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[ZoukGalaxy]

As usual...

 

[MrTroubleMaker]

Were DEI folks affected?

Doubtful, usually newer hires are "cheaper" to keep on. I'm sure there is also government incentives to keep them as well. This is mostly gutting experienced workers.

 

[simpatico]

Because the devs working in the trenches chose to make a GaaS game that nobody wanted? Leadership failed here at every level and most of them are probably going to keep their jobs.

I said fiscally responsible, not morally awesome. The Rocksteady brand is a liability now. Their next project will be met with a ton of skepticism that they will have to undo. Starting off the in hole when it comes to public opinion, on a multimillion dollar endeavor is not ideal. The only option is back to a very safe Arkham release, and that would be what? 5 years from now at the very soonest? Better to let the devs go their separate ways. Is WB going to happily pay 5 years salary for that whole studio hoping SS was just a fluke? After the 8 year bath they just took that's a tough sell.

 

[Bashtee]

I'm sure the pigs responsible for this mess will sit comfortably in their chairs while letting ChatGPT write how sad they are about all of this.

 

[cormack12]

Suicide Squad breaking that 4th wall huh

 

[The Skull]

 

[hussar16]

I really think the industry needs to scrap the whole “our games is secret, nobody can know about it until we’re 4-5 years deep in dev”. Announce it early and show it early, like they do with films. That way you can gauge interest. If you announce it any everyone screams “THIS IS AN AWFUL IDEA!!!”, you have a chance to rethink before spending the best part of a decade and hundreds of millions.

If the initial announcement is mixed, then you show it off and people are “LMFAO, this looks terrible, what the hell are you thinking with xyz” , but you’re only 2 years deep, you still have time to fix it. Everything I’ve read suggests suicide squad was a troubled development and went through several redo’s along the way anyhow, but all of that was done in complete secrecy, none of those versions met public critique (maybe the public response to one of those would have been better).

Concord is ofcourse another example. If they hadn’t made the whole thing and 8 years in a bubble, and shown it much sooner people outside their bubble could have said “this is terrible, you will lose hundreds of millions if you don’t make big changes”. This would have been blindingly obvious by YouTube dislike rates etc.

Release early, listen to the masses, and put particular weight on the opinions of the core demographics of the genre, not small echo chambers, and people who are a minority demographic for the game you’re trying to make. It’s really not rocket science, but we keep seeing these massive companies making very very similar mistakes in both games and film, and consistently losing vast sums of money.

They dont do it with films. And feedback of trailers doesnt always mean changes wil happen

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

Imagine if they had just made a solid Batman game, it would have sold millions and would have generated an acceptable profit and no one would need to be laid off

Instead, they got extremely greedy

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

coming soon to

Maybe, but the good news for FireWalk is they are across the street from Bungie and could easily support all the projects they have including the new IP from a new studio that was spun off

They always wanted to be a GaaS team as well, so it wasn’t forced on them

 

[AJUMP23]

They earned it.

 

[MiguelItUp]

I'm genuinely surprised they didn't completely shutter. Hopefully they don't ruin their second chance.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

I said fiscally responsible, not morally awesome. The Rocksteady brand is a liability now. Their next project will be met with a ton of skepticism that they will have to undo. Starting off the in hole when it comes to public opinion, on a multimillion dollar endeavor is not ideal. The only option is back to a very safe Arkham release, and that would be what? 5 years from now at the very soonest? Better to let the devs go their separate ways. Is WB going to happily pay 5 years salary for that whole studio hoping SS was just a fluke? After the 8 year bath they just took that's a tough sell.

Great points.

Game studios dont realize that since they are often one project at a time as all or nothing, youre only as good as your last project. Also, many of them seem teetering on life or death. A successful game = live on for another game. A failure means mass layoffs or maybe studio closure.

These studios risking their brand based on a different kind of product (GAAS SS vs SP Batman) is begging for rolling the dice at a casino.

For other industries with companies with tons of money and brands and product lines, one stinker product wont sink the ship. Also, gaming and other companies make use of branding differently. A studio brand lives and dies trying to make whatever game they are making based on the brand. Other companies can do that too, but often will make a new brand to cover that product line. Unless there is an easy to relate to link, a big non-gaming company wont confuse customers using the same brand (game studio) to make something totally different.

Game studio branding also gets affected heavily based on who works there too. Bioware now is way different than Bioware 20 years ago with those doctor founders. The games made can have a totally different view and quality. I dont think the quality or focus between Nestle chocolate bars or Honda lawn mowers product/marketing depts now vs 20 years ago changes much. The entire floor can change people but things are more stable. But a game studio can be totally different.

 

[Red Crayon Aristocrat]

It's really cool how modern society works, take something as established as Arkham and DC, proceed to wipe your ass with it, then proceed to act shocked when now people are losing their jobs.

Is it worth it to these people? Is it worth it to not stand up and say "no, this is ugly and stupid bullshit and nobody will like it" when the result is the very real cost of people losing their jobs? Is it worth it to just drive your entire company into the ground to spite fans to that degree?

It's an insane world we live in, there has been a fundamental breakdown of order that is genuinely worrying, because if it affects video games so hard, what else does it affect?

 

[StreetsofBeige]

It's really cool how modern society works, take something as established as Arkham and DC, proceed to wipe your ass with it, then proceed to act shocked when now people are losing their jobs.

