Future of THQ is in question...

The picture that I'm getting of THQ is not necessarily a company that was horribly incompetent. And they made some good games. Isn't part of the problem that it costs a lot of money to make games and very few companies exist that can make AAA games and absorb losses? Who else is there not counting platform holders? EA, Activision, Square, Konami? Who else?

From what I've been reading, it was incompetently run because they had a number of money-losing franchises they tried to keep going for a long time and they put down tons of money to secure licenses for kids games when that market was tanking and now most of those licenses just got handed back to the IP holders with no refunds. Also, betting the future of the company on uDraw for 360 and PS3 which anyone with sense could have told them would tank. Also, doing things like releasing Saints Row The Third in the busiest release period of 2011 when it probably could have sold far more if it was released around now when nothing's coming out. The AAA business model is in a pretty bad place right now and that's definitely a part of the problem but from my armchair position, I don't think it's been a very well-run company either. Had they made some of the decision they're making now a couple of years ago, they'd probably be better off.

The thing is though, what do you do instead? It's easy to say "AAA is bad" in retrospect, or that releasing in the middle of November is dumb, but Saints Row 3 did well for them (I think it was their best mainstream game last year), and November is the best time to release. Looking at the flip side they released Homefront with lots of publicity in a quiet period and it didn't set the world on fire. AAA is a big gamble, and there's lots to lose if you do it wrong, but the rewards are there if you do it right.

Scratched wrote:

The thing is though, what do you do instead? It's easy to say "AAA is bad" in retrospect, or that releasing in the middle of November is dumb, but Saints Row 3 did well for them (I think it was their best mainstream game last year), and November is the best time to release. Looking at the flip side they released Homefront with lots of publicity in a quiet period and it didn't set the world on fire. AAA is a big gamble, and there's lots to lose if you do it wrong, but the rewards are there if you do it right.

That's why I asked earlier who is making money in AAA outside of a few big name publishers. Seems like it's feast or famine for everyone else.

Scratched wrote:

The thing is though, what do you do instead? It's easy to say "AAA is bad" in retrospect, or that releasing in the middle of November is dumb, but Saints Row 3 did well for them (I think it was their best mainstream game last year), and November is the best time to release. Looking at the flip side they released Homefront with lots of publicity in a quiet period and it didn't set the world on fire. AAA is a big gamble, and there's lots to lose if you do it wrong, but the rewards are there if you do it right.

Hindsight is 20/20 of course but SR3 is great by all accounts and Homefront is awful. They'd be in way better shape if they had swapped those.

But that raises the bigger than THQ question of how do you make sure your game isn't awful.

The point I was making is that AAA in November isn't dumb. SR3 wasn't sent to die, they sent it to be their best AAA game in the year.

I know SR3 sold 1 million copies in the first week, but I haven't seen any numbers since then. It certainly was their best AAA game of the year, but I can't help but wonder if it might have been less overlooked if it had released 2 or 3 weeks earlier (i.e. before Skyrim, another highly anticipated open-world game).

Last figure I saw was 4.8 million copies of SR3.

If that's accurate, and I hope it is, then that's very respectable. I got the impression that it would be significantly lower than that.

Malor wrote:

Last figure I saw was 4.8 million copies of SR3.

I saw 3.6 recently but maybe that's been updated. And again, I don't know anything but from what I heard on a lot of podcasts from people who know better than any of us, the belief is it could have sold far better had it come out now instead of November.

Parallax Abstraction wrote:
Malor wrote:

Last figure I saw was 4.8 million copies of SR3.

I saw 3.6 recently but maybe that's been updated. And again, I don't know anything but from what I heard on a lot of podcasts from people who know better than any of us, the belief is it could have sold far better had it come out now instead of November.

That sounds kind of crazy to me. Mass Effect games release at this time of year and don't do over 3 million in the (edit) two months.

Parallax Abstraction wrote:

From what I've been reading, it was incompetently run because they had a number of money-losing franchises they tried to keep going for a long time and they put down tons of money to secure licenses for kids games when that market was tanking and now most of those licenses just got handed back to the IP holders with no refunds. Also, betting the future of the company on uDraw for 360 and PS3 which anyone with sense could have told them would tank. Also, doing things like releasing Saints Row The Third in the busiest release period of 2011 when it probably could have sold far more if it was released around now when nothing's coming out. The AAA business model is in a pretty bad place right now and that's definitely a part of the problem but from my armchair position, I don't think it's been a very well-run company either. Had they made some of the decision they're making now a couple of years ago, they'd probably be better off.

