Rami Ismail谈影响游戏行业的12个重要变革

原作者：Marie Dealessandri 译者：Willow Wu

如果说2020年有证明了什么的话，那就是游戏行业可以从容应对任何意想不到的挑战。

经历了这一年，我们完全有理由得出这样的结论：3A游戏公司对远程办公并不是特别认可。微软CEO Satya Nadella说，作为一种永久性的办公方式，这是不可行的。然而，就在昨天，SquareEnix宣布公司打算让日本的员工永久远程办公。在线上举办活动已经逐渐成为一种常态了，这种远程的行业人士对话形式将会持续下去，远程办公正会慢慢成为一种新常态。

“如果游戏开发没有灵活性可言的话，那还叫什么游戏开发，”Rami Ismail在NG20+活动说道。“我在这个行业也不过十来年的时间，但在这十年中发生了很多事情。Steam发生了变化、移动领域发生了变化、Twitch发生了变化，还有《我的世界》《堡垒之夜》跟赛季通行证……这么多事情发生了，而且其中很多都对我们的工作产生了非常深远的影响。”

Ismail与Jan Willem Nijman合作创建的独立游戏工作室Vlambeer在前段时间关闭了。他现在主要是为独立开发者提供咨询服务，尤其是关于新兴市场的。同时他也是gamedev.world的执行董事——这是一个使用八种语言的线上讨论会网站。

在一篇题为“重塑游戏开发”（Reinventing game development）的演讲中，Ismail回顾了过去十年来行业发生的变化，并在过程中与来自世界各地的30多名独立、2A和3A游戏开发人员进行了讨论。

“起初，我打算讨论的是过去一年游戏行业的变化，COVID-19疫情对我们的生活工作产生了怎样的影响，”他解释说。“但是跟人们交谈过后，我很快就意识到其实值得讨论的还远不止如此。”

1.直播

在讨论过程中，最常被提及的话题就是游戏直播，以及它如何从根本上改变游戏开发的。

“对游戏来说，没有什么是比直播更能产生颠覆性效果的，”Ismail说。“我记得六年前，有个来自Justin.tv的人来到我的PAX展位，询问我说可不可以在Justin.tv直播自己的游戏，肯定会引起轰动的——这还是不到十年前的事情。Twitch从根本上改变了我们的游戏设计方式，还有营销的方式。现在的游戏必须要有一定的重玩价值。如果主播一直玩你的游戏，这就基本上就相当于是免费的营销了。”

这也对游戏类型产生了影响——比如battle royale游戏的兴起以及多人射击游戏的复兴。

“这些类型之所以能够保持热度或获得大量的关注，是因为它们的直播效果非常好，” Ismail继续说道。“现在非常明显的一个现象是人们在为Twitch设计游戏。这不是说设计一定要能与Twitch特性相结合的游戏，而只是在设计游戏时考虑到Twitch这个平台。游戏的UI界面和设计要怎样才能让观众很容易就看懂？你要怎么确保人们在玩游戏时有时间聊天？像这样的顾虑真的彻底改变了我们的游戏设计思维。

2.服务型游戏

游戏直播的流行跟“游戏即服务”趋势的兴起是有密切关联的，像《英雄联盟》《反恐精英：全球攻势》《命运》这样的游戏就起到了很大的助推作用。开发服务型游戏的主要还是那些3A工作室。

“我们看到了不少尝试——有些是成功了，但大部分还是血本无归，事实证明作为一个独立开发者，服务型游戏不是那么容易就可以做出来的，”Ismail说。“不过，我们很多人应该已经从手游那边学到了一些经验教训，他们近十年来都是在做这样的游戏。关于留存率、用户粘性、转化率的学问，以及如何创造出让玩家保持沉浸的游戏，这一切都意味着我们需要新的商业模式。”

在服务型游戏当道的背景下，人们最常用的策略就是订阅和微交易，但它们并不是毫无争议的。然而，鉴于现在的玩家倾向于对一个游戏进行长期投入，行业确实需要想办法不断革新。

“游戏行业一直在寻找方法摆脱付费模式——这是我个人很喜欢的一种模式，”Ismail说。“但很明显，如果你打算之后做一款跟当下畅销游戏类似的游戏，到那时候你就会发现那些模式就长远来说可能没有那么理想的效果。”

3.订阅模式

在众多新模式中，Ismail认为订阅模式是开发者最应该关注的。像Apple Arcade和Xbox Game Pass这样的服务会继续影响行业，逐渐放弃那种“你卖我买”的直接关系。

