Homeworld 3 and the industry as a whole...

[Scaradeus]

Industry is very bad shape right now. Little Story time: Dawn of War 3 was one of those games I waited a lot for, had an excelent introduction trailer, it was super hype, and... Truth to be told it was not outright terrible, it solved many issues that DoW1 and DoW2 had, it was supersmooth, grahpics and atmoshere were good, it was fast paced action. The problem was that the gore, the toned down brutality, art direction, and also the tons of E-sports/MOBA elements that was introduced, also the campaign is very bad, immersion and acting really screwed up the entiry thing. Technically it was not terrible, but it was far from what it should have been, the essence is lost.

The same thing happens here in Homeworld 3, Graphics are beatiful, Atmoshpere is great, Music and Sounds are spot on, Art-Direction is great (with a few expections), but... the Story, Balance, Unit behavour (oh that ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ automatic formations are killing me...), and so on... and in Wargames they still only have placeholder "simulation" units for Unique ships? Come on... it is clearly rushed and somewhere somebody took over and changed directions in this game.
Also the strategy part in Multiplayer is really just a numbers game, rush out as many Resource Collectors as you can, start spamming basic units and rush for the big units as fast as you can... rinse and repeat, the one who outproduces the other wins most likely, and the Obejcts and Megaliths are hard to utilize practically to win crucial battles. Maybe bringing back "producing one-unit-one-at-the-time" just like in HW2 could help with this part, and rebalancing tech-tree to bypass things for more interesting strategies.

The problem lies with the fact that everything is pushing toward for "general audiance and trends", and game developers are pushed aggressively to this direction, in order to make as much money as possible. Leaving behind the old but powerful fanbase of these franchises, looks like numbers wise it is better to release a game half-baked and "uninspired" than developing a true successor. If this part is true then the industry in the future is really screwed, it is like a plague.

This topic not really about questions, but more like a long time observation and "trend". Really all franchises are going down this cash-and-grab route?

HOWEVER this game is very salvagable, but needs more work, more ship. Problem is DLC-s are coming, at least 3 new Factions. I fear that these factions going to be "copy-paste" versions of the current ones... like in Deserts of Kharak. Overall less work for more money for the Company.

Hopefully Modders will salvage and wastly improve HW3 in every regards (still remember the good HW2 Mods that really the game everlasting).

[OverMindLess]

I think what people miss is that this was pre-funded. Read - first pre-paid for by core fans. Which means that any decisions they'd make afterwards through the years - would exclude core fans as target group for a wider generic audience.

[TheOrangeBox]

I agree the game Industry is in a very bad shape right now - TOO MANY DEVELOPERS THROWN ONTO THE STREET by Executives obscene salary payout and share holders growth returns.

[Mike]

Originally posted by TheOrangeBox:

I agree the game Industry is in a very bad shape right now - TOO MANY DEVELOPERS THROWN ONTO THE STREET by Executives obscene salary payout and share holders growth returns.

My hope lies with indie developers who still have a passion for what they create, rather than the big corporations churning out bare-bones products and squeezing every penny they can. The old mindset of making a game and earning a buck has been replaced with making the cheapest possible product to maximize ROI. It's a shame that gaming has gone mainstream and become so money-driven; that's when things inevitably started going downhill - Mostly due to exec and shareholder greed.

[VinBG]

+1 to opinion

[Gaudioom]

Modern day management doesn't go through the trenches.
You can see it beyond the video game industry, quality of products and service are dropping fast, since the investment goes into marketing and strong arming consumers to pay more.

You rush the order, then you fire the whole staff that did that order. Then you get all the profits, rinse repeat show shareholders profit.

As a machinist I can see it in even worse places, I get aerospace parts that no longer undergo in depth QA, and some are allowed to passed to next department even though considered scrap by technical drawingsl tolerances.

I've also been part of companies when the siblings or the kids took over the business. In general the whole idea to put some one in charge that doesn't breath that same "oxygen" you do, won't bring any good changes because they just don't understand.

Seeing how many developers are being tossed out just tells me executives are robbing our games from capable minds to deliver what we ask for.

Sadly we are rewarding this with our wallets, we are in this together.

[TheOrangeBox]

Originally posted by Mike:

My hope lies with indie developers who still have a passion for what they create, rather than the big corporations churning out bare-bones products and squeezing every penny they can. The old mindset of making a game and earning a buck has been replaced with making the cheapest possible product to maximize ROI. It's a shame that gaming has gone mainstream and become so money-driven; that's when things inevitably started going downhill - Mostly due to exec and shareholder greed.

