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  • 3 days ago
Asmongold Reacts to: Avowed has to be the biggest cope I've ever seen
by @LegendaryDrops https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJwPu4t8UkY
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Transcript
00:00This is just crazy trying to trick us into believing something is popular. So then we go out and buy it
00:05I'm getting so sick and tired of watching both game developers and games media
00:10Gaslighting the audience and themselves rather than just calling things out for what they are
00:14You need to throw up a signal flare when there's an issue
00:17But they want to keep handing out consolation prizes and then they wonder why studios close down
00:23How do you not recognize that you are exacerbating this issue?
00:27About the reason is that the people that are running these studios and the people that are in media
00:32They don't have any risk of the studio shutting down because they're not going to lose their job if the studio gets shut down
00:38It is one of the biggest copes I have ever seen
00:42game developers and journalists
00:44Self-congratulating when the numbers and the player sentiment are telling a completely different story. It doesn't make any sense to me
00:51I'm struggling to tell the difference between article and advertisement this week
00:56well, that's because there is no difference people and the problem with the game like avowed is that
01:02the game was
01:03The game got positioned and you know what you would say the culture war and because it got positioned in the culture war
01:10Everybody decided that avowed is either good or bad based off of their position on that
01:16So like if you're one of the quote woke people you're going to talk about avowed being good
01:20And if you're not then you're going to talk about avowed being bad
01:24That's the reason it's completely fucking tribal
01:28There's no actual logic behind any of it
01:31They want to wish success into existence. That doesn't work. Yeah, i'm getting dragon age the veil guard deja vu all over again
01:39Look, I don't think that avowed is an objectively bad game. I've played it
01:43We're gonna end up talking about that, but it's just a
01:46It's just a fine game. It's an okay game, but okay
01:49Isn't acceptable from a studio as storied experienced or as prestigious as obsidian
01:57We should I think the game listen, I played the game. I played avowed. I beat avowed on the hardest difficulty
02:07I had fun playing the game
02:12I did
02:14i'm, sorry
02:16I had fun playing the game
02:18I I would I say it's a seven out of ten after looking at other rpgs. It's probably closer to a six
02:25But my experience was probably closer to a seven
02:29That's how I feel
02:31Expect more from them. They should expect more from themselves
02:35But the funny thing is is that they don't the industry doesn't want you to expect more
02:39These studios don't want you to expect more and this studio specifically doesn't expect more from themselves
02:46This is a growing issue in the games industry, it's poisoning the culture of some of these studios because they're not just
02:53They're not just accepting mediocrity
02:56They're aiming for it
02:58Not my words
02:59Theirs, but before we get into that a word from today. Yeah, that's a good way to say it
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04:12Thank you to exit lag for sponsoring this video about has to be one of the strangest launches
04:16I've seen in years because when it was first announced the high weird thing about the avowed launch was the fact that
04:22A month before the game came out. Everybody started rumoring about it being delayed
04:28Everybody thought the game was going to get delayed and then they said oh no, it's actually coming out in a month
04:33It's undeniable. It was positioned as obsidian's answer to skyrim at least by the fans
04:38It was a return to first person rpgs from a studio that's known for one of the best in the genre
04:43But as the release date crept closer something strange happened the buzz just vanished
04:48Nobody seemed to care about the game anymore
04:50The game barely got marketed conversation among players was dead silent
04:54And then by the time it launched it felt like nobody actually even cared about it
04:58There's nothing that was appealing about the game
05:00That's the problem this game had is that like at least dragon age the veil guard had being non-binary, right?
05:06It's like that's a reason to talk about avowed
05:09Or sorry to talk about dragon age is like, oh, so i'm non-binary
05:14There's nothing that's even interesting enough in avowed
05:18or or like
05:20Dynamic enough in the game in order to get people to talk about it in the first place
05:25It was just a very vanilla boring flaccid game
05:30the combat was
05:31Okay
05:32the story was
05:34Like I guess it was okay. I I thought it kind of sucked but I mean overall it's like all right fine
05:41The the gameplay was okay, like everything about was okay, right?
05:44It was aggressively mid
05:46but like at least with dragon age veil guard or with a number of other games like
05:50There's either something really cool or really stupid that people can talk about
05:54But avowed is like that perfect middle ground where there's nothing that's compelling or noteworthy enough
06:00To talk about it one way or another
06:02Other than maybe a couple of really stupid character creators
06:06Still interested i've enjoyed grounded and I love new vegas and while I haven't played pillars of eternity
06:11I was excited to see what obsidian could do with a first-person fantasy rpg
06:16I wasn't expecting skyrim, but I was expecting something that would at least try to stand alongside it
06:21But as time passed my optimism faded the warning signs were all there xbox barely promoted the game
06:27The general audience showed no real excitement and it was well
06:31I think that it can't be downplayed the amount of damage that was dealt to the dealt to the game
06:37by the um
06:38That arc director talking about like white people
06:42I think that a huge amount of negative sentiment that the game had came out of that and the pronouns stuff
06:49and so like
06:50You basically like I I wouldn't be surprised if that caused the game to lose millions of dollars
06:56Because there were so many people talking about it. No one cares
07:00So if no one cares and nobody cares about that, then why is it that companies keep paying streamers a bunch of money to play games?
07:09And make youtube videos about them
07:11Why so if nobody cares why why like how does that work, right?
