The reason behind the studio shutdowns

[B4d4ssHunt4r]

What grabs my attention is that the recent wake of a couple of studio shutdowns that have happened because of what I believe there is the Fortnite/battle royale craze trending that is affecting sales of that studios games. Thoughts?

Edited September 21, 2018 by ryan32289

[Squirlruler]

Unlikely. Studios always come and go. It's natural imo.

[Wavergray]

It's pretty much a supply and demand problem. Currently there are too many games that exist and not enough money for people to buy all of them. So in order for the market to settle itself games have to start disappearing. In order for those games to disappear the studios that make them also have to disappear. The current sell culture that surrounds the video game industry probably doesn't help either.

[B4d4ssHunt4r]

1 minute ago, Squirlruler said:

Unlikely. Studios always come and go. It's natural imo.

Yeah but gamers these days prefer highly shitty FPS shooters which are proven far more successful than story driven games hence Black Ops 4 has no campaign and bought in to the trend of battle royale mode though.

[Squirlruler]

2 minutes ago, ryan32289 said:

Yeah but gamers these days prefer highly shitty FPS shooters which are proven far more successful than story driven games hence Black Ops 4 has no campaign and bought in to the trend of battle royale mode though.

I mean, maybe in that specific genre. Spider man, God of War, these games are doing incredibly well. check out this list https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PlayStation_4_video_games

[Redgrave]

If we're talking about Telltale and Capcom Studio Vancouver, then in Capcom Vancouver's case Dead Rising 3 didn't do too well from what I recall, and it being an Xbox exclusive probably didn't help too much either. Then you have Dead Rising 4 which did everything wrong for a Dead Rising game. Beyond those games I can't think of much else that they have done, so they weren't really doing too well for quite a while. 

 

And I think in Telltale's case I feel like it's because the Telltale formula got pretty stale. They got lightning in a bottle with The Walking Dead Season 1, Wolf Among Us was pretty cool, but after that everything between those and Batman and Tales From the Borderlands were average at best. It kind of became evident they were struggling when they had inconsistent episode release dates with things like Guardians of the Galaxy and I think Borderlands had a longer wait period than normal. And that's not mentioning how some games would get buggy like TWDS3 or Batman Season 1. So I think they were also having issues with polishing games before a certain deadline too.

 

So yeah, I don't think it has to do with Battle Royale or anything like that. I think it has to do with them releasing lackluster games that either failed to improve or they stagnated. Had Dead Rising 4 been a good game that was more like Dead Rising 1 and 2 then they probably could have lasted a bit longer and maybe been given more sequels or more projects if they were willing to try a new IP or something. And with Telltale I feel like they were riding on the success of TWDS1 so long that they didn't want to try things that were too different, so nearly every game after that would have the same sort of formula and it got old after a while, with a couple of exceptions.

[AJ_Radio]

7 hours ago, ryan32289 said:

Yeah but gamers these days prefer highly shitty FPS shooters which are proven far more successful than story driven games hence Black Ops 4 has no campaign and bought in to the trend of battle royale mode though.

 

Not exactly true. 

 

If anything, multiplayer only games, especially free to play ones, are a big risk. Almost none of those are story driven except for games like Destiny because those two games have a big, dedicated fanbase. 

 

I would love for the Call of Duty series to take a years break or so, but that would never happen because Activision is too damn greedy. Money is all that matters to them. 

[ProfBambam55]

33 minutes ago, Spaz said:

 Activision is too damn greedy.

activision ceo makes $8.3 million...has 4000 employees...gets taxed 39.6% meaning $3 286 800...remaining salary is $5 013 200...divide by 4 000...makes $1 253 / employee in a year...i make way more than that off my employees annually and am far from greedy...

 

finding ways to make money is not only good for a country's economy since it keeps people employed but the tax money gets redistributed to help (debatable) improve public services...so my question is how many people have you helped by employing them and how much good do you think your tax money has done?...i'm guessing in your lifetime you haven't come near even 1% of activision ceo's totals...

 

So rather than hate big companies for being big and finding ways to make money, why not try to appreciate they are in fact making your country a better place?...perhaps not for you directly as an individual but thankfully there are other people in your country...

 

nobody is forcing anyone to buy anything they don't want to buy or pay for a service they don't want...in business it really is supply and demand and clearly the demand for telltale games is simply not there...or their ceo has an addiction...or they are making poor business decisions with the money they make...or the cost of making a game/advertising is more than their sales (which is a poor business decision)...etc...