This is my understanding. I can't believe anyone thought the uDraw would be a hit. Then again, the Wii was a hit (although now may be floundering, the WiiU looks terrible to me, the 3DS hasn't done that well, and Nintendo has had what, two straight quarters of record losses or something?).

EDIT: Too bad, love Saints Row 3.

The Mass Effect series while popular, is not as popular as the "Grand Theft Auto" class of games. Mass Effect is a title hardcore gamers (and specifically RPG fans) buy. GTA or similar games are the second title the guys who also buy Call of Duty get every year.

Nah, only GTA/RS has ever done that kind of business in that genre. Expecting the same from the second string is folly. You mention CoD, but similar games bring a fraction of the sales. Same principle.

If indeed they've sold over 3 million copies of SR3 it's a step up from 2, and they should be happy with it. I would expect half of that in a non-holiday release. EA was pretty keen to get ME3 into that window because they know you won't get the same impact any other time of year. Not every game belongs in November, but there is room for one blockbuster per week starting in October and ending at Thanksgiving.

Blind_Evil wrote:

Not every game belongs in November, but there is room for one blockbuster per week starting in October and ending at Thanksgiving.

Yeah, and SR3 came out the same day as AssCreedRevo, the best-selling title in that series to date and that week's de facto blockbuster, and four days after Skyrim, the second-best-selling title of that month. Even by late fall standards, that's crowded as crap.

The point I was going for earlier was that while you can probably make a list of games released to success in Q1, it's probably significantly shorter than the list of successful games in Q4 (talking calendar quarters). It's not a matter of "you have to give the big studios some space", it's that there's a truckload more people buying at that time, so there's room for everyone.

Also if you're trying to say "THQ should give the bigger studios room", then why stop at THQ as though they're some garage outfit, there's plenty of other games that presumably the publisher was 'unwise' to ship at that date. What qualifies you to release in Q4?

Sticking to my guns here, the game wasn't gonna do better any other month, except maybe late October. If another similarly-established series has an entry do better in like May or June I'll eat crow. Scratched is right though, you're fighting for a piece of a WAY bigger pie around the holidays.

Yeah. A holiday release makes far more sense for most games. Even if the market is very crowded more people are buying games so the opportunities are greater. And whether SR3 sold 3.6 or 4.8 million copies I think that the figures support that.

hbi2k wrote:
Blind_Evil wrote:

Not every game belongs in November, but there is room for one blockbuster per week starting in October and ending at Thanksgiving.

Yeah, and SR3 came out the same day as AssCreedRevo, the best-selling title in that series to date and that week's de facto blockbuster, and four days after Skyrim, the second-best-selling title of that month. Even by late fall standards, that's crowded as crap.

And it sold 4.8 million.

I mean, that's like saying someone made two billion dollars in a day, but if they had done it on another day they'd have made two billion and five hundred thousand dollars and as such it was a bad and dumb idea.

I think if you're a big AAA game, it's better to sell around the holidays because everyone will be buying you up for Christmas at full price. But, if you're a smaller game or a new IP with less marketing and such behind it, then you will do better during the non-Holidays. I mean, think about it. Every holiday people have to pick and choose what they'll get because of all the releases, and most of the time it's the games that can't afford to get cut, get cut.

Stop undercutting my Monday-morning quarterbacking! I need someone to feel superior to! Someone who's not here to defend himself! Stop defending people who aren't here to defend themselves! (-:

Nah, in seriousness, I'm not a businessman and this is all just spitballing anyway, so I can't say I'm too terribly interested in debating this any further. Y'all could be totally right, I have no idea.

Y'know, you'd think it would be worthwhile for a publisher to sponsor 2-4 man teams to produce 'indy' games once a year or something. Maybe it's too much small potatoes for these guys, but you'd think that you'd be able to cycle through a LOT of design concepts and ideas over time, getting yourself a good sense of what the public likes or doesn't like.