07:16Hmm, I wonder maybe because people care
07:19Yeah
07:21Set to launch in the same month as kingdom come deliverance 2 and monster hunter wilds
07:25Yeah
07:26My perspective that looks like you're trying to hide the game and it looks like that's exactly what happened because of how it's 90
07:31Dollar early access period peaked at just 13 000 players on steam
07:36That was a launch hit that number barely crawled to 17 000 players. I was shocked
07:42like
07:43Absolutely shocked to see that the game didn't even go up that much in players when the full release came out
07:50That means that and this is my opinion
07:53If you have the core release of the game
07:57And then you also have the early access release of the game and they're about the same
08:02Maybe this is like a hot take or not, but I think that you did a really bad job marketing
08:07Because what that means is that you activated your core fan base, but you didn't activate a greater fan base
08:15You didn't actually market it to a wider audience at all
08:18and so that was the issue because like I was expecting that this game would have
08:22Because many games whenever they hit their uh, they go out of early access
08:26The game usually about doubles in popularity, right? You can look at lost ark hogwarts legacy
08:33space marine 2
08:36Those are three that I can think of right off the top of my head, right?
08:39There's probably another one that I can think of as well
08:41And so ignoring game pass just shows you're trying to push an agenda. Well game pass is a big factor
08:47You're right
08:48But there are other games like for example stalker 2 that were available on game pass on day one
08:53That put up way better numbers than this game did too. So I don't think game pass is a perfect argument
08:57And also we're talking about numerical sample size trends
09:01So we're not actually looking at the raw number
09:03We're looking at how the numbers work in terms of percentages compared to each other and themselves
09:09So, uh, you're wrong on two different ways
09:11And so anyway, uh what I think is going to happen or sorry
09:15What I think happened is that avowed hit its core audience
09:20It hit its core audience dead on
09:2317 000 players bought at early access something like that
09:27But it did not hit a mainstream audience at all
09:31The excuses i'm seeing or but it's on game pass as if that somehow invalidates the reality idiot
09:38The of what we're seeing steam's concurrent player count doesn't tell the whole story true
09:42But it does indicate a trend and if a game is a massive hit on game pass
09:45Well, it's going to be an even bigger success on steam
09:48You've already seen plenty of games launched both on steam and game pass while pulling huge numbers
09:52Power world had 15 million copies sold and 10 million players on game pass. Yeah, over two million
09:58Concurrent players on steam stalker 2 100 000 concurrent players on steam despite also launching on game pass
10:04Starfield over 300 concurrent players on steam even with day one game pass availability if a game is truly successful
10:10It's successful everywhere. That's right. Now avowed is not doing well
10:14That's obvious to me to most players that are paying attention and to anyone that's looking at the numbers without blinders on but
10:20That's not the narrative that games journalists are pushing right now
10:22Instead they're trying to manufacture success with articles like avowed is already a big hit on steam celebrating
10:44Come on guys
10:47Celebrating a measly
10:4917 000 concurrent players on steam as if that's something to brag about
10:52About top's best sellers list on steam despite backlash pretending that the chart that's what it's all about
10:59All of the positive feedback and sentiment about avowed is totally socially and politically motivated
11:05It has nothing to do with the game itself at all
11:10There there it's just totally based off of that
11:14I bet a lot of these people somehow means anything despite the fact that the competition
11:17Is on there are weeks old releases and games that aren't even out yet avowed hits impressive steam chart milestone before its release
11:24Hyping up. I bet if you look at a lot of these uh, these writers and you go back to and you look at like
11:29What they said in the past?
11:31They were probably saying things that were hyper critical and like complaining about like
11:35People that didn't like the game and they were like, you know, I don't like this. I don't like this
11:39That were hyper critical and like complaining about like people that didn't like woke video games
11:45It is absolutely a team sport for them and avowed is on their team. So they're supporting avowed
11:53The same with wukong, right? They did the same thing with wukong. They did the same thing with fail guard
11:58I mean again, how many points on a line do you need?
12:03Meaningless number that's outweighed by a complete lack of long-term engagement
12:07I'm, so tired of being crazy for me to watch other people's builds and see how much they suck compared to my build
12:12My build was so much better than this. It was not even close
12:15And all this media spin you're not my game stop rep trying to sell me a game your media outlets that are supposed to be
12:20Covering industry news. It's the same pathetic gaslighting
12:23We saw with dragon age the veil guard a game that was supposed to
12:27Top the steam charts and was declared a strong seller despite completely failing to gain any traction with players
12:32Ultimately even ea acknowledged that it was a failure
12:35Let's be real and and do you remember how much that the games journalists tried to push out and the media tried to push out
12:41That veil guard was a success
12:45They tried so hard and it was completely politically motivated it had nothing to do with the game
12:53Avowed's failure isn't just about the weak sales numbers. It's about how this game got here in the first place
12:57Xbox's marketing for avowed was non-existent
13:00It felt like it just got dumped onto the market with no fanfare
13:02No build up no attempt to get the players excited or involved if you haven't followed the news closely
13:07Then you barely even know that avowed was coming out
13:09But and that's why it didn't sell a lot more. That was the one piece of the puzzle. I was thinking about this a lot
13:16That was the piece of the puzzle that I misunderstood
13:19Whenever I gauged avowed
13:22Is that I didn't understand how little marketing the game had because i'm so much involved in video games
13:28So like i'm always hearing about it and talking about it
13:31And I think that was my blind spot. That's why I made a mistake
13:35Now also because like I don't have a good frame of reference for rpg games because I haven't played a lot of them
13:40But it's also because I didn't understand the damage that marketing or the lack of marketing had on the game
13:49You're the only reason I knew about it. Yeah, exactly
13:53Things matter is even worse is the only real marketing that this game has got over the last year
13:57Well, it came from the art director
13:59Torpedoing the game instead of trying to build hype for avowed the art director
14:03Matt henson took to blue sky to rant about elon musk and identity politics in video games
14:07And not only did he make it about himself?
14:09He dragged avowed into it turning it into a political talking point instead of an exciting rpg. This is the first it's crazy
14:16Like I hope that obsidian is happy
14:18That almost all the sentiment about their game was totally turned sour by one bald retard at your company
14:26Like if I was working at whatever company owns obsidian, I would want this guy fired completely
14:34Like just no severance pay nothing just like as soon as the game is done you're fucking out of a job
14:41Damage control. Yeah, they should and and also here's the truth. Do you want to know why he wasn't fired?
