What is Digg?88 Comments
- rjc5056, on 10/20/2008, -4/+50Maybe the average Valve game player is that smart, but the average gamer overall? C'mon. Madden always sells like a billion copies and anyone who's ever spoken to those hundred thousand or so still playing Halo 3 know that the true average gamer is as dumb as a sack of rusty doorknobs.
- Merendino, on 10/20/2008, -1/+45That was entirely too short an article.
- iruel, on 10/20/2008, -1/+32He says publishers not designers. there is a difference.
- wizpig64, on 10/20/2008, -5/+36Being a gamer himself, it's no wonder Gabe can make such great games.
- krabat, on 10/20/2008, -0/+30Have you seen some of the people who play TF2?
- D3PyroGS, on 10/20/2008, -1/+25Gabe Newell, managing director of Valve, has made a lot eyebrow-raising comments through the years, more particularly the ones about his stand on console game development. Here's his latest quote from the Game Informer:
It seems by and large that gamers are incredibly smart; the average gamer seems to know more about what makes a good game than the average person at a publisher.
It's true - gamers are smart. In many ways, no one really knows what a gamer wants out of a game better than a gamer. Haven't we all gone, "It'd be better if..." at some point while playing? Whether it's a bad camera angle, crappy in-game dialogue, or unreasonably hard-to-get items, we all have our ideas as to how to improve a game.
It's nice to see Gabe Newell recognizing gamer intellect - especially since he's a publisher (being a gamer too sure helps). He ought to use that recognition more when bashing consoles, though. - dalittle, on 10/20/2008, -0/+21Haha. That is the entire article. (seriously)
- KevekKerinth, on 10/20/2008, -0/+19Yeah... there's a big difference between publishers and developers. It's sad to think how many games with potential were flushed down the toilet and out onto shelves because of publishers' deadlines
- tattertech, on 10/20/2008, -0/+17Clearly you haven't spent much time in CS...
- FuzzyBunny, on 10/20/2008, -0/+15The thing is, publishers aren't looking for good games. They're looking for games that sell. Those two areas don't always overlap. And while I wish they would, that doesn't make me smarter than the publisher just because he's doing his job.
- capndan, on 10/20/2008, -0/+12Here's an idea.
A company spends millions of dollars developing a game, the publisher hypes the crap out of it for the 4 years it is in development, everyone gets excited, and then it underwhelms everyone. The game completely undersells expectations and every reviewer points out obvious flaws and weak points that kept the game from being much better, if not a complete winner.
When the game is nearing completion, rather than booting it out the door and hoping for the best, just give it to a couple respected reviewers with an NDA, ask them to give a private review and show what needs work, and then see what can be remedied in a decent amount of time without delaying the game for another year.
I think the main problem is that developers never get an outside perspective on the game, or get too butt-hurt by criticism of the game to actually be receptive of what needs to be fixed. The result is a potentially awesome game crippled by bad controls, cameras, awkward dialogue, or maybe some lackluster elements.
Spending a little extra money on a consultant will more than pay for itself with the positive reviews later. - valkyries, on 10/20/2008, -1/+12always put PC first, and they don't want your PS3 money anyways.
- FreshPineSent, on 10/20/2008, -0/+11Buried for not reading the ***** article.
- latova, on 10/20/2008, -0/+10Especially pyros.
- PedleZelnip, on 10/20/2008, -0/+10And yes, that's the whole "article"
- chthonical, on 10/20/2008, -0/+9Valve is the ideological antithesis of EA.
-Pretty much every game they've put out has gained acclaim.
-Every game they've put out that has gained that acclaim has deserved it.
-If you buy a third party game off of Steam and it turns out to have issues with certain hardware that was unrecognized and unlisted, they will refund you the money without a hassle. - graahBrains, on 10/20/2008, -0/+8"It's nice to see Gabe Newell recognizing gamer intellect - especially since he's a publisher (being a gamer too sure helps). He ought to use that recognition more when bashing consoles, though."
If memory servers the only console he bashed was the PS3 because it's (apparently) a bitch to code well for. Carmack said the same thing in several interviews. - TwwIX, on 10/20/2008, -0/+8I wish we had more developers such as Valve around. I have yet to see a gaming company that supports their games and its community as much as they do.
- Hotrox, on 10/20/2008, -2/+9Maybe you should pony up some cash and get a real system. Might I recommend gaming on your PC?
- Soriven, on 10/20/2008, -0/+7The problem with gamers (particularly in MMO land), is they're dead-on accurate when it comes to determining what would please them as individuals but tend to be narrow-minded about what is in the best interest of all gamers.
- paulsmith288, on 10/20/2008, -0/+7Carmack is a legend. Quake 1 and 2 dm has never been bettered.
Anyway to stop some fanboyism
"... I spoke to some people at Microsoft, and as I said, I can't point to a single feature in Vista that I care about that solves problems for us. At all. And I had the same conversation with the Xbox 360 guys. It's like Xbox 360 doesn't make my life any better, and in fact, it makes it a lot worse, as you're telling me I can't count on having a hard drive," said Newell.
Newell was equally harsh, if not more so, on Sony for its design of the PS3 architecture and programming environment. "There are incredibly few programmers who can safely write code in the PlayStation 3 environment. And I totally see why Sony wants people to write code that runs on seven SPEs and a central processing unit, because that code is never going to run well anywhere else," he said. - bitterbug, on 10/20/2008, -1/+7A spy, by his nature, is not backstabbing you. You're just too trusting.
- wizpig64, on 10/20/2008, -2/+8Uhh... remember Half-Life?
From the article: "It's nice to see Gabe Newell recognizing gamer intellect - especially since he's a publisher (being a gamer too sure helps)" - ociris, on 10/20/2008, -0/+5Tahiri doesnt like anyone who hates on the PS3. Gabe is probably somewhere at the top of his list.
