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Easy Allies Podcast #82 - October 18th 2017 (Patreon)

Published:
2017-10-18 21:54:06
Edited:
2017-10-19 08:21:31
Imported:
2021-08

Content

EDIT:If you were have trouble with the original Soundcloud link, please try this one: https://soundcloud.com/easyallies/easy-allies-podcast-82-october-18th-2018/s-9QjqA

This week we're focusing a great deal of the show on covering EA's sad, strange, and scary decision to close Visceral games and overhaul Amy Hennig's Star Wars game.  

L&R,

- Damiani

Files

Easy Allies Podcast #82 - October 18th 2017

This week we're focusing a great deal of the show on covering EA's sad, strange, and scary decision to close Visceral games and overhaul Amy Hennig's Star Wars game. CLICK HERE FOR TIME STAMPS AND LINKS! Corrections - 00:02:52 EA Closes Visceral, Reworks Amy Hennig's Star Wars Game - 00:06:43 Podcast Halftime - 00:50:40 L&R - Favorite Business Partnerships - 00:59:15 L&R - What's Your Favorite Fruit - 01:06:02 L&R - Help with Settling a Bet - 01:09:28 L&R - Back of the Box Game - 01:13:02 Time for Bets - 01:20:54 Closing - 01:26:11 Thank you to our official sponsors! Scorn - http://www.scorn-game.com iKeyless - https://ikeyless.com Hoeg Law - http://www.hoeglaw.com Iron Harvest - http://iron-harvest.com/ Jigarbov - http://www.jigarbov.net Support us through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/EasyAllies Schedule: http://easyallies.com/ Merchandise: http://shop.spreadshirt.com/easyallies Live streams - https://www.twitch.tv/easyallies Stream archives - https://www.youtube.com/easyalliesplays https://twitter.com/easyallies https://www.facebook.com/easyallies https://easyallies.tumblr.com/

Comments

Anonymous

I've been waiting all day for this. Jones rant GO!

Chris H

Well it seems less needs to be spent on Marketing, retailers need to stop being so greedy and more companies need to go self published. I bet Hellblade made a lot more money for the devs being self published then it would if they had one. This digital downloada being such a big thing now you dont have to spend so much reaching audiences because the games are advertised where players are playing (ie. Steam, Xbox live and psn). Also YouTube and twitch for easy cheap advertising. Make your own trailers and host your own streams.

Anonymous

Not sure if it's happening to anyone else but the sound cloud link isn't working for me. Edit: Says not available on mobile

Anonymous

I'm glad you guys mixed up the lineup this week.

Anonymous

Jones' frustration is awesome!

Anonymous

Soundcloud isnt working says track cant be stresmed

Anonymous

Looooooooove the EA rant from the Allies! L&R!!

Anonymous

Just for Damiani : Shadow of War is sellin bonkers, so the bubble on the internet trashing the game for its microtransactions doesn't have a real effect on those big franchises. It will be the same for Battlefront 2. The average consumer doesn't read Kotaku or watch EZA....

Anonymous

Love me a classic Jones Star Wars rant

warren blyth

slightly weirded out that yall seem to think the game was on track and great. no love and respect for EA management? I'm sure they would have loved to push this game out AND start a new direction in EA Vancouver (selling 2 star wars games == twice the money). but someone did the math and decided it was best to flush the years of development on ragtag. In my mind, this sort of extreme move is usually because of serious problems with the game's development slipping past deadlines. (maybe mentioning 2019 in the press release was even a hint at why it was being canned? I'm 100% sure it was discussed as 2018 game in the past)

Anonymous

That poptart/toaster strudel hot take in the sponsors was hilarious, kyle's expression was worth it alone lol.

Anonymous

JONES RANT 10/10

Anonymous

Correction: Fiscal year 2019 is not all of the year 2019. It is from April 1, 2018 through March 31, 2019. The Visceral Games Star Wars game was meant to be released in FISCAL YEAR 2019, which is in line with their original release date of 2018.

Anonymous

Hey Allies, just wanted to drop a line about fixing loot boxes. It's my personal take but wondered if it could be as simple as just adding a second currency to let players buy the item they are hoping to get out of the RNG loot box. Much like overwatch where they have two systems in place. The people who want the items and have money to burn will inevitably buy the boxes, keeping developers happy and cost down for us. Jusy don't have the secondary currency take weeks to accumulate so even those of us not spending money on boxes are still getting items fast enough for that endorphin high. Nothing made me quit wow harder then spending 12 hours a week stressfully raiding with absolulty no new drops for three weeks at a time. Sorry so long. Love and Respect boys.

Anonymous

That finally word was so somber.

Anonymous
>>7821539

A lot of people keep forgetting all those Ubisoft games that no games media/personalities cared about. They all charted as sold very well. Without much social media hype and average reviews.

