Games Industry Slump Related to Shoddy Games, Not Economy?

17Feb09

The New Enthusiast featured a very insightful article today, talking about the reason behind the recent slew of lay-offs in the games industry. The skinny of it is that developers are pushing production budgets sky high, and whilst sales are increasing it just isn’t covering the costs so well any more.
I agree with most of [...]

Filed under: Game Design, Industry   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Fantastic Contraption, Portal, The New Enthusiast, World of Warcraft, WoW

There have been way too many people let go recently…

06Feb09

To those who lost your jobs recently, you have my sympathy. I am currently feeling quite glad of my move outside of the games industry, and have postponed my desire to get back into games for the immediate future.
I can’t help feeling that many developers really need a wake up call. This is not the [...]

Filed under: Industry   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Layoffs, MMO, Mythic, NCSoft, THQ, Warhammer, World of Warcraft

Scott Jennings’ MMO news headlines, and Paul Barnett doesn’t play MMOs?

18Sep08

In his latest blog post Scott Jennings goes over all the recent tidbits from the MMO world.

Wrath of the Lich King release date now official
Blizzard Releases some impressive numbers in a stockholder/analyst call
Age of Conan PvP updates
More on Age of Conan’s recent leadership change
Warhammer Online release
Paul Barnett on why WAR is better than WoW
Paul Barnett [...]

Filed under: Game Design, Industry   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Age of Conan, Broken Toys, Paul Barnett, Scott Jennings, Warhammer, World of Warcraft, WoW

Has World of Warcraft reached its peak?

12Sep08

This article was put up on DailyGame a couple of days ago, giving an interesting insight into the rate at which Word of Warcraft has grown over the past three years.

Filed under: Industry   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: DailyGame, Subscriptions, World of Warcraft

WAR vs WoW

11Sep08

The infamous Mr Barnett tackles that burning question on everyones mind: What makes WAR better than WoW? More to the point, he manages to do it without prancing around on a stage in sunglasses and silly shoes.
Thanks to Amber Night for pointing this out. I sure as hell would never have found it on myspace.

Filed under: Industry   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Amber Night, Barnett, Warhammer, World of Warcraft, WoW

Visual Recognition Pt.2

11Sep08

The recent release of Spore reminded me of the original very interesting demonstration by Will Wright at the GDC three years ago.
The core of his talk was about ownership, something which I think is vastly underplayed in most games. The ability to make your character your own, make it unique and recognizable, and play the [...]

Filed under: Game Design   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Epic Gear, Visual Recognition, World of Warcraft, WoW

My Gaming Background

10Sep08

My gaming background is pretty mixed. I started taking it seriously with the Sega Megadrive RPG titles such as Shining in the Darkness and Sword of Vermillion. Later came isometric PC RPGs like Baldur’s Gate and Planescape Torment. Some of these games remain favorites to this day.
However, my whole fascination for storyline and depth was [...]

Filed under: Personal   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Baldur's Gate, Dark of Camelot, Game Design, Guild Wars, Planescape Torment, Shining in the Darkness, Sword of Vermillion, Warhammer, World of Warcraft