Molyneaux On The Future of The Indies

#1 an interesting read, particularly now that i'm looking into residency in the UK, but i can'thelp but think this post was miss-placed.

I'd love to see some government grants going out to game industry, as it would really help some game developers. Lets hope everyone follows the lead.

#2 Its a shame that there's not more help, but there is a hefty tax break if your company is involved in any research & development.

From the numerous business manager meetings I've had with the bank, it basically means that if you have someone in the company working on building an engine you're entitled to x% (can't remember how much) in tax relief.

Its not much but it helps a bit in the long run to keep the tax bills down.

#3 I think he makes some good points.

Also, his prediction on the current state of gaming and the future is pretty accurate.

If you look, a lot of the small development studios are part of publishing houses. They were bought out.

And now games have seemed to stagnate and not really innovate a whole lot.

I think there are a lot of parallels with the music industry. Most artists today are controlled directly by their publishers, and music really isn't doing that great.

But when the artists themselves take over, then great things happen.

I think that same thing can happen to the games industry.

#4 What's with you people??? You want government grants to help you create games?? You guys want.. taxpayers to supplement your income so that you can have a dream job... ehh.. yeah....

As for small computer firms going out of business.. well, they deserve it! If they can't make a good game, they don't deserve to be in business. Have you ever played Black and White? It's riddled with bugs, and gets very boring after about 30 minutes.

I agree that computer games nowadays are far, far less original than they used to be, which is a good thing for us! I'd say that the very existance of Garage Games is a result of the stagnation of the computer game industry.

So.. quit asking for handouts, and make a cool game!

#5 No offense but goverment grants to help make video games is a pretty moronic idea. Opportunity cost - the government has much better ways to spend time, money and effort. Does it really make sense to tax people and redistribute that money to game developers?

#6 Thank you so much to the last two posters for injecting some common sense into this thread...


Look, I like computer games, we all do. But if the Government wanted to take MY money to help people make games, I'd be pissed, and rightfully so.

It's like Jessie Ventura said when an art student asked him how he, as governor, would help her out with her art career. His response?

"Make some art. Sell it." That's an obvious, simple point, but it's brilliant.

I'm not big on taking people's money to support "art", in any form, video games or paintings, movies, whatever, it doesn't matter. If people LIKE your product, they will buy it. Otherwise, you don't deserve the money.

End of story :)

If indy games are good, and people market them right, they don't need taxpayer money to support them. That's the way it should be. Don't STEAL MY MONEY to support a game that nobody wants...

Peter's wrong. He's so off the mark it's ridiculous. Do you think the average taxpayer wants to pay for indy games? No, and therefore, they shouldn't have to. What kind of crazy communist idea is that???

#7 I will say that I have a lot more tolerance for paying for artistic endeavors. Paying a small stipend to an artist is a lot more cost effective, in terms of cultural enrichment, than paying someone 3 million bucks to overhype a mediocre video game.

Video games are products. In general the government should not support companies with product development. Creating a web server or database is tough too, should the government support that? A lot of people tend to think that the government is free money, especially people who don't pay taxes or have money not to care. People like me...I lose a lot of money in taxes, I gots me student loans to pay - not gonna part with another 5 bucks to fund Europa Universalis 3!

I would also point out that instead of begging for more money, a better solution is to spend less money. Yes, creating a AAA title and hyping it to the point where it is 99% certain of reaching certain sales figures does cost a lot. But why not create something that costs a reasonable amount,make some profit off of that, and expand - that's the way businesses work in general.

A small indie shouldn't be looking to create a AAA title on their first go, which is what he seems to be advocating. Yes it costs alot, which is why you build up to that point. You didn't see the Id guys askig for handouts, they made their Commander Keen's and such and bided their time.

----

On a more tangential note, I find most gaming "gurus," especially American and European ones, are mostly self-aggrandizing hot air spewers. (At one point the Shiny Entertainment website was basically a shrine to Dave Perry, their founder.) Warren Spector I like, from what I've read he really does seem on the ball. He's really the only oft-quoted "guru" that seems to really know much.

One thing that is cool about GG, when I first arrived here I had no idea that the GG guys had worked on some really cool games I enjoyed playing. I think that says good things about them, that self-promotion is not a big part of their agenda.

#8 I'm a big fan of much of Molyneux's early work, but I have to say that if my tax money funded, say, Black & White, I would be really, really angry.

Game production budgets are out of control because developers and publishers allow them to be. Games like Rollercoaster Tycoon show clearly that you can STILL very successfully publish fun games made completely by one or two people without pissing millions of dollars down the drain.