 

running a business can be incredibly challenging and particularly when stock holders are involved...they put a lot of pressure on the top execs...i would suggest trying it out before spouting what comes down to just jealousy over someone (or their corporation) working their a$$ off to make more money than you often by trying out new ways to increase their profits...some ideas flop...some are a great success... maybe you don't approve of their business decisions and that's fine...don't buy their products, others will...the numbers speak for themselves...

[AJ_Radio]

15 minutes ago, ProfBambam55 said:

activision ceo makes $8.3 million...has 4000 employees...gets taxed 39.6% meaning $3 286 800...remaining salary is $5 013 200...divide by 4 000...makes $1 253 / employee in a year...i make way more than that off my employees annually and am far from greedy...

 

finding ways to make money is not only good for a country's economy since it keeps people employed but the tax money gets redistributed to help (debatable) improve public services...so my question is how many people have you helped by employing them and how much good do you think your tax money has done?...i'm guessing in your lifetime you haven't come near even 1% of activision ceo's totals...

 

So rather than hate big companies for being big and finding ways to make money, why not try to appreciate they are in fact making your country a better place?...perhaps not for you directly as an individual but thankfully there are other people in your country...

 

nobody is forcing anyone to buy anything they don't want to buy or pay for a service they don't want...in business it really is supply and demand and clearly the demand for telltale games is simply not there...or their ceo has an addiction...or they are making poor business decisions with the money they make...or the cost of making a game/advertising is more than their sales (which is a poor business decision)...etc...

 

running a business can be incredibly challenging and particularly when stock holders are involved...they put a lot of pressure on the top execs...i would suggest trying it out before spouting what comes down to just jealousy over someone (or their corporation) working their a$$ off to make more money than you often by trying out new ways to increase their profits...some ideas flop...some are a great success... maybe you don't approve of their business decisions and that's fine...don't buy their products, others will...the numbers speak for themselves...

 

I don’t think Activision will be hurting any time soon. Just making more money doesn’t mean they’re good. 

[Risarra]

idunno, the fps trend had more of an impact than the battle royale trend and other genres still did pretty well.

[ProfBambam55]

51 minutes ago, Spaz said:

 

I don’t think Activision will be hurting any time soon. Just making more money doesn’t mean they’re good. 

so you think activision employees go around cheating and robbing people to make the $8.3 mil then?...making that much money in voluntary transactions = you're good at business...

 

and I quoted you saying they were greedy, not good...if you have dirt on the ceo being a racist, sexist, rapist, pedophile, committing adultery, etc...that's a whole other matter...any convictions that you know of?...and if so, why isn't the ceo in prison?...following the law = a sign of not being overly terrible...morals and values are pretty subjective...

[Soufwar]

Alright, here we go. 

Telltale’s closure is tied to allegedly (case is still being investigated) due to toxic management, and apparently (according to rumors) every game they made since TWD bombed except for Minecraft and 7 Days To Die. The reason why those games bombed are plenty, consumer churn towards the Telltale formula, Telltale’s Engine, low quality, competition (Life Is Strange, Beyond: Two Souls, Until Dawn...) in that genre...

you cant really put your hands on it but it was a storm of bad decisions and unfortunate events. 

Capcom Vancouver is Capcom’s fault, Deadrising is not a big name in the games industry, it’s a consistent seller that does 2 million copies per lifetime per game, they’re games made on a budget and supposed to be long term sellers and not blockbusters, but Capcom decided it wanted more from that franchise, the first bad decision was tie Deadrising 3 as an Xbox exclusive, that literally killed it on PlayStation. Its been proven before with Rise Of The Tomb Raider and how bad it sold on PS4 once it came over, these multiplatform games don’t do well once they’re tied to a platform. Deadrising 4 bombed when it released on PS4, and the people at Capcom probably saw the signs that the next Deadrising game will bomb as well so they had to cut it short and move on, lose the 40 millions and shut down the studio instead of a lot more money if they moved forward with the next Deadrising. 

 

All of Of this is to say that no, it’s not because of Battle Royale games taking the market by storm, it’s because of bad decisions and unfortunate events. 

Fortnite being a thing is a good thing for the games industry, just because a strong Epic Games means a stronger Unreal Engine, which in turn means better games for you. As a gamer you should be happy Fortnite is as big is it is. 

