I'm not sure what the point of this blog is, but as far as I can tell you're trying to justify opinion articles that seem to stir up controversy for no reason...or with a reason.

Maybe I misread it, but seems you want people to feel that your intentions were pure, but truly, I don't think anyone here knows you or what you're talking about...which is why I can only make a reply based on the numerous examples of the people who post articles like what you are talking about.

Anyhow, the following section may seem confrontational and an attack on you, but it's really just me trying to drive home my point, and I will resort to some sweeping generalities...because again I don't know your work.

I think this may be why you seem to feel a bit down about this topic.

"But it affords me the sense I am somehow a productive variable for creations which have no direct connection to me whatever."

The truth is, you aren't a productive variable for creations which have no direct connection to you.

The truth is, developers more and more have to balance not only the desires of the publisher to make lots of money, but also the almost unreasonable hype that gets placed onto their games sometimes before they're even announced. On top of that, they have to spend untold amounts of time addressing criticisms long before the games release, or even much is know. Just look at FF7:Remake right now, it's getting criticism and all we have is a CGI trailer and a couple brief statements from the dev.

How are the kinds of articles you talk about in any way productive? How can a developer take the things any journalist or blogger say and apply it to a game that is well into development? More often than not they can't. Even if they wanted to. These games are the creation of the creative minds, and it's rather insulting when every random person on the internet thinks they know better than the professionals how to design and implement a game.

It's fine to have criticisms of things about games when they get revealed, or even on policies that may affect the game. But it's not fine to think that you are somehow special enough to influence the course of game development. That could happen if something gets enough traction, but those cases are extremely rare, and more often than not, the games still go on to sell well in those established franchises.

Let the developers and publishers make their mistakes. Criticize them where it's necessary. Let the consumers at large decide if the game is worth it to them. If the game fails, then the company can go and analyze why and try not to make the same mistake again.

Hi rainslacker. I actually understand where you're coming from in a broad sense, and I agree that not having the Premortem pieces themselves here to demonstrate what kind of pieces they were doesn't exactly help to make me look humble in this post. If I were you, I would also look at a post like this and assume Premortem was just as predictive and doomsday-prophesying as all the rest. I won't chagrin you for making that assumption, because in your position I would as well, but I would ask that you read a little closer before making the sweeps you have.

I am not blind to my insignificance regarding the development of games in progress, and expressed in the post that the pieces were personal observations on what I "believed" were potential or probable weaknesses. I also said I didn't want to be correct, given that Premortem was only written about IP's I cared about (annoyed that I have to repeat all this, frankly), that most of the time I didn't even feel my observations were novel (some of the time I did, but - although I never expressed as much - it was more a case of feeling people simply weren't talking about them, or as much as I felt they should be), and that given my "meager peak", and of whose meagerness I was also very aware of at the time, believe me, I wrote at least with the feeling that my concerns were being voiced, even if they weren't being heard (by many), or heard from my lips.

I don't think there is anything wrong in thinking there is a chance you can make a difference, even or perhaps especially when you know the chance to be small. And you're simply not being fair when you say it's too late for criticism if the game is already in development: we see changes made to games, based on community feedback, at almost all stages of development, even latter ones, all the time. In those cases does it put the developer under even more pressure? Sometimes, yes, but changes are not always major or a matter of addition. Sometimes small changes have a significant effect on the whole, sometimes not. It's always dependent on the unique circumstances of the project, and though we may raise concerns on this aspect of the game or that, we understand that the response to these concerns, in theory but especially practice, is ultimately up to the discretion of the developers themselves. Which is why it's okay for us to make observations and, if we feel it may be of any help, voice them, critical or not - because we know our words aren't going to stymie the progress of the game. Or if they do, and they give the developer some pause or reflection, that they were probably at the very least worth thinking about then, no?

I agree with you that hindsight is the most instructive, but the point of the Premortems was to talk about games before that was available specifically because, however small some of our voices, that is the only timeframe in which our influence is possible. And while it would, it's true, be conceded to claim to know better than the developers themselves, it is okay to have enough confidence in yourself and enough self respect to make judgements on pre-release media the developers themselves are officiating specifically for your eyes, and know themselves that scrutiny is implicit in, and should be welcomed as long as its based on observation and not conjecture or emotion. All this putting aside that community feedback, criticism included, has helped countless games over the years release as something stronger than they likely would have been.

(1/2)

(2/2)

And let's give ourselves a bit of credit: sometimes flaws ARE glaring, and we don't have to pretend that we have no competence in recognizing them when they are. Again, we don't necessarily know better than the developers, but if and when we do it is because individual games don't exist in a vacuum, and the medium is highly dependent on iteration and influence from the inside, so when we do spot flaws, we recognize them as such from the hindsight we've gained from countless titles before it.

Some of us don't think about games in the terms you do, where we're fine if a series "eventually" gets most or everything right through iteration. Some of us hold games to high standards not only because many of them won't get the chance for a second iteration (or it wouldn't be appropriate: e.g. we're never going to see The Last Guardian 2 regardless how it turns out), but because we want the games to be great for their sake too, not just for our benefit.

Anyway, despite the admitted abstraction of having a blog post about a series of articles, and despite the fact that the general concept of Premortem sounds similar to the pretentious, ennui or blindly emotional pieces you've alluded to, it wasn't that. Amidst any "predictions" I made were always many caveats about how I could be wrong, or in what ways the developer might have been planning to address said issue before release. And despite the tagline I included in the post from my Premortem on Dead Space 3, the tone was never one of anything but worry.

I named the series "Premortem" not after the medical sense of the word, but the business/creative one wherein the failure of a project is imagined (see: IMAGINED) for no other reason than to prevent that scenario from coming to pass. It's actually a positive exercise.

By all means take issue with the idea of my series in concept, but don't, as you have, take issue with it in practice when you haven't seen it in practice. If I write them again (which I probably will) decide if it is "worth it" then, to borrow your words.

Also, I don't want to give the impression that I wrote many of these, and that I feel so strong in my positions as to make proclamations on MANY games. In Ninja Gaiden 3's case, for example, I was making observations based on having been obsessed with the prior two (and the Sigma versions), having put hundreds of hours into them each, having mastered every mode and difficulty or combination thereof, and having been a third-person action game aficionado. It was my bread and butter.

And I still included caveats with my statements wherever I could.

Not looking good. Hopefully Asha Sharma is able to turn Phil’s disaster around.

Mediocre as usual.

To me it's still quite remarkable how they can cash-in 5.3bn in revenue in a single quarter, since their hardware is basically dead.

Wait until E3

Once they re-evaluate exclusive all will be fine….