Anonymous

Probably been ask already, but does anyone know where one might get a coffee cup like the one Jones uses? Is it made of wood? Too cool, I want one. Sorry so off topic, but coffee is srs biz.

Anonymous

Super Mario Odyssey install size was apparently revealed last month by Nintendo Japan online store which is 5.7GB

Anonymous

Jigarbov is the hero we need, but not the hero we deserve.

Cameron O'Neill

A huge issue with development costs is the wages’ being commanded in Silicon Valley currently. Regardless of how much you LOVE making video games, imagine being in a position where you could work on software for Google and make $200,00 a year, with no crunch. Or make a video game for half the salary but twice the hours. If you want to solve this problem the base price for games must go up, or we let the market speak and we lose out on extremely unprofitable single player games.

EasyAllies
>>7825166

If I recall correctly, Jones said be bought that thing at a Renaissance Fair

Anonymous

SoundCloud not available on mobile...

Anonymous

So turns out the game was cancelled and the studio closed because the project was a complete disaster, and the game being single player had nothing to do with it. Couldn't watch the main segment knowing this now.

Anonymous

Is Kyle wearing a "Death Note" shirt?

Anonymous

thank you damiani for that closing thought

Anonymous

Damiani, I think Hellblade proves that you can do a successfull single player game with a smaller budget. What doesn't make sense is to spend 60 million dollars on a horror game that would never, ever, be a Call of Duty scale game. Even Madden can't reach over 7 or 8 million each year, and if you make a horror sci fi game that needs to sell as good as Madden, you are just crazy.

Anonymous

Correction for Kyle about the fruit..... seedless watermelon! You get no more fruit.

Anonymous

I think Damiani is off the mark on retailers being the problem. Retailers provide crucial marketing, promotions , discoverability, and gifting opportunities. The music industry didn't benefit from a ITunes monopoly and if first party has a monopoly on distribution of your game long term developers will suffer.

Anonymous

This Visceral/EA thing outrage from the industry/community seems weird to me. Visceral hasn't made a great game since 2011. Has everyone forgotten that Visceral made Dante's Inferno, Dead Space 3, Army of Two: The Devil's Cartel, and Battlefield: Hardline? All games that were considered heavily mediocre projects. Even Ben has said as much on Twitter. I honestly feel the game Jones wants exists only in his mind. The sad truth is that Hardline, Visceral's last game, scored WORSE than Force Unleased on Metacritic. Visceral's game previous to that, Army of Two: Devil's Cartel, released in 2013 was literally one of the worst games of that entire year with a 54 Metacritc. We shouldn't just handwave the Force Unleashed games away so a rant can be justified over the closure of one the worse big publisher developers whose games aren't that much better than the games you're handwaving away in the first place. There's plenty of things to be angry about. I'm not sure this is one.

Anonymous

Great rant by Jones. EA gonna EA as usual

Anonymous
>>7833372

I agree with you that Visceral has had some bad bombs in recent years but before EA forced their hands with Dead Space 3 coop and microtransactions they were one of the best studios that EA had. The reason Jones, and so many others are on a righteous crusade against the closure right now is two fold, first that the studio has been great, and without all the messing from EA would have most likely stayed great, and second that this is just par for the course for EA. They force a studios hand with things like multiplayer, microtransactions, wide appeal, focus testing to death, etc and then when the game fails they blame the studio and close them down.

Anonymous
>>7822764

I dont think the game was bad. EA, in their post about the closure, literally states that they decided due to focus testing that gamers did not want single player experiences and that they wanted a game they could play forever. The thing is that EA has ruined games with focus testing before because the idea of focus testing is flawed out the gate. The biggest two examples of this are Overstrike being turned into the bland homogenized mess that was Fuze, and the adding of coop and microtransactions to Deadspace 3, but these are far from the only games that were ruined through focus testing. EA is also not the kind of company to cancel a game for being bad, they release bad games all the time. they just want to make a ton of money as easy as possible and a destiny like or battlefront like game is gonna make more money. The flaw in this thinking is that they come up with things like "gamers dont want single player games" and take that as fact, even though when compared to other games single player games still have a huge support, Zelda sold better than damn near anything, Every Uncharted has sold gangbusters. Tomb Raider sells well. Final Fantasy XV sold well. Skyrim is one of the best selling games of all time. Dont believe EA. They are some of the best and biggest liars in the biz.

Anonymous

So happy you all recorded AFTER the announcement from EA. It's the only gaming news I cared about this week, so hearing you all echo my feelings on the matter was a breath of fresh air on the topic.

Nicholas Poer

Jones slowly becoming my favorite with that banana pick, Kyle falling dramatically with pineapple though I expected him to be a weirdo and say tomato because technicalities

Anonymous

"I'm done. I would go paint houses" True that man.

Anonymous

Where do we give jigarbov money so he can keep being the sponsor for Podcast halftime?

