Games Inbox: Why video game publishers wanted to kill E3, GTA 6 photorealism, and The Day Before

Death of an expo (pic: ESA)

The Wednesday letters page asks about alternative events to E3, as readers are appalled at the video game job losses in 2023.

To join in with the discussions yourself email [email protected]

PLEASE NOTE: We are currently preparing content to run over the Christmas and New Year break and, as usual, we’d like this to include Reader’s Features. So, if you’ve had an idea for a feature, that you’ve never got around to writing, then sending it in now would be the perfect time. In can be on any subject, but anything taking a long-term view of recent trends or games would be particularly apt.

Undead expo
To be honest, I thought E3 had already been officially killed off, but either way the news came as no surprise. The show was already looking vulnerable before the pandemic, when Sony moved away from it, but as soon as Covid came in it was clear to me there was no way back. Not because it couldn’t be organised but because publishers were clearly very happy at the excuse not to do it anymore.

As GC explained, the lack of E3 means less hands-on and less interviews, which means less questions and, ultimately, less potentially negative opinions. Previously publishers had to take that risk, when games coverage wasn’t as widespread as it is now, but the pandemic has taught them that it’s better not to take the risk and they can get away with saying as little as possible.

You can understand why with games like Starfield and Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 but with games like Alan Wake 2 you can only assume that a good showing at E3 would have helped it greatly, as despite all the awards it doesn’t seem to have made much of an impact.

The death of E3 also puts increased importance on reviews, so I expect to see publishers trying to make that as difficult as possible for websites to do before launch. Although Bethesda’s attempts to do exactly shows how it can backfire.
Lonnie

End of an era
Bit of a sad day, GC, that E3 has come to an end. There was nothing like staying up till 2am (UK time), waiting for the showcases to start. First it was Xbox with the 360/Xbox One going all out, showing off games for the year.

Next day, PlayStation going on, trying to pull the rug out from Xbox by showing off the PlayStation 3 and 4 and all of their games for the year. To be honest, soon as PlayStation said that’s it for E3, we are done, everyone other than Xbox gave up and then Covid hit. It’s a sad day, loved staying up and watching it live. RIP E3.
David

Spent force
Sad to hear the news that E3 is officially no more.

When I was a kid, E3 was all the rage and I dreamed of being able to attend one day to see the announcements of new games and play some demos, live.

Now I’m a mid-30s married man I’m sad that I’ll never get to go but everything is on YouTube now and digital demos mean I don’t need to leave the house (or buy a magazine) to get my gaming news.

Is there any event in England that’s comparable? I’ve got money and time!
TommyFatFingers

GC: It’s not as if there are many demos. We guess the closest thing in England would be EGX, but we don’t know what the future of that is, given the problems at ReedPop (who were originally going to revive E3). Gamescom in Germany is the closest thing to E3 now, although it’s still not what it was pre-pandemic.

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Limited options
Great reading your interview with Mike Ross, in spite of the gloomy overtones of the games industry.

Be nice if industry interviews were a regular-ish thing on GC, as I find myself spending more time reading about games and it’s good reading hearing insider thoughts. I’m def in the box of caring about game devs as human beings category, never read of such relentless redundancies as in 2023. Awful.

Hope Mike bought that Team17 redundancy dev a pint and gave some words of encouragement!
Tundrastrider

GC: Thanks. We do take the opportunities when we can, but they are much reduced since the decline of E3. We are speaking to the director of RoboCop: Rogue City on Thursday though, so we’ll see how that goes.

Happy ending
Great interview with Mike Rose. No punches were pulled, and it gave a fascinating insight into the current state of affairs within the developer community and how it’s impacting them, especially after the pandemic.

The most interesting parts to me were hearing how Game Pass is not the be all and end all for developers. It helps them financially, for sure, but doesn’t give them any long-term traction due to gamers treating their titles as almost throwaway, as they don’t perceive their monetary investment in the same way.

Also, the money being thrown about by companies like Embracer, only for it to now be biting them on the bottom and, as usual, it’s the people at the bottom that suffer most from the fallout.

So, I was very heartened to read the end about No More Robots latest, Spirittea, doing so well. The interview was scathing, but the happy ending made up for it.

Thanks for a great article. We can only hope it opens the eyes of ourselves as gamers to the hard work that goes into game creation and the risks and rewards that it entails and interviews akin to this one really helps.

Thanks GC and Merry Xmas!
ZiPPi

GC: Thank you.

Too real
We’ve had this debate before. My son played GTA 5 from around the age of 12 through to 17.

Predominately, he spent his time in GTA Online larking about with his mates. I still remember the periodic laughing emanating from his room. He is now 20 years old and is a kind, considerate, gentle lad. I’m pretty sure he has never punched anyone ever in his life or shown any amount of violence.

Should he have been allowed to play? Possibly not, the law says he shouldn’t.

