Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
PC Games (Games) XBox (Games) Entertainment Games

Microsoft Games Boss Promises Higher Quality, Fewer Games 51

Posted by simoniker from the one-title-per-hardware-platform dept.
Thanks to the San Jose Mercury News for its article discussing Microsoft Game Studios' new general manager Shane Kim's attitude to development, as the piece notes: "Some of Kim's first acts have been to ax or delay several projects. Since the fall, Microsoft has scaled back its staff of internal game developers from 1,200 employees to about 1,000." But it's argued: "Because there are now so many others making games for the Xbox, Microsoft needs to make fewer titles, Kim said... This shift toward a conservative investing style mirrors the larger shift within the video game industry, where development budgets and marketing costs are reaching Hollywood proportions."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Microsoft Games Boss Promises Higher Quality, Fewer Games More

Microsoft Games Boss Promises Higher Quality, Fewer Games

Comments Filter:

  • Microsoft makes some pretty decent games (Score:4, Insightful)

    by linzeal ( 197905 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @05:25AM (#9049399) Journal
    They may merely assimilate a good code shop here and there, but they have good taste. Oh if I could only have the hours back wasted on the "Age of" [amazon.com] series, sigh. Maybe than I would have a girl, oh well back to my game of star wars galaxies.

    • Re:Microsoft makes some pretty decent games (Score:5, Insightful)

      by LeoDV ( 653216 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:18AM (#9049719) Journal

      Microsoft make some awesome products until they are in a monopoly position. DOS was a fine OS, and so was Windows 3.*, same with Word up to 6.0, IE up to 5... They have lots of $$$ and they know how to use it. When they go after a market they make the best products, that is until they've got it locked, at which point it doesn't matter and they slack off : just look at how they stopped development on the bug-ridden, outdated (popup blocking, tabbed browsing anyone?) IE. But on the other hand, since QuickTime and Winamp have the media market, WMP 9 is a really cool piece of software.

      It's the same with games (and the console, by the way). Since it's a highly competitive market, they'll know to get the skilled people to work for them, make some really good titles. AoE was pretty cool for a while, there were the Mechwarrior series and the Close Combats... Microsoft are great when it comes to games.

      • Re:Microsoft makes some pretty decent stuff (Score:5, Insightful)

        by MachDelta ( 704883 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:35AM (#9049783)
        And its not even only their software. Just look at the perhiphrials market (keyboards, joysticks, wheels, etc), where Microsoft actually makes some competetive products. I'm primarilly a Logitech man myself, but my Microsoft sidewinder wheel is actually a pretty good piece of hardware (even if the software bundled with it sucks :P)
        • I've been very happy with IBM's perhiphrials as well. MS brands some excellent stuff, but all of the majors (except maybe Logitech) outsource everything. IBM sold most of these business to Lexmark (who was licensed the brand for a certain period) but Lexmark focused on printers in the late 90s and sold or stopped work on the few products they were still making at that point. Anything from IBM is from one of the big asian ODMs, with IBM's logo slapped on the box.

      • Re:Microsoft makes some pretty decent games (Score:4, Interesting)

        by polyp2000 ( 444682 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:39AM (#9049791) Homepage Journal
        Microsoft make some awesome products until they are in a monopoly position.

        So how come they are having so much trouble with the X-Box then? If what you are saying is true, then as they are struggling with Xbox at the moment (and not holding the monopoly), surely there should be lots of great games. Instead we see mainly PC ports and a few average multi-plaform console ports.With the noticable acception of Halo and the other launch titles.

        Since they are not in a monopoly in the console market (thank god) your comments would suggest that their games should be excellent. As this article suggests though, this isnt the case( why else would they be making promises?). Any how as the old saying goes. If at first you dont succeed, try, try again.

        When they go after a market they make the best products, that is until they've got it locked, at which point it doesn't matter and they slack off :

        Just imagine, what that statement means for the future if Microsoft manage to get a hold of the console market? I personally think I'll lose interest in the whole idea of console gaming if this happens. Console gaming should be a hotbed of innovation. The last thing we want is anyone slacking off.

        nick ...