[Soufwar]

2 hours ago, ProfBambam55 said:

activision ceo makes $8.3 million...has 4000 employees...gets taxed 39.6% meaning $3 286 800...remaining salary is $5 013 200...divide by 4 000...makes $1 253 / employee in a year...i make way more than that off my employees annually and am far from greedy...

 

finding ways to make money is not only good for a country's economy since it keeps people employed but the tax money gets redistributed to help (debatable) improve public services...so my question is how many people have you helped by employing them and how much good do you think your tax money has done?...i'm guessing in your lifetime you haven't come near even 1% of activision ceo's totals...

 

So rather than hate big companies for being big and finding ways to make money, why not try to appreciate they are in fact making your country a better place?...perhaps not for you directly as an individual but thankfully there are other people in your country...

 

nobody is forcing anyone to buy anything they don't want to buy or pay for a service they don't want...in business it really is supply and demand and clearly the demand for telltale games is simply not there...or their ceo has an addiction...or they are making poor business decisions with the money they make...or the cost of making a game/advertising is more than their sales (which is a poor business decision)...etc...

 

running a business can be incredibly challenging and particularly when stock holders are involved...they put a lot of pressure on the top execs...i would suggest trying it out before spouting what comes down to just jealousy over someone (or their corporation) working their a$$ off to make more money than you often by trying out new ways to increase their profits...some ideas flop...some are a great success... maybe you don't approve of their business decisions and that's fine...don't buy their products, others will...the numbers speak for themselves...

Dude, your reply to the other guy is very passive agressive, and I don’t know if you know this but let me chime in and correct a few things here. 

Bobby doesn’t pay jack shit when it comes to taxes, if you’re familiar with USA-Netherlands tax evasion legal loopholes for the games industry you would know what I am talking about. 

Telltale games bombed financially for a long time, and Activision is manipulating people into spending money on micro transactions, that’s why their games are Grundy, that’s why they have psychologists working on their games and that’s why they’re patenting ways to force players to pay money through matchmaking, so no, when you say morals are subjective, can’t be farther from the truth. 

Thats not a future I want live in where we control players and make them pay us money by beating them into submission mentality. 

I do agree with you when you say that Battle Royale didn’t kill Telltale but Telltale killed Telltale, i don’t agree with how you think going about it. 

[AJ_Radio]

1 hour ago, ProfBambam55 said:

so you think activision employees go around cheating and robbing people to make the $8.3 mil then?...making that much money in voluntary transactions = you're good at business...

 

and I quoted you saying they were greedy, not good...if you have dirt on the ceo being a racist, sexist, rapist, pedophile, committing adultery, etc...that's a whole other matter...any convictions that you know of?...and if so, why isn't the ceo in prison?...following the law = a sign of not being overly terrible...morals and values are pretty subjective...

 

Activision has pulled a lot of shit over the years. Like forcing people to buy the Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare Deluxe Edition to get Modern Warfare Remastered. Or trying to pump out more money on the Guitar Hero games, among a list of other things they did that made them to be a hated publisher.

 

CEO Bobby Kotick was quoted with saying this:

 

"We have a real culture of thrift. The goal that I had in bringing a lot of the packaged goods folks into Activision about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games."

 

Every company has to make money, but someone like Activision can be more ethical about it. When you're one of the biggest video game publishers out there, it's easy to see why they would jump on the opportunity to add things like lootboxes and the such. Activision is just doing them slightly differently than what EA did with Star Wars Battlefront 2.

 

Maybe you're saying this because Activision in recent memory for some people hasn't been as horrible and terrible as they were in the previous generation when it comes to anti consumer practices.

 

Blizzard was one of my favorite companies in the business before Activision took over. These days, they're not as great and innovative as they once were.

Edited September 22, 2018 by Spaz

[Fubuki]

As much as I fucking hate fortnite. I don't think its the real reason why there are studio shutdowns. Studio shutdowns happen for multiple reasons. Trust me when FIFA 19 battle royal drops all of this battle royal shit will eventually die.

[ProfBambam55]

6 hours ago, Soufwar said:

Dude, your reply to the other guy is very passive agressive, and I don’t know if you know this but let me chime in and correct a few things here. 

Bobby doesn’t pay jack shit when it comes to taxes, if you’re familiar with USA-Netherlands tax evasion legal loopholes for the games industry you would know what I am talking about. 

