And please, STOP using caps and tags. They make your posts seem stuck-up and self-righteous. We DON'T need these to express points, do we?
Random Logic II:
Why Most Game Companies Don't, and Can't Care How Good They're Rated
It's a sad and obvious fact of life. Most large game conglomerates (I'm looking at you, EA) don't really care what online gaming sites and other review sources say about their games. Why? Most people blame it on the companies' ignorance of their fanbase, some people blame it on corporate greed. However, in fact, this is almost completely vital to the survival of larger companies.
Let's take a look at our small community, centered around our near-god-like th15 and his mad 1337 developing skills, and BSF. BSF is highly rated by many official gaming sites, yet the BSF fanbase is extremely small. Now look at a game developed by a large company (once again, I'm looking at you, EA). SimCity: Societies. Completely bombed. I have yet to find a single score higher than a 65% (about 7/10). Yet, they are gaining huge revenues from it. Now what if they had made an actual sequel? What if they had dedicated years and years (I mean around 6 or 7) towards developing a great sequel to SimCity 4 (Yes, I'm very bitter about SCS). One might think that that should be the route that should've been taken. However, that not only makes horrible business sense, it'll destroy large businesses (not so much smaller ones, since they require less money to run).
Let's say we have a really high-quality game for $60, and a really crap game for $50. Various gaming sources have rated this 60 dollar game at their highest levels, and this 50 dollar game at the lower levels (it can't be that bad). Logically, people would go for the 60 dollar one, the 'good' corporation with their commitment towards quality and innovation, will succeed in the market. Two things wrong with this:
A.
Mediocrity satisfies a huge number of people. For people like us, only the best will do. However, for others, the middle will do just as fine. It's why the most stupid and illogical bills like the 'No Child Left Behind' act were put into place. We don't punish for mediocrity, and we don't provide incentive for greater things. People are content with mediocrity, and therefore will just go for the cheaper 50 dollar one.
B.
Even if the 60 dollar game sells better, it will be a far longer time before the company pulls a profit from it. I mean really far longer. High quality games require high-skill developers working long hours. That is much much much more expensive than simply going the easier route. I don't just mean double or triple, maybe quadruple or quintuple. In combination with people's satisfaction with mediocrity, this means that companies pushing out high-quality games will be pushed into the 'niche' market.
EDIT:
That is the most ignorant statement I've ever read.it allows things which completely are not acceptable to human intelligence.
