I’m talking about smaller studios but even for big studios, guaranteed income instead of gambling can be more interesting for certain projects.
The logic is still the same.
It’s like selling your product at Costco instead of Walmart. Costco will rent you the space to sell it for a certain amount of time and you are gambling on the fact that you’ll make more revenue than the rental cost you, Walmart buys your product and sells it for more. Hell, Walmart even pays for exclusive products as well so the example truly fits. It doesn’t prevent companies from selling other products at Costco, but it gives them a guaranteed income from one source.
The analogy I used makes more sense with indie games because I’m talking about having a job (small scale), but the same logic applies to companies.
A company like Lockheed Martin will do R&D to come up with new engines and hope to recoup their cost by selling the technology later on, they’ll also sign governmental contracts with guaranteed payments as the project moves forward. You need a mix of both.
That’s the thing though, you can make an excellent game and never recoup your cost just because you didn’t get the luck of the draw.
Do you know how many games released on Steam this year? 18k. How many did you hear about? How many were successful? How many were good but didn’t get the coverage they needed? Hell, sometimes you have indie games that will suddenly become successful years down the road. It’s. Just. Gambling.
Even for a well established company, sometimes one in the hand is worth two in the bush.
We see big studios that made successful games going bankrupt every year, don’t you think a studio like that would have loved to have an income guarantee so they could finish their next project instead of closing their doors?
If they want to be guaranteed to be able to operate, they should join the communist movement. Monopolistic capitalist business practices aren’t the way to go. If we’re having a capitalist market, it had better be a free market, which is to say one with sufficient consumer protections so that customers can make free choices about who to give their money to for a certain product.
Oh so a free market where companies can decide to sign exclusivity contracts isn’t ok but a free market where everything is released on the platform that you like is ok.
Sufficient consumer protection would see Valve being broken apart as a preventive measures because they’re in a position where they can sway the market any way they want and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Funny how you guys never talk about their monopolistic position in the market, right?
If Aldi only sells apples and Walmart only sells pears, that’s not a free market. That’s two monopolies. Drag doesn’t get a choice who to buy apples OR pears from.
If Aldi starts selling pears too, that’s not a monopoly. That’s customer choice. Drag can choose to shop at Aldi because of their lower prices and better customer service. Drag can vote with drag’s wallet. If Walmart has a deal with the pear farmer not to sell pears to Aldi, that IS a monopoly.
Drag doesn’t want to give any money to Epic. Put the game on GOG, put it on Itch, hell, put it on Origin! That would be great for consumers! A monopoly isn’t.
I’m talking about smaller studios but even for big studios, guaranteed income instead of gambling can be more interesting for certain projects.
The logic is still the same.
It’s like selling your product at Costco instead of Walmart. Costco will rent you the space to sell it for a certain amount of time and you are gambling on the fact that you’ll make more revenue than the rental cost you, Walmart buys your product and sells it for more. Hell, Walmart even pays for exclusive products as well so the example truly fits. It doesn’t prevent companies from selling other products at Costco, but it gives them a guaranteed income from one source.
Oh, so only indie games should be exclusives, then. Not games like Control 2.
The analogy I used makes more sense with indie games because I’m talking about having a job (small scale), but the same logic applies to companies.
A company like Lockheed Martin will do R&D to come up with new engines and hope to recoup their cost by selling the technology later on, they’ll also sign governmental contracts with guaranteed payments as the project moves forward. You need a mix of both.
If a company makes bad games, they should go out of business and their developers should work for better companies.
Remedy doesn’t need to worry about that, because they make good games.
That’s the thing though, you can make an excellent game and never recoup your cost just because you didn’t get the luck of the draw.
Do you know how many games released on Steam this year? 18k. How many did you hear about? How many were successful? How many were good but didn’t get the coverage they needed? Hell, sometimes you have indie games that will suddenly become successful years down the road. It’s. Just. Gambling.
Even for a well established company, sometimes one in the hand is worth two in the bush.
We see big studios that made successful games going bankrupt every year, don’t you think a studio like that would have loved to have an income guarantee so they could finish their next project instead of closing their doors?
If they want to be guaranteed to be able to operate, they should join the communist movement. Monopolistic capitalist business practices aren’t the way to go. If we’re having a capitalist market, it had better be a free market, which is to say one with sufficient consumer protections so that customers can make free choices about who to give their money to for a certain product.
Oh so a free market where companies can decide to sign exclusivity contracts isn’t ok but a free market where everything is released on the platform that you like is ok.
Sufficient consumer protection would see Valve being broken apart as a preventive measures because they’re in a position where they can sway the market any way they want and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Funny how you guys never talk about their monopolistic position in the market, right?
If Aldi only sells apples and Walmart only sells pears, that’s not a free market. That’s two monopolies. Drag doesn’t get a choice who to buy apples OR pears from.
If Aldi starts selling pears too, that’s not a monopoly. That’s customer choice. Drag can choose to shop at Aldi because of their lower prices and better customer service. Drag can vote with drag’s wallet. If Walmart has a deal with the pear farmer not to sell pears to Aldi, that IS a monopoly.
Drag doesn’t want to give any money to Epic. Put the game on GOG, put it on Itch, hell, put it on Origin! That would be great for consumers! A monopoly isn’t.
Yet I’m sure it doesn’t keep you from buying from Steam when games are only on there, right?
Don’t talk about wanting a free market if that’s not what you want.