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Tag: ideas

Predictions and prizes

We are arriving at the end of 2024, and every year, we will get predictions from experts and prizes for the best games according to many different lenses.

Until now, I have seen a lot of AI in predictions, and China is the clear winner of the year. The underlying message seems to be that the industry is moving towards cheaper developments and removing the intervention of humans from simple tasks, at least.

The message is that the big-budget, high-quality human craft is not sustainable anymore, but is it? I think the main issue is greed instead. The idea is that 3-5 people in the World need to get stellar bonuses at the end of the year and grow and grow. This is unsustainable, for sure, not quality. Not craft. Not the participation of people also in simple tasks, which are the tasks that made us seniors.

I do not have predictions, as every year, I am a designer, not a marketer. I am a creative guy, and I accept that it’s impossible to predict anything, the World is made by interconnected systems and tomorrow a plane accident can easily unlock WW3 and disrupt the job market for many years.

But I do have a wish: to see great games coming from my continent, Europe. And I do have a dream to complete my game this year my game Pawtners Case. Wishing and dreaming are refreshing.

Do not get fooled

In recent years I have become an avid listener of content disseminated by experts on the video game business. The tendency is to take the few extreme successes and start breaking them down using visuals with curves and Venn diagrams.

Thanks to this content I have learned to interface with the business side, to better communicate my opinions and design solutions. I am immensely grateful to be able to live in the age where all this information is free.

However, I want to insist on one point: a video game is a fundamentally aesthetic experience. Aesthetics means many things, in ancient Greece aesthetics was the science that studied the essence of things. Video games touch fibers that are difficult to explain with charts.

We are approaching the time in the year in which all the experts will make their predictions, stating them with conviction and using swear words to underline the importance of what they say. Inevitably, this will affect some investments and opportunities. As always, those will not become reality, but then the marketer is always capable of changing the semantics.

I just want to say that it can be difficult to see the reality amidst so much noise, do not be fooled.

Find a way to talk

Years ago a politician spoke from a pulpit and people listened to him. Today there is a dialogue, real or virtual, with people. Otherwise, the politician has difficulty winning.

Years ago television told stories and people watched dancers and presenters from home. Today we see more dialogues and artists who train to become professionals.

Years ago the blog trend exploded on the Internet. People wrote and whoever wanted to read and commented. Today, various types of social media are used to connect with readers and dialogue. Substack works very well.

Years ago a company created a video game and put it on the shelves. People bought it and finished it. Today a company makes a video game and establishes a dialogue with the players. The video game is constantly updated.

The key to the intricate problem of distribution is to ease communication. Even while the game is being developed. Test the product with performance marketing, but open opportunities for dialogue, too.

Why not “best DLC”?

Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree DLC is a candidate for “best game of the year” at The Game Awards. But it’s not a game, is it?

It would be wonderful if these events kept up with the times. We are clearly in the era of games no longer as artifacts but as entertainment. Living games, updated to keep the public’s attention for many months.

It is absurd to reward only the new, when an update or a DLC, as is the case of Elden Ring, receives so much admiration from the public. The Game Awards should start considering awards such as “Best DLC”, “best live event”, etc. The market moves on completely different perspectives than 10 years ago when these awards were created.

They earned my silence

Maybe it’s because I started on a new project. Maybe it’s because a company that canceled the position when I was the last candidate republished the position again. Maybe it’s because I am tired of influencers. Or maybe it’s because they use content to train shitty algorithms to produce empty content faster.

Maybe it’s because I don’t want to constantly check out likes and notifications there. Or maybe it’s just because I got bored.

I decided to commit to (at least) a period of silence on LinkedIn. I will continue to write here and on my Substack, though.

I am going indie!

Yesterday a client of mine hired me as lead game designer on a new game. I cannot say much about it, but it will be a Steam game, 3D, premium. The game will feature emerging narratives and I will care about the gameplay systems to support that.

Plus I will manage a team of game designers, which is something that I love. I am happy because I am trying to switch sector since quite a while.

Mobile F2P is broken, for now. A total race to the bottom with unrealistic expectations. Plus, the survivors are not looking at the future. They look at the past. They want people ex-<PutFamousCompanyNameHere> to repeat formulas. They hope the dramatic situation with distribution will change someday. It will not. They should look at the future instead.

I was happy to collaborate on f2p projects, but a little frustrated with this way of running businesses. Do you start a race following other runners? That’s wrong in so many ways.

