analysis of DN IP future strategy

[pjVgt]

Originally Posted by prophecy holder

Sniper got more cheese then, but who gets more cheese overall? It will no doubt be GBX with borderlands and future products. Yes it does matter whom people are willing to buy from, when you have customer loyalty by the balls you have them where you want them. This is why Valve can do anything they want and people will blindly defend them to no end. They ****** up tremendously with the L4D series but still manage to rush out L4D2 and get over 2.5 million retail copies in two weeks while people still defended and love them like blind puppies.

But You can only do that if the previous game generated enough sales to stimulate sales of next release almost automatically. L4D was a pretty fun game so it is normal that so much L4D2 sold - but I doubt L4D3 would be as much succesfull. This is a high risk business - You can spew cheap games with recycled or cut data and get high on cash but only few times. How long CoD will live? Till the first time they will drop the ball - but they will have so much money that it will be worth it. Like in case of the Sniper - City Interactive entered stock market and plays with stocks as their real business - they still make games but by third or fourth party slave labourers in China (no joke). Their bosses throw biggest parties in Warsaw with chinese businessmen, mountains of coke that black strippers with huge silicon titties and asses dance on in their gold-plated high heels. This is the goal of every video game developer - screw hard work, brand recognition, fanboys and nerds.

When they ignored the old duketards is when DNF failed hard. The number one complaint about DNF was that it was too much like Halo and Call of crap: modern ****. DNF would no doubt sell more if the game wasn't made like Halo or Call of crap.

I remember I once wrote why they didn't take those advices - simply because we don't count. This is sad but in reality as BlackCat said - we are too few. Journalists in some way backed us up but their opinion is virtual and has no power over sales. We are old people that played last good DN game in 1996 - average person who bought DNF probably didn't even know there was a DN3D. I doubt our advice would make DNF sell better - I actually think it would sell worse. You can't just release DN3D with DNF graphics - You would confuse the stupids.

Bolderdash, the digital PC market is bigger than you think. The only reason others are not going in is because of popularity and lead Steam. Steam has been out for years and a another company going out with another digital sales will die because people prefer the ease of Steam.

If the market is this big then there is always a spot for a competition. Steam has lots of faults - there is no ease in using it. If there was serious money on the market then companies bigger and more aggressive than valve would enter it (and they are better informed than us too) - EA origin is only a half-assed attempt probably because it failed at their expectations of the market size. Valve is a private company so in reality Gabe could be getting a BJ right now from Paris Hilton in his diamond encrusted platinium shell only because no one considers his virtual realm a threat for their retail sales.

Kids are stupid and will buy anything. I once got a kid to give me thier Nintendo DS for a freakin Snicker bar while waiting in Gamestop to see if they have and Nes consoles or games (some do and some don't). Release a gory game and kids will buy, thier demands are anything to kill the boredom at home.

Wow that one dumb kid - I would never give my DS to anyone (I have priceless Cooking Mama 2 saves on it).

Kinect adventures, 18 million units sold. Half life 2 11+ million copies. Battlefield 3 sold (according to publisher) 8 million units. MW3 sold (according to publisher) 13.7 million. Not very best selling huh. Also Super mario brothers, well over 40.25 mllion copies. Tetris for the gameboy, 35 million copies.

It is not nice to count bundled software - which in case Kinect, Tetris and SMB fall off. Now it doesn't look that nice doesn't?

Then what? expect the same with Mw5, 6 and 7? Wont work because kids get bored with the same thing over and over and stop playing. Thats your key demographic and you have to keep giving them things or they get bored waiting. If the wait is too long they lose interest, too short they burn themselves out and not do anything with it. They are hitting the brick wall hard and will lose money. Once that happens the higher ups freak out and start demanding higher sales, if they can't get that people will be fired.

Then they will release refreshment like CoD5: back into WW2 again or just Call of Duty remake. Don't worry - they have at least few scenarios in their sleeve for that occasion.

Look at Sonic as ultimate proof, insanely popular in the 90's and no one thought he would ever die or be in a bad game. Hell for a little while some were thinking Sonic was winning the mascot wars and be the ultimate gaming mascot. For those that are too young or clueless, Mario and Sonic were ultimate mascots of gaming and bitter rivals. Nintendo and Sega were competing to out-do eachother and win the wars. Sega lost with **** ups with consoles and Sonic games. Then it happened, Sonic became a joke. He hit that brick wall and then the developers/publishers tried too hard to be "hip" and modern. Then he jumped the shark with Shadow and everything went down hill fast.

