Talking to fans on Twitter, Vincke explained that single-player games aren't dying the death executives claim they are. While major AAA releases continue to focus on live-service titles to soak up post-launch sales, Larian is staying firm in its market for great single-player titles.
"That time of the year again when big single player games are declared dead," the Baldur's Gate 3 director said on Twitter. "Use your imagination. They're not. They just have to be good."
If any game is proof that great single-player games are alive and well, it's Larian's latest RPG. While the game does have online multiplayer and even cross-play with the release of Patch 8, the majority of fans play the title in a purely single-player form.
At the time of writing, BG3 has over 31,000 players with a 24-hour peak of 67,000. More than a year after release with no battle pass schlock or live-service pandering, Larian has proven that single-player games can be massive successes in their own right.
Vincke's words not only ring true with gamers, but also other game developers. David Goldfarb, the man behind Battlefield: Bad Company and Payday 2 commented on the Larian CEO's post saying: "Can I bring you to all my meetings, Swen? F**king exhausted."
We see this talking point circle back every few months and you'd think all publisher execs came out in unison to tell you SP is dying, but whenever I try to find the source, I find fuck all or some quote from some EA fuck that was posted back in 1945. Who tf is declaring them dead/dying? WHO SWEN?
Larian is quite lucky to even get that reception to be honest. Pillars of Eternity flopped comparatively.
A couple of commercial failures that were definitely good.
Prey 2017 and Mooncrash DLC
Whole Earthbound series
Days Gone
Mad Max
Alien isolation
Okami
Sunset Overdrive
Planescape Torment (WTF, yea, 75k copies sold in its original release window)
Alpha Protocol
Ico
Psychonauts
System shock 2
Grim Fandango (basically closed put a nail in the coffin of adventure games at LucasArts)
Beyond good and evil
Shenmue
Conker's Bad fur day
Deux ex mankind divided
Vanguish
Returnal
and on and on and on, huge list that I'm sure I forget a shitload
Anyone telling me that just being good is assured success is out of their fucking mind.
Gamers have dropped some real gems throughout the years.
Larian is quite lucky to even get that reception to be honest. Pillars of Eternity flopped comparatively.
A couple of commercial failures that were definitely good.
Prey 2017 and Mooncrash DLC
Whole Earthbound series
Days Gone
Mad Max
Alien isolation
Okami
Sunset Overdrive
Planescape Torment (WTF, yea, 75k copies sold in its original release window)
Alpha Protocol
Ico
Psychonauts
System shock 2
Grim Fandango (basically closed put a nail in the coffin of adventure games at LucasArts)
Beyond good and evil
Shenmue
Conker's Bad fur day
Deux ex mankind divided
Vanguish
Returnal
and on and on and on, huge list that I'm sure I forget a shitload
Anyone telling me that just being good is assured success is out of their fucking mind.
Gamers have dropped some real gems throughout the years.
Larian is quite lucky to even get that reception to be honest. Pillars of Eternity flopped comparatively.
A couple of commercial failures that were definitely good.
Prey 2017 and Mooncrash DLC
Whole Earthbound series
Days Gone
Mad Max
Alien isolation
Okami
Sunset Overdrive
Planescape Torment (WTF, yea, 75k copies sold in its original release window)
Alpha Protocol
Ico
Psychonauts
System shock 2
Grim Fandango (basically closed put a nail in the coffin of adventure games at LucasArts)
Beyond good and evil
Shenmue
Conker's Bad fur day
Deux ex mankind divided
Vanguish
Returnal
and on and on and on, huge list that I'm sure I forget a shitload
Anyone telling me that just being good is assured success is out of their fucking mind.
Gamers have dropped some real gems throughout the years.
Larian is quite lucky to even get that reception to be honest. Pillars of Eternity flopped comparatively.
A couple of commercial failures that were definitely good.
Prey 2017 and Mooncrash DLC
Whole Earthbound series
Days Gone
Mad Max
Alien isolation
Okami
Sunset Overdrive
Planescape Torment (WTF, yea, 75k copies sold in its original release window)
Alpha Protocol
Ico
Psychonauts
System shock 2
Grim Fandango (basically closed put a nail in the coffin of adventure games at LucasArts)
Beyond good and evil
Shenmue
Conker's Bad fur day
Deux ex mankind divided
Vanguish
Returnal
and on and on and on, huge list that I'm sure I forget a shitload
Anyone telling me that just being good is assured success is out of their fucking mind.
Gamers have dropped some real gems throughout the years.
For example Returnal, great game, main character is a mom woman. Who is that appealing to? I'm surprised it sold any copies at all.
