EA Shuts Down Visceral

KingBran

Three Eyed Raven
Apr 24, 2014
6,436
2,284
It seems to me that developers who are very close to their publisher (in effect, they are their publisher) are far more stable. I'm thinking of Bethesda, Rockstar, Blizzard, Paradox etc. Of course, not everyone can work for them and I'm sure turnover is not non-existent, but it doesn't necessarily have to be unstable.

Its VERY unstable. Think of it like Hollywood. How often do we hear about directors changing in a movie or actors coming and going. Sometimes you get work, sometimes you don't. There is a lot more to a game than just developers too. Its extremely rare to find anyone in the gaming industry who has worked for a single company for more than say 5 years. Yes the faces of franchise and like I said the C-level types. The people you see who created hit games that you see interviewed all the time. But a LOT of the people behind the scenes are people from all over that will move on after a game or get replaced. Single player games, once released don't need tons of developers to stick around unless its some huge company that will use those staff for a different project. Very rarely though does a person work on a single game for say EA than immediately have another game to work on once that game is done.

Again, I'm talking about the behind the scenes people. Not the faces of a franchise / game designers / creators / c-levels of a company.
 

God King Fudge

Championship Swag
Oct 13, 2017
6,308
6,793
Been so much discussion on the podcasts I listen to lately about the industry of games and how people believe the current industry isn't sustainable, so you have companies pushing micro transactions and loot boxes and season passes and that every game must have MP so they can try and squeeze more money from that.

It's depressing. When you look at how big the indie scene has gotten and how good those games are for the price points they're releasing at...it just seems hard to believe these companies can't find a way to make games without the constant need to nickle and dime their consumers.

Some of the hands down best games I've played this year were indie titles that were at or below $20. Dead Cells, Cuphead, Sexy Brutale, Hollow Knight, etc. List grows even bigger when you expand the price to $30.

Maybe AAA games just need to die. Outside of BoTW, Prey, Nier Automata and mayyyyyyybe RE7 depending on the day you ask me, I've had infinitely more fun with indie titles this year than I have big time releases.
 

DrFeelgood

Chairman Meow
May 8, 2006
21,057
402
San Jose, CA
Its VERY unstable. Think of it like Hollywood. How often do we hear about directors changing in a movie or actors coming and going. Sometimes you get work, sometimes you don't. There is a lot more to a game than just developers too. Its extremely rare to find anyone in the gaming industry who has worked for a single company for more than say 5 years. Yes the faces of franchise and like I said the C-level types. The people you see who created hit games that you see interviewed all the time. But a LOT of the people behind the scenes are people from all over that will move on after a game or get replaced. Single player games, once released don't need tons of developers to stick around unless its some huge company that will use those staff for a different project. Very rarely though does a person work on a single game for say EA than immediately have another game to work on once that game is done.

Again, I'm talking about the behind the scenes people. Not the faces of a franchise / game designers / creators / c-levels of a company.

That wasn't really the case with Visceeral. There were quite a few people there that had been there for a very long time (myself included), it wasn't until recently that there had been a fair bit of attrition. With EA, when you're done with your project, usually your group either starts pre-production on the next one or helps out a different game team for a few months until your new project is ready for you. That's not to say that it doesn't happen at all, there are always people that jump from job to job to job but any sort of layoff or forced departure was pretty rare.
 

Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,093
9,356
Last month, I read a few quotes from someone who worked at a small game developer that made a PC game (The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes) that was published by EA in 1992. He made it sound like they were really rushed to meet deadlines on the game and that it hampered their ability to polish the game. I was surprised because I thought that that was still the era when EA was a good company, but I guess that they were getting the wheels turning on the whole overbearing publisher shtick earlier than I realized.
 

