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[Lunatic_Gamer]

Speaking to Game File (subscription required) , Insomniac Games founder Ted Price was asked what his best decision as head of Insomniac was.

Price replied, ““I want to talk about a collective decision that I think we have made as a team, and that is to double down on the story-driven character action games that we make today.”

In addition, as part of the Sony acquisition, Price added, “There was a point around the launch of the PlayStation 5 when it became obvious to us as a team that this really was where our home is.”

In the same chat, Price says he doesn’t see the budget issue as a permanent problem, and surprisingly, he also doesn’t share the clouded and pessistmic viewpoint of some of his peers.

“I think it’s like every challenge that we have faced at Insomniac for the last 31 years,” Price said, “And that is: There are solutions.

The question always is: How creative are we willing to get to solve those problems?

“And a lot of the time it’s just, first of all, identifying the problem very clearly and asking: ‘Why does it cost this much to make a game? What specifically are we doing that inflates the cost? Is it the way we make decisions? Is it the way we set up our production pipelines? Is it the scope of our games?

“It often is a very complex answer, but we and every development studio need to—like we do—commit to take the time to unravel that, so that we can find real answers, versus just waving our hands and saying, ‘It’s just going to keep going up.’ That’s not reasonable.

“And the last thing I’ll say about this is: We love solving problems. This is what we tend to do, probably like most developers, and we are engaged by that opportunity.”

Insomniac Collectively Decided to "Double Down on Story-Driven Character Action Games;" Founder Talks About Ballooning Development Costs

Insomniac's Ted Price talks about the ballooning game development costs, and how it was a studio decision to focus on single-player games.

mp1st.com

 

[Imtjnotu]

Cut out the DEI missions and you've saved a few million Ted.

If wolverine has to help another teenager to ask his boyfriend to prom I'll fight a pack of raccoons....

 

[Loomy]

Very level headed approach. Shows why he led a company successfully for over 30 years.

If wolverine has to help another teenager to ask his boyfriend to prom I'll fight a pack of raccoons....

Wolverine is not a "friendly neighbourhood" anything, so I think you're safe.

 

[DownLikeBCPowder]

Admittedly, the cinematic sequences and whatnot that they produce are damn impressive. But I completely agree- costs don't have to inflate to infinity just because. There are many solutions, one of which is moving the studio to an area with a much cheaper cost of living.

 

[InterMusketeer]

Well that's boring. Sony already has several studios making those types of games. I wanted to see the outcome of them becoming a dedicated RTS dev.

 

[Loomy]

Admittedly, the cinematic sequences and whatnot that they produce are damn impressive. But I completely agree- costs don't have to inflate to infinity just because. There are many solutions, one of which is moving the studio to an area with a much cheaper cost of living.

You're right. Although, while I think that's a non starter for a lot of the studios already there, I think opening new ones California is going to be a tough sell.

But they can even start making more games at the scale and length of the Miles Morales game.

As much as I appreciate Shawn Layden sounding the alarm bell on this, unless he has solutions he wants to propose, I'm starting to tune him out now.

 

[digital_ghost]

Well that's boring. Sony already has several studios making those types of games. I wanted to see the outcome of them becoming a dedicated RTS dev.

Id prefer a MLB baseball RTS called "Age of Umpires"

 

[Danjin44]

It would have been nice to see Insomniac make other type of games other than Marvel crap.

 

[lh032]

please cut out the nonsense DEI "gameplay" sections.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

 

[Pimpbaa]

I played through Spider-Man 1 multiple times, but struggle to get through Spider-Man 2 even once. The writing was absolutely fucking atrocious in the 2nd game. I have zero faith in them making anything interesting int he future unless there is a big shake up in the writing staff.

 

[TransTrender]

Imagine the cost savings and streamlined production if you actually focused on the protagonist and dropped all the other performative ancillary virtue signaling bullshit.

 

[DownLikeBCPowder]

It would have been nice to see Insomniac make other type of games other than Marvel crap.

Well, they can still make this type of game they're speaking of without them being licensed. Whether or not they do is another question, though.

