I agree that dev to user is best, and I agree that the current greenlight processes for game publishers are pretty busted, no arguments there. I also have bigger issues with the sub model he's not even mentioning.
In fairness, though, I think for majors with that busted greenlight process the sub model does enable some games to get made that wouldn't otherwise. Some games just don't work at full price and just can't stack up to the major productions but they do get checked out in a sub. For smaller games and devs the sub money can guarantee survival.
But that doesn't take away that a subscription-dominated market is poorer, the preservation issues or any of the other problems with that being the primary thrust. Tech guys tend to be all-in on things and think they should be THE way because more money is more optimal and if they dominate then that's more money. In reality for a content ecosystem to thrive a multi-window ecosystem is probably best. Also, I want to buy games I can own, and the less they let me do that the more I want it, so... there's that.
I have no problem with subscriptions as they are right now, my issue is a potential future where I am not given the opportunity outright buy the games I want to play.
Game subscriptions will never stay as they are right now. Microsoft is basically burning money with GamePass they aren’t making a penny. Currently they are wining and dining the devs with big checks, but once MS has cornered the market they won’t be handing out these big bags of cash anymore. And they will definitely raise their prices. It’s big tech disruption tactics 101. Undercut the competition and go into the red until the competition throws in the towel then lower cost and increase the prices.
I always tell people concerned about this sort of thing to look at how cable TV still exists long after obsolescence. The content delivery system won’t dry up before the content you want does (at least not in your lifetime).
Yeah, but much of the cable content is lost to time. That’s why we have stories like that of Marion Stokes, who collected tapes at her home and preserved hundreds of thousands of hours of news footage.
Sure, and the amount of lost PBS footage alone due to draconian copyright restrictions borders on criminal.
The point isn’t on the quality of the distribution method. Even if it was, preservation efforts for games that qualify for the concept of game ownership are far more advanced. The point is that when an entertainment industry gets this big, it takes the deaths of multiple generations for the market to dry up.
Are there examples for a games that wouldn’t exist without subscription services?
Small games can sell for smaller money and get successful without subscriptions, too (like Vampire Survivors, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice and many more).
I don’t think subscription services will pay good money to small productions. I mean look at Spotify’s or Twitch’ payouts. Only the big dogs get fed and the smaller ones have no choice.
Not even going to joke about this, but I am really hoping nobody there gets the bright idea to make a Barbie blockchain or NFT or anything like that.
Speaking of “Ready Player One”, the author Ernest Cline also wrote literally the absolute worst, grossest, most misogynistic poem I’ve ever had the displeasure of reading in my life. Now you’ll have to read it too to make sure the “Reqdyverse” never succeed and thus, zero possibility of Barbie blockchain.
It’s easily the worst book I’ve read, and I only finished because of the unintentional hilarity of it all. In a story ostensibly about how evil media mega corporations are, the author wrote a hail corporateove love letter to top selling franchises without realizing the irony.
There was potential in it being a self parody, although in a way the whe situation is funnier because he was so earnest.
I spent my first audible credit on that book. I hadn’t seen the movie…still haven’t. But it was narrated by Wil Wheaton, and I knew him from reddit. He did a good job. That’s all I have to say about it.
Ironically I found the megacorp produced movie version much more palatable both because it wasn’t stuck on making that which the author liked the only media worth obssessing about, it showed that fans of all eras enjoyed themselves equally in that world. And because it gave more of a human core to Halliday’s quests and the plot, rather than it just being about who’s more of a fanboy gets rich and gets the girl.
Seeing the book describe how Wade is so great at reciting every line of War Games just took me out of it. Am I supposed to be impressed by this second hand fawning over a different story? Is there even a point to that beyond Halliday/Ernest Cline thinking it’s cool?
“372 Pages We’ll Never Get Back” is a podcast where Mike Nelson (MST3K, Rifftrax) and Conor Lastoka (Rifftrax) read and review books they’re “pretty sure they’re going to hate”. RP1 is the first book & source of the podcast title, since it’s 372 pages. It’s like Mystery Science Theater 3000 for books and it is hilarious, I highly recommend.
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