EA CEO talks AI, says the usual stuff before the bong rip hits and he starts blabbing about a future where 3 billion people are creating EA's games with it
The development cycle is very iterative, and incredibly time consuming, which is why games are now taking six and seven years to build, as they've gotten bigger and deeper," said Wilson, "So the first thing for us is how do we make that more efficient?"
I dunno maybe take a page from indie developers and make fun games that are innovative?
I think the bigger takeaway from indie devs is to cut back on the graphical fidelity and stick with something stylized visually.
Even if you want some graphical "wow" factor, you can get a hell of a lot from good lighting and other shaders over a less detailed environment.
Ultimately I feel that's what is making "mainstream" games take so damn long to develop: high quality "realistic" graphics take an absurd amount of work. The longer timelines mean bigger budgets, bigger budgets mean more incentive to "play it safe" and try to maximize appeal to the lowest common denominator in an attempt to break even.
When a game takes so many years and millions of dollars to make, there's a lot less room to let them be a passion driven "art" based project. Why take a risk at something innovative that may fail at mind bending cost?
Honestly, who needs absolute top of the line realistic graphics. Take Battlebit remastered or Hollow Knight. They don’t have the state of the art graphics, but give more value than any AAA game.
Yeah, there are many such games in AA and Indie space. Heavenly Bodies, Outer Wilds, Hardspace: Shipbreaker come to mind. Each of these games are completely different. That is why, I have been mostly focussing on playing older games or AA or Indie games. They are pretty fun and unique experiences, without dealing with unfair monetization practices or thousand other caviats.