Infinity Blade Delivered Epic's Best Return on Investment

[alfistas]

Great Game!!!

 

[mdelvecchio]

Is it just me or are there a mess of games that people tend to buy just to show their device off to friends but aren't really all that fun TO ME?

there, i fixed it for you.

i used to be a hardcore gamer and am now a casual gamer. IB2 was a game i loved playing (by myself) because i thought it was *fun*. not because i was showing it off.

kinda like the silly notion that people buy iphones or macs to show off, and not because theyre simply easier to use machines w/ fewer problems that millions of people simply enjoy using.

 

[JellyFish]

I used to be a console gamer, but the Wii was the last one for me. These days I play on my iPad and iPhone. I don't even own a TV any more, I just watch stuff on my Macs, iPad and iPhone.

I love the selection of games in the App Store, and the low cost. The graphics look great, and the gameplay is as good as anything on a console for my needs.

I can't imagine paying $50 for a console game again. Why? The additional cost doesn't deliver more fun to me.

I'm grateful to Apple for delivering such a fine platform for games in iOS. I'm able to play games, but I can also read ebooks, magazines, watch movies and TV shows, browse the web, and run many non-gaming applications. And it's all mobile and goes with me wherever I go.

 

[St. Germain]

I deeply doubt that in just a matter of years, there will be any possibility for portable devices to provide the same level of graphic acceleration as SLI or Crossfire. Unless Nvidia wanna kill themselves or Apple is able to "innovate" their own superior GPU (which Intel tried so hard but still can't).

Who needs all that when a game can be streamed without any lag or slowdown to your tablet? You won't need a superior GPU. Only a matter of time...

 

[needfx]

All that cheap casual talk means is that mobile has cornered the budget market with $1-5 pricepoints. It doesn't mean they're destroying the AAA game market with $60 pricepoints.

With business models, in the console industry, software sells hardware. Gamers don't care about hardware as much as they do what type of IP they can play on it. Which is why all console makers have first party IP exclusives they leverage to sell hardware.

And the one thing Epic didn't bother to mention was that Apple did all their marketing for them by demoing their game at WWDC. How many developers have enjoyed that luxury? Epic, Gameloft, a couple other studios, that's it. Most developers see their titles buried in that commoditized mess called the app store with little fanfare. If Apple didn't demo Infinity Blade to help sell the iPad and stick that game in all their commercials, no way would Epic be pulling in $30 million ROI.

And $30 million is puny compared to the ROI of a blockbuster AAA game.

Get in there!!

 

[0098386]

Activision can dump $100mil annually into the CoD/MW series because the games generate BILLIONS of dollars in revenue every release. At least the last three or four versions have generated hundreds of millions of dollars on launch day alone. MW2 set a single day entertainment sales record, Black Ops broke that record, MW3 broke Black Ops' record and I wouldn't be surprised if MW3's record gets broken this fall.

Now, can everyone have sales numbers like these? Of course not, but there is obviously still a place for big budget games like CoD/MW just like there is a place for big budget movies even though cat videos on YouTube get millions of views.


Lethal

I don't understand how someone could have downvoted you. This is total sense.

But he is right, you cannot run a multi-million dollar game investment anymore...the returns just arent there for literally everyone but a select few.

Yes you can. I'm dealing with a new console publisher who have been doing great even with the prevalence of mobile games, I don't think I know (personally that is) any console publisher who is not doing okay to great right now.



The matter of the fact is mobile gaming is a huge risk. For every Infinity Blade, Angry Birds, etc you have countless other flops. Some of the original creators of Geometry Wars got together after Activision disbanded them with the idea to dive into this superduper world of mobile gaming. They invested their severance packages into their new mobile company. They flopped.

Experienced, talented and well-funded. But they flopped. Because iOS (to serious developers) is the gold rush now. A couple of people will have these huge success stories, but most won't.

Compared to the console world where you almost always make back your investment and break even. Even the biggest console flops (Duke Nukem Forever and co) turn a profit.

There is much less risk attached to making console games. They're going nowhere.

----------

Who needs all that when a game can be streamed without any lag or slowdown to your tablet? You won't need a superior GPU. Only a matter of time...

Don't mean to burst your bubble, but there will always be lag with streaming. It's unavoidable.

 

[LethalWolfe]

I don't understand how someone could have downvoted you. This is total sense.

Probably because someone doesn't like one or more of the following:
A. FPS's in general
B. CoD/MW
C. Activision
D. Logic

Don't mean to burst your bubble, but there will always be lag with streaming. It's unavoidable.

If all you are doing is playing Angry Birds or Words with Friends lag is less of an issue.

 

[Earendil]

Experienced, talented and well-funded. But they flopped. Because iOS (to serious developers) is the gold rush now. A couple of people will have these huge success stories, but most won't.

I haven't seen anyone try and argue that developers should all switch their platform of choice, and develop iOS. In fact that would fly in the face of what a few people (myself included) have said, which is that a gaming platform is a tool, it works better for some games than others. To ask every game developer to go make iOS games is retarded, and will surely be the end of studios. But the problem is not a lack of developers that want to make games, the problem is there is a finite amount of money that the general public spends on games (or even entertainment). What Infinity Blade shows is that a significant amount of that entertainment money is switching platforms. It would be stupid for console platforms to ignore that.

Compared to the console world where you almost always make back your investment and break even. Even the biggest console flops (Duke Nukem Forever and co) turn a profit.

