posted 08-19-99 11:01 AM ET     

The game company gets no revenue.

Therefore, no matter how lofty their ideals, every economic incentive tells them to spend as much time as they have to to address the most grievious errors and then move on.

'Enhancements', ala SMACX, provide one possible mechanism for addressing errors in a revenue providing fashion. The problem is, SMACX is another 'one time' gig.

For a FPS with virtually no replay value, this isn't much of a deal. I don't know about all of you, but I played CivII for _hundreds_ of hours, and have played SMAC for at least one hundred, plus the 40 hours I spent playing the demo.

We, the hard-core users of a very replayable game, are the only ones who _really_ care whether these things are addressed. Look at the time that Yin26 has invested in Firaxis.

We've got CIVIII and the mysterious 'third episode' coming to the sweep of time trilogy, with the suggestion that with the next iteration- CIV4,SMAC2,third2- you will be able to play from humble beginnings as a nomad on earth to a galaxy-spanning empire.

There has never been another game phenomena like this one, nor one that crys out more compellingly for _continual_ bug fixes and patches to refine and redefine gameplay.

I have a modest proposal. Firaxis should have a monthly or quarterly Sweep Of Time subscription. SoT'ers would get certain benifits, including a clearer channel to inside firaxis, participating in beta-tests, participating in bug-fixes (they could use mozilla's bugtracking software), special tournaments, seeing their names show up in future games in the scenery or as place names or whatever, etc.

There might even be an electronic issue, featuring interesting scenarios, gamefiles, a unit or two- and PATCHES.

The patches would be public, a gift from the fanatics to the world. The rest would be ours, by right of lunacy ;-).

We would, in return, pay firaxis for this.
Perhaps there would be tiered pricing- at the highest tier, you never pay for a Firaxis game, it just shows up in your mailbox.

I would pay $10 a month for everything except the 'free games' and $15 with free games.

Q's:
What would you be willing to pay for this?
What would it 'have' to include (no red phone on BR's desk, please.)

posted 08-19-99 11:21 AM ET            

Yikes...somebody who knows how to work this board crash this thread before Firaxis gets word of this.

posted 08-19-99 11:35 AM ET         

But _if_ It means I've got a hotline into the heart of firaxis- i.e. I'm directly involved in the game-making process, not just 'getting updates' then I think it's worth it.

I'm also operating on the assumption that the reported 'big increase' in Firaxis' staff means an increase in the rate of game release.

How much would it be worth to you? anything?

posted 08-19-99 11:49 AM ET            

But I am paying for this service. I will buy SMACX and Civ3 and SMAC2, etc when they come out because in my experience Sid's games and Firaxis games have been of good quality and the type that I like.

These regular updates are advertising for the company, much better than ads in a mag. Many of us were excited with the announcement of SMAC originally and the forums should our interest.
If they succeed in grabbing our interest and building our desire they will sell a lot of games and make a lot of money (and their reputation will grow thus more money next time.) If they piss us off with too little support, they will drive customers away. This is what happened already. I will buy SMACX but how many of the ex-patriate vets will.

All those suggestions you had were great, but they should be automatically done to get and keep our interest (and money!)

posted 08-19-99 11:52 AM ET            

As I said once before and think bears repeating: I have gotten FREEWARE games, games the programmers got NOTHING for making other than the joy of making it and the appreciation of others, that have been far better supported, with no attitude, than I feel SMAC has been.

I think the difference between those freeware programmers and the Firaxis staff is that the freeware programmers have pride in the work and the Firaxis staff just wants a paycheck.

posted 08-19-99 12:25 PM ET         

Maybe I distorted this conversation by talking about how much _I_ should pay.

A freeware games developer is, investing his/her time for nonmonentary reasons, whether it's for reputation or just because they like it.

Firaxis is expanding to a staff of 40. They do not have the luxury of doing things just because they want to, though there certainly is the reputation element.

If they are going to devote staff to continually- or even principally- working on bugfixes, they _have_to_pay_them_.