“这些平台已经扮演起了新的角色——既是内容策划负责人也是资助者。” Ismail说。“它为游戏开发提供了新的范式。我们突然间开始思考如何制作B2B模式的游戏。这会彻底改变开发的工作流程。”

Ismail补充说，就当下而言，这对独立开发者来说究竟是好事还是坏事，还很难说。对那些已经有作品的开发者而言，订阅模式肯定能带来很多好处，但是新手开发者可能就不一样了。

“对他们来说，这意味着他们与用户之间还多了一个中间人需要说服。作为一个行业，我们显然非常关注这些平台的未来发展。

“如果这种模式在未来成为主导，那么我们之前在其它平台为游戏所做的投入还能给我们带来稳定的收益吗？这会对我们的行业产生怎样的影响？关于这个话题，大家所持的观点截然不同——有人认为这对我们的行业来说绝对是个好事，而不少人则认为我们应该更谨慎地去对待，还有人就表示游戏行业正在走向终结。”

4.新的平台

过去十年出现了新的游戏消费途径和新的商业模式，还有一些新的平台正在改变行业的生态系统——比如Epic Games Store、VR和Google Stadia。

与此同时，像Steam这样存在已久的平台也在进一步演变，开发者要在这一平台获得成功更加困难了。2016年Steam平台新游戏的数量比前一年多了40%。2017年又增长了53%，直到2019年增速才有所减缓。

“这些平台又会回归到了内容策划者的角色，这其实是一件很有意思的事。因为有段时间我们一直在努力让这些平台变得更加开放，当时的它们对某些开发者来说并不友好，”Ismail说。“如今我们看到了成果——Steam现在就是一个开放的平台。只需要支付少量的费用，你的游戏就能在这个平台上架。

“但这也带来了很多问题。要让玩家注意到你的游戏，这真的比以往任何时候都难——除非你已经有粉丝基础或者营销做得很好。Steam尝试着去应对平台上大量涌入的游戏，要让游戏脱颖而出真的是越来越难了。”

Ismail指出，在过去10年里，跟他交谈过的大多数开发者都表示收益出现了小幅下降或小幅增长，没有剧烈变化。Steam的报告显示他们的利润在持续增加。

“这并不是说Steam无法为你带来收益了，只是现在失败的人比以往更多了。显然这就是选择Steam这样的平台所需面对的挑战之一。但有意思的是现在我们也有了一些在非常注重内容策划&展示的平台可以选择。”

他提到了Apple Arcade和Epic Games Store，它们目前的游戏展示方式比Steam更理想，尽管它们打算在未来往更开放的方向发展。

“这种抗衡是很有意思的。有些从业时间比我更长的人跟我说，这基本上就是一个不断重复的波动函数，在开放和人为筛选展示之间来回切换，一直持续到未来。

“现在看来，他们是对的，我想这就是我们的未来：各种经过筛选策划的小型商店，而不是算法商店。所以，在为未来做决策时，商店的发展也是一个值得思考的因素。”

说到平台，Ismail还提到了Mike Bithell近期在GamesIndustry.biz Live：Academy演讲上表达的观点：开发者应该寻找一个没有人探索过的空间，快速抓住机会。

“独立开发者主要还是在开放平台活动，因为它们比较友好。但是很多人也提到了缺乏竞争的问题。如果你可以率先在某个平台占到一席之地，在定制化的商店中你是可以获得相当不错的优势的。很多跟我交谈过的开发者都表示他们很高兴能够在Stadia或VR这样平台发售游戏，或者是早期的Switch。

5.小而专注的发行商

平台数量的增加对特定类型发行商的兴起是有直接影响的。自主发行在10年代中期之前一直都很流行，但之后大家都去Steam了，所以在后五年的时间里我们看到有越来越多小型、针对特定领域的发行商发展起来了。

“很多独立开发者都想覆盖全平台，但这是很艰巨的任务，” Ismail说。“在如今这个时代，让游戏登陆尽可能多的平台，由此来分散你的风险，这是很多人都认可的一种做法。大多数工具集——包括我们在Vlambeer使用的GameMaker，还有Unity和Unreal——它们都能让你比较顺利地把游戏上架到主流平台，不会有多少困难。

“让开发者们付出巨大努力、对平台望而却步的根源其实就是开销问题。随着平台数量的增加，针对这个问题，这些小型发行商似乎又多了一个额外的角色。”

