keltickennedy
Member
The reason is known. It's money.
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EA shuts down Visceral, moves Star Wars game to EA Vancouver/others
- Thread starter DKHF
- Start date
The reason is known. It's money.
Baron_Calamity
Member
"I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of loot boxes suddenly opened at once. I fear something terrible has happened."
facetheslayer92
Member
Till 2023 unfortunately.
But sales figures aren't evolving at the same rate that the "medium is evolving". That's a huge problem. Something has to give.
Where do you see the industry going to compensate?
I don't think a lot of people know EA have multiple studios tied up with a single Star Wars game at a time too. Right now it's Battlefront 2 (DICE, Criterion and Motive), so probably just see DICE's name plastered all over it and assume they're only ones delivering at the moment.
Even knowing it's not just DICE, I'm pretty disappointed with just 2 Battlefront (one of which was very barebones) and one of the more anticipated ones cancelled after 4 years of hype, so get were the anger is coming from.
Saucestin_Roast
Member
I miss the days when we got 2-3 Star Wars games a year. Even if some of them weren't the best quality. Sigh... This EA deal hasn't worked out too well so far.
Bronetta
Ask me about the moon landing or the temperature at which jet fuel burns. You may be surprised at what you learn.
Ridiculous development costs are a self inflicted wound mega publishers like EA started last gen in an effort to squeeze competition (mid tier and AA games) out from the industry.
Too bad for them, the gaming community kicked back in the opposite direction with the rise of indie games and self publishing.
Heck, Arkane Studios alone put out two games and a standalone expansion in the span of one year. I'm not even talking Bethesda overall, just one of their studios) So no, 2 games in 4 years (one being ridiculously barebones) from EA is not reasonable at all.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Yea no look at net profits and you'll see a huge increase across the board due to factors like a major increase in digital revenue, so yes sales figures are evolving. It may not be what a large section of GAF wants, but yes, revenue is better.
I frankly don't understand the anger given how much longer studios in general are taking with games this gen. And the fact that most of EA's games use FB. An Uncharted like game has never been made on FB by my knowledge. Let alone at the quality people expect like with the animation blending seen in games like UC4.
That's a really nice way of ignoring the reality of profits this gen among major pubs. Did the community really kick back?
They're absolutely not self inflicted. The audience is constantly demanding more, the hardware supports the "more" that's constantly being reflected, people really need to stop trying to pu all blame of rising development costs on devs. Especially when you have posts with a list of things a dev didn't get right including graphics.
Yeah! I had 0 interest in "Star Wars Uncharted" and just want an open world GTA in Star Wars game. I'm fine if it has loot boxes or micro transactions out the wazoo, if I can play a non-linear Star Wars experience.
Exploratory
Banned
And the third category that isn't crazy. We buy stuff if it's worth it and we don't when it's not.
Revolutionary
Member
As much as I disliked DS3, I never had a problem with that being an ending for the series. Very Lovecraftian.
Bronetta
Ask me about the moon landing or the temperature at which jet fuel burns. You may be surprised at what you learn.
1) I didn't blame anything on developers, I blame the publisher. The executive out of touch suits on the business side of things who see games as dollar signs and dividends, not the hard working devs who pour their lives and passion into making these games.
On the other hand you sure are blaming customers for ballooning costs of development.
2) Gaming is more popular than its ever been, more and more people play games and there are more ways than ever to monetize games. Its only natural revenue would increase. Then why do we get good studios shutting down left and right. Why is it that one game can result in a studio getting shut down or restructured? Thats bad risk management.
EA doesnt want 10 games making them $10 million each, they want 1 game making $100 million plus and will kill any project they dont see providing those kinds of returns.
3) When a game looks worse and has less content than its 6 year old predecessor while costing the same $60 you bet I'll call them out. I hope you didn't have to dig too far through my post history for that.
I find it strange that people seem to think that corporations are some kind of social welfare scheme.
These people have skills, they can seek other jobs with other companies. Does it suck? Yes, but that is capitalism.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
I'm saying it's a multitude of factors that led to higher dev costs. It's just evil men in suits, it's not overly ambitious devs, it's not a community that constantly wants more, it's a combination of several factors.
It's more just disappointment from me, but after closing a fan favourite studio and add to that the reasoning coming across like it was because they can't add enough MTs to it, I guess it's just the tipping point for some, who were already disappointed with EA's offerings so far.
