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The best was back in the day when there weren't separated dev environments for downloadable games, so you could just download any Big Console Live Arcade game with Monopoly money and play the living poo poo out of it in the office while you were there till 7am in case QA found a must fix in the build you got them at midnight that had to be on the west coast by noon if you wanted jobs next month
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Aug 28, 2021 09:50
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more falafel please posted:The best was back in the day when there weren't separated dev environments for downloadable games, so you could just download any Big Console Live Arcade game with Monopoly money and play the living poo poo out of it in the office while you were there till 7am in case QA found a must fix in the build you got them at midnight that had to be on the west coast by noon if you wanted jobs next month 
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Aug 28, 2021 10:01
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:I can't really fathom why the Big Console A devkit is like that, it looks like a prop from some Star Trek episode. So did the previous generation one, but at least that one had a reasonable shape. But my "favorite" in terms of things like cooling is Last-Gen Console C, which if you've ever encountered it, will recognize as a big boxy brown monstrosity made out of the cheapest folded metal available, with ports and lights on the front like it came straight out of the 60s, and a fan so loud you have to turn the whole thing off between test runs lest the noise drive you insane. Since I'm not a cool kid anymore I can't tell what you're referring to but surely it's not as bad as the PS3 CEB-2000? https://www.retroreversing.com/official-playStation3-devkit We used to surround that thing with Studio grade egg-shell sound proofing it was so loud.
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Aug 29, 2021 00:21
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Hughlander posted:Since I'm not a cool kid anymore I can't tell what you're referring to but surely it's not as bad as the PS3 CEB-2000? https://www.retroreversing.com/official-playStation3-devkit We used to surround that thing with Studio grade egg-shell sound proofing it was so loud. Everything I've heard leads me to believe that one is worse, but I never had a chance to work personally with it.
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Aug 29, 2021 09:10
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thebardyspoon posted:Out of curiosity, are there rules about those dev kits not being allowed at employees homes and stuff? That went out the window with covid. It went from “leads/need to have people only” to “please come pick up your workstation and devkit to take home” which seemed to happen overnight. There were a few odd edge cases with some people with room mates and such … security issues but it was dealt with. [Meaning planning ahead, eg, putting physical locks on devkits, asking the employee to keep it in a locked room, etc] Some places tried doing remote play or vpn access to kits but that suuuuucked. A lot of studios didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with that. There’s still issues with wfh devkits… mostly do you ship one to a junior/new employee? Who may quit and sell the unit and go gently caress it? It depends … Big K of Justice fucked around with this message at 02:27 on Aug 31, 2021 |
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Aug 29, 2021 13:05
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Hughlander posted:Since I'm not a cool kid anymore I can't tell what you're referring to but surely it's not as bad as the PS3 CEB-2000? https://www.retroreversing.com/official-playStation3-devkit We used to surround that thing with Studio grade egg-shell sound proofing it was so loud. That's the one I was talking about rack-mounting. I miss the foot pedal though.
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Aug 29, 2021 18:00
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Big K of Justice posted:
Not ominous at all. noooo.
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Aug 29, 2021 18:47
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Big K of Justice posted:There’s still issues with wfh devkits… mostly do you ship one to a junior/new employee? Who may quit and sell the unit and go gently caress it? It depends …
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Aug 29, 2021 23:29
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Big K of Justice posted:There’s still issues with wfh devkits… mostly do you ship one to a junior/new employee? Who may quit and sell the unit and go gently caress it? It depends … A PS5 devkit did show up on eBay pretty recently, so something like that may have happened https://www.playstationlifestyle.net/2021/08/06/ps5-dev-kit-ebay/
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Aug 29, 2021 23:35
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Big K of Justice posted:There’s still issues with wfh devkits… mostly do you ship one to a junior/new employee? Who may quit and sell the unit and go gently caress it? It depends … I'd assume the first party would go to the police / FBI and come down on the person like the fist of an angry god? All sorts of things about Industrial Espionage and Trade Secrets...
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Aug 30, 2021 03:06
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what are they so paranoid about, someone using the ability to run unsigned code to break copy protection?
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Aug 30, 2021 03:21
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Hughlander posted:I'd assume the first party would go to the police / FBI and come down on the person like the fist of an angry god? All sorts of things about Industrial Espionage and Trade Secrets... Don't forget theft. Pretty sure the kits are still owned by first party and licensed for use?
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Aug 30, 2021 13:10
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It's pretty amazing watching game studios try to come to terms with levels.fyi being accurate for comp.  No, I'm not surprised I'm the fifth person you've talked to that doesn't want to take a role for 30-40% of current comp.
