Support NeoGAF

[Plague Doctor]

Well if a record breaking GaaS game can just layoff their staff, Bungie better figure out a way to have Marathon make Fortnite money and ccu tomorrow.

Edit: I think we are far past cultivating their own modest sized but hardcore audience and slowly building it up phase of the Western AAA Industry.

They better make that pivot to the casauls if they want a hope of this continuing.

 

[P:axMagellanic]

1757, David Hume:

"Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty."

Enlightenment snobbery from a man who was blessed enough to live in an era at a civilisational height of human aesthetics and in the arts.
Who also did not get to the experience the rot of post modernism which would be so singularly successful in tearing down the achievements of his people and descendants.

 

[PeteBull]

With those terrible numbers there is no way we dont hear about massive layoffs at bungie in march still, latest in april if sony is super slow with reacting to that flop, guess it will be time to blame players by then

 

[Kronark]

Side tangent to this topic. I knew Destiny 2 was doing bad, but I did not know it was down to 4k players with a 10k peak bad... I thought 10k was the floor.

RIP BUNGO.

 

[Roman Empire]

Side tangent to this topic. I knew Destiny 2 was doing bad, but I did not know it was down to 4k players with a 10k peak bad... I thought 10k was the floor.

RIP BUNGO.

Too many players saw the final shape as the right stop point. There was nothing concrete about what would come next, so player counts plummeting was the obvious outcome. Bungie may as well be prepared for the worst.

 

[Sohurmk833]

Side tangent to this topic. I knew Destiny 2 was doing bad, but I did not know it was down to 4k players with a 10k peak bad... I thought 10k was the floor.

RIP BUNGO.

Pissing away over 3,5 billion for this and Marathon. What a trainwreck.

 

[Bitmap Frogs]

Enlightenment snobbery from a man who was blessed enough to live in an era at a civilisational height of human aesthetics and in the arts.
Who also did not get to the experience the rot of post modernism which would be so singularly successful in tearing down the achievements of his people and descendants.

So once it's been proven that your statement about objectivity in art was a result of either ignorance or lies, now you pretend to pivot? tsk tsk

In fact, Hume (a noted conservative no less), wrote "The Standard of Taste" because people like you, who critique art from a position of prejudice and bias.

Even more, back in the 18th century there were people like you who harshly criticised new art styles that emerged back then. You see, it's the passage of time that has made the prejudices disappear.

This whole thing is so old, that we know that back in times of the greeks, when the corinthian order appeared, being vastly different than the classic doric, it garnered the same response that you have about modern art.

So don't belittle Hume by saying he'd think like you about art. He wouldn't.

 

[DrFigs]

Totally agree with the "to this point" part. It's been down-right TERRIBLE! I see no way for this acquisition to be viewed as a success, until 2030 at the earliest.

If they improve the game and get positive buzz, more people will start playing it. This isn't a concord or destruction all stars situation. Or even a foamstars (which i actually quite liked). The game is apparently good, according to steam reviews. So they can turn things around.

 

[Kronark]

Too many players saw the final shape as the right stop point. There was nothing concrete about what would come next, so player counts plummeting was the obvious outcome. Bungie may as well be prepared for the worst.

I didn't even stick around for the Final Shape. I was already very disgruntled with the game in general and the stupid hardcore / steamer focused direction Bungie continued to take the game. The made it an absolute grind fest and made the game as casual unfriendly as possible. I think most people were burned out before Final Shape but stuck it out to finish the saga. Lightfall was such a pathetic excuse for an expansion I dipped there and then, not even bothering to do the seasonal content I had paid for. It was hard for me to give a shit about the story after Lightfall basically introduced space pouchie and still had us chase an unexplained mcguffin in the penultimate expansion story.

 

[Guilty_AI]

So once it's been proven that your statement about objectivity in art was a result of either ignorance or lies, now you pretend to pivot? tsk tsk

In fact, Hume (a noted conservative no less), wrote "The Standard of Taste" because people like you, who critique art from a position of prejudice and bias.

