That's not how financial reports work. Go to finance.google.com and search for some companies, they have pretty up-to-date data on most American companies. The only projections are the ones which appear in financial forecasts (which have to be clearly marked as so), which are not what the linked data is showing.



I agree with the general idea. That's why I think that graphics have to be less ambitious, since they're the biggest reason for the big budgets we see nowadays. Unfortunately for publishers it's pretty hard to do that on the PS3 and 360, since the "core" PS360 gamers now expect high graphical quality out of any HD title. The only resort on those consoles is downloadable titles which have lower standards, but those don't generate anywhere near the amount of revenue that retail games do. I admit I haven't looked closely at sales/profitabiilty of downloadable titles, but even with publishers investing in these they're still losing money.



I don't support mediocrity either. However I do support whatever it takes to make the industry sustainable, and the "graphical arms race" is clearly not a sustainable path. It just heightens gamers' expectations to a level that makes most or all publishers spend too high amounts of money in a significant percentage of their titles, which leads to the financial disasters we're seeing today.

NJ5 said: ... That's not how financial reports work. Go to finance.google.com and search for some companies, they have pretty up-to-date data on most American companies. The only projections are the ones which appear in financial forecasts (which have to be clearly marked as so), which are not what the linked data is showing. ... That's the way of the world. It's the way movies went, and I still don't see why we should go out of our way to support mediocrity. I don't support mediocrity either. However I do support whatever it takes to make the industry sustainable, and the "graphical arms race" is clearly not a sustainable path. It just heightens gamers' expectations to a level that makes most or all publishers spend too high amounts of money in a significant percentage of their titles, which leads to the financial disasters we're seeing today.

I meant that it made more sense for you to show yearly projected data, not for their financial reports.

And obviously any arms race is not a sustainable path. But the financial troubles we've been seeing stem as much from the inability of those producers to adapt than from the potentially increased costs.

I don't care for the "industry" at large because I believe it will just naturally split in very different segments. The blockbuster movies, authorial movies, the Sundance festival films, TV productions, straight to DVD movies... all of these are different kinds of productions with different production values, different costs and different targets that have been proved to be sustainable.

The various entities in the game industry will learn to do the same, it's about time it matures a bit. Saying that the only way out is for everybody to go back to lower graphic investments is naive. Differentiation is where it's at.

Why didn't EA sell Braid? Since we're at that, why don't they have a $10-$15 line of smaller but good games? Why didn't they try serial experiments like Siren's Curse (that I bet recycled a lot of assets, but expanded the story in each "episode"... and stories are cheaper than art)

Look at Valve. They went for the episodes, made of content more than new assets and technology. They invented their own distriibution system. They created small, excellent games like Portal with minimum investment in HD assets (the "Sundance" segment).

Frankly, going back to SD is a poor substitute for real advancement in the industry.

 

That would be making up data or assuming too much. It's much better to write the known data and what it represents ("2009 to date") which is what I did. A critical reader can then make his/her own conclusions. My conclusion is that the fiscal year of 2009 (ending this month) was another disaster for EA like 2008 (in fact it was a bigger disaster).



I didn't say everybody has to go back to lower-quality graphics. Clearly there are several developers and franchises which are profitable when they make high-quality graphics. That seems to be the exception rather than the norm though, so a big correction is needed.

I agree that differentiation and innovation are much needed as well. In any case we seem to agree that the industry is in for a big change due to crazily high investment in game development (not that anyone can disagree, the financial results of publishers obviously imply that).

 

It's clear that HD doesn't do a whole lot to increase sales and 360's success at its current pricepoint shows you're very wrong.




Indeed, that's the key. Wii games don't always require ridiculous of sales to cover the development. Sometimes a good idea is what it takes, see World of Goo. That's sustainable business. The big budget projects (Zelda, Smash Bros) pay off, but smaller ones as well, because they can be produced cost effective.

On the HD consoles we see a particular type of game sell very well: the Blockbuster; a mighty expensive very polished game, aimed at a 15+ audience. This is all nice, until it bombs (see Stranglehold).

BengaBenga said: It's clear that HD doesn't do a whole lot to increase sales and 360's success at its current pricepoint shows you're very wrong. Indeed, that's the key. Wii games don't always require ridiculous of sales to cover the development. Sometimes a good idea is what it takes, see World of Goo. That's sustainable business. The big budget projects (Zelda, Smash Bros) pay off, but smaller ones as well, because they can be produced cost effective. On the HD consoles we see a particular type of game sell very well: the Blockbuster; a mighty expensive very polished game, aimed at a 15+ audience. This is all nice, until it bombs (see Stranglehold).

Is it clear?   Over 50% of the market has dished money out for HD gaming.  The Wii has been a success sure but don't mistake the fact that the Wii is a success because of it's motion controls not because of it's insistence on 'Worse' Graphics.  Wii HD would garner the casuals (Like it already has) as well as many of the hardcore (Who care the most about HD gaming). 

