T w e n t y S i d e d

No column this week. It’s a long story. Actually, that’s not true. It’s a short story, it’s just not very interesting. At any rate, I made a video this weekend and so I offer that instead.

Yahtzee Croshaw is making “12 Games in 12 Months”. Right now he’s on month 2. His game this month was a top-down strategy game where you run a televised battle royale. You place the camera and have some minor tools for influencing the the action. The Escapist invited me to test the game and do a reaction / critique video of it. So that’s what this is:

As people have pointed out on YouTube:

Yes, I missed the detail that, as the host / officiator / producer of this murder-show, it’s the player’s job to place the safe zone. It even says so right on the screen. Somehow I missed this detail and went right to clicking on the person I wanted the drone camera to follow. I’m not sure how I overlooked that detail. I guess part of the problem is that I can’t read and talk at the same time, which you kind of need to do if you’re making an off-the-cuff reaction video like this.

Anyway, if you’re of a mind to watch a video then I hope you’ll give it a thumbs up so my work doesn’t look pathetic next to the rest of the Escapist’s offerings.

We’re getting back to normal content tomorrow with the return of the Spider-Man series.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

My column this week is about Bungie leaving Activision and how this is impacting the design of Destiny 2. Will Bungie be able to make it a better game now that they have creative control and are able to adopt a monetizationThe spell checkers in Google Docs and WordPress both recognize “demonetization” but not “monetization”. That’s weird, and probably the fault of YouTube creating a never-ending series of controversies involving the longer word. scheme of their own choosing? Will the game flourish, or will it struggle now that they no longer have access to the wisdom and genius of Activision CEO Bobby Kotick?

The big move happens at the end of summer. Destiny 2 is still running on Activision’s infrastructure on the PC, but in September it will be moving to Steam. I’m very curious to see how that goes. I can’t remember the last time a popular MMO broke away from a financially healthy publisher like this. This can’t be the first time, can it?

2019 is turning out to be an amazing year for the big publishers. Between this, “surprise mechanics“, and unskippable in-game ads in a $60 title, it feels like Wilson and Kotick are a couple of frat boys who have just discovered that nobody’s paying attention and now they’re competing to see who can perpetrate the most egregious breach of social norms. It’s a cross between Jordan Belfort and Jackass.

I can’t believe EA CEO Andrew Wilson still has a job. John Riccitiello – the previous CEO –  resigned back in 2013, and his failures were a lot less severe than Wilson’s antics. Sure, the company struggled under Riccitiello, but he didn’t accidentally create a global backlash that threatened to outlaw one of the company’s largest revenue streams. Stockholders supposedly don’t care about bad press or scandal as long as the money is coming in, but this screwup is threatening the money. Sooner or later an adult has to show up and tell Wilson he’s done enough damage. I mean, this can’t go on forever.

Can it?

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.