Executive paycuts aren’t going to cover the delta of 1000 job cuts per year. Everyone loves to cite that one time Nintendo did that, but the math just usually doesn’t work out to the point where this solves layoffs or something. What’s going to get them out of financial fuckery and keep their talent retained is if they stop wasting hundreds of millions of dollars on projects like Hyperscape, Star Wars Outlaws, and Avatar that people don’t want and instead make games that their customers do want.
Okay, criticize Ubisoft and other publishers for a lot of shit, but in my view things like Star Wars Outlaws are off limits.
Is the game amazing? No. But it’s an idea using a fresh character in an underserved IP. They put together a lot of things based on unique ideas - and it didn’t hit.
That’s a consequence of a company taking risks, even though we generally want them to take risks. They put out 8 new singleplayer IPs, 7 are junk to be forgotten while one becomes the next Halo franchise.
Taking paycuts to execs can better excuse paycuts at low level, and can slow the bleed if the company is to accept going into the red during a new game’s development.
I’ll agree with you that a lot of projects are getting overfunded. Good games don’t need thousands of people working on them. It can help with tertiary objectives like accessibility, marketing, or other features.
Even I said in my comment it wasn’t a fantastic game. It likely could have been a lot better, and I don’t fault anyone bored by it. But I take issue with claims it shouldn’t have been made - that greenlighting it alone was the mistake.
“Don’t make bad game, dummy, just make good game” isn’t a tremendous observation.
Sometimes I don’t even think the way people summarize Ubisoft games as “open world” is a good descriptor of their failures. I will see people meanwhile applaud dozens of games that can all qualify as “open world”.
Maybe Ubisoft is deserving of a lot of criticism, but I’d also put them in perspective against an Xbox that is canceling studios and games left and right, and a Sony that just isn’t making anything except 8 more Last of Us remakes. No clue if EA even makes anything anymore.
I have no criticisms myself for Star Wars Outlaws, as I didn’t play it, but the market didn’t want it, and Star Wars is for sure not underserved. I have been inundated with so much Star Wars since Disney bought it that I’m sick of it, and I’m not even seeking it out. The other thing I’m sick of is the Ubisoft Open World Game. I’ve played a lot of those. They built an efficient machine for churning those out. The market seems to be sick of them, too, at least relative to its former appetite. It’s not surprising that people are tired of both Ubisoft’s formula and Star Wars. You take a risk with Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, a moderately budgeted game. You don’t take a risk with $200M+; that’s lunacy. Even with The Lost Crown, they reminded me via their Ubisoft launcher and additional DRM why I haven’t missed purchasing Ubisoft games for so many years.
Executive paycuts aren’t going to cover the delta of 1000 job cuts per year. Everyone loves to cite that one time Nintendo did that, but the math just usually doesn’t work out to the point where this solves layoffs or something. What’s going to get them out of financial fuckery and keep their talent retained is if they stop wasting hundreds of millions of dollars on projects like Hyperscape, Star Wars Outlaws, and Avatar that people don’t want and instead make games that their customers do want.
1000 x 70000 gross salary or whatever = 70 mil. 70 mil isn’t endless amounts of money in the managerial world, actually.
Okay, criticize Ubisoft and other publishers for a lot of shit, but in my view things like Star Wars Outlaws are off limits.
Is the game amazing? No. But it’s an idea using a fresh character in an underserved IP. They put together a lot of things based on unique ideas - and it didn’t hit.
That’s a consequence of a company taking risks, even though we generally want them to take risks. They put out 8 new singleplayer IPs, 7 are junk to be forgotten while one becomes the next Halo franchise.
Taking paycuts to execs can better excuse paycuts at low level, and can slow the bleed if the company is to accept going into the red during a new game’s development.
I’ll agree with you that a lot of projects are getting overfunded. Good games don’t need thousands of people working on them. It can help with tertiary objectives like accessibility, marketing, or other features.
That’s a bit too far in the other direction, innit?
Games (or anything really) don’t get immunity from criticism just because they take risks
Even I said in my comment it wasn’t a fantastic game. It likely could have been a lot better, and I don’t fault anyone bored by it. But I take issue with claims it shouldn’t have been made - that greenlighting it alone was the mistake.
“Don’t make bad game, dummy, just make good game” isn’t a tremendous observation.
Sometimes I don’t even think the way people summarize Ubisoft games as “open world” is a good descriptor of their failures. I will see people meanwhile applaud dozens of games that can all qualify as “open world”.
Maybe Ubisoft is deserving of a lot of criticism, but I’d also put them in perspective against an Xbox that is canceling studios and games left and right, and a Sony that just isn’t making anything except 8 more Last of Us remakes. No clue if EA even makes anything anymore.
I have no criticisms myself for Star Wars Outlaws, as I didn’t play it, but the market didn’t want it, and Star Wars is for sure not underserved. I have been inundated with so much Star Wars since Disney bought it that I’m sick of it, and I’m not even seeking it out. The other thing I’m sick of is the Ubisoft Open World Game. I’ve played a lot of those. They built an efficient machine for churning those out. The market seems to be sick of them, too, at least relative to its former appetite. It’s not surprising that people are tired of both Ubisoft’s formula and Star Wars. You take a risk with Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, a moderately budgeted game. You don’t take a risk with $200M+; that’s lunacy. Even with The Lost Crown, they reminded me via their Ubisoft launcher and additional DRM why I haven’t missed purchasing Ubisoft games for so many years.
Instead they can waste hundreds of millions on executive salaries.
The CEO makes $1.5M per year in cash, so I very much doubt they’re spending hundreds of millions on executive salaries.