Based Baldur's Gate 3 devs slam and call out "greed" of games industry and publishers

there's one publisher and game development Studio that I'd say standing on top of the world right now it's laran Studios the developers of baldder Skate 3 and not only because they made a game of the year and they made just one of the greatest RPGs of all time but also because of their stance on just the general games industry and the way other Publishers have been behaving and just not valuing the artists and the work ERS who have made these games possible uh the folks at laryan especially with a leader like zven Vin who isn't just a suit but actually a developer and a creative who is at the head of this now major publisher and development studio with him at the helm you know that defines the whole attitude and the the whole purpose and intent of the company as a whole and we got someone like zven who's a champion for developers and a champion for the art form that is game making you get a company that is truly truly based on a level that is so unfortunately rare so one of the things that happened early in February of 2024 is that laran Studios won game of the year at the dice Awards and for the acceptance speech some folks from laran came up and discussed the layoffs that have been happening uh not only this year which is already up to like 8,000 layoffs which is almost the total that we saw in 2023 and it's only April uh but beyond that they talked about just the fact that they make games for one purpose and that's to make games that they would want to play they make games that fans want to play they just enjoy making games that are fun and don't care about shareholders two folks from Lan went up on stage during the dice Awards to say their peace and by the way there's more than just this this is a piece from February but even recently laran across the board especially ven Vin have speaking out against awful trends of the games industry and just been saying things that just give me a lot of Hope for you know developers like uh this and and leaders like this who can lead the charge on a more positive feature for gaming for this uh specific instance we're looking at direct of publishing Michael Dow and head of production David walgrave who went up on stage during the awards ceremony and had this to say I'm just going to play the clip for you so that you can hear the sincerity behind the words and you can just here some Choice uh stances on how the games industry should be and what it shouldn't be so here it is uh this is existential to us as you can tell from all the emotion on David's face uh we're very lucky we've had a lot of stage time uh others are not so lucky this is a really human industry and we're really bad sometimes at showing that showing developers what they're worth and showing the players at home that we care about them Executives care the room especially surrounded by all this opulence which you know can only go so far without people we would not be standing here without the people that work on these games we would not be standing here many many people will let go at the start of this year I want you all to know that you are talented and that you matter and that you are the future of this [Applause] industry don't let that flame be extinguished by our Collective mistakes I know that everyone here is scared cuz shit's really [ __ ] up all of your projections are wrong and it's scary but we persevere as an industry we will persevere as an industry and you will all find your place and you will all be welcomed back with open arms and we'll still be making games for the players and for you and uh with these guys so as a great shout out to the developers and then here comes a shout out to the community and laran putting out there why they make games to to add to that uh a lot of people probably want to know what's the secret to your success um that's a good one last year I started thinking the secret to Our Success is the decisions that we make come from what does the player want what do I think is best for the game what is the most fun what is the most crazy people telling us we shouldn't do this or we can't do it or this is too challenging or too hard like it was already said here today that usually just gives us a kick up DRS to actually make it happen um the stuff that we make at laran is we ask you to pay one price only for the game and that's it you can own it for the rest of your life how sad is it that it's so rare for that to happen in Triple A now we we don't have shareholders but we also don't think about them [ __ ] yes yes this is the way we think there there's an expression in Dutch that uh honesty lasts longest or something I there there's probably a version in English as well that makes a lot of sense but what we have tried in the last 20 years is to treat people like we would like to be treated ourselves as players as Gamers so we don't make decisions where we take where we think this could make us the most money on the long run building a community building a player basee building games that are actually fun is going to make you the most money that's it it's that simple it's that simple such an obvious thing when you think about it but the intentions of the executives and the business suits are not aligned with the intentions of the creators and the artists who know that if you just make something good that isn't driven by corporate mandates this this seeking of infinite monetization instead of just making some something that Fosters a long-term community and loyalty that generates money over time because the product itself is good if you just follow some honest tenants in the creation of video games and