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How Close Can Indies Get To AAA Games?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Assembler-Maze, May 1, 2017.

  1. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    I have only played Ghost Recon Wildlands of these (Dont have time to play games anymore). And its soooo much dumb downed from the early Ghost recon and Rainbow six games.

    edit: Have not played Battlefront 2 but I did play Battlefront 1 and it was way dumbed down compared to Battlefield 1942 BF2 and even BF3
     
  2. EternalAmbiguity

    EternalAmbiguity

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    If you look above (both your post and this one) you'll see that I'm arguing much the same thing as you, than AAA is pretty much objectively better than indie in almost every way.

    My point about how the tools are used is completely independent of the indie-AAA "debate." And a few very powerful tools I know of include TerrainComposer (which can do most of the things you mention in the beginning, though it requires a bit of setup), Archimatix, and soon some procedural roadbuilding asset I've forgotten the name of. Plus maybe (I'm not sure) Vegetation Studio. In addition to Houdini for...materials/textures? (never used it).
     
  3. EternalAmbiguity

    EternalAmbiguity

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    I've never played the old Ghost Recon games, but I just watched this video (
    ) and while I see nothing in there that wasn't replicated in Wildlands (granted it didn't go into very much detail), it implies the "tactical" nature of Ghost Recon only really existed for two (the first and GRAW) out of like 6 titles. So I'm not sure that's an example of some modern push to dumb down the series.
     
  4. zenGarden

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    I agree there are great indie plugins and tools and triple A are at another level.
    Houdini has been the procedural tool used as the tool for creating terrain, towns, roads etc .. for Ghost Recon otherwise it has been impossible because their team was not big enough to produce such content.
    The customized Houdini and create many scripts and tools on top of it.
    Watch the detailed video if you are curious about Houdini :)

    For Horizon it's also lot of work during 5 years, they build engine, editor and tools form scratch :eek:
    And the level of their tools is high.
    Read the presentation and you'll get a glimpse of what a big studio can do , and this is just the engine , pipeline and tools.
    https://www.guerrilla-games.com/read/creating-a-tools-pipeline-for-horizon-zero-dawn
    An indie studio can't do the same work in the same time or they must become a big studio and hire hundred people.
     
  5. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    Wildlands is in third person come on now
     
  6. EternalAmbiguity

    EternalAmbiguity

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    And according to what I saw in that video, it's not even the first time. The two (maybe 3) previous PC/console releases were the same, making 3 or 4 out of 8 that way.
     
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  7. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    Ghost recon 1 was a PC game then they dumb down the sequal for console then a few years later GR Advanced warfighter came for PC and it was not as hardcore as the first but pretty ok. my point is triple A studios only make games that apeal the broad console kid market. If you want hardcore you need to go indie like Squad or our own game for that matter
     
  8. EternalAmbiguity

    EternalAmbiguity

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    My point is that "hardcore" is for console kids. As an adult with multiple obligations I'm almost continually behind on I don't have time for "hardcore" videogames. That silliness is for high school kids with nothing but time. Videogames are for enjoyment, not childish ****-measuring competitions inside a made-up world.

    See what I did there? This isn't about "console kids" or "hardcore" or anything like that, and talking like that is unbelievably petty. There are a million reasons why a person would want a more difficult or easier experience, and they have nothing to do with their age or attention span.

    Step back from the "True Gamerz" stance for a moment and realize how arbitrary the walls are.
     
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  9. neoshaman

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    I think a lot of people here got lost in their insecurities, the thread is called "how close can indie get to AAA" NOT "indie can do best than AAA".

    Handwavy argument that does not show the specifics of the rational are simply useless.

    God of war of nothing like assassin's creed origin, even AAA don't compare to each others. Also Unchartred 4 is made by a team of roughly 50, hellblade by a team of veteran roughly 15, and assassin's creed by thousand all over the globe. All these AAA games vary in scope, size, quality, gameplay, attention to details, and focus. Unchartred still has best facial animation other assassin's origin, creed still the bigger game. What about the rendering of overwatch and fortnite?

    The point being is that AAA level is itself varied, going AAA don't mean you are besting the best of the category, it just mean you are seen as the same category.
     