Let's look at damn near every game on that list. They are all super niche or somehow a spinoff of something else or have some other dumb aspect that hurt their commercial prospects. Prey 2017 for example, there was already a game called Prey. Prey 2006. Did they think we forgot? Maybe they just LOVED the name(stupid af but okay). That is why you had to say 2017. Why would they name it the same as another game? The other game wasn't that great, that's why I didn't buy it at the time and I'm not a lame. Of all the names in the world why do you have to pick a generic name that is already the name of another recent game that came out a decade earlier. I just searched "are prey 2006 and 2017 connected" because I had no idea. Why would they steal the name of another game? Even if the name was good(it isn't) why would they want to name a new game after a mediocre game? Should I name my new sp rpg Concord (2027) but of course in the marketing don't list the 2027? Isn't that some dumb shit?
The games need to have commercial appeal. Can you name a game that is SP that had commercial appeal that didn't sell well? If so I bet I can point out something the studio did that was stupid that helped the game on the way to failure. For example, Titanfall 2, release window and marketing budget. EA triple fucked Titanfall 2 on release, so there is no wonder it was a commercial failure, no? Every game that failed has examples like that of where hubris, ignorance, or malice stepped in somewhere in the long chain of game creation. Many of them were at inception. Marketing is a trade not an art.
The gaming market in general is an extremely oversaturated one.
Being good alone doesn`tget you anywhere if you don`t stand out in some way. There`s a reason for the somewhat ridiculous marketing budgets big titles often have.
Well then they are not that "alive and well" if the game is good, is it? When a ton of studios bit the dust or changed completely the direction after flopping hard on some of the above list.
No wonder some publishers would/did say that single player games are dead. Gamers have dropped the ball on some major good ones.
Larian is high on their success and puts its head in the sand about the hardship of so many other studios in single player genre. Lecturing "just be good" is comically naive.
He released his mega hit on gog day1 for example....thats something I consider as pretty fckn "good"! Larian does a lot of things right and very few things wrong (if at all). Players respect that.
Well then they are not that "alive and well" if the game is good, is it? When a ton of studios bit the dust or changed completely the direction after flopping hard on some of the above list.
No wonder some publishers would/did say that single player games are dead. Gamers have dropped the ball on some major good ones.
Larian is high on their success and puts its head in the sand about the hardship of so many other studios in single player genre. Lecturing "just be good" is comically naive.
If he had said being good always leads to success then I would agree with you. But he didn't say that. Probably should have said being good is a must if you want to have a chance to succeed. That's how I read it anyway.
If any game is proof that great single-player games are alive and well, it's Larian's latest RPG. While the game does have online multiplayer and even cross-play with the release of Patch 8, the majority of fans play the title in a purely single-player form.
Larian is quite lucky to even get that reception to be honest. Pillars of Eternity flopped comparatively.
A couple of commercial failures that were definitely good.
Prey 2017 and Mooncrash DLC
Whole Earthbound series
Days Gone
Mad Max
Alien isolation
Okami
Sunset Overdrive
Planescape Torment (WTF, yea, 75k copies sold in its original release window)
Alpha Protocol
Ico
Psychonauts
System shock 2
Grim Fandango (basically closed put a nail in the coffin of adventure games at LucasArts)
Beyond good and evil
Shenmue
Conker's Bad fur day
Deux ex mankind divided
Vanguish
Returnal
and on and on and on, huge list that I'm sure I forget a shitload
Anyone telling me that just being good is assured success is out of their fucking mind.
Gamers have dropped some real gems throughout the years.
Baldurs Gate 3 is obviously a very good game. But a lot of it's success comes down to other devs crying on twitter. That's when EVERYONE started talking about it, word about the game being amazing just went viral before the game came out.
Baldurs Gate 3 is obviously a very good game. But a lot of it's success comes down to other devs crying on twitter. That's when EVERYONE started talking about it, word about the game being amazing just went viral before the game came out.
This applies to all types of games really, not just single-player, but it's probably a bit more applicable to those considering they don't have the "friends can play with me!" element of multiplayer/GAAS titles.
Larian is quite lucky to even get that reception to be honest. Pillars of Eternity flopped comparatively.
A couple of commercial failures that were definitely good.
Prey 2017 and Mooncrash DLC
Whole Earthbound series
Days Gone
Mad Max
Alien isolation
Okami
Sunset Overdrive
Planescape Torment (WTF, yea, 75k copies sold in its original release window)
Alpha Protocol
Ico
Psychonauts
System shock 2
Grim Fandango (basically closed put a nail in the coffin of adventure games at LucasArts)
Beyond good and evil
Shenmue
Conker's Bad fur day
Deux ex mankind divided
Vanguish
Returnal
and on and on and on, huge list that I'm sure I forget a shitload
Anyone telling me that just being good is assured success is out of their fucking mind.
Gamers have dropped some real gems throughout the years.
How are you qualifying Returnal as a commercial failure when SIE themselves came out and said they were satisfied with the game's sales? You think they lost money on it or something? Also in what world was Ico a commercial flop? SCE at the time probably never expected GT numbers from that type of game, and it served other importance such as bolstering the PS2's library at a time it really needed some bolstering. Big reaches on your part to put those two in that list.
As for your general point, yes, it holds true, but a lot of these games can be broken down into specific reasons why they were commercial failures.
