than franchises I love, I did notice most of my purchases have been indie games nowadays.

[@AJDOLDCHANNELARCHIVE]

It doesn't help that all of the major studios/publishers are largely dependent upon investment from BlackRock and Vanguard who push DEI/ESG requirements on these companies or their social credit scores plummet and they can no longer get access to capital. Staying private/independent is the only way to retain integrity in the modern age of wokeness, DEI, and ESG infecting everything.

[@makotoisthebestprotag1870]

You’ve hit the nail on the head. Soon enough, we’ll be on Final Fantasy XXX, Call of Duty 50, and a Last of Us 2 Remake with the way things are going. Originality has been stomped out in favor of servicing the bottom line, ergo, companies have exploited the infinite money glitch by delivering the bare minimum.

[@Artimes.]

isn't that an issue for all mediums now? I mean the lack of orginality and creativity has for sure taken an immense step backwards since the height of the economic boom period of the 1980's. I miss how "art" in paticular was viewed and preserved over all this corporate franchising that has become the backbone of the industries now.

[@AlainSTO]

@@Artimes. Certainly not KZbin...surely.

[@xMawkKnightx]

​@@AJDOLDCHANNELARCHIVEinvestment firms are a problem. DEI and ESG are the least of anyone's problem.

[@IronCodyAlan]

First Monday Podcast Let's Go!

[@GamerGuyOG]

I'll tell you what happened. Passion is gone. It was replaced by greed and poor corporate decisions. Minimum effort on (most) games and expecting maximum profit. Dont believe me? How many remasters have we gotten recently? Why make a brand new game when you can upscale an old one and charge full price? For those few companies left that still have passion, their games are met with nothing but hate and malice. It's "cool" to hate on literally everything now because hate brings in the views. A game scored a 7? Well it's clearly shit. A game wasn't what you wanted it to be? Clearly it's shit. A game would have been much better if *insert reason here* but it's shit. The entire industry is beyond fucked and it's consumers are just as fucked.

[@neidhardt8093]

Not to mention terrible remasters that sometimes end up worse than the original.

[@ConanOG]

The type of employees that build the games because they loved and wanted to create their dream game are a lower percent of the market now. We still have WAY more of them now than before, but, we also have tons of the kind of people that are there just as a career, that some times may love the specific part of what they do (like concept art or sound design) but not the final product (game), and that drives a lot of companies to bad decisions because they don't have people that understand their public. I would never say the entire industry is in a bad situation, there are a lot of nice games every year. I think the BIG corps are f*cked, but not the entire industry. We may have some crashs and changes, but the industry will always exist because we have the biggest incentive for it to exist: consumers that want more.

[@SaberRexZealot]

I despise the review score at this point. It’s so counterintuitive. Some of the most innovative games (God Hand, Dragon’s Dogma etc) got 7/10s

[@JayM928]

The desire for profit itself isn't bad. If you believe that the best way to make money in a game is to make a game that everyone will love, then your goals align with the customer. The problem with many games, just like movies nowadays, is that the studios are shooting for maximum budget for maximum return. Make a billion dollar movie for billions in profit. Gone are the mid-level decent games. They are either biggest investment, biggest game ever that's trying to appeal to everyone in the planet, or it's some pixel indie game. There's very little in between. So many great companies that made great games that got bought out by giants like EA or just faded away... Pop cap, bullfrog, Sierra, Westwood, Mythic, just to name a few off the top of my head. I think almost that entire list is EA now and all the games that they made to cause me to remember their names have been completely ruined, driven into the ground, and/or abandoned.

[@finalheaven9818]

You guys need to cover Triangle Strategy

[@DKZK21]

Just wanna say I recently upgraded to the Blizzaga Tier and got to watch yall stream the recording of these episodes and it was a a lot of fun with the added chat interaction, easily worth the tier upgrade!

[@spyderwoods]

Casen says he's removed from deciding what types of games get made, but i disagree. I think his (and many others) decision to mainly buy old games IS voting with your wallet. It's telling devs that THIS is the type of game you want. No live service, no micro-transactions, no modern gaming nonsense. People just have to get over FOMO and wait a bit after games are released. Plus the price drops to what i feel is a more fair price. I've played every entry in the series, but I've never payed more that $20 for any Assassins Creed game, just because i wait to buy them. I don't feel like my experience is cheapened in any way by not playing day 1. (Nintendo is the exception to this as their games NEVER drop in price).

