Oh, you! :-)

My Walgreens still have GameFans. NICE.

Man, this is exactly the point people like me have been getting ridiculed for making for years now. Why oh why do we just accept that we have to sacrifice for the industry because costs are rising when the most obvious cause of this rise seems to be the way publishers are burning money?

Its not whining, or the more recently popular "evangelizing", its showing genuine concern for a very real problem. Big publishers are addicted to spending money with reckless abandon, and they use those costs as justification for all those questionable revenue streams.

I'm sorry for ranting, I just see an article like this every so often and wonder why people still refuse to believe publishers are responsible for their own growing costs when the evidence is so overwhelming.

http://www.seattlemet.com/assets/0006/4347/GrilledCheeseAd.png?1305129131

As usual I suppose, I'm failing to see the problem here. Yeah, ok, what the guy is talking about sucks and I guess in a perfect world it wouldn't exist, but it's just marketing. Such things have been going on for decades for the press associated with every other medium in existence.

I guess what *I* personally find strange is that we somehow expect gaming to be above this kind of thing. It's just an entertainment medium and we're just consumers. We all know about the swanky side of Hollywood and TMZ makes a fortune covering it, but something similar happens in the world of video games and we all collectively gasp? I don't get it.

I've said this kind of thing until I'm blue in the face and I'm sure anyone who actually remembers me is as sick of hearing it as I am sick of having to say it... but seriously. For fuck's sake, guys. Stop worrying about petty bullshit and just play the games. What happens in board rooms and convention centers simply isn't our concern. You and I are neither stock holders nor industry analysts nor industry journalists. We're just consumers. Just play games.

But without Online Pass, Uncharted wouldn't be able to SURVIVE!

@Tristrix - I'm not in the business of defending any given statement, but I will take the time to point out the fact that Dave -IS- a journalist, and though this may only affect you in the most nominal, inconsequential of ways, it still affects you.

@Tristrix

The problem here is not that it is happening, its how its happening. Of course there will always be press events, galas, celebrity circle jerks, etc. Their existence was never in question. However, there are certain truths that come into play that cannot be denied, the fact that costs seemed to skyrocket at the same time profit did at the very base of things. When Activision, the largest video game publisher on the planet, is spending a fifth of its anual budget on a single game, then citing the failures of woefully under supported games in its annual reports as the reason for its year over year failings, there is a definite problem.

The notion that this kind of reckless spending is harming the industry is not new. Developers and industry insiders alike have spoken out against the AAA model because of what it does to costs, most recently from a Halo dev placing the blame for rising costs squarely at the feet of publishers. The evidence is everywhere, there are entire genres that have disappeared from the console market because of costs, and many more subgenres that have been equally as abandoned for the same reason.

Which is why what happens in boardrooms should matter, because they invariably effect the state of gaming for the gamer. In fact, this generation has seen creative control itself handed over to those bean counters wholesale, as they put maximizing short term profit over diversifying product. To say that the aspect of gaming that wields the most direct influence over what we play is none of our concern makes no sense, and probably why the argument holds little weight with passionate gamers. The playing of games, and the passionate following of the mechanism by which those games are brought to you, are not by any means mutually exclusive.

@Tristrix - They aren't "maintaining negativity," but expressing a concern for the future of the medium. And rightly so. Saying it's the best it's been "right now," is short-sighted when, given the state of affairs, tomorrow seems bleak at best.

Make no mistake, we aren't breeding the negativity. We're reacting to it. It's already there, and has been for some time.

I understand where you're coming from, considering the consumer's point of view, but ultimately it's what goes on in those very boardrooms that affect your purchasing power where options and product diversity are concerned. It effects you in a very real way.

@tristrix
Play games yes, but why can't we talk about the industry? Isn't that important to gamers?
Obviously you don't have to but a lot of others always will, so I think you're wasting your breath here..

I come back hoping for a nothing-but-cheese-pics derailment but what do I get?

Walls of coherent text and valid opinions, goddammit.

@SBC

"Saying it's the best it's been "right now," is short-sighted when, given the state of affairs, tomorrow seems bleak at best."

That's what confuses me. How can you say that with Bioshock Infinite and Mass Effect 3 and Skyward Sword still coming out? And then, by most accounts, a whole new generation of consoles coming soon?

It looks poised to be even better tomorrow than it is today. I'm not worried at all. I'm freakin ELATED.

CHEESE? HOW ABOUT CHEESE METAL?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEdBgi4_UPI

@Tristrix - Quarter One of 2012 hardly counts as "tomorrow." Tomorrow, in this context, generally means some unknown time, wherein all of the variables of the present converge to either fulminate in the manifestation of, or alleviate all of the concerns we presently hold based on the current situation. Bioshock Infinite and ME3 couldn't possibly represent this.

Given current trends, and observable history, it is not unreasonable to assume that our concerns for the future have merit.