You're right. Although, while I think that's a non starter for a lot of the studios already there, I think opening new ones California is going to be a tough sell.

Agree, no idea why these companies are still opening the studios in California.

But they can even start making more games at the scale and length of the Miles Morales game.

Here as well - inbetween the larger titles, there should definitely be smaller, easier titles to produce, flipping as many existing assets as possible - within reason.

 

[Danjin44]

Well, they can still make this type of game they're speaking of without them being licensed. Whether or not they do is another question, though.

Marvel makes money regardless how shitty the quality, I don’t see them stopping.

 

[RafterXL]

Spider-Man 2 sucked as as a character driven story game. In fact, it was so bad I went back and played Second Son and First Light and those games are so much better than the SM stuff it's not funny. They also aren't hamstrung by the Marvel cheese and guardrails. If they are going back to their roots, cool, but if all they are going to do from here on out is Marvel slop, what a waste of a developer.

Edit: And before anyone mentions they are two different companies, I'm merely point out how much better the one series is than the other even though they share the same basic DNA.

 

[Physiognomonics]

Yes they are driving their company to the ground. At this point they must justify the existence of all the creative employees, scenarists, actors, DEI hired, custcenes directors, Marvel IP story ($100 million for SM2) etc. But those are bringing next to nothing to the actual quality of the game that is mainly coming from gameplay loop, game mechanics, level design and such.

When they'll fail they'll blame their customers as usual or the cost of development which is coming mainly from this useless stuff that has taken over western game development.

 

[simpatico]

Crazy they would get a Wolverine game so far into production just to throw people off the trail and secretly have another, completely different Wolverine game in production at the same time. That seems expensive. Not seeing how that matches up with what they're saying here.

 

[Thanati]

Admittedly, the cinematic sequences and whatnot that they produce are damn impressive. But I completely agree- costs don't have to inflate to infinity just because. There are many solutions, one of which is moving the studio to an area with a much cheaper cost of living.

And then more people move there, which immediately drives up the cost of living in that area.

This literally happens everywhere.

 

[MrRibeye]

Now and then I take some dudes from the game design team and that one programmer I like and we sit down on the couch with the big TV in meeting room 5 and we play games while analyzing them from a design and technical perspective.

We played the latest Spider-Man game and it was cutscene after cutscene after cutscene and everyone got bored because we didn't get to talk about mechanics, instead it was like watching a movie. Granted it was the beginning of the game, but still, we never booted up Spider-Man after that.

 

[noob smokes]

Make a hulk game

 

[analog_future]

Odd how bad the story was in Spider-Man 2 if they're supposedly putting all their focus on story.

 

[EN250]

Wolverine is not a "friendly neighbourhood" anything, so I think you're safe.

He'll be bossed around, dragged down and emasculated by old hag Sean-Grey

Yas Kweeen, sLaY!!!111

 

[PJX]

Very level headed approach. Shows why he led a company successfully for over 30 years.


Wolverine is not a "friendly neighbourhood" anything, so I think you're safe.

Marvel / Disney pussified Hulk so they are capable of demanding Insomniac make Wolverine be friendly everything.

 

[Nowa]

Ape Escape 4 would cost way less and it would be more fun than insonmaniac's capeshit.

 

[semiconscious]

Very level headed approach. Shows why he led a company successfully for over 30 years...

yep. & he's gettin' out while the gettin's good...

 

[lh032]

He'll be bossed around, dragged down and emasculated by old hag Sean-Grey

Yas Kweeen, sLaY!!!111

thats a maam

 

[Hawk The Slayer]

I just want more Ratchet and Clank games from them.

 

[deriks]

And they put a fridge to hold a super hero

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

The issue with this approach is that you need great writers, and Insomniac's are mediocre at best.

They excel in gameplay and graphics. People play their games because they are fun. They should double down on that and not insert pace-killing "narrative" side quests.

 

[Lucie Goosey]

I love hearing stuff like this. Being given real, honest, heartfelt insights into what the experiences and challenges are for him and his team, and what's been learned, is really refreshing to hear, opposed to typical PR stuff that's put up as a mask or front to sugar coat the truth. The man comes across as an actual human being.