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Sep 1, 2021 18:45
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Share salary numbers all day erryday
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Sep 2, 2021 01:14
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Hi! I have several stupid questions and what better place to ask stupid questions than the Something Awful forums! So UE4... I saw some videos online that show it has a "blueprint" programming system for dummies who can't code that is drag and drop. Since what I'm wanting to make in concept is fairly simplistic (simple arcade style action FPS, boomer shooter sort of poo poo) I imagine this would be an easy way for someone like me to quickly work up an optimal primary gameplay loop to build a game around. However once this basic build is laid out is it possible then go in and fine tune the code to exact specifications? I know UE4 is base C++ but I'm old and can barely program in BASIC, and I want to see my concepts come to life. Also I have some questions about UE4s renderer. Is it possible to have certain lines between vertices on a model be assigned a neon like glow rather than trying to use a shader through UV mapping without making the entire model a wireframe? I've seen some games do similar stuff with models but it would really help with the aesthetic I have chosen for this concept. If it is possible is it easy to do or require a ton of programming and code execution that would complicate things? I do want to make sure this game is highly optimized so people with lower end PCs can play it. That's all I have for now but throughout the process I'm sure I'll have more stupid questions as I journey towards my goal of having Yahtzee Croshaw call me a bell end on Zero Punctuation. Thanks in advance!
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Sep 18, 2021 00:06
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Skunkrocker posted:
Answering the first question, Epic provides an FPS template as a starting point you can play around balancing stuff to achieve a more arcade game feel. Its in Epic>Unreal Engine> Learn > scrooooll at the bottom to find "Shooter Game" , it is also documented in this link (the core of it is in C++ unfortunately but Blueprints and cpp code are meant to coexist) : https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/Resources/SampleGames/ShooterGame/ Otherwise you can create a Blueprint only fps project with starter content and play around to achieve your loop: https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/Resources/Templates/FirstPerson/
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Sep 30, 2021 09:47
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more falafel please posted:The best was back in the day when there weren't separated dev environments for downloadable games, so you could just download any Big Console Live Arcade game with Monopoly money and play the living poo poo out of it in the office while you were there till 7am in case QA found a must fix in the build you got them at midnight that had to be on the west coast by noon if you wanted jobs next month Think we eventually got an email sent around to the entire studio that basically said "Don't go downloading and playing any non-EA titles you see on the XBLA store"
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Sep 30, 2021 12:18
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I remember people saying that PartnerNet was the leakiest sieve ever.
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Sep 30, 2021 12:39
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real_scud posted:God I remember abusing the hell out of that with Trials HD on XBLA back when I was working on Tiger 11 or 12. We played it so much and all got so goddamned good at it before it came out. Trials HD practically shut down Midway Chicago for at least a week. N+ was the other big one.
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Sep 30, 2021 16:11
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more falafel please posted:Trials HD practically shut down Midway Chicago for at least a week. N+ was the other big one. That's awesome to hear. My cousin and his long time partner are the two devs behind N/N+/N++. It wouldn't surprise me if a few people in this thread knew them personally.
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Oct 1, 2021 01:47
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VelociBacon posted:That's awesome to hear. My cousin and his long time partner are the two devs behind N/N+/N++. It wouldn't surprise me if a few people in this thread knew them personally. I haven't met them in person, but I saw them give a talk at GDC a few years back. I've played the poo poo out of all three of their games, it's the one "technical" platformer I keep coming back to because it just feels very good.
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Oct 1, 2021 07:05
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I played the absolute poo poo out of N, and later N++ when it came to Steam.
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Oct 1, 2021 07:27
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I saw something on their twitter saying only 19 people have 'finished' N++ which seems crazy for a game everyone seems to know.
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Oct 1, 2021 07:35
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VelociBacon posted:I saw something on their twitter saying only 19 people have 'finished' N++ which seems crazy for a game everyone seems to know. I believe it.
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Oct 1, 2021 21:56
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VelociBacon posted:I saw something on their twitter saying only 19 people have 'finished' N++ which seems crazy for a game everyone seems to know. I would love a GDQ TAS run of this. It would be insane.
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Oct 3, 2021 02:20
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Hi not sure we're still taking applications but feel free to add me to the Answerers section if y'all want. I'm an Esports Product Manager which means I design and lead esports and competitive influencer/creator programs and have worked for some industry big dawgs (i.e. Blizzard) and touched on a whole lot of stuff. As a product lead I also work a LOT with game design teams and marketing teams and variously contribute to/am privy to decision-making by those teams as well. I don't know if anyone cares but I can try to answer questions on:
I don't have time to trawl through 69 pages of previous questions but I'll try to keep reasonable tabs on this thread going forward in case anyone finds these things interesting.
