Epic Exclusivity is something that has been a very controversial topic in the recent days. Many fans have been against Epic Store’s business strategy of grabbing timed exclusives to increase the exposure of their Store. Amidst all that, a report revealed by Digital Bros, parent company of 505 Games, Digital Bros, parent company of 505 Games, reveals that Epic Store paid 9.49 million euros for Control Exclusivity
*SNIP*
Based on the details made public when 505 Games and Remedy announced their deal, we know that 45% of the funds—€4.27 million—went to the publisher. The remaining 55%—€5.22 million—were distributed to Remedy
SidAlpha | Epic Games Store Exclusive Payment for Control Disclosed by Publisher:
Imagine how much EGS paid Randy/2K for Borderlands 3 exclusivity?
*SNIP*
It seems as a reference to his statements, developers at Gearbox added an easter egg in Borderlands 3.
Rumor has it that Randy wasn’t happy about a quest in the game called “Randy Randy,” in which the quest giver asks the vault hunter to “storm a castle and find my hard drive, unless you are the FBI.”
It looks like an attempt to publicly shame Randy. It seems even his own development team is tired of his antics.
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/01/gearbox-ceo-allegedly-kept-underage-porn-on-usb-stick-new-lawsuit-alleges/
The allegations about a USB stick places its discovery at a 2014 Medieval Times Dinner and Tournament location in Dallas, down the road from Gearbox's Plano, Texas, headquarters. Callender alleges in the December suit that someone from the restaurant perused the USB stick's contents upon their discovery and then contacted the game studio so that its employees could recover it. "Pitchford declared that the thumb drive was his and requested its prompt return," Callender's suit states.
Following the Metro Exodus debacle, Borderlands 3 just had to go and make things worse with their own Epic Games Store exclusivity. It was an unnecessary move that merely highlights the money-hungry reality that plagues triple-A gaming publishers like Deep Silver and 2K. Though it's realistically always been about the profits as opposed to the fans, now so more than ever it has become the driving nature for most game production. *SNIP*
The AAA gaming industry is totally corrupt and one day they will pay for this.
Gambling is heavily regulated and in some countries Casino owners can go to jail for underage gambling. Both EA and Take-Two has abused a legal vacuum and turned sport games for kids into gambling simulators.
This creep over to other game genres as seen clearly with Star wars Battlefront 2.
Also, the blatant conflict of interest in self-regulation such as PEGI / ESRB and ESA is obvious for anyone looking into this.
https://twitter.com/bradjohannsen/status/1167228031632650240
@bradjohannsen
@AngryJoeShow
@YongYea
I think we know how NBA 2K20 got the E for everyone rating, with simulated gambling; The Chairman of the board of the #ESRB and #ESA is the CEO of Take Two, Strauss Zelnick.
Here is the response ESRB gave to consumer inquires about NBA2k20 gambling/age ratings:
AngryJoeShow | The ESRB has Failed Us! their NBA2k20 Response - Angry Rant!:
YongYea | ESRB's Response To NBA 2K20's Gambling Controversy Even More Pathetic Than PEGI's
First off, I want to thank you for actually inspiring me to write my very post mimicking yours Cobra, very much appreciated for your "model" so to speak.
Second, here's me destroying the "heroic" myth of communism and the Soviet Union in one fell swoop
Don't put words in my mouth, it's insulting. I'm not defending communism lol. Calm down.
My post was about Relic failing to sell WW2 video games and turning CoH2 into Company of Villains.
Perhaps the context was unclear and could be misunderstood, for that I apologize. For those that have read my previous posts on CoH2.org I believe the context is clear.
Alienating paying customers is bad business and Relic did this with both CoH2: Eastern Front and DoW3. Perhaps some of this was un-intentional but the result is the same.
WW2 is very popular in Russia and Wargaming has capitalized on this while Relic did shit.
Don't lecture me on politics/failed ideologies, I'm well aware about the danger of communism+nazism, more than you think. Also Russia did not invent communism, that came from Europe.
Most countries has a light/dark side as do America/Europe.
A. Soldier you don't seem to understand where Russians get their news from such as RT and alternative media. Movies are entertainment and to insinuate this is what Russia believes is just BS.
If you want to know what Russians believe in go watch some RT shows who has far less propaganda than any American MSM channel (including FOX).
Currently Tucker Carlson (former CNN) is the only good MSM journalist that is left.
