theRepublic said:
To a certain extent, I think that is some of the point for these big third party publishers. They don't want to compete with the little guy. They want to raise the barriers of entry ever higher, so that they have less competition. It works too, just look at all the dead companies. But, it is a double edged sword. Even the big publishers seem to be struggling with their profit margins this gen. |
I've been pondering this for years now, and while I can't recall any direct evidence which proves this theory, I have to admit that it does explain what is otherwise a course of action that is contrary to their own financial interests. But I'm not quite willing to buy in yet. Third-parties have done several things that tell me that, in certain circumstances, they're quite willing to operate in low-budget arenas.
Most third-parties, for instance, did eventually devote dev teams to the Wii, even if those teams were rarely their A-teams. The same is true of the DS. As another example, EA in particular is going to pretty great lengths to try and crack the mobile and low-end PC markets, to the point where they're opening new studios and spending hundreds of million to acquire teams that are experienced in those markets. We also have examples like Epic going through the effort of making their engines work on the iPhone, notwithstanding that it's much less powerful than the Wii.
I actually think your theory is giving third-parties too much credit. In my opinion, they're not long-sighted enough to conceive of such a strategy, let alone try and carry it through. I think it boils down to the fact that the big (at the moment) third-parties really only know how to make games bigger (but not necessarily "better"...
). They know how to work with the traditional control pad. They rely on ever-increasing horsepower to sell games. They know how to superficially emulate what's worked for others. They're comfortable with PC gaming.
If we hold these true, and assume that these factors override financial viability, have we not explained everything that's happened this generation? Higher dev costs and smaller markets be damned, we know how to operate with the HD console market. The legion of superficial Wii minigames is explained quite well. Even the infatuation with the iPhone, a market that theoretically should be anathema to The Industry, suddenly makes sense: it's a handheld PC that's got more horsepower than other handheld systems. What's not to love!?
EA is the only one that's trying to bust out of this cycle; coincidentally, EA is run by someone who has no prior experience in gaming and who has not yet found a winning formula. Meanwhile, we have Activision mindlessly milking winning formulas to death, and Ubisoft clamoring for a new hardware generation because they need to extra horsepower to sell games (their words, not mine). Originality is rare amongst these folks, and insight seems to be even more so. :-/
