For those that don't follow non-FPS games, EA's Bioware has had a particularly troubled history with recent projects Anthem, and Mass: Effect Andromeda. There have been interviews with employees that wanted to publically point out internal cultural and structural issues which went unfixed.
Anthem's flounderings (a, b), and critic reception (metacritic: 55), were actually praised by employees:
Interview with Anthem devs under anonymity
“I think Anthem might be the kick in the butt that BioWare leadership needed to see that how you develop games has changed dearly,” said one former staffer.
Even lucky successes for Bioware like Dragon Age, which happened despite bad hierarchy and processes, were lamented by devs in the long run. These successes occurred through luck, and while burning out devs through panic crunches to meet deadlines.
"If Dragon Age: Inquisition hadn’t been so successful, perhaps BioWare would have changed its production practices."
No doubt devs having a strong PvE narrative RPG background among at Bioware helped in panic pulling rabbits out of hats - which didn't apply to a multiplayer, FPS, arcade lootgrind like Anthem.
For anyone reading the article - I'll also add - this isn't the type of reveal all that happens 15 years after a game or studio shuts down. The type of reveal that tell the real story after excuses and spin. Look at the Lionhead interviews for a good piece that also goes over problems with processes. This is the initial version of Anthem's story, done while the game is very much live, by people working at Bioware. It's a reveal about specific problems, and there's some spin. Standard conflicts of interest familiar to PvP players apply.
If critics held back any feedback afraid of some lost sales, and didn't call a spade a spade, it certainly didn't help the case of voices within Bioware pushing to make things better.
Making games isn't a one off event. In the long run the amount of fun will determine success. It's not straightforward, or simple. Games are knowledge industry engineering things in multiple disciplines to suit entertainment psychology : ) Failing to provide critical feedback will just hurts long-term improvement of processes.
Not fixing things early, even if it costs a bit of success, will just result in continuing lack of success. Games can be fixed later, and there's the next game. Or even the next company with similar problems when history repeats.
“There are lessons that need to be learned and the only way they’ll get learned is if they become public knowledge.”
Companies have hierarchies, and devs lower down can get marginalised. Companies aren't homogeneous. There are multiple view points and voices within companies.
As a DBG dev said a month back to a player going out of his way to apologise for DBG even though he was out of his depth & not familiar with the software industry:
[..] the higher-ups are the ones who make the big decisions about what games get made and with how many resources and with what kind of timeline. [..]
Also, I do recognize that programmers have a lot of privilege with regard to demand for us, but ideally we're using that weight to stand up for important issues at our companies when others can't afford the risk.
By witholding or toning down public criticism, let alone players making apologist excuses for bad decisons, all that's happening is eroding the momentum of voices within the company clamouring for change to improve things.
Sometimes critically arguing with a public facing dev a player likes and respects, in public, is the best thing they could do to help that dev's personal point-of-view in internal debates. Companies tend to use a few public facing devs, or even one main creative director, to represent most of the outcomes of internal processes and arguments.
Similarly media should not be reluctant to criticise even though the embedding effect of meeting and getting to know devs used as frontmen can make it awkward as devs have nice characters.
The best example is Higby during the upper-management directed OMFG lockdown which prevented him from trivially fixing ZOE balance for months. Higby had to front up and get by without the problem being fixed, even though he fought 'tooth and nail' for it internally. The absolute last thing the Planetside project needed would have been players inventing excuses to apologise for ZOE not being fixed. On the flipside, strongly critical feedback pointing out that it was just a value in the database to fix would have made the dev's positions stronger.
Similarly Higby pointed out company outcomes that created 'instead of junk like implants that nobody, including the developers, want'. Higby refused to put forward an 'explanation or defense' of why implants were in the game even with ongoing articles about the implant system in the media - as that's the CEOs jurisdiction being motivated by monetisation and not by game design. He definitely didn't try to invent excuses.
TL;DR
Making games is about processes. Devs voices can get marginalised in typical corporate hierarchies. Withholding public media criticism, or feedback for fear of short term impact just stops processes improving. This includes processes that better allow getting games right on release, and understanding 'fun' before committing to traveling down paths. Companies can change direction, work to change trust levels, or fix game design. It's their responsibility. Views at companies aren't homogeneous. Sometimes critically arguing with a devs player likes and respects in public when the dev is communicating a company outcome is the best thing they could do to help that dev's personal point-of-view in internal debates.
The moral of Bioware's story is critics and players should realise the way to be the best friend they could be to a franchise or a company is not to withold public criticism.
Submitted September 18, 2019 at 04:31PM by igewi654 https://ift.tt/31x3Rcx
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