'Middle class games are dead,' says Bleszinski
You need to be triple-A or indie to have any chance of success.
A studio making a "middle class" game might as well scrap the project now, Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski told an audience at GDC last night. Unless your game is triple-A or indie you don't stand a chance.
"I'm going to go on the record and say that I believe the middle class game is dead," said Bleszinski during his 'Rise of the Power Creative' presentation.
Making an analogy with the movie industry, he added: "It needs to be either an event movie – day one, company filed trip, Battlefield: LA, we're there. Avatar – we're there. The Other Guys starring Will Ferrell and Marky Mark? Nah, I'll f****** rent that, I don't really care - right?
"Or it has to be an indie film. Black Swan – I'll go and see that. I'll go to The Rialto or I'll go to the AAA Imax movie. The middle one is just gone, and I think the same thing has happened to games."
Thankfully for Bleszinski, Gears of War 3 sits firmly in the triple-A category.
VideoGamer.com Analysis
It's an interesting idea, but surely one which publishers face a huge risk in following. Triple-A titles don't come cheap, and while there is the potential for massive success there remains a good chance the game will fail to meet targets.
Is Namco Bandai's Enslaved a middle class game? The Ninja Theory developed title had great production values, Hollywood talent and an engaging story, yet was a commercial flop. Perhaps when held up against genre rival Uncharted 2, Enslaved does fall into no-man's land.
User Comments
Bloodstorm
enviro-bear@ CheekyLee
I think he was referring to 360, PC and ps3
Woffls
He is right about the traditional game market, but this theory entirely ignores 'casual' gaming and evergreen titles. Games like Dark Sector, Crackdown 2 or Red Faction aren't likely to achieve great success, and may even struggle to make a profit, despite being decent games. It's the ones at extremes of the scale which are making the money, and that's why middle sized publishers are slowly being eaten up, and middle sized developers are going out of business.
Ghost_Dog@ altaranga
altaranga
CheekyLee
rico_rico