There is no right or wrong answer to this in the wider public sense. The answer only is what is right for your family.

In the grand scheme of things, it was alright for me to let my son play it. We did a decent enough job with him in every other way, that GTA Online didn’t wreck it all. The irony is that he is about to become a police officer.

Other people’s experiences with GTA and their children may differ.
Anon

GC: That didn’t seem to us to be the main point the reader was making. It was more the fact that the graphics are now approaching photorealism, which makes the normal GTA action more disquieting, especially for younger players.

Get on with it
The complete capitulation of The Day Before and Dunkey’s YouTube video of the opening sections has led me to ask the following question: ‘Does the Steam two hour refund policy incentivise developers to excessively draw out the opening sections of their games in an attempt to reduce the number of players refunding them?’

In the case of The Day Before, many people appear to have accused the developers of doing just that and have labelled the game a scam. Obviously most games are not scams and do not do anything as blatant as what people are accusing The Day Before of.

There have been cases of the reverse occurring, where good short games were being played and then gamers were refunding them just because they could. This obviously disincentivised developers from making very short games, as they were completely unprofitable.

I have found many Japanese games to have laborious starts, but I have always attributed that as a desire to artificially extend the very first play session in an attempt to grip the player. This is often achieved by preventing saving until the scene has been properly set and I do not believe it to be anything as cynical as the question I asked above. (But it does still annoy me and has the opposite effect on me to what I believe they were aiming for.)

As someone that reads reviews prior to purchasing games I tend to avoid the mediocre titles that would be best placed to intentionally prolong early sections of games to minimise refunds. As hardened game reviewers though you will have played many of those titles.

Do you ever feel that some games are purposefully slow starters, not through naturally poor design but intentionally?

I would be interested in hearing GC’s thoughts.
PazJohnMitch

GC: You make a good point about Steam’s two-hour policy. Certainly, some Japanese games can be very slow to get going; Persona is one high profile example, but it’s proven popular nonetheless.

Stocking fillers
The Sora amiibo from the Kingdom Hearts game is currently in stock to pre-order for February 16 2024 on the UK Nintendo Store, if you want one get your pre-order in quickly before they sell out, here’s the link.
Andrew J.
PS. What is everyone getting for Christmas? I am going to get a new headset in the sales.

More: Trending

Shocking numbers
David Jenkins’ interview with Mike Rose was an eye opener as to just how dirty a job developing video games can really be.

I never click links on any website but the Eurogamer article about Team17 was well worth reading and also appalling. The disparity between the execs and those people actually making the games is stark, unjust, and downright wrong.

You have people with a passion for what they do being ground down to the point of tears by heartless and greedy (very sweary word, plural).

I read GC every morning when I eat my cornflakes, so I wasn’t oblivious to the job losses this year. But I don’t keep track of the total and it was pretty shocking that there have been 6,000 lay-offs. Going by what Mike Rose had to say none of them will have been executives.

The worst part of that interview was David Jenkins saying there were a significant sub-set of GC readers who had no sympathy for the job losses or poor conditions at some of the companies involved.

There’s no point saying what I think of that because it wouldn’t get passed the Inbox editor. But I’ve seen enough in my life to know things can turn to poop very quickly and I sincerely hope if it happens to any of those readers, they’ll remember their cold heart when it was happening to someone else.
Mitchell

GC: The 6,000 total was from October; it’s now thought to be at least 9,000.

Inbox also-rans
For anyone who has Amazon Prime, Prime Gaming currently have Deathloop on PC for free. You just need to connect your Prime Gaming account to your Epic Games account and claim it and it should appear. Enjoy!
The Dude Abides

Maybe I’m being mean but I really have no sympathy for anyone that spent £33(!) on The Day Before. Even if it wasn’t a scam, and I’m not convinced it was a purposeful one, how many red flags do you need that they pe is writing cheques the game can’t cash?
Supes

This week’s Hot Topic
The 2023 Game Awards happened last Friday, revealing not only the award winners but the usual suite of new trailer reveals, but what did you think of it?

How much notice do you take of the award nominees and, in general, do you think the winners were justified this year? Do you think there’s a better way to organise the awards and do you feel there are any categories that should be added or removed?

What do you think of the emphasis on new trailers and announcements and does this enhance or diminish the award ceremony? Is the large amount of advertising distracting or an understandable necessity to fund the event?

E-mail your comments to: [email protected]

The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic Inboxes at the weekend. Readers’ letters are used on merit and may be edited for length and content.

You can also submit your own 500 to 600-word Reader’s Feature at any time via email or our Submit Stuff page, which if used will be shown in the next available weekend slot.

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MORE : Weekend Hot Topic: The final verdict on the GTA 6 trailer

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The Wednesday letters page asks about alternative events to E3, as readers are appalled at the video game job losses in 2023.