I spoke to over 40 game developers whose companies had been impacted by layoffs in the last year. They shared with me the explanations companies gave them for what was causing the sudden loss of their livelihood, but they also told me why those explanations didn’t always seem to match reality.
Far too many game studios came to view themselves as either a money printer or a political advocacy group first, and a game publisher only as a distant second, as a means to that end. Predictably, people have been losing interest in AAA gaming. Turns out that, whatever you want to say about the content of a game, creating a GOOD game that people genuinely enjoy playing is indeed an art, and a game planed and directed by a marketing research department has all the artistic appeal of a commercial.
Far too many game studios came to view themselves as either a money printer or a political advocacy group first, and a game publisher only as a distant second, as a means to that end. Predictably, people have been losing interest in AAA gaming. Turns out that, whatever you want to say about the content of a game, creating a GOOD game that people genuinely enjoy playing is indeed an art, and a game planed and directed by a marketing research department has all the artistic appeal of a commercial.