Telltale games bombed financially for a long time, and Activision is manipulating people into spending money on micro transactions, that’s why their games are Grundy, that’s why they have psychologists working on their games and that’s why they’re patenting ways to force players to pay money through matchmaking, so no, when you say morals are subjective, can’t be farther from the truth. 

Thats not a future I want live in where we control players and make them pay us money by beating them into submission mentality. 

I do agree with you when you say that Battle Royale didn’t kill Telltale but Telltale killed Telltale, i don’t agree with how you think going about it. 

if you find an analysis of numbers and a very brief description of big business passive aggressiveness then I think it kind of proves the point of subjectivity...if you truly believe that, for example, people have the same basic morals in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, France, India, Japan, and, the U.S., etc. then I would have to guess that you likely haven't travelled much...

 

if companies doing whatever they can to earn money is not a future you want to live in, that's fine...but when you say "forcing people" what does that even mean?...like putting a gun to their heads?...stealing their banking info?...are you personally being manipulated by their mind control tactics and if so, how do you deal with it?...you really think the ceo made $8.3 million dollars by essentially stealing and that people don't buy their products willingly?...

 

even if we take what you say about tax evasion (which as far as I know is not illegal) as fact, and divide $8.3 Mil / 4 000 it's still only $2 075 made off each employee...hardly worth being called greedy over...and as far as I know they still need to pay about 10% tax despite loopholes...this is a huge amount...would prefer not to open the can of worms on taxes too wide though  since I think we would have a broad range of opinions on whether taxes are positive or negative for societies...

 

that being said, there's a point where reality sets in and it's worth acknowledging that maybe your mindset doesn't represent the majority...$8.3 million dollars is pretty convincing that if you don't like activision, you're in the minority...so I would recommend going out and trying to change the industry if it is so bothersome...and all the power to you...i honestly would like to see you succeed...would be great for the economy and people's lives...

 

6 hours ago, Spaz said:

 

Activision has pulled a lot of shit over the years. Like forcing people to buy the Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare Deluxe Edition to get Modern Warfare Remastered. Or trying to pump out more money on the Guitar Hero games, among a list of other things they did that made them to be a hated publisher.

 

CEO Bobby Kotick was quoted with saying this:

 

"We have a real culture of thrift. The goal that I had in bringing a lot of the packaged goods folks into Activision about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games."

 

Every company has to make money, but someone like Activision can be more ethical about it. When you're one of the biggest video game publishers out there, it's easy to see why they would jump on the opportunity to add things like lootboxes and the such. Activision is just doing them slightly differently than what EA did with Star Wars Battlefront 2.

 

Maybe you're saying this because Activision in recent memory for some people hasn't been as horrible and terrible as they were in the previous generation when it comes to anti consumer practices.

 

Blizzard was one of my favorite companies in the business before Activision took over. These days, they're not as great and innovative as they once were.

again with the forcing people...what are you guys talking about?...

 

so the ceo basically says "we're going to do whatever it takes to thrive in this competitive industry"...how is this unethical?...ever worked or know of someone who worked a $hitty job and only cared about the pay cheque at the end of the week?...is this by definition, unethical?...

 

and yes, I agree, every company has to make money...about $6 million of the CEO's salary comes from share holders investing in his ability to run the show...that makes for a lot of pressure that inevitably trickles down the ladder and a need for a team that specializes in areas other than just making fun video games...

 

and no I couldn't care less about what activision does...admittedly, i don't buy games based on the studio that makes them or really follow gaming news...i do own a business though and see a common trend of thinking that rich companies are greedy and cheating the world when in fact they are actually making many people's lives better by being good at business...it would seem that many people have not much of a clue on how business works so it's become easy to sit in an armchair and say "f**k corporations" backed up by pretty weak reasoning...it often just comes down to being jealous that some people make a lot of money and that they are not catering to a (financially weak) minority...it just seems odd...

 

do you think it's possible that blizzard was losing popularity and therefore was bought by activision?...or do you also think that they were forced to merge?...is it possible that perhaps you might love blizzard games but that a majority of people don't and that the decision to put less effort into development was a financial one?... 

[totallycrushed]

Blaming Battle Royale trends or some other shit... Remember Jack Thompson?

[RNumbers]

12 minutes ago, totallycrushed said:

Blaming Battle Royale trends or some other shit... Remember Jack Thompson?

 

So it's his fault!? Man, fuck that guy in the neck.