Really? Is Duke Nukem really a good example of a flop? I've at least HEARD of that game. There are many many games in the bargain bin that I'd never heard talked about, and never seen in anyplace BUT the bargain bin. I seriously doubt they do. I'm betting instead that there are a significant number of games that publishers don't make a profit on, but all they need is 1 in 10 (made of number) to be a hit, and they recoup their money. Since they don't know exactly how a game will do until it's done and released, they have to go through with most of them.

Edit: Proof that my numbers were made up and that I was talking out my ass
20% of games that are released make a profit.
Edit: Also a sobering read, though it's wikipedia so take a grain of salt with you. List of Commercial Failures in Video Gaming.

There is much less risk attached to making console games. They're going nowhere.

The amount of money required just to get a line of code onto a disc that can be read my a console is HUGE, much larger than the majority of other platforms. They aren't going away, but the amount of money going into that market WILL drop IF they don't adapt. Anecdotally they've almost lost me, because I spend a fair bit of time and money on iPad entertainment. I have no doubt that people like YOU won't leave consoles any time soon, but they need to be careful not to lose too many people like me, or it'll effect their bottom line.

 

[sunspot42]

Not quite

At the end of the day there are soooooooooo many more casual gamers/bored people out there that are happy to spend $0.99 on a game to pass time while commuting etc, just cause Epic made a heap of money of these bored communiting sods... does not indicate gamers are about to jump ship, on the contrary most consider mobile gaming without physical control to be a joke.

The problem is, it's been the casual gamers who have made the last generation of handhelds and consoles profitable. Without them, the hardware manufacturers and the software studios wouldn't have the base to support the development of ever-more-expensive hardcore titles.

Next gen hardware won't save the console business if casual gamers don't bite. And casual gamers are clearly flocking to mobile devices. I don't see how Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft can get the math to work for any next gen devices without casual gamers.

By the way, there's nothing preventing mobile devices from supporting physical controllers, or even Kinect-style motion controllers. I wouldn't be surprised to see the iPad and Android devices come with such input by default within the next couple of years.

 

[LethalWolfe]

The amount of money required just to get a line of code onto a disc that can be read my a console is HUGE, much larger than the majority of other platforms. They aren't going away, but the amount of money going into that market WILL drop IF they don't adapt.

I don't code, so what makes programing for a game for a console so much more expensive than programing a game for any other platform?

The problem is, it's been the casual gamers who have made the last generation of handhelds and consoles profitable. Without them, the hardware manufacturers and the software studios wouldn't have the base to support the development of ever-more-expensive hardcore titles.

I wonder how many different definitions of "casual gamer" there are 'cause to me a casual gamer is typically a non-gamer that picked up a Wii plus a game or two (which lead to the Wii's massive rise) and then never bought another Wii game (which lead to the Wii's massive fall). Casual gamers are finicky, unreliable (from a platform loyalty perspective) and shouldn't be counted upon as the core demographic for something like a game console, IMO.

Next gen hardware won't save the console business if casual gamers don't bite. And casual gamers are clearly flocking to mobile devices. I don't see how Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft can get the math to work for any next gen devices without casual gamers.

If Sony, MS and Nintendo were only making machines that did nothing but play current gen video games I might agree with you, but that's not the case. MS, Sony, and to a lesser degree Nintendo, are putting next gen home entertainment systems in your living room and have been doing it for over half a decade. I mean, look at everything XboxLive offers and video game content is only a fraction of it (and a shrinking fraction at that). Kinect was never just about casual gaming and with SmartGlass coming... wow.

The 360 and PS3 were built to be connected home theater devices and it's only been in the past couple of years that The Cloud & streaming has caught up with them. Speaking of The Cloud, Sony just bought Gaikai (a video game streaming service) and in the leaked Xbox roadmap from a couple of weeks ago MS basically said streaming gaming is becoming a reality and mentioned OnLive by name (either as a future competitor, future acquisition or both). MS has deals in place w/AT&T and Verzion where if you have U-verse or FiOS you can use a 360 in leu of a cable box for TV content.

If anyone thinks these companies are just coasting and Apple is the only one 'innovating' they aren't paying attention.


Lethal

 

[diamond.g]

I haven't seen anyone try and argue that developers should all switch their platform of choice, and develop iOS. In fact that would fly in the face of what a few people (myself included) have said, which is that a gaming platform is a tool, it works better for some games than others. To ask every game developer to go make iOS games is retarded, and will surely be the end of studios. But the problem is not a lack of developers that want to make games, the problem is there is a finite amount of money that the general public spends on games (or even entertainment). What Infinity Blade shows is that a significant amount of that entertainment money is switching platforms. It would be stupid for console platforms to ignore that.

What Infinity Blade (1&2) show is that if you have a game engine already paid for via other games (every other UE3 game) you can make a ton of money with effectively minimal work. You can't get visuals like that on a home grown engine cheaply.

 

[jdiamond]

The role of high end graphics?

I deeply doubt that in just a matter of years, there will be any possibility for portable devices to provide the same level of graphic acceleration as SLI or Crossfire. Unless Nvidia wanna kill themselves or Apple is able to "innovate" their own superior GPU (which Intel tried so hard but still can't).

You are assuming that top of the line GPU power is important for most games. I've found that developer mind share is most important. Programmers can do amazing things with almost any hardware. Just as the majority of cool applications left the PC platform, it is possible that cool games could leave console platforms. That would lead consoles to die, not because they didn't have superior hardware, but simply because most of the cool games were on other platforms.