Rebuilding Faith in RPG Development

[Socrates]

I've noticed here that there is a lot of extreme negativity focused on developers and more specifically, development studios as whole. In my experience the usual source of problems like these tends be communicative in nature. In other words, how could development studios rebuild trust and confidence in RPGs they produce to you specifically. I would especially be interested if any developers or creative types here would have anything to add. The list of questions would go something like this:

1. What are modern studios doing that are a problem or annoy you?
2. How could a developer demonstrate good-faith efforts to resolve those concerns?
3. What type of communication style between the developer and you would be ideal?
4. How would the communication ideally be established between you and the developer. (Examples: AMA's or Open Forums)

 

[Fedora Master]

1. What are modern studios doing that are a problem or annoy you?

Not designing games for me, the actual audience.

2. How could a developer demonstrate good-faith efforts to resolve those concerns?

They can't.

 

[Socrates]

1. What are modern studios doing that are a problem or annoy you?

Not designing games for me, the actual audience.

Do you have some examples of this?

 

[frajaq]

1) Stop putting ugly past-the-wall foids in videogames
2) Less black people/gays/trannies also

 

[Butter]

Obsidian are the easiest example. They had a passionate and hardcore audience, and they utterly abandoned them. New Vegas is interesting because it appealed to both casuals and to more hardcore RPG enthusiasts, but Obsidian's latest slop is for casuals only, and they show no signs of wanting to re-engage with their former audience.

Additionally, they let all of their most talented writers get away, and replaced them with a bunch of untalented woke midwits. They don't even have what it takes to write another Pillars of Eternity at this point, let alone another Mask of the Betrayer.

How can Obsidian ever regain my trust? They would have to fire most of their staff and make a quality product. I'm not going to hold my breath.

 

[Socrates]

Obsidian are the easiest example. They had a passionate and hardcore audience, and they utterly abandoned them.

Would you say this was intentional or unintentional?

 

[Butter]

Obsidian are the easiest example. They had a passionate and hardcore audience, and they utterly abandoned them.

Would you say this was intentional or unintentional?

Very much intentional.

 

[Lagole Gon]

>3. What type of communication style between the developer and you would be ideal?

Sometimes I wonder if too much communication can be more harmful than not enough of it.
BG3 suffered from too many mid-development changes, maybe the feedback is too blame here.

 

[biffthestiff]

> 1. What are modern studios doing that are a problem or annoy you?

a. Story and gameplay always feel recycled because I've played so many games. I think it's a huge challenge to try to please RPG veterans while aiming for financial success, and it may be unwise. Probably better to make a mass market game.

b. For AAA games, I can spot nu-dev (diversity hire/male feminist/corpodrone/etc) contributions in the writing, character design, etc, which is a huge turnoff. By this I mean using the game to make modern political statements, usually dictated from on high. In addition to being immersion breaking, it's usually written by people who can't actually write anything good. And games already struggle with having decent writing.
To be clear I'm not interested in some game that goes the opposite way, I'm not looking to be pandered to. Just go back to circa 2005 game design.

>2. How could a developer demonstrate good-faith efforts to resolve those concerns?
I think I'll be able to see it from a trailer, and from reading other people's comment online.

>3. What type of communication style between the developer and you would be ideal?
>4. How would the communication ideally be established between you and the developer. (Examples: AMA's or Open Forums)

None? As a gamer I have no interest in talking to devs. Let them make the game they want and when it's out, either we'll like it or we won't. If some devs absolutely need feedback to guide development, they should rely on a trusted small group of genre fans + a few normies.
Forums like this let you reach hardcore older gamers, Twitter gets you normie older gamers...and idk where they can find the average 20yo gamer, I guess Reddit?

 

[Iucounu]

how could development studios rebuild trust and confidence in RPGs they produce to you specifically.

I don't think they can without replacing much of their staff.

1. What are modern studios doing that are a problem or annoy you?

They are in a cult.

2. How could a developer demonstrate good-faith efforts to resolve those concerns?

Alas I believe that good faith is missing, so the question is moot.

3. What type of communication style between the developer and you would be ideal?

Why would I communicate with developers if I don't want to play their game? They would have to pay me very generously.

On the other hand, if I do like their games, there already is "trust and confidence" and thus no negativity.

4. How would the communication ideally be established between you and the developer. (Examples: AMA's or Open Forums)

For paid consultancy work that would vary from case to case. My free advice is available here on the forum.

 

[Tyranicon]

Never gonna happen, but here's a list of common sense items if any studio of ill repute wants to try:

1. Hire people who are talented and have a passion for games.
2. Have honest and transparent communication with the playerbase instead of hiring community managers to be punching bags.
3. Money is important, but don't go chasing trends or follow the advise of some clueless business guy.
4. Don't gouge every cent out of the player. Sell them high quality (as much as you're able to) finished games for a reasonable price.
5. Know what your core audience is and make games for them, not a super broad net to grab as many consoomers as you can.
6. Don't be a dick.