I think when EA starts to shows off more of their Star Wars games, it'll quickly calm down, but this kinda just really sucks at the moment. I was really looking forward to seeing how Hennig's and Visceral's Star Wars game turned out.
A lovely thing to tell the fired developers.
It also ignores the history of EA shuttering studios for doing what EA told them to do and that not working out. Of course, the employee always gets fired, while the executive who told them to do it remains in place
Does it suck? Yes, but that's capitalism.
DriftingSpirit
Member
A shame.
Sorry, this doesn't really have any impact on your point, but just want to clarify: The Devil's Cartel had little to do with Visceral. It was developed my Visceral Montreal, who were formerly EA Montreal (the series developers) and renamed between the release of The 40th Day and The Devil's Cartel. Visceral Montreal was closed after TDC went gold but before the game released. The two studios only shared a name, and the Montreal studio was likely only given the Visceral moniker so people would associate it with the Redwood Shores studio, similar to how they renamed Victory Games to BioWare Victory around the same time.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
I mean same, yea it's disappointing, but only the game in it's current form is cancelled, holding my breath to see what the retooling of it is.
At the moment I can scarcely blame folks if they feel like there aren't any more EA Star Wars games to see. I know Respawn's working on one; I know this one technically still exists in the sense that a Star Wars game will get released out of it one way or another. But with zilch to go on in either project until further notice, it feels like a ghost town to people like me who heard "Amy Hennig" and "Star Wars" in the same sentence and jumped for joy.
Meh.
I'll keep an eye out on those other games for sure. Hopefully something decent comes of it. For now however I went from two must-have upcoming titles (this + Dragon Age 4) to 0.5 (this is gone and DA4 has me very worried in light of recent events).
privitsan02
Member
Just kill off Criterion already then. It's like they are keeping that studio around for name and Star Wars driving only.
Hopefully these guys settle at EA VC or move towards greener pastures.
Best wishes.
Hopefully these guys settle at EA VC or move towards greener pastures.
Best wishes.
Dr. Kitty Muffins
Member
I want linear. I'm sick of everything being open world. Screw their surveys and focus tests.
That's kinda were I am at, at the moment too. Hope is with all the work DICE, Visceral and all the other studio have already done we start seeing a lot more of EA's Star Wars stuff now too.
But first with 1313 and now this, my Uncharted Star Wars is never going to happen and if it somehow does, it'll always be a "but what could've been?" thing now.
Oh, I agree completely. EA haven't handled it well at all imo, saying too little and showing fuck all is a good way to make people not really know what's happening or what to expect. Cancelling other doesn't help either.
Bolivar687
Banned
I was really looking forward to Hennig's game, a "broader" experience from an unnamed Vancouver studio retooling the core elements doesn't sound so great. I know she reportedly had issues managing her previous project but EA has squandered so many great IPs in recent years, it's hard for this not to reflect poorly on the publisher. Their statement is trying to position this as a smart, reactive pivot but it unintentionally comes across as grim tidings for the future of blockbuster single player games.
Doest it really though? ME: Andromeda, #NotMyBioware
Plague Doctor
Member
Fuck... I was so psyched to see the game Amy Hennig was putting together. .
I have lost most hope for AAA games in the years to come if they are rejecting games in favor of market trends will be Open World Lootbox MP "me too!" games.
I have lost most hope for AAA games in the years to come if they are rejecting games in favor of market trends will be Open World Lootbox MP "me too!" games.
privitsan02
Member
To be fair, that was a brand new Bioware studio in Montreal and their first major project was a huge test. That's like buying a relatively popular football club and buying a bunch of decent to great players and hoping to throw enough money at the problems for it to go away.
Sometimes it works, like what Sony were able to do by transforming Guerilla Games similar to Chelsea in the Premier League.
Other times it fails real hard like Bioware Montreal and Queens Park Rangers.
Best wishes.
Knuckle Sandwich
Member
Damn that fucking sucks. Amy Hennig can't catch a break. :-\
Spyder_Monkey
Banned
"You just lost your job to a shitty corporation and you're going to have to find a new job in an insanely competitive industry that might not be guaranteed because you're old studio closed for no reason, but hey that's capitalism. And I know that's no excuse but I think corporations are my friend."
Just read this article at Waypoint: Today's Star Wars News Makes the Future of Single-Player Look Very Messy . Very good article by Klepek's.
The article points out a great example of why the industry is not willing to pay for AAA SP experiences.