NEW YORK — When Larry King moderates Tuesday’s third-party debate in Chicago, his former network, CNN, will not be carrying it live. And neither will Fox News or MSNBC.
RT Max Keiser Report also is great.
Keiser Dropping truth bombs about Goldman Sachs story:
As American you'll be more informed watching Russia TV channels (RT) than any American MSM channel (except Tucker Carlson). Irony?
Yes I know RT has bias, but they do more journalism than American MSM. That's a fact, like it or not.
Bellular News | Borderlands 3 UNDER FIRE | Epic DELETE Saves, Keylogger?! Bad DRM & Performance | Much Misinfo!:
Borderlands 3 has been under the spotlight for its rocky yet successful launch, but no-one seems to know what's really going on. There are reports of extreme performance issues across all platforms, accusations of keylogging and hogging bandwidth, and supposedly, the most intrusive version of DRM we've seen yet.
History of Denuvo - the DRM for DRMs:
An investigation into the history of Denuvo Anti Tamper, the controversial anti piracy protection that is rumored to hurt game performance.
Development of the Denuvo software started in 2014.[1] FIFA 15, released in September 2014, was the first game to use Denuvo.[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denuvo
gamertribalism
Irdeto!! The same asshats that partner and monitor the cable companies users traffic, torrents and streams and have them send out piracy notices on music and movies.
Also, note to current and future CoH streamers. Sega now use Denuvo in new games including DoW3, Total War series, Football Manager, Two Point Hospital, Valkyria Chronicles 4 and Sonic Forces.
Denuvo likely will be in future CoH games and could have a negative impact on CoH streamers without highend PC/bandwidth.
I fully agree with this, CoH2's marketing and their portrayal of the Soviet are completely at-odds with each other. The marketing was a favourable portrayal of the Soviets, which also drew in a large Eastern audience, which then felt betrayed when they played the campaign which is unfortunately seems to be a Cold War era NATO interpretation of the Eastern Front. Not to mention the Great Red Army is protrayed as being staffed mostly of Conscripts and Penals, with a handful of Guards or Assault troops on the side.
company-of-heroes-2
Sega is looking into concern around real-time strategy game Company of Heroes 2 after its Russian distributor pulled it from sale.
Russian distributor 1C-SoftClub (part of the company responsible for the IL-2 Sturmovik and Men of War series') announced it had stopped selling Relic's World War 2 RTS after complaints over the portrayal of the Soviets.
Sega, publisher of the game and owner of its developer, Relic Entertainment, told Eurogamer it is taking the issue "very seriously".
"Sega and Relic are aware of the press stories circulating concerning Company of Heroes 2 and the historical context of the game from a Russian perspective," a statement read.
"At this time we cannot offer any further comment, however we are taking this issue very seriously and are investigating these concerns thoroughly with all relevant partners."
A Change.org petition calling on Valve to pull the game from sale in CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States] has, at the time of publication, over 17,000 signatures.
“The way the game developers see the conflict is disgusting,” reads the petition.
Relic community manager (Noun) pouring gas on fire. I don't blame Noun, but he is not the guy that put out a community fire.
All things considered, this studio basically told Russia/Eastern audience to go play another video game (classic Relic passive-aggressive behavior/righteousness/holier than thou attitude).
This failure + negative user reviews cost Relic millions of dollars and without a doubt will impact future sales due to brand devaluation etc..
CoH is not Call of Duty, WW2 fans won't easily forget Relic betrayal like this (along with p2w betrayal etc.). For years Relic leadership was tone deaf to fan criticism which then resulted in DoW3 betrayal as well.
CoH: Eastern front, Relic really missed out on a great WW2 market opportunity.
So they don't want to sell CoH3 to Russia? Wargaming WoT do not exist without Russia WW2 patriotism.
Below a few Russian WW2 songs that highlight how popular WW2 is in Russia (gamer or not):
Concert for the WW2 Victory Day, "It's necessary to live", May 7, 2016
5,515,726 views
Victory Day a holiday that commemorates the surrender of Nazi Germany in 1945
Russian Beauty Sings Patriotic Favorite - Audience Loves It and Sings Along:
12.227.608 views
Opera Megastar Hvorostovsky Sings WW2 Favorite 'Katyusha', Audience Sings Along:
PCgamer | Randy Pitchford says Borderlands 3 has twice as many players on PC as Borderlands 2 did:
source Randy: 247,000–249,000 concurrent players
https://www.pcgamer.com/randy-pitchford-says-borderlands-3-has-twice-as-many-players-on-pc-as-borderlands-2-did/
Borderlands 3 launched on September 13, and I don't know about you but my Twitter feed is full of people talking about it (and pictures of dogs, obviously). People having opinions about a game doesn't necessarily translate into people playing it, but according to Gearbox CEO and part-time magician Randy Pitchford, "the launch day peak concurrent players of Borderlands 3 is about *twice-as-high* as the all time peak concurrent players of Borderlands 2."