make something sincere and something that really elevates the medium people will show up and everyone wins the creators win because they get to make whatever they want to make and I get to realize their Vision the consumers get to Wi because they get something truly amazing like balers Gate 3 and the executives get to because they'll make a boatload of money off of this and this is something that will continue in the long term all right so with that let's move on to Larry and boss Sven Vin and what he had to say uh earlier in March of 2024 when he went up to accept an award at the GDC award ceremony for balers Gate 3 the headline here already says everything balers Gate 3 boss blasts publisher greed behind layoffs and I found the video for that speech right here and this is also pretty gold and I have to show this to you guys and then the speeches here have been so good and basically stole all my funer of the things I wanted to talk about uh so about stopping war and about stopping the Greet which has been [ __ ] this thing up for so long so long ever since I started ever since I've been fighting with Publishers my entire life so it's like and I keep on seeing I love the honesty here somebody telling us from their perspective what it's like to actually face Publishers the same same same mistakes over and over and over and it's always the quar toally profit the only thing that matters is the numbers and then you fire everybody and then like next year you're going to say [ __ ] I'm out of developers and you going to start hiring people again and then you do Acquisitions and then you put them in same loop again and it's just being broken and broken and broken you have to you just can make reserves slow down a little bit slow down on the Greet be resilient take care of the people don't lose the institutional knowledge that's been built up in all of those people that you lose every single time so that you have to go through the same cycle over and over and over again pretty obvious stuff it's that simple so because it really pisses me off anyway so yeah that's kind of the bid he had to put out there as far as his grievances with the games industry goes just the fact that not only are developers not treated with respect you're losing so much with the mass layoffs that you're engaging in he talked about institutional knowledge which is the foundation of why you know companies like Nintendo continue to Output amazing games you've got folks like mamoto and Aluma and you name it who've been there since the start whose Talent continue to be valued you've got veterans who aren't just let go when the going gets tough you've got folks like iada who take a pay cut and allow the developers whose knowledge and whose experience is so important to live on for to to fight uh another day and to be able to Output amazing things down the line that's why Nintendo has been so consistently great with their outputs and the thing that's a really hard cell from what zven Ving said here was slow down on the greed executives are incapable of doing that the sole purpose of them existing is to fuel greed to please the investors to fuel the company and keep that vicious cycle going instead of the positive vicious cycle of retaining your talent so they can keep making amazing games that fuel uh customer loyalty and that uh just creates a level of consistency in the quality of releases that allow people to feel confident in your products and allow them to look forward to your product because your brand name means something it's a stamp for quality and for creativity uh that people can look forward to certain companies many companies don't have that because their output has been so inconsistent and that's what happens when you're constantly disrespecting Talent you're not giving them the creative autonomy or the proper environment to allow them to do their best work and the fact that laran just outright finally puts this out there and them being in the position that they are now as one of the most renowned game Publishers and developers in the world given the accolades that they won for Bal Skate 3 using their position now of you know all eyes are on us now and now it's time for us to be able to use the spotlight to say these things that need to be said it is just the most based thing that they could do in their position and I cannot begin to tell you not only how much I agree with their words but how much I appreciate that they're putting this out there and when Sven Ving speech was reported on he decided to add on top of that uh with the following tweet for the avoidance of Doubt there are plenty of people in publishing I met who have their hearts in the right place this message was for those who try to double their revenue year after year your Bobby codic your Andrew Wilson so on and so forth your stuss zelic you don't have to do that build more slowly and make your aim improving the state-of-the-art not squeezing out the last drop when you improve the state of the art the money comes with that it might take longer it might take a little more nurturing uh but it'll it'll happen it'll come and it's far healthier in the long term than the constant Chase for short-term profits and gratification that has Rocky grounds that makes the future unpredictable and respect the people making the games yeah it's that simple I mean respect the people with whom whose Talent you've built your success you'll find it brings you more joy says Sven Vin could have put it better myself and obviously this Garner a lot of Praise Sven Vin then moved on to speak out further in an interview with EUR gamer that was published on March 28th 2024 and he once again talked about just the