That's it. That's all you need to run successful RPG studio.

Meanwhile, most of them:

 

[AdolfSatan]

How stupid would it be if a musician released a wonky song with the rhythm section missing thru half of the track, and then asked why listeners are dropping?

Nobody cares about communicating. Make good games, price them accordingly, release them on time without bugs. You know, the basic level of professionalism one would expect in any product.

If you have to ask what makes a game good, then you’re probably not cut for it and should be focusing on what you know.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Any developer would be insane to develop a game aimed at the Codex. We clearly don't represent mainstream trends and no studio could survive on our support alone.

 

[Tyranicon]

Any developer would be insane to develop a game aimed at the Codex. We clearly don't represent mainstream trends and no studio could survive on our support alone.

Yeah but we have good taste and fuck everything else.

It's all slop out there.

 

[Faarbaute]

I've noticed here that there is a lot of extreme negativity focused on developers and more specifically, development studios as whole. In my experience the usual source of problems like these tends be communicative in nature. In other words, how could development studios rebuild trust and confidence in RPGs they produce to you specifically. I would especially be interested if any developers or creative types here would have anything to add. The list of questions would go something like this:

1. What are modern studios doing that are a problem or annoy you?
2. How could a developer demonstrate good-faith efforts to resolve those concerns?
3. What type of communication style between the developer and you would be ideal?
4. How would the communication ideally be established between you and the developer. (Examples: AMA's or Open Forums)

They need to produce good RPGs. That's it.

 

[agris]

Never gonna happen, but here's a list of common sense items if any studio of ill repute wants to try:

1. Hire people who are talented and have a passion for games.
2. Have honest and transparent communication with the playerbase instead of hiring community managers to be punching bags.
3. Money is important, but don't go chasing trends or follow the advise of some clueless business guy.
4. Don't gouge every cent out of the player. Sell them high quality (as much as you're able to) finished games for a reasonable price.
5. Know what your core audience is and make games for them, not a super broad net to grab as many consoomers as you can.
6. Don't be a dick.

That's it. That's all you need to run successful RPG studio.

will never happen. only remaining hope is eastern european vagrants squatting in the exclusion zone finally get tired of replaying Fallout 1 and decide to make their own game

 

[Hammer Of The Heretics]

1. Rebuild RPG development.

That's it. Do that and you don't need "faith". You can point to what you created as actual evidence.

 

[Socrates]

If you have to ask what makes a game good, then you’re probably not cut for it and should be focusing on what you know.

I don't think this is true - the ability to introspect and take new ideas and innovate them is also a crucial factor in design direction.

 

[Abu Antar]

Do the game "you" want to make, no compromises made. Do not make games that the market* wants.

*The loud minority.

 

[The Wall]

Any developer would be insane to develop a game aimed at the Codex. We clearly don't represent mainstream trends and no studio could survive on our support alone.

Yeah 40k Rogue Trader like RPG but with male/female genders selection, better writing and slightly more grim-realistic graphics and without shoe-horned in black characters would sell TERRIBLY

Morrowind or Daggerfall or Ghotic like RPG that promoted masculinity, was Euro-centric and had good writing and gameplay coupled with nice art style that told kind of stories that have been told for thousands of years prior to ~2015. That game would BOMB

You see, if Baldur's Gate 3 didn't have demographics of Chicago or New York in 2023, and didn't feature gay parades and bear forest gangbangs, noone would play it. Noone

What gamers are most excited about Dragon's Dogma 2 is all the nigger characters that perfectly blend in with medieval european fantasy setting of knights, high castles and dragons

 

[The Wall]

What gamers want is more nigger dick in their face, more ugly women, your love interest being magical tranny and being told repeatedly by game narrator:FUCK YOU! KILL YOURSELF WHITE SCUM

Gamers realllllllyyy lack those motifs and messages in their games. Without those, any game is unplayable

 

[The Wall]

Make game about gang raping Western Civilization to death and sell it to Western audience. Earn billion$

 

[AdolfSatan]

If you have to ask what makes a game good, then you’re probably not cut for it and should be focusing on what you know.

I don't think this is true - the ability to introspect and take new ideas and innovate them is also a crucial factor in design direction.

If you already have a solid ground to stand upon. Critique and iteration will add a layer of perfection, but if you don’t have a good base, you’re just polishing turds.

 

[Fedora Master]

Every single major studio has got to go and the people, down to the janitor, must be prevented from ever working on games again.

 

[just]

let (male(heterosexual)) programmers do the writing in games