KingBran

Three Eyed Raven
Apr 24, 2014
6,436
2,284
That wasn't really the case with Visceeral. There were quite a few people there that had been there for a very long time (myself included), it wasn't until recently that there had been a fair bit of attrition. With EA, when you're done with your project, usually your group either starts pre-production on the next one or helps out a different game team for a few months until your new project is ready for you. That's not to say that it doesn't happen at all, there are always people that jump from job to job to job but any sort of layoff or forced departure was pretty rare.
I am not saying its a be-all end-all, I am just saying that's how a lot of it works. EA is much larger than a lot of game companies but its not like the devs, tools team, admins... etc. once Skyrim is done were suddenly ALL working on Fallout 4 of the next ES game. Definitely depends on your position too. When I was in the gaming industry I honestly cannot remember anyone that I worked with who had not previously worked somewhere else for a different gaming company at some point. We had some interns that were new to the job market itself and they were really the only ones.

For instance I worked on an xbox exclusive game, it was a big success and the head of my company had a different game he wanted us to work on. So Microsoft, who owns the rights to the game sold it to an independent developer and we started working on something else. Some of our team was "enticed" to move to this other company - nothing shady, they weren't poached really depending on who you talk to. We made another game (funny enough, EA became our publisher and rushed the game) and it tanked hard. The guys I worked with were from all over and now we all had to move on again. Just saying that's fairly common type of scenario for a smaller gaming company.
 

DrFeelgood

Chairman Meow
May 8, 2006
21,057
402
San Jose, CA
What do you have lined up for yourself now?

Nothing yet. They're trying to place us at other positions within the company and keeping us on payroll for a bit but i'm also looking around to see what other options are available.

Last month, I read a few quotes from someone who worked at a small game developer that made a PC game (The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes) that was published by EA in 1992. He made it sound like they were really rushed to meet deadlines on the game and that it hampered their ability to polish the game. I was surprised because I thought that that was still the era when EA was a good company, but I guess that they were getting the wheels turning on the whole overbearing publisher shtick earlier than I realized.

EA is first and foremost a business, they exist to make money first and make great games second. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, but if you're going to EA with the expectation that they're going to give you all the time in the world to make the absolute perfect game, you're going to be in for a rude awakening.

I am not saying its a be-all end-all, I am just saying that's how a lot of it works. EA is much larger than a lot of game companies but its not like the devs, tools team, admins... etc. once Skyrim is done were suddenly ALL working on Fallout 4 of the next ES game. Definitely depends on your position too. When I was in the gaming industry I honestly cannot remember anyone that I worked with who had not previously worked somewhere else for a different gaming company at some point. We had some interns that were new to the job market itself and they were really the only ones.

For instance I worked on an xbox exclusive game, it was a big success and the head of my company had a different game he wanted us to work on. So Microsoft, who owns the rights to the game sold it to an independent developer and we started working on something else. Some of our team was "enticed" to move to this other company - nothing shady, they weren't poached really depending on who you talk to. We made another game (funny enough, EA became our publisher and rushed the game) and it tanked hard. The guys I worked with were from all over and now we all had to move on again. Just saying that's fairly common type of scenario for a smaller gaming company.

I think it depends on the studio that you're working for, whether it's big or small. I know plenty of people around the industry that have worked at the same place for a long time and others that have jumped between jobs, though it's usually because they weren't happy with where they were at. I'm not at all trying to say that employment in the gaming industry is the most stable thing out there, it isn't, but I also don't think it's common for every place to be wound up and shut down frequently.
 
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Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,093
9,356
EA is first and foremost a business, they exist to make money first and make great games second. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, but if you're going to EA with the expectation that they're going to give you all the time in the world to make the absolute perfect game, you're going to be in for a rude awakening.

I realize that, but other publishers don't have as bad of a reputation as EA has earned for itself. They manage to put out good games without appearing overbearing and making so many demands (like having a particular type of gameplay, multiplayer, DLC or copy protection). The game that I referenced (The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes) even says right on the label on the back of the box that the game has no copy protection, so even EA (the publisher responsible for ruining the success and profitability of games like Spore and the new SimCity because of it) wasn't nearly so dogged about copy protection 25 years ago.
 

sa cyred

Running Data Models
Sep 11, 2007
20,844
3,112
SJ
Bumping this for something interesting regarding EA, their view on micotransactions, etc:

http://www.gamezone.com/news/former...-talks-microtransaction-push-in-games-3460464

Over the past few years, there has been mounting frustration over the addition of microtransactions in games. Some developers have come out to comment on microtransactions, claiming that their presence in games is due to the fact that games are too costly to make.
Now, a former BioWare developer, Manveer Heir, who worked at BioWare Montreal during the development of both Mass Effect 3 and Mass Effect Andromeda, has come out with a different viewpoint on microtransactions.
Heir's opinion falls more in line with the consumer's view, where microtransactions are simply cash grabs. Speak with Waypoint Radio, Heir said that publisher's added microtransactions because they “only care about the highest return on investment. They don't actually care about what the players want, they care about what players will pay for. Those are subtly different things."
 