14:47It's because the rest of the people at the studio agree with him
14:51That's the reason why
14:53They all share his viewpoint
14:56I
14:59Am in months that people were even that's not true
15:02Enough of them share his viewpoint to where they're not comfortable firing him. I'm sure not everyone shares his viewpoint there
15:11Talking about avowed and it was actually because the developer hijacked it for his own personal agenda
15:16He did i've talked about this before but this is a growing problem in the industry developers don't seem to understand
15:21What they say impacts their games we live in a world where half the audience is terminally online and alienating a portion of that audience
15:27And completely derail any momentum a game has this is a leadership issue
15:31You have your key creatives out there and they feel comfortable using your game as a soapbox for their personal beliefs
15:37This is telling me two things you have no control over your employees and you do not care how players perceive your game
15:44Third thing you don't care about your game
15:47Because the creative integrity of your game is secondary to the game serving as a vehicle for you to push your politics
15:57That's the other third thing and that's an important one right there
16:03Notable thing about your game before launch is controversy
16:05You're setting yourself up for failure the uncomfortable truth that no one in the media wants to talk about or say out loud
16:11Is that obsidian and xbox set themselves up for failure?
16:14Not only just allowing one of their developers to hijack their product for personal reasons
16:18That's right, but also for a failure to manage expectations and genuinely trying to connect with their audience
16:23This isn't just marketing and management incompetence. It's a complete breakdown of studio leadership. Now. They're paying the price for it
16:29No, it's it's a breakdown in the studio having viewpoints that are just completely antithetical to what average people think
16:38That's the problem
16:41If you guys really want to know why avowed isn't selling let me go ahead and play you guys the game's first trailer
16:48This trailer was insane we have always known war
16:55I'm turning it down a little bit
16:58This was nothing like the game absolutely nothing like it it forged our empire
17:06And
17:09Turned heroes into queens and kings fucking baited us. Yeah decimated our foes
17:22Now our oaths are lost this is a game made for men forsaken
17:32And you must face the monsters
17:37So people thought that they were about to be gandalf about to square up with a balrog and it turned into
17:43Fighting some sort of like magic green kovid with a bunch of furries
17:52Yeah, it's a bit of false advertising, huh
17:56Things have born
18:03Is an oath worth the weight of a crown and even the music hits
18:14So good
18:17We were teased a dark broody gritty world a narrator weaving a tale of conflict in high stakes adventure
18:23Yet years later the rings bait it is absolutely is
18:27And revealed that the game's actual art. And by the way, I love being baited
18:32Great
18:33Great. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right more. Let's do more of that
18:37Story didn't really line up with players expectations instead of a mature grounded fantasy rpg setting like people had imagined
18:43We got yet another pink purple neon soaked game using a soft modern art aesthetic that has infected so many games today
18:50Instead of immersive distinct character designs. We got the same androgynous feature muted male and female characters that
18:57We just keep seeing audiences reject who's lining up for that
19:00Who the fuck wants to look at a bitch that looks like that who wants to look at this?
19:05Let me go back to the who's the blue guy
19:07Where's the blue guy?
19:12Who the fuck wants to look at that
19:17Really
19:19It's fucking weird
19:23Who's lining up for that who's getting excited for that nobody and I would bet good money that dragon age the veil guards
19:29Disastrous reception probably led a lot of players to be a lot more cautious of avowed because of how similar these games look
19:35You know, I hear game developers and journalists whining that players need to respect creative freedom and expression
19:40But where the hell is that? Well people they are respecting creative freedom
19:43But developers need to respect other people's financial freedom to not support it. That's the problem
19:49That's what happens
19:53Of freedom when all these games are starting to look the same now, of course developers can change their art direction
19:58I'm, not saying that they can't that's not the issue here
20:00The issue is the radio silence for three years followed by a bait and switch reveal that left players confused and disinterested at that point
20:06People just tuned out you can't do that, especially not today. And this isn't just an avowed problem
20:12This is an industry-wide problem developers need to engage with their audience. They need to see how players are responding
20:17They need critical feedback early not just validation from industry insiders and co-workers
20:22Especially when they're taking radical shifts in art direction tone and atmosphere
20:26Larian studios publishing director made a really great point about this while they didn't mention avowed specifically
20:31Let's be honest. They're talking about avowed or at least dragon age
20:34There's a lot of games like this. You can't wait to see if a game resonates with players. It's insane
20:39Why wait and see it's a strategic play build resonance before launch set expectations under promise over deliver
20:45The latter may sound crazy, but it's far less crazy than saying something didn't resonate in a financial report
20:51Like that's a surprise. It shouldn't be a surprise
20:54It should be a process and this is exactly what xbox and obsidian didn't do developers need to be direct with their vision
21:00Be transparent imagine how different the reception would have been if obsidian had communicated these changes earlier when player feedback
21:06Actually could have meant something instead
21:08They just dropped a trailer wouldn't have meant anything because the developers were so dead set on making the game based around
21:15some kind of like weird
21:17uh, like
21:19But it's a it's like a form of like cultural rot
21:23That I think this game was a victim of
21:27It's like instead of things being dark fantasy about oaths and responsibilities. It's now about doing what you want to do
21:33And everything is purple and pink
21:36That's it
21:37Like I it actually like I I legit I I keep seeing games like this over and over and over
21:43I'm, sorry, but i'm seeing a pattern
21:47I'm seeing a lot of patterns
21:50That players immediately rejected down voted and yelled at and then they launched a game to an audience that didn't even want it
21:56Look at the difference in viewership from the initial teaser trailer 1.8 million views insane the actual launch trailer
22:03Of
22:05And look at the down dudes
22:09Look at that that's a lot
22:11People will see that and they'll say you know what this game doesn't look very good
22:1799 000 views what does that tell you?
