7 ms·

It was a different time: “Condor plans to spend one year in the development of Diablo. Personnel will consist of: one designer, one chief programmer, 2 junior p

by kosei 3y ago

It was a different time: “Condor plans to spend one year in the development of Diablo. Personnel will consist of: one designer, one chief programmer, 2 junior programmer, 2 art director/artists, 1 illustrator/sculptor, 3 pixel artists, and 1 sound FX person” So, 11 people for a year for Diablo. Meanwhile Diablo 4 took 300+ people 6+ years. So over 150x the cost, not accounting for the fact that game developers are paid much more now as well. People pretend it’s the same industry but it’s evolved dramatically.

hourago 3y ago
The results are also vastly different as the expectations, the number of platforms to support, the quality of the cut-scenes, ... and the revenue. But there are still indie games developed with such small teams. So, that is still a viable possibility.
- mikepurvis 3y ago
  And there's a massive trickle-down in terms of what very small teams are able to accomplish now by leveraging modern tools, engines, and art pipelines. It astonishes me to this day that Hollow Knight was basically developed by three people, including all the writing, art, design, and programming— there's definitely more content in that game than what passed for triple-A in the PSX era, maybe even PS2.
  - hypertele-Xii 3y ago
    It's easy to say "oh this modern indie game was made by only X people!" forgetting that the [open source] stack it was developed on has hundreds if not thousands of contributors. So no, Hollow Knight wasn't developed by three people "including all the programming". It uses Unity. Unity is worth billions and employs thousands of people, many of them certainly programmers. I agree though that very few people are needed nowadays for the art. With generative AI, even less. (But that's also sort of an [open source] giant to stand on the shoulders of with countless contributing artists.)
    - malermeister 3y ago
      Well if you see it that way, the original diablo was also written by the hundreds of people that wrote windows, the GPU drivers etc etc. Almost no software is written in a vacuum, but it doesn't really make sense to always include all preexisting dependencies in work estimates.
    - rozularen 3y ago
      we can go that route too when talking about EV batteries production emissions vs ICE but sure we don't because that's not the point, right?
  - fermentation 3y ago
    The downside of this is of course that there are so many high quality games to compete with now
eek2121 3y ago
Yet I have to say this: Diablo was more fun. Diablo 2 is pretty great. My only complaints about it surround harder difficulties. Those of us with accessibility issues (like me with a gimped hand) found hell to be super challenging. Diablo 3 sucked when it launched, however, right now, it is absolutely amazing. Blizzard has absolute gold with the tiered difficulty/rift/season design. Unsure why they didn't improve upon it... Diablo 4 has potential, but many of the great systems developed in 1-3 are gone. What made previous diablo games great: A fixed level/difficulty system Randomly generated levels A way to measure yourself against both yourself and others. Potential for multiple unique build paths for every class. An awesome loot/gear system that eventually makes you feel overpowered until you aren't. Diablo 4 has none of those. Diablo 1-3 have some combination of those.
- logicchains 3y ago
  Diablo 4 has no sense of progression because enemies level up as you do. In fact they increase in power faster than you, under the assumption you'll be itemising optimally, so if you level up but don't update your items fast enough, you'll find that mobs actually get harder and harder to defeat as you increase in level.
  - nemo44x 3y ago
    That’s what great I think. Levels give you skill and paragon points which eventually makes you stronger so you can go to higher tiers where better gear drops. They give you many ways to customize your gear (affix modifications, aspects, gems) with your build and paragon board. That’s what it’s all about.
    - logicchains 3y ago
      > Levels give you skill and paragon points which eventually makes you stronger so you can go to higher tiers where better gear drops Paragon points are only granted around level 50, and skill points stop making much difference around level 20-30 when all the core skills are unlocked. I got so bored of combat I stopped playing at around level 40. Particularly annoying is after getting a few items with good aspects, it's rare to find another item with the same or better aspect, so I have a choice of either sticking with the old item with bad stats and the good aspect (and dying really quickly due to low armor), or picking a new item with better stats but no good aspect. Yes it's possible to extract the aspect from an item and use it on another, but that can only be done once.
jayd16 3y ago
AAAs are paying for consistency. The marketing budget is fixed. This makes the goal something that's certainly good enough and hopefully great.
- YurgenJurgensen 3y ago
  They may pay for consistency, but they're not really getting it. There hasn't been a year since 'AAA games' were a concept that hasn't had multiple high-profile titles that failed to deliver.
ricardobayes 3y ago
Definitely. This complexity creep is very visible with certain franchises which churned out a new game steadily every 3-4 years but not a peep for 10+ years now. (Elder Scrolls, Grand Theft Auto etc)
- Cthulhu_ 3y ago
  Said franchises - well, mainly GTA and now D4 - also are a live service though, in that they have recurring income from in-game purchases - in the case of GTA 5, it paid off to spend hundreds of millions on development, given it's earned the company billions ($6bn according to wikipedia).
  - vancroft 3y ago
    Elder Scrolls kinda falls under that umbrella, given that Elder Scrolls Online is a subscription-based MMO that I believe is still receiving content updates. Unfortunately that's probably a lot more profitable and safe than developing a new single-player game that has to surpass the bar set by previous games.
Cthulhu_ 3y ago
Counterpoint: indie games, they will often have similar sized teams or smaller and come out with great games. AAA games build on top of gameplay mechanics from either older games or indie games, but need the extra staff and investment due to higher quality (and quantity) assets. To generalize, indie games focus on the core gameplay loop, AAA games on high effort visuals.
- enkid 3y ago
  This is why I've been playing indie ges almost exclusively lately. The core game play is just so much tighter in a small game vs. AAA games where they implement a huge amount of features.
fennecfoxy 3y ago
Whether a modern game turns out to be fun or not is besides the point, the answer is fidelity, fidelity, fidelity. I think it's fair enough that modern games take much more effort; we have much higher expectations as gamers/consumers than we used to.