If they consider this a portion of the cost of the game, that's one approach. But how long can they keep paying someone to fix bugs on a title that's no longer selling?

Software-as-product has been a problem of the industry for a long time. It's particularly acute in the game industry.

If Firaxis could have a recurring stream of revenue, they could devote it to a recurring stream of work, which bugfixes are.

Since we cannot be expected to pay for bugfixes, I'm trying to find a way that _we_ can get value in return for giving Firaxis a steady revenue stream upon which to fix bugs.

It doesn't have to be that much- think how little of your $50 (or 9000$esc, in my case) actually went to Firaxis- it's about $10, I believe.

So if us 'hardcore fans' gave a subscription fee- like, akathisia, one that _equalled_ the cost of buying all their games retail- we would be a 5x more valuable customer than a retail buyer.

If you're a hardcore fan and do this already, there's no price difference to you, but I bet there'd be a world of difference from Firaxis.

And as far as them only loving money, or whatnot- they are a company. they exist to make money. This is just the way it works.

I believe there's an opensource Civ "The clash of Civilizations" in development: you can help with that if you don't want to deal with proprietary games.

posted 08-19-99 12:58 PM ET            

Info on upcoming game-This should also be free. I signed up at the start to get the Firaxian newsletter via e-mail. It would take 5 minutes for someone, anyone at Firaxis to write a 2 paragraph letter and e-mail it to everyone regularly. My car company also does this about new car models and get your oil changed, etc. and they have to pay for the stamps. I think most people would agree with this one.

Accept Suggestions-They should pay me.: )They can have any suggestions I have for free, no charge, gratis. They don't even have to acknowledge me. If it makes the game better then they can have it. Most people would agree with me.

Enhancements-Maybe I would agree to pay $1 for a good enhancement, NOT a patch. New terrain, new maps, etc. How many SMAC's did Firaxis sell? Let's say they sold 20,000 games (I have no idea) and 1/2 would pay $1 for one all-encompassing greatest enhancement of all time. Would a member of the Firaxis team accept $10,000 to fix bugs in his spare time after dinner? Maybe, I don't really know. Would people be willing to pay $1 each for the Boreholes and the Manifold and the Borehole Scenarios? Maybe. Well, then triple the amount of money you can pay the de-bugger.

I don't know if anyone would pay for these enhancements. I might for a really cheap price. I guess if its cheap enough, they would make the money on volume.

posted 08-19-99 01:11 PM ET         

fix bugs- I agree with you, I'm just saying that the current arrangement has financial disincentives for them to fix the bugs. I'm trying to find a way to change that.

Info on upcoming game- if the game is in alpha state, and you're getting info that's not 'we're doing a lot of cool stuff, yessirree' especially things like nightly builds, etc, it's a bit different.

accept suggestions- well, I suppose, but to have a really effective suggestion/bugfix process requires a good deal of infrastructure and labor to support, especially if it's not going to completely overwhelm the designers. Again, this would be a recurring expense not directly related to the success or failure of a given game.

enhancements- $1 for the greatest enhancement of all time is not recurring revenue.

again, I'm trying to come up with a way for Firaxis to get a recurring, stable revenue stream so that they can devote more effort to the things that matter most to the hard-core fans.

And, as I mentioned in the last post, it need not be 'more' money than you already spend on Firaxis' games, just recurring and steady.

posted 08-19-99 01:54 PM ET            

I more than see your point. But if that is the model they want, they need to go into the subscription business... say On-Line Play. $10/15 month earns you access to their game network. Like Ultima Online, Everquest, etc.

That is not their business model. Their business model is that of a application publisher.

The income they gather is from SMAC being the major product for them. Their flagship product... until Civ3 is released.

Their incentive to fix bugs and make enhancements is to keep their reputation hey, and keep the buzz about their product on the good side. Civ2 had how many patches? Why? Because it was their flag-ship product. I don't have access to Microprose's sales and income figures, but how much do you think Civ2 carried? It had to be significant.