[@gunbladeguys]

I say it over and over every chance I get. In under 5 years... we got Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy IX, and Final Fantasy X. Sure the series was known for pushing the boundaries of graphics and presentation at the time, but that wasn't what me and my friends were talking about, obsessing about, coming back to over and over. We were captivated by the worlds, the characters, the music, the artistry, the creativity, the gameplay. Getting together with friends and chatting about our strats to kill Ruby Weapon, or bragging that we'd finally killed Ozma, or getting the Gold Chocobo... those memories are what made the games amazing. I liked FFXII... but there's no discernable quality of why that game took 5ish years to release after FFX (XI excluded for obvious reasons). The production quality of X and XII are very similar. There's next to nothing in XIII, or XV that stuck with me as moments worth celebrating, or sharing with friends. Sure, they looked amazing... had high production "value" so to speak... but so many other aspects of the games failed to captivate or compel. Today, I cannot for the life of me see why games like Tears of the Kingdom took 6 years to release, when it's just built on top of a pre-existing game and world. Go back to the era where the goal was to make memorable, compelling experiences at a scale that means I'm not waiting 5 years until the next one. I promise you I won't miss the open world "collect 900 turds" aspect one bit. Plenty of indie studios are releasing kickass RPGs with a handful of people, but they don't get the exposure and success that Big Game 32 gets, so they remain indie or end up having to do layoffs or close altogether.

[@Xenowolf8]

Of all the places to talk about Concord, I was not expecting it here.

[@Lee86THUNDER]

Funny but its very fitting when talking game industry stuff. Concord has so many lessons to learn from.

[@ProxyDoug]

Concord is like the Morbus of the gaming industry. We just need to convince Sony to re-release it and not play it at all.

[@SaberRexZealot]

@@ProxyDoug hahaha

[@johnmcternan4157]

A disgrace to name it after that beautiful aircraft

[@waterguyroks]

Casen, I think you might be interested in the philosophers Deleuze and Guattari (specifically 1000 plateaus) based on your interest in analogies and examining the underlying structures to processes. They have infamously opaque prose but that's essentially what they're all about, figuring out the way systems of any kind organize, the relations between systems and their subsystems, discerning the breaks between strata of organization, etc.

[@CasenSperry]

Oh, sounds like there's a psychoanalysis cross-over there. I'd be very interested in reading that.

[@28_Spokes]

I was expecting a news update on the world of gaming and it’s troubles, but instead I got some incredible insight of inflation, corporations and declining in human population. Great listen!

[@Xeno_Vega]

We need you guys to make games!!! Or atleast be writers for games. I'd buy

[@ghost-in-the-ciel]

Mike was great in this discussion, I was happily surprised to hear how he thinks about this topic, and so passionately. By the way, Adam Smith's usage of the term "invisible hand" has been widely (and probably deliberately) miscommunicated by people with a grotesque religious belief in unregulated markets. In his original usage, Adam Smith said "as if by an invisible hand", referencing and mocking the childish magical thtinking of the very people who hoist the term up today.

[@jacobmonks3722]

Adam Smith was also not a "profits over people" guy, like a typical capitalist stereotype might be. In his lesser known work, Theory of Moral Sentiments, he argues that humanity should naturally be disposed to community and helping each other out because we are social creatures, and we all want to see others happy. He probably wrote Wealth of Nations with the naive but well-intentioned idea that when humanity is told to look out for their own interest, that interest would include the happiness of others. That's my interpretation at least.

[@gubreal]

I love how, starting from gaming, you manage to touch on such important topics in such a deep and thought-provoking way. Never stop, guys, please!

[@SquallNoctisGUX]

Me saying the industry needed to crash after that whole “Japanese games suck” period of the ps3 era and seeing so many things failing so many years later now feels conflicting cause a part of me is glad but it’s costing these people their jobs 😭

[@jairekambui7738]

I still say that was the worst era of gaming

[@SaberRexZealot]

Phil Fish was such an asshole lol

[@razmeanie4519]

I don't think I would argue with you. Unless you like shiny and brown.

[@Jerrel28]

​@@jairekambui7738I 100 percent agree with you. There are many today who look back and claim that was the golden age of gaming. Not understanding that most of the shady business practices and loss of creativity started that generation.

