Unity’s new “per-install” pricing enrages the game development community | Fees of up to $0.20 per install threaten to upend large chunks of the industry.::Fees of up to $0.20 per install threaten to upend large chunks of the industry.
The problem with patron model is that most people don’t want to pay for something they might get some time in the future. We have tried things like gofundme and it generally has been a disappointment. Patron models works for some things, like I might pay for an entertaining content creator to keep making content, at least if the stuff isn’t also available for free, but games are not like that. It’s generally considered stupid to pay in advance for games and seeing how expensive making big games is it would require millions of people being stupid per game.
In the end the patron model in game development would mean mostly big well established companies could make money. Who would pay for an unknown new company with no well established track record? Investors wouldn’t because there would be no return later. Only idiot users would.
I hope users see a difference between preordering the lastest AAA studio’s game and donating to a community developed game {e.g. a multiplayer RPG like Veloren }. I’m an idiot who has donated a couple of times :)
As an amature game dev I have no expectation that I will get paid enough to live off. Even if I did that wouldn’t prove to others that it can be the norm. I find this preferable to joining the games industry as it is now.
Nickel and diming, dark patterns, gambling to children, rootkit anti-cheat, tying games to consoles, attacking emulation of no longer sold games, shutdown servers required to play the game you paid for. The design is very different from the coin-operated arcades days. I want to make games that repect users’ software freedom and for now I bet on users learning to value their software freedom too.
Yeah… “community developed game” very rarely turns out well. Especially if they attempt something resembling AAA content. Perpentual alpha state is the most common outcome. And when they work they typically just recreate some existing game with little creativity in terms of IP. Maybe Veloren will be the exception but nothing they show is in any way special. It seems they have already rewritten the engine entirely once. Edit: and of course it looks a lot like cubeworld and minecraft.
It’s not really difficult to create some graphics content and moving characters on some engine engine, but that’s like 5% of what it takes to make a good game. Communities are very good at the former but not so good at the remaining 95%.
I want to make games that repect users’ software freedom and for now I bet on users learning to value their software freedom too.
Users generally want games that are fun to play and that actually work. Software freedom is very very much secondary even among those who even know what it means.
Could it be said many game companies attempts end in alpha but communities’ failures are just more transparent? A lot of games are clones of others games with just some differences? I feel the desire to create something new but don’t mind creating clones if that can work.
I’ve focused a lot on implementation but if you’re right then I think I aught to learn more about game design. It has been fun to think about designing gameplay in the past but I’ve never studied the basics.
I’ve recreated a game myself as I’d outgrown what I wrote (and rewrote it in an incompatible updated language). It’s just “connect the dots” game as a few learning experiences but I will be posting the first alpha release soon, and hopefully isn’t much after that (if one was harsh it’s basically an asset flipper).