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Oct 12, 2021 17:28
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I Love You! posted:Hi not sure we're still taking applications but feel free to add me to the Answerers section if y'all want. I'm an Esports Product Manager which means I design and lead esports and competitive influencer/creator programs and have worked for some industry big dawgs (i.e. Blizzard) and touched on a whole lot of stuff. As a product lead I also work a LOT with game design teams and marketing teams and variously contribute to/am privy to decision-making by those teams as well. Do you feel eSports have hurt or helped smaller studios who may feel a need now to make their game into a competitive platform to appease producers/publishers?
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Oct 12, 2021 17:48
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VelociBacon posted:Do you feel eSports have hurt or helped smaller studios who may feel a need now to make their game into a competitive platform to appease producers/publishers? The first wave or two of esports definitely encouraged a lot of small studios to over-index with no real path to success. There was a huge misunderstanding in the industry as to the value of formalized esports - primarily it is useful at prolonging the life and health of an already-successful or highly-visible game, as artificial esports programs have not been particularly successful at bringing in new users in my experience. I think you saw a lot of this from 2005-2015 or so as small studios spent a fortune on esports assuming the path to success was Game => Esports => Audience rather than Game => Audience => Esports. That said, several mid-sized studios have done esports well over the years - in these cases, it's largely a matter of understanding scope and audience and using esports to encourage longevity rather than making a splash. Modesty and organic growth is typically the key here and while you might not really hear about these communities if you're not into the games, that's fine and not really their goal anyway. The successful smaller esports programs are ones you probably don't know about. The current trend in "esports" to focus more on content creators/influencers rather than "pro esports", however, is really beneficial for a lot of small studios who understand how to play and live in that space. Making personal connections with your community and building participatory programs is a lot cheaper and, frankly, pulls in better day-to-day viewership than complex and expensive esports programs, and many of the small-medium studios have figured out how to do this much better than most of the big orgs. This trend has helped smaller studios who understand the space and make good games immensely, and is just a whole lot cheaper and more controllable than previous trends. I Love You! fucked around with this message at 04:04 on Oct 13, 2021 |
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Oct 12, 2021 19:04
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I Love You! posted:The first wave or two of esports definitely encouraged a lot of small studios to over-index with no real path to success. There was a huge misunderstanding in the industry as to the value of formalized esports - primarily it is useful at prolonging the life and health of an already-successful or highly-visible game, as artificial esports programs have not been particularly successful at bringing in new users in my experience. I think you saw a lot of this from 2005-2015 or so as small studios spent a fortune on esports assuming the path to success was Game => Esports => Audience rather than Game => Audience => Esports. what's your opinion on farm simulator somehow getting series of esports competitions, because wtf
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Oct 16, 2021 22:23
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Tunicate posted:what's your opinion on farm simulator somehow getting series of esports competitions, because wtf In addition to being unequivocally awesome I'm guessing they keep costs WAY down by the ease of sponsorships and brand integrations. I have no idea what their metrics of success are but I'm guessing viewership isn't super critical so much as sustained hardcore player/fan interest and good overall publicity for their regular releases. I love that there are farm simulator esports. Basically the more niche an esport is the happier it makes me
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Oct 17, 2021 04:05
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How do games get included in things like Game Pass or the EGS free offerings these days? I assume back in the day it was mostly a mix of connections and companies finding interesting games at conventions. With covid, is it basically all just connections now? I'm working on a game that I think has good potential (of course I think that, I made it!), and of course it'd be nice to add some financial surety to the development process, but I've no idea how I'd go about shopping it around.
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Oct 28, 2021 17:29
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We just put Legend of Grimrock games on EGS. You can submit the game using a form found somewhere on their site and, if they’re interested, they’ll email you back and you can then use the opportunity to discuss the option of getting distributed as a free game. Your game needs to have some serious clout in order to qualify though since there’s a lot of takers. You’re in direct competition with AAA games from a few years back and indie mega hits. My gut feeling is that if you’re aiming for a freebie deal you first need to build some hype: it’s a marketing tool for their store and I wager they are looking for well known names rather than undiscovered gems.
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Oct 28, 2021 17:52
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Thanks, that makes sense. I'd definitely have to figure out some angle to convince them that my game would be good optics for them. I have strong user-generated content (custom warships) and a lot of modding potential which could make the game "sticky" if the mod scene takes off. There's also plenty of scope for DLC if the game does well -- mission packs, mostly, but also new gameplay modes like submarines or aircraft carriers. But I'd hazard that there's still a fair number of games that can make that kind of claim.
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Oct 28, 2021 19:29
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A lot of this is connections through publishers. GP has a lot of devolver, humble, no more robots, etc etc. The benefit is working with known people on both sides and establishing relationships. Not saying don't take a shot, of course, and I definitely believe that if I were starting ground up with a game right now I'd be shooting for Game Pass to get a wide exposure.