Ismail表示，他所说的“小型发行商”（boutique publishers）指的是拥有独特做事方式或特征的小型公司，如Raw Fury（2015年创建）、Annapurna Interactive（2016年），或者他们的先驱Devolver Digital（2009年）。虽然我们不可否认这的确为开发者们带来了机会，但这也可能成为一种威胁。

“他们会在筛选&产品展示上下很多功夫。在他们存在之前，就营销方面来说，独立开发者竞争的对象是独立开发者。而现在，我所接触过的几乎所有人都不可能像Devolver Digital那样保持稳定的产量和品牌知名度。”

这种发行环境的变化可能意味着融资流程的改变，Ismail采访过的开发者表示在不久的将来，大部分资金主要是用于前期投入。

“以前，你会先做一个游戏，获得一些资金，发行你的游戏，然后在收益分成完后开始正式赚钱。许多人都希望这种模式能够变成在前期或整个开发过程中获得更多的资金，然后到合作尾声阶段拿较少的收益。

“这也促成了融资需求的产生，而自筹资金的新项目越来越少了。我认为，在接下来的几年里，自筹资金的情况会越来越多，然而，几乎所有跟我交谈过的人都对公司自筹资金的能力持悲观态度。”

6.直接营销

营销也发生了变化，现在开发者可选的渠道越来越多了，可以让他们更直接地跟用户交流。如今，行业讨论中更关注的是公司而不是针对具体的游戏。

“一些开发者表示营销对他们来说没有那么重要了——他们的意思是现在人们营销游戏的方式没有那么积极了，而是更侧重于确保被动行为出现时，他们能够及时利用这个机会、采取行动。他们中的许多人都表示，现在更注重的是品牌认知度，而不是单独一款游戏的直接营销。

“有趣的是，直接营销非常碎片化的。要把你的游戏推广给消费者，方法有很多，而作为一个独立开发者，通过自己的YouTube频道或者Twitch平台营销还是很难有明显的成效。这就相当于创造了一个类似于中间人的位置。”

Ismail提到Geoff Keighley在今年夏季的时候，在Summer Game Fest上将游戏产品公开变成一个很私人化的活动。还有Wholesome Direct、LudoNarraCon这样的较为小型的组织活动也是颇有成效的。

“出于营销目的创建临时联盟，直接锁定某些具体的小众市场，人们现在能够更好地使用这种策略了。”他强调说。

7.云游戏

无论是Google的Stadia，Nvidia的GeForce Now，微软的xCloud，亚马逊的Luna，还是Steam仍处于测试阶段的Cloud Play，我们可以看出各方都想从云游戏中分得一杯羹。

“很大程度上可以说这是上述所说内容的（游戏直播、服务型游戏和订阅模式）一种几乎不可避免的演变，”Ismail说。“这些公司想要更进一步地控制人们玩游戏和接触游戏的方式，并减少他们在过程中可能遇到的障碍，当然这些公司也能从中获得更多利润。

“这项技术是功能性的，而且在适当的环境下可以发挥很好的作用。就目前来说，我的个人看法是每个平台都遭遇了严重的挫折。尽管Stadia在技术方面是具有革新意义的，但是现在似乎处于一种停滞不前的状态。Nvidia最终因为对未签约的游戏使用该服务而引发了许多争议。”

因此，尽管Ismail说了一些“值得参考的选择”，但他认为云游戏要真正流行起来还需要数年时间。

“但好消息是已经体验过云游戏服务的用户还是感觉挺高兴的，坏消息就是那些打算尝试云游戏的人也很期待。同样，这也会有力推动游戏行业将重心转向B2B，而这将如何在不同类型的游戏中发挥作用，我们仍没有答案。这是很多人都在思考、担忧的问题。”

8.社区管理

跟Ismail交谈过的所有人都强调社区管理是过去十年中关注需求不断提升的事项之一——他们认为这个趋势还会持续下去。

“先前我曾说过现在营销没有那么重要了，更重要的是品牌推广，大多数人所说的‘品牌化’本质上就是社区管理。一些工作室表示，社区可能就是拉动销量、扩大品牌知名度的主要驱动因素，也是他们成功的最关键因素。

“在这种竞争加剧的环境下，半管理半放任会成为工作室带来真正的风险。你可以选择完全管理，也可以选择完全不去关注它，但‘我将每周查看一次Steam论坛’这种做法会对社区的未来是没有好处的。”