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  10. BIGTIMEMASTER

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    There is an indie game that came out recently called Ghost of a Tale developed by a single person. It's definitely AAA graphics, but then the maker was a AAA veteran. Still, IIRC, he did it all himself.
     
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  11. neoshaman

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    - Using unity engine (roughly 900+ person),
    - With generic assets and tools bought on the asset store and various place (increase the headcount again)
    - Slight push by the unity marketing (used as an example of the engine or asset in demo, already in the 900+ headcount)
    - Most effort goes into the specific heroes objects and final composition (1 person)
    - That is barely a programmer (more of an artist).

    Also the wildland ghost recon gdc mentionned the game was realized by core dev of roughly 14 persons, that is less than hellblade declared headcount. That does not account for marketing push and people working on the various cg trailer obviously.
     
  12. zenGarden

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    They will never be close, that's it.

    Until an indie can get hire thousand people (and it would not more be an indie team by definition) they can't compare to triple A teams work. Tools , quality, content, narrative, level design in triple A will always be miles away from what indies will make.

    Anyway it'useless and a loosing your time comparing both, anyone knows what are the differences.
    The topic would have been more constructive and better if instead of comparing , it would focus on tools, and ways indies can use to reach higher level of quality and content , for example a title like "What is the best indies can do and what tools or workflows can help them".
     
    Last edited: May 6, 2018
  13. AndersMalmgren

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    My main point was not hardcore, the point is indies are the only ones with the balls todo it, because AAA only do things that fell well with 99.9% of the population. Because of this many AAA games are bland you can really feel the safe cards they played when creating it.
     
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  14. neoshaman

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    That's the case every times you use a high end engine.

    Anyway I guess the only meaningful definition of AAA for you is size of the team, despite good result being done with a variety of team size, some AAA team are less than hundred people (unchartred).
     
  15. EternalAmbiguity

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    Ridiculous. AAAs aren't the ones creating a billion cookie cutter 2D platformers or indistinguishable RPGMaker games or dime a dozen "survival sim" games.

    I've said this before and I'll say it again: proportionally, AAA games are more diverse than indie games are.

    Ubisoft may create lots of open world games, but Far Cry plays nothing like Watch Dogs which plays nothing like Assassin's Creed which plays nothing like Rainbow Six Siege which plays nothing like GR Wildlands which plays nothing like The Crew which plays nothing like Trackmania which plays nothing like Splinter Cell which plays nothing like For Honor. And this is completely ignoring their smaller games like Grow Up, Eagle Flight, Child of Light, Orb, maybe a couple others.

    It's not even a contest. Indies are many times more derivative. Yes, you do get genuinely unique games every now and again. But in the aggregate indies play it safe far, far more than AAAs do.
     
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  16. neoshaman

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    I won't say indie are proportionally less diverse at all, even with the mountain of cookie cutter clone, if you keep tab on indie, there is more experimentation that wildly differ in genre, tone, style and gameplay than AAA, even inside tired genre. Just because you don't like pixel platformer mean they are all equivalent, there is as much difference between them there is between AAA. Also new genre don't happen in AAA generally, I can't think of anything that wasn't a simple variation (because watch dog IS a variation of the assassin's creed formula).
     
  17. BIGTIMEMASTER

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    Have you guys played Ghost of a Tale? It's as good as any AAA title I've played recently. Strong art style, polished controls, polished UI, good music... the only AAA stuff it lacks is voice acting and cinematics, but even in the best AAA blockblusters voice acting and cinematics are usualyl a major turn off for me. Unity fans should be dancing in the streets -- this is a great showpiece for the engine.
     
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  18. frosted

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    I would agree with @neoshaman - if you're really going to differentiate 3rd person action titles with a fine tooth comb it's kinda unfair to paint platformers with such a wide brush.

    That said, I think that indies do have more derivative titles, but that's just kind of the problem with the sheer volume of low end titles. More or less, anything that is inexpensive to make will get flooded with low effort clones.

    At the top end, extreme costs prevent risk taking, but at the bottom end more and more 'generic' clones flood the space.

