I'm still so sad for Tango Gameworks and Hi-Fi RUSH. So many studios and great projects being burned because of greed and the illusion of endless growth is infuriating.
The absorbed studios aren't dissolved/laid off I don't think? They said the intent was consolidation of management and resources instead of having 20 guys who only work for X studio on Y game
My biggest beef is that there’s no consistency. Arkane suffers through a flop -> fired. Tango makes a unique game that slaps and wins awards (despite no advertising) and they get fired too? So wrong
@@NoNameBagu Tango's head left and formed his own studio meaning what was left of the "Evil Within" studio was mostly "Hi-Fi Rush" people, whose experience with Hi-Fi Rush is better served elsewhere within the greater company ecosystem. The whole thing is a nothingburger and just reshuffling people to where they'd fit better
Came into this expecting a fun video about Tony Hawk. Left saddened at being reminded at how many layoffs and shutdowns are happening right now in the industry.
The final death throes of late-stage capitalism, it sucks that this is how its supposed to work. But hopefully with people making their own studios the creative spirit of games can continue to thrive.
@@silikaspider I have hopes that, among companies seeking ever-increasing profits, and people slowly buying less, this investor driven model will die out, and life will get better.
the good part about all this is that those people don't disappear into the aether, you can always help them in some way, as the video itself explores they open new studios and are much better off on their own although of course without the safety net of billions of billions of dollars support them while you can, lest the flames burn out for their candle is the shortest
Vicarious Visions folding into Blizzard was painful. Their back-catalogue is huge, and riddled with incredibly competent work. If you played videogames, especially as a kid, in the 00s, chances are there's a VV game you consider a 'hidden gem' - they never made a big splash, but they did make good games. Sad to see them folded into a company that, these days at least, always makes a big splash with its bad games.
Current game developer navigating the storm. Just wanted to say, thank you for seeing us and telling us our work matters. You made one of my colleagues emotional watching this, so...thanks.
Maaaaan, let me tell you I fucking CRIED when you said "thank you." I'd been nodding along as you talked about "all the money in the world," but as you started to go through the parts about the modding communities, I could feel the tears welling up, and then the floodgates opened. It's jaw dropping how many people's lives the c-suite psychopaths are carelessly disrupting. And to hear them talk about "long term commitments" just fills me with despair because I know their trying to set up their own infinite money printer. We can vote for our wallets, supporting those new studios that come together out of the layoffs, but that only goes so far. Anyway, I also want to say "thank you," for this video.
Voting with our wallets is actually working, though. Middle Market is springing up and taking the place of big companies, mostly being formed by the talented developers still sticking around and refusing to give up even after getting layed off by the mega coprorations. They aren't long for this world, and the mass amounts of layoffs and other factors show that many of these companies, if they don't clean up their act, really aren't long for this world. I have very rarely bought games from mainstream companies like EA, Activision, Blizzard, etc. for almost a decade now, because I want to set my own example and standards for games I want to see. Everyone else could follow the same model, too, because ultimately you are still the consumer with the the money who has to voluntarily give it up, no one is forcing you to support these games.
Didn't we already go through this live-service trend 20 years ago? Everyone and their dog made an MMO and the vast majority of them face-planted because they couldn't steal WoW's audience. New players with new bank accounts aren't created when you release a new game, most of your potential audience are people who already have a favourite multiplayer game. Every studio can't have twelve Helldivers 2s because it's mathematically impossible.
They know, but they all think they're gonna be the one that makes it big cause they're all egocentric. Somehow they're all going to be the one that cracks the code and makes the big one that rakes in everything, by following the latest trend. This time it'll work, surely.
As someone in an industry that's also being horribly impacted by the "line go up forever, make the most money there ever will be" mindset, knowing the art that comes of it still matters means a lot, especially to those involved. Thank you for making this.
I was at MCM London a few days back, and I remember seeing 2 cosplayers dressed as Chai. The first had gone all out, making the prosthetic and the sword using EVA. All to a high degree of accuracy. It took him about 2 days straight to put together, according to him. The second was a kid. The lad just wanted to rep his favourite game. His mum said I made his day when I recognised it. I was thinking about that when you brought up the fans of these projects. Sure, cosplay may be small compared to the digital equivalent of refiring a dying star that is fan projects and custom servers, but the love is still there. That love is for the devs, that love is for the game. And going through the effort for no return on investment, just to preserve that, and keep it going, well it's like you said, the communities of these games will never let the flame die. Also, happy birthday
I think it's really cool that games like this and SSX, Burnout, Guitar Hero, etc had such an impact on the music taste of so many people who played them! There are so many bands that would never have crossed my radar if I hadn't played along to their music for hundreds of hours in a video game. Wild.
