Comment by comex
6 years ago
I don’t know. My guess is that the average gamer is less willing to forgive crappy art than the average game dev, because game devs have more experience dealing with works-in-progress that have unpolished graphics, and “seeing through” the graphics to the underlying merits. I could be wrong, though.
Certainly Jeff’s customers don’t value art too highly – or else they wouldn’t be Jeff’s customers! It’s a self-selected group. The real question is how many potential customers pass over his games because of the graphics.
Yes, the only way to answer that question would be for Jeff to make a big gamble. It makes perfect sense for him to not want to take such a risk. That doesn’t mean we can’t speculate about whether he would win that gamble if he made it. :)
>My guess is that the average gamer is less willing to forgive crappy art than the average game dev, because game devs have more experience dealing with works-in-progress that have unpolished graphics, and “seeing through” the graphics to the underlying merits. I could be wrong, though.
Thing is, the target market for his games is not "the average gamer".
This. This is niche-within-niche-within-niche level stuff. Gaming nowadays is insanely big market and there are endless weird niches for all kind of tastes. Businessmen like Jeff discover some specific niche and make living out of it.
I'm not sure. Look at the Hyperdimension Neptunia games, for example. Reuses a lot of assets, not really known for any graphical prowess, pretty much functional at best graphics. They sell a ton of them. Same with the Atelier games, they are pretty much decent PS3-level graphics but nothing fancy.
Or the Earth Defense Force games. I think once you get loyalty to a series, if anything change is a net negative. There's a lot more to go wrong than go right. Gamers are conservative by nature; if it works, keep playing it
Neptunia, Atelier, and EDF all have much better graphics than Jeff's games. The first 2 have a lot of well-drawn scantily clad girls, and all the graphics are nice. They're old-school, but very well done.
Jeff's games do not have that same air of quality. It's not just about techniques or style, it's about artistry.
Personally, that's fine. I value a game much, much more for its gameplay than its graphics. But that is certainly not true for the market at large.
And even for myself, if a game doesn't put in the effort to have good art, I assume they didn't put in the effort for the gameplay easier, as its a lot easier to buy good art than good gameplay design.
People do judge books by their covers, and Jeff isn't acknowledging that.
Having said all that, if I ever played any of his games, it was forever ago. I've looked at them and haven't seen or read anything that makes them stand out. People sometimes say they're great, but they never say anything that makes them sound special.
exactly, The game i spent most time playing this week is entirely text based, there is only a background image, which i turned off as it was a little annoying.
im talking white text on a black background.
the gameplay was and always will be much more important than the graphics.
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Your comparisons are actually proving the opposite of your point. There's no way you can even approach the graphical fidelity in Hyperdimension Neptunia on Jeff's budget.
A fun way to visualize this comparison... this is the ending credits for Hyperdimension Neptunia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQXspiEngM8 (NSFW for scantily clad women)
There's 13 people listed as working on graphics. That's legitimately pretty small for professional games... but it's still huge compared to what Spiderweb can afford.
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My guess is that Jeff's customers are not average gamers. In all likelihood, they're people like me who have been playing his games for decades.
I'm on the same page, Jeff can ship whatever passes for playable art, I'm in it for his stories and interesting gameplay. I still remember opening that giant list of spells in Exile 3 for the first time, filling a good chunk of my 640x480 screen... nothing quite like it.
I'm the opposite. I own his games, but fighting the UI all the way means that I never got very far. And this is from a guy who used to mainline dwarf fortress
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