The Callisto Protocol developer, Striking Distance Studios, considered adding its upcoming horror game to Xbox Game Pass, but "as a single-player linear game, it's really hard to be successful in those types of services."
"It was so offensive to me"
Cliff Bleszinski shares thoughts on Gears of War’s PlayStation debut, E-Day, and Microsoft’s Game Pass strategy.
The Callisto Protocol director thinks the solution involves the right people, the right timing, and perhaps a little bit of AI
I don't agree with that. I WISH I could agree with that. But buying habits and customer opinions prove otherwise
We've seen developers in the AAA space try new things and ideas. More often than not, the customers aren't willing to give things a chance, or not enough people buy into the project for it to grow.
Creativity works better in the indie space because the budgets, pressures, and expectations aren't the same.
it's a nice idea and it worked during the PS2/PS3-era when AAA didn't cost hundreds of millions of dollars. smaller budgets and shorter development time left room for more creativity and more risk. a game didn't need to sell 4 million+ copies to break even. things are different now.
This is the guy who bragged about crunching his staff and having them work through the night. Crunch culture has lost more talent and done more damage to the industry than any other factor. Screw him.
Why does this read as “acquire us and we’ll put our game on Game Pass?” After all, Striking Distance Studios is Led by Dead Space and Call of Duty Franchise Veteran Glen Schofield.
Microsoft has their own single-player games within the service, and I still think you're going to see the platform holder studios provide single-player games in them; I'm just saying [that] as a financial model, it's a difficult one to make work as an independent studio," James said. "I think you're going to see single-player games, but it will probably come from the hardware companies."
"As an independent, third-party, it's really hard to make a linear third-person game work within those services
Lol the only games that come to Game Pass are:
1)M$ owned games (Redfall and High on Life)
2)Games that don’t expect or didn’t get great sales, so they need to recoup their investment (Guardians of the Galaxy)
Callisto Protocal devs would likely prefer category 1 over 2, but M$ is also likely hoping they can make an argument to them that they are category 2.
I’d expect them to sell well, and I doubt they’ll take a check pre-launch, because the game is getting attention. So, barring an acquisition, I think this game will cost Xboxers $70.
People still remember Dead Space.
I don't understand why this one game is being so heavily focused for GP as if it was supposed to come to the service in the first place.
Not every third party new releases will come to GP as some might not see it feasible or want that.
As nice as it would be, no one is expecting every new game to appear on GP.
It’s not hard to be successful with a single-player, linear game; it’s more the AAA developer/publisher toxic version of “success” has been bastardised since games were judged on how many copies they sold.
They’re now judged BEYOND copies sold for no other reason than “the publishers wanted to be more than simply successful.”