That’s why I am happy to finally work on something truly creative. The expectations are not surreal. I am happy, thank you!

Nexflix will close the games department in 3 years maximum

At long last, I am ready to talk about what I’m doing next: I am working on driving a “once in a generation” inflection point for game development and player experiences using C++. This transformational technology will accelerate the velocity of development and unlock truly novel game experiences that will surprise, delight, and inspire players.  

I am focused on a creator-first vision for C++, one that puts creative talent at the center, with C++ being a catalyst and an accelerant. C++ will enable big game teams to move much faster, and will also put an almost unimaginable collection of new capabilities in the hands of developers in smaller game teams.

Sounds like weird, right? Well, someone wrote the same stuff, but instead of C++, he spoke about genAI. That guy earns more money than me, you, and everyone who will read this post altogether.

The difference is that in my version of the statement I named a technology that actually helped lots of people make fantastic games. This is not the case with genAI, which is a theft created to destroy jobs.

Game making is a creative activity, which means that there are a lot of micro-decisions that we have to make every day. It involves conscience. And conscience is not the result of a set of electric signals, it’s something higher that comes from above. The most powerful processor, or GPU, can create many signals and solve complex operations faster than our brain, but it can never have conscience.

Netflix will shut down its games operations in a maximum of 3 years. If you want to have a more secure/safe job do not work for a company that will fail.

Creativity and productivity

A common misconception in this age is that creativity means productivity. But creativity doesn’t mean completing things and shipping them.

I am very creative, but I am unproductive with most of my own projects. You know, those books I want to write and indie games I want to make. The intention to change that is always there, but it is what it is.

If you want to increase your chances of financial success you need to be productive, or “lucky”. But you can always choose creativity, it’s free.

Blue and red Oceans

For me, game genres are not markets. For example, there is no “merge games market”. There are “merge games” in the “mobile market”.

Every time I see a team created like this:

  • someone believes that a genre has formed a market (on the last sad news you can find a lot of “hero shooters”)
  • hires talents who already work in that “market”, also if they would enjoy better another kind of game, in some case
  • the offer is attractive and the project is new, easy to convince the bored employee

in 3-5-7 years everything gets shut down without results. Surprise, there was no market at all.

When do I see that things work?

  • a group of enthusiasts of a genre get together to explore it
  • the team (including marketers) engages for real with the players
  • concrete and measurable experiments are done to define a vision well
  • after years of effort, they publish the game.

In this case, the probability of success increases. Even if the timing is somewhat unpredictable (never seen a success in less than 7-10 years, in mobile f2p).

Games please our entertainment needs uniquely.

  • People play Royal Match to relax, brain train, tournaments, curiosity… Not because they want to “play a match-3 game”.
  • millions are playing Metaphor: ReFantazio because of the story, map revealing, and challenge with combat… not because it’s a modern JRPG.

The fact that a specific game gets massive doesn’t mean we have a new market around its genre.

This means it has found its audience in the market, which is different!

A console concept for Netflix

After the shutdown of a Netflix studio, I read the opinions of many experts. One of the most common ideas is that Netflix needs its hardware to create a healthy games business.

To sketch up this idea, I also used LLM platforms. I will not publish any images, because they are based on stolen copyrights, but still, I want to admit that I used them for inspiration.

Netflix can reinvent the concept of the console, as they reinvented the business of VHS renting years ago.

Audience

The core audience is, of course, people (like myself) who have a Netflix subscription and who love video games. People that probably have kids, and work using technology.

We love to jump from series to series, we are nostalgic about the old days when games were simpler and gamepads had fewer buttons!

Features

The new console should:

  • Use common smartphones both as screens and controllers
  • Load games from fast support with no extra connections required
  • It will work as a “radio”, with knobs and everything, but for podcasts!
  • Once you own it, you are part of an ecosystem where you can also stream to others and create your program

Games

The games allowed on the platform should follow these rules:

  • The Player will be able to play opting out completely from micro-transactions
  • Every game must have a single-player experience and the content length will be public
  • Games can come with physical support that should contain the whole game and that will be played forever
  • Games are owned by the players forever and can be played on that console forever

Mood

The console can have a retro look but its colors and curved lines will attract new audiences.

The gamepads will have fewer buttons than new consoles. Every game should be simpler than competitors. Also, they can “wrap” a smartphone inside.