Even more, back in the 18th century there were people like you who harshly criticised new art styles that emerged back then. You see, it's the passage of time that has made the prejudices disappear.

This whole thing is so old, that we know that back in times of the greeks, when the corinthian order appeared, being vastly different than the classic doric, it garnered the same response that you have about modern art.

So don't belittle Hume by saying he'd think like you about art. He wouldn't.

If we're gonna use quotes as proofs of something, there are much better ones:

Art is the uniting of the subjective with the objective,
of nature with reason, of the unconscious with the conscious, and
therefore art is the highest means of knowledge.

To say that a work of art is good, but incomprehensible to the majority of men, is the same as saying of some kind of food that it is very good but that most people can't eat it.

The matter of whether Marathon artstyle is good or not depends upon two factors:
>Why does it look like that and
>Does it achieve its purpose by being what it is?

 

[PeteBull]

If they improve the game and get positive buzz, more people will start playing it. This isn't a concord or destruction all stars situation. Or even a foamstars (which i actually quite liked). The game is apparently good, according to steam reviews. So they can turn things around.

They can only turn things around if they make new game, singleplayer halo-like new IP with blockbuster campaign, thats it, marathon is dead and burried by now with 0 future, remember we not talking AA 20m usd budget game made by new studio from asia or eastern europe here, just to keep bungie alive they require crazy monthly income with their western salaries, and destiny2 stopped giving them that few years ago, marathon never even started...

Quick and dirty ccu comparision vs yesterday, same time at 6pm eurotime game had 61k ccu, today not even 40k, again 6pm eurotime so u would expect most players came back from school/work/outside activities by now, and yet...
And yeh game has 20k reviews on steam with 87% being positive, the thing is- if playerbase likes game so much why did big chunk of them already stopped playing, its only 5th day after launch, most singleplayer games have better ccu retention even xD

 

[Shin-Ra]

Side tangent. Sony's number one priority should be to make the most pro-consumer, seamless box / ecosystem, and a system experienced that drives people to their system over PC so they can maintain this level of profit from the 30% cut.

I feel like PS5 was the first time I felt the system level experience get worse gen-on-gen (outside of load times) and I think they should be doing more to make their console offer more than what Steam does.

Marathon PC: free online play
Marathon PS5: PS+ required

Save backup PS4/PC: seconds to USB storage
Save backup PS5: seconds to subscription PS+ 'cloud' or many minutes using the SLOW system backup option which doesn't allow restoring individual saves. All or nothing.

The online features improved gen-on-gen PS3 to PS4 at the expense of a subscription, PS4 to PS5 they took away USB save copies just to make PS+ more attractive.

 

[GermanZepp]

The existence of differing views without an empirical way to show which is true further reinforces that art is subjective. You can quantify the effort, time, and technique but the impact of a piece will always be subject to the viewer and their surrounding culture. Nobody's view is ever incorrect.

Yes. Your view is incorrect.

 

[MMaRsu]

Marathon PC: free online play
Marathon PS5: PS+ required

Save backup PS4/PC: seconds to USB storage
Save backup PS5: seconds to subscription PS+ 'cloud' or many minutes using the SLOW system backup option which doesn't allow restoring individual saves. All or nothing.

The online features improved gen-on-gen PS3 to PS4 at the expense of a subscription, PS4 to PS5 they took away USB save copies just to make PS+ more attractive.

And thats the type of shit I mean when I say arrogant Sony

They know console players will gladly bend over backwards

 

[Plague Doctor]

Yes. Your view is incorrect.

Arguments on post modern subjectivity remind me of this gem.

 

[hyperbertha]

I'm beginning to think that you don't know the definition of subjective since you keep using opinions as examples of fact. People who believe that the earth is flat are objectively wrong since the theory has been fully disproved for centuries. 99 out of 100 people thinking Angelina Jolie is beautiful doesn't make her objectively beautiful since 1 person who disagrees exists and there is no empirical way to change their opinion. Beauty is just as subjective as art as evidenced by the myriad of subcultures based on non-conventional looks. What you're describing in your examples is mainstream appeal which changes according to the times. Personal dislike doesn't change the subjectivity of art. Objectively, Marathon is a work of art as it is a product of a creative endeavor. Whether or not its a good or noteworthy work is a matter for debate.