他特别说了一些例子，比如精心设计的Discord服务器、非常活跃的Twitter个人账户，或者玩TikTok，这些都是开发人员为了显得更亲民而经常使用的策略。

“从单枪匹马做游戏的独立开发者到大型3A游戏公司，这些策略有很多人都会使用。成功的游戏大多都是能让人联想到某种个性的。你可以说这种格调就是某些发行商的卖点吧。不一定是游戏本身传递出来的（虽说它们也得符合发行商的个性风格），可以是社区传递出的一种感觉，人们能从中获得一种归属感。”

9.社会责任&约束

在过去几年里，人们更加深刻地认识到游戏作为一种政治媒介的社会责任和影响力。就比如说，如今发行商经常会因为游戏中的一些冒犯性内容而受到谴责，这与我们的社会发展密切相关。但Ismail表示这是有两面性的。

“即使在大型的3A游戏中，你也能看到现在开发人员为了内容的正确性耗费了更多精力——虽说他们必须很低调地做这些事。近几年的三款《使命召唤》游戏有两款是阿拉伯裔主角，在《使命召唤：现代战争》中，玩家还能操控法拉·卡里姆这个阿拉伯裔女性角色。所以，开发商的社会意识确实提高了。

“另一方面，当游戏出现不当内容时，政府和监管机构自然会加大审查力度。关于微交易的讨论就是一个很典型的例子。如果我们的行业不进行自我纠正、监管，政府就会开始干涉。游戏圈太庞大、太有影响力了，这种情况是无法避免的。所以如果我们不这么做，政府会出手的。

英国互动娱乐协会的CEO Jo Twist近期就谈到了这个变革，尝试对“监管审查新时代”做出正确的回应。

10.工会化

来自行业内的监管，其中一种方式就是工会化。

“世界各地都有不同程度的工会化需求，但在很多游戏工作室密集区，工会的存在是必要的。”Ismail说。“就目前的情况来看，行业所做的这些努力都是分散性的，在效果上也是各有不同，但这些人是真的想做出改变的，他们会坚持下去，对即将踏入行业的人才会产生实质性的影响，我认为这很好。

“无论是哪种方式，我们确实看到了行业单位之间的合作有了喜人的进展，对高强度加班、员工权益的讨论增多了，比如让员工能够组织起来，为争取更好的条件而团结、战斗。所以我觉得在某种程度上，这是让行业自身担起责任的好方法。如果这会对你的管理造成一定麻烦，那就接受吧。”

11.新兴市场

欧洲、美国和日本，一直以来被视为游戏产业的摇篮。但是新兴市场正变得越来越引人注目了，独立开发者应该关注下相关的讨论。

“这些新兴市场的增长实在是太令人难以置信了。像中东和北非地区、印度、东南亚地区，这些都是很多工作室现在重点关注的市场。你要做的不只是本地化——还有新社区的搭建与管理、职务安排、重新推广。

“针对这些地区的本地化，行业中肯定是有做出一番努力的，至少要认识到这些市场的文化敏感性和文化机遇。之后几年可能会有不少游戏是来自这些‘非传统地区’的——人们或许想不到这些地方竟然还有做游戏的。”

12.持续大众化

Ismail谈论的最后一个话题是游戏开发的大众化，这主要是得益于相关技术上手门槛降低了。游戏引擎的数量越来越多，为有抱负的开发者提供了比以往更多的机会。

“这就引发了一种‘人人都能做游戏设计师’的潮流，”Ismail说。“越来越多工具把焦点放在‘利用有限的技术知识进行创造’上。这在很多方面导致了产出质量的提高，以及来自那些外行、技术能力不强或专业程度不高的人的产出数量的增加。

“好的方面是，这增加了游戏的多样性，同时也增加了游戏制作原因的多样性。有一大群人做游戏并不是出于商业目的。有了这种多元化，我们就可以关注特定趋势或小众市场，寻找那些有意思的尝试或能给你带来灵感的东西。”

展望未来

现下有很多公司在Ismail所强调的这些机会上加大投入。作为一个独立开发者，能够抓住这其中一个机会就已经是很了不起了。

“巨大的转变——可能会在接下来的几年内出现，但很有可能会因为行业的发展变化而迅速消逝。一位开发商说，如果Stadia现在有意向跟他们合作，他们一定会毫不犹豫的答应，因为云游戏趋势可能在一年内就会衰落了，他们的钱自然也就白投入了。如果现在有一个机会摆在你面前，要及时抓住它。

