Game News Puuk dishes out THE TRUTH about Fallout 3

[Volourn]

Hmm.. VD... Just a point. Over three times the amount is not that much of a difference in price? WOWSERS. Not to mention, the PC price you quoted is only found if you are picky and shop around for the best prices. Take time = money factored in; and the price is even more than three times.

I do, agree that one should not generalizationize as the Sims, Diablo, and Warcraft prove that PC games games can sell quite well. The BIO games show this to a lesser degree as well.

Lastly, doesn't 99% of people who argue on both saides claim they're an insider who know the cold hard facts? It's lame either way. As soon as I hear the follow words:"Listen to me as I work in the industry."; I rend to roll my eyes. Like this even:

 

[DrattedTin]

You get a lot more for that 600-700 than you do for that 200, though.

 

[Volourn]

True; but it is still agreater investment so you SHOULD get more out of it. That doesn't make it, relatively speaking, barely more expensive.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Hmm.. VD... Just a point. Over three times the amount is not that much of a difference in price? WOWSERS.

The key word was THAT. 2,500 vs 150 is huge, 600 vs 200 is not THAT much especially considering like DrattedTin pointed out that you get much more, a computer is a multipurpose tool while a console is only a toy.

Not to mention, the PC price you quoted is only found if you are picky and shop around for the best prices. Take time = money factored in; and the price is even more than three times.

I was talking about affordability. Of course you can get an uber rig that would cost you 5 times as much, but the point was that an average person could buy a decent box from Dell for 499 (Celeron 2.4G 128RAM) to 799 (P4 2.6 256RAM) both comes with 17" monitors. If you go to a small shop, they will build you something for 500 easily. It IS affordable these days

 

[Volourn]

Cool.

 

[chrisbeddoes]

Look I am an adult gamer.

There is no way i will ever buy a console.

Bying a console and playing games is not very socially acceptable.

You cannot alt+tab and make the console dissapear.

So i will only play pc games.

It does not matter what else happens.


I can understand that console games are a bigger market than the pc

BUT this means nothing. How many games are made for the pc and how many games are made for the console ?


How much money a console game earns and how much a pc game ?


And do not forget the console wars.

A war like between SONY and Micro$oft is made until 1 winner exists.

If Micro$oft did not enter the game the Playstation 2 would cost 300$ or more right now.

If Micro$oft quits or Sony quits the next gaming console will have an average price of $350 NOT $200.

And if the next thing happens also

Linux can do a good emulation of Direct X in the future

then we will have a $450 PC versus a $350 Console.

Who do you think will win ?


And another question .

Is'nt Micro$oft loosing like $800 Mil per year in order to finance this console war that has made consoles far cheaper and made in turn console games sell so much more ?

Do you really think that this situation will last for ever ?


Ha ha ha !!!!!

 

[Feargus Urquhart]

PC vs. Console...

Some comments about the return on the investment in making games when you compare PC vs. consoles.

1) When a new console comes out generally everyone has to spend a lot of money just figuring out how to now make games for it, while on the PC the engines generally evolve. I can't really quantify this, but I would guess this to cost most publishers $10M to $20M in new technology and cancelled projects every time the new consoles come out.

2) All console games require about a $10 licensing fee, which includes your packaging and DVDs. This can be two to five times the cost of packaging for a PC. When the Whole Sale Price is around $36 (most people will say $40, but I've never found that to be true with all the special dealing that happens). The PC game can start out 20% ahead on the actual net cash you get.

3) Marketing for console games can be a lot more expensive since they have to derive more units to make the same money - so more people need to buy them, which means more marketing. Plus console players have traditionally been less tuned in - so publishers have had to use more mass market marketing like Maxim and TV, which cost a crap load more than websites and ads in Computer Games.

4) Development systems for console development can run upwards of $100K to $200K depending on the size of the team and that is on top of the normal hardware people need like PCs and Monitors.