    The fact is, the easier to clone a game, the faster clones will start flooding the market. Look at fortnite and pubg. It took under a year for Epic to shift gears and steal PUBG's thunder out of nowhere.

    Fundamentally, the battle royale genre is cheap and easy to produce - but there was also enough money to attract a fast moving AAA developer.
     
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  19. CarterG81

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    Agree strongly here. As a seasoned hardcore gamer, I pretty much exclusively play indie titles or replay ancient 90's titles (which are still more innovative feeling and unique than newer titles.)

    I will definitely consume stuff like Fallout 4 the MOMENT it came out. Day 1 obsessed. However that doesnt mean it doesnt feel dumbed down or too themepark-y compared to previous games. Doesnt mean it isnt worse IMO than Fallout 2 or even 3. Hell, I think it is improved and better in every single way to Fallout 3, but I still like it and enjoyed it way less. I cant explain why except it feels dumbed down. Fallout 2 feels the most intelligent. In 2018.

    Right now I am craving a fallout game & since all 6 are old, my instincts tell me to go play Fallout 2 or New Vegas - not Fallout 4.

    For AAA games, I like them less than Indies but still can get excited to play them at release, then get bored fast. I dont get excited for Indie games but end up enjoying them significantly more and for significantly longer.

    That sums up my feelings for Indie vs AAA and it is because of "DUMBED DOWN" in AAA. I cant explain why because I think a game like FO4 is better in every way - including gameplay - but somehow it still feels dumbed down (and thus worse) even when all evidence & inspection says it is better in every way.
     
    Last edited: May 7, 2018
  20. neoshaman

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    Fortnite won because they kept the building mechanics which created never seen gameplay before, "fast action defense building and crafting as tactical navigation" (though RUST had them long before in a lite way). But fortnite was a slow follower (6 years) to all previous old trends, it was minecraft + free to play + zombie horde + survival + AAA cartoon character + multiplayer only, which was genres in vogue when they started conception, having them to turn around and clone quickly was kinda in their DNA, but the end result of the super late kitchen sink mash up gave that huge needed "innovation", when it failed at being anything special, but pivoted one last time to catch the new trend, and then the bland mix become unique. That's luck through dedication, hats off to them lol.
    It's less of a world with realized character than the previous one, and they perfected the gameplay loop of "wandering - quest - loot", which makes it a mechanically superior game, but narratively weaker.
     
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  21. AndersMalmgren

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    Complete nonsense, all AAA coming out today are either a clone of a indie game or a sequal to a older AAA game but slightly dumbed downed.
     
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  22. adampzb

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    Seems like u didn't play it for longer. Graphic assets are absolutely top quality but code side this game is absolutely broken, things like damage tied to frame rate, fire rate tied to frame rate, double rendering while scope in (peoples saying its issue with unity but idk) this frame drops is memory leak that is there since over year and tarkov can even ate 20gb of ram if u not using memory cleaner or just restart client once per few raids. Netcode is a lot better after this patch but last year u could play games and count desync in minutes where even ai did not see u. List goes on and on but yes if u playing it first time it seems to be great game, after some time u can see major flops in basic design
     
  23. AndersMalmgren

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    Thats what happens when a game is made by artists not programmers :D
     
  24. adampzb

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    Ye, it can look like AAA but under that have to be terrible spaghetti. Anyway im kinda amazed what they achieve with unity, these big maps filled with multiple hitboxes, ton of loose items, ai and other things like real timeweather etc.
     
  25. AndersMalmgren

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    Well, AAA does not mean well structured code ;)
     
  26. McDev02

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    I think that a lot of people don't value content anymore if you see people ranting on the AssetStore that $100 for a complete level is too much. You can't demand a uniquely looking game and not spend a dime on it.

    Graphics as technology is one thing and when everyone uses the same image effects and lighting setups it looks alike.
    But aesthetics is hard work. People either don't have the experience to make art related decisions or lack the right artists to make their vision become reality.

    My view is that if you want a unique and well running game you need custom assets. If you make an RTS game then you cannot just use First person shooter models. You might find a model that is split up in 4 materials but you actually need only one. If you just ignore all that then you run into issues sooner or later.