[@jairekambui7738]

One thing I will say is that this generation has the greatest availability of great games of all time thanks to all these remakes, ports and remasters. The industry is falling apart, but the availability of games is incredible. For example, you can finally play almost every final fantasy game, every kingdom hearts game, both Nier games, and every modern persona game, all on the PS5. You can play the entire Xenoblade trilogy just on switch. There’s no shortage of great games. The huge problem is the industry and the homogeneous nature of their business platform as it relates to trying to get the most money possible by selling to the biggest audience possible and not having an actual audience.

[@LS1Highwind]

Tbh that was my first thought. Even if it collapses regarding new games there are 30 years of great games to enjoy. Hope it doesn't come to that but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't ready.

[@johnmcternan4157]

If you were out of gaming since about 2010, the embarrassment of riches you'd have, graphically every game in the last decade looks more than fantastic. And cheap, literally a packet of steaks.

[@johnmcternan4157]

​@@LS1Highwindnot dissimilar to films, you could spend several lifetimes watching old stuff you never saw before.

[@Epiphanetic_]

This is one of the best episodes I’ve ever seen out of you guys.

[@jimpowell889]

Really digging this new style of extra podcast format. Gives me something to watch and feel a part of while I go back and play Xenogears with the old videos. lol. Life happened and just trying to catch up. At this pace it'll never happen but I enjoy the journey anyway.

[@Xenowolf8]

8:25, Hi Fi Rush has a big Xenogears reference in it that made me super happy.

[@AntonioCunningham]

The problem with Hi-Fi Rush was that it was a Game Pass game. That's the sole reason why I didn't buy it

[@MillenniumEarl014]

​​​@@AntonioCunninghamIsn't that the point of Game Pass? So don't people don't need to buy it? Online on paid games is not free on console. You need subscription. Look at diablo IV on consoles. You need to buy the game and need an online subscription to play it.

[@RaihanSays]

I feel like we have to mention Nintendo here as someone who just simply buys games that are interesting to me, I feel Nintendo very much is still able to grasp the "fun" and artistic nature of games that I experienced in my childhood and can still find new ways to experience it without the added toxicity or predatory practices. Even the Xenoblade series is really Takahashi retelling his Xenogears story.

[@mellybeannn14]

Agreed, Nintendo as both an innovative publisher and hardware platform would be an interesting topic for the guys to talk about

[@ryandude3]

Casen, I love that around the half-hour mark you basically describe The Adaptive Cycle. It's a conceptual model from Resilience Theory that has empirical grounding in ecology (where it first developed) to anthropology (where I and others have researched societal changes through that lens). Generally speaking, it goes like this: 1) The growth or exploitation phase 2) The conservation phase, which is the peak where organizational size and complexity (and therefore costs) are highest 3) The release phase, which could be a correction but could be as dramatic as a collapse 4) The reorganization phase, which typically leads back into a new growth or exploitation phase A big question in the conservation phase is how rigid versus flexible (or resilient) the organization is. If it's flexible, the system can usually correct things before a collapse, but a rigid system typically can't respond adequately and so collapses.

[@orngcreator6115]

That comment in the first article about Vertical Slices was particularly enlightening to me about how these investors often have no clue how games work. For those who don’t know, a vertical slice is a small section of a game that includes most if not all gameplay aspects of a video game. They often either don’t exist in an actual game or are very difficult to make before a game is in full production. I recall Tim Rogers saying at one point that it’s called a vertical slice because it’s like getting a slice of a multi layered cake so you can get a taste of each layer. The problem is that making a vertical slice is both incredibly difficult and wasteful to make before a game is green lit for a multitude of reasons. Rogers said in one of his reviews something along the lines of “if you wanted me to make you a cake, why would you ask me to make you only once slice of it first?” Anyways this was a good discussion guys! Looking forward to more current events topics in the future as well as the game club videos!

[@razmeanie4519]

It makes you wonder what those slices of things like Concord or Dustborn looked like. Although I hear Dustborn got a lot of government money so that may have been a different process.