“还有就是很多游戏工作室很难决定他们到底是要保持小规模还是快速扩大。从我的交流经历来看，10~12人规模团队都对自己的生存能力很有信心，那些职工数超过100人的团队也是如此。

“但现在，处于这两者之间的公司似乎都相当不稳定，许多公司很难获得融资，不清楚该怎么继续经营下去或者实现增长，甚至只是在当前环境中保持稳定。特别是考虑到即将到来的经济衰退带来的潜在影响，COVID-19疫情出现以后，不少中等规模工作室对于当下该做什么很迷茫。”

面对着充满不确定性的未来，他们的情绪也变得有些不稳定。

“跟我交流过的很多开发者表示他们对B2C到B2B的转变趋势感到很担忧，还有这种转变对行业的意义，”Ismail总结道。“很多人都觉得他们没得选择，只能跟着转变，因为他们的收益来源是无法预测的，而且能分到‘免费的午餐’也不错。

“但他们也表示，这也不是第一次面临不确定性了，自2010年代以来，游戏行业的状态一直都很不稳定，不同业务类型的公司都经历了触底再反弹。但我接触过的每个人都清楚，作为一个行业，我们最大的优势仍然是灵活性、对新趋势的关注、擅于抓住机遇，以及我们的适应能力。”

本文由游戏邦编译，转载请注明来源，或咨询微信zhengjintiao
If 2020 has proved anything, it’s that the games industry can catch any curveball life has to throw.

Entering the year, it’s fair to say that many AAA studios didn’t strongly believe in remote working. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that it wasn’t viable as a permanent setup. And yet, just yesterday, Square Enix announced its intention to make remote working permanent for its Japanese staff. Online events are becoming the norm, and that digital component in industry gatherings is here to stay, while remote working slowly becomes the new normal.

“Game development is nothing if not flexible,” said Rami Ismail in a NG20+ talk released earlier this week. “I’ve only been around for one decade, but a lot has happened in that decade. Steam happened, mobile happened, Twitch happened, Minecraft, Fortnite, Game Pass. So much has happened and so much of that severely impacted how we do business.”

Ismail was one half of Vlambeer until the indie studio disbanded earlier this year,. He’s now a consultant for indie developers, particularly focusing on emerging markets, and executive director of gamedev.world, a free online conference in eight different languages.

In his talk, titled “Reinventing game development,” Ismail looked back at what’s changed in the industry over the past decade, speaking to more than 30 independent, AA and AAA developers from all around the world in the process.

“At first I thought I’d make this a talk about what has changed in the last year, what has changed now that COVID-19 is such a large part of our reality,” he explained. “But talking to people, it really quickly became clear that there is so much more happening all the time.”

Live streaming

The most commonly mentioned topic during Ismail’s discussions with developers was live streaming and how it radically transformed game development.

“There has been nothing that is more disruptive to gaming than live streaming,” Ismail said. “I remember six years ago a man from Justin.tv came to my booth at PAX and asked me if I could stream my games on Justin.tv because it was gonna be a big thing. That’s less than a decade ago. What Twitch did is it fundamentally changed our approach to designing games and to marketing games. Games are now built to be replayable. Because if a streamer keeps playing your game, then it is very likely that you’ll just have free marketing.”

That also created a shift in genres, with the emergence of battle royale games and a resurgence of multiplayer shooters.

“Those genres have retained or gained a lot of popularity just by grace of being easily streamable,” Ismail continued. “The very prominent note right now is people designing for Twitch. And not designing necessarily to integrate with Twitch, but just designing their game with Twitch in mind. How do you make your UI and design easily readable for a viewer? How do you make sure that people have time to chat or talk while they’re playing your game? Things like that have genuinely shifted how we design our games.”

Live services

The emergence of live streaming is closely linked to the ascent of games-as-a-service, popularised by titles such as League of Legends, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, or Destiny. Live games do mostly remain the realm of AAA studios though.

“We’ve seen quite a few attempts at that — some successful, most of them deeply deeply unsuccessful, because it turns out that making games as a live service is not something that you can easily do as an independent creator,” Ismail said. “A lot of us have learned lessons from mobile though, who have been working with this sort of [approach to] game development for almost a decade now. The knowledge of retention, engagement, funneling, the way of creating games that are meant to keep engaging, meant that new business models were needed.”

Subscriptions and microtransactions are the most popular solutions created to support this new era of live games, but these have not been free of controversies. However, the industry does need to keep coming up with ways to reinvent itself as players now expect support in the long term.

