I am not sure what you talking about but sounds almost like a Ponzi Scheme, we too ( LS ) try to be "constantly on some new project(s)" because basically "it's grabbing coins there and there" it's a race that never gives you any break it's like living on the edge of drowning all the time.merman wrote:You look at someone like Blitz Games (perhaps a bad example as they are gone, but still) and they had years of working on contracts - shitty licensed titles - to let them develop more personal/indie projects. They get to the next landmark, payment comes in and covers the bills.gilesgoat wrote:It's still to me a TOTAL MYSTERY about "how companies that it's YEARS they are NON profitable" they are still alive/in business.Dio wrote:There's a lot of ways to run the numbers about what makes a profit and what doesn't. Hollywood accounting has been part of the gaming ecosystem for some years now (see also Apple and Google).
To me I reason "if I spent X and I collected Y and Y-X < 0 then I am fucked".
Because unless I get "soon" some more Z from somewhere ( theorectically my own sales ) I am soon going bust ( going into ever increasing debts I won't be able to repay ).
The problem is it seems to exist "some Z" that "keeps coming" from whatever reasons even if the company itself does not really make any profits with its own sales of its own products ?
Ok theorectically is a bit like the story "don't sell them the razor, sell them the blades ?" .. the razor is the console, the blades are the games/services/subscription associated with that ?
Certainly .. "if there are so many people willing to spend $$$$$$ on cosmetic add-ons for the game C" then it could be all worth, as long as "from somewhere" you get those $$$$$ you need to keep going.
Even Remedy have changed from being focussed on one project at a time to multiple teams.
I really worry how smaller teams are going to cope under the subscription model. It will be like Spotify, trying to survive on crumbs while the big stars get all the money. That's partly why Xbox swallowed up so many studios in the last eighteen months, so they have teams that can work on content/updates.
But at least we don't have debts/things to pay other than ourselves, which is still not easy at all.
I don't think it's just "Xbox" is "the whole games market" I should say "in general" because ultimately it's about what people buys, how people buys, how people spend AND especially how INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT is to find/reach your "best tartget market".
I don't know but more than once "in this so internet connected world" I feel "something is not working as you think it should" to reach certain "target audience" is very very very hard and extremely time/resources consuming !
The famous "word of mouth" seems NOT to exist at all, despite all the twitters, youtubes, things, whatever .. it just does not work "naturally".
You can already worry A LOT because it's SUPER DIFFICULT to stay alive "for a small team" and the scenario "surviving on crumbs" I am afraid to tell you that's in place since quite long so "you could stop worrying it could be going to be like that" because it's ALREADY like that !
Question is more along the lines of "how long smaller team can survive" .. hopefully "long enough" but it's super hard.