    AAA for me includes experience and budget. You need to have at least one of these in the disciplines that make up your game. And of course your game has to fit these capabilities of yours. If you are a good programmer who has no budget for art or art skills then don’t make a game that relies on artwork. And if you are an artist then don't make an MMORPG but something like Dear Esther or Limbo.


    Some of you know Banished. It was developed by one person who was (I think) an experienced Graphics Developer. He used like 3 years to make the game and it was based on his own engine. The graphics are simple and the game mechanics are sometimes extremely limited. Not sure how it is today but for instance Units did not spawn where they were after Loading a savegame or people don’t extinguish fire if it was not their house. Not by design but because the AI was so simple. I just want to point out what one person is able to do.

    We use Unity for a reason, even if we could make our own engine it’s extremely unproductive. If you read his blog I guess at least half of the time he worked on the project was related to engine development. Simply supporting and optimizing for different graphic cards is only for people who enjoy being tortured I guess. I am just happy if my surfaceshader compiles :)
     
  27. frosted

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    That's all true. But the fact is - for them to be able to pivot into PUBG as quickly as they did (what, 6 months?) - it had to be because the hook for PUBG was relatively simple to clone.

    A game like Witcher 3, in contrast, that hook takes vast amounts of labor. Can you "clone" witcher 3? Is that even possible? Otoh, in games with relatively simple mechanical hooks, you can clone the core in fairly short time.

    I think that games that are hardest to properly clone are heavy content driven games and heavy procedurally driven games. Content requires manpower, procedural requires time in testing and refining. Mechanics driven games, the hardest part to "get right" the core mechanics - those are laid bare in game play and therefore relatively easy to copy.
     
  28. neoshaman

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    The witcher is an interesting case, It's possible to say the witcher series is derivative, it doesn't do anything new in structure, but they did it well ... because they could focus on NOT reinventing the wheel:

    1. The first witcher was indie scale production made by an inexperience team, they learned the ropes the hard way,
    2. the witcher 2 was on par with AAA production of the time following success of the first,
    3. the third became gold standard leader of AAA.

    In term of production:
    - Tried and true game mechanics
    - proven world and characters adapted from successful book series, laying strong base to build
    - Tried and true genre with zero uncertainty and proven market
    - inexperience team but low wages country, grew with the production iterations
    - incremental approach to production value
    - "Polish" culture hooks on old tropes as flavor
    - the other kind of polish on quest and stories, which mean clear focus on value (combat was never great just average at best)

    I would say it's the text book case of punching above your weight, they minimize risks by turning creativity from the big decision (no world to create, no new mechanics, realism as art direction) toward small scale creativity (the details of the world, the quest quality) with a flavored hooks (typical fantasy but through polish culture). They basically removed uncertainty to focus on core elements.
     
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  29. EternalAmbiguity

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    I still believe they're less diverse proportionally, but you definitely have a point about Watch Dogs and AC. In each case though they're using a unique hook that completely changes the way the game is played. In Watch Dogs it's manipulating the environment around you. That's something that doesn't exist at all in AC (nor in most of the other games I mentioned).

    There's a mission like 9/10ths of the way through the game where a character in the game essentially turns the city against you: constant cop searches, switching traffic lights to cause accidents, making steam pipes under the road where you're driving explode (you can also do this in one of the multiplayer modes). It was one of the most unique and incredible experiences I've ever had in a game. Nothing in AC has ever been even remotely similar to that.


    This type of generalization doesn't help anyone. I acknowledged that there is diversity and novelty in indie-land (just with the caveat that most aren't that way). To say that literally "all" of something is a particular way (especially a negative) probably means that you're not looking at this objectively.
     
  30. frosted

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    I agree with all of this generally, but I would not classify W3 as derivative, even though the mechanics and game systems were. The game's "hook" was in the environment, dialogs etc - not so much the mechanics. So even though the mechanics are derivative the real heart of the game is not.

    I could probably clone W3's core mechanical systems in a month or two, but the result would be an empty shell because the game's hook is really content and presentation driven.