From the article:
The article points out a great example of why the industry is not willing to pay for AAA SP experiences.
From the article:
more at the link at the top.
hydragonwarrior
Member
And fourth type (and sadly most common): "Don't care unless it's steam sale...Ah fuck it, I'll just pirate it."
The reality being there's lots of low income or frugal gamers out there worldwide which more than likely hurt their bottom line the most.
Audioboxer
Member
Didn't they largely put the ME3 MP team on Andromeda? That didn't particularly work well. I don't think it's too respectful when people start up the A team and B team posts. Such as with From Software. Sometimes though you really are putting your B team on your flagship IP. Too many previous ME SP writers and staff were missing and it showed. I think some of them actually left Bioware though which didn't help. Still it was up to Bioware to try and fill talents shoes that moved on.
It really is worrying it's probably down to Anthem or Bioware might be next to go. The legacy of that studio deserves better.
Obliterator
Member
Yeah I can't imagine that looks great on her resume.
I mean she's super talented and has Uncharted in her past so that certainly helps, but being removed from two AAA games back to back with both being massively overhauled in a total different direction than she intended for them will raise questions
Jeff Freecss
Member
Bethesda is the only multiplatform publisher pushing pure single player experience now. And most of their games are critical acclaimed, they flop hard in recent year. If I am EA, I'll be worry about the Star Wars game, too.
Gamer gotta put the money where their mouth is or accept that Destiny style Season pass or lootboxes future.
It's okay for an industry to have a Blade Runner 2049 once a while but we can't have it all the time or the industry will have to change to adapt.
Gamer gotta put the money where their mouth is or accept that Destiny style Season pass or lootboxes future.
It's okay for an industry to have a Blade Runner 2049 once a while but we can't have it all the time or the industry will have to change to adapt.
And yet the best selling PS4 games are Uncharted 4 and Horizon.
I almost feel like they're flukes, diamonds in the rough.
And, yes, I know Uncharted has a multiplayer mode too (at least I think it does. Never actually checked when I played it...)
Spyder_Monkey
Banned
You honestly think a Star Wars game would flop?
Why? Do you feel they lack something?
did Battlefront (1) flopped? I really don't know.
Sword Of Doom
Member
Yup. Thats what pivot means. Lots of checklists full of tedious and mundane tasks ensuring players will want to come back to and enjoy
CrichtonKicks
Member
Number of Amy Hennig Games:
2001-2011: 7
2011-2021: 0 (Possibly)
Given extreme dev times its very likely we won't see another project from her for 3-4 years unless she joins a game already well in progress.
Druckmann pulling the strings, of course.
Thing was selling like hot fire.
The opposite. They fully satisfied. And I was happy for a satisfying, single-player, content-rich adventure without most of the fluff and fat AAA games get saddled with.
But they're getting more rare by the year.
privitsan02
Member
I agree. In fact, EA had the kahunas to sacrifice one of the biggest IPs of last generation for the sake of getting in on that Destiny action with their flagship Action RPG developer known for their storytelling, world building and characters. These guys are now funneling down the same path as Bungie. Mass Effect was one of the biggest IPs of last generation alongside Uncharted and Assassin's Creed.
That says a lot. Not just about EA's strategy but the gaming industry as a whole. That's like if Sony tasked Naughty Dog to rush and release a broken mess of an Uncharted 4 so they can get started on a GaaS title.
EA are showing that all they care about right about are GaaS, mobile, EA Sports and microtransactions because that's where the money is. They have never been privy of playing the market, as popularly shown during 2013 when they backed Microsoft extremely hard to banning used games, which blew up in their faces.
Best wishes.
CrichtonKicks
Member
I was already nervous last week with Mark Laidlaw leaving Bioware but this news makes me think that they are truly going all-in on Anthem and we may not see anything else from them for a long, long time.
It's sold at least 14 million copies. Seen people saying it's as high as 16 million though.
http://uk.ign.com/articles/2016/05/10/star-wars-battlefront-sales-top-14-million
Ohhh +1. I'm with you man. But they are Diamonds alright. Maybe the last of them.
Sometimes I think that going full Nintendo and buying the Switch will be the solution to this MP/GaaS madness, but who I'm kidding?
WHATTT??? so if a Half ass game can make that much only because it has Star Wars in its name something else happened at Visceral's. Because Star Wars is all the rage right now. I think the only game that underperformed by numbers was the Force Unleashed 2?
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