“The industry keeps pushing to find a way to move away from that premium model that I personally love,” Ismail said. “But it is abundantly clear that if we’re going to be making the games that are selling right now, that those models might not be as sustainable as we thought.”

Subscription models

Among these new standards emerging, Ismail believed that subscription models are the biggest thing that developers should pay attention to. Services such as Apple Arcade or Xbox Game Pass will continue to impact how the industry works, moving away from a direct relationship with consumers.

“[These] platforms have taken a new role as curator and as a funding platform,” Ismail said. “It creates this new paradigm for how we make games. Instead of trading games business-to-consumer, suddenly we’re thinking about how we make games business-to-business. It could be highly disruptive to the workflow of developers.”

Whether this is a positive or a negative for indies is hard to say at this point, Ismail added. Developers with established titles can benefit greatly from subscription services, but it might not be as easy for newcomers.

“For upcoming developers, it means that they have another middle man they have to convince of the quality or viability of their game. As an industry we obviously have to worry about what [these platforms] will be like in the future.

“If these models become prominent, will the amount of money that is being spent on games for those platforms sustain, or will that go away? How will this affect our industry? The views that people had on this were incredibly varied — some people saw this as an incredibly positive thing for our industry, a lot of people saw it as a thing that we have to approach with a bit of skepticism, and some people basically said that the games industry is dying.”

New platforms

The last decade brought new ways to consume games and new business models, but also a few new platforms that are transforming the ecosystem — such as the Epic Games Store, VR and Google Stadia.

In the meantime, historic platforms such as Steam have evolved in such a way that it’s more difficult to be successful. New games on Steam in 2016 rose 40% over the previous year. In 2017, it increased another 53%, before finally slowing down in 2019.

“The platforms have shifted back to being in a curator role, which is interesting because for a while there was this very hard push for platforms to be open, to be as accessible to every developer,” Ismail said. “And over the past years we’ve seen that result in what Steam looks like right now, which is an open platform. Anyone can put a game out there if they pay the small entry fee.

“But it has also led to a lot of problems. It is harder than ever to get your game noticed on Steam, unless you have an established fan base or you have good marketing. As Steam tried to deal with the influx of games on their platform, it became harder and harder for games to stand out.”

Ismail pointed out that most of the developers he talked to have either seen small dips in revenue over the past decade, or small increases, but nothing drastic. Steam also continues to report increased profits.

“It’s obviously not that Steam is not generating revenue anymore, there’s just more losers now than there were before. There’s more people that are launching a game that is unsuccessful. Obviously that is a function of a platform like it. But it also makes it very interesting that we have a few platforms out there that are very strictly focused on curation.”

He mentions Apple Arcade and the Epic Games Store, which for now has a more curated approach than Steam, though it is meant to open up in the future.

“It is interesting to see that counterweight. Some of the people I spoke to, who have been in the industry longer than I have, have said that it’s basically a wave function that keeps repeating over and over, and that the shift between openness and curation will continue into the future.

“And for now it seems that they’re right, that this is going to be where we’re going to be: small curated storefronts rather than algorithmic storefronts that are pushing different niches. So that’s an interesting thing to think about when making decisions for what you’re going to be doing.”

Related to platforms, Ismail also touched upon something Mike Bithell recently mentioned in a GamesIndustry.biz Live: Academy talk: developers should find a space where no one else is and take these opportunities quickly.

“The indies are still moving mostly to open platforms, because those platforms are more accessible. But a lot of people also brought up a lack of competition. If you can be on a platform first, that will net you quite a beneficial place in a more curated space. A lot of developers that I’ve talked to were pretty happy with launching on things like Stadia, or VR, or early on Switch.”

Boutique publishing

The increasing number of platforms had a direct impact on the rise of a certain type of publisher. While self-publishing was in vogue until the mid-2010s as developers flocked to Steam, the second half of the decade saw boutique publishers going from strength to strength.

“A lot of indies are struggling to keep up with launching on all platforms,” Ismail said. “It is common wisdom at this point [that you should] launch a game on as many platforms as possible to spread your risks. Most of the tool sets — including GameMaker which we [used] at Vlambeer, but also Unity and Unreal — out there allow you to publish to most of these major platforms without too much hassle.

“The thing that takes a lot of indies a lot of effort and that is stopping them from launching on a lot of platforms is just the overhead. As the amount of platforms is increasing, it seems that there will be an additional role for boutique publishers to take care of that. Ironically the biggest need for boutique publishers comes from the existence of boutique publishers.”