    For games that have a more mechanics driven "hook" cloning the core systems presents something closer and closer to the full game experience of the cloned game.

    The hook of battle royale is: 100 players, large map, full player loot, and shooter.

    That's a relatively simple game to clone. To the extent that most games probably won't even bother - they'll just have that as a side game mode. "Call of Duty: Battle Royale" for example. The barrier to entry for Battle Royale is securing the audience more than anything else.
     
  31. AndersMalmgren

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    Well I did say coming out today, so that does not include old AAA does it ;) But ok fair, I can stretch it to MOST of todays AAA then :D
     
  32. neoshaman

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    It's a AAA medieval fantasy with dark theme, it has dragon, king, diplomatic plot, griffon, monster, sword, and a grumpy hero. It has quest, loot and dialogue box, and romance subplot with sex. It's a bioware rpg, and bioware don't have the monopoly of this either.

    Hear me out, derivative don't mean bad, it mean it's safe and follow known formula, which open production focus on making things better, not figuring things out. When you don't innovate, you got to hella add values to what's been done before.

    Witcher 3 took the formula and improve immensely on it by focusing on deeper characters and looser plot (structurally speaking I mean, the plot was still strong, but less a main driver of structure than in bioware, as in not everything is in service of the plot). Witcher 3 added so much values to old tired tropes it makes old attempt bad by retrospect, dragon age inquisition lost all the praise it had after witcher 3, and witcher 3 is basically following the pitch of the original dragon age. The question is, how do you top witcher 3? How can we make character and quest better? How do we increase the scope while keeping tight pacing? And how do we do it at the quality of production they have?

    I'll take another example of derivation vs refinement through derivation:
    - Rogue like game had permadeath which enforce survival/crafting strategy
    - minecraft has a survival mode
    - terraria has invasion cycle added to the survival formula
    - it inspired survival game like dayz who get success on the novelty of the experience undiluted by minecraft
    - it inspire the mod PUBG which focus on the p2p part of dayz, with the shrinking mechanics (inspired by a movie) to force player encounter (fixing dayz p2p interaction) and remove permanent world
    - fortnite inspired by minecraft/terraria but focus more on the horde invasion cycle, shift focus to PUBG style of battle royale, but keep the building, creating building battle gameplay and crafting navigation.

    Each games here is derivative, but they also have some innovation to set them apart. There is also increase of quality at each iteration, but each iteration is also safer. Fortnite vs PUBG don't have as much innovation than minecraft vs rogue like for example. But also it's likely that a game like terraria could only explore these new idea by going 2d before settling down the mechanics at low cost, before it could replicated at high cost.

    Thus my reasoning, if you are indie and what to tickle the AAA envy:
    - Be derivative to allow focus on detail (you need the skills)
    - find one point of weakness where you can improve from old formula
    - have a unique hooks that don't necessarily fundamentally change the formula but add flavor (horizon -> open world rpg where monster = robodino, uncharted -> tomb raider but cinematic in all aspects)
    - Improvise on what can be done, instead of what you want using the safety of the formula (facial animation is costly and result fail easily, can you replace it with alien creatures? what asset works well with automation? don't do asset that don't work with automation well!). Example in witcher 3, they remove the part of the books Ciri brings all human in another dimension, too expensive to represent in games! Now she's queen!
     
  33. frosted

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    Fundamentally, we look at this from a different perspective.

    All work is derivative, all games are always derivative. Game systems are far too difficult to design correctly to allow for non derivative work (and gamers do not like radical change). The question is, what proportion of the labor is very close or exactly a replica of previous systems and what proportion require detailed, custom design work.

    For a game like W3, vast amounts of labor went into custom design work - the characters, dialogs, environment, plotline, narrative. Relatively small amounts went into exact or near exact replica of previous work: camera, input system, inventory system, skill system, leveling system, etc.

    All games are derivative, the question is how derivative and how exact the copy and what the ratio is between very derivative and heavily custom.

    When we look at Fortnite vs PUBG, the vast majority of Fortnite is utterly derivative, and frankly the vast majority of PUBG is also heavily derivative (PUBG is just DayZ without zombies, PUBG even has it's roots in Arma modding same as DayZ).