#9 I dont see what you guys have got against government help for small business. Thats what it is. Not "funding" games, but providing jobs.

As in any other industry (there are plenty of industries that are subsidised by governments, food, arts, raw materials, technology etc).

If you treat game development as a business, with value in that it employs a lot of people and its supposed to be getting bigger in overall cash terms, doesnt it make sense to foster it with subsidy to some extent?

I'm not a big fan of giving PM money either, but thats for different reasons :)

Phil.

#10 There is some logic in using government money to create jobs, but I don't think funding game developement is a good example of that. For one thing the jobs created are most likely not going to be sustainable, and you don't get a high return on investment money in terms of the number of people helped and future growth.

A better idea IMO is for the government to offer low-interest loans to small businesses. That is very different from simply giving money away, there is some assumption that the money will be repaid and that the business is sustainable given an initial leg up.

I wouldn't compare funding games to art, because funding art is far cheaper and of greater cultural value and art is generally not profit motivated. If the games were being created by non-profit entities I might be more receptive. But funding a commercial game doesn't seem too different to me than funding any other piece of commercial software. If you are a for-profit organization you make money on your goods and services or fold. I don't see what distinguishes game developement from any other software development or owning a liquor store.

I mean, sure it would be *nice* if the government just gave you money, but that money does have to come from somewhere, and you have to think about what else it could be spent on. That money that went to the "next generation tactical FPS set in the Korean conflict" could have gone to a local community theater, disease research and prevention, education...or um anti-terror measures. (As an American I am required by law to stress anti-terror measures in every post) In all seriousness, I would rather have that money go to the INS or customs so they can stop using 20 Mhz 286 computers for their paperwork. (Now with "Windows 1.0"!)

#11 Guys,

I find it interesting that it would annoy people that taxes went to start-up businesses like game developers. It must really blow your top to have $100+ million dollars a day go to the 'military'. I would sooner some of that money go towards killing people virtually rather than physically, at least it would be a step forward. A strong military is needed in most cases but jeez.

My simplistic view. :)

- Melv.

#12 Melv,

Exactly.

-J

#13 Jesus, make a post saying about a tax break and how it'd be nice for government grants and already the communist and "stop begging" posts come out :)

What I was meaning from that isn't for me, its for the number of established studios in the UK that are struggling just now due to the rising costs of development and to poor sales of their - possibly/admittedly - shit games. To give them grants to help them until royalties come through to stablise them would be a good thing.

(writing this from memory of an old Develop magazine article)
Case in point being Rage in the UK, a lot of flops and the long development of Rocky across the platforms has put them in jeapordy and although Rocky is selling well on the consoles they have not be able to pull in the cash quick enough to save the studio.

A government grant or whatever could could have helped there and in other places, providing working capital and possibly allowing expansion. This in turn would mean more wages being paid and more for the government in the long term in taxes. I don't really class that as communism or begging for handouts.

bleh, god knows to be honest. I don't see helping companies that have solid long-term plans or a dire short-term need as being a bad thing. Then again, thats what loans are for. And the government does help a bit, guarenteed loans for start-ups and the DTi providing subsidies getting teams to the GDC.

In a word, bleh. In two, f*** knows :)

#14 Wow! Some interesting yet conflicting views!

First off, thank you to those who support such a plan as you honestly have a good idea of it's intentions. (Melv, you shock me! ;)

As for those who don't quite grasp the point, if funding was supporting, and notibly any help, then maybe games would end up becoming less mediocre and, as per the most recent ideas and posts from the 'industry' itself, would become more mainstream and looked at as modern art, which I fully agree it to be.

This is also to mention that yes, jobs will be created.

Also, you should take note that Government should be supporting the people in making life more prosperous as that's the intended role of a government as a whole. Of course this could be done as a way to provide for itself as well, but it should not be limited as such.

And don't forget people like me who could greatly appreciate as well as contribute afterwards to and by such a boost, considering I 'represent' the less fortunate. (James, you shocked me as well :(

- Chris

#15 @Melv and josh: Without that "military" you wouldn't need to worry about who the government gave money too. If sure as hell wouldn't be any small business. It's the military that gives you the ability to bitch about them from the safetey of your own home rather than being forced to keep you mouth shut and do as the goverenment says.

So yeah spend my money on the military and let companies compete on theri merits instead of turning us into yet another socialist state.

#16

Quote:It's the military that gives you the ability to bitch about them from the safetey of your own home rather than being forced to keep you mouth shut and do as the goverenment says.