You're absolutely right. It's great. If it weren't for the first Alan Wake, I wouldn't even know about Poets of the Fall and neither would anyone I know; Little Big Planet 1 & 2 also showed me the work of several artists I never would have known about; and Rayark's rhythm games Cytus and Deemo had the most examples of that.
I know right? Thinking back on it, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of our music taste comes from the games we played as kids. I was replaying Midnight Club 3 and I had a moment of realising that that game was where my love for drum and bass came from
It has to be appreciated that the people who do sountracking for games can often shape the music tastes of generations to come. I can imagine that half of the songs on my spotify playlist woulnd't be there if I didn't play games growing up.
Well you got that right at 1:30 . Eric Sparrow, the most evil game character that proves you don't have to kill or cause deaths to be pure evil. Unless he endorses faulty skate gear that leads to a fatality but still pure evil.
Congress actually did an extremely good thing on this front recently. Non-compete clauses in employment contracts have been struck in the United States. You can no longer expel a team from this industry, as was extremely common before this point.
Had to update now that I'm done listening to the video. It's a wonderful surprise to see this kind of subject be approached. I work in the game industry and most of the studios I have worked at were founded off the same kind of "Originality Not For Sale" sentiment you approach, thanks to this kind of experience in the industry. And thankfully, people are starting to see the results of those studios founded off former pillars of some of the bigger players of the field not being tethered by corporate greed. It's also terrible to see the way investors are treating those studios though in the current years. Once again, another reason why you are rapidly becoming one of my favorite creators. Thank you
I hope that eventually the games industry will phase out the concept of giant publishers and companies that buy them up. I don't know any game developers personally, but making a game sounds like HELL, just from the side of coding one and making it WORK. It's hard, there's no one right way to do it, you pour your heart into it and then you get laid off because you got sold to a giant entity that wanted to appease their shareholders. Sounds ass, gotta have huge guts and ambitions to see all this and still wanting to be a game dev.
The AAAAAA videogame industry is depressing right now, it's true, but look on the bright side: because the big studios are racing to the bottom, the indie scene's blown up. You introduced me to one of my favorite FPS games ever, Cultic, and I'm chomping at the bit for Chapter 2 to be released. PS: Happy bday my dude
I know it won’t happen but I hope that the insane success of balders gate 3 gets it through the heads of some higher ups that YES quality games will get insane love and still make an insane amount of money. Happy birthday man here’s to another year of silly shit
What a fantastic retrospective/postmortem on the industry. This was one heck of an introduction to yout channel. I can't wait to binge the rest of your stuff.
This Video man. It just hits. The whole situation over the past year has been really sad. I'm watching a weekly show on public broadcasting and they have been excusing themselves because EVERY WEEK they need to start the news section with another layoff. Thank you so much for making a Video that for some reasing gives me hope
This industry is fuckign cooked man. Not even the indie game scene is gonna last, since we can't get new blood while drowning in debt and needing to put food on the table, or get bought and and dismantled the moment their fluke success doesn't equate to lasting impact. See what happened to Mane 6, who made a beloved if niche fighting game Them's Fightin Herds, got bought out, were rushed to put out new characters instead of the story mode they were previously working on for a season pass, and then shut down before proper playtesting could happen.
I feel like naturally become more of a nihilist in these recent years but I think one thing is very important to remember. Big studios are there to make a product, but more than anything they are there to make money.
As sad as the story of the Tony Hawk series is (as well as the entire state of the video game industry in the 2020s), I’m very thankful that the franchise got one final hurrah. 1+2 is a great remake and it is truly amazing just how well it turned out. Pro Skater 5 being the last game was depressing but 1+2 is a much better sendoff for the franchise. Vicarious Visions deserves huge props for doing such a good job after the franchise had seen no quality titles in an extremely long time. The story of the Tony Hawk series also makes me think about SSX. Another amazing extreme sports series which fizzled away and didn’t even receive the comeback it deserves. The last SSX game came out over 12 years ago, the franchise has now been gone longer than it was alive and that makes me very sad.