Earthbound: Offbeat JRPGs at a time when JRPGs weren't even that popular in the West
System Shock 2: Bad timing, caught in the post-QUAKE & Unreal environment, and coming right before Half-Life would steal a lot of its thunder
Grim Fandingo: Bad timing and possibly many still thinking it was a pure point n' click, a genre that was dying by the late '90s
Okami: Very late PS2 release just as 360 was launching and gamers were transitioning to that, PS3 ('06) and Wii (also '06)
Sunset Overdrive: Failed marketing by Microsoft and XBO acting as a commercial bottleneck. Also not a game appealing to most of Xbox's core audience at the time.
Psychonauts: Lack of marketing and stiff competition. Also a victim of platformer saturation at the time.
Shenmue: Was a massive money sink ($70 million) for a game meant exclusive to a console with niche install base (Dreamcast)
Could've touched on a few others but that's probably good enough.
There is a bit of truth to it. DOS2 turn based rules are really fun and a bit more balanced which leads to longer and more epic fights....in BG3 it was like....either kill everyone in the first 2-3 turns or get rekt....just because health bars were really low compared to the damage output. But BG3's item progression was just awesome. Every time I found a new magic/legend item I wanted to create a build around it. So many unique stuff were actually really useful and improved yr builds.
System Shock 2 was very heavily influenced by Half-Life. I don't know if System Shock 2 actually did that badly for what it was, but EA probably fucked them on the deal, and didn't promote it properly.
How are you qualifying Returnal as a commercial failure when SIE themselves came out and said they were satisfied with the game's sales? You think they lost money on it or something? Also in what world was Ico a commercial flop? SCE at the time probably never expected GT numbers from that type of game, and it served other importance such as bolstering the PS2's library at a time it really needed some bolstering. Big reaches on your part to put those two in that list.
Returnal didn't sell like it was acclaimed. As for it being fine internally at the studio or not, sure, Sony can be happy for the "indie" idea. Compared to the GAAS bleeding money, they probably saw Housemarque as a drop of water in the ocean comparatively. This game was also bundled so reported numbers are quite pathetic all things said.
But it still didn't sell like it should've. Otherwise most games in the list would have just met the bare minimum of it sold enough to not be a financial hole or even covered costs of making it. But publishers do not make games just to cover costs, do they? Otherwise most of the studios that are on the list of games above would have not changed direction to something completely different after their last flop or downright close.
Ico, I'm surprised I even have to show receipts where were you during those years?
The VP of Sony's Japan Studio, Yasuhide Kobayashi, has revealed that its forthcoming title The Last Guardian was given …
www.gamesindustry.biz
"ICO sold about 270,000 units in the US, but Kobayashi explained his belief that it could have performed better: "If the packaging was designed differently, we think it would have sold more - in fact on the internet many people have said that the Japanese version was better."
You know you are difficult to please when two of the industry's favorite games, ICO and Shadow of the Colossus, aren't good enough in your eyes. Fumito Ueda has
elder-geek.com
"I think the problem is different," discusses Ueda, "I believe the issue is with the product. The fact that Icoand SOTC didn't sell well is because they weren't good enough. They didn't have enough to appeal to users…The Last Guardian wants to learn from this. I'm making the game so that it's appealing, with the hope that many people will give it a try and love it."
As for your general point, yes, it holds true, but a lot of these games can be broken down into specific reasons why they were commercial failures.
Earthbound: Offbeat JRPGs at a time when JRPGs weren't even that popular in the West
System Shock 2: Bad timing, caught in the post-QUAKE & Unreal environment, and coming right before Half-Life would steal a lot of its thunder
Grim Fandingo: Bad timing and possibly many still thinking it was a pure point n' click, a genre that was dying by the late '90s
Okami: Very late PS2 release just as 360 was launching and gamers were transitioning to that, PS3 ('06) and Wii (also '06)
Sunset Overdrive: Failed marketing by Microsoft and XBO acting as a commercial bottleneck. Also not a game appealing to most of Xbox's core audience at the time.
Psychonauts: Lack of marketing and stiff competition. Also a victim of platformer saturation at the time.
Shenmue: Was a massive money sink ($70 million) for a game meant exclusive to a console with niche install base (Dreamcast)
Could've touched on a few others but that's probably good enough.
Like I said. Larian is high as a kite on success but they might have lucked it out. There's more than just "be good". Exactly my point.
Nowadays you need streamers and flock mentality for high CCUs. If YouTuber goblin kings and their short attention span Gen why twitch chatters aren't jumping up and down with a game stream, its put aside.
Larian was in the beginning for a very long time on the edge of going bankrupt. They went from zero to hero over the last 30 years without bending over for a mega corp and taking the easy route. I allow Vincke to flex a bit now.
It's my game of the generation, but it didn't hurt his sales that he got to develop the third game in a beloved franchise built by other people. Name recognition matters. Lots of "good" games fail.
www.videogamer.com
Larian does a lot of things right and very few things wrong (if at all). Players respect that.
www.gamesindustry.biz
