RAGE

    Quote

    ":2ho89cje]30 minuts Rage gameplay today, at 2:30 (quakecon local time) This website basicaly, got the whole conference covered:

    http://quakecon.quake-live.tv/

    there's live stream, and if you missed anything, there's the recorded videos in there as well.

    Carmack looks like cenobyte in the image of him at the bottom of that page lol

    I think it's funny how Carmack talks about the aquisition by Bethesda like the perfect merge as opposed to the alternatives which would have been Actiblizz or EA, yet the game (RAGE) is published by EA

    Quote from Sindwiller

    Well, it is Fallout, Bioshock, Motor Storm, Quake, Doom, Unreal and Sonic Adventures in one game after all... right?

    you forgot death rally !

    Quote from dux

    You have to shake it out of that damn glass bottle so infact you get more irritated. That's when you go and get this:

    I approve of this post.

    Quote from FrieChamp

    I think it's funny how Carmack talks about the aquisition by Bethesda like the perfect merge as opposed to the alternatives which would have been Actiblizz or EA, yet the game (RAGE) is published by EA

    I doubt they are publishing the game in the traditional sense. Lots of companies partner with EA as a promoter/distributor; they're very good at it. If it's good enough for Valve...

    honestly EA have turned from being the scum of the universe to being actually decent. activision blizzard seem to have taken over the throne of the malevolent tyranny that is the game industry.

    Quote from Defrag

    I doubt they are publishing the game in the traditional sense. Lots of companies partner with EA as a promoter/distributor; they're very good at it. If it's good enough for Valve...

    Yeah, they're under the same EA Partners label that Valve uses, which I believe Frie would also be familiar with from Crytek. By all accounts I've heard, it's a pretty great system.

    Quote from Sentura

    honestly EA have turned from being the scum of the universe to being actually decent. activision blizzard seem to have taken over the throne of the malevolent tyranny that is the game industry.

    This is also true, there's still people dismissing them on name alone, but recently they're doing a lot of great things. They're still a huge mega-publisher, but taking a lot more gambles, and taking more gambles with their owned studios and original IP, which is especially apparent with games like Dead Space and Mirror's Edge, which they committed to giving sequels even though sales were less than they hoped. At the same time, they dramatically cut and overhauled their long-running Need For Speed franchise that was stagnating. They're also delivering some absolutely killer post-release support with Burnout Paradise by way of Criterion, and testing some support models that I hope continue through the rest of their catalogue in the future.

    The funny thing is Activision is perpetually a couple years behind EA - and in following that model they gleefully plowed headlong into "king of the world but also giant jackasses" phase. They may be making all the revenue right now, but add to that things like their handling of some Vivendi titles from the merger (Brutal Legend lawsuit, anyone?), the ungodly milking of all things Guitar Hero, and the money-hungry attitude of their CEO ("Games should be more expensive!")... it's a pretty hilarious role reversal. The WoW and COD juggernauts won't be going anywhere anytime soon (and Diablo 3 and Starcraft II will be printing money), but I look forward to efforts like Tony Hawk Ride crashing and burning big-time... I'm also not sure how much longer their version of the rhythm game genre can support itself the way they're tossing it around with the endless spinoffs and now things like DJ Hero and Band Hero (which completely competes against THEIR OWN products).

    that's a great comparison, KFS. to me it poses the question whether it will actually change for activision blizzard, or whether they will just stay money hungry since it is an easy way for them to go (all things put aside, world of warcraft, guitar hero and call of duty each probably make more money than any other franchises from other publishers). obviously you would only want to change your business strategy if things don't work out... and i'm just not sure that's the case with activision blizzard...

    if they do, however, it'll show that the industry is progressing into maturity.

    Money post right there by KFS! I completely agree, very good assessment of EA's and Actiblizz's roles today.

    Defrag: As KFS already mentioned, I'm familiar with the EA Partners programme. While it's a collaborative effort during the development of the game and EAP's input might help, the studios keep creative control of the game and I'm pretty sure that Valve and id are more keen on the big marketing bux, not necessarily the creative input.. I just thought it's funny because Carmack talks about why they are not comfortable with partnering with Activision or EA anymore: id used to be the FPS arm of Activision, now that there is Infinity Ward with the highly succesful CoD series, things have changed. They don't want to compete in-house. That's why a merge with Bethesda makes more sense, because they do completely different games. He also said something quite striking on the subject of acquiring funding for independent studios as a whole: Publishers don't like the idea of funding a project when they don't own the IP, because the developer might quit the cooperation after the first game and work with a competing publisher on the sequel. They would build up a franchise from the ground up that a competitor would profit from later on basically. As far as I can see that's what's happening with Rage, EA and Bethesda at the moment.

    Quote from Sentura

    that's a great comparison, KFS. to me it poses the question whether it will actually change for activision blizzard, or whether they will just stay money hungry since it is an easy way for them to go (all things put aside, world of warcraft, guitar hero and call of duty each probably make more money than any other franchises from other publishers). obviously you would only want to change your business strategy if things don't work out... and i'm just not sure that's the case with activision blizzard...if they do, however, it'll show that the industry is progressing into maturity.

    I'm absolutely positive that Actiblizz will continue milking the franchises until they are no longer profitable. As you said, from a business perspective, it's the logical thing to do. That's where I agree with the post by KFS: EA is a few steps ahead of Actiblizz, not necessarily in terms of success, I mean they've already lost momentum on some of their most profitable game series. Fifa, NFS, Battlefield...that's why they invest into new IPs and that's what's Actiblizz is going to do WHEN market need for those GH and CoD games declines. It's what the big hollywood studios do too by the way, purely business decisions.

    The idea that Actiblizz would stop development on sequels for these games, just for the sake of "helping the industry progress into maturity" is a noble, but less likely thought...and rather vague too, I don't think these are thoughts that cross Robert Kotick's mind

Participate now!

Don’t have an account yet? Register yourself now and be a part of our community!

Register Yourself Login