 

On HD consoles,  small games sell very well as well.  Just the other day the maker of Pixel Junk: Eden  came out and said they made profit on their game within 24 hours of it being released.   I'm sure Flower has turned a proft as did Flow and many other games like Braid,  Castle Crashers.     This isn't some Wii owner exclusive thing.    

If we want to generalize like that,  Then I could just as easily point out that very few third party games sell well on the Wii and outside companies see far more success on 360/PS3/PC then the Wii.   I mean the Wii's primary form of sales is either based on games for young kids or Nintendo made games.   Granted, it's probably not fair to anybody to generalize them like that.  Right?

 

In total install base, yes, HD has 50%. However Nintendo went from a 20 million Gamecube to a 50 million Wii in 2.5 years. By staying in HD.

Besides that Nintendo is making lots of money, which can't be said of the others. This is first and foremost a business and losing money isn't sustainable. Period.

Also Nintendo makes more profit than all other top 20 gaming companies combined(!) and loads of publishers have presented losses in a growing market. Something must be off, right?



[quote]If we want to generalize like that, Then I could just as easily point out that very few third party games sell well on the Wii and outside companies see far more success on 360/PS3/PC then the Wii. I mean the Wii's primary form of sales is either based on games for young kids or Nintendo made games. [quote]

That's totally wrong. Just this week Iwata announced that MORE 3rd party titles sold on Wii than any other platform. You shouldn't believe the internet memes.


You have a point with the XBLA and PSN games though.

BengaBenga said: ...

 

"Besides that Nintendo is making lots of money, which can't be said of the others. This is first and foremost a business and losing money isn't sustainable. Period."

There are things called investments. Nintendo only gains money by its consoles and software. Sony and MS knew very well they were going to lose money on their consoles, and still chose to do so because of the HD multimedia buiness for the years to come. It's not like they can't make the "console production cost - retail revenue" subtraction and see that they are going to bleed money.

"That's totally wrong. Just this week Iwata announced that MORE 3rd party titles sold on Wii than any other platform. You shouldn't believe the internet memes."

That could be true. But if 1500 games on Wii sell 20k copies each, that's alot of third party titles, but none of them is successfull. I'm not saying that all third party games on Wii sell bad, only that what Iwata said doesn't contradict the statement that it's difficult for third party games outside of a certain kind to sell well on the Wii.

WereKitten said: BengaBenga said: ...   "Besides that Nintendo is making lots of money, which can't be said of the others. This is first and foremost a business and losing money isn't sustainable. Period." There are things called investments. Nintendo only gains money by its consoles and software. Sony and MS knew very well they were going to lose money on their consoles, and still chose to do so because of the HD multimedia buiness for the years to come. It's not like they can't make the "console production cost - retail revenue" subtraction and see that they are going to bleed money. "That's totally wrong. Just this week Iwata announced that MORE 3rd party titles sold on Wii than any other platform. You shouldn't believe the internet memes." That could be true. But if 1500 games on Wii sell 20k copies each, that's alot of third party titles, but none of them is successfull. I'm not saying that all third party games on Wii sell bad, only that what Iwata said doesn't contradict the statement that it's difficult for third party games outside of a certain kind to sell well on the Wii.

1) I'm pretty sure Sony didn't want to invest all the profits from the PS2 era into the PS3. Microsoft is another story, since their main goal was to tackle Sony's dominance over the living room. And the 3rd parties that are bleeding money has not a lot  to do with investments either.

2) From IGN: 260 Wii titles vs 170 X360 titles. So roughly 50% more titles. We know from various reports that development on Wii is 200-400% cheaper than on HD, but I think on the average game this is much more lobsided, since Wii hardly gets any expensive 3rd party projects and HD loads.

Although this doesn't conclude anything it's pretty probable there was much more 3rd party profit on Wii then on HD, despite a lot of HD multiplatform development.

 

@BengaBenga

1) I am not really into Sony's plans. With hindsight of course they would _now_ love to have spent less, because of their overall financial red :) But we can't really know how much they count to make out of BR royalties and movie streaming 5 years from now.

2) You're now counting titles, I thought Iwata was talking about total third party game copies?
Btw, your counting is weird... I did some statistics on Metacritic a few weeks ago and I had 374 titles for Wii and 512 for 360. I doubt excluding first party titles will tip the scales :)

BluRay is not Sony's exclusive property. The BluRay association has a lot of members that all want their share. Obviously their decision was partly based on a huge BluRay succes, but most of all on a continuation of PS1/PS2 dominance.



That's for 2008 as is Iwata's statement. But 360 having more titles selling less in total would make it even more of an achievement (sorry) for the Wii, doesn't it.