Ismail clarified that by ’boutique publishers’ he means smaller companies with a distinct approach or identity, such as Raw Fury (created in 2015), Annapurna Interactive (2016), or the founding father of them all, Devolver Digital (2009). While these present an undeniable opportunity for developers, they can also be a threat.

“They’re usually highly curated publishers. Before those existed, indies were competing with indies in terms of marketing, and nowadays it is almost impossible for almost everyone I spoke to to keep up with the consistent output and the brand awareness that a Devolver Digital might have.”

This change in the publishing landscape could mean a change in the funding process too, with the developers Ismail talked to indicating that most of the funding in the near future will be primarily front-loaded.

“Before, you would make a game, get some funding, release your game and then make some money after your revenue split. A lot of people are expecting that the model will shift more towards getting a larger bag of money upfront or throughout development, and then seeing less of the revenue on the other end per se.

“That also creates a necessity for funding, and self-funding for new projects is increasingly rare. I generally thought self-funding would be on the rise over these next few years, but almost everybody I spoke to was pretty down on the ability of companies to self-fund.”

Direct marketing

Marketing has also evolved, with more and more channels available to developers, allowing them to communicate more directly with their audiences. Communication in the industry is now more focused on companies rather than specific games.

“A number of developers said that marketing is becoming less important to them. What they mean is that the way people market their games is less actively pushing for things, and more making sure that, when there is passive movement, that they jump on top of [it] and are aware of [it]. A lot of them expressed that the focus for awareness around their games is now focused more on a brand than on the direct marketing of each individual title.

“What is interesting is that direct marketing is extremely fragmented. There are many ways to market your game to consumers, and as an indie doing it through your own YouTube channels or Twitch stream, it’s still relatively hard. That has created a sort of new middleman position for a focus on critical mass.”

Ismail mentioned that Jeff Keighley pretty much successfully privatised game announcements during the summer of 2020, with the Summer Game Fest. But there were a few smaller, very successful efforts such as the Wholesome Direct or LudoNarraCon.

“People are getting better and better at sort of creating temporary alliances for marketing purposes, in which they target very specific niches directly,” he highlighted.

Cloud gaming

Whether it’s Google with Stadia, Nvidia with GeForce Now, Microsoft with xCloud, Amazon with Luna, or Steam with its Cloud Play beta, everyone wants a slice of the cloud gaming pie.

“A lot of this is an obvious, almost inevitable evolution of all of the above — the live stream, the live services, the subscription models,” Ismail said. “Everything that is there pushes these companies to want more control over how people play and access games, and give them less obstacles on the way there, while also getting as much money out of that.

“The technology is functional-ish and it works well under the right circumstances. So far my personal opinion is that every platform out there has dropped the ball incredibly hard. Stadia feels stagnant, despite being a revolutionary technology. Nvidia ended up in a lot of controversy about putting games on the service that weren’t signed to [it].”

So despite noting a few “inspired choices,” Ismail said it’s going to be years before cloud gaming properly catches on.

“The good news though is that the people that are using these cloud gaming services seem happy. The bad news is that the people that seem to be using these cloud services are happy. Again, this will push the games industry very hard towards a more business-to-business sort of focus, and how that is going to play out for different types of games remains a question. It’s something a lot of people are thinking about and are nervous about.”

Community management

Everybody Ismail talked to stressed community management as one of their increased focuses this past decade — a trend they see continuing going forward.

“Earlier I said marketing is less important and branding is more important, and what most people mean by branding is community management. Several studios said that it is probably the main driver of their sales and brand awareness, and that it is potentially the most critical part to their success.

“With that comes increased competition, and half well done community management is becoming a real risk to studios. You can either choose to focus on it entirely or not at all but doing sort of the ‘I will check the Steam forums once a week’ is going to be actually negative towards your community in the future.”

He stressed examples such as elaborate Discord servers, very active personal Twitter use, or a TikTok presence as strategies developers have been using to appear more personable.

“You see it all the way from AAA to the smallest indies out there. The games that are successful are overwhelmingly games that have a personality attached to them. And for a lot of the upcoming publishers, you can tell that the tone is they’re selling point. It is not necessarily the game, even though the games have to fit the tone of the publisher, but it is the tone that people can see and get from them. The sort of feeling of community, the sense of belonging that people get.”

Social responsibility and regulations

Over the past few years, there’s been an increased awareness of the social responsibility and influence of games as a political medium. Publishers now regularly take responsibility for offensive content in their games for instance, closely following the evolution of our society. But there’s two sides to that coin, Ismail said.