Personally, Marathon isnt for me. Art I do not enjoy is still art. My opinion doesn't invalidate the opinion of somebody else who loves the game's creative choices.

Just because some idiots and deviants COPE that angelina jolie isn;t hot, doesn't mean its suddenly subjective. GENERAL CONSENSUS determines objectivity. For something to be subjective, there should be no general consensus. For example, its subjective that Zendaya is hot. Because there really is a 50/50 divide between people who consider her attractive vs not. Get it resetera deviant??

 

[Roman Empire]

I didn't even stick around for the Final Shape. I was already very disgruntled with the game in general and the stupid hardcore / steamer focused direction Bungie continued to take the game. The made it an absolute grind fest and made the game as casual unfriendly as possible. I think most people were burned out before Final Shape but stuck it out to finish the saga. Lightfall was such a pathetic excuse for an expansion I dipped there and then, not even bothering to do the seasonal content I had paid for. It was hard for me to give a shit about the story after Lightfall basically introduced space pouchie and still had us chase an unexplained mcguffin in the penultimate expansion story.

I left with Beyond Light. Played the campaign on my warlock, and saw how barren Europa was and how tedious unlocking aspects were that I just gave up. To add to injury, all the sunsetting of content and the content vault soured the game for me.

Never I've been more relieved of leaving a game behind.

 

[Hollywood Hitman]

He really did tuck his balls into his ass and leave didn't he

 

[Kronark]

I left with Beyond Light. Played the campaign on my warlock, and saw how barren Europa was and how tedious unlocking aspects were that I just gave up. To add to injury, all the sunsetting of content and the content vault soured the game for me.

Never I've been more relieved of leaving a game behind.

Agreed, I felt so free after finally walking away.

Beyond Light was a particularly sad state of the game because of the sunsetting. They removed so many guns from the game that entire weapon types + element combos were missing from the legendary pool. I needed to do a master lost sector to grind out the new exotic armor pieces at the time. Except the seasonal mod / champion type required me to use a scout rifle and the enemies in the lost sector required it be arc. There was no legendary / purple arc scout rifle in the loot pool because of the sunset and I could not infuse anything in my vault up to content appropriate light level. Blue rarity weapons could not be infused.

I ended up grinding for hours until a random blue rarity arc scout rifle dropped at a close enough light level to do the content. Just no planning at all around the implementation of the sunset. Fuck Luke "You had to be there" Smith.

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

Marathon PC: free online play
Marathon PS5: PS+ required

Save backup PS4/PC: seconds to USB storage
Save backup PS5: seconds to subscription PS+ 'cloud' or many minutes using the SLOW system backup option which doesn't allow restoring individual saves. All or nothing.

The online features improved gen-on-gen PS3 to PS4 at the expense of a subscription, PS4 to PS5 they took away USB save copies just to make PS+ more attractive.

Wait... you can't do USB save backup on PS5?!?

 

[SlightlyUnstable]

If they improve the game and get positive buzz, more people will start playing it. This isn't a concord or destruction all stars situation. Or even a foamstars (which i actually quite liked). The game is apparently good, according to steam reviews. So they can turn things around.

I just can't see how. One of the things I'm looking at is where it's ranking, not necessarily raw numbers. Currently it's not even in the top 30 games being played (33rd at the time of this post). For the investment put into this game by Sony that's a massive failure. If they manage to pull this one out of the gutter it will be one hell of a comeback.

 

[Shin-Ra]

Wait... you can't do USB save backup on PS5?!?

Only PS4 saves.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Totally agree with the "to this point" part. It's been down-right TERRIBLE! I see no way for this acquisition to be viewed as a success, until 2030 at the earliest.

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.

