this post was submitted on 20 Mar 2024
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500+ people for a videogame is insane. That's kind of cool - despite the problems they faced. I feel like these games don't reflect the number of people being hired for them. I'm not sure it should linearly scale (probably not), but they seem like they scale down rather than up with an increase in staff.
I feel like modern producers are missing the forest for the trees. Games are not successful for being infinitely large. Skyrim is small by today's standards. So is Oblivion. So are hundreds of other contemporary indie games that have captured the hearts of thousands.
It's not about more content. It's about content that feels deeper. Depth over breadth. Baldurs Gate 3 proves that out. I don't think you can expect these large groups of 500 people to all work towards a deeper game without major changes in roles. I'm no expert by any means, but I am a software engineer with some side-hobby game development experience. I think games are flat because mechanics aren't growing with the power. We're getting graphics, dialogue, and places. But the places aren't any more "deep" than 5 years ago. The dialogue isn't more interesting. The graphics are nice - but hardly why people buy games. I want to capture the "anything is possible" feeling when I hop into a game. BG3 recaptured that illusion for me for a long time.
/Rant
TL;Dr developers can't throw more bodies at this problem. It's an artistic and structural problem. They need to reframe how they create the art. It can't be mass produced without ending up flat.
This is what happens when game studios are being run by people that only view video games as a means to generate money. They do not understand the industry or craft involved and will blindly apply whatever the newest MBA management strategy is the new hotness, throw money and headcount at projects. And cannot understand that more is usually not better when it comes to video game development.
We cant have artists on the payroll, if they wanna get that creative juice flowing, they need to do it between firings so our stock holders are happier!
It's interesting playing indie games and seeing how a small or solo team can put out great experiences.
I kinda feel that a better pipeline for triple A games might be to start with small teams making indie scale games, and the ones that play test great can then get the triple A treatment to add art, music, dialog, additional content, etc. Games that fall short can maybe be released as "indie games" (game genre, obviously not indie published).
I feel like that would be a great idea!
Their workflow isn't designed to produce great games. I'm not sure what they're achieving