Marathon, Mayhem, and the State of AAA | 363

[Music] What's up everyone to another episode of Game Dev Unchained and no one game development podcast about game development and the lifestyle thereof. I am your host Brandon Bam. If you saw the title of the episode, you know it's a roundt news and that also means we're welcoming back Ray Graham. What's up Ray? Hey, how you doing, man? What's up? What's up? What's up?
All right, Ray. Uh, so once a month, well, it's a couple months now, we talk about the latest and greatest game news and discuss it as game developers and its impact on game developers. So, let's just go ahead and dive right into it. right off the press, the long and awaited uh marathon from Bungie. All right, let's talk about that first impressions.

Let me, you know, since you're the guest, I'll kind of let you kind of kick off what you saw and how you felt about it.
I mean, I I at first glance, I was like, I really like I really dig the art style. I I think
yeah,
you know, increasingly uh more and more games are going for this like super super super realistic photoreal photore photo real. Everybody's doing photoreal and then in the same time everybody's like why are games so expensive to make, right? And so um and so now now uh the art style that I saw I was there I was really digging it actually. I think it looks it look really cool, you know? It's kind of like um kind of around the lines of like little bit more stylized version of like say games that look like Astronineir, you know, or like a more
simply simple shaded stuff. Like it's I think it's even even more um even less real than what Mirror's Edge even was going for. Right. So, it's just it's

just really cool. Really cool art style. I actually actually was intrigued intrigued by that.
All right. And then the next then the next part was like ah another extraction
extraction shooter right there.
Which which which which I'm like h you know like hey you know maybe there's room for really another really good one if if if Bungie can do it. Um but but um I was I was like ah and I'm not going to be like an old person and be like I want my old version of Marathon. Yeah. I understand times times change and and and time moves on, right? Yeah.
Um and they were mentioned some cool things that that maybe it will be a cool team-based game, but um I am I am not at all enthused by by yet another extraction shooter.
Yeah.
All right, my turn. Uh let's just start it off by saying Concord 2.0. All right, that's the buzz word. Uh, I think most

people who uh saw Marathon aren't as familiar as the original game, right? I would say probably less than 10% knows.
No, because old only old people only old people.
So, like to a lot of people, this is a new IP, right, from Bungie. That's how they kind of take it.
Um, the art style, I get it. You know, it has a very digitized I I guess they're going for like a digital hackery like clean colors, mirror's edge look, but then I saw the gameplay. All right. And this is the trick with art here. Uh it's like you're painting lipstick on a pig.
Yeah. Tell what what you're what you're doing.
Well, I mean, it just really looked like it leaned too much on the art, you know, like the cool part about and and there's very few, right? The cool part about the trailer that I saw was the art and the gameplay was just non-existent, right? There was just nothing. Like when the players dies, it

it digitized into like this kind of pixelated thing. It's like, oh, that's a cool effect, but that's it. That's it's the effect. You know, there's nothing about
killing players that that is any different from any shooters right now. Uh, even the gameplay feels very similar to like War Zone or I would say very simplified War Zone to be honest. It's it's not even I say more to Counterstrike gameplay, you know, than than you know what War Zone has become lately, which is like crazy aerial jumps. It's too much, right? Arcade.
I don't I don't I don't even play War Zone.
Right. But what I'm saying is like there's um on one spect one side of the spectrum where War Zone goes like too crazy with the movement. Uh and then the other side is just like pure simplify first person shooter Counterstrike, right? So I I would say Marathon leans more to the Counter-Strike. It's very simple, slower pace. And then I you know I I tried to give it a chance like first impression I was

like, "Oh my god." I mean, it looked like it we've been into we've been doing this for a long time. So, when you see games like that, I was like, "Oh, obviously this it's been internally rebooted a few times." And what they have and have shown is just like just enough to kind of get it out the door. You know what I mean? Like it's just been so simplified to a point of gameplay whereas like let's just make it like bug free and then just and get it to a point. I get it, right? But then
it's a good start. Yeah,
it's a good start, but five years later is not a good start. Yeah,
but also like Yeah, it's been a long time in development. 100%. Right. So like, oh my god, you know, I like I expect the cure to cancer to come out or whatever. That's never that's never going to happen, right? But the the other part is like, how are we judging gameplay off of a trailer?
Like how how how are you?
Well, well, let me finish. Let me finish. All right, so I saw the trailer. I was like, all right, let me trailer.

Yeah, there's a 15inute uh gameplay. I was like, "Let me kind of get a feel for this game, right?"
And I watched it and there was multiple uh player sessions that I I kind of sift through. I kind of try to
see what's up and uh I I didn't see anything special about the game. Like I think it made it
to me uh worse seeing the game play versus the like I was hoping that there were would be more because in trailers obviously there's cuts and you know it's more actionoriented and so obviously the gameplay nuances you don't see in those trailers. So I I tried to do the long sessions and man it's just like I I think this game is going to sink the studio is what I'm seeing man. It's just like
I think so, dude. It's like
I think that's I think that's dramatic. I think
No, man. It's like they're on their last legs with I mean the last time we checked in

with Bungie, you know.
Is there a pulse? Is there a pulse? Uh Sony was like at the door like waiting to take over the facility, right? they were on like their last stand of like we know what we're doing bungie s right and they were you know I think it was last year or something somebody was saying how
in terms of income and expenses like Bungie was like 10 times or like a ridiculous amount of expense and nothing was coming in right they they just spend ridiculous right
so with that problem if the takeover hasn't taken place already. What they saw, I mean, internally, I mean, they have to know that this is this isn't like their next Halo or Destiny, right? This can't be on that level. It's not. If anything, they're just hoping to break even. And I

don't think they're going to break even at all.
I Well, I think it's Well, one, the game's been in development for a very long time. Too long, right? So, so like, who knows, right? But um and who knows if Sony hasn't already taken over because I you know there's rumors of that already happening.
Yeah.
Um but um but like yeah I I I just think like yeah if you're going to go for a genre that's people there's already a ton of those games out there like that. That's what you end up with. You're going to end up with like okay what sets it apart from that game and and re from that genre. And I think really it's it's about like oh it's from a studio with a name.
Yeah.
Right. So everybody has eyes on it. Right. I do think calling it Concord 2.0 is like wholly unfair. Uh because because one of the reasons why people are hating on Conquered is because of the the art style and all this kind of stuff, right? When we I think we all agree that the art is cool, right? So like why isn't Concord too? It's just