    The hook for this game (what makes the game desirable to players, and an interesting experience) is 100 players and shrinking map. The "hook" or draw of this game is relatively straight forward to copy, which is why Epic was able to make a near exact replica in under a year (that also made improvements).

    Most of the time when people talk about derivative work, they are using a wide brush. "The AAA shooter formula". This is not what I mean, when I look at AAA shooters, I see the vast labor that goes into their encounter design, set piece battles, etc. These, like W3 are heavily driven by content very specific to that game.

    Again, how much of the work is a raw copy, and how much of the work is very specific to this one game.

    The hardest to copy is very content heavy, the easiest is mechanics. I think we agree with eachother mostly - although we are looking from different perspective.
     
  34. neoshaman

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    I think we have the same perspective, that derivation is a spectrum. The point I was making was related to topic, that is, if you want to push above your weight reduce risk by being derivative! Which is the formula for AAA games anyway, they are allow to go very far precisely because it reduce the load on tried and true and mix up flavors.

    But if we are going to nitpick, and since I'm a nerd, let's do it :p Also it's not an essential thread, more like an opinion thread anyway.

    Witcher as a video games series lift all the details from the books and polish folklore, you can't be more derivative than that, it's literally an adaptation of existing works with the known bioware formula (and even witcher 1 used the aurora engine). That's not bad, that's pretty smart!

    So let's define derivative in a way that benefit discussion about it. I would define derivative by how many iteration you have to do to figure out things?
    - It's not catching up, ie someone did it before and you are iterating to get there
    - it's not invention, because things are already figured out and you just adjust
    - it's mostly adaptation or application, you use known thing with a slight spin.

    I would even say mass effect is less derivative than witcher as a stand alone works, they had to create the universe from scratch, even though they lift huge element from various scifi series, from star wars, star trek to babylon five, complete with design copied from the spirit within, but they didn't lift it up a ready made book to adapt it, and it bit them in the ass when they couldn't figure up some aspects later in the series, creating problem. Witcher by using a proven work has only to focus on making it comes alive and not what will come next.

    And I don't mean it in a way to judge the quality of the work, but in the most practical way, that is how much work you have to do to figures things out? Which is a wall I meet multiple time, where big idea didn't work because the whole structures had hole and I have to work extra hard to filled them.

    Which ties to my main point, if you want to try above your weight, you want to reduce risk, that's a production perspective. Artist always want to do new thing, but be sure your novelty and grand vision is contain into something that is familiar and known, and that you have a fold back plan B.

    If you read the production of witcher 3, they did that, they spend a lot of time on making amazing side quest, but then they ran out of time and literally hurry out two third of the game, the thing is that they had established a bar so high "relative" to other game than even their second rate quest was better than the typical fetch quest (they use automation to help them too).

    And that ties too to something I said somewhere in the thread, the best part of your work will bleed over the lesser part and make all seems more amazing than they actually are, if the lesser part don't cross a certain threshold of low quality. Which is actually something taught in composition, take care of the focus part first, and then build everything else to support it, not overshadow it.

    The last reason why derivation is good, is that if you have a lot smaller team getting on the wind of a much bigger team, even if you don't achieve the same success, proportionally you have a much bigger ROI because the formula is laid down and you don't have to think too much. Which is the logic that marketing and production lead generally make (and why there is so much derivative commercial game). You let other innovate and if you have the resources, you put your weight to make a fast follow at a higher production values, as it will be the main differentiating issue.

    So while derivation is a spectrum, and it's hard to agree where the cut off is enough, the point is that, from a production perspective, it make sense, you have to be smart about it. And this logic will infuriate all the artist sense in you!

