Quote:
Originally Posted by DragonRR1
Quite honestly, imo, like everything these days it is all about money. Massive budget usually (but not always) means a fairly bug free final product. There are almost no high budget PC games anymore other than WoW and maybe The Sims. End result, PC gamers tend to get bugged games.
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That really does not have to be that way. Again, the first but not only examples are Matrix Studios, Madminute Games, or the studio that years ago did "Panzerelite". The original panzer sim of WW2 tanks was an incredibile step ahead, groundbreaking and filled with immersion, historic detail and lessons, and most importantly: carefully researched and establoished realism. And at that time the studio was completely new, very small and unknown. But they delivered something pretty much bug free "on first light".
I think they didn't earn a lot with it, but enough to cover the cost and come back a couple years later. They didn't squeeze the last cent out their customers, but they provided an added-value product as exchange for the (money and) trust of the customer. They succeeded.
A couple years later the core of the developers, that had the original idea to make an ultrarealistic (tank) sims had changed, and with it sadly the ideals and goals of the studio. I recall they had two more releases in the last 4 years or so, one being a competitor to bite of a bit of the success of Operation Flashpoint and other 1D combat simulators (Soeldners or so was the title), and that one quickly died due to its initially very buggy release. It sold badly as you could read later and see from a quick price drop, and customer reviews. Some story with SHIV, or now SHV, but that time without DRM adding a huge red sign (that shades even the lightest error in a dark red light) to the casual gamer.
The other release they had was a remake of Panzerelite -- and guess what, they tried to bias it to a wider audience of casual gamers as they, as stated in interviews that time, "realized" that gamers would "prefer more arcade like fun games". As from all I followed afterwards, their "realization" was quite off, and they did not only not enhance the customer basis but simplification of the game, graphic candy, and less sim-like feel, but they also lost their hardcore fan basis very quickly. I don't think they repeated the bug-release story that we get so often these days, and they had a notably bigger etat than for the original Panzerelite, but their "splits" failed. Thereafter, I never again heard about that studio (JoWood?).
Do you have a "déjà vu"? I guess history always repeats, and human aren't exactly learning at lot from it.