Firaxis will carry on as it has... SMACAX is a pay for patch/expansion. It's job is to leverage the existing SMAC fans into giving more money to Firaxis. We, the public, are paying Firaxis to get the latest installment to our favorite game. That's how the system works.

SMAC will PROBABLY drop to 0 interest product once Civ3 comes out. At some point, there may be a SMAC2... a sequel to update on old product, and reopen an old revenue stream.

I applaud your efforts at trying to find ways to improve support of the products you love. But I find that sending Microsoft serious cash every year so that they make sure my developer tools and kits are up to date to be enough. M$ has several levels of service like you talk about... and last time I looked, the lowest was $100 a year. The highest was $2000. They are motivated to do so to keep the development community in using their developer products and tools, and hence making products that support their other products (IE, Office, Sequel Server, yadda yadda blah). I don't see Firaxis operating in that sort of world. They make games. Throw away products, like movies, music, and books. That DOES seem to be their attitude. Most people will get bored with their product and move on. That's true of even the developers. Sometimes, especially the developers.

posted 08-19-99 05:00 PM ET            

mindlace23, I think your ideas are good and well thought out, but unfortunately they are not feasible. A game developer could not provide enough value to warrant a continual revenue stream. The items that you have outlined should be part of their marketing plan; I should not have to pay for this.

Don't beleive developers when they tell you that fixing bugs is a costly and painful process. This line of thinking is complete garbage. I am a developer... fixing bugs is clearly the easiest part of the entire development process (unless the original design is in disarray). Let me rephrase that... fixing bugs is the easiest part of the development process for the original programmer!! It is quite a difficult task for someone who has never seen the code.

The problem with the game industry (and most other software sub-industries) is that the original programmer very rarely fixes all of the bugs. The process is relegated to a junior programmer who usually creates as many problems as he fixes... been there, done that. This is call nextprojectitis (thank you Darkstar), and is/was the subject of an earlier thread.

Also, I beleive in the case of SMAC, that EA must shoulder much of the blame for the lousy patch cycle. SMAC should be on version 6 or 7 by now; all bugs fixed and many wishes granted. EA's insistance of performing their own QA, and their insistance of the fully translated "worldwide release" slowed the patch cycle and its subsequent feedback loop.

If Firaxis had been allowed to release smaller "English only" beta-patches, they could have wrung out all of the major bugs and concerns by June. Instead, EA took their sweet time in releasing the patches, and the Firaxis programmers were either sitting idle or moving to new projects. The delays allowed Firaxis to lose their focus. Bug-hunting requires focus and a strong feedback loop. The process feeds on itself; if it stops, it can take a considerable effort to get it going again.

posted 08-19-99 07:23 PM ET         

I think they _are_ moving in this direction, I just think they need a bit of a hand to include their 20% in on it...
(from the old maxim that 20% of your customers are responsible for 80% of your revenue.)

When it will take you a hundred hours just to complete _one_ game of the sweep of time trilogy, and assuming multiplayer gets thrown into the mix, there's _got_ to be a subscription routine extractable from that somehow.

The warmongers too, I suppose, if there's a new battle every X period. I dunno, that's really not my gig.

RLMULLEN:
the simultaneous language release was the fans doing, actually. Lots of people bitched that they couldn't upgrade their versions. If I wasn't english, I would too.

I'll bet Firaxis will pay more attention to I18n next time around.

Jythexinvok: thanks, though I imagine it would require quite a subscription base to pay for a full time coder.

--

I do think getting the hard core fans in at an earlier phase of development would really help the games, since many of the real hardcore folks also have some coding experience.

Since a lot of the 'bugs' appear to be systemic, getting feedback from an earlier phase in the cycle would help a lot.

For example, if the code was cleanly client-server, the Infinite Range Missile Feature never would have happened.

Of course, this all assumes BR&SM, both of whom have been coding in a different style for a long time, are willing/interested in involving 'players' at an earlier stage of development.