another big game that's gonna that people say it's going to flop from looking at a trailer. Like come on now. Um you know and and it's you know especially if it's like from the certain circles like from from like the the internet the people that are always online always always on the internet and they're immediately like oh it's Conquer 2.0 after seeing a trailer. Like you just can't take that serious right and and it's and it's just unfair. Um like full stop right you know. Um but um but uh but it is uninteresting right and I think that's more of the but that's that is actually a problem that is plaguing everybody in the industry because everybody's making the same rehashed
gameplay that you've seen a hundred times before.
Yeah.
Right. And it's hard to like if you say like hey I'm making a shooter
like good luck to you
making a shooter. Like there's there's hundreds of these things out here. Right. So, like, how you going to stand out, right?
Um, and it's really the interesting gameplay from a lot of the indie games

that are stoking the fires of people's imagination, right? It ain't going to be no shooter from a AAA company. It's just not going to be, right? And so, I think sitting there thinking that a company's going to come out with a a shooter
in this day and age that's going to knock your socks off and be revolutionary, I think you're just tripping. I think you're just you're expecting too much. Um, right. because it's just it's just uninteresting, right?
Yeah. I mean, what's sad is that western let's define like the state of industry, right? Western studios especially are definitely faltering in a big way like just falling off the cliff. Eastern studios, Chinese companies, Korean and even Japanese games are having like their second industrial revolution right now, right? all these games coming out. I mean, Nintendo just came out with its, you know, promo for
Don't even get me started about that.
Yeah, but like I mean,
I'm just saying like on this side, it's

with Bungie coming up with something like this.
Yeah.
It's going to be a while till we go back to the golden era of western games. I just don't
I mean I I
well like when you think PlayStation 2 especially 3 it just felt like you couldn't go wrong
kind of were kind of whack but
yeah but like the string of let's just say Sony right Sony PlayStation Studios Naughty Dog there was just like this long even Horizon Zero Dawn there was a period where like oh there's a certain quality of games that just continuously keep being pushed out and it's been visible hard and with the pandemic and everything
and these games taking 5 10 years and GTA takes 10 years, you know.
Oh god. Yeah.
Like how long is the cycle of bad games before we get those times?
Here's here's the thing. You're saying bad games and physically I don't know this, but what I what I really think it

is it's it's a symptom of the fact that games are getting more and more complicated to make. They're getting bigger, more content, the teams are bigger.
Like these are teams of a thousand people. We're talking 900 people, 800 people teams, right? And like you just can't make anything. You don't have a team that that's that big, right?
And then and then because the team is so big, because you spend so much, you're like, "Oh, this has to this has to appeal to everyone." And that's as soon as you say that, as soon as you're like, "We need more players. We need to make Yeah,
it starts becoming really whack, right? And so generic and so that's that's what you end up with, right? And and I think that that is really the problem is like we're seeing the symptom
of these are just symptoms and the the problem is like of more expensive bigger teams, bigger things that need to make more money and we're also feeling the symptom from all the studios that are also closing and laying off people, people out of work, right? Like these

are symptoms of the problem, right? Um,
yeah. I mean, it's definitely an issue like the I'm in conflict because like any industry, you need these behemoth
game projects. I I do I do to kind of balance things out to balance a small
Really?
I think so. Let me finish my thought here. This is what I'm thinking, right? Because uh I wasn't at GDC this year,
but uh you probably stopped by a few times from secondhand opinions. I heard like the atmosphere was really sobering because there's a lot of people out of jobs.
Uh it's coming from the the worst year the industry has ever been hit in h have no early signs of recovery yet even deep into 2025. We're still kind of just waiting and seeing. uh like you said, I I I do believe the the pulse of the western game studios

are these smaller game companies with innovative ideas. However, these small game companies are not going to sustain like the huge group of game developers that are out of jobs, right? It's these big companies, big games that hire like hundreds of people, right? That employs hundreds of people. Yeah,
you know, for at least a good two, three years.
Well, who says the industry has to be this large?
I I don't mind definitely there's a size limit that I think we're definitely blue to out of proportion, right? I I think uh going to earlier where it's not a thousand people unless you're making GTA, right? But like I look at a game at Marathon. Even the art style, it's it's um it's a good choice, right? I'm not even sure if they went with that since the beginning, but what they put

out.
Probably not, right? It definitely seems like a reaction of let's hide some [ __ ] Like that type of art style is like let's hide some [ __ ]
Like or it's it's like we have to make this faster. Yeah, it makes faster. But when I see when what they put out and I don't I don't know the size of the marathon team, but we have to assume
if not not working on anything else. I mean it's it's Bungie, right? Everyone hands on deck unless they have other secret projects.
Well, at least 100 or something, right? Yeah. But the output as an artist is I look at it and I'm like
this doesn't take hundreds of people to make. Like if I were to get
formulated form a team and makes a similar thing, it would take a smaller team like
no doubt.
But you but you already know you know the story of like the game uh threes, right? The the the mobile game threes where you just you know you're doing multiple three, right? And you're sliding numbers around. You know this game, right?
Explain it. You mean quality and what you
No, no, no. I'm getting to the point.

I'm getting to the point, right? But the the story of this game, right? The game's really simple, right? You look at it. you look at it right now, you'd be like, "Hey, I can make this game in six months."
Yeah.
Right. Really, really simple. But then the guy that made it released his like his work logs of like the iterative steps that he took to end up making the game. And it was like a a two-year thing, right?
Simple game. You could somebody copied it and ripped it off and made more money than him, right? Because it's such a simple game to make. But there was a process of of of um
discovery, right? Prototyping, right? And and same thing with Marathon. Yeah. You look at the argument like ah it shouldn't take 5 years to make this, right? But you don't know what they were doing the first two years, right? Um they were obviously doing something, right? But but it clearly wasn't the direction they ended up going, right? And and so like that's that's why that's the problem with saying that kind of stuff is like you you know that this is an iterative process, right? And there probably is problems. People leaving team rebooting the project, the project's not going the right direction. Like there's all sorts of things that

happen
that are that are factors and happen in that process because we know that. Yeah.
Right. You've worked on teams where this has happened before.
Of course.
Yeah.
I do I do feel uh yes, it's always been a part of creating a big game, right? Just iterative and throw away things and simplifying things. Um I feel like it's gotten worse, right? uh in a way where uh hitting a point of no return uh you know just just a certain uh lifespan of the g the game development where where there's no recovery right and I feel like Marathon what they put out is at a point of no recovery there's no way it's going to even hit it's not going to hit even right
I have no idea I I have no idea Yeah,
I have an idea. I I look at that.
No, no one no one has any idea. All we could do is just go