I have also found that you can make PC games somewhat cheaper as a whole compared to console games. If I budgeted a product like Fallout right now and I had a technology base (like an engine), I would say someone could get it done for between $3M and $4M. It could even be as cheap as $2M or $2.5M with some careful re-use of assets. Now that is just the development budget though, that doesn't include all the other costs of getting a game on the shelf like QA, Audio, Localization, Marketing, PR and payoffs to the mob.

-Feargus

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Yeah, but in turn, you also get a lot of free sales to places like Blockbuster(lots o copies!), who rent out console games. That said, it's rather funny to look at Interplay's track record with consoles and wonder why the hell they're wanting to only do console games. BG2 sold many, many copies compared to BG:DA, for example, so one has to wonder why they'd opt for BG:DA2 instead of BG3.

 

[Jinsai]

Riiight. Now who'se tweaking facts? You assume everyone in the games biz is like Herve Caen? Nobody wants to make a shitty game. But you do need to make money on your game to get a shot at making another one.

hose $500-$600 PCs won't play Deus Ex anywhere near the level of the XBox. The point I am making here is that a "gaming PC" is far more expensive than a gaming console. Consoles are the mass market, PCs are for the connoisseur.

You people are so hostile.

 

[Otaku_Hanzo]

And you are a moron.

I can EASILY put together a system for $500 that will play ANYTHING the XBox can and even better. And if you think it's not possible, then you need to research PCs alot better. I have done this plenty of times in the past for friends and myself. I also have a friend who puts together PCs as well and sells them for profit. Those $1500-$2000 PCs you can get in the stores? He can make them for $600-$800 dollars and make a killing.

I'll let you search the computer hardware/software websites out there and do the math.

 

[triCritical]

What Otaku said. You couldn't me to take a PC that was of the same quality as an XBOX. Keep in mind that for about a 1000 bucks you could have a PC better then the XBOX 3 years ago!

Yeah, but in turn, you also get a lot of free sales to places like Blockbuster(lots o copies!), who rent out console games. That said, it's rather funny to look at Interplay's track record with consoles and wonder why the hell they're wanting to only do console games. BG2 sold many, many copies compared to BG:DA, for example, so one has to wonder why they'd opt for BG:DA2 instead of BG3.

Wasn't some of the problems with BG3 associated with its maturity level. Essentially that DnD is kiddy stuff now so no bad stuff like drugs, or black markets and what not. I think Hasbro and their family reputation haver turned DnD into something I and many other will no longer find the least bit interesting.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Riiight. Now who'se tweaking facts? You assume everyone in the games biz is like Herve Caen?

No, of course not, the PC gaming industry is known for smart decisions. That's why Atari had plenty dev time for MOO3 but not for ToEE, that's why somebody had the money to publish that UFO crap, Lionheart deserves a special category, departure of Blizzard's key players, the BIS sad story, and so on. Anyway, you referred to some guys who "run development houses and do things like decide whether to make a PC game or a console game" and my point was that it usually means shit, unless you are willing to call names so we can see whether this company's record is worth something.

Nobody wants to make a shitty game. But you do need to make money on your game to get a shot at making another one.

well you can do slumdunks and hope it would fly somehow or you can do what Blizzard does or did. To anyone who'd say that Bliz had plenty of time and money unlike Iply for example, count how much money Iply wasted on a number of stupid projects.

hose $500-$600 PCs won't play Deus Ex anywhere near the level of the XBox. The point I am making here is that a "gaming PC" is far more expensive than a gaming console. Consoles are the mass market, PCs are for the connoisseur.

Ok, one more time with more details:

1. Price-wise, check PriceWatch and see what kinda system you can get for 500-600.
2. When you buy a PC you get a lot of stuff, the net, truckload of easily accessible games including tons of free ones, word and excel are a must these days, etc
3. There are games that are exclusive for certain consoles. The best ones usually are. So you have to buy another one or limit yourself. If you buy all 3, there you go, you are already at PC level price wise and all you got are some toys.