I was waiting till someone will mentions sonic - but I think that even those BAD but modern games saved sonic from obscurity. There was no way that in the dark age of the 90s - with 3D and angst You could go with 2D cutesy game. To counter this - my sister never played 2D sonic. First sonic she ever saw was Sonic Adventure on Dreamcast. She likes new sonic games and would never touch old ones. Those games got really bad reviews because people want old stuff their know - but sonic games still sells enough to make new releases (unlike hundreds of 2D platformers franchises that died). Without those even bad experimental games there would be no sonic at all today. The same way we wouldn't have neither DN3D or DNF today. Only time can decide of the shift was for good (DN3D) or bad (DNF).

[~Orcrist]

pjVgt, I implore you to come out with the Truth...
You are, in reality The T-800, aren't you ?
Dont lie.

[Neoshredder]

One of the problems with this second chance Duke will probably get, and I hate to admit it, is Duke himself. A lot of his stuff doesn't work in 2011, although his character premise is still good, it's not executed well, and it certainly wasn't executed with that "You're ******" joke in DNF, now I like Duke, but that was just an assholish thing to say. Here's what you have to do to make him work in the present.

1) No more misogyny, Duke made jokes some jokes about women before, but they were never mean, they were never like they were in DNF. If anything, Duke seems like the guy that should beat the **** out of misogynistic assholes, they did this in the DLC though, so I think they recognize the issue.
2) No more stealing lines from movies, he can still have one liners, just make them original but at the same time, appropriately cliche and cheesy.
3) Make the Duke Nukem universe more crazy. Duke Nukem (at least in DNF) is an outlandish, cartoonish character in a rather bland and generic world.
4) Actual funny humor. I laughed a few times in DNF, but really, the bad jokes outweighed the good. Dick jokes can be done right, but in DNF they really weren't done that well. Oh yeah, and no more repeating lines from movies and passing that off as humor, that doesn't work, it hardly even worked back then. Make pop culture references, but make them clever, like "Shadows Of The Damned" did. However, again, I can see they're going in the right direction with this with "The Doctor Who Cloned Me" DLC.
5) Is it too much to ask that Duke actually tries to save the people he comes across under attack from the aliens...people other than women that is?
6) Be self aware. Take a few nods in the script to how stupid it all is. Crack a few jokes about Duke himself, or better yet, have Duke crack a few jokes about himself. Break the fourth wall a few times. Say something about how out of date the idea of one liners are. If you don't do a Duke game while being self aware, Duke just comes off as some crazy guy talking to himself.

Do all this, and I'm pretty sure the general public will like Duke Nukem again in all his glory. He can still have his sarcastic, slightly vulgar, take **** from no one attitude, he'll just be less of an asshole while doing it. I'm not entirely sure if the misogyny was part of DNF only, I don't remember him really being that mean to women in his previous games, but we need to get Duke back on track, and the gaming community will accept him back.

Oh yeah, and make it OLD SCHOOL!

[MrBlackCat]

I agree with alot of the above conceptually, and some of how it might could be done. (by the Shredder of Neos )

In my mind it comes down to knowing the difference between Arrogance and confidence.
These things are black and white to me... and Duke 3D was always confident, but not totally lacking humility, as he is usually talking to himself or stating something "AFTER" the fact... like "Rest in Pieces." after that gibb... but never ranting or "talking smack". He just did it, then comment.

Duke Nukem 3D never came across as "silly" or "arrogant" within the context of the Duke Nukem 3D world... Duke Nukem Forever, Duke, was not this way, in my opinion.

Example of the exact same concept in another game... GTA III, never stepped over a certain boundary with sexual innuendo, and its suggestive nature. Liberty City Stories was amazingly vulgar and I can't even play it with children about... they got WAY out of line on that one, and it really hurts the game for me.

MrBlackCat

[Neoshredder]

Yeah, but his one liners are still a problem. The reason being, that everybody in the DNF universe is like "HOLY ******' ****, DUKE NUKEM AHHHH!". They have to pretty much what I said with the original, not stolen one liners, but they also need to either A) Make Duke Nukem's universe crazier B) Make it extremely self aware of how stupid it is, or best C) Do both.

The problem is that Duke Nukem is an outlandish character in a bland world. They need to make it apparent that this world is not our world, and some guy spouting extremely cheesy one liners is still considered cool by the general public in this game world. In DNF, they don't do this. Other than the character of Dylan and the aliens, this world feels way too normal. The only reason it worked in the older Duke games, was that we never really got to see any of the world at all. The character of Duke can't work in a "normal" world, because let's be honest, in a "normal" world, Duke Nukem would be considered ******* insane. Now, just look at, say," Borderlands". Every character in that game is ******* insane, from Cl4ptr4p, to TK, to Dr. Zed, to Mad Moxxi. Another example would "Shadows Of The Damned", it starts off with the Demon King making a lot of dick jokes, then Garcia making a bunch of dick jokes, then his flaming, floating, British skull sidekick transforming into a motorbike and driving him into hell. Duke Nukem Forever begins with Duke Nukem being complimented by everyone in the world, preparing for a talkshow, then he fights aliens. All the people he's complimented by look and act completely normal. All the other characters in the game besides Dylan and Duke look and act completely are normal.