[@HeyHedgehog]

Loved your guys takes on these topics. You’re always so thoughtful and informative, open minded on a wide variety of subjects. It’s brilliant. ❤

[@suitNtie22]

This is wonderful. I like hearing you guys talk about the state of things. very excited for future discussions on the channel

[@AlastairGames]

I know what the ultimate solution to all of this is! It starts with you. If we stopped all trying to change the world, change others, and instead focused our energy on changing ourselves. Once you heal the core internal issue, then the external issues will no longer exist. Each person affects everyone else, like ripples in a pond. So change yourself and you change the world. Internal work. Know thyself. Contemplation. Healing your traumas and addictions. Spiritual growth. Awakening. Shadow work. Meditation. All that stuff.

[@mellybeannn14]

Based on my experience in different sized companies, the note about the ideal size of company is so true. The sweet spot seems to be between 100-200 people. Any less and you don’t have enough people to do as much as you want to do, any more and making decisions becomes a zoo. One can only hope some of the indie studios stay small and don’t get swallowed into a bigger corp.

[@DerDudelino]

OpenAI is such a fascinating comparison - they were able to pull off in the AI space with 400 people what Google wasn't with thousands of the best engineers. Smaller teams move faster and get more done within a much less risky framework and this is where the games industry should try to go back to. We used to make some of the best games with 300 people and less than 50M US-Dollar in budget. Now most games are 100M +.

[@Nigel222]

Nice to watch another video from you lads again. I've been out of the loop for last few months with all the Xenosaga videos. One of the best channels on KZbin in my opinion.

[@Peetizzle]

I love these kind of video's!!!! Keep'em coming!

[@quiddity131]

A few more thoughts having finished the video: As was discussed, I think the ideal would be for the creators/developers to never sell out to a large corporation and as such avoid the need to worry about shareholders, earnings reports, etc... But the fact is its really easy for us to say that having not been in the position to "sell out". If any of us was presented with the offer of a large amount of money to sell out whatever artistic creation/podcast, etc... we have, can we really say we would decline it? Very few would decline the offer. Re: Population, the birth rate is massively collapsing across the entire world. Especially in first world countries that have the luxury to play video games. Regarding having to abandon this "growth" model, its not a matter of if, but when. The big question is how is society going to sufficiently adapt to that. Because it doesn't just impact corporation earning reports. So much of our government entitlement programs (ex. social security), pension plans, etc... are not equipped for a scenario where the population goes down or where the population is heavily weighted towards the elderly. Practically everyone in a position of power wants to stick their head in the sand and kick the can down the road. Society is going to be facing a lot of challenges in the future due to this.

[@MrTamriell]

Loved the podcast. Really enjoy you guys talking about random things like this.

[@ocher8931]

Totally agree about the corporation problem. The entity is too big and loses any connection to humanity. You see them bending governments to their will and treating humans as any other assets. It seems the focus always shifts on levelling up financially rather than creatively. I wonder if you can’t do both by investing in your teams and the right people rather than selling your soul to investors.

[@johnmcternan4157]

I think capitalism was always the natural mode for humanity but its being corporatism for over a century now which is entirely different.

[@ocher8931]

@@johnmcternan4157 I agree. I believe there’s a way to keep things steady with capitalism. This corporate variant takes everything.

[@vigvillain]

I actually think it would be VERY surprising if Microsoft quit gaming. I could see them transitioning away from hardware to focus on 3rd party publishing and their subscription model, but I don’t think they are even remotely considering shutting down the gaming division. After spending approx. 80 billion to buy both Zenimax and ABK? A move as erratic as that would likely put MS stock into free fall.

[@leif54]

welli well. my favorite duo is back on the tube!

[@seancatacombs]

It's no coincidence that almost all of the actually interesting RPGs these days are 2D projects led by very very small independent teams or, increasingly, one person. That's the only scale at which innovation in writing, worldbuilding, or mechanics can be pursued without having to bring in investor capital.

[@LV99guy]

This is where the story takes a turn. In my mind this is where the story really starts.

[@nifftbatuff676]

Yeah. The last 20 or so years looked like a stasis.

[@Aerisetta]

wow didnt expect this from you guys

[@Kasaaz]

Mike hitting on the Scalability issue. Nothing scales Linearly across all aspects. Some will scale Exponentially, etc. Yet humans will generally assume everything scales the same. It's how we get into SO MANY issues. Edit: In regards to Corporation / Body / etc. As the size of a Body is squared, the volume of a Body is cubed.