@Silent Protag - I suggest you check the FB page for the full statement. It's an eye-full, but much more detailed, and the ultimate point is that the independents are suffering. Indie games, print, all of it suffers due to current practices.

Diehard Gamefan (circa early-mid 90's) had the greatest visual layouts ever in a videogame trade publication. In the age of Nintendo Power and EGM, DG put out a product that was miles ahead. Awesome RPG and niche game coverage. I still have a stack of em' hidden away in the ubiquitous basement boxes.

Don't really have any comment on the meat of the article...but god-damn, Diehard Gamefan!!!!!

@KingSoup - Check out the new stuff. There should be a few preview pages on our website: www.gamefanmag.com

@OneRed

"You're going as far as to say that you are completely unaffected by something that you don't personally have a problem with because you don't have a problem with it, which is remarkably fallacious."

First off, can we please stop with this? I'm getting beyond tired of being accused of this. The fact that I'm arguing against something being a problem can be taken one of two ways. On the one hand, it can mean I'm a dismissive jackass that has no concern for anyone else. On the other hand, it can be taken that I simply don't see things the same way you do. One way makes me sound like an asshole. The other way makes it sound like I'm a reasonable human being with a valid opinion and a point to make. Why assume the worst? I shouldn't have to defend myself on a personal level just to be allowed to carry on a discussion.

Moving on to more important matters, from what you're saying to me, the absolute worst that I can imagine happening is that Activision and EA and Ubisoft and the like reach a point where their business models aren't successful anymore and they can't get by on CoD and Battlefield and Assassin's Creed anymore. So yeah, fine, lets say they crash and burn. Just like Interplay did? And just like Midway did? And Sierra? That's the way of the world.

Each one of those names I mentioned were giants of their day. They were cornerstones of the gaming world. And they're gone. Well ok, Sierra is still flopping around technically but you get my point I'm sure. The games will still BE there. You see that happening right now, as I mentioned earlier. If you're not into brown shooters, and that's fine, plenty of people aren't, the games you're looking for have simply found new homes. There are developers out there making some incredibly unique and exciting games, and making fucktons of money in the process.

Take Limbo for example. Amazing fucking game. Truly amazing. And not only did a game that amazing get made, and find a home on three different platforms (XBLA, PSN and Steam), it made a fortune in the process. I can't find final sales figures, but wikipedia mentions it making at least $7.5 million on XBLA alone. That's encouraging. In fact, I personally feel that this particular example and those like it (Super Meat Boy, Joe Danger, The Binding of Isaac, Geometry Wars, the list goes on) prove my point for me. No matter how down on major publishers you want to be, we've absolutely established beyond any shred of doubt that gaming doesn't NEED to rely on major publishers. If these indy games were the only games that existed at all and the Mass Effects and the Bioshocks and the CoDs stopped coming tomorrow, it would STILL be the best time to be a gamer in history. The market is just THAT freakin good right now.

Uh, aren't PR costs and production budgets separate things that get calculated when a project is first started?

I could see your point, SBC, if it weren't for the fact that the gaming industry obviously IS evolving and improving, broken process or not. The existence of digital distribution has completely revolutionized gaming as a whole and opened the door to a stunning variety of experiences from a stunning variety of indy developers. That didn't exist last generation, and it's absolutely undeniably a major advancement and a major improvement. And that's just one of many many examples of how our hobby is advancing.

I'm not denying that the process is, in some ways, broken. I'm just denying that it's as gloomy as you're making it out to be. A lot of things do very well despite having some absolutely mind-numbingly ridiculous processes. Movie distribution is insane. Book distribution is insane. Both are almost entirely under the thumb of publishers/distributors with retarded boardroom antics. Hell, if you really want to see a broken process, watch the documentary called "Beer Wars" and look at how batshit insane the beer distribution process is.

Point being, these things all get by, evolve, improve, and innovate in spite of... hell, maybe even BECAUSE of broken processes. For me to suggest that these problems aren't the end of the world isn't to say they aren't problems at all, or that I want to see gaming stagnate. Of course I don't. It simply means that I don't see these things significantly impacting the runaway freight train of gaming and the flat out fucking JOY it brings to my life, and the lives of millions and millions of other gamers.

Underwhelming, generic "event-games" filtered through the hype machine are our present and the future, baby. MW3 ftw. I look forward to it not sucking, but sucking nonetheless.

@Tristrix

I'm sorry that you don't like your arguments being called fallacious, but they are. If you'd like them not to come off as such, you are free to offer substance as opposed to opinion when it comes to something that has a substantial amount of tangible evidence that stands in contrast to how you feel. Fallacious is an entirely appropriate term to use in this context.