    This however pains me a lot as a game designer :(
    The formula hasn't change a lot since 16bit era, even AI didn't change much.
    You have the range, the rusher, teh tank, the sprayer, the thrower, the melee, all which correspond to know gameplay tropes (make the player prioritize targets, make the player move, have the player stay in cover, etc ...). That's trite and over done, it works, but rarely you have game like mgs that have some few spin put on it, if anything the huge turn over in the game industry assure we don't innovate much on combat loop at all. All you have is a series of junior who rediscover old mechanics as if it was genius graal stuff!
    The advantage of AAA is that each level is made by a junior, and he will spend a lot of time iterating on that map instead of having 10 map to make in short delay, like some junior indie who know nothing about level design. However the rare indies that tooks time (like years) or have veterans dev, have level design that actually stand out. Too bad there is more level design junior and a lack of literacy overall in the industry.
     
    Last edited: May 8, 2018
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  35. Martin_H

    Martin_H

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    Wasn't fortnite already in development for like 5 years or so, and they just slightly shifted the concept at the end? I mean it always had crafting, building, shooting, and multiplayer, didn't it? I doubt they could have cranked out a clone *from scratch* in such a short time. They already had the hardest parts solved imho.
     
  36. neoshaman

    neoshaman

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    In the realm of things that aren't comparable:
    1. a short linear focused action game, team is 14ish
    2. a long big open world game, team is hundred ish



    I'm saying if chasing 2 put you at 1 level, that's worth it.
     
    Last edited: May 8, 2018
  37. EternalAmbiguity

    EternalAmbiguity

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    Okay. I don't wanna argue. It's just that I look at my Steam queue almost every day, and I see far, far more chaff than I see in the AAA world. Even though I don't play very many AAA games, I can still see that they're very high quality, and they aren't merely relying on exploitative mechanics to keep people attached.

    I don't disagree with your overall point at all - CDPR reduced a heck of a lot of worldbuilding challenge in going with a known universe for TW, and they're doing the same for Cyberpunk - but I do want to point out that the games are set after the books, so they were creating new main plots. They didn't do a whole lot with it for the first two games, and as you say it isn't as much of a focus as it is for Bioware, but that was an area where they had to come up with something on their own. I have my own beefs with certain things TW does, but credit where credit is due.
     
  38. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    Steam have zero quality control on what they let on their store. Also if we ignore visuals and look at mechanics indies are often much more refined. We can take our own game as example, Fallout 4 and Doom have very simple VR controls, while our own game is written from the ground up for VR. They did a sloppy job because they knew they could justt live on the IP.
     
  39. sxa

    sxa

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    It didnt, actually. It lifted the larger setting and many characters etc from the books, but a very large amount of the detail, from the political situation and their progression to specifics of the characters' situations, allegiances and actions are new, and those details progress over the games especially 2 and 3. The first game is set several years after the last book.
    The whole thing about the Witcher games is that they extended past the events of the books; they follow canon, but the detail isnt lifted from the books, its new.

    They were very significantly 'what will come next'. That was their fundamental relationship to the books.
     
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  40. EternalAmbiguity

    EternalAmbiguity

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    They don't have simple controls because they're sloppy, they have simple controls because they aren't sim-type or "hardcore" games. You'd be better off comparing your game to some type of Arma VR experience. Your game isn't in the same category as either of those games (independent of the VR vector), so it doesn't even make sense to compare the way they play in any "value judgement" based way.

    It would be like me comparing your game's plot to Fallout's. Your game is going to come up woefully short (even considering how weak Fallout's is)--but that doesn't even make sense as a comparison because that's not what you're trying to do. I'm going to get a little elitist here, but I honestly have no interest in doing nothing but running around shooting things in games. That seems utterly purposeless to me, just a complete waste of time. So your game is obviously not the game for me. But does that make it "worse" than Fallout on some objective level? Of course not.

    Virtual Warfigher and Fallout have different goals--they're essentially different types of works--so it doesn't make sense to apply the same standards for determining "value" to them.
     
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  41. neoshaman

    neoshaman

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  42. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    I tried to be diplomatic towards Zenimax and used the term simple, I ment plain bad. They just slapped VR controls on a none VR game, much like AAA slaps PC controls on a gamepad game.

    edit: But I do agree with you in the points you are making even though they are wrong in this case
     
  43. Arowx

    Arowx

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    Aren't we comparing sailing boats and ocean liners here...