 

[Nydius]

I left with Beyond Light. Played the campaign on my warlock, and saw how barren Europa was and how tedious unlocking aspects were that I just gave up. To add to injury, all the sunsetting of content and the content vault soured the game for me.

Never I've been more relieved of leaving a game behind.

Ditto, except I felt that way once before, when I quit playing World of Warcraft after 11 years. I quit Destiny 2 with Beyond Light and felt that same kind of relief coupled with the retrospective "why did I keep playing this for so long?"

About the only way I'd play Destiny in any form again is if they magically gave D1 a 60+ fps patch. Then I'd go back and play some D1, play all of the raids again. Otherwise, I'm not interested in Destiny.

 

[Hollywood Hitman]

Yea I quit in May of 23 right before Diablo 4 dropped and I haven't looked back since. I do miss the crucible it was my main, I miss trials and gettin to the lighthouse, I miss all that but quitting was the best choice I got back to really enjoying gaming, platinumed about 30 games since.. I have had a blast

 

[Guilty_AI]

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.

 

[MMaRsu]

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.

Ahh a classic long con

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

Only PS4 saves.

What the fuck... I was gonna get a second PS5 for my game room but fuck that. I had no idea you HAD to pay the fee for cloud saves and that's the ONLY option.

 

[PeteBull]

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.

Even if we assume 3.7b dollar purchase was supposed to be longterm profitable only, then those 400-500m spent on marathon is pure waste.
I mean we can tell how nasty every1 at bungie and sony hq feel coz they dont yell about sales numbers or even players numbers, hell ac shadows that was total flop for ubi and ubi still early on announced those what was it 3-4m players back then, not a peep from bungie/sony, at all, like its studio funeral already

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Even if we assume 3.7b dollar purchase was supposed to be longterm profitable only, then those 400-500m spent on marathon is pure waste.
I mean we can tell how nasty every1 at bungie and sony hq feel coz they dont yell about sales numbers or even players numbers, hell ac shadows that was total flop for ubi and ubi still early on announced those what was it 3-4m players back then, not a peep from bungie/sony, at all, like its studio funeral already

Sony lost so much money on Bunge it's a farce.

Right off that bat shit loads was paid out in retention bonuses of $1.2B which no doubt was scooped up by the execs and high level employees. That dollar value is right away gone.

That leaves the enterprise value at $2.4B. Considering the company has been tanking since they bought them, two rounds of layoffs, D2 has barely anyone playing it (down to 5 - 10k daily) and Marathon doing lousy, that asset value will be in the toilet. Sony already wrote down some Bungie in an earnings report. I think they wrote off $200 or $300M already.

You'd be lucky if they are even worth $500M now.

Sony doesnt even have confidence in the studio. When they were laying off people, they transferred some people to another SIE studio to make a new game there. They didnt even want to leave it with Bungie to get the Bungie badge.

 

[Bitmap Frogs]

If we're gonna use quotes as proofs of something, there are much better ones:

But that's not the point, the point is he claimed the idea of beauty in art being subjective is modern, and I clearly showed it isn't.

Everything else is noise.

 

[winjer]

So yesterday, at around this time, the game had 73K players on Steam. Today it has 49K.

 

[Chuck Berry]

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.

Cope level increased to 4

 

[Hollywood Hitman]

So yesterday, at around this time, the game had 73K players on Steam. Today it has 49K.

Dawg it's international finger blast day, gotta way til tomorrow

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

 

[ByWatterson]

1757, David Hume:

"Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty."

LOL Hume is the same asshole who posited there is no actual right and wrong, or rather that happiness is the measure of what is good.

All Hail the Father of Moral Relativism.

 

[kpopSuperstar]

So yesterday, at around this time, the game had 73K players on Steam. Today it has 49K.

To be fair, it's Monday. The weekend was actually more solid than expected, Marathon barely lost any players, it was very stable. It's the next weekend that's gonna be interesting, to see if it can get to 70K + again.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Peak time for this game on the weekend skews Europe. Friday was USA. Assuming today keeps skewing to 4-5 pm EST as the peak like the weekend, the CCU now is 50k. It might creep up a bit to about 55k in the next hour or two. Then drop down a bit and rise later tonight when USA EST kicks in which will probably be back down to 45-50k.