You people are so hostile.

Welcome to the RPG Codex! :D

 

[Volourn]

Weird... HOTU has slavery, sacrifices, and the like in it... Hmm.... However, I must point out that supposedly like Troika and TOEE; BIO was also forced to remove a brothel... Perhaps, it's just brothels Hasbro despises?

 

[EvoG]

Consoles get a higher sell through due to the nature of console gaming, that while yes, you want to have greater visibility, console games tend to sell more naturally ( of course unless they are critically slammed ).

On top of that, the many Blockbusters, Hollywood Videos, etc, all over the country buy most console games, if only 1 or 2 copies....so there is guaranteed revenue right there. We were working on minor CG film/tv thingy some time ago, and as I was led to understand, even if the film tanked, we could look to get 20 million from direct to video purchases and rentals. I can't verify that particular amount, but if its any measure, there you go.

New console engine developement is also iterative, just like PC, so I'm not sure where the 10 - 20 million dollar investment cost comes in. You're programming on PC's for your console game, so really the only thing is the learning curve of developing the sometimes godforsaken hardware to make it do what you want it to, but nothing above and beyond the programmer costs. It was Sony and Nintendo and MS's job to spend hundreds of millions in R&D. THEY invested the money on the new technology; the developer is going to invest time reading the huge ass manuals. :D

200k for dev systems? Erm, no, unless something's changed. If I recall correctly, our PSone dev kits ran for about 20k +/-(per programmer). This was of course 7 years ago. They had big clunky boards that went inside your computer, hooked up to the fancy blue box PS's and such. I don't have specific figures for Xbox, but the PS2 is/was around 15k, with linux versions of both being had between 200 and 500 dollars( not that that matters a whole lot but whatever ). So I'm not sure where 200k comes in for hardware sans computer system.

Finally, WITH engine already complete, it would cost 3 - 4 million just for development?( someones salary is WAY too high at that point ) Fuck, it cost the brilliant( I mean this sincerely ) Peter Molyneux 7 million to make his engine for Black and White INCLUDING game from scratch( out of his own pocket I might add ). Love or hate B&W, it was an incredible piece of work. So where the heck do you spend 4 million just on asset dev when you already have the core completed?! Sheesh, no wonder no one wants to invest in games these days unless it's sure fire. Didn't all of NWN cost 5 million, with their fancy MP engine and toolkit made accessible to the masses?

In order to see games like FO and games expanded beyond the scope of the mainstream, these numbers have to come down a little. There is a lot of waste and bloat that goes into making medium to large budget games. Heh, go find the video of the RIDICULOUS shit the guys that made Getaway for Sony did. It was WAY over the top, completely uneccessary and added absolutely nothing to the final look and play of the game ( which was not very good to add ). Money very much wasted and clearly not evident in the game.

Cheers

 

[triCritical]

Weird... HOTU has slavery, sacrifices, and the like in it... Hmm.... However, I must point out that supposedly like Troika and TOEE; BIO was also forced to remove a brothel... Perhaps, it's just brothels Hasbro despises?

Its funny what people find offensive. If I remember correctly I think it was stuff like drugs and possible other black market stuff that made BG3 mature. Don't know for sure.

Anyhow TV will censor nudity but allow the act of murder to go uncensored. Mainly because our society has their head up their ass. I am sure this is what Hasbor is thinking.

 

[Dhruin]

200k for dev systems? Erm, no, unless something's changed. If I recall correctly, our PSone dev kits ran for about 20k +/-(per programmer).

Presumably Feargus was talking about outfitting the team - he did say "depending on the size of the team". 5 programmers, ~$100k - makes sense.

 

[EvoG]

200k for dev systems? Erm, no, unless something's changed. If I recall correctly, our PSone dev kits ran for about 20k +/-(per programmer).