        • Re:Microsoft makes some pretty decent games (Score:4, Insightful)

          by TechniMyoko ( 670009 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @09:10AM (#9050280) Homepage
          Where'd you get your information? They aren't having trouble with the XBOX considering its outselling GameCube. There are tons of XBOX games that I like, moreso than GameCube has (People are complaining about the lack of Cube games) Their games are excellent. But every game (Except Zelda 3) can be better. As for slacking off, look towards the purple cube of non-onlinishness you troll
          • You're the one trolling. The GameCube is outselling the Xbox worldwide by a significant margin. In the US, the Xbox is slightly ahead, but the GameCube has been closing the gap since the cut to $99 last fall.
            • After the PS2 and the GBA.

              And who cares about third place vs. fourth?

              Jon Acheson
            • Cube is ONLY outselling in japan, and last time I checked, the majority of /.ers are not in japan. In the US it is slightly ahead (as you admittided), which therefor it outsold Cube. Japan isnt an accurate representation considering most japanese have admitted they dont buy xbox just cause its american and big.
              • Japan is the 2nd largest market for games. It's not something you can just talking aside when talking about console sales. Especially not in this situation. The Xbox has a slim sales lead over the Cube in the US and Europe, but is hugely behind in Japan. Perhaps if the Xbox had a huge lead in the regions its ahead ignoring Japan would be interesting. But right now, ignoring Japan is just tossing aside the numbers you don't like to make your side look better.

                Tossing aside Japan can really change the outlook
                • Actually, Japan is the third biggest videogame market, not second. It has really been shrinking the past few years. Maybe you can't really ignore it now, but there is plenty of evidence that you can safely do that for the next console generation. The Japanese just aren't buying many games anymore, period.
              • There was an interesting article on Gamespy recently about gaming in Japan. In fact, they have a word to describe Western products and from what I recall, it doesn't connotate high quality. One (of the main) reason(s) the XBox has done so poorly in Japan is because of this cultural factor.
        • If what you are saying is true, then as they are struggling with Xbox at the moment (and not holding the monopoly), surely there should be lots of great games.

          Project Gotham Series
          Amped Series
          Crimson Skies
          Mechassault
          Top Spin
          Links
          Halo
          Grabbed by the Ghoulies (I liked it - so did Famitsu, which gave it a 31!)

          Seems like a pretty good list to me. Many of them are absolutely huge sellers, too.
        • While they haven't unseated Sony as the market leader (and Nintendo will probably always have the niche of younger oriented games). The X-Box certainly exceeded most expectations for unit sales and installed base. They don't have a library of exclusive games yet, but third party developers are beginning to take a second look at them. This is a huge improvement from their introduction when the XBox was expected to bomb miserably. Their success in online gaming is a huge part of the second looks from deve

        • Good points.

          First of all, they may not be the leaders (yet), but the X-Box did a lot better than anyone would have given them credit for a few years ago. Yes there are lots of PC games but there are also good original titles, and Live works really well. I think the main reason why they haven't cornered the market is because they don't understand it (sometimes just throwing money at a problem doesn't solve it), and because Sony are pretty much unbeatable -- no matter how much money you throw, Sony are big

      • Hmm... I don't know about that Windows 3.*
        It was good for it's time, but it was an awful product compared to what we have today.

        One upside was that it didn't have a web browser bundled with it, but then it was really just a shell for DOS anyway.

        Back then, given the choice, I would have chosen a Mac. And I hate macs.
      • Windows 3.x was always horrible. Compare it to other things of the time - OS/2, GEOS, GEM, Mac. It had the worst of both stability and usability. It won because of the monopoly position DOS had, and some illegal product tying.

        You're forgetting that IE before 4 was a terrible product. IE 3 couldn't render lots of common sites without problems.
      • I'm using a version of IE with pop up blocking and tabbed browsing. It's from XP Service Pack 2. Microsoft did not STOP development on IE. The world at large was saying 'we don't like having updates pushed at us every week' so they slowed it down.

        Microsoft is trying to keep the updates down, so they are going to roll out a ton of new features in Service Pack 2. It's not just promises, you can go get it yourself [microsoft.com], right now.
        • I'm using a version of IE with pop up blocking and tabbed browsing. It's from XP Service Pack 2. Microsoft did not STOP development on IE. The world at large was saying 'we don't like having updates pushed at us every week' so they slowed it down.

          Wow. Pop-up blocking and tabbed browsing? State of the art, for 1999. What about inline searches, mousegestures, style sheet switching, or even a built-in search bar? Does it even display PNG's properly yet?