If it was at 25k at low last night, it'll probably fall to 20k assuming the trending falls a bit.

We'll see.

 

[touchfuzzy]

I stopped playing Destiny sometime after The Dark Below. On Destiny 1. Y'all are crazy to have played it for that long.

 

[mckmas8808]

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.

I wouldn't say "profitable", I'd say worth the price. And there's no way for Sony to truly know if that $3.6 Billion was "worth the price" until 2030 or so. Keep in mind...........Sony has already written off like $250M from the Bungie purchase, so.....

Technically, the purchase was only "worth" $3.35 Billion. So they are in the hole right now.

 

[drotahorror]

Western gamedevs are pretty much dead to me. Lett'em burn, there needs to be a videogame crash or something. More people need laid off and hopefully never return.

 

[DrFigs]

I just can't see how. One of the things I'm looking at is where it's ranking, not necessarily raw numbers. Currently it's not even in the top 30 games being played (33rd at the time of this post). For the investment put into this game by Sony that's a massive failure. If they manage to pull this one out of the gutter it will be one hell of a comeback.

There is no doubt in my mind the game is currently a failure. I think it is unlikely to succeed, but not impossible!

 

[EN250]

Side tangent to this topic. I knew Destiny 2 was doing bad, but I did not know it was down to 4k players with a 10k peak bad... I thought 10k was the floor.

RIP BUNGO.

The game is like +10 years old, it's surprising how people still engage with it tbh, Destiny 3 should have released like 3 years ago, if not more...

 

[StereoVsn]

What the fuck... I was gonna get a second PS5 for my game room but fuck that. I had no idea you HAD to pay the fee for cloud saves and that's the ONLY option.

It's frustrating as hell. You essentially have to backup the whole PS5 onto external to get the saves.

 

[drotahorror]

The game is like +10 years old, it's surprising how people still engage with it tbh, Destiny 3 should have released like 3 years ago, if not more...

a game that is actually going to be 10 years old in 2 months.

 

[Bitmap Frogs]

LOL Hume is the same asshole who posited there is no actual right and wrong, or rather that happiness is the measure of what is good.

All Hail the Father of Moral Relativism.

He's also the guy who argued for limited government, private property, constitutionalism, the rule of law and generally the respect towards customs. He also said that the American colonies would start a war of independence and that Britain should let them leave. Not bad for an asshole.

But again, that's not the point, the point is that the thought that beauty is in the eye of the beholder is much, much older than communists. Everything else is noise.

 

[Negotiator101]

Sony lost so much money on Bunge it's a farce.

Right off that bat shit loads was paid out in retention bonuses of $1.2B which no doubt was scooped up by the execs and high level employees. That dollar value is right away gone.

That leaves the enterprise value at $2.4B. Considering the company has been tanking since they bought them, two rounds of layoffs, D2 has barely anyone playing it (down to 5 - 10k daily) and Marathon doing lousy, that asset value will be in the toilet. Sony already wrote down some Bungie in an earnings report. I think they wrote off $200 or $300M already.

You'd be lucky if they are even worth $500M now.

I don't claim to know how many players it needs to be a viable long-term investment but at what point does Sony start ringing the alarm bells with Marathon?

 

[StreetsofBeige]

The game is like +10 years old, it's surprising how people still engage with it tbh, Destiny 3 should have released like 3 years ago, if not more...

Some games click with gamers. Dead by Daylight has slowly crept UP over the years.

Rust is even bigger. Never followed Rust at all except way back watching some funny video about trap houses. But turns out it has tons of new content.

 

[PeteBull]

I don't claim to know how many players it needs to be a viable long-term investment but at what point does Sony start ringing the alarm bells with Marathon?

 

[Signalis]

At what point is a 3.6b dollar purchase supposed to be profitable? Buying Bungie was never a short term profit opportunity. It was always a long term play.