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Bungie told Naughty Dog not to go all in on a live service game

Draugoth

Gold Member

Bungie gave Naughty Dog feedback that Naughty Dog found extremely helpful when making what was likely a very smart decision to not go all in on a service game - Jason Schreier


People lamenting this cancellation should really look at the history of single-player studios pivoting to make service games such as Anthem, Suicide Squad, Marvel's Avengers, Redfall, and so on


 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Bungie .... were the good guys?

john-cena.gif
 

MiguelItUp

Member
Haha, yeah, I guess they know a thing or two about that. Especially with all of the "restructuring" they've been doing. What a mess.
 

Men_in_Boxes

Snake Oil Salesman
Why couldn't they give the same advice for Concord?
Factions 2 never entered full production. They probably got their hands on Concord when it was a year or two away from the finish line. It will still serve as a solid test bed for Sony.
 

LectureMaster

Gold Member
ND has been one of the pinnacle single player studios for two decades and their MP stuff were always just nice freebies.

Why the fuck Sony think it was a great idea to let them all in for a service game? Now 4 years have past since Part 2 and they couldn't even release a fucking teaser for their next project. What a waste of resources.
 
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Killjoy-NL

Member
A regular MP mode would’ve been enough.
Pretty much.

But ND wanted it to be more fleshed out to the point that it needed to be it's own game.

Guess Bungie gave them feedback about the risks, which apparently resulted in ND not going through with Factions 2.

So, turns out Bungie gave the anti-Gaas crowd a W, even though they get all the blame.
 
The original Factions had some real scummy monetization but it’s an amazing experience that lots of people still play today, and it didn’t require all of ND’s resources. It was included with a long and well received single player game.

They should have retooled it into something more like the original, something that could stand on its own and doesn’t need massive resources as a service game like Destiny.

Launch the game, sell some expansions and skins, give out new maps, done. You can still make money doing that.
 

Lunarorbit

Gold Member
Whatever jason. Such horseshit

He goes on to compare that factions could have been like other single player gaas, anthem and redfall. People still play the original factions. Bungie totally axed factions and Neil didn't have the forethought to protect it.
 

SHA

Member
PC has it's own domain, y'all need to understand there's a necessity to build a hybrid pc /console, it's no longer an option to look back, if y'all want to join live service games, you have to join pc first, the division isn't real, people don't care, just like how Nintendo built the switch, these consumers don't really care, they just bought the switch.
 
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Whatever jason. Such horseshit

He goes on to compare that factions could have been like other single player gaas, anthem and redfall. People still play the original factions. Bungie totally axed factions and Neil didn't have the forethought to protect it.


His agenda is so obvious, typical scoundrel.


"Very honest" of Bungie to advise the cancelation of Factions but not say the same about Concord, developed by ex-Bungie staff.

Shameless stuff.
 

JaksGhost

Member
His agenda is so obvious, typical scoundrel.


"Very honest" of Bungie to advise the cancelation of Factions but not say the same about Concord, developed by ex-Bungie staff.

Shameless stuff.
They didn't advise the cancellation. They focused grouped and advise them of what would be necessary to run a successful GaaS over years. Something Naughty Dog thought over and eventually said they didn't want to commit to because it would pull the entire team away from other projects. Concord was already pretty far along in development when Bungie was acquired in June 2022. Firewalk was acquired less than a year later in April 2023 with the reveal of the game the next month in May 2023. Meanwhile Naughty Dog was still releasing concept art.
 
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Punished Miku

Human Rights Subscription Service
They didn't advise the cancellation. They focused grouped and advise them of what would be necessary to run a successful GaaS over years. Something Naughty Dog thought over and eventually said they didn't want to commit to because it would pull the entire team away from other projects. Concord was already pretty far along in development when Bungie was acquired in June 2022. Firewalk was acquired less than a year later with the reveal of the game the next month in May 2023. Meanwhile Naughty Dog was still releasing concept art.
That does make more sense honestly.
 

Xtib81

Member
I mean, I could have told them too and for half the price.
On a serious note, I do believe that cancelling Tlou online was a mistake, unless the game was in a terrible state.
 
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rm082e

Member
I thought this was already known? This is what I took away from the reporting around TLOU GaaS getting canceled. Somebody at that time said Bungie had taken a look at their game and "gave them feedback". Maybe I was just filling in the gaps with assumptions that Bungie was like "RUN BITCH!!! RUUUUNNNN!!!!!!!"
 