Is it worth it to these people? Is it worth it to not stand up and say "no, this is ugly and stupid bullshit and nobody will like it" when the result is the very real cost of people losing their jobs? Is it worth it to just drive your entire company into the ground to spite fans to that degree?

It's an insane world we live in, there has been a fundamental breakdown of order that is genuinely worrying, because if it affects video games so hard, what else does it affect?

I dont even play Batman games from 10-15 years ago. but I know the games got solid ratings, were dark and gritty and sold a ton. Gamers loved them.

Well, in every other industry, you'd keep making those golden goose products until it fizzles out or the quality stinks.

Gaming is a funny thing because some game companies realize that and will churn out FIFA, COD, Ass Creed etc.... knowing the demand is there. And the games are so steady, gamers know what to expect. If they want to make something else, they can, but will hire more people, form another studio and let them make a different game. Why would EA or Activision tell their FIFA and COD teams to stop making them and make them? COD's biggest draw is MP/Warzone. Big gamer base and money. That would be like tellig them to shift focus from GAAS to SP only campaigns. Makes no sense.

But WB wanted Rocksteady to drop successful Batman SP games and try for the jackpot of GAAS with SS.

Truly puzzling.

In other industries, doing a 180 in business strategy like this would get you instantly fired. Imagine if Oreo cookies were dropped or converted to low calorie/vegan cookies instead of their tried and true sugary round black cookies. Doesnt happen. If they want to try different variations go ahead (they do). They add supplemental products, not replace a golden goose.

 

[Starbuck2907]

never go full gaas

Have you talked to Sony lately? You might want to mention this to them.

 

[EDMIX]

Funny they are laying off QA Team when the game has no Quality Assurance.

? Ooooorrrrrr they did a bad job, thus they laid them off lol

So I'm sure they existed, simply sucked at what they did lol


I don't know if it was really this team or someone above them, for all we know they've been telling people about issues and the higher ups didn't list. QA only works if someone listens so... who knows

 

[Danjin44]

Gass is the future!

 

[Hot5pur]

Kept playing injustice for another 20 min.
Turns out it's a giant turd.
I don't understand how the Batman team could produce something like this.
Looking forward to the VR adaptation that seems to be a proper Arkham game.

 

[Elginer]

Well tons of money lost when a single player or even coop campaign would have worked. Tons of money lost.

 

[Lord Malachite]

I really don't want to be "that guy", but it's hard for me to feel for those affected in this case. No, I don't applaud working grunts just trying to complete projects and surviving paycheck to paycheck being told they don't have a job anymore. But Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League lacks so much humanity that apathy towards bad news surrounding the game is my default.

It was clear for at least a year before release that the game was going to be stillborn. Layoffs were absolutely inevitable and it would have been proactive to try to get the hell out of the meat grinder that Rocksteady has become.

It's hard for me to think of another studio that was once so great only a generation ago and is now in a state that I won't be the least bit sad when WB inevitably shutters them. I just don't feel there's enough there worth saving anymore or much of the talent that knows how to make an awesome Batman game. Maybe the time has come for Rocksteady to just die so the rest of us can move on. I see posts about "letting Rocksteady make another SP Batman Arkham game." Why?

I don't see any evidence that the Rocksteady that made Batman: Arkham Knight can make another game of that caliber today. It has pivoted entirely, a huge amount of the staff has turned over, the founders are gone (though they did start Rocksteady down the terrible road they are on today). What is left of them?

Sometimes a property becomes so bad that we need a whole new team to take it over and inject new life. I'd welcome an actual new Arkham title from WB Games Montreal, but it looks like they have other things they want to do. Let's contract this out to a studio with experience in creating open world titles that aren't drab or cliche and can return the series to form.

 

[YeulEmeralda]

Steady as a rock

 

[OmegaSupreme]

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

Feel sad for the people whose legacy was ruined not for the hacks who did it.

 

[MonkD]

Wait, you're saying there wasn't a big enough player increase for a gay, race-bent and gender-bent Mr Freeze to carry this game?

What is the projected ROI when catering to a market like that?

 

[MagusMajul]

when you sell a crap product you get crap results, fuck em

 

[Ywap]

Imagine if they had just made a solid Batman game, it would have sold millions and would have generated an acceptable profit and no one would need to be laid off

Instead, they got extremely greedy

This + that the development time would have been like halved

 

[Hugare]

Whole company have probably updated their Linkedin profile the moment after both founders lef the company (one of them being responsible for directing the whole Batman trilogy)

Anyone with a brain knew at that moment that they were in danger. Most talent have probably left the company by now.

Its a walking corpse

 

[SmokedMeat]

Warner Bros. Doubles Down On Live-Service Games Again

Its bestselling game in 2023 is Hogwarts Legacy, a single-player game.

www.gamespot.com

Remember this? Rocksteady taking the fall for Warner Bros stupidity.

Sure it would’ve made sense to just do another Batman game, but that’s not what WB wants.

 

[SEGAvangelist]

 

[Buggy Loop]

Maybe, but the good news for FireWalk is they are across the street from Bungie

You want cancer to spread?

 

[thismeinteil]

This is what happens when you let your political messaging infect your games. All studios need to clean house...

 

[Drew1440]

How on earth does a studio go from producing Urban Chaos Riot Response, to this?

the studio turned into a lgbt activist studio rather than a game company, so its time to shut it down.