22:19You know on top of that imagine how different things would have been if xbox and obsidian had held their developers
22:23Accountable if they had fired matt hansen and disavowed his use of the game as a weapon in a culture war
22:29Instead of letting a key developer drag about into controversy
22:32They had made a clear message that their focus was on the game not politics
22:36Think about how it's gonna be so funny the day that I make the video about obsidian having to do layoffs and maybe studio closure
22:44It's gonna be so funny
22:47Because it's gonna happen
22:49Like I don't think this game did well enough for them to justify that size of a studio
22:55I think it did. Okay, but probably not enough
22:57Many players would have rallied behind the game out of respect. How can they not see these easy layups here?
23:03You need transparency and you need respect to build trust with your audience xbox and obsidian had neither
23:09I don't understand how these companies think that they can continue to be successful while excluding their audience and remaining silent or worse
23:15Mocking them. It's because they're in a complete echo chamber of people that agree with them
23:20And anybody who doesn't agree with them is seen as a bad person and ostracized
23:24And if you even begin to question them or question the way that they look at things you're also seen as an enemy
23:32Yeah, it's like basically the entire like the entire culture around like video game development has turned completely fucking toxic
23:40And nobody wants to be the person that calls it out because then they get called all the bad names
23:45And then their political, uh, sorry, their uh professional career is damaged
23:50Career is damaged
23:51So you have a world where nobody in the professional space is willing to call this out
23:57While everybody in the entertainment space is calling it out, but nobody is listening to each other
24:04And alienating them the games that resonate that build a dedicated playerbase think about it like this
24:10Imagine being the guy that's working on the avowed team
24:13Who says maybe we shouldn't add pronouns to the game because people seem like they really don't like that right now
24:19It's just going to add unnecessary controversy and it's not worth it
24:23Well, you're probably going to get called out for homophobia transphobia. You're going to get called into hr and you might lose your job
24:31So why would you do that?
24:33So you have a culture of toxic positivity that protects these people and it just very naturally
24:39Progresses into the most extreme version of this content
24:43The ones that developers are actually engaging with their fans setting clear expectations and delivering on their promises
24:49But obsidian xbox they did none of that. They refuse to listen. They refuse to market
24:53They refuse to control their own people and now they're learning the hard way that if you ignore your audience
24:57Well, your audience is going to ignore you. That's right
25:00This might sound like it's coming out of left field
25:02But I think that game developers need to disconnect from politics
25:05And some people are going to agree completely do
25:09And I think that they don't actually I think that game developers need to they need i'm going to be more specific they need to
25:15Disconnect from divisive left-wing american western focused politics
25:21This is not the way most of the people in the world think
25:24And it's not even the way most of the people in america think we just had an election that proved that
25:30So if you're still focusing on that and you're still thinking about putting that into the game
25:34So if you're still focusing on that and you're still thinking about putting that into your game you are poisoning your game
25:42Maybe like yeah, yeah, I don't want to hear their opinion and I get where you're coming from
25:46But what i'm actually saying we want to hear the opinions of people like kojima and the people that wrote metaphor
25:51We want to hear their opinions about politics because they're good opinions
25:55We don't want to hear the opinions of some weird freak
25:58That has like 18 different mental disorders that are all advertised in their bio three different flags
26:04And they used to be a furry artist before they got hired at a game company
26:08I don't want to hear about their politics because their politics are stupid and annoying and weird just like they are
26:15That's the truth
26:18That's the absolute that that that's the bottom line
26:23Thing is it like it's in general, it's just not good for people
26:26Whatever your political leaning is look at the news cycle given any channel
26:31It's constantly you're doomed. We're doomed. We're doomed. We're doomed. We're back. We're doomed. We're back
26:35You're going to be spiraling all of the time if you're constantly dialed into that stuff
26:40That's not healthy
26:42And eventually you're going to feel like the walls are closing in on you like the world is on fire and in some cases
26:47The world is on fire, but of course you're gonna do about it you make video games
26:52so then you start putting it into your video games your opinions or your beliefs or the things that you're afraid of or what you're
26:57Trying to fight against and since this industry has a lot of people that share the same opinions
27:03Well, all of a sudden all these games start looking the same playing the same sounding the same
27:07They're destroying the relationships with their studios. They're destroying the relationships with their audience
27:12It's just not good for the industry at least that's my perspective
27:15You're welcome to disagree, but I think it's something that these studios need to route out
27:19Well, I think the controversy had yeah, uh, they have to get rid of these people
27:23Like they do like if they don't get rid of them, then the studios will get rid of themselves
27:31Because more and more I think that like there's this meme that I I think that average people don't really care about this stuff
27:38A whole lot and while that is true
27:41Sometimes I think that it's not true in a general sense
27:45And I do think that average people will go and they will look at game trailers and things like that
27:50And think to themselves. Yeah, this does look really bad
27:54An effect on the game's
27:56Reception, I think more than anything
27:58It's just the tonal shift and the art change from the first trailer to what the game actually became
28:02Because players came and they were like, oh, you know, I went to the butcher and all they were selling was wonder meat
28:06It's just not what players were expecting. It's not what they're excited for. It's not what they're asking for
28:11Everyone has their time to realize that obsidian is not the studio that you think they are
28:16That you think they are most people are basing their opinions on obsidian off of
28:21New vegas
28:23Or pillars of eternity. It's been seven years since years of eternity, too. It's been 15 years
28:29since
28:30Uh fallout new vegas. Somebody says how can you have such strong opinions?