          By reducing the number of updates you're supposed to
      • Yeah, Win3.1 was just amazing. I just loved how a single application would bring the entire OS down. And then the daily reboots...
        And DOS - the best half-assed single user shell I've ever used; the thing I particularly enjoyed was freeing up the 640K memory to play games.
        Ugh.

      • > WMP 9 is a really cool piece of software.

        Not it's not, it's a piece of shit with an appalling user interface.

  • Cost vs. Methods (Score:5, Interesting)

    by October ( 107948 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @06:55AM (#9049647) Homepage
    Personally I think it's a little worrying that budgets for games have spiralled up so quickly to approach the level of hollywood blockbusters, while the process of making games is still somewhere in the early 1900s, by hollywood standards. I'm glad to see studios favoring quality over quantity, but I'll be happier when the processes mature to similarly modern levels. Once we cut out the majority of wasted work, schedule overruns, and plain old bad planning I think we'll start seeing what games can really do.

    • The fact that game production costs are now approaching Hollywood proportions isn't really news to anyone who follows the industry. What is news and what is different here is how Shane Kim approaches game investment and development, and how that directly affects quality and innovation in games.

      Laying off 200 (presumably) talented game developers and alienating some of those that remain seems counterintuitive to producing high-quality games, but on paper I'm sure it looks like a good financial move for a

    • I'm not sure Hollywood is the best place to look for a standard of well thought through 'quality' projects. Don't believe me? Take a look at the "major" releases that came out this week [metacritic.com]. I'm thinking there are some 'quantity' films there.

      Don't let the flash and glamour of tinsel town fool you, games are pretty much at the level of movies right now. For every Lord of the Rings [metacritic.com] there's a Tony Hawk [metacritic.com], and at the same time, for every Fugitive Hunter [metacritic.com], there's a Battlefield Earth [metacritic.com].
  • Taking a page from Nintendo's book?

  • Microsoft Games Boss (Score:5, Funny)

    by vjmurphy ( 190266 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:25AM (#9049741) Homepage
    When I read the first part of the headline, I thought this was going to be an information on how to beat the Microsoft Games Boss. Something like:

    * Press X-X-Y while pressing both triggers
    * Jump up
    * File antitrust lawsuits
    * Fire wave-motion gun
    * Go to Court

  • Caught red handed (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by wizarddc ( 105860 )
    So are they basically admitting to flooding the market with crap games to offer consumers a "choice" when buying games? Were they padding their number of titles with junk just to make XBox look like a viable console next to the PS2? And now that they have a decen number of third party developers producing horrible games, they don't need to anymore? I see, gotcha. One hundred percent clear, now.

  • High Quality != High Budget (Score:4, Insightful)

    by codexus ( 538087 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @08:34AM (#9050060)
    Sure they are going to invest more money in the games and with the new capabilities of the graphics cards we are going to see some amazing graphics.

    But they are going to be even less willing to take the risk to innovate than before. A high-quality game isn't just last year's game with prettier graphics.

  • Pajitnov (Score:3, Interesting)

    by arhar ( 773548 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @09:17AM (#9050331)
    What I'm wondering is... does Alexei Pajitnov (the inventor of Tetris, for both of you who didn't know that) still work for Microsoft games division? It's kind of sad how he didn't make anything of notice since then ...
    • He still works at MGS. He now works in the MSN Games by Zone.com group. The last two games he helped created were Hexic [msn.com] and Mozaki Blocks [msn.com], both puzzle games like Tetris. Neither are enormously popular, but it's hard to match what happened with Tetris.
  • EA just announced they are trying to double in size every 5 years while Microsoft is cutting back on game dev? What does Mr. Kim have to say about EA's direction? So Microsoft is saying that it wants to produce quality games -- so it wants to only create million-selling items? Yet by cutting out all its sports titles they have left the field to be owned by EA in an areana where quality versions guarantee return of the faithful on an annual basis. The MMORPG market is flooded -- so killing Mythica kind of
  • where development budgets and marketing costs are reaching Hollywood proportions

    and so is quality.
  • Of course. That's why they've axed Psychonauts and green-lighted Blinx 2, right? Idiots.

Slashdot Top Deals

He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him. -- Bion

Close