Gaming thesis

hooradiation

koHd wrote: »

I don't get this comment. Gamers are the funders of the entire industry and always have been. What exactly do you mean?

Nope, the people who fund the development of games are publishers, who in the name of jesus do you think actually pays for developers to make games?

koHd wrote: »

What do you mean by "alternative" thinking?

Your ideas are on the face of them interesting, but don't stand up to any scrutiny.

koHd wrote: »

And my point about extravagant offices if just one example of how video game development costs are bloated.

It's also a bullshit notion. Outside of some exceptions (social media studios make an obscene amount of money, for example and as such can afford to splash out a little, as do a clutch of other studios like blizzard) the majority of development studios are in places where the cost of living is low, and rent modest buildings.
Why?
Because when they're being paid milestone to milestone they need to keep operating costs low.
Don't believe me? Go to gamedevmap and have a look around the UK, there are about 25 development studios in the capital. That's across all of London, and some places are cheaper than others, so I'm being generous and letting you count them all.
That's 25 out of 100+.

Then notice the places where there are loads of studios - Guildford, the Midlands and Scotland Vs The south of England.
They gravitate there for a good reason, it costs less.

I don't know what part of your ass you're pulling this notion that developers are working in guided palaces but I suggest you stop it.

koHd wrote: »

I take it you're a developer and can enlighten me on why internet collaboration will not work in the future?

It's like herding cats. See how many mod projects fall flat on their asses.

Distributed development sounds like a great idea, until you realise how inaccurate communicating over the internet is (see: This very conversation)
being able to talk to people face to face is important. Being centralised is also important. And being in a work environment is pretty goddamn important too.

Every single place that I've worked that's allowed people to work from home has come to regret it and with good reason. Not everyone is cut out for the self discipline it takes not to just fuck about because you're at home.
Also, it's pretty horrible for the people involved. You essentially become a prisoner in your own house, work unsuitable hours and without being in the same place as your workmates end up isolated.

So yeah, fuck that idea.

Kirby

dmcg90 wrote: »

I'm currently doing a thesis on If/How piracy has benefited media (music, video and gaming) and I'd like to just know a few opinions on the matter just to give me some inspiration. What do you think?

Well you could argue that the piracy of Crysis drove billions of dollars worth of hardware sales for graphics technology. Items like CPU's, Motherboard, Graphics cards, etc.

The question often banded about at the time was "But can it run Crysis?" and nearly everyone had a copy just to see if their rig could run it......and often when it couldn't new technology was purchased.

However to be honest I find that argument kind of pointless. Piracy is never really a good thing. Sometimes people make money from it like the example above.....but that doesn't make it right. It is what it is however and will always exist.

JTER

Firstly, good luck I do not envy you, secondly fair play for taking on this topic.

Perhaps you should look at how piracy has changed music/gaming/video/ebooks and then look to the benefits or detriment to both the creators and consumers ( the two sides benefiting from copyright law)

Music has been utterly changed. If you google around you will find studies highlighting how a download does not equate to a lost sale and actually evidencing an increase in sales per illegal download. I read a few canadian studies a few years ago( its almost 2am and I'm not going searching for you ) that same study was predicting that artists as a whole will soon earn more than the recording industries. Thus swinging the benefits towards the actual creators rather than the industry .HBO made a film/documentary on how the music industry dealt with piracy , it's titled Appetite for Destruction , based on a book with the same title afaik. I guess hardware such as the ipod go hand in hand with creating these changes for music . On the other hand it could be argued that Apple were simply reacting to how piracy was killing off the old business model of the record labels.

Video- Netflix and other streaming services, 3D, enhanced surround sound, Blu ray 1080p, Some new surround sound system I read about that is being used on Brave.

I see all those changes as being driven by hardware but also perhaps you could argue an appetite to create a new experience/create a much larger file that is not as easily shared over the internet/experienced at home. The creative industries need to creatively change their service/product , litigation thus far has proved largely ineffective. ( it can shut down the elephants(limewire, megaupload etc) but the mice ( usenet, p2p) are ever present.

Gaming - Steam, onlive, emphasis on multiplayer, permanent internet connection , DRM / removal of DRM - See Spore's ratings on Amazon and then Sims3 lack of DRM as possible reaction from the people.

All very wishy washy I know but that is your job to research , I just reckon they are some ways the gaming industry have responded directly or indirectly.

Books - ebooks are possibly another area you should look at, Paulo Coehlo has some interesting thoughts on how piracy has resulted in his sales sky rocketing.

That's all my late night ramblings on it. best of luck

dmcg90

JTER wrote: »

Firstly, good luck I do not envy you, secondly fair play for taking on this topic.

Perhaps you should look at how piracy has changed music/gaming/video/ebooks and then look to the benefits or detriment to both the creators and consumers ( the two sides benefiting from copyright law)

Music has been utterly changed. If you google around you will find studies highlighting how a download does not equate to a lost sale and actually evidencing an increase in sales per illegal download. I read a few canadian studies a few years ago( its almost 2am and I'm not going searching for you ) that same study was predicting that artists as a whole will soon earn more than the recording industries. Thus swinging the benefits towards the actual creators rather than the industry .HBO made a film/documentary on how the music industry dealt with piracy , it's titled Appetite for Destruction , based on a book with the same title afaik. I guess hardware such as the ipod go hand in hand with creating these changes for music . On the other hand it could be argued that Apple were simply reacting to how piracy was killing off the old business model of the record labels.

Video- Netflix and other streaming services, 3D, enhanced surround sound, Blu ray 1080p, Some new surround sound system I read about that is being used on Brave.

I see all those changes as being driven by hardware but also perhaps you could argue an appetite to create a new experience/create a much larger file that is not as easily shared over the internet/experienced at home. The creative industries need to creatively change their service/product , litigation thus far has proved largely ineffective. ( it can shut down the elephants(limewire, megaupload etc) but the mice ( usenet, p2p) are ever present.

Gaming - Steam, onlive, emphasis on multiplayer, permanent internet connection , DRM / removal of DRM - See Spore's ratings on Amazon and then Sims3 lack of DRM as possible reaction from the people.

All very wishy washy I know but that is your job to research , I just reckon they are some ways the gaming industry have responded directly or indirectly.

Books - ebooks are possibly another area you should look at, Paulo Coehlo has some interesting thoughts on how piracy has resulted in his sales sky rocketing.

That's all my late night ramblings on it. best of luck

You have saved my thesis. Brilliant idea to compare and contrast. I've been up all night working on it.

Quick update:
So far I have five interviews with big companies in music, video and (smaller) companies in Gaming.
I have my literature review done, in gaming I'm talking about:

- How streaming (eg Gakai) may have been inspired by Piracy they are unworkable due to the high licencing costs a new game would command.

- How freemium gaming is a good anti-piracy device but not for gamers

- How second hand games could be deemed 'paid piracy' as the creators receive no profit. Hence the introduction of online passes.

- How minecraft shows that good content is commercially popular regardless of piracy, also mentioned how it's creator semi-condoned pirating the game if you couldn't afford it.

- How gaming shows that file size doesn't make an impact on the rate of piracy.

- How DRM affects game companies, and consumers.

- How piracy may bring people and small companies into the industry thanks to easy access to tools used to create content but also takes away in a smaller revenue stream crucial to small publishers.

All of that in 3,000 words was tough!

Methodology is done, music and video is today's task (in the lit review) and I'm just writing up interview questions now (5 interviews over the next 5 days with industry people). Has to be all written up in 20 days, least I'm 1/4 of the way there!

Note: I changed my topic to this so there is a good bit of reusing content (especially in music).