This is why I disagree with you at that point, Duke Nukem can't NOT come across as silly, the very character of Duke himself is outlandish, I mean, just look at him. I agree that he shouldn't be arrogant, he should be confident once more, not arrogant, but it's impossible for the character of Duke to come off as even a little bit normal, so what I'm saying is, make everything around him abnormal, so it would make sense that Duke fits as a celebrity within that world. The aliens certainly look absurd enough, what with the Pigcops and the Cycloid Emperor, but they don't do anything outlandish. At least in Duke Nukem 3D one of the aliens swore at you, in DNF, they do nothing.

"Shadow's Of The Damned" was also very self aware. It took nods in the script to say stuff like "Yeah, we know this is stupid, it's supposed to be that way" or "Yeah, we know, he makes really bad jokes". In DNF, they don't do this. The fourth wall breaking only takes place near the end of the game, and that's too late to start being self aware. Hell, even the Duke Nukem comic book was more self aware than this, with the scientist touching on how Duke hides behind "false bravado". The comic book even had a crazier premise than DNF, where Duke travels back in time and has to fight aliens and ninja nazis all while stopping the people that live in the Earth's core from building a giant war machine to take over the world! The comic book did Duke more justice than DNF actually did. The script needs to take a few nods and say "Yeah, we know this is stupid" or "Yeah, we know Duke's one liners are incredibly cheesy". Or just break the fourth wall a few times throughout the game, just don't wait so long to do it. Once again though, they actually took a few nods in the DLC, so I'm guessing they recognized this problem as well.

[pjVgt]

Originally Posted by ~Orcrist

pjVgt, I implore you to come out with the Truth...
You are, in reality The T-800, aren't you ?
Dont lie.

No I'm just a drunken idiot who likes coke - that's all.

Originally Posted by Neoshredder

One of the problems with this second chance Duke will probably get, and I hate to admit it, is Duke himself. A lot of his stuff doesn't work in 2011, although his character premise is still good, it's not executed well, and it certainly wasn't executed with that "You're ******" joke in DNF, now I like Duke, but that was just an assholish thing to say. Here's what you have to do to make him work in the present.

1) No more misogyny, Duke made jokes some jokes about women before, but they were never mean, they were never like they were in DNF. If anything, Duke seems like the guy that should beat the **** out of misogynistic assholes, they did this in the DLC though, so I think they recognize the issue.
2) No more stealing lines from movies, he can still have one liners, just make them original but at the same time, appropriately cliche and cheesy.
3) Make the Duke Nukem universe more crazy. Duke Nukem (at least in DNF) is an outlandish, cartoonish character in a rather bland and generic world.
4) Actual funny humor. I laughed a few times in DNF, but really, the bad jokes outweighed the good. Dick jokes can be done right, but in DNF they really weren't done that well. Oh yeah, and no more repeating lines from movies and passing that off as humor, that doesn't work, it hardly even worked back then. Make pop culture references, but make them clever, like "Shadows Of The Damned" did. However, again, I can see they're going in the right direction with this with "The Doctor Who Cloned Me" DLC.
5) Is it too much to ask that Duke actually tries to save the people he comes across under attack from the aliens...people other than women that is?
6) Be self aware. Take a few nods in the script to how stupid it all is. Crack a few jokes about Duke himself, or better yet, have Duke crack a few jokes about himself. Break the fourth wall a few times. Say something about how out of date the idea of one liners are. If you don't do a Duke game while being self aware, Duke just comes off as some crazy guy talking to himself.

Do all this, and I'm pretty sure the general public will like Duke Nukem again in all his glory. He can still have his sarcastic, slightly vulgar, take **** from no one attitude, he'll just be less of an asshole while doing it. I'm not entirely sure if the misogyny was part of DNF only, I don't remember him really being that mean to women in his previous games, but we need to get Duke back on track, and the gaming community will accept him back.

Oh yeah, and make it OLD SCHOOL!

You know that "oldschool" word means "bankrupcy" for the publishers? Check the sales of Serious Sam 3 - Croteam never expected sales that low. I suppose DNF which is sadly an inferior game to SS3 outsold it by a order of a magnitude (main point is that SS3 was not consolized and was not published on PS3/X360). Everything that DN5 should be the "oldschool" is not on the list. And You know that most of the DNF humour is not "universal" but references - to the stuff that happened from 1998 to 2009. Almost 2 years before the release - in the internet culture where memes are born and die in matter of months simple reference humor is a failed way to go and I agree with You that they should develop something on their own.