    Sailing Boat Crew 1-5
    Ocean Liner Crew 2000+

    Indie dev small team 1-10
    AAA dev teams 100-300

    Then factor in development time and...
    Indie dev 3-6 months a game
    AAA dev teams 2-3 years a game

    So just in dev hours your comparing...
    18,000 hours work (10 dev indie team working for 6 months on a game)
    vs
    2,250,000 hours work (300 dev AAA team working for 3 years on a game)

    That's a difference of 125x.

    Maybe we should be looking at the smallest teams/studios that produce AAA or near AAA content?

    Is No Mans Sky a AAA product? It was released onto a console and developed by a small studio, it just utilised procedural generation.

    Also does game genre/style affect team size and development times and game world size?

    Is there a trend in the industry for larger teams or smaller teams depending on game type?
     
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  44. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    A 2 man team can be more effective than a 20 man team though, it all boils down into team effectiveness, agile management, etc
     
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  45. Arowx

    Arowx

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    I agree and disagree with you on this and here why...

    A small team can work on a new idea with just a few people this helps limit the scope with enough of a creative mix to maximise the ideas potential and fully explore it. So for game design, story design, prototyping you can probably get more done with a smaller team.

    On the other hand once an idea is prototyped, fully designed, mapped out to a good level of detail then expanding the content or world size to fit the map will take a much larger team size.

    Imagine filling a 5km square world with AAA assets optimised for fun gameplay then filling that world with interesting items and characters?

    A small team or studio could probably build a great AAA house/garden up to a small town or island where a large team could build a small world/land in about the same time.

    So it depends on the scope/scale of your game, there is only so much you can do within an allotted time span and that's where larger teams can really open up the scope/scale of your game.
     
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  46. frosted

    frosted

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    Not all 20 man teams are equal though. If you look at Hellblade, no, I don't think a 2 man team can compete with that. They were 14. As @angrypenguin mentions above, some things are simply more labor intensive than others.

    The workload can really grow exponentially as higher fidelity is targeted.

    Truly top quality work requires specialist attention, top end sound, top end animation, top end art, top end code. Small agile teams can get to "good enough" - but they can't get to the real top end without specialists and the attention to detail that only comes with manhours.

    Not to mention stuff like motion cap, voice work, etc, that not only requires specialists but also generally requires coordination with facilities, scheduling, revision, etc. That kind of stuff eats up time and attention. At some point you really need an at least semi dedicated person to deal with communication and coordination.

    ... and we haven't even talked about PR ;P
     
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  47. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    You can always try to fix it with more people but in the end it's competence you want :) sadly there isn't much competence in this world so you need to fix it with numbers :)
     
  48. BIGTIMEMASTER

    BIGTIMEMASTER

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    IIRC, it was the island of Papua New Guinea that, until ~ the 1950's, was totally undiscovered by the modern world. It was literally still the stone age there, with several tribes living in a constant state of tribal warfare. After being discovered and introduced to the modern world, within a single generation those "incompetent" savages were flying airplanes.

    There is plenty of competence. As far as animals go, humans are pretty smart. Getting that highest level of competence out of a team of individuals takes a leader. It's all about motivation.
     
  49. AndersMalmgren

    AndersMalmgren

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    I only have two employees so can't really talk out of own experience, but my father was CEO over 50 people at the peak of his career and he has one thing to say about it 'Becoming a employer was the worst decision of my career' :)
     
  50. McDev02

    McDev02

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    I thought like this too a few years ago but my perspective has changed. There are people who should seek another job out there but from my view you find them rather on the producers and executives chair rather than at the programming desk. You can not compare the attitude of a small team where maybe the people in charge also do development (and are good at that).
    There also is business involved, sometimes there are wrong decisions and sometimes there are compromises. Regarding VR that can be a very subjective topic and I am not even sure what you dislike about it. I do that myself so I know how different people think about that. Some get sick very quickly and some don't. For a successful game you got to make sure it appeals for the masses at first.

    Not sure if you actually mean that but you should not judge the competence of basically all that work at Zenimax because this is how it sounds like especially if it is just about one aspect of it that was obviously added later to just earn more money and make those happy who just want to walk around in a nicely looking world. Not many VR games can compete with that.