As the gaming industry continues to expand, there are a large number of titles that are being released every month. As a result of this expansion and the growth potential of the industry, the flow of financial investments has also increased.
As gaming companies produce titles and run behind in meeting financial figures to keep investors happy, gamers have begun to feel neglected. It is rather unfortunate given that the gaming industry almost completely relies on gamers for revenue.
Helldivers 2 succeeded because it took the risk
Recently, players started voicing their opinions about how they feel that gaming companies are so busy driving sales and generating revenue to please investors that they are losing touch with the gamers and what they want.
A user named ‘Rondine1990’ started a Reddit thread elaborating on one of the biggest issues in the gaming industry currently. “That problem is losing touch with gamers and making games for the investor board instead of the players,” they wrote.
Helldiver 2 shows a glaring problem in modern big gaming companys
byu/Rondine1990 ingaming
They cited the example of Arrowhead Studios’ recent superhit game Helldivers 2 to support their claims. They also mentioned the plight of canceled games like Halo, saying,
“Helldivers 2 is successful cause it took the risk to be special, fun and a game. While franchises that would have fit perfectly would rather not bring out a game at all, rather than taking any risk. If my information serves right, Halo shut down the idea for a similar game in the halo universe… a universe most of us love. Why? Because the board did not like the risk. Can you imagine this game would have come out with the face of starcraft? Or halo? Or starwars? Or Mass effect? Or Doom…or…”
They further emphasized that Helldivers 2 did not go through the same plight since the developer Arrowhead Studios, which is a relatively smaller studio, took the risk of making a sequel to a top-down shooter. They took the risk, and it paid off.
The user ended their post hoping that the bigger studios, who are stalling some of the gamers’ beloved IPs “hostage,” take notice of this and pay attention to what the gamers actually want.
Problem with the game companies
Similarly, another Redditor named ‘Doctor_Omega’ a couple of years ago shared a similar kind of post. The user demonstrated the problem of the gaming companies using a graph on two parameters, namely, quality and time.
It starts with the establishment of an indie developer studio, then moves to the release of an initial game developed with love and passion for gaming. The graph then moves upwards to the golden age of excellent games. It then transcends to its peak wherein these indie studios are either expanded into larger studios, or bought by the bigger gaming giants.
Once it has reached the peak where the quality is highest, the graph and quality eventually begin to drop due to pressure. This pressure could be from the new management or funding. At this stage, studios are quickly forced to develop unpassionate games.
Finally, it comes to a point where the now money-making game companies release half-finished games wherein the quality is compromised.
Given the current stance of the gaming businesses, it pretty much sums up the condition of most games and their studios. It remains to be seen if gaming companies realize this and make the right decisions keeping the interests of the gamers in mind.