Well, here's the problem with that internet say
and most of the time they're still going to go cop it. So, like So, like I you I have no idea. I
Well, with the with a big game like that,
right,
especially with the pedigree of Bungie, there's an expectation. I If you're not going for high-end graphics where it's like ultra realism,
right?
Wait, what? No, no, no. If if if if if you're looking at a game like Bungie and you're not looking at for high-end graphics like top marks like of the generation, right? And you're looking more at like Mirror's Edge simplify art style, right? Okay. And as a gamer, I I expect that to come from somewhere like that that multi-million dollar uh production either through gameplay or art, right? I'm not seeing in the art, right? The art, like I said,
yo. Yeah. Yo, it doesn't need any of those things if it's coming from like

that's the that's the problem with the industry, man. It's like we're sitting here saying that all these AAA games need to be like you need to spend millions of dollars. Like you don't need to do that. And I know for a fact I know for a fact
that that internally in Bungie they there was some focus on smaller games that could have a much longer tail. Right? There's the you know there's smaller games get grow following get people playing it right? get people enjoying it and then a longer tale where you can monetize over a longer tail, make more money in in the long run, right? It isn't about spending 300, 400, $800 million upfront, right? And in this climate is especially not about that, right? And I and I think Budgie's one of those few studios that is like realized that pretty early actually and been trying to go down that path, but but of course there's been some missteps along the way of course, right? and probably

internal disagreements even, right? But like I think like I think like yeah simplified graphics game coming from a triple AAA I I want that right because because I know
they're going to execute like they're going to execute a certain level and they lower the cost of making that thing.
Yes. Let me rephrase it. Right.
Allow people to have fun. Right.
Rephrase. Let me rephrase that. I um
I guess when I look at Marathon, I can tell that that art style wasn't like from the get-go how they wanted to do it, right? Um
Mhm.
because you look at something like Hi-Fi uh Rush, remember that game that didn't do well, but like critically acclaimed.
Well, critically acclaimed.
Yeah.
Yeah. Critical acclaim. Great gameplay, awesome direction. And I I think it was I'm thankfully it got I think it eventually got bought um after it shortly closed down. But like that's a

game that from the very beginning you can tell Art Heavy inspired everything else, right? And uh that's a smaller team. So they even though I think the sales didn't hit the way they wanted to hit um you know it's not going to it's it's not breaking the bank right in terms of like longterm long long development complete failure on marathon level right let's just say that right marathon something like that right the reason why I'm hating on hating on them more than highfi rush is I can tell that they changed directions. It took them so long. What they ended up with isn't something that is as detailed as H High-fi Rush, right? Uh it's stylized, simplified just to kind of like s It looks like it's salvaging production. It's salvaging whatever this game ended up being, right? That's how I feel about it just because of how the

game play kind of marries with the art. It just seems like two separate things, but the game play doesn't really support the art style. to the degree that I would want it to if they're going for the full
Tron, right? I mean, essentially, that's what it it feels like. It's trying to do the Tron universe, right? Which I get, right? I love that art. I get it.
But it's like halfbaked, right? It's it it's like it's like taking the old Halo kind of gameplay
when they when Bungie was taking care of it sort of, right? It's like very simple jumping mechanics, some grenades, and you're running around, you're shooting with like these big bulky guns. So, it feels like
you just described You just described like every shooter. But anyway,
I know. I know. But at least Halo had a distinct style, right? It had it it had a very defined style. This one feels Yes, it is a It is a style, right? It does has a It does have a look, but it feels like last minute uh to me. I I'll say

this, right? I'll say two things. One,
I think Halo,
like you said style, but also Halo is doing things that nobody's ever seen before when it came to shooters, right? Period. Like Halo started a lot of [ __ ] that copy to this day, right?
Um two, although I never did like Halo, but anyway, but two,
yeah, I didn't either, but I respect it for what it did.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Um and especially on consoles, right? Like people started playing for
Yeah. No one had that on console. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um but anyway, um and then the other thing like you're talking about I I think the one thing I will agree and say a studio of the caliber of Bungie at this point shouldn't really have problems with production.
I know that's crazy, right?
Right. Like they just shouldn't, right? And and but things happen and and that's the thing to knock them off because because you're doing the comparison between them and Hi-Fi Rush, right? And hyper probably had problems with production, but it didn't come through

in what we saw. We saw like a cohesive game that's super fun, critically acclaimed.
That's the word. Yeah. Cohesiveness.
And and then with with with Bungie, you're you're like, I wouldn't expect, you know, a multi-million dollar AAA studio to to have these kind of problems. And that's and that's something to truly criticize. Um, but then when it comes to the game itself, like I I I'm just not gonna judge it too tough until until I see it. Although I like I already said, like the whole genre, Extraction Shooter, I'm good. Right.
Yeah. You know, that's uh it's a
it's it's dead on arrival for for it to like enter uh because when I look at the gameplay, it's it's a game that I can play now, you know? Like why am I waiting for this?
Well, you're not playing a game. You're not the one you're playing now ain't from Bungie, though. Is it though?
That's not enough.
And and a and they ain't got that art style, though. That's not enough. I

mean, the like the the the gamers nowadays with the have a short-term memory and they have like a fiveyear gap, right? And the last game that Bungie really delivered was like
Destiny, right? And uh from that original fan, it was like eight years ago, right? when they first released the before the expansions.
And so no, nobody knows Bungie, you know, except for us old.
What do you mean?
No, I'm telling you, man. Like us old heads like maybe kind of know Bungeie.
Anybody? No, no, no. Anybody that has a console,
right, at all knows Bungie. Anybody at any age, right?
It's not It's not a strong consoles, you know. It's just not a strong brand as it used to be, right? It's not like a guarantee. Like even Halo like uh was their biggest thing, right, besides Destiny and 343 closed down and created

