One reader expressed concern that publishing executives aren't interested in the games' prosperity, but are more worried about Neil Druckmann and Hideo Kojima.
Everything that's happened in the video game industry over the past year has left many questioning what those in charge are doing. Is Phil Spencer a failure? Is Sony asleep at the wheel? How do the heads of Ubisoft think calling Skull And Bones a 4A game will be received by average gamers who know that's nonsense?
Gaming is a great hobby, and there are tons of great games made by dozens, even hundreds, of people, but all too often we hear about executives who couldn't care less about what business they're in. Is it the love of games that made Bobby Kotick want to stay at Activision so long? Is it the faceless accountant in charge of EA who's in his job because he wants to push the boundaries of interactive art?
I don't think we need to answer that question, except I don't think it's too different in other industries. After all, how many times do people complain that movies were ruined by executive interference? It apparently happens a lot in games, but games are a lot more secretive, so we'll never know the details.
Maybe these executives pretend to enjoy video games in interviews (I mean, I saw my nephew play Fortnite for 5 minutes once), and maybe someone like Phil Spencer is more into video games while caring much more about his financial situation. But the truth is, none of them really care about games. They're not willing to sacrifice what they own to make better games and consoles.
Contrast this with the developers who actually make the games, who sacrifice a lot: time, low wages, and now the constant threat of being fired, to keep the company's profits at 96% instead of 95%. Developers work overtime without pay, sacrifice time with their families, are mentally exhausted… and for what? They get fired the moment the game is finished, regardless of whether it's a hit or not.
I've always found the president of Take-Two particularly egregious, as he brags about how much money GTA is making and claims to investors that GTA 6 will be the best game ever made. I'm pretty sure he has no understanding of what makes a video game good or bad; all he knows is that on a financial spreadsheet, “the numbers go up, the numbers go down.”
This complete disregard for games themselves can also be seen in the way companies are responding to the current crisis: laying off hundreds of employees, cancelling everything but sequels, and quickly abandoning games that have served them so well thus far in favor of live service games that have a 1 in 100 chance of success if they're lucky.
But hey, I'm not sure about some of the people who are supposed to be developers. There's this guy named Herman Hulst who is now co-head of PlayStation, and he must think that the best game he's ever worked on is Horizon Zero Dawn, and he thinks it was God's gift to the gaming world.
Or Neil Druckmann of Naughty Dog, who is touted as a groundbreaking game creator, but the only good things about his games are the graphics and the story, which are very basic as video games go. The Last of Us is to gameplay what Doom is to storytelling, and it's worrying to see someone with such extreme bigotry in such an influential position.
Consider also Hideo Kojima. Why does his Twitter profile say “70% of my body is made of movies”? If he loves movies so much, why doesn't he make movies instead of games? Why is he always trying to turn what is clearly his favorite pastime into a game?
Some of these people may be talented, but they are not the right people to lead the games industry, and they are not leaders who have the interests of the games industry first, and in some ways the mess we're in right now is proof of that. This won't change, but as companies get bigger and buy up more and more developers, there are more middlemen and senior management, and less control that actual creative people have over their work.
Reader's Trepsillus
Readers' opinions do not necessarily reflect the views of GameCentral or Metro.
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