[@-Monad-]

If you guys keep making videos like this, I'll keep tuning in 👍

[@agroed]

There are exactly two problems with the industry: 1. The corpo nepo babies running these companies with no appreciation or understanding of video games, the people who play them, or the industry at large. 2. The casual gamer NPCs that buy all this garbage. (At the end of the day, this is the only real problem.) Supply and demand, it makes the world go 'round.

[@the_Analogist4011]

The only way to resist greed is if the hearts of the people are trained in resistence to it. Collective and collaborative work is often not possible without hierarchy because that same ego which desires is similarly unwilling to share power, so force is needed. You have to solve the problem of the human heart

[@johnmcternan4157]

Quote from Resetera regarding if there was a path back to shorter PS2 length games with AA visuals: "I was watching a streamer a while back who was discussing the shorter and worse meme with chat and seemed really receptive to the message. Then he proceeded to mock a weapon texture for an environmental decoration as being too PS3 like. What people say and what people do are two different things. Yep. Even on here at "we want AA games back! bloated industry bad" HQ, people were arguing over a fucking low-quality rock in the corner of a screenshot in the Rebirth performance thread. And we expect the mainstream will be receptive to a modest production downscale?"

[@andresrosel821]

I'm currently playing Chained Echoes which is such a good game, better RPG than all recent indie RPG's in years I'd say, and it seems it didn't sell much, 7 years of development and so much greatness, not such a big margin of earnings in that case I'd say too.

[@TheMetalGaia]

Incredible game. I agree.

[@thepedanticcreature680]

I'm glad that you enjoy it but oh boy, the writers were not great at keeping it in their pants while writing women.

[@andresrosel821]

@@thepedanticcreature680 explain :)

[@Miraihi]

Chained Echoes is excellent. Though there's a long line of great indie RPGs that came out lately.

[@thepedanticcreature680]

@@andresrosel821 I've told several women in my life about how Sienna gets introduced as 'the Red Succubus' and it never fails to elicit groans and laughter. I then mention how she also gets established to be six feet tall with a noticeably hourglass body type and weighing 120 lbs - this being from around when the characters fall in the river - and their reactions change to 'These writers have never talked to a woman in their life.'

[@Zoombeanie132]

This was great guys, more of this please!

[@PelvicGaming]

Passion is a dying trait I'm afraid.

[@kurisu3000]

Would you still make videos if KZbin no longer paid you ad revenue?

[@GRAG3R]

She cosplays. That's a net financial loss, done out of passion. So there's your answer. She doesn't make money by dressing up, but it makes her happy and she has fun doing it.

[@Shatterglass23]

Passion is still there but sadly things like this happen. Things will get better...they always do 🤟

[@orcbrand]

This discussion reminds me of destoyevsky who would gamble away all the money he earned from novels, saying, "i can't write unless I'm broke." Final Fantasy, as we all know, only came from the modest going for broke with a labor of love. But the lack of modesty and the wealth available now seems to hamper creativity.

[@CasenSperry]

Now that is a VERY interesting take. . .

[@Crimsonrain13]

Excellent episode

[@remimezelle5402]

For all we talk about in that podcast, is the pure expression of the human nature. Even if we don't agree with what happens, our nature leads us to make selfish decisions when we are confronted to fear.

[@SeveraLF]

Are either of you interested in the upcoming Romancing Saga 2 remake

[@Scimarad]

You guys should do this sort of thing more oftern. Very interesting and entertaining.

[@adamscott5307]

This is quite the thought provoker for me fellas. I'm sure the rest of us here have the same adoration for the industry but it hits pretty hard when I step back and see I've commited my life in aspiring to be a part of this industry to see it get to this stage. My pursuit of creating games - as you guys thankfully pointed out, also stems from these smaller, visionary devs building new and exciting ganes and pushing the boundaries of 'play'. It's quite the rift between wanting to do what I love, and not wanting to get involved with the state of things. I take solace in industry veterans telling me I'm better suited and better off being an Indie Dev, mainly because of the way I work but also because generalists with passion for development as a whole don't really get a look in. What a mess eh? Keep up the good work chaps

[@dustinp1164]

PirateSoftware is the name of the guy who did the short explaining the microtransaction problem.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

Why do you need someone like that guy to explain how that's problem? That's literally common sense. He is pro Killing Games.

[@rangerscoach]

im an old hat and i thing that gaming needs people like Lars Von Trier and Thomas Vitenbergs Dogme 95 which in large part said that the expressive tools need not be overly expensive. the director centric model is better but they recognised in order to do this they needed a much harder cap on costs.