28:33Uh when you both practically have zero experience in game development game playing, uh is not game development
28:40Because I don't need to have any experience in game development to be able to understand that people don't like certain things
28:46in video games
28:50I don't need to have any experience in game development
28:55Like I just need to have experience in games and I need to look at what people are saying
29:00Why would experience in game development give me any additional insight into if people like pronouns and video games or not
29:09These two things are completely unrelated they're not even close
29:16So
29:17Things have changed look at their last few games. They're competent, but they're forgettable
29:22Yeah outer worlds it had style, but the writing was bad the world felt static
29:26The rpg mechanics weren't all that good grounded was a fine game pentimate was a
29:32thing
29:34But that's the thing they aren't failing to live up to their expectations I think that
29:40Or sorry, they're not failing to live up to their potential. This is their potential
29:45I think that's what this is. They're not it's not a bug. It's a feature
29:51Not aiming to be the studio no, no and yeah because we're customers retarded chatter
29:55Yeah, well a lot of people think that like I mean for example
30:01This is the same thing I say about streamers
30:04Like when you're a streamer and your content is bad because of some sort of exterior reason that's sad
30:11But don't expect your viewers to just be like, oh, okay
30:15Well, I guess now i'm just gonna have to watch bad content
30:19The only thing that really matters is the customer
30:22And if you're not making your customers happy, you're not going to be in business
30:26That's it
30:27And the reason why my stream is successful and my youtube channel is successful
30:32One of the reasons why is that I never forget that
30:35I always put and this is something that I did with everything that I tried to focus on with like
30:40You know, for example like otk remember remember whenever we announced star forge
30:44And we had a bunch of people that were really mad about the prices and the configurations of the pcs
30:50You know, we had a meeting that night. It was like me like everybody was there
30:54It was an all hands on deck meeting like charlie was there schlatt was there
30:59Obviously everybody from otk was there the guys at star forge were there and we figured it the fuck out
31:05Because it doesn't matter like we were thinking. Oh, well, you know, they'll see that it's better or whatever
31:10It doesn't matter
31:11Doesn't make a difference. Nobody gives a fuck
31:14what matters is that if people are
31:17Happy with it or not, and they weren't happy with it. We changed it
31:22And the company improved
31:24That's the way it works
31:26And if you can't do that, you'll fail
31:31That's all there is to it if you can't like the thing is like for example
31:36There are a lot of times where I have to take feedback from people and I might not like that feedback
31:45Like some of the examples like right now is that
31:49Like I people there's a lot of people that don't like the fact that I haven't been playing a lot of video games
31:54and
31:56I think that there is some truth in that feedback and I have tried to consciously put more of an effort towards playing more games
32:03Especially because there's been more games that I felt like playing
32:06And so like you'll fail every fucking time, but I I listen to what the feedback is, right?
32:11Even if I might not agree with it or apply to all of it
32:14I still listen to what that feedback is because those are people that like the content. That's what matters
32:20And it's the same with any other game or anything else. There's more to life than video games
32:25Video games are just simply one avenue that you pursue this topic on if you're selling tvs
32:30This is the same truth if you're selling, uh, you know, like computers
32:34This is the same truth if you're selling guitars, that's the same truth everything all of this means the exact same
32:42It's the same same basic principle
32:47New vegas or try to make better than new vegas. They're not chasing innovation or excellence. They're chasing
32:53Okay. Yeah, so if they've lowered their standards that much
32:58Why should the players have any higher of expectations
33:01we shouldn't
33:03And they don't want us to
33:04Now initially I thought that avowed was underperforming for the quality it delivers
33:08I've played the game for around 15 hours and there were a lot of things that I genuinely liked
33:12I think spell casting feels really good combat in general feels really good, which is pretty rare for a first-person rpg
33:18The world is dense rather than the fact that that robot didn't come to life
33:21And you didn't have to fight the robot after you activated all those things was so fucking lame
33:27Expansive which I actually appreciate biggest exploration has its moments and performance on day one is pretty solid on paper
33:34This should be a pretty decent rpg
33:36But the longer you actually play it the more the game just feels lifeless like the world might be dense, but it's not reactive
33:44It's dragon age the veil. So there's five zones really six zones in the game
33:48Yeah, I think it's six zones in the game
33:52Every single zone basically functions the exact same
33:56By the time that I got to the third zone in the game
33:59I knew what the game loop was and I just applied that same principle
34:04four big one small one quest
34:06um
34:09I don't remember the names of the zones, right?
34:13Art in first person exploration is not rewarding six
34:17Environments the principles and you quickly realize that every area just boils down to the same bandits skeletons bears and lizards
34:23After a few hours, you just feel stuck in place
34:25There's no real variety no sense of discovery just a repetitive loop of looting upgrade materials collecting coins and reading dull notebook entries
34:34Let's be honest
34:34Nobody's playing an obsidian game for the combat people are coming for the writing the characters and the depth pillars of eternity
34:40The very foundation of this world was built on that but avowed there's just nothing no urgency. No emotion
34:46No tension you crash land on a hostile island with only one other survivor and you're both acting like it's just another tuesday
34:52The world is dangerous, but nobody seems to care
34:55I knew I was in trouble when three hours in I was already starting to skip dialogue modern rpgs have this
35:00I sat through all of the dialogue
35:04I did
35:07I did it
35:09I do it for every game
35:13I view it as like a
35:17It's like I have to do it because if I don't listen to this dialogue
35:23No one will
35:25So just so I can understand what the story is, did you regret it though?
35:30um
35:32no, because like I now have a greater understanding of the way this game works and
35:38Kind of like some of the like that the functions and things like that. Did you do that for veil guard too?