Halo Studios, right, to it was so bad that they had to change their name.
I I wouldn't say that that's Bungie's problem at all. That's
No, but like it's somewhat attributed to Bungie
and so their legacy is tarnishable.
It's more like it's more like Bungie didn't want to be in a box and they have more ideas that they want to get out there and so they're like let's go and make other ideas. And I think
to make Halo and then make Destiny I think is like a huge thing, right? Those are two great games like games that people love to play and things like that. And Destiny started out had a lot of issues when Destiny first came out if you remember. But Destiny had a distinctness like like even with me
well not even with me not being a big fan of
both those games like I can still see Destiny the production value right I was like oh that's a big game that that that take a while right and I look at Marathon and let's be honest right let's

yeah let's say they worked on it for 5 years they probably rebooted it like last year that's what I see and what you ended up having is what we saw. It's like a year's worth of production, which is if you just erase the last four years, yeah, it's that's pretty good for a year, right? But if you're going for this style, um, you know, it's a it's a mesh of what we've seen before. If you guys try to go do Ghost in the Shell, do [ __ ] Ghost in the Shell. You know what I mean? Go full on, you know what I mean? Cellshaded.
That's what they're shooting for, right? That's what they're shooting. They're going for a ghost of the shell draw.
They're going for like android.
Android. Yeah. But like the the highest peak of this style is Ghost in the Shell, right? So So make that, right? Um the art obviously,
you know, just compare the two and just try to make it look as exactly like that. And then the game play itself.
Talk about talk about things that the

kids these days don't know. Uh, Ghost of Shell is definitely one of those
like hardcore anime, right? It's like, but like I just don't see they they didn't hit the mark in terms of like I get where they're going with it,
but uh it's not enough to uh to push it because you're literally just walking around with a gun and like you're not even doing crazy aerials. Like if you're going for straight up Counter Strike in space and sci-fi, then let me see that like payday like type of objectives with it, right? I just don't like even the objective extraction stuff. I'm not seeing in this the gameplay sessions enough to differentiate it from any else right now. It just seems like, oh, we gotta announce it, so let's just gather these play sessions as much as we can. Like even the finals, right, which kind of rose and fizz out really quickly, but

it had like a
thing the No, that's the thing with the final. Has it fizzled out? Because people are still playing it. people are still playing it, but you know, it hit a really high peak and again with seasons uh season passes. I I
uh it still has a chance to come back. Yeah. Yeah.
They haven't closed down the studio like a lot of
they haven't closed down the studio and they have another big game coming out which also has a distinct feel to it, right?
Uh I'm just very disappointed that Bungie didn't have something of their own to kind of showcase here. um in a time where we kind of need Triple A to kind of prove themselves again. I mean, that's what it feels like. Like Triple A haven't been proving itself. Like the last thing I saw from big studios, freaking Battlefield
looking freaking awesome with tech, right? I mean, it's like a modern shooter, but they displayed amazing destruction

to every building and stuff. I was like, "Oh, that's enough." So, there you go. That's the production value. Like that's if you were to buy into this game,
like that's where all where all the money went into, right?
No, I I'll still push back on that though, right? I I think I don't I don't think we need to look at games like what's the production value? How much money did you spend on this? At the end of the day, it's like, is this [ __ ] fun or not? Period.
This is true. I guess I'm looking at like,
is this [ __ ] fun or not? There's a lot of really cheap games that are fun as hell.
Of course. Of course. Of course. I guess I guess the the the stance that I'm trying to portray here that I'm not doing such a good job is like I've been I've been hurt so many times with Triple A, you know, like you know, Scar, right? So there's a lot of like trepidation to trusting Triple A again. So a lot of my judgment comes from like
you know trying not to lie to me again. Uh and when I see Marathon,
you can't trust nobody. You can't trust nobody.
Well, it just means when I look at Marathon, it's like I could see the lies. I was like, "You guys are just scrapping this up together last minute

because you you wasted all that time just with bad planning and and everything uh politics, whatever, right?" And what I saw was just a let's just scrap together. That's just what it feels like. Oh [ __ ] we got this much amount of time. We need to show something.
Let's just grab together something. Let's put an art style on it, but not full, you know, it doesn't go full out, right? It was very half C's,
very half baked.
Uh because you you do something like that, like I said, you can really push it.
What's the release date for this thing anyway?
I think it's like this here.
No, what is the release date for this? Have they even announced that is my question.
I think they did, man. I I thought I saw September. Yeah, September. Okay. Bungie confirmed that Marathon will be released on September 23rd, 2020. Yeah, it's dead on a revival. That's the most he can show. September, dude.
You also know how this works. You also know how this works.
You're in bug fixing time. That's the

game. There's nothing
you know how this works.
Gets push gets pushed back.
I don't think at this point you should push back. You got to put alpha out and and see how people the best chance that game has right now is to iterate upon game play.
Yeah.
Game gamer feedback. Yeah, that brings another that brings another point to this is is um that I don't think people talk about nearly enough um out in certain circles. Like that's how games are made.
Yeah.
Right. Games are made like that. Right. And then um and uh and uh what's going to say? Oh, yeah. And the AAA model of like going dark for five years.
Yeah.
And then coming out going, "Here's our game. Hope you guys like it."
Like that's done. Like you can't do that no more.
Yeah. You can't hide in a cave anymore,

right? Maybe a big name can do that because they have their name to rest on.
Yeah.
Um but but I I I think that's even dangerous, right? Um
clearly dangerous. Yeah.
Yeah. And especially with like how games are opinionated and all this kind of stuff and you especially about production value and all this and reboot and you know bringing people along for the ride. They're a lot more forgiving um when when your stuff is like all busted up.
Um and and um and so like that I think is like the model going forward even for big companies. Like I I just don't think you can hide away and go, "Okay, here's our next game. Hope you guys like it." You know? Um,
yeah. I mean,
especially if it's like an online game where you need people to play.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think they just had so little to show and uh they didn't want they didn't know what they wanted to be until basically I

guess the alpha testing is happening soon. So, they are doing that. But then again, it's six months from release.
There's not much to change. It's It's also not full price either, by the way. Um, so it's not going to be 70 bucks, right? So,
how how I I I guess for I would love to know their measure of what would make it success, you know? Is it a million copies, two million?
I mean, games nowadays have to be like 10 million copies like that, right?
Well, well, that's the problem. Yeah, it's it's I would hope that it it isn't those kind of numbers because that would just be
impossible.
It's very very stiff competition.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, back to my point like just as I was saying before, right, a lot of people at GDC having like this sobering moment about the game industry. uh and uh

what I'm seeing is that like these bigger companies, everyone's thinking small, right? The mindset now investor-wise, studio founders, everyone's like, let's create small teams. Uh it's all about the smaller teams about double A, right? AA is dead. Like that that's kind of like the direction of everyone what everyone's saying, right? But I fear that is going to create a bigger issue with um well I mean there's just way too much unemployment to to to form these small teams like there's we're going to permanently lose a lot of developers if bigger teams are gone.
Yeah. And I think that's
stability wise too. The reason why the industry grew to this point is I think because of just over not just co but overindulgence in general.
Yeah.
Right. And so I think I think saying oh we need to go back to smaller