[@themeangene]

We're in an entertainment bubble - partially because of easy money thanks to government programs & investment firms. Projects are way too expensive. They will start coming down. Indy and small team projects will be the future for film and games as these companies readjust. AI and newer software is making it easier every day to make media.

[@chrilz1498]

Yes to artists and visionaries, I appreciate you guys a ton

[@optimusuk]

The movie industry analogies make sense, also a longer older medium of books is a good comparison, perhaps may be eventually where gaming will be headed. One of the biggest issues (half way though listening so not sure if this is raised yet) is the sheer volume of choice. To really stand out takes something really special and even then may go unnoticed without a big corporate machine driving the marketing etc. We may have hit peak civilization for this particular medium and it will take another new one to spark innovation for delivering experience. P.s, good choice for the twice weekly episode format, for all the reasons mentioned in the previous video 👍

[@jairekambui7738]

I remember hearing it like this: back in the day, the best shot for your entertainment to be successful was for you to make it as good as you can. Put your heart and soul into the art. Not everything that was good was popular or successful, but most things that were popular were generally pretty good. Passionate creatives were allowed to make great products for specific audiences and have their product generally be as successful as it could be for the time. These days, thanks to the massive developments in internet and technology, this is no longer the case. These days, The main way to make your entertainment product the most successful, is to broaden your audience to ridiculous degrees and take financially exploit all of them as much as you can. Your product no longer has to be at a decent level of quality to be successful, it just must take steps to psychologically manipulate a mass audience base. In fact, these days it seems like the most soulless and exploitative, repetitive and generic garbage are the most successful titles. That’s why a lot of us who have been following games, music, tv and movies, anime and manga, have noticed that the popular content in all of these industries has plummeted in the last 10-15 years.

[@skippyzk]

The tower of babel analogy is so good. I fucking love this channel

[@onresonance]

thank you Mike for speaking so passionately against this horrible system we're living under

[@remimezelle5402]

I really do believe that money corrupts everything that it touches. It takes more or less times depending on the growth, but I see that as a flower that you fertilize with money, it grows until it reaches its peak, the flower is beautiful, and then you continue to add more and more and whatever you do, it will eventually fade and die. Isn't that the all purpose of Life though? To keep growing forever? If you look around us in the nature this is the main rule.

[@mizuko6132]

It’s just money now. Cutting corners on quality. But it’s just about money. $100+ for special editions of new games. DLC. Every company trying to create their own GTA Online, Fortnite or hero shooter. Now systems are pulling a GTA 5 having you buy something you’ve already bought. My PS5 is having issues playing PS5 games. We were in a golden age. And it’s been over for a long time.

[@Balbazac]

John Michael Greer touched on many of your system critiques in his old blog the Archdruid Report; cogent title "Collapse Now and Avoid the Rush".

[@keen96]

What a good convo.

[@Xanderpr96]

I like the philosophy + games conversation, look forward to other episodes.

[@IWubYooz]

Though you mention the military as being designed such that no commander surpasses the Dunbar number in the number of people they lead, you also describe how horribly inefficient we are right after. Just getting office supplies is the worst and slowest process.

[@lmaopog6481]

As far as the Xbox lay offs, I'm pretty sure they're exploiting the Gartner hype cycle. Essentially, they hire, expand, and acquire at a great rate, which makes is appealing to investors, as it projects the idea that business is booming. With this new interest (or hype, if you will), they have a greater influx of capital, which comes in handy later when they inevitably begin layoffs, restructurings, and even close studios. At this stage, they begin to downsize, which they can do efficiently off the back of the extra capital they amassed in the previous stage, and manage to still keep the good will of investors under the guise that this is a sensible or responsible way to manage the company at this stage. This cycle repeats from here as far as I understand. It's a strategy used liberally by the tech industry, and it's becoming more common in the rest of the video game industry as well with EA, Ubisoft, and other corporations starting to implement it as well. With all this said, it seems to me as though everything is business as usual with most of these larger companies. It's a little cynical, but that's just how it seems to me. I'm by no means an expert on this topic, but if anyone would like to learn more about it, Moon Channel made a pretty great video earlier this year on this topic where they discuss it very eloquently and to a much greater level of detail than I could in a comment. I highly recommend everyone to look into it.

