Game Development: What You Rarely Consider

Playing games has been my most common escape from the everyday world since I was a small child. At first, they seemed flawless, and whatever problems may have appeared were gladly accepted, or more likely, simply unnoticed. However, as games and gamers have become more sophisticated, the outcry against the bugs, balance issues, delays, and the like have become both incredibly discerning and alarmingly absurd.

There is no doubt that the occasional game drops the ball in terms of quality, and while I don't wish to offer excuses for the clear occasions where a company hasn't lived up to their end of the bargain, there are some facts that bear keeping in mind.

The Beta Launch Conundrum
There's a fine line between infuriating the hardcore faithful with yet another delay to a highly anticipated title, and launching it knowing that problems (sometimes serious) still exist within the code.

I bet you the delay will be worth it.

I worked as a tester for two-and-a-half years, and while not a lifer, I came to the following conclusions.

• Test-leads (supervisors) are, for the most part, fanatical about finding, reporting, and resolving bugs. At no time did I ever report a serious problem like hard lock or memory corruption, only to be told that I should ignore it.
• Legitimately trivial bugs are given a blind eye as development winds down, and for good reason. If I spot a seam in a texture, or notice a pop in the audio on load-up, there's no doubt the dev team would like to fix the issue, but it simply cannot and should not be a priority. Games are like a house of cards: You can fix the smallest thing and somehow cause the whole thing to come crashing down.
• Even as a tester just breaking into the industry, I knew the idea that companies were actively trying to screw over the gamers was absurd. While not every company may have the strictest standards, you can be sure that the last thing anyone wants is to alienate their fans. Every game developed is a massive financial risk, and ruining their reputation won't just hurt the developer and publisher short-term, but quite possibly permanently.

If it Doesn't Work, it Doesn't Work
Another common focus of gamer ire is the delay of a title, or, if you are to believe conspiracy theorists, the purposeful delay of a game. First of all, only the biggest companies can afford to hold a game back a month or so to slide into the most profitable time-slot. For the most part, developers and publishers can't get the game out fast enough. Case in point: You don't see games "go gold" and then come out four months later. They get finished, they get pressed at the factory, and they're sent out to the stores pronto.

There are always features, levels, weapons,
maps, or whatever else you can think of that
simply don't make the cut.

Regarding more common delays, I agree they are frustrating and I think I may have even wept when I found out I wasn't getting Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell® Double Agent™ until September. That said, I'll be damned if I would accept a poorly executed version of a series I love just to get it sooner rather than later.

Feature Loss
Peter Molyneux of Fable® fame may be most notorious for several features he discussed during the development of Fable that didn't make it into the much anticipated title. To be fair, he learned his lesson and you likely won't hear quite as much from him during the development of Fable® 2, but more importantly, you have to realize that what happened with Fable happens with every game. There are always features, levels, weapons, maps, or whatever else you can think of that simply don't make the cut.

It's a brutal business, and you have the ultimate pressure of both time and money bearing down on you during each step of the development process. You simply can't implement everything you wish you could. That said, I agree the wisest course would be to simply announce what is confirmed, not just what the developer is hoping for.

I'm guessing they keep a tighter lid on the sequel.

Sense of Entitlement
Let me say first that I do not speak to legitimate complaints or concerns, but primarily to those whose sense of entitlement has strayed to the edges of sanity. You know who are; you crouch maliciously over your favorite games forums, talking mess like:

• Dude, it's so easy to make it so you could swap out units between factions, it's not even funny. Developer X just won't do it because they're lazy!
• They're charging for new content now? That's crap! I bought the game, I deserve everything they make afterwards too!
• Watch, I'll bet they start charging for patches to their broke-ass game next.

I have a couple of problems with this kind of attitude. First, I don't quite get how someone could hate a game so much, and both have bought the game and continue to play it consistently. As a consumer, you have to know that just about the only power you have is in the money you spend. If you don't like a game or a company, don't buy from them!

Bring on the downloadable content.

The bigger issue here though, is this sense that just because you buy a game, you're entitled for the game to play exactly like you want it to, and that you deserve any and all content released for the game after launch. Now, there's no doubt that if you've got constant hard-locks, are losing saves, or the game is simply fundamentally busted, that you deserve to have gotten more for your dollar.

By the same token though, the game is what it is when you buy it. If the publisher releases content afterwards, you can bet your ass that they're probably going to charge you for it, and rightly so. They spent money (usually much more than you would imagine) to make it, so they deserve the opportunity to make some profit off their labor. It is a business after all.

Of course, there are always two sides of a coin. If companies start releasing content that doesn't just add to the game, but punishes people for not buying it, then we've got a problem. It's one thing to add a gun that maintains the delicate game balance, but it's quite another thing to add a gun that makes you better simply by purchasing it.

It's a fine line that both gamers and developers must walk. Both sides deserve to be treated with some common sense.

Article by Ryan Treit