

Ask HN - it's clear, status quo in gaming is f'sckd, how do we improve? - jmspring

So, with the LucasArts shut down and a few other articles around the web, computer gaming is clearly a challenging industry.  With the SimCity franchise, we saw the DRM debacle, with the LucasArts shutdown we see popular (3+ million activations) as not successful.&#60;p&#62;I ask, where do we go?  Is gaming doomed to social gaming/FB cheesy/Zinga game levels?  In app purchases to gain a stronghold is the norm?&#60;p&#62;I ask these questions in the context of looking at a recent obsession -- The Masterpieces of Infocom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classic_Text_Adventure_Masterpieces_of_Infocom)  Where game play was first rate, if old school.&#60;p&#62;Is computer gaming doomed?
======
fusiongyro
The biggest problem with the gaming industry is that they think they should
give a shit what vocal gamers say on internet forums. They've hemmed
themselves into a weird little violent, misogynistic, anti-kid, anti-family,
hyper-competitive corner because the loudmouth bullies that play the popular
games are loud about it. Computer gaming is basically a counterculture trying
to run itself as if it were Hollywood. You can't keep alienating larger and
larger segments of the marketplace and just raising the price of admission.
Eventually you have to lower your costs. The news lately is that they're
noticing they can't throw Hollywood budgets at high-speed Germanic thrash
metal markets and make back the investment. You can, however, throw Metal
Blade budgets at them and do quite well. They just need to relearn how to do
that, and the indie gaming industry is showing them how.

Look at everything the indie gaming industry is getting right. They're focused
on polish, family-friendliness, low stress, low risk, low investment fun.
That's the real takeaway from Angry Birds. Angry Birds doesn't need high
pressure, extremely realistic death, a complex story, voice acting, a new 3D
engine with photorealistic cloud shadowing or any of that other shit. It's a
simple, fun game, and it's $1. It cost so much less to make than the big-
ticket games it's ridiculous, and it made way more money because everybody
could buy it for themselves, for their kids, for their friends' kids, and
nobody had to wonder if it would be socially acceptable or get them into
trouble. In-app purchases are not the problem. The problem is that over half
the marketplace won't go near a modern game, but will happily spend a dollar
or two (or ten or a hundred) on non-confrontational, unrealistic distraction.
Gaming is fundamentally entertainment, and the whole country gets bored. The
problem is emphatically _not_ lack of a market, it's just lack of
understanding what the market wants and will bear.

------
sfrechtling
Thats a very big question. I think the first step to understanding this is
outlining what is happening in the industry: i) casual gaming is growing
(iphone all the way to wii) ii) piracy is growing iii) social gaming is
growing (attached to facebook's growth) iv) game studios merged in the 90s and
00s and now are too big v) in app purchases actually do work vi) kickstarter
games and indie games are growing in popularity.

My summary of this is that larger studios are sticking with what works (makes
money) and are looking more and more like hollywood - they want low risk games
and are mostly only concerned with money. Games in this category: COD, NFS
etc. Piracy is growing, and taking a large cut of revenue. Diablo III and
other games made a lot of money, but implemented quite strong DRM - maybe they
are taking Diablo's lead and ensuring revenue (or at least making it hard for
widescale pirating. Casual and Social gaming is growing introducing new places
to play, leading to different types of games (Temple Run, Farmville etc) that
are built on a different revenue model - FREEMIUM. This means that in app
purchases support the development and support of the game, along with
advertising. There may be a merging of hardcore games and casual games in
terms of business models, but I think even the games themselves may become
more similar. The growth of indie games will ensure a large scope of game
level/immersiveness.

