Amplitude joins the SEGA family!

Sublustris wrote:

Romeo wrote:

Not in the slightest. But just saying "don't worry about DRM!" is beyond naive. And as far as the options go, Denuvo is one of our better outcomes. So I'm not exactly sure what you want from them. If you have that much of an inexplicable hate for it, don't buy the game. If I were a Denuvo-dev, I'd be closing your help ticket as "solved".

You've provided 4 points, that each of which is either: a) misleading; b) a blatant lie. So you are probably have poor knowledge of how it works.

As far as DRM goes, CDProjekt RED's example shows, that quality of games is the most that affect sales.

So, I've provided four points which literally every case I've seen overwhelmingly supports. Not sure how to make that any clearer. Would it sedate you if I go and post links for all four points? Because only a moron would argue that you can't tamper with game files when Total War just came out, and somehow, seems to have mods. Must be Chaos magics.

And if you want to use CDProjekt RED as an example, how about the fact their game was pirated about as much every Amplitude game put together, and then tripled. http://ca.ign.com/articles/2011/11/30/the-witcher-2-was-pirated-over-45-million-times

Yeah, a big company can weather that storm, but Amplitude is still growing, that kind of piracy rate would immediately sink them. So again, I'm well and truly confused what you're upset about here. If you don't want to play a game with Denuvo, don't buy it, and stop whining. Heck, according to you, "it does nothing to stop piracy", so have at it. http://kotaku.com/the-anti-piracy-tech-thats-tearing-video-game-hackers-a-1759518600

SpaceTroll wrote:

We really love the way they leave a lot of autonomy to their studios, if the game is bad it will be on us, not them. Thanks to them we can now focus on making games, not selling them. Please judge us on our results, on our games, we'll work hard not to disapoint you!

I'm already seeing disappointing prices on pathetic DLCs. That is precisely what happened to Relic. I love their games (even though they are FAR(!!!) from delivering a proper quality), but those prices for shit content DLCs (Company of Heroes 2 is a beautiful example of both - lack of proper quality and absurdly expensive shit DLCs) is something me and my colleagues aren't very happy about, because it is a straightforward and disgusting money grab. Therefore you have already disappointed me with this decision, even though I can imagine it was an important decision for your future welfare. I love indie studios because there is always a good one with fresh new ideas and their prices are fair. Without good indie developers we wouldn't have new mechanics being implemented into games. You're no longer one of them and it saddens me heavily, because I loved you the most.

As a customer I will not judge you based only on quality of your games, but also based on your prices. The only thing that will now change for me is that I will expect much higher quality (especially in AI department, because I'm truly sick of EL cheating and useless AIs) from you than I did before, when I excused you as an indie developer and I assure you I will always buy your games only on highest sales possible. Welcome in big industry!

Romeo wrote:

So, I've provided four points which literally every case I've seen overwhelmingly supports. Not sure how to make that any clearer. Would it sedate you if I go and post links for all four points? Because only a moron would argue that you can't tamper with game files when Total War just came out, and somehow, seems to have mods. Must be Chaos magics.

Only a moron would argue denuvo isn't anti-tamper because it allows modding. It protects its executable, so any mod that isn't relying on its modification will work. It IS anti-tamper software.

Romeo wrote:

And if you want to use CDProjekt RED as an example, how about the fact their game was pirated about as much every Amplitude game put together, and then tripled. http://ca.ign.com/articles/2011/11/30/the-witcher-2-was-pirated-over-45-million-times

Yes, it hurt them so "bad", that they released Witcher III next with the same DRM-free model, so the numbers were even higher. And yet they succeeded. The numbers in your article are a very rough and unprecise estimation, and more importantly - they don't reflect sale numbers in the way you expect. Something that is stated in that article explicitly, if you even bothered to read it yourself in the first place.

Romeo wrote:

Yeah, a big company can weather that storm, but Amplitude is still growing, that kind of piracy rate would immediately sink them.

Amplitude uses Steam as distribution platform, I'm not aware if they use Steam CEG for protection. Their games were pirated, I bought all their games, you bought all their games, their games are sold well. Do you see them stagnating? I sure don't.

Romeo wrote:

So again, I'm well and truly confused what you're upset about here. If you don't want to play a game with Denuvo, don't buy it, and stop whining. 

Look, pal, my original question wasn't addressed at you, I'm intending to buy ES2 as soon as it hits early access regardless of what way Sega will affect the product (if only). So quit bitching about it. I have a little care for your opinion here.

Cracking denuvo-protection is only a matter of time, and when that happens it wont evaporate from legitimate copies, it stays there forever. I see a negative trend in game industry, and I'm not going to be silent about it.