SolidSnakeUS

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Aug 13, 2009
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Microtransactions are always and forever cash grabs. If you think the companies want what is best for us, then you're delusional. They care about one thing and one thing only, revenue. And companies like EA will go to any length possible to obtain more, even if it's just a single penny.
 

RandV

It's a wolf v2.0
Jul 29, 2003
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Yeah it's kind of like the push in North American pro sports to put ads on jerseys. It's not going to improve the viewer experience or lower the ticket prices for us or anything, it's just a way for teams to make more money. Nothing more nothing less.

I've always thought the current state of the big game publishers is comparable to the old Hollywood studio system in the 60's/70's before they crashed and the industry was rescued by the so called "movie brats" (Spielberg, Lucas) . Now I don't really think the game industry will crash in the same way, but there's a lot of similarities there. The reason old Hollywood crashed is because in response to adversary through the rising TV market the only way they knew how to respond was to make their movies even bigger and more expensive spectacles, resulting in films like Ben Hur.

The business model of game development doesn't have to be that complicated, nearly all the cost is in the creation of the product, the physical cost of distribution can be practically nil. You can break it down into a fairly simple formula:

$price * #expected sales = development costs + expected profits

So the problem with big publishers like EA when they get their hands on a company like Visceral, is when a game like Dead Space sells a healthy 2 million or so (?) it's simply not good enough when they see other games selling 10+ million. And their solution to getting more sales is to ramp up development costs so the game becomes more like those other games, until you get to a point where now they have to sell 5 million copies to make it worthwhile.

There's no reason why you can't budget a game that will sell a modest 1-5 million copies and turn a healthy profit, yeah just have to adjust for development cost. While indy teams have picked up a lot of the pace delivering great lower end games there's still a pretty big hole in the middle, which is a real shame.
 

SpookyTsuki

Registered User
Dec 3, 2014
15,916
671
Yeah it's kind of like the push in North American pro sports to put ads on jerseys. It's not going to improve the viewer experience or lower the ticket prices for us or anything, it's just a way for teams to make more money. Nothing more nothing less.

I've always thought the current state of the big game publishers is comparable to the old Hollywood studio system in the 60's/70's before they crashed and the industry was rescued by the so called "movie brats" (Spielberg, Lucas) . Now I don't really think the game industry will crash in the same way, but there's a lot of similarities there. The reason old Hollywood crashed is because in response to adversary through the rising TV market the only way they knew how to respond was to make their movies even bigger and more expensive spectacles, resulting in films like Ben Hur.

The business model of game development doesn't have to be that complicated, nearly all the cost is in the creation of the product, the physical cost of distribution can be practically nil. You can break it down into a fairly simple formula:

$price * #expected sales = development costs + expected profits

So the problem with big publishers like EA when they get their hands on a company like Visceral, is when a game like Dead Space sells a healthy 2 million or so (?) it's simply not good enough when they see other games selling 10+ million. And their solution to getting more sales is to ramp up development costs so the game becomes more like those other games, until you get to a point where now they have to sell 5 million copies to make it worthwhile.

There's no reason why you can't budget a game that will sell a modest 1-5 million copies and turn a healthy profit, yeah just have to adjust for development cost. While indy teams have picked up a lot of the pace delivering great lower end games there's still a pretty big hole in the middle, which is a real shame.

Yep. Bioware will soon be gone because dragon age won’t be witcher or skyrim and anthem won’t be destiny in terms of popularity
 

Oscar Acosta

Registered User
Mar 19, 2011
7,695
369
I don't even understand the gameplan of buying a company just to kill it off, and do nothing with their games. Like why buy Pandemic on the heels of the Saboteur and then kill a potentially awesome franchise off?
 