- dalittle, on 10/20/2008, -0/+5They do that with focus groups. It usually ends up in dumbing down the game unless they get a good group of people (which I would guess would be hard).
- UselessTrivia, on 10/20/2008, -1/+6Meh. He hates developing for the PS3. They outsourced the whole PS3 port of the Orange Box to someone else he hated it so much. He's not a god, like many here seem to think...but he is entitled to his opinion.
- valkyries, on 10/20/2008, -2/+6Must digg for Gabe, but on the other hand a console website bashing a PC Legend....
- forthex, on 10/20/2008, -0/+4And my favorite class is the spy.
- Shaflugi, on 10/21/2008, -0/+4360 TF2 or PC TF2? Entirely different people.
- PedleZelnip, on 10/20/2008, -0/+4Read the article description and you've pretty well read the article.
- painting, on 10/20/2008, -0/+4you're not missing much.
- Rapter09, on 10/20/2008, -0/+4Just because you're a developer doesn't mean you're necessarily a gamer - or a hardcore gamer - or somebody that 'knows' games. The ***** thing about it is that although we gamers sit around salivating about how wonderful it would be to work at one of these companies making games, there's people there working for those companies doing art and things like that that have absolutely no passion for games whatsoever. It's just a "job" to them, no different than working at a cell center, or in some sort of tech department. We always hear about "passion" and "love" of games from game developers, but... it's not always there. And you can tell.
You know, I often made the mistake early in my line of work that somebody who uses Photoshop a lot, for example, and is a graphics designer should know *something* about computers. The spend a lot of time in front of the system, etc. It'd be really annoying when I'd have to go fix something some ass hat graphics designer screwed up on their computer. Same with network admins and 'computer nerds' that just don't like, or can't play games.
Same with focus groups. If you put out an ad for a focus group, you're not necessarily going to get people who know or love games. You're going to get a bunch of weekend gamers that see the ad and say "lol that'll b fun lez do that!" - bagboyrebel, on 10/20/2008, -0/+4duh, obviously if we play video games we don't do anything else. Just like how people who play football don't do anything else and how people who play instruments don't do anything else.
- Checkerd, on 10/20/2008, -2/+6If Jenny, like, goes to the prom, like, wearing the same dress that I'm, like, wearing I'll just ,like, die.
/This is how ridiculous you sound. - paulsmith288, on 10/20/2008, -0/+3finally some sense in this thread.
- bagboyrebel, on 10/20/2008, -1/+4Guys, he may sound ridiculous, but this is a Tim Schafer game we're talking about here.
- gabeN, on 10/20/2008, -0/+3I think there is further evidence of this in the ability of gamers to consistently defeat whatever DRM publishers throw at them. It's a losing battle for developers. All this cat and mouse stuff needs to end.
- Zyphron, on 10/20/2008, -1/+4"multiplayer is good for all the custom game types, something not many other games offer"
You obviously have never played an FPS on the PC... - staticneuron, on 10/20/2008, -0/+3Whats weird about that is the fact that many devs have people on hand to play the game to tell them if thing suck or not. How can they miss stuff? Take for instance half life 2 and the longest driving sequence I have ever played in my life. It was fun at first but then later on it seemed to be a chore.
- forthex, on 10/20/2008, -1/+4Apparently, you have bigger issues than the release date of a video game.
- Mujokan, on 10/20/2008, -0/+3Well, that's why they have gamers doing QA, right?? And betas. Not that it helps them that much.
I was a tester for an MMO once, and I was diligent about reporting stuff for a couple of weeks then just got sucked into playing in and stocking stuff up for my guild... Sorry... - kinseyincanada, on 10/20/2008, -0/+3or maybe some people have different tastes than you?
- MacHarborGuy, on 10/20/2008, -0/+3agreed. while I did enjoy Doom 3 personally, many people did not. However, the game was a success for ID Software due to it selling so many copies and making them a very good profit.
Gamers want good games that they don't put down after 20 minutes *cough* Bioshock *cough* STALKER *cough* (my personal opinion on those two games, not majority opinion)
Gaming Developers and Publishers want games that they can milk for as long as they can *cough* the sims *cough* - PedleZelnip, on 10/20/2008, -1/+3Gabe Newell, managing director of Valve, has made a lot eyebrow-raising comments through the years, more particularly the ones about his stand on console game development. Here's his latest quote from the Game Informer:
"It seems by and large that gamers are incredibly smart; the average gamer seems to know more about what makes a good game than the average person at a publisher."
It's true - gamers are smart. In many ways, no one really knows what a gamer wants out of a game better than a gamer. Haven't we all gone, "It'd be better if..." at some point while playing? Whether it's a bad camera angle, crappy in-game dialogue, or unreasonably hard-to-get items, we all have our ideas as to how to improve a game.
It's nice to see Gabe Newell recognizing gamer intellect - especially since he's a publisher (being a gamer too sure helps). He ought to use that recognition more when bashing consoles, though. - Narcowski, on 10/20/2008, -0/+2I still think q3a was/is the best Quake, if only for the modscene.
- Valyn, on 10/20/2008, -0/+2I was about to ask 'Who's that?'
Then googled him.
Now I agree. - Jektal, on 10/20/2008, -0/+2Is there a mirror, or can anyone post the article? Site is blocked at work
- Scrappy1850, on 10/20/2008, -1/+3do you work for a consulting firm?
- SOS84, on 10/20/2008, -2/+4Some of these ***** commenting here have to remember that Valve is a PC game company. Consoletards need not apply.
- TheJimid, on 10/20/2008, -0/+2Like those backstabbing pricks that play as spies
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