Why Are You Crouching Spock?
Avenger
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http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=20026
Sins of a Solar Empire sells 500k
Wardell: Sins Of A Solar Empire Hits Low System Reqs-Aided 500,000 Units
Wardell: Sins Of A Solar Empire Hits Low System Reqs-Aided 500,000 Units Sins of a Solar Empire cost less than a million dollars to make, and recently passed its 400,000th unit sold full-price at retail -- and has racked up over 100,000 units sold via digital distribution, it's been revealed to Gamasutra.
"People were so surprised at how well Sins of a Solar Empire did," explains Brad Wardell, CEO of Stardock, who published the sci-fi real-time strategy title on PC -- although Ironclad Games is the developer, Stardock (Galactic Civilizations series) had a high level of involvement with the game's process and design.
Long-time 'core' PC game supporter Wardell has been discussing with Gamasutra his passionate opinion on the PC gaming industry, its problems and some possible solutions in a series of recent news stories.
Wardell says that system reqs and compatibility issues mean the PC gaming biz has "damaged itself... That definitely hurts the PC, because it's frustrating."
Part of Sins' success, Wardell says, is that it was designed to ensure a wide potential audience. "Sins of a Solar Empire was explicitly designed to work on a wide variety of machines," he says. "It will run on a four-year-old video card, and it looks great."
For example, he says, ship turrets don't move in the game, although many people might prefer they be mobile. "Sure, we could have done that, but that requires higher-end hardware, and most people don't even realize it doesn't have that," he says.
"You make those kinds of design decisions, and you greatly increase the number of people who can play your game. You lose out on some piddly super-mega effect, but you get those units. The results come in sales."
No DRM....
http://www.gamecyte.com/2008/03/24/controversial-opinion-ignore-pc-game-pirates/301
According to Brad Wardell, the CEO of Stardock Entertainment and publisher of the critically acclaimed PC strategy title Sins of a Solar Empire, the way to make sure your game pulls in the benjamins isnt to load it up with DRM; instead, he believes its best to ignore piracy altogether.
Ars Technica reports:
The way to make money in the world of PC gaming, according to Wardell, is to make sure many systems can play your games, while continuing to make them attractive. Find a market where people want to buy and support the games, and dont go by what the magazines and the blogs seem to think are the big name titles. Dont let people who arent your audience control the titles you make, and ignore piracy. This is much like Trent Reznors strategy, although the execution is different. Instead of worrying about pirates, just leave the content out in the open. The market Reznor plays to will still buy the music; hes simply stopped worrying about the pirates. He came to the same conclusion: they werent customers, they might never be customers, so spending money to try to stop them serves no purpose.
The reason why we dont put copy protection on our games isnt because were nice guys. We do it because the people who actually buy games dont like to mess with it. Our customers make the rules, not the pirates. Pirates dont count, Wardell argues. When Sins popped up as the #1 best selling game at retail a couple weeks ago, a game that has no copy protect whatsoever, that should tell you that piracy is not the primary issue.
We cant wait to see DRM take a hike, permanently even when its not doing nasty or illegal things to our machines, its damned annoying. Why in this day and age of tremendous hard drives must I reinsert a physical disc every time I want to load a game I went out and spent $50 for?
Sins of a Solar Empire sells 500k
Wardell: Sins Of A Solar Empire Hits Low System Reqs-Aided 500,000 Units
Wardell: Sins Of A Solar Empire Hits Low System Reqs-Aided 500,000 Units Sins of a Solar Empire cost less than a million dollars to make, and recently passed its 400,000th unit sold full-price at retail -- and has racked up over 100,000 units sold via digital distribution, it's been revealed to Gamasutra.
"People were so surprised at how well Sins of a Solar Empire did," explains Brad Wardell, CEO of Stardock, who published the sci-fi real-time strategy title on PC -- although Ironclad Games is the developer, Stardock (Galactic Civilizations series) had a high level of involvement with the game's process and design.
Long-time 'core' PC game supporter Wardell has been discussing with Gamasutra his passionate opinion on the PC gaming industry, its problems and some possible solutions in a series of recent news stories.
Wardell says that system reqs and compatibility issues mean the PC gaming biz has "damaged itself... That definitely hurts the PC, because it's frustrating."
Part of Sins' success, Wardell says, is that it was designed to ensure a wide potential audience. "Sins of a Solar Empire was explicitly designed to work on a wide variety of machines," he says. "It will run on a four-year-old video card, and it looks great."
For example, he says, ship turrets don't move in the game, although many people might prefer they be mobile. "Sure, we could have done that, but that requires higher-end hardware, and most people don't even realize it doesn't have that," he says.
"You make those kinds of design decisions, and you greatly increase the number of people who can play your game. You lose out on some piddly super-mega effect, but you get those units. The results come in sales."
No DRM....
http://www.gamecyte.com/2008/03/24/controversial-opinion-ignore-pc-game-pirates/301
According to Brad Wardell, the CEO of Stardock Entertainment and publisher of the critically acclaimed PC strategy title Sins of a Solar Empire, the way to make sure your game pulls in the benjamins isnt to load it up with DRM; instead, he believes its best to ignore piracy altogether.
Ars Technica reports:
The way to make money in the world of PC gaming, according to Wardell, is to make sure many systems can play your games, while continuing to make them attractive. Find a market where people want to buy and support the games, and dont go by what the magazines and the blogs seem to think are the big name titles. Dont let people who arent your audience control the titles you make, and ignore piracy. This is much like Trent Reznors strategy, although the execution is different. Instead of worrying about pirates, just leave the content out in the open. The market Reznor plays to will still buy the music; hes simply stopped worrying about the pirates. He came to the same conclusion: they werent customers, they might never be customers, so spending money to try to stop them serves no purpose.
The reason why we dont put copy protection on our games isnt because were nice guys. We do it because the people who actually buy games dont like to mess with it. Our customers make the rules, not the pirates. Pirates dont count, Wardell argues. When Sins popped up as the #1 best selling game at retail a couple weeks ago, a game that has no copy protect whatsoever, that should tell you that piracy is not the primary issue.
We cant wait to see DRM take a hike, permanently even when its not doing nasty or illegal things to our machines, its damned annoying. Why in this day and age of tremendous hard drives must I reinsert a physical disc every time I want to load a game I went out and spent $50 for?
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