35:44Yes, I did
35:46I did it for every gotcha game as well because I feel like the more stories I know
35:51And the more of these things that I watch and read
35:54The better and smarter I am at being able to identify things in the future and understanding them
36:02Did you do it for yakuza, yes
36:07Action with exposition dumping constantly bombarding the player with highlighted phrases that they don't understand giving zero context and then
36:15Piling more exposition on top of that avowed is exhausting in that way
36:19But I found myself like I play a lot of gotcha games and so like avowed didn't bother me in that way
36:24But he's right about this sentiment
36:27Let's introduce five proper nouns
36:38Fixating on the characters in the story. I had realized that avowed is suffering from the same problem that starfield
36:44Let's be real better rpg launched within the same window
36:47And I just can't accept mediocrity anymore
36:50If you go to play kingdom come deliverance 2 and then you go play avowed
36:54The difference is staggering it is kingdom come 2 characters react to you
36:57If you get drunk henry is slurring his words wobbling about he can barely hold himself together in dialogue scenes
37:03If you commit crimes towns people remember you guards hunt you down and the world shifts to your actions
37:08If I pick a lock I actually pick a lock if I steal there are consequences if I murder an npc
37:14I'll hang for it. Then I go back to avowed and none of that exists. The game just feels dead
37:20NPCs don't even move around town. They just stand in place enemies. Don't free roam. They stay in static positions
37:25It's just a world in stasis
37:27Gabe newell had a really good quote in a documentary where he's right. I mean like he is and what an unfair comparison
37:33What's the point?
37:34Well, how's it an unfair comparison? You can buy one game or the other game?
37:40Why would you buy the game that's bad
37:44You
37:51Said if I go up to a wall and shoot it, it feels like it's ignoring me
37:54I'm getting a narcissistic injury when the world is ignoring me. He's right and that's exactly how avowed feels
38:00It's a game that doesn't respond to you. It ignores you now
38:03I don't need every rpg to be kingdom come deliverance 2 or balder's gate 3
38:07I don't think I need that level of reactivity every single time
38:10But when you're charging $90 for early access and $70 for full release
38:14I would at least expect you're trying to reach for it
38:17Kingdom come deliverance 2 warhorse studios the people that made that game have less funding and less developers
38:22Tell me how it's unfair to compare these two things when obsidian should be the one that's the unfair
38:27Comparison to make against warhorse the whole game feels front-loaded like a rushed essay where the first few paragraphs get the most effort
38:33But the rest is just filler sounds like the one character that you get at the very beginning
38:37He's a pretty solid character, but it's obvious that he was the one that was written first everyone else forgettable
38:43The deeper you go the more obsidian just ran out of steam
38:46But come to find out I would actually argue that kai is the most boring companion
38:53I I think marius is the best companion
38:58I I feel like kai is the generic
39:02guy
39:04Yada is also good. Yeah, I mean I I would say I would rate kai as number four
39:12They didn't run out of steam this is what they wanted to deliver because they want acceptable work not exceptional
39:18Not kai sanat kai in the game. That's his name
39:23Work and that's how they plan to make their studio last for justice for pewdiepie. No kai sucks
39:29100 years apparently in an article written by pc gamer titled obsidian won't chase huge profits or grow aggressively
39:36That's how it's going to last a hundred years in the rpg business. Are we serious?
39:40Yes, tyler wilde writes obsidian's 100 year plan isn't and I hope this isn't disappointing a decade by decade breakdown of future projects that
39:48End somewhere around fallout old vegas. I'm assuming pre-apocalyptic settings are popular in 2103
39:55It's more of a thought exercise but morgan and birch said that they genuinely want obsidian to continue beyond their lifespans
40:00Are we serious?
40:01Yes, and morgan said why not nintendo was founded in 1889
40:06One of the pillars of the plan is staying lean and invested meaning small enough that none of obsidian's employees feel like a cog
40:11In the machine morgan and birch said in recent years
40:13They had considered opening multiple international studios
40:16But they decided to partner with existing studios rather than weakening obsidian's culture by getting too big
40:21I think that obsidian's culture might be a problem though
40:25When it produces products like this
40:28Also refer to obsidian's games it doesn't aim for unprecedented scale or the most advanced graphics
40:34and before greenlighting a game birch in the studio spent a lot of time determining how much to invest on a project with the
40:39Assumption that it will be a mild success not a smash hit now
40:43I'll be honest on the surface. This sounds like a smart sustainable approach. It is that does sound like a smart sustainable approach. I agree
40:50Really what i've been asking a lot of these studios to do stay lean and keep expectations in check
40:55And not sink into the same trap as other studios that are overextending themselves with bloated budgets and impossible sales targets
41:02In an industry where companies are collapsing left and right obsidian strategy makes sense
41:06But then you get to the part where they assume that every game will be a mild success
41:11And that's where everything starts to click into place. I would say that avowed was a mild success
41:17I I could say mild success. That's accurate
41:21But focus on the the two words there that the the one that's emphasized is mild
41:28This is why avowed feels so lifeless because it was never designed to be anything more than good enough
41:33The writing the world the mechanics all feel like they were built to be serviceable not groundbreaking
41:38And you can see that pretty much across the game obsidian isn't trying to push boundaries
41:42They aren't trying to make the next great rpg
41:44They're trying to make a functional decent game that checks enough boxes to be playable enjoyable and forgettable
41:50But from my perspective that's not sustainable because here's the thing if you assume that all of your games are just going to be a mild
41:57Success. Well, that's exactly what they're going to be. That's exactly what your developers are going to aim for
42:01This isn't just playing it safe. It's embracing mediocrity as a business model
42:05It's one thing to be realistic about your sales projections and expectations
42:08But when you start baking that mentality into your development process, you create games that aren't trying to be great
42:14They're just trying to exist
42:16I want studios to be realistic about their sales projections
42:18But I don't want that to impact how they actually make games and I think that's what's going on here
42:22Larian studios fenvinca talked extensively. I think it's better
42:26Like if you want to bring out like an average game every few years, that's okay
42:30But like the problem is that nowadays you have so many other competitors in the gaming market
42:36That it's very rare that people have to settle for average
42:40There are always going to be games that came out maybe a year or two ago that have like really high quality gameplay
42:47And why would you not just go back and play one of those?
