Friday, December 2, 2011

Bad Business Models and What You Can Do About Them


In the last several years gaming has grown. More people play games now than at any time in history. It's gone from being a children's diversion to the most sophisticated technology in the entertainment industry. There can be no argument that gaming is bigger than it has ever been.
But that's not altogether a good thing. As gaming has become more profitable, it's suffered from the same problems as many other industries. It is a business, yes. But now there are more that see it only as a business. The industry has become dominated by those who are only in it to make money. And that comes at our expense in more ways than one. Let's look at a few of the bad business practices that are infesting gaming today.

Shovelware
Particularly prevalent on the Nintendo Wii, shovelware is what you get when companies throw out as many games as they can that provide as little as possible to cut expense and maximize profit. Usually low quality ports of other consoles' games, or quick attempts to cash in on momentarily popular movies, shows, or anything else, as long as it's cheap to make and get out the door.

Rapid Release Titles
Perhaps the biggest offender here is Activision's Call of Duty franchise, with a new title released yearly. Activision tends to keep two developers working on the franchise and alternating releasing titles. This way they can keep coming out with titles yearly, and spending the bare minimum of two years on development. The results are badly broken gameplay experiences that can last for months from release, if they ever do get fixed at all.

Gutting Games for Profit
It was bad enough when this was confined to simply holding out parts of the games to be released as DLC for an additional cost. Now it has spread and gotten worse as publishers are taking things from the game to be given only to people who preorder at specific retailers. LA Noire is a prime example. Numerous different missions and associated content were withheld, meaning if you wanted it all on launch, then you would have to preorder the game from several different places. It was eventually put up for sale as DLC months later.
But even that's not as bad as EA's recent attempt to give preordering players permanently exclusive weapons and accessories in the upcoming Battlefield 3's online multiplayer. Only a massive outcry from the gaming community stopped them.

On a similar note, we have the PSN Pass or Project $10, which won't let you play online without an additional investment unless you buy the game new. My initial reaction to this was very negative. However, having given it some thought I'm now torn because the arguments for and against it both have merit.
On the one hand, I understand that it takes money to keep servers running. They're providing a service, and do deserve some compensation. I also understand that the used game business is starting to really cut into profits for them.
But on the other hand, games are still quite profitable. In fact, they've never needed additional compensation before when they were making less. The profit from selling the game and from any DLCs has always been more than enough to cover the time the servers are up. Games have gotten more expensive to make, but they've also raised the prices accordingly.
If the used games business is cutting into their profits, then it's the publisher's own fault. By releasing shorter, easier games with less content and heavily targeting the growing casual market, they've assured that more games are going to be traded in. Since used games are cheaper, and the discs themselves will have seen very little use, it makes more sense for the consumer to buy a new quality product for less. The only way to make people buy new is to partake in these other shady practices.
Though they are still providing the service of running the servers, it feels more like publishers trying to dig their way out of the mess they made. And the only exit is through our wallets.

Pay to Win
EA's aforementioned abomination was the first real hint of this that we've seen on consoles. However, another big blowup recently occurred in the EVE Online PC game. CCP, the game's developer, recently had some internal documents leak that strongly suggested plans to unveil what came to be called "Gold Ammo". That is, the ability to use real money to buy your way out of a bad situation, or into a position of superiority, in ways you simply could not manage in the course of the game. Things like this throw all sense of balance and fair play out the window, giving victory to those with the deepest pockets.
The outrage from the EVE community was enormous. Protests ranged from actual in game rioting to about $1M worth of cancelled subscriptions. It was enough to get CCP's attention, and they ended up having the game's Council of Stellar Management (a player-elected council to represent the views of the players to CCP) flown to the head office in Iceland in an effort "to help us define and address the real underlying concerns, and to assist us in defining and iterating on our virtual goods strategy." said Arnar Hrafn Gylfason, Senior Producer of EVE Online. The result was a claim that the leaked info was taken out of context, and that there never were plans for Pay to Win. Many remain skeptical.

Overpriced DLC
And we return now to Activision's CoD series and take a look at Black Ops. To date, three map packs have been released, each one containing four multiplayer maps and one zombies map. A fourth map pack, all Zombies maps (4 remakes of WaW's zombie maps and 1 new one) has also been announced. At $15 USD per pack, the total price comes to $60 USD. The initial cost of the game is $60 USD, and that included the single player game, 14 multiplayer maps, and two zombies maps. That raises the question, if you got all that for $60, then is 12 maps and 8 zombies maps really worth double the initial purchase price? Especially considering it's entirely digitally distributed, meaning there are no packaging, shipping, or even physical production costs. For those keeping track, that's $120 USD you'll be paying to get all the Black Ops content out there.
It's also worth noting that another popular franchise, Halo, includes in their games a "Forge Mode" which allows the players to create their own maps all for free.

Sadly, this isn't a full list of all the business practices we could certainly live without. But the important thing is that all the things we want to get rid of share the same solutions. You have few weapons in this fight, so make the most of each one.

Education
Many people just don't know why these business models are bad, especially the booming causal market which is largely responsible for their creation and propagation by buying into them. Talk to them. Help these newcomers and you help us all. Spread the word not to support these business models wherever they crop up. Tell them why it's bad, and take the time to explain that as long as we keep supporting the publishers that do these things, the worse they are going to get.

Abstain from Buying
This is our most potent weapon, but it hurts us almost as much as it does them. It's a part of our culture, and a well ingrained desire, to buy the newest game. To rush out and pick up our favorite series' latest installment. These publishers are taking advantage of that and trying to milk it for profit. As much as it hurts, as much as you don't want to miss out on that special preorder bonus or "free" DLC, do not buy games that are doing these things. At the very least, do not preorder or buy from retailers that assist in the gutting of our games. Angry rants and sincere complaints all go for nothing if you're still handing over your money.

Donate
You might ask, "Why should the developers suffer for their publisher's decisions?" And I would say, "They shouldn't." Time to put your money where your mouth is. Donate to the developers you want to support, preferably with a message as to why you're doing it. You think Battlefield's great? Wonderful! Send money to DICE. Leave EA out of it. You love IG? Help show them that they don't have to be under Sony's yoke. Donating sends two messages. To the Devs it says, "We care about you." To the publishers it says, "Look at all the money you're not getting."

The industry has changed for the worse, but that doesn't mean it can't be changed again for the better. And change is coming. The only question is whether it will be the change we want, or one that takes us further down the wrong path? Your only hope for the former is to use each of the weapons you have to their fullest effect wherever possible. Do this, and change for the better will happen.
It won't happen overnight.
It won't happen without sacrifice.
But it will happen.

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