treave
Arcane
- Joined
- Jul 6, 2008
- Messages
- 11,370
Rather than going all out working on big huge AAA projects they might do better to assign a few staff to produce multiple small-scale 2D indie style "proof-of-concept" RPGs that can be more experimental and push the boundaries of the genre. It'd bring in some money at least. It seems like nowadays any game with a decent amount of creativity and style will net you more than 10k worth of sales easy.
Indeed. That's what Double Fine have been doing now, making several smaller projects, and they have been quite succesful with it so far.
Again, Obsidian's too big for that. They are nearly double the size of DoubleFine. And an AAA Project will always be more profitable. It's a good idea of course, but its also risky and you still need publishers for them. Double Fine has an excellent reputation they can bank on as well.
(Also, Double Fine had its own problems. Layoffs were closing in before their Kickstarter.)
Well, because of their size they should be able to spare a small portion of their manpower for indie projects. While working on their AAA projects, some of the more dedicated or creative staff can be funded to pursue cheaper projects. These don't need to be ambitious, 50 hour epics. Short games with less than 10 hours of gameplay can sell (cheaply), especially if they have an interesting gimmick or style.
Sure, these little projects, by themselves, aren't going to keep the company afloat, but they have at least two other advantages:
1) Funding is inexpensive, so the profit margin is higher. Any bit of money counts.
2) If they're good at it (and part of the Codex certainly thinks they are), this will only help improve Obsidian's reputation. Right now they're known for being buggy and for only doing sequels to the IPs of others. Regardless of whether that reputation is deserved, this is what the casual gamer thinks of them. Releasing quirky, interesting RPGs (could even be episodic, as dreaded that word may be) often will change how people view them.
If the games are good, it increases their fanbase. A rabid fanbase practically ensures sales in the gaming industry. If the games are bad... well, Obsidian, you weren't as good as we thought you were after all, eh? Eh?
Rather than getting a publisher, can they not sell it themselves digitally? Though listening to Fargo talk about the way publishers behave, I could see how it could be that publishers do not like developers who have a successful track record of going indie. Such a move might harm their relationship with publishers for that petty reason, I guess. (edited for clarity)
Not coaching this as the be-all end-all saving strategy for Obsidian, but they could do with rethinking their approach to the industry. Then again, Fearghus is still at the helm isn't he?