 

[RedC]

I just want more Ratchet and Clank games from them.

The problem is that Spider-Man games are by far their biggest selling games, so it is difficult for a business to decide not to invest further in Marvel games than in their previous IP, which likely already reached the peak of their appeal.

 

[EverydayBeast]

Insomanic games are pretty awesome.

 

[LRKD]

Insomniac has been king of doubling down on bad choices since the ps2. Rushing every R&C game to the point that everysingle one was somehow worse then the previous. Hiring 'real' writers for the PS3 games, who decided the best direction for the series was incredibly generic chosen one hero back storys for both characters, and non stop retcons. Doubling down on the boring Spiderman game, and trippling down on wokeness with each entry.

It's a miracle the studio is as highly praised as it is today. They literally haven't made a good game since the mid 2000s. Unless the Resistance games are good, idk with how bad all their other games are I haven't bothered giving it a chance.

 

[Hawk The Slayer]

Insomniac has been king of doubling down on bad choices since the ps2. Rushing every R&C game to the point that everysingle one was somehow worse then the previous. Hiring 'real' writers for the PS3 games, who decided the best direction for the series was incredibly generic chosen one hero back storys for both characters, and non stop retcons. Doubling down on the boring Spiderman game, and trippling down on wokeness with each entry.

It's a miracle the studio is as highly praised as it is today. They literally haven't made a good game since the mid 2000s. Unless the Resistance games are good, idk with how bad all their other games are I haven't bothered giving it a chance.

Ratchet and Clank Going Commando and Ratchet and Clank Up Your Arsenal were amazing and even better than the first one. I also like Deadlocked but didn't consider that one better than 2 and 3.

I enjoyed the other mainline Ratchet and Clank games too from the PS3 and PS5 but will admit they aren't as good as the PS2 ones.

 

[LordCBH]

Just throw me a new ratchet game every 5 or 6 years or so and I’m happy.

 

[kevboard]

translation into English:
"we double down on bad game design"

 

[PixelatedBeast]

Now and then I take some dudes from the game design team and that one programmer I like and we sit down on the couch with the big TV in meeting room 5 and we play games while analyzing them from a design and technical perspective.

We played the latest Spider-Man game and it was cutscene after cutscene after cutscene and everyone got bored because we didn't get to talk about mechanics, instead it was like watching a movie. Granted it was the beginning of the game, but still, we never booted up Spider-Man after that.

This is such disingenuous take that dismisses the fact Spiderman is based on comic books, cartoons and movies. Storytelling is rooted in the Spiderman IP dna, but there are plenty of gameplay mechanics and activities that build on the last game. In the beginning when all players are introduced to the new traversal and combat mechanics, the first boss fight, the ability to switch characters, you mean to tell me us that you ignored all of that to complain about cutscense in a storytelling game?

You do know this was uploaded by IGN and the whole tutorial is only 20 minutes, right? Pretty sure theres more gameplay than cutscenes.



Ironically you have an avatar of a Rockstar game that that used too many gameplay mechanics for building immersion, and was one of the main reasons why it lost GOY against God of War; a game that was lauded for its cinematic storytelling and combat. I still havent finished RDR2 because I dread the the idea slow walking through the base camp, managing my horses health and stamina, or playing a mission where i have to tap X on my hourse for 10 minutes while having a lore dump about mostly irrelevant information just to get into a shootout.

Coming from a game dev, I would have thought you would choose a different game to rep as your avatar, or represent what you thought was more modern and forward thinking when it comes to game mechanics.

 

[JackHanma]

I don't want to play as soy Peter Parker or as a rip off character whose entire persona is about their skin colour.

 

[mckmas8808]

You're right. Although, while I think that's a non starter for a lot of the studios already there, I think opening new ones California is going to be a tough sell.

But they can even start making more games at the scale and length of the Miles Morales game.

As much as I appreciate Shawn Layden sounding the alarm bell on this, unless he has solutions he wants to propose, I'm starting to tune him out now.

Totally agree about Shawn Layden. Dude has no answers. I'm 100% sure Insomniac will solve their growing budgeting issues.