Oscar Acosta

Registered User
Mar 19, 2011
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Yep. Bioware will soon be gone because dragon age won’t be witcher or skyrim and anthem won’t be destiny in terms of popularity

Anthem already has a negative connotation to it because of EA's tactics. Have a feeling this is going to be the biggest bust in video game history.
 
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SpookyTsuki

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Dec 3, 2014
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Anthem already has a negative connotation to it because of EA's tactics. Have a feeling this is going to be the biggest bust in video game history.

It can’t be a bust if nobody thinks it will be good in the first place.

In terms of money for EA though yeah it could be.
 

SolidSnakeUS

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I'll say this, I believe that if Anthem isn't the success they were hoping for, I could see Bioware being the next one out the door. I would hope that Bioware, if they got close to that point, do what some other companies did, and that's buy themselves away from EA.
 

KingBran

Three Eyed Raven
Apr 24, 2014
6,436
2,284
I think it depends on the studio that you're working for, whether it's big or small. I know plenty of people around the industry that have worked at the same place for a long time and others that have jumped between jobs, though it's usually because they weren't happy with where they were at. I'm not at all trying to say that employment in the gaming industry is the most stable thing out there, it isn't, but I also don't think it's common for every place to be wound up and shut down frequently.
That's exactly what I was saying. Each company is different. You worked at Visceral with EA as a parent company. That's much more stable but still prone to the same kind of instability, obviously. I think it's more common than you think is all.

Just think of how many gaming companies out there that were once huge that don't exist anymore.
Midway
Sierra
Acclaim
Westwood
Irrational
Looking Glass
Ruffian
Lucas Arts
Maxis
Kojima MGS
Lionhead
Realtime Worlds
I.D. (much smaller now)
Sega (much smaller now)
Rare (much smaller now)


The list goes on and on. Even some of the biggest companies come and go. A big way to stay viable in the industry is to be a publisher as well as a development studio. That's why companies like Bethesda, Activision and EA are doing very well even if they aren't making a lot of first-party titles (EA being a big exception here). There are a few companies like Valve and Blizzard that really only make first-party games but can stay viable due to other forms of income. For Valve its Steam and for Blizzard its WoW and games like Diablo III, StarCraft II and Overwatch which have seasons, many updates and sometimes have micro-transactions.

But it's kind of becoming a publisher / indie eco-system. When an indie game gets big, a big publisher may buy them (see Mojang) and they will be around for a little bit to make a few more games then they go defunct and either the publisher takes them over and disbands the original studio or they stop making those games (that hasn't happened to Mojang yet but I would be surprised if Microsoft doesn't throw their name all over it as soon as they can, I am betting when Notch sold Minecraft to Microsoft they had a clause to keep Mojang around for a certain amount of time at least). Indie games will always be around but a lot of times those people move on to bigger companies or sell their studio or game rights. This isn't uncommon at all. A lot of these mid-range studio's just don't last as long as they used to.
 

XX

Waiting for Ishbia
Dec 10, 2002
54,886
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Publicly traded companies are a problem for the industry, but we'll probably never get away from it.
 

theotis77

Registered User
Jul 25, 2005
5,467
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Publicly traded companies are a problem for the industry, but we'll probably never get away from it.
Public trading (or, rather, the market obsession with infinite, unsustainable growth) has become a problem for lots of industries, and ruined many a good, sustainable, profitable company in the name of 12-15% GROWTH YEAR OVER OR YOU ARE ALL FIRED.
 

syz

[1, 5, 6, 14]
Jul 13, 2007
28,864
12,266
All in the name of putting more money in the executive pockets.

Like people were pointing out at the time of this, there are probably 4th string businessmen at EA who have nothing to do with development who could fund this project.
 

Oscar Lindberg

Registered User
Dec 14, 2015
15,597
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CA
Jason’s article about Visercal is one of the best I’ve heard this year as it relates to games

If Anthem bombs, Bioware will be the next next studio to close
 

Oscar Acosta

Registered User
Mar 19, 2011
7,695
369
Bioware bombed out the moment they sold to EA. We all knew it then, it's just writing on the wall now.
 

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