In 2023-2024 the whole situation just went out of control, it's not even been hidden any longer.

If you consider the CEO salary you soon realised where the money goes. In 2020 the following companies paid the following salaries to their CEO:

Playtika – $372 million
Activision Blizzard – $154.6 million
Skillz – $103.3 million
EA – $34.7 million
Zynga – $32 million
Unity – $22 million
Take-Two – $18.1 million
NCsoft – $15.6 million
Razer – $10.4 million
Team17 – $10.2 million

To put that in perspective the compensation granted to Activision Blizzard’s CEO was roughly the same as the average cost of paying 1,560 employees.

[Utwig_Chenjesu]

Originally posted by OverMindLess:

I think what people miss is that this was pre-funded. Read - first pre-paid for by core fans. Which means that any decisions they'd make afterwards through the years - would exclude core fans as target group for a wider generic audience.

I didnt know that.

[Dalv]

The problem is also the development time. There is no way this took 5+ years to make, not by working continuously on it. It seems more like an expansion, something that takes 2 years to make. So I wouldn't be that defensive for the developers side either. To me it seems like they tried to lengthen the development of the game for as long as possible so they keep getting paid whilst not doing much.
The game is too barren, too short, too many basic things missing or not working. Either laziness or lack of know-how.

[Mike]

Originally posted by TheOrangeBox:

In 2023-2024 the whole situation just went out of control, it's not even been hidden any longer.

If you consider the CEO salary you soon realised where the money goes. In 2020 the following companies paid the following salaries to their CEO:

Playtika – $372 million
Activision Blizzard – $154.6 million
Skillz – $103.3 million
EA – $34.7 million
Zynga – $32 million
Unity – $22 million
Take-Two – $18.1 million
NCsoft – $15.6 million
Razer – $10.4 million
Team17 – $10.2 million

To put that in perspective the compensation granted to Activision Blizzard’s CEO was roughly the same as the average cost of paying 1,560 employees.

That's insanely dark & wild to put it mildly and kudos to good research, hardly surprised of the results as far as where the quality of the products went sadly - More wants more and all that, we consumers just have to make darn sure to vote with our valets!

[Vault Traveler]

Originally posted by OverMindLess:

I think what people miss is that this was pre-funded. Read - first pre-paid for by core fans. Which means that any decisions they'd make afterwards through the years - would exclude core fans as target group for a wider generic audience.

This.

[Mike]

Originally posted by OverMindLess:

I think what people miss is that this was pre-funded. Read - first pre-paid for by core fans. Which means that any decisions they'd make afterwards through the years - would exclude core fans as target group for a wider generic audience.

Yeah, like most of today's that throws their funders aside for their own political reason! Its easy to be a zealot when its others that pays!

[joseph66hole]

Can they please put it on sale now instead of next or the one after. We know it is going on sale very soon, so just do it now.

[Mastermatta]

Originally posted by Vault Traveler:

Originally posted by OverMindLess:

I think what people miss is that this was pre-funded. Read - first pre-paid for by core fans. Which means that any decisions they'd make afterwards through the years - would exclude core fans as target group for a wider generic audience.

This.

However people dont realize that the crowd funding was actually likely very small compared to the actual cost to make the game. They had like 40 people or more working on the project and it was in development for 7 years. Average game dev saleries are like 100k now. Do the math. The game raised like 2.5 million from crowd funding.

Not excusing what they did to the story but i dont believe crowd funding contribution really substantially paid for the game.

[Vault Traveler]

Originally posted by Mastermatta:

Originally posted by Vault Traveler:

This.

However people dont realize that the crowd funding was actually likely very small compared to the actual cost to make the game. They had like 40 people or more working on the project and it was in development for 7 years. Average game dev saleries are like 100k now. Do the math. The game raised like 2.5 million from crowd funding.

Not excusing what they did to the story but i dont believe crowd funding contribution really substantially paid for the game.

So in other words the whole crowdfunding was a gigantic fraud.

[Mastermatta]

Originally posted by Vault Traveler:

Originally posted by Mastermatta:

However people dont realize that the crowd funding was actually likely very small compared to the actual cost to make the game. They had like 40 people or more working on the project and it was in development for 7 years. Average game dev saleries are like 100k now. Do the math. The game raised like 2.5 million from crowd funding.

Not excusing what they did to the story but i dont believe crowd funding contribution really substantially paid for the game.

So in other words the whole crowdfunding was a gigantic fraud.

I mean generally crowdfunding is a stupid thing to do unless you like gambling. Ive only crowdfunded one game in my entire life and when i did i accepted the money could simply disappear.