things is and also it doesn't necessarily mean that all these people be unemployed. all these other people could do smaller things too, right? And we could have more smaller creators, right? I don't think the competition in terms of like releasing your game and getting your game in front of people is going to get any less crazy, right? It's just going to get more. And I think I think also a lot of the studio like throughout the industry, I've seen other companies always spring out of other studios closing. A studio will close, four, three more will pop out of it kind of thing, right? And I think that that will just continue. Um, I I don't necessarily think people could be out of jobs forever. I do think like if your job is like game designer, um, a narrative designer, producer, manager, right? Uh, it's going to be a harder time for you like period, right? Because because there's going to be less of those jobs to go around and especially as companies are smaller with smaller budgets, can't just hire, oh, we can just hire a nerv designer for that. Like sometimes you just have to like oh

like we have to do that work internally.
Yeah.
Or or we have to find it like find someone to help us out on it like super cheap, right?
Um so like I I I think that's that's kind of where this thing is going. Um and I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. Um, you talk about GDC, like when I was at GDC, the one shining light out of I went to a lot of technical talks, like more programming oriented talks, and every Astrobot talk was amazing. The the game Astrobot, right, the critically acclaimed, everybody says it's a great game. I actually never played it, and I still I I keep I keep meaning to want to go play it. And every one of those talks was like super crazy [ __ ] they were doing performance, technological, artwise, looked great, custom engine, all this stuff, right? And then they show here's a picture of our team and it's like

40 people max, right? You know what I mean? Right. And and and everything they're doing is clearly they're just having fun doing it and being part of the development process. and they have a really distinct process of like iterating and finding the fun and finding the details and super super small team and I was just like yeah like like that's what like I saw I saw presentations from AAA companies none of them were having as much fun as these these guys. So, so Ray, like I was mentioning before, I wasn't at GDC. I just heard secondhand stuff. What was the biggest thing compared to the other GC that you felt personally? What was it? Just people's faces were a little depressed. Were there lesser people? I heard that a bit and like the the lobbies were sparse.
Yeah, definitely that. There's still like, you know, GDC there's still a lot of people um period. But it was yeah it

was a lot I I felt like it was a lot less people
um than than in previous years for sure. And I there's I think it's a combination of like yeah the layoffs and all that. I think there's also there was also some uh some unwarranted uh fear related to your your your president um
um your president too. And so, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. It's Oh, no. He's not. Um I I am not American. Um and uh yeah. And so, like I think that that um that played into
the attendance, right? I think there's some of that and also the layoffs. Um, and then the other thing is like, yeah, there's people out there, everybody hustling, trying to get deals, trying to trying to trying to trying to get money, trying to trying to pimp their consulting services or trying to pimp their over out their outsourcing operation, right? Everybody like I was

just sitting down minding my own business and some Russian dude just rolls up on me while I was working, wants to talk to me about his company. I'm like I'm like, yo, like I don't even know you, right? Ah,
wow. That's pretty desperate.
And so, yeah, like I think a lot of people are struggling cuz cuz companies are closing down and there's there's less games right now and so people are struggling for work right now
just for Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, that's the biggest component right now and like these games that are coming out. I have to say, man, it's I I really do feel the the quality of them have gotten down gone down. So there's lesser uh investor um confidence in in these bigger games. It's just like the string it I mean it speaks for itself. It's like how like if Bungie can't get it right like you said before the one thing obviously during a development of a game

a lot of things can happen but like by now right Bungie you know you there's there's got to be some lessons learned where the process have to be smoother
right
and the output
but also
have to reflect that somewhat. Yeah.
Also, making games be hard. Yo, um,
making game is hard. I mean, I think I I think the the thing that people don't talk enough is the revolving door of talent, right? When you don't keep the team together,
you are dealing with a new dynamic every single time. Like if it's a team of 10, you feel the effect
when one guy or two two of the dev uh people let leaves, right? there there's an immediate effect, right? And you you know you you can multiply that by hundreds of people.
Yep.
Uh it matters. It really does matter. Uh

that's that's the other thing I noticed about the Astrobot team.
Yeah. Tiny team.
They they tiny team, but they've also made like they they've made two other games or three other games
before.
Yeah.
Together. And so like that just further cements your processes, your tech, everybody's familiar with how everybody works, right? And so like yeah, definitely the strength of keeping teams together shows a lot in the in the quality of the game.
Yeah.
Yeah. I mean I I guess the biggest frustration from this fallout that we're having with the layoffs is that the retention uh humility of it all is non-existent. It's like just understanding, appreciating talent staying together
cementss your your just your studio success,
right? And right now like uh everyone's expendable and somehow it's like, oh well, we'll, you know, recover in a

couple years when the economy is better, but it doesn't happen like that, right? It just like you just really killed the industry. Like it's not single individuals right now. It's like literally teams of people are being dispersed. Uh and the the hopes of them ever working together again is very slim to none. Let's be honest here, right? Because everyone's just trying to find any job
and holding on to that, right? They're not thinking about let's migrate in a group to another company, right? It's not
like the after effects of what's happened right now. We're we're probably not going to see any real long-term success in recovery post 3 years most likely.
Yeah. I I I think I think that's one thing that the companies didn't really consider
think ahead think ahead on, you know, and um I think in a few years there's going to be kind of a drought of games cuz games take a while to make, right?

And as everybody's scaling back, there's going to be like just less games. And then and then when the times are good again, people going to be like, "Where are the games at?" And, you know, it's going to be hard to kind of build back up those teams to to generate those games again. I I still think that's an opportunity right now for small teams. That that is opportunity for them to kind of
the gap gap. Yeah. Um and so like Yeah. Um, of course I'm speaking I'm speaking like this from my my hopeful wishes for my own for my own optimism. Yeah, of course. Yeah. You know, but um but that that's like I I feel that a lot and I I think Yeah.
Yeah. And and the ramp up of good games is it's going to take a while too. Like we said, when these individuals
or groups of people do find jobs, that new dynamic, you know, you're going to have their first game come out and it's like, ah, you know, this first try, you know, there's certain things we got and certain things we didn't,
but then the second game, so we're

talking longer than five years where like a group of people can actually make uh things well and on time, right? Um, I'm very scared, man. I'm very scared for everyone that's out there, what it means for the Western game studios, right? Um,
and that's the one thing I think, you know, yes, the smaller games over here are are going to help fill the gap, but the big games will be coming from overseas in terms of polish and cohesiveness. you know, it's going to be Eastern Europe, it's going to be gains from Japan, China, like that's what's going to fill the next six years. Um, and I I I I will also and I I anticipate a lot of Western developers are going to remotely work for those studios in the time being because those studios are hiring. their