idiotic cycle of constantly laying off people and constantly destroying the foundation of knowledge that those people set that allows uh game development processes in the future to be smoother he especially honed in on how technical artists being fired is just one of the stupidest things you can do stating straight up if you fire technical artist you're an idiot and there's been rounds of layup play offs recently that has involved the letting go of technical artists and he says that the reason that's so stupid is because they Define your entire pipeline which is going to Define your cost of your assets they can Define so many things and they know your games especially the senior ones it really doesn't make any sense anyway we're hiring them to come work for us yes ven [ __ ] is just utterly baffled at the kinds of layoffs he's been seeing lately especially season veterans who've been at companies for you know 10 15 20 years who are being let go for I mean who knows why he said right here I see companies like with the current layoffs when I hear who's being fired I say what that doesn't make any sense because that person is like a beacon of knowledge within that company and it's what shows that disconnect I was telling you about because I know it's being looked at in an Excel file referring to the fact that these decisions come from Executives who have no idea just how pivotal the roles that certain individuals play in the development of games are the developers know the creatives know because they are there down at the trenches going through the development cycle and understand what cogs need to be there to make this machine as smooth as possible the executives just see a spreadsheet and go uh well whatever we need to do to save cost and please investors for the next quarterly quota and the next financial meeting Sven Vin also talked about the major growth that Len has seen since Divinity original sin 2 how the company went from roughly 50 employees now 470 when asked if that's sustainable and if laran can make this kind of growth work he said yes Zen Ving talked about how he has multiple fallback positions and how he ensured that in the development of balers Skate 3 if this project failed there'd be enough of a safety net so that they can still carry on and just did what a leader does and managed expectations and and and manage things appropriately uh so that he's looking out for his employees uh while understanding you know where they have to draw certain lines as to not become over ambitious and screw themselves in the long term should balers Skate 3 not pan out though thankfully balers Skate 3 did extremely well so much so that uh Sven Ving said we're good for quite a number of years with where we are at right now uh so balers Skate 3 no doubt has allowed them to build up quite a bit of a war chest so they can take more risks and uh they can just feel safer as a company and zven [ __ ] has no plans to lay off employees while they're thriving because it helps shortterm profits and Outlook and whatever no he's thinking long term he's he's playing the long game uh to become just you know to continue to rise as one of the best game developers right now as for what the future holds for larian Studios they' have straight up come out and said that they are not making DLCs or expansions for balers Skate 3 and also they're moving on from balers skate they're not thinking about making a Baler Skate 4 they just want to make their own projects move on from this IP and just create something new and something that they feel passionate about not that they're not passionate about Baler skate but what they basically said is that we set out to make the most finished product possible with balers Skate 3 and we're not trying to milk balers skate right now and we're trying to just follow our hearts what we're passionate about right now and they've worked enough on Baler skate that they want to move on to something new and obviously stuff like this is going to upset some people because Baler Skate 3 has become so beloved that people are like we'd like to see more content more official uh just stuff you know new campaign storylines whatever it's just new content in general to further extend the longevity of the game but on the other hand you could argue that balers Skate 3 really does feel like they poured everything into it they charged you one time for this game you know the $60 $70 whatever and uh that's it you get a finished product that is so comprehensive and so expansive that to this day over 100,000 concurrent players can be found on Steam on a 24-hour basis people are still coming back to this game modding tools aren't even out and that's going to further extend the longevity of this game once Moder really get to go ham with this title and I mean the game is feature complete it doesn't feel like it's missing much and it'd be cool if it got new stuff but if it doesn't you know I think me and many people are okay with that and then leaving balers Skate 4 to somebody else and moving on to new Ventures I respect their decision uh to not milk something and to know where the priority is at where the Hearts are at and instead of chasing this thing that you know could generate more money they're saying we're we kind of want to just do what creatively fulfills us so we're going to let our hearts take us there I respect it even if it might pain some that we're not going to get more new official balers Skate 3 content in zven in zven Vin's word when he announced that he' be moving on from the DND world and IP and from balers skin and all these things here's what he said uh during his GDC address we're a company of big idas we're not a company