[@ConanOG]

XBOX screwed up buying Blizzard. The investment was too high, and because of that they had to show much bigger numbers. It's a trap they dug themselves. They couldn't barely handle the amount of studios they already had, instead of improving their inside management to release better games they just opted to buy more studios... Luckily Blizzard and Activision hadn't much to be saved, they were already screwd for some years already.

[@Metro4466]

Happy to see views increase ^^ I love you guys

[@silentobserver888]

Disco Elysium is the tragedy of corporate politics and unfettered capitalistic control. The best sustainable model we have seen thus far in the modern age is Fromsoft wares model of consistency and quality out put of games.

[@benjamindonahue9434]

I think the solution to this (like with governance) really comes down to a change that fundamentally makes us not human anymore. As long as life is a competeion for resourses (specifically money for humans), there is no system that can prevent overgrowth and self interest. Even if someone comes up with and implements a system like that somehow, someone will eventually circumvent it some eventually causing the same degredation.

[@v.m.a.d.l.e.6972]

As any other bubble it is expected to collapse eventually. There are way too many games. It doesn't help that the industry has become too influenced by political and sociengineering agendas of global level.

[@nuclearbeeberman]

great podcast episode, keep going the awesome work! I btw worked in different gaming companies who made free 2 play mobile games (even rather big ones) and I hated how manipulative those games were. I'm happy not to work there anymore... There are insane subtle mechanics that work in the background in those games that most people don't know about, even people that come out of the industry don't know about.

[@OmbraArt]

The Hayao Miyazaki clip went viral on social media but I think it may have been slightly misleading. In a slightly longer clip of the video I found it showed that Miyazaki was upset at the grotesque depiction of the zombie model and the way it moved, he mentioned that a person suffering like that is no fun matter. On the topic of this video, it is sad how corporate things become, when they do they do indeed lose their soul as the sole intent is money. It shouldn't be true that a company only wants money, but that is how it often is. Meaning we don't live in such a comfortable and prosperous society after all. Thats why I haven't seen many modern games on par with games like FFX or Chrono Cross. Well, there are many great modern games but they are usually not the Chrono Cross or FFX of our present day.

[@joepeezy4sheezy]

Monday just got a bit better. Long May these trends continue. Thanks boys.

[@OniLink99999]

As an indie developer, I particularly appreciate Casen's "give money to indie developers" suggestion 😉 But in all seriousness, this was a fantastic discussion about a topic I've been thinking about a lot recently. I ideally want to see a return to smaller budgets and moderate returns, like we saw in the PS1/PS2 era - I think that would greatly help the sustainability. But as you say, large corporations want huge profits and huge increases...so we'll see.

[@Allwyn121]

Casen came back! Missed seeing you in person buddy

[@Shanmania]

Casen getting comfy in the socks

[@Shanmania]

omg they both got socks

[@Shanmania]

#teamblacksocks

[@cheezburgrproduction]

I was just watching the Fire Emblem videos and was amazed they came out 11 years ago but I still find myself recommending those games. I absolutely love you nerds getting excited over stuff when you’re on the same wavelength you just can’t get the words out fast enough to get to your point sometimes xD

[@excalipoor]

Love this discussion episode

[@Artimes.]

The film industry is what is really collapsing and the quality of art is just franchising popular brands with no originality being present anymore, the video game industry still actually has original design principles and idea's which is what makes such a diverse medium especially within the smaller indie publishers. It has not went the way of Disney yet and THANK GOD for that, but its heading there and if we don't do something soon, it will inevidebly end up like hollywood or disney.

[@JayM928]

54:39 I will happily "support indie" when "indie" stops making crappy Rpg Maker solo pixel projects or cute little marshmellow stacker games and gets a couple friends and makes some real games. I have already stopped giving my money to EA, Activision, Disney, and all these other giants. I've supported a couple Kickstarter projects that went nowhere. I've got a wallet ready to support though for any folks that want to step up and stop making silly mobile games and memes.

[@MattMillerMacLeod]

Big agree on supporting indie games. Not that they don't chase trends either but you're more likely to find genuine content there.

[@stevenrohttis4202]

I feel like the Square-Enix merger was misrepresented. They truly thought The Spirits Within was gonna take off. It wasn't a bunch of projects failing but just one ballooning mismanaged mess creating a disaster.

[@durden6627]

great! excellent content