[totallycrushed]

1 minute ago, RNumbers said:

 

So it's his fault!? Man, fuck that guy in the neck.

This thing I don’t like HAS to be behind why shit happens. Fucking Battle Royales and fucking FPS. Let’s throw Minecraft and LoL in to that mix too. Ruining my goddamn vidya

[Soufwar]

3 hours ago, ProfBambam55 said:

if you find an analysis of numbers and a very brief description of big business passive aggressiveness then I think it kind of proves the point of subjectivity...if you truly believe that, for example, people have the same basic morals in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, France, India, Japan, and, the U.S., etc. then I would have to guess that you likely haven't travelled much...

 

if companies doing whatever they can to earn money is not a future you want to live in, that's fine...but when you say "forcing people" what does that even mean?...like putting a gun to their heads?...stealing their banking info?...are you personally being manipulated by their mind control tactics and if so, how do you deal with it?...you really think the ceo made $8.3 million dollars by essentially stealing and that people don't buy their products willingly?...

 

even if we take what you say about tax evasion (which as far as I know is not illegal) as fact, and divide $8.3 Mil / 4 000 it's still only $2 075 made off each employee...hardly worth being called greedy over...and as far as I know they still need to pay about 10% tax despite loopholes...this is a huge amount...would prefer not to open the can of worms on taxes too wide though  since I think we would have a broad range of opinions on whether taxes are positive or negative for societies...

 

that being said, there's a point where reality sets in and it's worth acknowledging that maybe your mindset doesn't represent the majority...$8.3 million dollars is pretty convincing that if you don't like activision, you're in the minority...so I would recommend going out and trying to change the industry if it is so bothersome...and all the power to you...i honestly would like to see you succeed...would be great for the economy and people's lives...

 

again with the forcing people...what are you guys talking about?...

 

so the ceo basically says "we're going to do whatever it takes to thrive in this competitive industry"...how is this unethical?...ever worked or know of someone who worked a $hitty job and only cared about the pay cheque at the end of the week?...is this by definition, unethical?...

 

and yes, I agree, every company has to make money...about $6 million of the CEO's salary comes from share holders investing in his ability to run the show...that makes for a lot of pressure that inevitably trickles down the ladder and a need for a team that specializes in areas other than just making fun video games...

 

and no I couldn't care less about what activision does...admittedly, i don't buy games based on the studio that makes them or really follow gaming news...i do own a business though and see a common trend of thinking that rich companies are greedy and cheating the world when in fact they are actually making many people's lives better by being good at business...it would seem that many people have not much of a clue on how business works so it's become easy to sit in an armchair and say "f**k corporations" backed up by pretty weak reasoning...it often just comes down to being jealous that some people make a lot of money and that they are not catering to a (financially weak) minority...it just seems odd...

 

do you think it's possible that blizzard was losing popularity and therefore was bought by activision?...or do you also think that they were forced to merge?...is it possible that perhaps you might love blizzard games but that a majority of people don't and that the decision to put less effort into development was a financial one?... 

Omg dude, you are one of the worst passive aggressive assholes i’ve ever talked to! Holy shit. You’re assuming I don’t travel, I am 21 and i’ve been to 8 countries, I am a son of a CEO of a big corporation, I live a very comfortable life financially and I am a foreign student here in the United States. Basically, I am very much the opposite of what you paint me as in your elitist mind. 

First of all let me hook you up with some facts, Activision and Blizzard were forced to merge due to them being fully owned by a French conglomerate called Vivendi, they didn’t choose to, they were forced to. 

I already told you, by design. Video games are made in such a way that would push people to be inpatient and spend money, prey on the weak minds that are vulnerable and sell them on loot boxes because it’s the same as gambling...and they’ve patented a way to sell you micro transactions because of matchmaking, so yes it’s fucking unethical wether you’re in Iraq or Canada. 

Now, i don’t go around saying this but I am a game design and development student, i am putting my money where my mouth is and I am trying to make for a better industry. I don’t buy loot boxes and micro transactions in 60$ video games out of principle, i don’t support things I am against and I am making it my career to make a better industry all about players (not payers). 

[T-100]

In my opinion, I believe there will be a new video game crash someday. I remember, when I was younger I had no pile of shame. The case was that there were not much games in which I was interested like today. Another case are the price drops, which were not so fast like today. 