That's on PC of course. According to Steamcharts, Borderlands 2 peaked at 123,596 players when it launched seven years ago, while SteamDB estimates 124,678 players. Double that would be somewhere in the 247,000–249,000 player range. Which is a lot of people trying to figure out where the general challenges menu is hidden (it's on the map but only if you zoom out to galaxy level), and why pressing F doesn't activate boost in vehicles any more (it's the shift key now, you're welcome).
Pitchford followed up by saying, "Best numbers in Gearbox history! No promises, but we *might* be ready for me to try a SHiFT code test with the Golden Key system tomorrow. If we do, it will probably be a time-limited key."
IMO, if these EGS sales/concurrent players was true Randy would back it up with a credible source.
I think he is lying to impress investors.
Forbes | 'Borderlands 3' Is Not Ready For Prime Time On The Xbox One X And PS4 Pro:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinmurnane/2019/09/17/borderlands-3-is-not-ready-for-prime-time-on-the-xbox-one-x-and-ps4-pro/#5ad28469341b
Borderlands 3 has been both praised and blamed for presenting the same combination of too many guns, frantic combat and juvenile humor we’ve seen in previous installments. If you loved the earlier games it’s a case of don’t fix it if it ain’t broken; if you were hoping for something more, it’s a monument to been there, done that. But what about the technical side of the game? Borderlands 2 was a last-gen game and here’s the sequel coming close to the end of the current console generation. After seven years of development does Borderlands 3 take full advantage of the power available in the Xbox One X and PS4 Pro? Digital Foundry took a look and the answer is a clear “No”. Borderlands 3 is a technical disappointment.
*SNIP*
The new Xbox podcast made by resetera members Kaironaut Shpeshal Ed FUNKNOWN iXi and Sikamikanico had a special guest. They've recorded a three hour podcast with the creative director at Xbox Game Studios who has worked on games like Red Alert, Killer Instinct and Age of Empires: Definitive Edition.
During the podcast they talk Monty Python, Ori, Killer Instinct, Red Alert and Age of Empires. I've tried to make some timestamps:
3:30 - Start of Adam's career
20:00 - Red Alert (Tanya, the Einstein scenes and more)
25:00 - Killer Instinct (Double Helix, Iron Galaxy, netcode of fighting games, Smash & Banjo)
34:50 - Biggest pet peeve game design principle
39:45 - Ori and Moon Studios
1:01:00 - Age of Empires
1:12:10 - Xbox and Age of Empires?
1:12:12 - Controllers
1:19:00 - Xbox and Age of Empires again
1:24:00 - Gears 5
1:28:20 - Xbox Game Studios - length of game
1:42:50 - Transparency in gaming industry, cost of making games
This Is what he said during Q&A session (by reddit source)
Essentially Adam Isgreen (the creative director of AOE franchise) was asked about AOE4 and gave couple of vague high level answers.
He didn't confirm that they will reveal it at XO19, instead went along with the "wink wink nudge nudge" method that we got from Gamescom.
About development, he said that everyone (in-house supervising studio at MS, Relic, FE, and Tantalus in Australia) takes it super seriously to develop the games (3 DEs + AOE4). They want to preserve and stay true to that feeling which makes AOE what it is.
Coming from the background of developing C&C and Red Alert franchise, Isgreen mentioned about bringing mechanics and ideas from other RTS games to AOE, for example, right-click-and-drag map scrolling. He could not withstand the archaic method of moving the mouse to the edge of the screen. According to him, the new scrolling mechanics is in all the DEs, but not AOE4 yet which frustrates (jokingly) him a lot.
There's also mentioning of some innovations to spice up some mundane and boring part of the genre. One example he talked about is how the resource gathering is usually very boring, but in Red Alert 2 they made it more interesting by introducing different harvesting trucks to different factions (teleporting Allies, armored Soviet). Relic and he have had a lot of meetings to discuss what kind of ideas and innovations are worth the effort and budget to put in the game. They don't want to "bring change for changes' sake".