42:50Like for example, why would somebody choose to play avowed if armored core is out?
42:55And I know these are two very kind of different genres
42:58But it's definitely a possibility or why would somebody want to play avowed if you know?
43:02There's baldur's gate 3 or something else just play older games
43:05Yeah, or skyrim, uh, or wukong right exactly or witcher 3
43:09There are a million other games that are out and I think that being average is okay
43:14But I think also like one thing that held this game back a lot is that the narrative of the game was very mediocre
43:21Like I would say that most gacha games have better stories than avowed
43:26There was only in my opinion one interesting element of it and everything else about it was boring
43:33But making sure how to keep enough money in the tank to be able to make your game how to budget your games appropriately
43:39but at the exact same time
43:40All he's ever talked about is wanting to make the biggest rpg ever and how baldur's gate 3 was a stepping stone to that goal
43:47So maybe this strategy keeps obsidian alive for now
43:49Maybe it helps them avoid layoffs or corporate disasters that we see happening at bigger studios
43:53But what happens when the industry evolves what happens when players expectations rise and when good enough stops being good enough
44:00We've already seen that happen
44:01Look how kingdom come deliverance 2 made avowed feel like an afterthought
44:04Look how baldur's gate 3 made starfield look obsolete
44:07Zavar is rising and the studios that aren't reaching for it at the very least are cyberpunk compared to starfield 2
44:13You're gonna get left behind. Yeah, nobody builds a legacy on mild success managing expectations is important
44:19But there's a fine line between mobile budgeting and outright surrendering to mediocrity
44:23If you're so focused on avoiding failure that you never take any risks, you never push yourself
44:27You never aim for greatness. Then what's the point?
44:29And beyond that how does xbox feel about mild success because let's be real obsidian doesn't really have the final say here
44:36If you're xbox, you would be celebrating mild success. I would say
44:40Kane, austin dropped one single flop and now they're gone
44:43Hi-fi rush had mild success and tango gameworks got wiped off the map
44:47Did microsoft really acquire obsidian just for them to be comfortably average? Of course, they didn't
44:53how do you think microsoft shareholders will respond to mild success when it turns into consistently underwhelming results because
44:59Here's the reality mild success isn't stability. No, it's a slow death march towards irrelevance
45:05I realize i'm going to have some detractors because some people really like the game and do you know what that's great by the way
45:10This isn't a video smearing the game. This is just a video that is saying hey, there's obviously a problem here
45:15We need to discuss this because that's how these studios can stick around longer
45:19Yeah, I doubt that a lot of people want obsidian to close. I want obsidian to stick around but
45:24Yeah, I think that a lot of people are probably unhappy with obsidian after they let somebody like that
45:30Like work at their studio
45:31I I really think that that people are downplaying the amount of damage that having people with like these really reductive weird politics
45:39Uh has on average players. I think that a lot of average players and especially like more plugged in players
45:47I I think that they're very much fatigued from this kind of stuff
45:51yeah, it's an insane amount of damage it is and
45:55I I feel like when when obsidian eventually has to do layoffs or shut down, which I think is possible
46:01Maybe this game wasn't enough. Uh, maybe it was we'll have to find out but if that happens
46:07You'll see a ton of people that are going to be massively fucking happy about it
46:12I think it's more surprising avowed was as successful as it was despite that guy
46:15Yeah, it definitely damaged them a lot because if you read a lot of the comments on like at least like the videos that avowed
46:22Put out uh coming into launch a lot of the comments were referencing
46:26The event of like that art director
46:29Come in, let's think about it. Let's have a thought experiment. We know that they're based in irvine, california
46:34They have over 300 developers
46:35I'm going to take a wild guess and say they probably spent a hundred million dollars making the game
46:39Maybe a little bit more maybe a little bit less i'm probably pretty close though
46:43We know that they have sold or at least they've had less than one fourth of the concurrent players of dragon age the veil guard on steam
46:50Yeah, so
46:52Dragon age the veil guard sold 1.5 billion copies
46:54So we'll take a wild guess and say they're probably right around about 400 000 copies sold
47:01You take out steam's 30
47:04Also think about the fact that it's being played on game pass
47:07Yeah, and you're looking at a game that likely made around 20 million dollars
47:11I don't know how much they subsidized lost 80 million dollars. I think usaid has to come in and bail out avowed
47:18Game pass how long they give these games until they need to be profitable
47:22But i'm gonna take a wild guess and say that's not gonna work
47:25and keep in mind
47:27Outer wilds did sell 5 million copies, but it took them four years to get there
47:33And also at the same time, even though that that game was on game pass. Well game pass wasn't as big then
47:40Xbox hadn't spent 70 billion dollars acquiring activision blizzard
47:45Xbox isn't also dealing with the issue that call of duty is losing relevance at a wild rate
47:50It is crazy. You guys need to go look at this make too many too many games, man
47:54Yeah, that's a lot of money. They're hemorrhaging over there right now. I just don't see this being
48:00I just don't see this working in the long run. It's gonna be too hard for them to justify if they keep costing them money
48:05Yep, it's mild imagine if you're always aiming for mild success
48:09And then you miss
48:11That's not good, man. That's not good
48:14You know, I like hearing studios that are trying to be responsible
48:17That are trying to budget themselves the right way
48:19But I think the problem is is that sometimes you can get too caught up in that and then you're not giving your developers
48:23The freedom that they need I should have brought this up and I just had it pop into my mind right now
48:29and
48:31the director
48:33Of obsidian was one of the same people that jumped forward and was talking about how
48:38Alder yeah. Yeah, I decided to buy I was excited for a valid, uh for like two years
48:43I'm, probably the super minority
48:44They did a teaser trailer from years ago and I was like skyrim by the people who made new vegas