Today, because of the many companies, indies studios, who delevop so many games, the player built a pile of shame of games and cannot play all games they want. I think this is the problem, because of the many different games. For e.g. if you like story related with decisions like the telltale games, but you have not so much time to play many which one would be selected by many gamers: a Heavy rain, where your decisions defines different situations and many different individual endings and it has nice graphics or a telltale game like game of thrones, which decisions dont have any real influence and the graphic looks like years before?

 

So I think the real big problems are the many different games, which cannot all be played, and the mainstream (more buyer more money for the company. But there some other problems like worse managing or sth else

[ProfBambam55]

5 hours ago, Soufwar said:

Omg dude, you are one of the worst passive aggressive assholes i’ve ever talked to! Holy shit. You’re assuming I don’t travel, I am 21 and i’ve been to 8 countries, I am a son of a CEO of a big corporation, I live a very comfortable life financially and I am a foreign student here in the United States. Basically, I am very much the opposite of what you paint me as in your elitist mind. 

First of all let me hook you up with some facts, Activision and Blizzard were forced to merge due to them being fully owned by a French conglomerate called Vivendi, they didn’t choose to, they were forced to. 

I already told you, by design. Video games are made in such a way that would push people to be inpatient and spend money, prey on the weak minds that are vulnerable and sell them on loot boxes because it’s the same as gambling...and they’ve patented a way to sell you micro transactions because of matchmaking, so yes it’s fucking unethical wether you’re in Iraq or Canada. 

Now, i don’t go around saying this but I am a game design and development student, i am putting my money where my mouth is and I am trying to make for a better industry. I don’t buy loot boxes and micro transactions in 60$ video games out of principle, i don’t support things I am against and I am making it my career to make a better industry all about players (not payers). 

hmmm?...really not sure what passive aggressiveness has to do with anything...no assumptions on you not travelling...i said I would guess that likely you haven't travelled much if you think morals are universal...simple as that...if you took it personally, well that's on you...

 

as the son of a ceo of a big corporation then you likely also understand that big business is just that, business at a very high level where taking risks can make or break and influence a lot of people's lives as we are seeing with telltale...

 

i'm not sure that I've painted you as anything...i've made an effort not to actually...not sure why this or asking a bunch of questions interspersed with my reasoning makes me elitist...

 

I'm also not really sure why microtransactions are unethical based on your explanation but ok...distasteful?...completely agree but unethical?...i don't know...it sounds like a solution would be to not buy into them?...but people are...that speaks volumes...and yes, I'm a bit sceptical that mainly vulnerable people with weak minds, as you put it, are making CEO's rich...do you have any specific data that shows these weak minds are being exploited en masse?...it'd be interesting to look at the numbers...

 

and gambling is also unethical?...not sure if that's 100% true here in Canada...also not sure about from here to Iraq...i think some would say immoral or unethical but others might disagree...again, it's subjective...

 

on the topic of patents...companies get patents all the time...yes, very often...another part of trying to grow a financially successful business is to try out new ideas and patent them...as far as I know the matchmaking patent has not been applied to any game yet...again, I would argue that whether or not the patent is unethical is a matter of opinion...would if tempt people to spend money on new items?...likely yes...does that force people to buy them?...or to puchase the game?...i'm not sure it would...again, they are not actually using the patent so not really an argument at this point in time...i don't think it's a secret that companies are trying to lower the cost of games and increase microtransactions...clearly, it's becoming a winning formula...i don't think it's a sign of greed, immorality, or bad business if companies back a winning formula...in the end, the consumers can decide their fate with their wallets...or not...

 

I'll admit I know nothing about the merger between activision and blizzard which is why I asked questions on possibilities...is it possible that someone, somewhere thought it would be financially beneficial to merge the two companies (i.e. a potentially positive investment)?...and is it possible that someone, somewhere also decided to put less money into developing blizzard for financial reasons (i.e. a potentially negative investment)?...would it be surprising if these were the only motivations behind the decision to merge?...

 

although very honorable, you not supporting things you don't believe in doesn't mean that a majority of other people won't and also doesn't mean companies are greedy, which is the point I tried to make at the beginning of this discussion along with trying to bust a few myths about corporations with numbers...we could share our opinions on wise or unwise decisions or morality all day but the truth is, the numbers pretty much speak for themselves...

 

it is great that you are going into game development and I wish you all the best...growing a business can be a tough path...sounds like you're lucky in that you have a father who could show you the ropes if willing...in my case, it was an independent thing and the learning curve was steep as can be...very rewarding though...on so many levels...now if only I could find a tax loophole I could grow a little faster...haha...