All 4 games had pre-alpha (maybe beta, I forgot the terminology he used) playtesting already. For AOE4, some die-hard fans of the old games were quite shocked and "intense" to changes made to AOE4 (sounds like AOE4 will be kind of revolutionary to the franchise). He used the analogy of "7 stages of grief" (I believe it should be 5 stages but whatever) saying that those fans became softer and more welcoming to the changes later on.
To summarise, he was extremely evasive on AOE4 saying that he didn't want to leak anything about the game (time setting, new mechanics etc.). But one thing is quite obvious TO ME: AOE4 will be a quite different game. Hopefully we can soon find out whether it can capture the magic of previous games or not at XO19.
rutiretan
Essentially Adam Isgreen (the creative director of AOE franchise) was asked about AOE4 and gave couple of vague high level answers.
He didn't confirm that they will reveal it at XO19, instead went along with the "wink wink nudge nudge" method that we got from Gamescom.
About development, he said that everyone (in-house supervising studio at MS, Relic, FE, and Tantalus in Australia) takes it super seriously to develop the games (3 DEs + AOE4). They want to preserve and stay true to that feeling which makes AOE what it is.
Coming from the background of developing C&C and Red Alert franchise, Isgreen mentioned about bringing mechanics and ideas from other RTS games to AOE, for example, right-click-and-drag map scrolling. He could not withstand the archaic method of moving the mouse to the edge of the screen. According to him, the new scrolling mechanics is in all the DEs, but not AOE4 yet which frustrates (jokingly) him a lot.
There's also mentioning of some innovations to spice up some mundane and boring part of the genre. One example he talked about is how the resource gathering is usually very boring, but in Red Alert 2 they made it more interesting by introducing different harvesting trucks to different factions (teleporting Allies, armored Soviet). Relic and he have had a lot of meetings to discuss what kind of ideas and innovations are worth the effort and budget to put in the game. They don't want to "bring change for changes' sake".
All 4 games had pre-alpha (maybe beta, I forgot the terminology he used) playtesting already. For AOE4, some die-hard fans of the old games were quite shocked and "intense" to changes made to AOE4 (sounds like AOE4 will be kind of revolutionary to the franchise). He used the analogy of "7 stages of grief" (I believe it should be 5 stages but whatever) saying that those fans became softer and more welcoming to the changes later on.
To summarise, he was extremely evasive on AOE4 saying that he didn't want to leak anything about the game (time setting, new mechanics etc.). But one thing is quite obvious TO ME: AOE4 will be a quite different game. Hopefully we can soon find out whether it can capture the magic of previous games or not at XO19.
Edit: To the folks worrying about that drastic changes will be made to resource gathering, please calm down I didn't do Isgreen enough justice. This is just one example he gave using Red Alert 2 since he cannot leak anything about AOE4, when talking about new ideas in the general RTS genre. It's definitely not the case that the same will happen in AOE4. Besides, we had asymmetric villagers in AOM and AOE3 before and I personally find them to be pretty good.
One more thing I forgot to mention is that when talking about creative freedom, Isgreen said that when they did the campaign/story for AOE4, they dug into historical events and found out that some are very reminiscent of game modes. He said something along the line that he's surprised nobody has made these events into a game yet. Again, he didn't say what time period the game is set in. But I think we can perhaps deduce a little:
1. It's not set in the future.
2. It has historical events that are not too familiar to Americans. So probably other continents.
3. The events surprised them when they were doing research. So probably not a recent time period as recent history should be more well-documented and well-known.
Jim Sterling | Loot Boxes Condemned By The Church Of England:
The Bishop of St. Albans has weighed in on loot boxes following the UK House of Commons report. Yes, the Church of England has opinions on in-game gambling!
While I'm not exactly a holy man myself, I do find it amusing to see the game industry getting it from all corners. The pasting that publishers are taking in the press is well deserved, too. They earned this with their arrogant ignorance of the issue.
Denmark
I didn't do Isgreen enough justice. This is just one example he gave using Red Alert 2 since he cannot leak anything about AOE4, when talking about new ideas in the general RTS genre. It's definitely not the case that the same will happen in AOE4. Besides, we had asymmetric villagers in AOM and AOE3 before and I personally find them to be pretty good.
SturmTigerCobra
DonnieChan
Inane EliteVideoGameMasturbater
SturmTigerCobra
Relic Entertainment