studios have stayed together and they're uh pumping out really good games. Yeah,
I don't think they're hiring. I don't see them hiring remote people, though. Um
it's not it's not going to like I said, there's just too many people unemployed. Like there's just no space anywhere. I mean, I think there there's going to be a few, but not
It's It's funny though because I do see people like posting they're like, "I'm looking for a new job, right? And and remote and it has to be this, has to be that." And I'm like I'm like you know what
stop it with the demands. Yeah.
Yeah. Like in this market right now like and and the people that are hiring know this, right? They're like they're like I'm like yeah you can't
bother you.
You can't have these kind of demands right now. And I get it though. I get wanting to keep that going. Um because it's it's you know why move and then get laid off in two months or 3 months? Like like you put your family through a lot. That's that's kind of stupid. But like but like you cannot be out here saying I need a I don't think there's many remote

jobs just sitting around. You know what I mean? So
yeah, I see that too. There's um I don't know if it's like because of postco there's a certain entitlement to a lot of developers now. It's like well you know
Yeah. Well yeah it was like they needed people right needed to scale up and and uh and it was a it was a sellers market basically.
Yeah.
Right. But now now it's a buyer market.
Yeah. And I think a a lot of developers are not sobering up to what the situation to an industry. Like I do feel like we're at a very [Music]
it feels like the great depression for the game industry right now. And so like they need this like it's ridiculous. Even to this day like you said on LinkedIn I I see people with their demands listed demands. I was like dude you're not going to find a job. You're going to be out competed by everyone. uh you better be ready to move. Learn some Japanese, learn some Chinese,

learn some Eastern European languages if you want to just if you want to stay in games otherwise you need to
just take a pause in the industry and find something else that is stable.
Well, and and that's and that's also happening which is also pretty bad, right? Because people are like people are like openly questioning
should I still be in this industry, right? So
yeah, they've like been so burnt from it that uh they're rejecting everything which which is a shame because uh like I said it it is a flourishing industry like
in spite of all these layoffs like the game industry yes it's it's reversing in terms of its growth right it's correcting itself but it's still very profitable like people
we've been here we've been here before you you know layoffs I've seen we've been here before, right? And um
people are still playing games. Yeah.
And it's a shame though. But it's a

shame though because like the industry has done things in the past even like when I was more fresh in the industry where I've seen people completely nope nope out of it and go, you know what, it ain't worth it. You know, and then go to Facebook or, you know, or something like that, right? You know what I mean? And and just be like, no, like I'm good. Right? Um, and then there's the people left um that have this passion for it and all this kind of stuff, right? But but we've been through this before and and it's just sad that when you see people um question, uh, should I even be in this cuz this thing this is kind of crazy, you know? And I and I tell you, you know, we teach, you know, at Game Heads, we teach kids, uh, and the first thing I say to them is like, are you sure you are really sure you want to do this? because like cuz it ain't
it ain't like it ain't sitting around and playing games all day, you know what I mean?
It's it's it's it's hard work and on top of it um you know you you might get laid off, you know, and and it's going to be

hard, right? And and we've I've had we've had students get into industry, get laid off, find another job, you know, and and go through that cycle um very early in the career, right? And and if you're not prepared for that, like it's very easy to go, this is crazy, I'm out. You know,
I I do think that the people who stick through it, we'll feel the windfall because there will be a shortage of game developers ready to go. Um, and the the even there's a setback in in terms of growth right now, it will kind of pick back up because there there's a new gamer every day that that's coming in the street. I mean, you look at the streamer community, it's transcending.
Well, well, I mean,
you say, no, here's though. Here's the thing about that. You're right.
You know,
they ain't they ain't playing games are getting made to right now.
I know they're not playing games. they're doing like crazy
and we have to and we have to also come

to terms with that, right? And figure out what what as a industry we're going to do about that. Um because yeah, like mostly like yeah, there's a lot of new gamers coming in,
streaming, all that kind of stuff.
Uh they they're not they're not out here talking about Marathon. Take that right now.
Yeah, I know.
Right. So, yeah, they're not at all talking about Marathon. No, there's a lot of anti-ripa sentiment that's been growing a lot, you know, from the streamers, from gamers themselves.
Um, the only people who isn't wisening up is
are the AAA developers and the publishers and the people who are kind of financing these things that they're not understanding, you know, what what's happening. Uh, keep kind of regurgitating the same crap. uh destroying which I feel is like a a major component to the game industry. Like blockbuster games need to exist. Uh

not for the sake of existing but like the old idea of what blockbuster games used to represent you know uh just like supposed to represent like the highest quality the pinnacle of great entertainment right in terms of gaming. Why is why is quality collaborated with size and and bigness?
No, it's uh you know what I mean?
I I think I know but like but the the fact that you question it like hurts my feelings too because
there was a time where Triple A just the the biggest games there was a guarantee of like somewhat success. You know what I mean in terms of
Yeah. But you but you know what's no you know what's crazy about that though is what we call AAA when we're talking about the height of the industry when we're looking at like Devil May Cry AAA games
Devil May Cry cost $20 million to make.

I know
dog like seriously like really think about that for two seconds.
Yeah.
Yeah. I mean like we can just go to Nintendo you know um real quick. And Nintendo moved in the right direction in terms of keeping their game quality there and the game budget budget not ballooning up to a certain risk factor, right?
But even them, even them now are like, you know what,
$80 games $80. Yeah.
To me, it's like
I mean, yeah. I mean, it's been like 20 years. Of course.
Of course. Of course. And like uh and I see a lot of this argument too is like if there's any AAA games that are worth a it's Nintendo games like%
there's there's a certain guarantee with their games that it's going to
you're going to sink in at least 20 plus hours and it's going to be polished
for years
and the last level is going to be as good as the first level. Right? There

isn't any shortcut that they do where they're kind of just like [ __ ] with the gamers, right? So um
there there's a certain uh humility here where like these other develop western developers it just feels like western developers really have really lost their their their way in my opinion. um uh the the there was a time that we dominated on this side, kind of leading the game industry for a while, right? And uh kind of got too boastful and lost sight. Uh felt too invincible, right? And now we're going too crazy. Uh it was something like Marathon. I look at that game in Concord. I was like, what is going on? I I think it's I still think it's wholly unfair to put that in the same category. Like it's just it's just it's just
it's not me, man. People are already calling it Concord 2.0.