I just think of a team like MinMax guys and what they've accomplished with Spaz...

I'm sure they do, you just don't hear about them and they happen rarely. Even so, developers at the AAA end of the pool struggle to get new things approved. I'm trying to think of one of the pitching stories that's out there where it went "...and the publisher was in full support from the moment they saw it", there's plenty of examples the other way, including stuff like COD Modern Warfare which might indicate publishers don't know what's good for them.

I just think of a team like MinMax guys and what they've accomplished with Spaz...

I have an absolutely unreasonable love for that game. I'd love to see more like it.

Lots of room for expansion with that engine, too.

Pawz wrote:

Y'know, you'd think it would be worthwhile for a publisher to sponsor 2-4 man teams to produce 'indy' games once a year or something. Maybe it's too much small potatoes for these guys, but you'd think that you'd be able to cycle through a LOT of design concepts and ideas over time, getting yourself a good sense of what the public likes or doesn't like.

I just think of a team like MinMax guys and what they've accomplished with Spaz...

It's a nice idea in theory, but there are some bumps in the road. Double Fine's post-Brutal Legend approach is something similar.

Indie games aren't like indie music, in that you can bang it out in a few weeks just because it's lacking in scope. Bastion I believe took two years to make with a seven person dev team. I also suspect that large publishers like EA or Activision would be treated like sh*t by the audience regardless of how sincere they are in the support of such a movement.

Blind_Evil wrote:
Pawz wrote:

Y'know, you'd think it would be worthwhile for a publisher to sponsor 2-4 man teams to produce 'indy' games once a year or something. Maybe it's too much small potatoes for these guys, but you'd think that you'd be able to cycle through a LOT of design concepts and ideas over time, getting yourself a good sense of what the public likes or doesn't like.

I just think of a team like MinMax guys and what they've accomplished with Spaz...

It's a nice idea in theory, but there are some bumps in the road. Double Fine's post-Brutal Legend approach is something similar.

Indie games aren't like indie music, in that you can bang it out in a few weeks just because it's lacking in scope. Bastion I believe took two years to make with a seven person dev team. I also suspect that large publishers like EA or Activision would be treated like sh*t by the audience regardless of how sincere they are in the support of such a movement.

I think Double Fine and Bastion are both proof that that idea works, but I agree that once a year might be too ambitious. Although clearly Double Fine had no problem with it.

Personally I just want to see more small games period. Whether its a 2 man team indie game or something like Renegade Ops which was made by a AAA team with a AAA engine doesn't really matter to me.

gregrampage wrote:

Personally I just want to see more small games period. Whether its a 2 man team indie game or something like Renegade Ops which was made by a AAA team with a AAA engine doesn't really matter to me.

Renegade ops was good, but that constant delay on the PC really dampened my feelings towards that game.

Pawz wrote:

Y'know, you'd think it would be worthwhile for a publisher to sponsor 2-4 man teams to produce 'indy' games once a year or something. Maybe it's too much small potatoes for these guys, but you'd think that you'd be able to cycle through a LOT of design concepts and ideas over time, getting yourself a good sense of what the public likes or doesn't like.

A couple of publishers have tried that. LucasArts did it once and we got Lucidity and then they went scrambling back to the All Star Wars All The Time strategy.

EA somewhat does this with their EA Partners program. Which runs the gamut from small games like Fancypants Adventures all the way up to bigger things like Shadows of the Damned and Crysis 2. However, that's more of a publishing agreement instead of creating a developer "farm team".

shoptroll wrote:

EA somewhat does this with their EA Partners program.

I don't think it's anything EA goes out and promotes for the aim of making new novel games. It's a publishing thing for companies external to EA, and I think there's an optional finance angle to it(as I think is the case for Respawn). As far as I'm aware it's strictly business.

BlackSabre wrote:
gregrampage wrote:

Personally I just want to see more small games period. Whether its a 2 man team indie game or something like Renegade Ops which was made by a AAA team with a AAA engine doesn't really matter to me.

Renegade ops was good, but that constant delay on the PC really dampened my feelings towards that game.

Yeah that was awful. Really I don't mean more games like Renegade Ops so much as more games that are small games made with AAA resources.

Are you talking more along the line of Shadow Complex?