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Oct 29, 2021 05:05
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I've avoided seeking out a publisher mostly because I'm financially able to get this game through to the end on my own, and I preferred the independence. But it's definitely true that if I were a large company and this solo indie dev came to me saying "look, I'm making a game, don't you want to buy it?" I'd be wondering if this guy was really able to deliver. I have no track record in games, after all. Having a publisher on my side that was willing to say "yeah, this guy can deliver" would carry a lot of weight. Mhhh...the message I've consistently gotten from other devs is "if you can make do without a publisher, they're not worth it". I always just took that as gospel, but I admit I don't really know the full extent of the tradeoffs involved in a publishing deal. Obviously they have to get their money, which means that less of the actual sales money goes to me. Whether they can increase my sales enough to make that a worthwhile trade for everyone involved is...just, really hard for me to judge.
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Oct 30, 2021 03:53
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I've avoided seeking out a publisher mostly because I'm financially able to get this game through to the end on my own, and I preferred the independence. But it's definitely true that if I were a large company and this solo indie dev came to me saying "look, I'm making a game, don't you want to buy it?" I'd be wondering if this guy was really able to deliver. I have no track record in games, after all. Having a publisher on my side that was willing to say "yeah, this guy can deliver" would carry a lot of weight. I can't comment on whether or not a publisher is better or worse for your specific case, but your other option for hype or connections is hiring a PR agency to make noise about your game. It costs money, so depending on how "able" you mean by financially able it could be out of your budget, but here's my quick and dirty cheat sheet to using PR agencies in the indie world:
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Oct 30, 2021 05:02
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:
I don't agree with this if you want to put your game on console. Caveat: I work for a publisher. It's an immense amount of work to get through the cert process, manage your store fronts, QA your title, etc for console, as well as localization. On steam you don't need the same support. A -good- publishing deal includes all of that and the PR and showcasing (a 15 second spot at E3, an indie showcase, etc). How do you get noticed that way? Sorry I really don't know. A good number of indie devs do put their games out on Steam and partner with a publisher to do console releases. Very notable ones will partner with Xbox or Sony themselves and offer some exclusivity, but that's not mandated. I *think* Xbox requires simultaneous release, and I've heard working with them (ID@Xbox) isn't a rough experience both online and by some folks here who have gone through that process whose names I don't recall. That doesn't mean just get any publisher though, which is an immediate burden of work on you. The reality is if you want to go that way, it pays to have someone doing bus dev for you, either full or part time. Someone who can manage contracts and establish relationships. I'm not saying you need that, but if you want to go onto console and position well to grow as a company, it's probably a worthy investment.
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Oct 30, 2021 05:30
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I guess this would be the place for this question: What's stopping game companies from releasing large packs of the entire franchise from their long-running IPs? Konami's kind of been doing that with Castlevania recently, but as separate incomplete packs. SNK also did one with all the Samurai Shodown games, but I'm surprised we haven't seen something like a full Zelda or Mario pack from Nintendo, or every Final Fantasy game in one huge bundle. Is it mainly the issue of having to emulate various different console games? Or is it more of a rights issue with red tape from publishers?
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Oct 30, 2021 05:58
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sticklefifer posted:I guess this would be the place for this question: What's stopping game companies from releasing large packs of the entire franchise from their long-running IPs? Konami's kind of been doing that with Castlevania recently, but as separate incomplete packs. SNK also did one with all the Samurai Shodown games, but I'm surprised we haven't seen something like a full Zelda or Mario pack from Nintendo, or every Final Fantasy game in one huge bundle. Is it mainly the issue of having to emulate various different console games? Or is it more of a rights issue with red tape from publishers?
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Oct 30, 2021 10:17
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sticklefifer posted:I guess this would be the place for this question: What's stopping game companies from releasing large packs of the entire franchise from their long-running IPs? Konami's kind of been doing that with Castlevania recently, but as separate incomplete packs. SNK also did one with all the Samurai Shodown games, but I'm surprised we haven't seen something like a full Zelda or Mario pack from Nintendo, or every Final Fantasy game in one huge bundle. Is it mainly the issue of having to emulate various different console games? Or is it more of a rights issue with red tape from publishers? Why release like the first 10 Final Fantasies for $60 when I can release them each for $10-60 dollars each? Developers/Publishers would need to answer a bunch of questions regarding the cost of porting and the popularity of the original game(s), before deciding whether or not they belong in a pack or as individual sales. Final Fantasies in my mind will have very few bundles. Like, I would assume that no Final Fantasy from 6 on would ever be a part of a bundle, unless maybe it's X and X-2, XIII and its sequels, or the first couple Final Fantasies. The individual entries in the series are too popular and will sell at a higher pricepoint without other titles propping them up. Similarly, individual Castlevanias are probably much weaker on their own, but getting a few together for a pack is an easy way to have a higher price point that customers will buy.
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Oct 30, 2021 10:21
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