You're unwilling to agree that there is a problem, and now you're saying that even if there were a problem it would not be a problem. You're also wildly oversimplifying the effects of a massive bubble bursting, which would reverberate around the industry in ways neither one of us could rightfully predict. Needless to say, however, gaming would not be "the best it has ever been" if the market collapses in on itself, that's a ludicrous notion. It would take years for the market to cope with a full collapse of something so large, it would devastate gaming's infrastructure in so many ways I wouldn't know where to begin.

But of course gaming would still exist, no one is arguing gaming would slip off into the ether. Just because gaming would go on does not mean I, or anyone else, would have the industry implode as a means of change. There is no need to carpet bomb an issue when change can come much more easily, and much less harmfully, with a gradual implementation of smaller, more focused changes.

There's no need to even compare the changing landscape of game publishers over time with the sudden collapse of a market brought on by a bursting bubble, their differences are evident. There is a major difference in the failure of a company, and the failure of a market that supports them all.

All in all, what it seems to me is that you're saying that the problem isn't a problem, and if were a problem the result of that problem wouldn't be a problem because gaming would survive. The issue was never survival, so what exactly is your argument?

On a side not, GameFan needs to get on that subscription tip. Reading the FB page has sold me, and I'd gladly plunk the skrilla for a subscription over buying individual issues online (or braving the Barnes and Noble on the off chance they carry it here).

@OneRed - believe me, I want the subscription service to go live as much as you do. I'm doing my best to leverage it in, somehow (digital or otherwise), but it'll take a lot of time, effort, and a devoted position that we're not profitable enough to maintain just yet. You'll be the first to know when it's up. :-)

@OneRed - That was, quite possibly, the greatest sentence I've ever read.

Tristix, I just wanted to get in on this to commend you for voicing your opinion and to show that there are other people who agree with you. This is all going to be tangent to the subject of this article but this is as good a place as any for these types of discussions.

I myself have a view very similar to Tristix, in that I think this definitely the best time to be engaged with video games as a whole. We have amazing things happening in every direction. There's variety, not only in current releases but the whole breath of products already available. Things are super fucking awesome. But everywhere, bred within and made most apparent through the internet, is unbelievable amounts of negativity. People hating on everything conceptually possible to hate on within the industry. The companies, the people, the consoles, the gameplay, the titles, the plots, the characters, the development, et cetera, et cetera. It gives the impression that nothing good ever happens, will ever happen and that video games should stop trying and failing and then go die in a corner. At least this is how I feel sometimes when browsing places such as GameFAQS, 4chan or what have you. And yes, I'm aware that these are places that are notorious for their distinctive user bases. I as an individual am not influenced by this, and I know there are many out there who are likewise unaffected. But it's the mindset, the attitude, that seems inherent and pervasive within the industry, within the community. The problem as I see it is that this general judgemental perspective, or inclination, does have an effect throughout the industry, and traces of it show through in many instances of more dignified outlooks and voices of the industry.

To give an example, it feels like more or less half time I read an article about Kingdom Hearts either here or other places like Siliconera, I encounter yet another derivative comment about how the game is gonna have lots of derpy talk about hearts and darkness. And most likely a comment about how stupid or convoluted the title is. This is before even getting to the user comments. It's instances like this that show to me, far beyond any single game, or company or what-have-you, that people need to be more open-minded, and accepting of what is being created and the industry workings in general.

I know it may seem like I'm just pulling in some random topic into the discussion, but I really do feel like this negativity is at a core of some of the big issues the industry is facing, and relevant to the discussion at hand. It seems to me that Tristrix is tapping into a larger concept then just the main notion of this article, and that's why this turned into an argument of sorts.

To push forward my point, can you imagine if the industry simply did not have the influence of consumer negativity and expectation? If consumers were all around welcoming to any sort of concept or direction producers went, while still remain constructively critical of end products, I think many of the big issues the industry faces right now would eventually disappear. Companies wouldn't feel like they'd have to 'wow' anyone (though it would still inevitably happen), and games would retain their creativity and innovation. This idea necessarily goes hand in hand with understanding other people. It means trying to figure out what a game or story was working to achieve, and appreciating it for that even if it didn't manifest itself in its most idealistic form. It means understanding other people's perspectives on things, trying to understand what they're trying to say instead of what you think they're saying. This is a cause for many-a flame wars on the internet, and was an aspect I could see beginning to appear.

I apologize for the long tangent, but these are things I thought needed to be said, and the discussion was already forming here. For the issue at hand, in light of what I said above, I think it's fine to be critical of what companies are doing, but these types of events are a by-product, not any actual source problem. Talking about what-ifs in how money could be spent otherwise to make games better seem to me like we're already tapping into some kind of pre-formed expectations of what has been done and what should be done. Can't we assume a more positive attitude, thinking that the company did the best they could in producing the game in the first place? And on the bigger scale, if this sort of attitude was adopted universally, even if and when the AAA bubble burst, I think the destructive force of it would be greatly softened and all but completely recoverable with ease.