16 réponses à ce sujet

[cJohnOne]

After DA2 there is a certain assumption that they needed more time.



I assume the same thing.  What do you think?

[Eudaemonium]

Not necessarily. It depends on how well the time is managed egarding the creation of the game. Personally, I'd say that for an expansive RPG about 2 years is a good timestamp, given correct management, but I believe that a good one could be made in a year if it was handled correctly. It might be smaller, but that doesn't make it 'worse'. It depends on the scope of the project more than anything. Given poor management you could take a decade and till turn out a bad game, and even if ti was amazing its unlikely you'd come close to breaking even after such an extensive development time.

[labargegrrrl]

rushing a game can certainly ruin it, but so can taking too long. duke nukem anyone? how about how hammy diablo iii turned out? of course, that's only my opinion, and nothing to get worked up over. my actual point is that i don't care if it comes out tomorrow or next year or in two years, so long as it's good and doesn't take so long it's not worth it.

[Fast Jimmy]

Depending on what you consider a good game, I suppose.

The Angry Birds team can whip out a sequel in the span of a few months that would sell more copies than the DA and ME series combined.

But as far as a game with varied gameplay mechanics, fully voiced dialogue scenes, a deep plot structure, multiple navigatable areas, enemy and companion A.I. coding to account for, context-sensitive collision logic, etc., etc., etc...

...then yes, a year is much too small a time frame. For one, most of the overall programming to set up the underlying game mechanics would have to be completed in less than four months (a near impossible task by itself), in order to get the story fleshed out and integrated, locations generated, companions and NPCs voiced. Then you'd have to have the vast majority of your game completed within the next four months, testing for a month (if you're lucky) and then with three months left, your game can go "Gold" and be sent to the manufacturing departments to begin mass production, which can take two to three months.

Let me tell you how many times that has been possible and still resulted in a game worth a crap.

[fchopin]

If you times one year with three then you are correct.

[Wulfram]

If you're doing a game in that short time frame, you should probably make it more of a stand-alone expansion pack type deal. Make use of as much of the assets from the previous game as possible, just tweak the balance a bit, maybe give the graphics a quick polish.

Don't make a whole bunch of unnecessary changes and then not have the time to implement them properly.

Modifié par Wulfram, 26 juin 2012 - 11:05 .

[Fast Jimmy]

Wulfram wrote...

If you're doing a game in that short time frame, you should probably make it more of a stand-alone expansion pack type deal. Make use of as much of the assets from the previous game as possible, just tweak the balance a bit, maybe give the graphics a quick polish.

Don't make a whole bunch of unnecessary changes and then not have the time to implement them properly.

Well... yeah. That's a given.

Who would be so full of hubris to try and do something like THAT?

[Arthur Cousland]

If they're giving the franchise a total facelift, then they definitely need more time. If it's an expansion, dlc or episodic content of some kind, then less time is needed.

DA2 was an example of Bioware being a bit too ambitious for the time given to them. Whether or not one would have liked the changes regardless, it didn't help that the game was rushed. On the other hand, just because a game is given an unlimited amount of development time, that doesn't mean that the game will turn out well, either.

[sickpixie]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Wulfram wrote...

If you're doing a game in that short time frame, you should probably make it more of a stand-alone expansion pack type deal. Make use of as much of the assets from the previous game as possible, just tweak the balance a bit, maybe give the graphics a quick polish.

Don't make a whole bunch of unnecessary changes and then not have the time to implement them properly.

Well... yeah. That's a given.

Who would be so full of hubris to try and do something like THAT?

Perhaps they had a lot of very convincing reasons to believe that a "safe" sequel wouldn't have gone over well.

[Fast Jimmy]

sickpixie wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Wulfram wrote...

If you're doing a game in that short time frame, you should probably make it more of a stand-alone expansion pack type deal. Make use of as much of the assets from the previous game as possible, just tweak the balance a bit, maybe give the graphics a quick polish.

Don't make a whole bunch of unnecessary changes and then not have the time to implement them properly.

Well... yeah. That's a given.

Who would be so full of hubris to try and do something like THAT?

Perhaps they had a lot of very convincing reasons to believe that a "safe" sequel wouldn't have gone over well.

Lots of reasons... like DLC that was selling successfully right up until a few months before the release of the sequel.

CLEARLY... there were signs that making the same game wouldn't result in people shelling out more money... oh. Wait.

[sickpixie]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Lots of reasons... like DLC that was selling successfully right up until a few months before the release of the sequel.

CLEARLY... there were signs that making the same game wouldn't result in people shelling out more money... oh. Wait.

DLC uses a different, lower metric for success. They've also mentioned that all the Dragon Age 2 DLC has been selling well. As far as I know, they haven't released any numbers or even told us what target number they have to hit to consider any given DLC successful, so this judgment call seems a lot like the blind-men-feeling-up-the-elephant story to me.

[Korusus]

Please do not let BioWare's propoganda fool you, there is an industry standard sweet spot for game development time for quality AAA cRPGs and it is between 3 and 5 years.  There isn't really as much leeway there as they would like you to think.  Anyone paying attention to the development schedule DA2 underwent knew it was going to be a badly designed, rushed mess of a game.

Cue irrelevant references to Duke Nukem Forever.

Modifié par Korusus, 26 juin 2012 - 10:22 .

[AppealToReason]

I've read that a lot of developers would love to have at least 2 years on a game if not 3 or 4. Thats dedicated time with all the resources. So not from release to the next game, but after all additional content is finished until the new release. You look at a lot of games people consider rushed and poorly stitched together and they usually fall in around 18 months.

[JohnCena94]

A one year time frame is bad. In RPG's it is nearly a fact that rushed games turn out bad. Of course games that take loads of time can be bad too, but rushed games tend to have certain issues, such as plot holes and glitches.

[Vormaerin]

As one of the devs (allan?) said, there is a difference between 6 guys working for a year and 3 guys working for 2 years, even if its the same number of man hours.

The six guys will get more things done, but have less time to polish.

[Hayllee]

I'm quite pleased we haven't heard of a DA3 yet. There needs to be small things implemented, that's what was missing in DA2. You know I played DA:O for the sixth time the other day and I didn't know you could talk to Petra, the mage with Wynne at the beginning of the circle tower? Those little things just make the game feel whole.

[cJohnOne]

Bioware time frame and people's expectations are worrying to me but I'm pretty easy to please. Just getting to the threshold of good game will be difficult this time around. I think.