--

Basically, my core argument is that they should get as close to open-source coding as they're comfortable with, and if me paying for the privelege helps, well then, I'm up for it.

posted 08-20-99 02:56 AM ET            

Trust me. The run of the mill coder makes squat. ESPECIALLY in the entertainment business (or so my friends that ARE developers in the industry have shared. A comparison of salaries has always backed that). A couple of juniors that get access to BR or TT for 4 hours a week would cost them, with full benefits, about $85K. That's paying about $25K to $30K salaries to the two, and all overhead. It would also allow them to train coders to their particular style. Think about what you were throwing around... $10/month = $120/Year. How many hard-cores would sign up? I might be over estimating the fan base, but subscription money racks up quick. It's a killer revenue stream... IF you can keep it open.

They have planned to expand the battles. Gettysburg! was designed that way from the start, if I remember all of Firaxis's buzz. And as soon as the opportunity presented itself, the wheels were churning on linking Civ3 to SMAC. Fit in, I suppose, with SMAC to Sid3. But I have to wonder... where does Sid3 pick up? Total Conquest or Transcendance?

I suspect the reason we haven't seen Gettysburg! new sequel previously, is that EA and everyone else involved wanted to see Firaxis perform. Civil War battles are a small clique. From what has been released, Gettysburg! was a smash hit, for it's genre. But it hasn't sold 1/4th of what SMAC did. See? Firaxis NEEDED the reputation shot with merchants...

I think there is a market that Firaxis could tap, subscription-wise. BUT, and this is a biggie, it has to be done properly. I don't know how they COULD do so. Maybe a quarterly on-line fan publication that included expansion matterial and demos (Scenarios, Factions, Maps of SMAC, [and CIV3... and SID3 when they are published]), might be able to succeed. They could include PR "spotlight on..." series on whatever they wanted to hype or share. I just don't know if the fan base is strong enough though.

But with them developing Civ3... That is a HUGE name. And will most likely live as long as Civ2 did... So they don't have a large enough reason to return to SMAC with expansions. They have a cash cow just waiting to be milked, if they can just get it grown enough to start milking...

posted 08-20-99 06:18 AM ET         

..Firaxis NEEDED the reputation shot with merchants...

And even with themselves, if I read the backnotes of the SMAC manual right.

...I just don't know if the fan base is strong enough though...

Who has a stronger fan base? Maybe id, but you have to be a serious gearhead to enjoy QIII, whereas I'm enjoying SMAC just fine on my CyrixPR200. (now that I've turned on fast graphics and such in the alpha.ini file)

...So they don't have a large enough reason to return to SMAC with expansions...

Not right now, and probably not until Sid3 hits the shelves, but there's going to have to be a SMAC2 to make it work with CIV3/Sid3.

I'd venture that they might be incorporating the SoT feature into Civ3, in which case it might be possible to see:

2000- Civ3
Q4 2000, Q1-2 2001- SMAC2
Q4 2001, Q1 2002- Sid3

And I'll bet my bottom dollar that Sid3- especially being a galactic game- could easily be an online sort of thing.

I mean, look at it: Play through Civ3, then SMAC, then you achieve 'FTL travel' and your Civ goes online and gets assigned one of the unclaimed M (or G, I can't remember) worlds in the Sid3 Galaxy, along with a bunch of other folks who played through at your difficulty level.

Maybe even for those of us (not me) with persistent net connections, your civ is 'online' from the getgo. Imagine:
"You have discovered gunpowder. The aliens have landed."- where the aliens are some other player playing Sid3.

I'm just spinning candyfloss, I know, but this whole thing just _screams_ epic.

I dunno. I want to collect some more feedback, maybe on some of the other forums too, and submit this idea to firaxis.

They're really in a unique position to capitalize on a subscription system.

posted 08-20-99 11:50 AM ET            

In other words, yes, it costs them a programmer's time (= money) to fix bugs, but it's not like Firaxis ought to be hurting for cash at this point.

As for the rest, see my post on ACOL.