I've been thinking about this for a few days now, and I am rather torn. I won't go joining the naysayers, but I am definitely nervous about this change.

Let me break down my thoughts.

+ The financial backing of a big publisher should take a burden off the team

- At the same time, it may mean outrageous expectations in sales numbers being set by SEGA

+ SEGA most likely has a far better marketing team, and this again takes a burden from the team

- At the same time, there's no telling how much SEGA will actually invest in marketing the Endless games.

- On a related note, given some of their past actions, I am worried about Let's Play series getting slammed with takedown notices

+ With SEGA's support, all those requests for features that require a lot of 3D assets and animation might be more feasible

- At the same time, people will be less willing to give Amplitude the benefit of the doubt. They will be compared to CivVI, NewMoO, and other big names. People will expect a lot of polish and won't forgive the little imperfections as easily (uqcu's post about AI above is a great example of this).

My most important question concerns the DLC pricing and policy: Will there be any change to the "only the host needs the DLC" policy?

As others have said, Relic and Creative Assembly aren't really convincing arguments for me, either. Their games have been very hit and miss in both quality and DLC practice, as well as frankly bullshit justifications on some issues. Heck, the best CA game of recent years wasn't a strategy game at all. And I am still displeased by their claim that they "really wanted to have 5 factions in Total War: Warhammer, but could only do that with pre-order DLC." Even if that is true, picking the Chaos Warriors rather than the Vampire Counts for the DLC is a slap in the face of the setting and the players, especially considering that the original teaser trailer had been all about an Imperial official falling to the touch of chaos.

In the end, I guess now it is up to Amplitude to show us if all those lousy decisions and releases in the past years were the fault of SEGA or the developers.

Sad news. You did amazing games without big publisher. Interesting what will change in ES2 and next games with the arrival of SEGA. Dawn of War 3 and Total War: Warhammer give a poor prognosis.

Anyway people vote by his money. For now I vote contra.

All the negitivity here is based on nothing more than hearsay, speculation and rumours. I've never seen a single bit of confirmation that SEGA are behind any of the DLC policies or quality of any of the CA or Relic titles... But I have read countless times that developers are choosing SEGA over others simply BECAUSE they don't stick their nose in or try to change anything. From what I've been told Relic and Creative Assembly create their own DLC policies and SEGA have little involvement.

 Hell, feel free to read it yourself:

GamesBeat: Why Sega?

De Waubert: Mathieu and I, the cofounders of Amplitude, have always been huge fans of their Creative Assembly and Relic games. So already we were extremely flattered that they would even consider us.

They were the right size for us and we knew that with them we could conquer new players; players who otherwise would have never heard of us and our games.

But the most important part is that we really loved the way they look at game development, and no other publisher we talked to had this kind of approach.

Basically they empower their studios, and make all the necessary services available to them so that they can deliver an awesome experience and help games find new players. They don’t tell us what to do, all they want is our success, as our success is their success!

Our understanding is that if we deliver a poor game, it will be Amplitude’s fault, not Sega’s, because they are here only to help us, not to break something that works.

 
Source:
http://venturebeat.com/2016/07/07/why-amplitude-choose-segas-strategy-studio-stable/

@The-Cat-o-Nine-Tales

You forgot to mention something important here. You said about SEGA "taking the burden off the team". You think they will do that for free? Naturally someone will have to pay for it and not so surprisingly it will be us - the fan base, the customers. It feels like a backstab from a great indie developer, because they chose the easiest way possible, instead of looking for alternatives that would be beneficial to both - them and us. They grabbed the better end of the stick and now we will be hit by the other end. Amplitude chooses to ally with a corporation that has zero respect for their customers. It is almost like they're saying to us, that they don't give a damn about us.

@Shark11

"All the negitivity here is based on nothing more than hearsay, speculation and rumours."

Does it really? Maybe you should first read the comments here and think about making such bold statements before you post them.

i wish you good luck

uqcu wrote:

@The-Cat-o-Nine-Tales

You forgot to mention something important here. You said about SEGA "taking the burden off the team". You think they will do that for free? Naturally someone will have to pay for it and not so surprisingly it will be us - the fan base, the customers. It feels like a backstab from a great indie developer, because they chose the easiest way possible, instead of looking for alternatives that would be beneficial to both - them and us. They grabbed the better end of the stick and now we will be hit by the other end. Amplitude chooses to ally with a corporation that has zero respect for their customers. It is almost like they're saying to us, that they don't give a damn about us.

Amplitude has been reasonably successful so far. As long as SEGA is satisfied with some of the money rather than all of the money (as many publishers strive to get), it is possible there will be no changes.