Originally Posted by MrBlackCat

I agree with alot of the above conceptually, and some of how it might could be done. (by the Shredder of Neos )

In my mind it comes down to knowing the difference between Arrogance and confidence.
These things are black and white to me... and Duke 3D was always confident, but not totally lacking humility, as he is usually talking to himself or stating something "AFTER" the fact... like "Rest in Pieces." after that gibb... but never ranting or "talking smack". He just did it, then comment.

Duke Nukem 3D never came across as "silly" or "arrogant" within the context of the Duke Nukem 3D world... Duke Nukem Forever, Duke, was not this way, in my opinion.

Example of the exact same concept in another game... GTA III, never stepped over a certain boundary with sexual innuendo, and its suggestive nature. Liberty City Stories was amazingly vulgar and I can't even play it with children about... they got WAY out of line on that one, and it really hurts the game for me.

MrBlackCat

I think DN3D was actually a pretty serious game - I remember in 1996 I was actually scared to play the E2 levels because of their creepy atmosphere. The game was like a sea of some putrid ugly grey reality with few isles of light that would lighten the game a bit (but not too much). Humor is actually the only thing that distinguishes DN from other FPS - and the only thing GBX could actually ma profit from. We must collectively forget about a DN as a game that can set the standards (mostly because DN3D never did it) because there will be companies with bigger budgets and bigger sales that DN would never have any chance to take on.

[Synthesizer]

I also feel the game was scary to play. & this feeling was like tempting you to play anyway. To go underwater & crap your pants when an octobrain was coming (with their screams!)

So I agree with you in that.

But about Gearbox's budget & sales, I don't think that this is actually a turning point. I think they are capable of developing professional games & they got the licence of a very important game. I don't know who was responsible of the game's flaws (3DR, Gearbox, whoever). It doesn't matter to me either. But 1st of all many main things that brought success to DN3D (& to DNF 2000 trailer among the fans) were not present in DNF.
I don't say DNF should have been a modern copy of DN3D, I just think that if you were successfull when creating a wheel & that changed the world; if you remove it you are regressing...
Wanted to make something different? ADD things. Improve things. But don't remove successfull things... Don't go backwards with level design, weapons, items, freedom... In DN3D you break walls & hydrants (& water goes off them). In DNF you can't.

Mario Bross is less linear than DNF!!! I hit the nail with this one, didn't I?!!!

[trustn0!]

Originally Posted by pjVgt

Check the sales of Serious Sam 3 - Croteam never expected sales that low. I suppose DNF which is sadly an inferior game to SS3 outsold it by a order of a magnitude (main point is that SS3 was not consolized and was not published on PS3/X360).

I personally would if i could but steam doesnt release sale data

Also apparently its gonna be ported to the consoles?

But imo that just wont work
Not because of the level structure(which imo has never been good in the ss series) but because the gameplay is just ******* demanding
I remember trying out the PS2 SS game and FFS i couldnt get past the first stage

]IMO the gameplay on a console just doesnt work due to the fast paced nature of it

[~Orcrist]

Yes, it is a very sad thing.
SS3:BFE has one of the best SP Campaigns I have played in a looong time...

I mean Seriously, the Last Level has more enemies in it than all the CoD's put together. It has perfect pacing, the weapons are powerful, the enemies are varied and powerful, the gameplay is hectic, it stays true to its roots, it is funny, the levels are HUGE, the sprinting is fast, MP is fun and surprisingly the plot is quite good too !

It is the perfect Old School game, and yet, it wasn't a blockbuster hit. (Though it sold quite well !)

Yes, it was recently ported to Mac, and is being ported to XBox 360/PS3 soon !

So, yes making an "Old School" game will not be what GBX would want to do with DN5. They want to earn bucketloads of money, not please a handful of fans !

[trustn0!]

Originally Posted by ~Orcrist

It has perfect pacing,

It is the perfect Old School game,

No
no
no
NO
NO
Just no


Serious Sam does not have good pacing nor is it old school

Old school is not about the character or the destruction no matter what the marketing hype made you think

Old school is characterized by these things

Brilliant complex level design
Good pacing within these levels
And genius enemy placement

SS has never done any of this
SS3 starts out as a corridor shooter then at the halfway point it turns into an arena shooter
It does not posses good pacing AT ALL unless you mean a good sense of escalation which it does provide but it is not the same as good pacing within its levels

A GOOD new old school game would be Bioshock

SS is not old school rather its based on custom doom and DN3D maps and mods people would make

Dont get me wrong its still good(SS2 can go the **** away though)