We Need Better Video Game Publishers

[Triplash]

Simple solution: Support indie developers. Support companies whose actions are those you can get behind.

Wanna play that new game but it has always on/it was released by a publisher who actively insults you for your feelings on DRM/always on/blames homophobia for people hating them?

Don't buy the game.

Yeah, the game might be fun. yes, this hurts the developer oftentimes more than their publisher. Is it kinda the only thing you can do to affect the only thing they care about (money)? Yes.

My feelings on the matter pretty much come down to this right here. They only make this stuff because it sells. Stop buying it, and they stop making it.

If you want to say "we need to make our voice heard," consider this: by continuing to buy products you don't like, you ARE making your voice heard. And what you're saying is "More crap please! I love crap!"

It's like when I bought Minecraft back during its beta. I knew it still had a lot left to finish, and a lot left to add. Now, over the last couple years they've fallen behind on a lot of things I would consider essential, and added a lot of things that I thought were pointless. In some cases I even felt like they were moving backward in certain aspects. However I've never once regretted buying that game. It only cost me $20, one time. I've been playing it for two years now, off and on, and I know that I'll be able to play it as long as I own a computer that can run it. They've been adding features to it this entire time, and haven't asked for a single extra cent for any of them. There's no subscription fee to access any part of it, and if their authentication server is down for whatever reason (or I have to play offline for a while) the only thing that happens is my custom avatar skin doesn't load and I have to look like the default "Steve" avatar until I can access it again.

Compare that to, oh I don't know, the complete and total loss of years of effort and hundreds of dollars, and I think I know which product model I'm not going to trust without guarantees anymore.

[Kistulot]

It only cost me $20, one time.

Imagine how good i feel having paid less than 10$ for it and having spent more time playing Minecraft than probably any other online game besides City of Heroes? :)

Dev tools are surprisingly affordable, at least for PC development.

Oh yes, they aren't by any means the worst costs involved. That would be silly to say. One thing also to consider would be the diversity a gamer expects in a game today. You can't just palette swap. You can texture swap, sure, but even that gets some raised eyebrows. I'd imagine the manhours of asset-development would be more expensive by the boatload than the dev tools.

That said, I'll still be happy to pay for the Phoenix Project on kickstarter. Which I've said a million times, but that doesn't make it any less true :)