I am not trying to say that I am not at all worried. But I am trying to say: Give Amplitude and SEGA both a chance. This could be great, this could be a disaster, or this could make no difference whatsoever.

The deed is done. All we can do now is wait and see and hope for the best. If the pricing and DLC policy turns out to be bad, then we can still decide not to buy once that is revealed. Making that decision now is premature (and immature).

Shark11 wrote:

All the negitivity here is based on nothing more than hearsay, speculation and rumours. I've never seen a single bit of confirmation that SEGA are behind any of the DLC policies or quality of any of the CA or Relic titles... But I have read countless times that developers are choosing SEGA over others simply BECAUSE they don't stick their nose in or try to change anything. From what I've been told Relic and Creative Assembly create their own DLC policies and SEGA have little involvement. 

While I have no particular insight as to how Sega operates (Relic is just down the street from my work, but something tells me they'll notice if I show up and start taking notes), but it is a bit disconcerting that multiple devs under their branch changed their DLC policies almost completely, and in eerily similar ways (Both Total War and Dawn of War II both ended up getting "gore DLC" after being taken over by Sega, for example).

Now, I'm not going to simply assume that Endless Space 2 is going to be sitting with its hand in my pocket while I play, but it does raise the suspicion of it. It also means, like others, I'm not exactly going to be jumping in to anything they release without waiting now.

I feel for them, I really do, because I understand the need for growth. And hell, as far as publishers go, I actually think Sega was one of the better options. But Amplitude had an innate trust built up, and I think anything that influences that was always going to be a losing preposition. I can't imagine anyone saying "I didn't trust Amplitude before, but now that they're under Sega's control, I sure do!"

I hope SEGA won't ruin this game.

I'm O.K with DLC as long as they provide actual content, and as long as that content wasn't supposed to be in the main game. 

Still no anwser about the DLC policy

As a Let's Player and a committed fan of FlyByNo's music, I've noticed that a lot of SEGA titles get content strikes against music in YouTube videos.  My niche concern is that, if I play ES2 on my channel, my viewers get to hear the sweet, sweet tunes your games provide.  Hopefully your new deal doesn't interfere with this in any way.

Best of luck in your transition!

Hotage wrote:

Still no anwser about the DLC policy

I don't think you will hear about that anyways, given that the game itself isn't even done yet (We didn't hear on the last three prior to release either). That said, if you're worried like me, just holdoff until you're sure it's what you want.

While I also doubt we'll receive an concrete answer about the number and pricing of DLC, some form of reply strikes me as quite important. Especially now that a $19 race pack of Total War: Warhammer has been put up for pre-order, I expect people to quote that as a prime example of "SEGA's" DLC policy, though it might well be on CA's head, and I'm not judging the price until I know the content for sure (though the feature list does not make me hopeful).

The-Cat-o-Nine-Tales wrote:

While I also doubt we'll receive an concrete answer about the number and pricing of DLC, some form of reply strikes me as quite important. Especially now that a $19 race pack of Total War: Warhammer has been put up for pre-order, I expect people to quote that as a prime example of "SEGA's" DLC policy, though it might well be on CA's head, and I'm not judging the price until I know the content for sure (though the feature list does not make me hopeful).

Yeah, the timing of that sure didn't do this announcement any favours. I understand they're changing quite a bit for the Beastmen, but it still seems obscene that a single race costs $20.

As for the reply, again, I'm not even sure what they even could reply. If they say "Our DLC is controlled by us" people will assume they're just not speaking against Sega. If they say "The publisher controls DLC" it'll incite backlash regardless of how fair the DLC is or isn't. There's no real win for them to answer.

I'm okay with DLC as long as the quality is good, developers have to eat right?

Joining a larger company can help small studios who don't have the budget to dedicate to non-development tasks, although it can come with some extra baggage and sometimes unwanted pressure on the product. Only time will tell, so please wow us with ES2.

Alexspeed wrote:

This is the end of Amplitude.

Sega will force their DLC policy, deadlines, DRM solutions and price inchreases on you and you will start nickel and diming your customers.

Lets Plays and youtube coverage are a thing of the past because Sega will claim any video anyone crates to earn money from it.

I was always a supporter, but my support to your company has to end here.

Unfortunately, i agree. Hope for the other way though....

Sometimes a developer needs more resources (marketing/$/engine development/etc.).  SEGA has not intruded too much into other developers they own and honestly, I can't see them wanting to mess with amplitude's stride/mojo.  SEGA couldn't be more different then Nintendo's heavy handed approach.  I have to admit that this news made me join games2gether.  No longer can I simply applaud from the balcony...

A bit late, but congrats to us all for these good news! :)