that's made to create DLCs or expansions we tried that actually a few times it failed every single time it's not our thing life is too short our Ambitions are very large and so like Stu Baler skate will always have a warm spot in our heart we'll forever be proud of it but we're not going to continue in it we're not going to make new expansions which everybody is expecting we're not going to make baller Skate 4 which everybody is expecting us to do we're going to move on we're going to move away from DND and we're going to start making a new thing whatever their next venture might be whatever this new thing is I wish them nothing but the best and I've little doubt that it's going to be triumphant if they keep going at the pace that they've been going at if they keep this role going Sven Ving further addressed this in a series of tweets where he empathized with those who might be disappointed by laring moving on from baldder skate and not making new content or sequel saying counter expectations but I've never been more sure about a strategy shift this is the right thing for laran moving on from balers skate is the right thing he says I understand there will be disappointment because people fell in love with what we created but it was a story with a beginning middle and end and it doesn't need more yeah I I agree like you can make more but what it is right now is I mean a pretty awesome comprehensive full flesh fully complete package he continues the team has grown a lot during Baler Skate 3 and I think you can be very excited for what that growth means for our next game more specifically Sven Ving said he's working on two games when interviewed by IGN here here's a quote from him we have two games that we want to make and we have lots of Concepts so let's just have closures on baldder Skate 3 we have done our job it is a story with the beginning and middle and an end so let's end it here on a high and just pass the torch to the next developer to pick up what is an incredible Legacy so yeah from the stances that they have about the games industry the critiques that they've put out there about how other Publishers have been handling their employees the institutional knowledge that is being lost and the vicious negative cycle that's being repeated the fact that uh the folks at the head of laran are speaking out about that and not only just talking but also walking the walk on that front and leading by example and outputting amazing games and uh knowing what they want and pursuing what creatively fulfills them instead of what makes the most money uh and and the fact that they're showing just such a respect for the developers and are just publicly putting themselves out there uh to speak for the developers And discussing just the amount of greed that Publishers tend to partake in and Sven Vin just being so open about the greed that he's encountered and how he himself is a developer who happens to run the studio uh but along the way had to deal with Publisher [ __ ] and just like making that very transparent to people in the hopes of leading you know to positive change and uh just putting as much information out there uh so that we can kind of be informed about what we need to criticize and how companies need need to change to achieve successes that are very much achievable as laran Studios uh has shown without partaking in uh awful greedy practices that destroys the art form of video games all of that genuinely makes laran Studios right now the most based video game development Studio out there I I just love these guys and everything that they stand for and now what they have to do is continue walking that walk putting all of that out there and now being the position that they are they have to continue leading by example now they have a certain responsibility to show the rest of the games industry how it's done and to not fall back or be tempted by uh shitty practices and to not suddenly start laying off in employees when it suits them and to not walk back on the sentiments that they have expressed to continue making games uh from the right place in their heart and to continue treating developers with respect hopefully this is not a situation where uh we'll look back at Wars that that said and we'll be like well that was hypocritical I don't get the sense that's going to happen but also you know there have been plenty of situations in the past where if trusted companies based on what they've said only for them to not deliver on their actions hopefully laran is in one of those Studios uh but right now I you know zven really I I think is uh a shining Beacon when it comes to what kinds of Executives we need at the head of companies and what kinds of leaders we need to steer the ship of publishing companies and game development Studios so I just wanted to give laran and zven and everyone there a big shout out for not only making amazing games but uh doing it for the right reasons and U making this industry a better and more hopeful place or at the very least that's one man's take let me know in the comments below what your thoughts and opinions are on everything that uh laran Studios developers and heads had to say about the current state of the games industry and what you think the future holds for laran especially with them moving on from uh Dungeons and Dragons and baldder skate share your thoughts in the comments below and to be further updated on all things gaming news reviews and discussions stay tuned right here on Yong yeah I'll see you guys next time Yong out

Channel: YongYea

Views: 164,621

Keywords: larian studios

Id: 5ZUa2QsPLAw

Length: 21min 56sec (1316 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 03 2024