Presumably Feargus was talking about outfitting the team - he did say "depending on the size of the team". 5 programmers, ~$100k - makes sense.

No I know, thats why I said per programmer...my exclaimation may have seem a tad strong, but I guess the sticker shock of 200k got me (though yea, when I first first read it, I was like "huh? per kit?" :D ). Really, if you have 5 leads programming, then thats fine, but most studios are going to get away with have only 2 leads total(excluding the junior coders), to whom have the dev kits, maybe an art kit or two for the artists. As I posted elsewhere, there's a point where you go "does EVERYONE on the team need these kits?". Thats a valid question. Ideally you say "sure, its a console game so we need to see all assets on console", but is it necessary within the scope of your budget lets say, if those artists can share dev stations or even use emulators on their pc's ( graphics aren't REALLY that different any more like they used to be regarding app vs. game engine ). Emulators will sufffice most of the time.

Cheers

 

[Sol Invictus]

Anyone who buys a $2500 PC is a fucking moron. There's no other way to say it. I have $1500 PC that's more or less top of the line (The only shortcoming is that it isn't a Pentium 4 Extreme Edition or an Athlon 64-FX51) so anyone who pays double the amount for a similar or lesser PC, as Falcon Northwest have proven when I entered lesser specs into their Configurator and brought the price up to $3200 is just clearly stupid.

That said, you can get a functional, mid-range, and some would say 'decently powerful enough' PC for 600-800 these days - a sum of money which would pay for a 17" monitor, Athlon 2.6, 5.1 surround system, and Radeon 9600XT. How's that for value? And the best thing about the PC is that you can have chats on IRC, post on message boards, listen to your 50 gigs of mp3s, downloaded movies or DVDs, and even type stuff up or create art with free programs like GIMP and Paint Shop Pro. What the fuck can a console do?

Play games? Hah.

Oh yeah, you won't be seeing anyone playing Battlefield 1942, World of Warcraft, Counter-Strike or Warcraft 3 on a console, either, so there goes most of the WORTHWHILE gaming prospects. Try telling me that any game in the FF series is more fun than Doom or Civilization.

Also the only reason that most games on the PC dont make as much money as a few games on the console is because most games on the PC tend to be under publicized, or just plain suck. Consoles get plenty of advertising (much like Blizzard's games and Maxis' games for the PC) and the quality of games like the Suidoken series and the FF series tend to be a lot higher than some half-baked crap like Anito or Chrome, which most computer games are like.

There's just a few games that people are anticipating, namely Doom 3, World of Warcraft, Half Life 2 and Vampire: Bloodlines. I just can't see anything else on the horizon. There might be games like Metalheart which may very well be worth buying and Silent Storm which IS worth buying, but where the hell are the advertisers?

 

[Sol Invictus]

Riiight. Now who'se tweaking facts? You assume everyone in the games biz is like Herve Caen? Nobody wants to make a shitty game. But you do need to make money on your game to get a shot at making another one.

hose $500-$600 PCs won't play Deus Ex anywhere near the level of the XBox. The point I am making here is that a "gaming PC" is far more expensive than a gaming console. Consoles are the mass market, PCs are for the connoisseur.

You people are so hostile.

First, let's point out some facts:

The X-Box is a PIII 750mhz with 128mb of ram. It's dedicated, yes, but have you ever played Deus Ex 2 on an X-Box? If you have, you'd have noticed how pathetically poor Deus Ex 2 runs on it.

Here's another thing most people don't get - just because Deus Ex 2 runs poorly on their P4 3ghz computers, they immediately assume that it's completely unplayable on anything slower than the only computer they've ever tested (their own). I've tested the game on several of my systems and the systems I've tested and the speed and performance is on par with just about each and every single one of them, all tuned with similar settings.

It more or less runs with similar performance on a P4 1.8a with a GeForce 4 as it does on an AthlonXP 2600 with a Radeon 9700, and an Athlon 1.3 Thunderbird with a GeForce 3. How's that for consistency? Oh and to make things look even more consistent, they all run at the same FPS as the game does on an X-Box.