48:48Fuck. Yeah, I literally decided not to buy the game because that guy's posts. Yeah
48:53I think there's a lot of people that feel that way
48:56It is and I think that people there's just a general fatigue from people like that
49:02Basically people play video games
49:05To get away from people like that
49:08They they don't want to be around those people that's why they're playing video games
49:15Baldur's gate 3 is an anomaly, you know way back when they had that now they're into video games, you know
49:20They don't really have a lot of autonomy because they don't have a lot of choice what they can do with their games because of money
49:27And saying that that's why baldur's gate 3 succeeded is because they got to put their money in the right places and stuff like that
49:33which leads me to believe that they don't really have all that much control over their game or over the
49:37You know creative freedom of the games that they're making which would lead to a lot of issues. Yep. That's just
49:43That's the conclusion that i'm coming to at the very least
49:47But I still believe you know
49:48The other thing that I brought up is that in studios and their obsessions with politics, especially with some of these folks
49:53Especially when it's your artist. It's your
49:55art director
49:57That is going to be reflected in your game
49:59Yeah, of course
49:59and I think that obsidian is now turning into one of those same studios that is walking down the wrong path focusing on the wrong
50:05Things and not realizing what audiences want today
50:09And you need to recognize it's important to keep in mind too. It's like he posted that
50:14On like his public profile. It's not like somebody went into his private facebook and they saw him saying that
50:20No, like he's putting this out as an announcement to the world
50:25That otherwise you're gonna lose them and right now obsidian is losing them
50:31Western studios man, they just cannot get their can't get their shit together
50:35Anyway, hope you guys enjoyed the video. Thank you guys for watching if you guys did enjoy
50:40Like the channel subscribe to like the video subscribe to the channel. Follow me on twitch. Follow me on twitter
50:45I ran over there as well. I'll make you guys really enjoying the random shit that I talked about on that side
50:50So, you know you can hear me, but i'm not on a video outside of that. Stay cool. Stay righteous
50:55Stay safe. Catch you guys in the next one
50:58It's so funny for me to see
51:00It's so funny for me to see all the people at obsidian
51:04Not repudiate the person who's actively making like
51:09Like basically racial escalations for no reason
51:13Like making racial statements about the game talking about like what he's going to put into the game and all that stuff
51:20It's crazy that they would not just immediately fire that person and here's the truth, right?
51:26is that
51:27If he went and he said that and it was negative about a race of people that was not white men
51:33He would have been immediately fired and the studio would have put out a statement
51:37Everybody knows that and I think that what people are tired of is that double standard?
51:42They're tired of seeing that double standard repeated
51:45Over and over and over for seemingly no real reason like these are very unforced errors
51:53Nobody needs to have this happen. Why would this happen?
51:56So yeah, I that would have destroyed him if he did that
51:59Yeah, exactly it would have and so the only conclusion that you can draw because of that
52:04Is that the studio supports his viewpoints or are at least?
52:09Ambivalent towards his viewpoints enough to where these viewpoints are acceptable
52:15They want that type of person. Yeah, and I think that they are that type of person
52:19He has connections at the top if they talk about it. They will be laid off before him
52:24Maybe right? I don't know seen this video. It's one of the skits I've ever seen. I might watch that. What is this here?
52:29Let me see
52:31Um, I feel like it's a bit overblown reaction in this case
52:36um
52:37Midday news. I think I did see this earlier. Yeah
52:41Yeah, I did of the snl skit. Yeah at the beginning of the video, but I don't know if I watched the whole thing
52:45Uh, we will go the ceo retweeted the original messages. I don't know if that happened or not
52:50I don't remember i'm not sure if it did or not
52:53Saying people threatened for playing hogwarts legacy because harry potter is made by jk rowling will say imagine not playing because of someone's comments
52:59Well, here's the thing, right? I don't understand this perspective knowing how much you disavow censoring speech
53:06I don't dis I I am fine with
53:10Uh, what do you call it? I'm fine with people having that opinion
53:14But you also need to be fine with people disagreeing with it
53:17It's the same thing that I said about like hassan going on trash taste or people collaborating with me
53:24There's a lot of people that wouldn't want to collaborate with me or with hassan or with destiny
53:29Or with techtone or with somebody else, right?
53:33It's like controversial because they just don't want to have anything to do with it, right?
53:38That's it. And so you can have your freedom of speech. That's totally fine
53:43But at the same time you can't expect everybody else to agree with it and to support it
53:49That's the difference like i'm not saying he should go to jail
53:52I'm not saying any of that
53:53But what I am saying is that and also this is a very important component that you're bringing up
53:58Is that it's not necessarily just him saying this and him expressing his political viewpoints?
54:04And you can draw the comparison to this with for example, um
54:10Ghosts of yotai where the voice actress for that game is a massive fucking like sjw retard
54:17Like i'm, sorry, i'm just gonna say it she is she's talking about defunding the police get the fuck out of here defund the police
54:23Like yeah, what do you mean anybody that says that that's like a beep beep retard alert to me
54:28But I didn't criticize her for that and I didn't say anything negative about her for that
54:33And the reason why I didn't do that is because she's not putting that into the game
54:38There is no evidence of her putting that into the game
54:41Whereas with avowed there is evidence of that being put into the game
54:45And so the difference with for example the director with um
54:49Avowed is that they were using the video game as a vehicle to push that message
54:55And you're contrasting that with for example ghost of yotai where yeah, and yeah
54:59But i'll we'll cross that bridge when we come to it or we'll burn that bridge when we come to it depending on what happens
55:04the point that i'm making is that
55:07I'm, not going to shoot first and ask questions later. I'm basing this off of what the video game is and what's there
55:13That's all that matters