The fact the fact that they're doing that though is not for us to repeat. It's for us to condemn because it's wholly unfair.
Um yeah,
I did see a funny Reddit post from a former uh because Concord is no more, the studio is no more, right? uh Firewalk uh Dev was like, "Hey guys, you know, I'm not here to defend anything." Uh just coming from someone who's been like 17 years in the industry and spending a good chunk of that on Concord and seeing how illreceive it was, not get making excuses, it just didn't hit the market, right? To his credit, he did kind of accept it as it was. I was like, let's just not spread that into marathon%,
right? Because it's a different team% right.
They put their life and soul into that. Let's not clump all these games into whatevers, right?
And of course, he did he did a fatal mistake. He tried to reason.

He tried to reason.
But I'm like, dude, that post alone is like, this is so sorry, dude. It's like, what are you doing? Just disappear. work on something.
No, no. He can have his opinion. He can express it per type of
Sure. But like people are going to dogpile it in a very negative way. Like it's not going to win any favors
because he's reasoning with the internet. And you have to understand the internet has no reason.
Yeah.
It doesn't work that way.
Well, the internet to their credit
Yeah.
need uh don't need to justify, you know, whether they don't like something, right? It it it's like your product out there is meant to be judged by its own merit, right? And
either good praise or bad.
As developers, we have to accept that, right? So like the act of him doing that I kind of well I really condemn, right? I was like, dude, stop with your

feelings, right? The project
as as a no as a developer. Oh, I I can't I can't You should defend.
You stand by your product. You stand by your product.
Sure.
You have to defend You have to defend other people and be like, you can't take what your experience with our game is and spread it to another game for the memes. Like, it's dumb.
I get I get it. It's blind. I get it. It's blind judgment, but I like
Yeah. I think what people are attributing uh what they see uh in in in Marathon and what they saw in Concord is that yet another game that nobody asked for, right? It's hitting nobody's list, right? And it's feeling like it's being pushed onto them as this is cool. This is what the next thing is, right? Uh, and uh, it's just not at all in that way right now in terms of like

I guess it's it's the era of gaslighting if that's what it feels like, right? It's like you're you're trying to gaslight me that this is a good game. Like I can tell it's not, right? The gamers nowadays I to to have evolved in terms of
Is there is there ever a thing such as a bad game? Isn't it just how you perceive it?
No. Yeah. It's a bad game if your studio shut down. Like you got to accept that. Like it's a bad game when you know you don't have uh you know money to put
food on the table anymore.
So many so many good games have flopped. It's not even funny. But
yeah, like Hi-Fi Rush like is the greatest last example where I was like this is an original game. Super awesome platforming game. Super cool style. Has a great tone, great voice acting. didn't hit quite the way it needed to be. I think part of it too is just the way they packaged it, right? Because it was released day one on Game Pass, but it was exclusively Xbox, right? I was like,

why? What are you doing, man? What chance does it have? Like, I went out to buy just to support the dev. Uh because I was like this is a game I want to sit down and try because even game pass like I try like it's not like if I have great connect internet connection I still can't sit through like I was playing Hellblade right is it Hellblade um what is that game from Ninja theory
Sissuna's sacrifice yeah
yeah yeah beautiful game right I hated the fact that I was like trying to like look at it like scramble porn right it was just It was
Wait, wait, hold on. You're playing Excloud.
I was playing that on ExCloud and just to try it because I didn't buy it, right? Because it's a single player game.
Uh, short, right? And I was like, I try.
I know, but I I was like, you know, Excloud is supposed to be the future here, and I don't want to eat up like 50 gigs.
I've played games on ExCloud. It's fine.

It's fine.
Fine.
But not for a high graphical fidelity game. It's like I felt like it was wasted.
Super wasted, right?
I was like
especially especially here's here's no here's the secret with XCloud that you also probably don't know. It's it's Xboxes,
right? So So you're also you're not getting the PC graphics, you're getting like the the console and and it's probably like kind of down
down res a little bit so that it can be streamed to you, right? Um so certain games certain games are completely fine in ExCloud, but yeah, you could play since it was Yeah,
it was ruining it for me because I could tell that it was amazing art, but like because of the pixelation, it's like, oh man, I'm wasting it right now.
Yeah. And your internet connection is trash probably, too.
No, it's not trash. I play everything else fine.
But, uh, get like 100 100 megabits per second and you're like, "Yeah, that's fine. That's perfect."
Oh my god. Give me more credit than that.

But yeah, I guess you know, the industry is in flux. It's still not on the road recovery. I'm just hearing more and more bad news. I games like this, like I'm not 100% hating on Bungie. I just hate the fact that it keeps happening that these big studios can't just do it right now. Like just out of the gate, awesome, right? Uh and a lot of the Sony games are in their 5year cycle. So, we're not going to see any of the Sony narrative games coming out 2027, right? 2028. You heard you're on that note, you heard the late like ex one of the ex Sony guys mentioned uh or he expressed an opinion like um I can't remember like he was like ex SS Sony president or whatever.
Yeah. Um, and I can't remember who I can't remember the name. Um, but you can look it up, but um, he was basically like, uh, Sony games need to start thinking about less about graphic fidelity.
Mhm.

Um, and and you know, make make simpler looking games basically.
Yeah.
And I was and you know, we started this whole conversation talking about that a lot and I was just like I was like ex Sony boss is starting to say this publicly.
Um, yeah. like five year these five year cycle narrative games that look amazing from Sony, you know, you also see part of their strategy where they're moving a lot of their games to PC. Yeah.
They're not move they're not moving part of their games to PC just like out of the kindness of their hearts or because they just want to share their art with everybody, you know?
Um it's about making more money, right? And because they're like, "Okay, we've tapped this out. We need to make more money, right? Grow a different market."
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And same thing with Xbox where Xbox kind of abandoning Xbox console and trying to go everywhere. Um so like so all of them are feeling the pinch, right? And so the next thing to do is going to be yeah how do we lower uh the cost of making these things cuz like you're going to run out of people you can reach. You know what I

mean? Um and I think we're seeing that trajectory like as clear as day, right? It's like it's obvious. Um
yeah. Yeah. the what was this the uh Yoshida Shu Yoshida saying this.
Sure. Yeah. Yeah.
Um it it's definitely to me stepping back with uh trying to grow the market into the PC market. It is a move, right? But it is band-aid solution to what what the main issue is is that a lot of these development teams, it's just poor planning, man. I mean I mean it's just terrible execution, poor planning and and just bad retention of talent. Um like it's at a certain point where like these games shouldn't be
I would say that's problem.
That's not Sony's problem.
It's not Sony's problem, but Sony dope

