Medical stuff again in the news.
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(Read recent medical assets + recent medical gun + recent dev talking about medical stuff = upgrade to medical gameplay incoming)
Oh LA, I can't help but like you, but lets go through this. Im going to use simple words that translate easily, I am not judging individuals or dismissing their efforts and certainly not their talent, its just for translation and understanding.
1. The ratio of 'artists' to devs is 4-1. For every 5 people, 1 is a dev and 4 are artists.
2. Artists can draw a picture, its what they do and are very good at.
3. Adding a picture into the game is proving harder than it should be. Adding a moving picture is a nightmare.
4. The pictures are very rarely actually finished as they get signed off and cancelled and back to the drawing board.....make that pixel blue
5. 4 Artists can produce 4x as much work as 1 dev...
6. 1 dev needs to do everything else to make the game actually work.
7. The game was paid for at the end of KS, with all the stretch goals met. All the funding for the game was in the bank....where has that money gone?
8. 4x as much has gone to Artists as Devs, to produce 4x as much Art as Game, which is then sold again for cash, but its already been paid for? So what exactly is the new money buying? More Art? To sell for more cash? For how long?
9. Contracted Devs are brought in to try and fill the gap but they are secondary to the ongoing issue of Cashflow. Where is the Cashflow if there is no Art to sell and not enough Devs to finish the game?
10. At what point should the focus switch from Art to Development? 4x as much development as Art?
A picture is not a game, or a mechanic, or a gameplay loop. It is a picture, a very good picture done by talented people, they can do another picture next week, and the week after that. They can draw anything as they have a blank canvas and their imagination. But when its drawn it is complete, it is a picture. Its not a sign of things to come, its a sign of 4x as much Art as Development but it keeps the Cashflow going.
CIG are now trapped. They cant spend the money on 4x Devs as they need to produce 4x Art to sell or a guaranteed funding source for what 12-24 months to get SQ42 released in initial format?. However long you think it will take they will need funding for that long. Where is that funding coming from if not promises of what is to come, and what better way to sell that concept than Art? The moment they stop producing Art the funding slows and stops until release.....and they dont have the Operating Costs to continue for more than a few months. (This isnt unusual in business, but most companies expect to sell a product to get the money in, CIG expects to sell Art)
Normally people browse a brochure and pick something out they like, then they order it and within a given timeline it arrives.
With SC people pick the game they want and order a product (a game + access to ABC ship at launch) and they get a JPEG and no product. and excuses about how difficult it is. It wasnt difficult during KS or the initial 2M, or the stretch goals, its not difficult to produce new Art. It is difficult because there arent enough people working on the proper project, producing the working game and not Art and CIG cant change it around, they are stuck. And now they kind of have to lie about how they are stuck as the truth would cause outrage.
They still need $X money and Y time to release anything. If they say what X & Y really are, well what do you think would happen?