Anonymous

I think if you miss your goal, you should have to say something positive about a game you don't like. Maybe the panelists that make their goal can choose the game.

Anonymous

Clarification. Carlito did in fact send me a short video of him finishing Red Dead Redemption. The reason I decided to add the review on my end of the bet is because as far as I know, Red Dead is quite a bit longer than Last of Us, so it was only fair to add something on my end to even out the workload. I will do my best to finish the game and review within 10 days but I am currently training for the New York Marathon which is November 5th so please forgive me if it's a day or two late!

Anonymous

Aloha Allies, I want to thank you for your Visceral discussion, and Jones especially for echoing my frustration when it comes to Star Wars games. There were so many memorable games from the mid-90s to mid-2000s, like X-Wing/Tie Fighter, Rogue Squadron, Rebel Assault, Dark Forces/Jedi Knight, Shadows of the Empire, Battlefront, KOTOR, Galaxies MMO, even games like Starfighter, Racer, and Republic Commando were pretty good. The only thing we have gotten in recent years is the Force Unleashed(s), a couple Lego Star Wars games, a bunch of Zen Pinball tables, SWTOR, Kinect Star Wars, Infinity 3.0 and the new Battlefronts. Granted Lego Force Awakens, Infinity 3.0, the Force Unleashed(s), and Battlefront were enjoyable for a short while, and while I personally love SWTOR, the recent selection of games doesn't even compare. We've also had 5 confirmed cancellations in the last 4 years; 1313, Outpost, First Assault, Attack Squadrons, Battle of the Sith Lords. As a life long Star Wars fan, and the recent resurgence of excellent content in the Movies and on TV, the shortfall when it comes to gaming is just inexcusable. And now with this news, it puts the future of gaming in jeopardy as well. We used to have at least one good game every year for almost a decade, now we're lucky if we get one in three. Let's hope that they're working on games they're waiting to announce, otherwise its going to be more lean years going forward. Mahalo nui loa for all you do, Samo Rozman PS. If you get a chance, please try SWTOR, leveling 1-50 which is the main storyline for each class is now free and really enjoyable, especially Imperial Agent (Space James Bond) and Trooper. You can play each class Light Side or Dark Side, and the storyline changes depending on your actions as well. I think one class has 5 different possible story endings based on your actions. Not to mention planets like Alderaan, Tatooine, Belsavis, and Taris are amazing to travel through, and there are plenty of call backs to KOTOR 1 and 2, as well as great planet-only storylines like freeing Corellia from Imperial occupation, or discovering the secret in the center of an ancient prison planet. I'm on “The Harbinger” server if anyone wants to play.

VGJunky
>>7844477

The fully voiced stuff and romantic companion stuff is just so fun. I miss good Star Wars love stories

VGJunky
>>7824022

I thought they did mention that it was through early 2019. But who are we kidding if they thought 2018 they would have said it - this was 2019

VGJunky

There is some room for the middle tier A games, but they need to be very efficient and precise about the direction of their game - they can't afford to make it too big, too ambitious, or take too long in development - and the trick then is to leverage the support of all of social media to handle the marketing budget as well. Not many games can pull it off, but waifus seem to help (based Nier Automata). Fanartists and cosplayers, Twitter, Youtube, etc all helped make that game a success Basically, do your best to stand out and not seem generic or boring as hell, as that is the stigma associated with the old A-tier random RPGs or first person shooters based on original IPs that don't have any standout qualities

VGJunky

Jones was just locked and loaded, taking nonstop shots at EA and hitting the mark every time wrt their corporate philosophy, mishandling of Star Wars, and all-around shoddy decisions. If I was watching it live I would have been applauding through most of it.

Anonymous
>>7840179

I'm flattered, if you are for serious, I'm making those dirty stinky microtransactions on the Minecraft Marketplace available on ios/android/xbox1/switch(soon) feel free to purchase one. But I'll be sponsoring for a little while to come anyway :)

David Sobiegraj

Correction: Yooka Laylee did have a retail physical release.

Anonymous

I don't know if I agree with Damiani here. The fact that the Vendors like Wallmart and Amazon take their cut (roughly $9 a copy) doesn't make it robbery. Vendors are the only companies with the resources to distribute games to customers, blaming them is kinda a strawman argument. Developers and publishers have a lot more say in how to monetize their games better, either by making better games or reducing waste.

Anonymous

*Damiani closing thoughts about not enjoying microtransactions* *Jones sound clip at end* "I'm enjoying these microtransactions!" 😂

Anonymous

That was a fairly brutal podcast. It reminds me of back when 3D gaming first started and lots of the best developers really struggled. Vastly increased budgets and having to employ many more members meant that many of the greats couldn't survive. Time to evolve.

Anonymous

Correction: Bloodworth says a pineapple propagated from its crown could produce a fruit "within like a month or two" but in actuality it will take at least a few years. By that method of propagation, it's roughly 2 years just to get a flower.