You guys have the single best forum of any game out their right now which has the best community and followers! Pluss you guys actually talk on them and participate in the discussions So congrats on being amazing!
i was shocked as well. not that it was a new thing for me. i was shocked that this kind of gaming has actually came back, where people cared and tried to make the game as interesting and fun and good, where everyone knew the game like the back of their hand and taught each other everything, where the developers contribute to the game and they help the players contribute a little as well (both by listening to wishes and by making custom options for gameplay), where the game gets better everyday and changes only in good ways and evolves to become better than ever. i thought this kind of gaming was sliced from ear to ear and left on the side of the road dead, somewhere between the original CoD and C&C renegade, and CoD4 but search parties havent found its body, so maybe something on that road didnt want it to be found, and ran it through the wood-chipper. ever wondered what is in the mulch in the foundation of the factory that makes copies of the MW2 discs? thats what i thought it was made of...
Aye its not even like the bigger titles can use the excuse that their community is on such a grander scale that its hard to give the comunity the interaction it deserves, look at blizzard, how many people play their games?! Yet they have frequent staff posting on their forums. Think its just a customer service thing. Alot of these companies are stuck in the past where thinking they can just use froums for announcments, and personal correspondence should be delt with via personal e-mails/PM. But forums are clearly an awsome way of keeping in direct comunication with, lets face it, the people who keep them in work!!
My only wish is that we could be even *more* open with you guys about our processes and the day to day of making games. That was really the original goal of the Birth of Game blog. Unfortunately sometimes business reality does impinge, but our goal is to be as open as possible.
Neutrino, you also have to look at it this way (analogy warning) -- when I go to a restaurant and order a burger, I dont want to know how the cow was raised, killed, ground up, injected with chemicals, shipped, frozen, and then thawed in order for me to enjoy it. I want the end result. The rest is stuff I don't need to know. Now, like video games, there are those who are interested in learning the burger process. However, sometimes the less details, the better. It's for the greater good. (The greaterrrr gooooooooood)
Interesting analogy...however if as a restaurant you have a collection of customers who say 'Hey, we as your paying customers would like to know more about this piece of meat you have served us', it would be concidered poor customer service to say 'How about, no? you buy it, you eat it, you f*ck off!'
Thats not what I'm saying at all. What I'm saying is that while some people (me included) enjoy the aspect of creating a video game, we dont need to see EVERY detail. Some of it is rather boring and I couldnt care less. There are key parts that we love seeing, and I think Uber did a good job letting us peer into what we want to see while keeping us in the dark about the not-so-glamorous part of game creation.
A lot of newer restaurants have open kitchens so you can see your food being prepared. Like I said I like the idea of being open, it's just hard in practice. We sign so many NDA's about random stuff that it's just a legal minefield. Timing of releases is complex and often impacted by forces outside of our control. I would rather hold back on some info than tell you guys the wrong thing and have to reverse course.
I hate NDA's and embargo's for video games. Why not show some aspects of a game prior to release? The only reason I see is "in case it gets scrapped", but even then it seems some companies would rather have you be surprised by a shitty title.
NDAs are also in place for fear of someone ripping off their idea and getting to market faster than the creator can. While not extremely likely, it is a valid business risk to consider.
There are very good reasons for making things happen in a timely manner, so NDAs help with that as well.
apparently there are even better reasons to put stuff off as long as possible. microsoft knows those reasons, and what wouldnt they know? (the reason is to make games they think they sell better, sell better. lets not advertise a game that would down-play and undercut a game that is more expensive and higher selling. lets not put dlc out for MNC, even if its free, if people will play that instead of Black Ops)
I don't think it's quite as evil as that. Microsoft isn't going to actively try and hurt sells of one game in order to improve sells of another game, that just isn't smart marketing. It's more like they have so many big projects going on right now that the little ones get forgotten about or pushed to the side.
The NDA's I'm talking about aren't necessarily about the game but more about technical and business stuff. Most of them also preclude talking about what's covered in the NDA too
Makes sense though. If you're not allowed to talk about something secret you probably shouldn't be able to talk about the fact you can't talk about it. For example: If you were working on a unannounced handheld console, like the 3DS, which you signed an NDA saying you couldn't talk about the "a next generation Nintendo handheld console with stereoscopic 3d visuals", but could still tell people you signed an NDA with Nintendo that says you can't tell them anything about their new stereoscopic 3d handheld console... well that would kind of give it away. Kind of like what happened to Nintendo that caused them to have to announce it almost immediately after announcing and launching the DS XL.