Bartski

Gold Member
The fact they chose to bin rather than downscope can either mean they went so deep into the gaas design they would need few more years to revert it into a niche MP doomed not to make ALL THE MONEY, or that it was shit, as a gaas - tlou abomination of sorts. Or both. Damn shame either way
 

JaksGhost

Member
That does make more sense honestly.

This article is from November 2023 when Neil was still saying "no update" after only releasing a piece of concept art in 2022 and one month before the cancellation post. By that time Concord, Helldivers, and Fairgame$ had already been revealed in the May 2023 Showcase. It was too late to cancel by that time, but not for Naughty Dog who had nothing to show.
 
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yurinka

Member

So Bungie did tell them to cancel it. Naughty Dog agreed.
Bungie .... were the good guys?
Bungie to Naughty Dog: Dont go all in on GaaS
Bungie to Bungie: Go All In on GaaS
I thought this was already known?
So Bungie are now Naughty Dog advisors. When will they make a game themselves.

Bungie never has been in the position of canceling a PS Studios games or to tell them to cancel it. And they weren't ND advisors.

SIE publishing, Bungie and PS Studios experts on GaaS specific parts were put together in the SIE Live Services Center of Excellence to share knowledge about GaaS specific topics, make shared best practices and pipeline, and to review the GaaS specific parts of all SIE games (all the ones from both PS Studios and Bungie) that are live or under development:

0026.jpg


So the SIE Live Services Center of Excellence -not only Bungie- gave ND feedback and guidelines about the GaaS aspects of TLOU Online as they did to any SIE GaaS title, not about the game itself.

And then with that, ND (not Bungie, not the Center of excellence) decided to cancel TLOU Online because the amount of resources that would take after launch to perform well enough was bigger than they originally expected, to the point that it would affect the single player projects they have under development.

ND thought they had to decide between the ND single player games and the live service game, and ND decided to keep the single player games.
 
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Kabelly

Member
they didn't need to.

They needed some nice maps, some unlockable costumes and TLOU2 gameplay. I would play that all day, but you can't have an online game without a monezitation plan in this day and age.
 
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nial

Member
Why couldn't they give the same advice for Concord?
"Very honest" of Bungie to advise the cancelation of Factions but not say the same about Concord, developed by ex-Bungie staff.
The thing is that Firewalk was pretty much set up to create live service games, this was not the case of a SP-focused studio pivoting to make GAAS like Arkane Austin, Rocksteady, or what could have been, Naughty Dog.
I still don't get all the outrage over The Last of Us Online's cancellation when ND outright said this last year:
So, we had two paths in front of us: become a solely live service games studio or continue to focus on single-player narrative games that have defined Naughty Dog’s heritage.
 
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EruditeHobo

Member
Whatever jason. Such horseshit

He goes on to compare that factions could have been like other single player gaas, anthem and redfall. People still play the original factions. Bungie totally axed factions and Neil didn't have the forethought to protect it.

When a studio is assessing the state of a hugely ambitious project, especially when making a decision on go/no go, you know what they don't do? They don't make a decision to pull the plug for likely many, many reasons... but then go "well hey let's INSTEAD pivot -- this is still going to take a ton of manhours and resources, but lets turn what we do have here, which is obviously not really working (otherwise we wouldn't be making this decision) and which was developed as something COMPLETELY different... let's turn it into the kind of game/multiplayer DLC that used to be released over 10 years ago!"

For many reasons that you perhaps will never understand, things simply don't work like this. And the fact that you feel the need to throw in a pathetic Neil dig at the end just really cements that you don't know what these kinds of decisions and conversations look like at all... just like many others who would flippantly comment on these kinds of moves with no insight whatsoever.
 
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StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Tip for ND employees anytime a Bungie employee butts into your office telling you what to do about GAAS.

Dont listen to them. Your studio makes solid games and Factions 1 was a good mode too. Bungie is a trainwreck, almost in the red (losing money) and had to ditch 375 (about 30%) of workers in layoffs and shifting to Sony studios. Never take advice from losers.

They only egged you on to cancel so Factions 2 wouldnt compete with their GAAS games. If Bungie and the rest of the GAAS overseers really knew what they were doing Concord would be releasing in 3 weeks in its current laughable state.
 
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Jesb

Member
Why did factions have to be a service game. Why not just a normal online game. Why did ND feel it should be gaas or nothing at all.
 
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