Actually, my militaristic friend, it's the people who want these rights that have these rights, by supporting a freedom driven government that is defended by the military. In all seriousness, if there were less power driven and evil oriented entities in the world, and a solid understanding of peace, the military wouldn't need such funding.

You have to admit it's very bad that military is funded so much when it's based on destruction. What upsets me the most is, living at the heart of USMC here in Havelock, NC, you know the military is already taking care of themselves through all this funding, so why is it I'm forced to lose job opportunities due to military personel, not to mention all the 'freebies' they already benifit from.

So yeah, the military deserves enough funding for their support, but they get way overboard.

My 2 cents on your post, J.

- Chris

#17 If The only way you can run a business is to have the government subsidize you, then you shouldn't run a business. There's plenty of help already available, if you look and work for it. Handouts are not the answer. Make a business plan, make a budget, start a project and register a company. When you get far enough along that you have something to show, go looking for a publisher or try for a small business loan to finish it off and make money.

If you fail, get up, dust yourself off, and do it again.

It's said time and again, but it seems that even Peter Molyneaux doesn't have it straight. The fact is, only the studios doing something right will succeed, and even then only after a number of tries. It's not supposed to be easy. You're only guaranteed the pursuit of happiness, not happiness itself. That's the way business works, and for governments to try and intervene and change that only invites the ruining of that industry.

@Melv: It only blows my top that that 100 million/day isn't spent *well*(and I could give you a 1000 examples of bad money managment). As a former Marine, I've got no problem putting foot-to-ass for my country, but the military needs fiscal managment training, bigtime!

#18 @Chris: I don't believe that what J. Donovan said was "militaristic", just a truth that is liked less and less. As for the rest of the post, I think we're veering way off topic, and to try and correct that, here's a few links for those who want the business info:

www.rainfallstudios.com/Articles/CanIMakeMoneyAsAnIndie/summary.aspx

www.rainfallstudios.com/Articles/RemoteTeamManagment/summary.aspx

www.igda.org/membership/

www.sba.gov

#19 If I had a choice about where my tax dollars went, I would want more of them to be spent on the space program.

I think that game developers are as entitled as any other small businesses to tax breaks and incentives to develop in order to provide more jobs to the population. I don't see that they need to be treated as a special case.

Change within our industry to encourage small game developers needs to be driven by us. We need to persuade the customers that they want the games made by independents more so than mass market pablum. The government has no especial power to make indy games popular.

#20 I think you guys are mixed up on what a grant really is for. You can't just walk into any old office and say "Hey look the government is giving away free money, GIMME!". You need to satisfy a set of requirements which get stricter as the dollar value increases. LARGE GRANTS ARE VERY DIFFICULT TO GET AND REQUIRE A LOT OF WORK!
Government Grants are long term investments to better society and strengthen your countries economy.

Case in point (using Canada as an example). There are approximately 34 million people in Canada. Lets say half pay taxes, so that makes 17 million people. Now lets say each one of those people pays 25 cents annually to go towards grants for an industry (might as well use the game industry ;) ). That would mean $4 250 000. So lets say they used that money to go towards ten different companies ($425 000 each). Of those 10 companies 1 signs a contract with a publisher and makes a AAA title that makes $1000000. That company then employs 20 people rather then the 10 they had working before (all of who pay taxes). The company also pays taxes (lets say 40%) so that means $400 000. This company then makes an expansion pack (like what about 80% of companies are doing now) and it makes a quarter of what the original made $250 000. So in a three year period (2 years for the original game one for the expansion) they have paid $500 000 in taxes strictly on their revenue. Now lets say the combined total of what the publisher and the employees was the same (which I think is unrealistic as it would be a fair amount more).

Over those three years the government has helped two more companies (which follow all the same rules as above). So one more company has completed a game. Another $800 000

So now over 3 years the government has recieved $1 800 000 back from their original investment and paid out $12 750 000. Sounds bad. But nows when it gets interesting. Lets say that every two years each of the successful comanies produces a new game that makes the same amount of money. So after 10 years the government has paid out $42 500 000 (ouch!) and received $27 000 000. 20 years: paid $85 000 000, received $109 800 000. And that is why governments offer grants.

Obviously there are a lot of assumptions in there (like none of the companies going under after their first hit or that none of them would make a better game and sell 1 000 000 copies rather then 150 000).

Conclusion: You want your childrens children to go to a better school for less, invest in an indie game company today ;).

Alc