“Even in large AAA games, you’re seeing a lot of increased effort to do the right thing, even if they have to do it quietly. Two of the three most recent Call of Duty games feature an Arab protagonist and [Modern Warfare] even allowed to play her. So there is definitely a push towards being more socially aware.

“The flip side of that is that obviously where games do not do the right thing, there is increased scrutiny from governments and regulatory bodies. A great example is the microtransaction discussion. It is increasingly clear that if our industry does not moderate itself and does not regulate itself, that governments will start doing it. We are too large, we are too influential to stop that from happening. So if we don’t do it, they will.”

CEO of UK trade body UKIE, Jo Twist, recently addressed this evolution, exploring the right response to “a new phase of regulatory scrutiny” for the industry.

Unionisation

One example of regulation that could come from within the industry, whenever it fails to do the right thing, is unionisation.

“There’s different levels of necessity for unionisation around the world, but it is incredibly needed in a lot of the primary industry locations that we have,” Ismail said. “The efforts so far have been scattershot and various in efficiency, but they’re very real, they’re very genuine, they’re not going anywhere and they have a very real effect on upcoming talent, which I think is great.

“Either way, there is great movement in the industry in the forms of co-ops, increased discussion of crunch, and increased discussion of worker power, like the ability for workers to organise, and to really fight and work together for better conditions. So I think in a way this is a good way of the industry taking responsibility for its own. And if that takes a little painful stuff on management, and so be it.”

Emerging markets

Europe, America and Japan have historically been the cradle of the games industry. But emerging markets are becoming more and more prominent, and indie developers should be paying attention to that discussion.

“The growth of emerging markets has been ridiculous. Locations like MENA, India and Southeast Asia have been the focal points of a lot of studios. And that is not just localisation — it includes entire community management positions, offices, representation, in those territories.

“There is definitely a push around the industry to localise for these territories and to at least be aware of the cultural sensitivities and the cultural opportunities of each of these markets. A lot of the great games of the nearby future will probably come from territories that many of us now don’t even think of as places where game development happens.”

Continued democratization

The final talking point in Ismail’s discussions was the continued democratisation of game development, led by the increased accessibility of the tech behind games. The number of game engines is on the rise, providing more opportunities than ever to aspiring devs.

“Somebody called it the ‘designerisation’ of game development,” Ismail said. “There is an increased focus of tool sets on the ability to create with a limited technological knowledge. That has led in many ways to an increased quality of output, and an increased number of output from people that are otherwise industry averse, or just not very technologically capable or specialised.

“The good news is that that has created increased variety in diversity of games, but also an increased diversity in why games get made. There is a huge movement of game developers that are not doing this for any commercial purpose. With this diversification, we can watch for trends or niches, things that could be interesting to play around with or be inspired by.”

Looking ahead

There are currently a lot of companies spending money on the opportunities Ismail highlighted. As an indie developer, being able to take one of these opportunities is an “incredible privilege,” he said.

“Huge shifts — that are likely in these next few years — will probably come and go incredibly fast as the industry changes. One developer basically said that if they could get a deal with Stadia, they would take it now, because that might just be gone in a year and then the money is gone as well. If there is an opportunity now, take it now.

“The other [thing] is that a lot of studios are making really hard choices about whether they’re committing to staying small or growing fast. The teams that I talked to that were ten to 12 people were generally pretty confident about their ability to survive, and so were the people and teams that were larger than a hundred people.

“But the space in between seems pretty volatile right now, and a lot of companies are having a hard time figuring out how to fund, continue, or grow, or even just stay stable in the current environment. Especially with the upcoming potential recession affecting our industry after COVID-19, a lot of studios in that mid-group are a little nervous about what to do right now.”

The overall sentiment was one of constant change, with uncertain times ahead.

“A lot of developers I spoke to expressed concern about the upcoming shift from business-to-consumer to business-to-business, and what it means for the industry,” Ismail concluded. “And lots of developers don’t really see a choice but to participate in that shift, because revenue sources are unpredictable and free money is nice.

“But they also said that uncertainty is nothing new and there’s this discussion about how our industry has been crashing since 2010ish, with different segments of our industry hitting the ground and bouncing back up. But across everybody I talked to, it was abundantly clear that our greatest strengths as an industry, remains being flexible, paying attention to new realities and opportunities, and adaptiveness.”

(source: gamesindustry.biz)