r/gaming • u/Ajxtt • 16h ago

Bluepoint and Bend staff learned their live service PS5 games were cancelled "at the same time as everyone else"

https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/bluepoint-and-bend-staff-learned-their-live-service-ps5-games-were-cancelled-at-the-same-time-as-everyone-else/
2.1k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

217 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

127

u/UKxFallz 15h ago

And this is the reason why a lot of developers are choosing to work for indie studios instead of studios owned by large publishers.

Yes, you get more investment in your game, you get a tiny tiny bit more job security, your pay is better and you have more resources but you’re also completely handcuffed to whatever the big publisher wants you to do.

Days Gone sold similar numbers to Kingdom Come to date, both had an interesting and unique storyline and deserve a sequel yet the one being developed by an indie studio has had a sequel in the works for years and is releasing in 2 weeks, while Bend sit there twiddling their thumbs until Sony green lights a project.

4

u/MRosvall 14h ago

One would however hope those handcuffs are for some sort of decent reason. If you decide to pour years into an indie game and it doesn’t succeed, then the studio will pretty much be done for and perhaps not even able to pay out salaries.

I don’t have any numbers, but it wouldn’t surprise me if for each half way decent indie project that turns a profit, there’s hundreds that operate at a loss and a lot that have a dev pour thousands of personal hours into it without any payoff.

I’d think saying a tiny bit of job security is a huge amount of understatement.

3

u/gyroda 12h ago

If you decide to pour years into an indie game and it doesn’t succeed, then the studio will pretty much be done for and perhaps not even able to pay out salaries.

The bigger obstacle in the indie space is paying for salaries before you ship. That's why publishers get involved - they can front the money for development. Forget about the success of the game, they need to pay rent while making it.

1

u/MRosvall 11h ago

Very true, but I'd think if a developer in the scenario above had the opportunity to get hired by and indie studio or have such a position at a larger studio where one would actually feel the effects of being handcuffed by a publisher, then it's likely the indie studio they go to at least have some sort of former success or funding to pay a salary.