ass games. Yeah,
they do. Um, and for whatever reason they're they're able to hit it, but still like their their problem is like long development time cycles, right? I mean, these games are I mean, you're looking at Naughty Dog there. How many times are they going to re-release Last of Us Remaster? It's like, dude, didn't you just do that last year? How much more Yeah. How much remaster you got to do?
Yeah.
How can you remaster a game that's only been released two years ago, right? And it's like I feel like it's it's saturating the market a bit too much of a these band-aid solutions. And I I don't know if there's going to be irreversible damage doing that to your brand, right? Oh, okay. Every two years you're going to because you have a 5year gap, right? You want to remaster old games from your library that you just released last year. Like to me, it just sounds silly, right?
No one's no one's mad at this though. We eat it up some.
I'm mad at it. It's too much. It's too

much.
Um, but yeah, I do think I think involving gamers in earlier chapters of the game is like Alan Wake tried to play with this model. Uh, I think they're finally turning a profit on their Alien Wake too like a few months ago. They their own they own most of their IPs now. uh they're coming out with like Max Pain Remaster like that's and they and and it's a custom engine, right? Like it's it's one of those rare studios that are kind of doing it the old way and that team
they're small and they kept their team together too, right?
Uh their license Control was a great hit. Um and now they have Control 2 and it's like part of the bigger universe. They have like a like I saw recent news that like 2020 they have plans up to 2029 where they're going to really feel the fruit of their labor is like in terms of the press because they are uh

publicly traded company I think
right um they they kind of feel to me out of all the development team have like that kind of Valve old school studio kind of energy tonight, which I feel every studio have demolished over the years. Like we're talking about Riot, Bungie, Blizzard, just all the big companies have. It's like a different uh brand. Like I saw something very interesting the other day where um what either Net Ease or one of these other big Tencent probably Net Ease, right? uh Chinese companies approached, no not Chinese, Korean companies, a Korean company approached uh Blizzard saying like, "Hey, let us make another Starcraft or one of these licenses, right? Like, let us update it." And the response gener generally was like, "We

forgot how to make these games." Like the the Blizzard themselves have lost all the designers that made these games,
but they've all left.
They all left. Yeah. And so like if Blizzard to this day were asked to make WoW, they can't. And that is like in a nutshell,
they can try, but
Yeah. But it would be like an attempt of a new guy trying to,
you know, copy what was there, right? And that is like what's
that the problem? Yeah.
That also speaks to like lack of lack of training, all the transfer, all this.
Of course. Of course. Well, I mean, if you lay people off within a two week notice,
that's not Blizzard's that's not Blizzard's problem. Blizzard's problem is like, "Oh, they're all those guys got very rich and left."
You know what I mean? That's that's their problem, right? So,
it's true. But like the the common DNA with most of these studios is that people left.
Yeah.
And people got fired, laid off, demoted, discouraged.

Are people like sexually harassed people?
Sexually harassed. And so like the people like all these like big names
like Bungie, right? Let me close it on this loop, right? Let me
in the industry they they say this is a call back. All right, they call it a call back. You look at something like Bungie, all right, that made Destiny that made Halo. The Bungie that made Marathon are not those guys.
Oh, definitely not. Right.
We know that. Yeah.
And you can tell by seeing it. So that's why like in terms of brand uh uh
uh quality, right, it isn't there like
Yeah. Never fall for the brand, right? Cuz you remember I'm going to tell you a quick story you could end it on.
Yeah. Uh EA um Dead Space came out
and then EA rebranded Visceral Visceral Games and then they just started releasing other games under the Visceral Games banner. And like legit people in

the industry who know better were like, "Oh, I can't wait for the next Visceral game. It's going to be amazing." I'm like, "You do you do understand one, I worked on that game that's coming out. It's trash and it's a completely different team, right? and they're only putting it under the banner cuz they're hoping uh the brand will will carry it.
Um, you know, and I was like, don't fall for the don't fall for the Okie do, right? Like it's it's a it's a different team,
you know.
So, yeah.
Yeah. I I think that that's always been happening,
but what's what we're seeing now is that,
you know, bigger studios are doing that and uh it's unfortunate because it it really adds
more to the flame of torture and torment. Like it's not helping. Uh, which is like the main headache that most people are having with the AAA games is like these games are just not hitting the mark
of they're the ghost of their library basically. Like you can't they can't

recreate what they they had before. Uh, so it means nothing. So you the there's this heavy price tag that comes with every release now without anything to back it up. And uh yeah, I I can't think of another studio that has a game coming out that feels like a success. Like the Sony studios definitely have the best chance of doing that, but that's like I said, not till 2027, 2028. Um I think it's remedy. Like to me, it's remedy. Valve does whatever it wants, which is never really escapes. But like of all the studios that I look forward to, it's Remedy, right? Even CD Project Red, you know, they're making the next Witcher and like the the the original Witcher people are like, "Yeah, that's not us making it. I don't know who the [ __ ] making it because all the people left
like Cyber Punk team is gone." Like

I'm not falling for that.
I know, right? And it's so sad. So like Remedy is like the only studio and maybe Respawn, right? Even though I'm hearing a lot of things about Respawn lately.
Mhm.
Uh going through like the same [ __ ] but Remedy seems like Oh, wow. I think Rey's the only one that kept the team together and they're pumping out
interesting games.
Nintendo, right?
I was about to say like Nintendo Switch 2 is about to come out. Like
but those are the only two like what other what other studios are there? Now we're hearing more Chinese companies this and that, but like
yeah, maybe
but they're they're not pushing anything new. Like I haven't seen it like
like we talked about rivals, we talked about Wukong, they didn't innovate anything. The Chinese
they do what they do best. They take what's there
and then and they just, you know,
I mean, Rebels is Rebels is good, but like I stick by it's not innovative.
I stick by what I said before. or you put you put Marvel in some [ __ ] and you execute it nicely like

Yeah. And they're good at that, right? The Chinese companies are good at that.
All right, so that ends it, right? I mean, there was a lot uh to cover, you know, since our round table, but the bungee was like kind of like a the leading theme of everything that culminating hopefully improves. But yeah, Western Studios are falling one by one, man. London Bridge is falling down type. It's like, god damn. Uh hopefully hopefully a a company comes in and and like reinvigorates it. Right. We didn't even talk about Fortnite, but Fortnite is becoming Oh, it's been like a joke. Like it's not a game anymore, right? It's like I I don't feel like
No, Fortnite is a metaverse period. That's what it is. That's what they're building. That's what it is.
It's a big commercial now. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.
All right. As always, uh, go ahead and and and and go on X and tweet at Ray or your opinions at himself and go on jump

in the Discord and push the discussion further.
I wouldn't even I wouldn't even see it if you do it on X. Right,
there we go. All right, see you guys. [Music]