 

 

Edited September 22, 2018 by ProfBambam55

[Wavergray]

10 minutes ago, ProfBambam55 said:

I'll admit I know nothing about the merger between activision and blizzard which is why I asked questions on possibilities...is it possible that someone, somewhere thought it would be financially beneficial to merge the two companies (i.e. a potentially positive investment)?...and is it possible that someone, somewhere also decided to put less money into developing blizzard for financial reasons (i.e. a potentially negative investment)?...would it be surprising if these were the only motivations behind the decision to merge?...

 

An good way to get an idea of why the merger happened would be to look up the public financial records of vivendi, Activision, and blizzard. Two or three years before and after the merger.

So like 2005 to 2010.

 

If I remember correctly back then Activision was close to going out of business and blizzard had already been bought by the vivendi for the same reason.

[Soufwar]

9 hours ago, ProfBambam55 said:

hmmm?...really not sure what passive aggressiveness has to do with anything...no assumptions on you not travelling...i said I would guess that likely you haven't travelled much if you think morals are universal...simple as that...if you took it personally, well that's on you...

 

as the son of a ceo of a big corporation then you likely also understand that big business is just that, business at a very high level where taking risks can make or break and influence a lot of people's lives as we are seeing with telltale...

 

i'm not sure that I've painted you as anything...i've made an effort not to actually...not sure why this or asking a bunch of questions interspersed with my reasoning makes me elitist...

 

I'm also not really sure why microtransactions are unethical based on your explanation but ok...distasteful?...completely agree but unethical?...i don't know...it sounds like a solution would be to not buy into them?...but people are...that speaks volumes...and yes, I'm a bit sceptical that mainly vulnerable people with weak minds, as you put it, are making CEO's rich...do you have any specific data that shows these weak minds are being exploited en masse?...it'd be interesting to look at the numbers...

 

and gambling is also unethical?...not sure if that's 100% true here in Canada...also not sure about from here to Iraq...i think some would say immoral or unethical but others might disagree...again, it's subjective...

 

on the topic of patents...companies get patents all the time...yes, very often...another part of trying to grow a financially successful business is to try out new ideas and patent them...as far as I know the matchmaking patent has not been applied to any game yet...again, I would argue that whether or not the patent is unethical is a matter of opinion...would if tempt people to spend money on new items?...likely yes...does that force people to buy them?...or to puchase the game?...i'm not sure it would...again, they are not actually using the patent so not really an argument at this point in time...i don't think it's a secret that companies are trying to lower the cost of games and increase microtransactions...clearly, it's becoming a winning formula...i don't think it's a sign of greed, immorality, or bad business if companies back a winning formula...in the end, the consumers can decide their fate with their wallets...or not...

 

I'll admit I know nothing about the merger between activision and blizzard which is why I asked questions on possibilities...is it possible that someone, somewhere thought it would be financially beneficial to merge the two companies (i.e. a potentially positive investment)?...and is it possible that someone, somewhere also decided to put less money into developing blizzard for financial reasons (i.e. a potentially negative investment)?...would it be surprising if these were the only motivations behind the decision to merge?...

 

although very honorable, you not supporting things you don't believe in doesn't mean that a majority of other people won't and also doesn't mean companies are greedy, which is the point I tried to make at the beginning of this discussion along with trying to bust a few myths about corporations with numbers...we could share our opinions on wise or unwise decisions or morality all day but the truth is, the numbers pretty much speak for themselves...

 

it is great that you are going into game development and I wish you all the best...growing a business can be a tough path...sounds like you're lucky in that you have a father who could show you the ropes if willing...in my case, it was an independent thing and the learning curve was steep as can be...very rewarding though...on so many levels...now if only I could find a tax loophole I could grow a little faster...haha...

 

 

Lets continue talking about this in private. I am really curious as to how you think and would love to actually have this debate, throwing a DM your way if you're up for it. 

[TheGamersLobby]

On 21.9.2018 at 10:47 PM, ryan32289 said:

Yeah but gamers these days prefer highly shitty FPS shooters which are proven far more successful than story driven games hence Black Ops 4 has no campaign and bought in to the trend of battle royale mode though.

Don't forget these Bastards Who only Have this specific Soccer game in their head and no I am not talking about PES it's from EA 

Edited September 23, 2018 by TheGamersLobby