It’s doubtful how many more folks are choosing to go outdoors and enjoy life, but one thing is for certain: there’s less showing up to play new titles. Whether it be from yet another studio buyout, followed by the inevitable layoffs after the new and previous owner(s) state how excited they are about the joining of families, or yet another failed launch leading to closures, there’s a new constant in the gaming industry of consistent bad news for developers and publishers.
The most recent, and far from being the only, in the last few weeks, is that Full Circle Studio is expected to lay off staff after player counts have plummeted for EA’s latest Skate game. The live service title is one of many where gaming audiences chose to move on from after launch, and six months in, numbers (per TechPowerUp, who has a deep rabbit hole of stories pertaining to this topic) are in the 2,000s. A similar number of players are all that’s left for Wildlight Entertainment’s free-to-play title, Highguard, which only just launched in January. An ex-developer for the game has already confirmed on social media that the majority of its team had been laid off.
Meanwhile, Sony, which had just revealed more God of War projects are in development, has closed Bluepoint Games, which was rumored to be working on an online multiplayer GoW title. It has also been announced that Tencent has closed its TiMi Montreal studio, which had previously released some moderately successful mobile titles, before it could launch its first AAA game. This was preceded by the closure of Spliced, a studio which NetEase had just put together.
Just yesterday, Nacon filed for insolvency following last week’s release of Styx: Blades of Glory. Nacon has experienced mixed levels of success with its titles, which include RoboCop, Hell Is Us, GreedFall 2, and its attempt to revive the Test Drive franchise with Test Drive Unlimited. The publisher said the following in its statement (per IGN).
“The aim of this procedure is to assess all possible solutions to ensure the sustainability of the Company’s activity under the best possible conditions, protect employees, and preserve jobs, while renegotiating with its creditors in a calm and constructive framework,”
– Nacon
Ubisoft, which continues to attempt to portray some semblance that everything is okay by making multiple new game announcements, presumably to appease its investors, laid off another 40 workers last week at its Toronto studio, following 500 laid off before, as part of its current restructuring strategy that could see as much as 18% of its total staff being cut.
It’s not all doom and gloom, though, as Arc Raiders continues to maintain a high player count, showing that while audiences have abandoned some titles, they are keen to play titles they enjoy, and perhaps studios need to focus more on that detail than on a checklist, formulaic approach. Meanwhile, the upcoming online multiplayer Horizon Hunters Gathering is about to enter Beta Testing, and Bungie’s Marathon is expected to finally launch in March, so we’ll just have to wait and see how these online games fare.
Discussion (19 replies)
Join Discussion →Its may be a matter of saturation more than anything else.
And money. Start charging $70+ for new releases and people stop buying them ... imagine that.
Plus a lot of crap free-to-play live service games. Studios invest a ton of money into something nobody really wanted and big surprise, it fails to reign in the loot box/extra whatever cash cows they thought would sustain and turn a profit.
Seems to me single player rpg games are still doing well.
I almost never play games when they are new. I usually take my sweet-@ss time getting around to them. And by then there's been patches and updates and sales/price drops. I didn't like paying $50 for newly-launched games. Now they want us to pay $70 or more? Riiiiiiight, let me open up my wallet and get right on that. And while I'm at it I can bend over and spread my cheeks too. When games start getting $30 or below is when I start paying attention. My sweet spot is $20 or less. $5-$10 and you usually got a deal. That's why Nintendo sales never work out, cuz games raaaaarely go below $40, and when you see Nintendo games below $40 it's usually due to the balls of a retailer like Best Buy or Target. On other platforms games are 50% off or more within a few months to a couple years after release. I paid $30 for Doom 2016 like 3 months after release, and the year after it was on sale at FIVE F*CKING DOLLARS!!! The most I ever paid for a PS4 game was $20. All the others were $10 or less, and that's including brand-new physical copies of top Sony IP games like GoW4 and HZD. Nintendo will re-sell you old-@ss f*cking games and continue to keep the prices of those games up real dang high.
And then there's stuff like Steam Family library sharing, where I can access the games that other people in my Steam Fambly own. Or if you go DRM-free and buy on GOG, then you can just give a friend a copy of your game. I consider these options to be the digital equivalents of letting a friend or family member borrow a physical copy of a game.
Also not many developers out there still publish demos. I don't buy before I try. I've been alive and playing video games too long to deal with that bullsh1t anymore. I need to ascertain a game's value before I put money down on it. If the developers don't provide, and I don't have a friend who owns a copy I can try, then that's where the community comes through with their "community demos". And I have made quite a good number of purchases just because I was able to check out a community demo first.
Yeah like I didn't see Baldur's Gate 3 having any problems selling copies.
BG3, Harry Potter, Spiderman Games, The Horizon series (until they kill it with the trash they are making now) and so on.
Good games still sell, solution: Make good games. And make games that actually appeal to the gaming demographic, not for social media virtue points. In fact I can share a secret: The less you virtue signal the more your game will appeal to gamers.
I no longer do multiplayer games, don't have the time. and good single player games are a dime a dozen
My perception here doesn't match yours at all.
Now good single player AAA games are fun and in my mind worth the spend. (and open world racing games specifically Forza Horizon.)
Sure non AAA games are a dime a dozen for various triple A, Vampires clones... I suppose those are called roguelike? Or Diablo Like?
I'm ok with the Diablo series while it is 'multi player' it's just mostly seeing other players no requirement for hard core grouping unless it's for fun.
In going with what I covered in the post, it's the online multiplayer games which have been flopping left and right and have been for some time. For every successful one there's about a half dozen which die out of the gate, or barely survive past 2-3 months.
R U SRS? one game a year is dime a dozen? Maybe not even that.
Quoted for facts.
Space Marine 2
ARC Raiders
Battlefield 6
Elden Ring
Black Myth Wukong
BG3
Kingdom Come Deliverance 2
Helldivers 2
Stellar Blade
They all understood the assignment. All have sold well. Even with game pass sometimes in the mix.
I would debate that Helldivers, Space Marine Two, and Battlefield 6 are definitely not single player games.
Space Marine 2 - mediocre game
ARC Raiders - not single player
Battlefield 6 - not single player
Elden Ring - I'll allow this even though I hate soulslikes
Black Myth Wukong - Not made by the western gaming industry
BG3 - Indie developer
Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 - Not made by the western gaming industry
Helldivers 2 - not single player
Stellar Blade - mediocre game
Just because you think it's mediocre, or it's putout by an indie, doesn't change sales figures. Which I would say correlate fairly strongly to "appeal"
Unless you were just talking about "appeals to MadMummy76"