How's that for bad programming?

Chances of you getting better performance on your console is nil compared to the performance you'll get on a computer you spent a meager $450 on. At least with a $450 computer you'll be playing Vice City at a resolution of 1024x768 at 32bit color as opposed to the horrible 640x480 resolution you're getting on your 250 dollar Playstation 2.

 

[Mr. Teatime]

Getting the thread back on topic, another former dev has posted backing up Puuk's statement (http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3805):

Please excuse me for jumping into the middle of this, but I have to put my two cents worth in.

Was BIS consulted about Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel...

I would have to say no. I can't recall ever being consulted about FOBOS, and I can't recall any of my fellow team members being consulted either. I think that the fact of the matter is that the FOBOS team went off and did what they wanted to with the license with little to no regard at all for maintaining any resemblance to the original games.

It's a very sad but true fact that the divisions at Interplay were exactly that: Divisions.

I don't want to go into details about that statement. I'm not here as an angry ex-employee trying to bash Interplay. Let's just say that, like almost any company, there was a lot of political crap going on between the divisions. Black Isle was not respected by the people in middle management positions of the other divisions. I honestly feel that we were not consulted about FOBOS because they wanted to be able to say that they did it on their own without our help...

In any case, enough said. Once again, excuse me for butting in.
_________________
John W. Deiley
Designer, formerly of Black Isle Studios

-----------------------
He then posted:
Gentlemen,

I have been contacted by a current employee at Interplay in regards to this matter and have been asked to put the record straight. No, it was not a lawyer.

I was informed that the FOBOS team did indeed speak with BIS in regard to the console version of Fallout. Apparently this happened at a time that I was not aware of. Since neither myself nor my team members were management personnel, we were not made aware of this. I can accept that. There is, and must be, a chain of command in a company.

I have no reason to believe that I am being lied to in this regard. Therefore, I retract my statement, apologize to the fans who are reading this board, and, most importantly, I apologize to the FOBOS team.

I was wrong, and I am not afraid to admit it. Please forgive my transgression.

-----------------------
interesting.

 

[Greenskin13]

No, it was not a lawyer.

"It was a hitman. They've got my family in a basement. Please, you've got to believe me!"

Okay, all kidding aside. Retracting the statement did sound kind of fishy, but I wonder more about what he said about FOBOS consulting BIS. If management was the only one who knew about any chatter between FOBOS and BIS, does that mean BIS management were the ones consulted? In that case, does anyone in BIS management have experience with Fallout?

I could use some clarity.

 

[Sol Invictus]

So basically one guy who probably had nothing to do with Fallout or Fallout 2, working at BIS, saw FOBOS and called it "cool" makes absolutely all of this incorrect?

 

[Sol Invictus]

I don't put stock in that.

 

[Rosh]

As I posted in reply to the same topic at NMA:

JDeiley, what still makes me wave the bullshit flag is that they claim "a lot of contact with them" when BIS people have been the last people to know of this, apparently.

Please note that I would put a bit of doubt of the word of someone who still works at Interplay versus those who have come forward and go "What the hell?"

Dan: Luckily for us, the BIS guys were very interested in what we were doing with F:BOS,

I would like names, as everyone I've seen at BIS distanced themselves away from it.

and from the very beginning we had a lot of contact with them regarding storyline, setting and characters.

Plural...plural...I'm looking for ONE.

They also provided us with a mountain of information to help out with all the tiny details that litter such a landscape, from timelines to bibles.

Oh, no... I know whom it was; it was Feargie again, but this time he was naked with the Fallout Bileball on Chuck Cuervos' desk! No wonder, I should have put together that the game fit his brand of brainwashing curriculum. :wink:

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Since neither myself nor my team members were management personnel, we were not made aware of this. I can accept that. There is, and must be, a chain of command in a company.

That's the key part there.