by kosei 3y ago

hourago 3y ago

The results are also vastly different as the expectations, the number of platforms to support, the quality of the cut-scenes, ... and the revenue. But there are still indie games developed with such small teams. So, that is still a viable possibility.

mikepurvis 3y ago
And there's a massive trickle-down in terms of what very small teams are able to accomplish now by leveraging modern tools, engines, and art pipelines. It astonishes me to this day that Hollow Knight was basically developed by three people, including all the writing, art, design, and programming— there's definitely more content in that game than what passed for triple-A in the PSX era, maybe even PS2.
- hypertele-Xii 3y ago
  It's easy to say "oh this modern indie game was made by only X people!" forgetting that the [open source] stack it was developed on has hundreds if not thousands of contributors. So no, Hollow Knight wasn't developed by three people "including all the programming". It uses Unity. Unity is worth billions and employs thousands of people, many of them certainly programmers. I agree though that very few people are needed nowadays for the art. With generative AI, even less. (But that's also sort of an [open source] giant to stand on the shoulders of with countless contributing artists.)
  - malermeister 3y ago
    Well if you see it that way, the original diablo was also written by the hundreds of people that wrote windows, the GPU drivers etc etc. Almost no software is written in a vacuum, but it doesn't really make sense to always include all preexisting dependencies in work estimates.
  - rozularen 3y ago
    we can go that route too when talking about EV batteries production emissions vs ICE but sure we don't because that's not the point, right?
- fermentation 3y ago
  The downside of this is of course that there are so many high quality games to compete with now

eek2121 3y ago

Yet I have to say this: Diablo was more fun. Diablo 2 is pretty great. My only complaints about it surround harder difficulties. Those of us with accessibility issues (like me with a gimped hand) found hell to be super challenging. Diablo 3 sucked when it launched, however, right now, it is absolutely amazing. Blizzard has absolute gold with the tiered difficulty/rift/season design. Unsure why they didn't improve upon it... Diablo 4 has potential, but many of the great systems developed in 1-3 are gone. What made previous diablo games great: A fixed level/difficulty system Randomly generated levels A way to measure yourself against both yourself and others. Potential for multiple unique build paths for every class. An awesome loot/gear system that eventually makes you feel overpowered until you aren't. Diablo 4 has none of those. Diablo 1-3 have some combination of those.

logicchains 3y ago
Diablo 4 has no sense of progression because enemies level up as you do. In fact they increase in power faster than you, under the assumption you'll be itemising optimally, so if you level up but don't update your items fast enough, you'll find that mobs actually get harder and harder to defeat as you increase in level.
- nemo44x 3y ago
  That’s what great I think. Levels give you skill and paragon points which eventually makes you stronger so you can go to higher tiers where better gear drops. They give you many ways to customize your gear (affix modifications, aspects, gems) with your build and paragon board. That’s what it’s all about.
  - logicchains 3y ago
    > Levels give you skill and paragon points which eventually makes you stronger so you can go to higher tiers where better gear drops Paragon points are only granted around level 50, and skill points stop making much difference around level 20-30 when all the core skills are unlocked. I got so bored of combat I stopped playing at around level 40. Particularly annoying is after getting a few items with good aspects, it's rare to find another item with the same or better aspect, so I have a choice of either sticking with the old item with bad stats and the good aspect (and dying really quickly due to low armor), or picking a new item with better stats but no good aspect. Yes it's possible to extract the aspect from an item and use it on another, but that can only be done once.

jayd16 3y ago

AAAs are paying for consistency. The marketing budget is fixed. This makes the goal something that's certainly good enough and hopefully great.

YurgenJurgensen 3y ago
They may pay for consistency, but they're not really getting it. There hasn't been a year since 'AAA games' were a concept that hasn't had multiple high-profile titles that failed to deliver.

ricardobayes 3y ago

Definitely. This complexity creep is very visible with certain franchises which churned out a new game steadily every 3-4 years but not a peep for 10+ years now. (Elder Scrolls, Grand Theft Auto etc)

Cthulhu_ 3y ago
Said franchises - well, mainly GTA and now D4 - also are a live service though, in that they have recurring income from in-game purchases - in the case of GTA 5, it paid off to spend hundreds of millions on development, given it's earned the company billions ($6bn according to wikipedia).
- vancroft 3y ago
  Elder Scrolls kinda falls under that umbrella, given that Elder Scrolls Online is a subscription-based MMO that I believe is still receiving content updates. Unfortunately that's probably a lot more profitable and safe than developing a new single-player game that has to surpass the bar set by previous games.

Cthulhu_ 3y ago

Counterpoint: indie games, they will often have similar sized teams or smaller and come out with great games. AAA games build on top of gameplay mechanics from either older games or indie games, but need the extra staff and investment due to higher quality (and quantity) assets. To generalize, indie games focus on the core gameplay loop, AAA games on high effort visuals.

enkid 3y ago
This is why I've been playing indie ges almost exclusively lately. The core game play is just so much tighter in a small game vs. AAA games where they implement a huge amount of features.

fennecfoxy 3y ago

Whether a modern game turns out to be fun or not is besides the point, the answer is fidelity, fidelity, fidelity. I think it's fair enough that modern games take much more effort; we have much higher expectations as gamers/consumers than we used to.