Man, what's sad is the part at 16:37 that lists trends corporations tried to chase is missing other shit like MOBAs. I remember when they tried capitalizing off the popularity of League of Legends and DotA. Remember things like The Witcher: Battle Arena? Does anyone even know Dead Island: Epidemic existed?! I also really hate the Battle Royale trend we're in now. Everything has to be BR now, it's crazy. Like I can't believe long dormant franchises like Marathon was announced to come back as a damn BR. I'm also so very upset about the closure of Tango Gameworks and that might be the most this industry has disappointed me in recent memory.
I feel that hitting with the depressing news kind of undermines the inspirational music video at the end. I would think giving us hope for something would have made that moment sweet. All I feel is just sad listening to it.
I didn't play the original game, because I didn't have a console, but THPS 2 came on PC and half of my high school was playing it. I remember that I ripped the music out of the game, burned it on a CD and played it during the school dance. Seeing 1000+ kids bounce together was as close to the world peace as we got that year.
what a superb video! the notion of infinite growth is foolhardy, and it astonishes me that none of these corporate executives can figure that out. nothing is infinite, as it just cannot be. gaming has been a huge part of my life ever since i was four years old, piggy backing off my mom's NES titles. there's been games over the years that have made monumental impacts on my life, shaping not only my group of friends, but shaping who i am as a person. it's not just the developers that are treated at expendable. it's us, the consumer, as well. and it's frustrating to see and feel.
My experiences with Tony Hawk probably started with the Pro Skater 4 demo, but I later went on to play 2 and 3. (also happy birthday) I don't believe that we are "too small" to make a difference. We're only "too small" to make a difference because we're playing THEIR game, playing by THEIR rules. They wouldn't last very long if they were forced to play a different kind of game, one with higher stakes and scarier rules. "Why make some money, when you can make ALL the money?" is a question that has gone largely unanswered, when it needs a very good and very STRONG answer, in order to convince the corpo to be content with SOME money. Thing is, that approach doesn't need to be the ONLY approach, much like laid-off game devs forming their own new studios doesn't need to be the ONLY approach. The desolation of the corpo needs to be a multipronged attack, striking from multiple angles at once, so that even if the corpo is able to defend against ONE prong, they are still being jabbed by the other prongs. Much like the creation of video games, the destruction of evil requires multiple disciplines working in tandem, and is very hard work indeed. But it is work that needs to be done.
Speaking of Sony... According to Jeff Ross (formerly) of Bend Studios (the Days Gone and Siphon Filter devs), they went to the higher ups of Sony with what they thought was an amazing sequel for Days Gone... But not only did Sony shut their idea down, they also took the bulk of Bend Studios dev team and put them on the development of The Last of Us: Part 1, and Factions 2. They even proposed the idea of them developing a new Uncharted game. Jeff Ross went on record and said he was SERIOUSLY concerned that Sony was trying to make Bend a Naughty Dog support studio (He left Sony Bend for Crystal Dynamics in 2021). Crazy, because Sony's ACTUAL ' support studio', known as *_The Visual Arts Service Group_* handled principle development of LoU: Part 1 Remake with Naughty Dog's oversight, before eventually handing it back to them... So it's weird that Sony would want to use one of their flagship studios in that capacity, rather than letting them make what they want. But Bend Studios are allegedly working on a new IP that _"they're very passionate about"..._ So, take that fornwhat it's worth.
Happy birfmas man! Im so glad i found your stuff from the My House video (which ultimately made me try the mod out myself). When you mentioned Respawn, all i could do was shout in agreement. The Tango shutdown hurts my soul. Keep making good videos but also take care of yourself!
Thanks for this. I'm trying to get into game dev myself (partly due to Blizzard being heroes of mine back in the day) and I've been constantly hearing and "doomscrolling" the bad news about whatever's going on in the game industry on . It's a bit refreshing to be refocused on what truly matters, and what even the 'little guy' can do; Say thanks.
I do wonder how much the FIRST comments by Microsoft about Hi-Fi Rush's success were putting a brave face on things. They were very non-committal about actual metrics for that success, and didn't tout new Gamepass subscriptions or sales for the game. Later interviews also made it clear that it cost a lot more to make than people think. It might legitimately have been an expensive, good game that only produced a very small ripple when it landed.
It could be like Psychonauts (one of my favourite games), a game that everyone loves and everyone seems to remember but apparently nobody played. So many games like that which are acknowledged to be great but weren't as popular as you remember them being.
@@ApocalypticRenegadeThat’s the point of a “cult classic”. Something valued by the weight of its impact as opposed to its sales. The same with Ōkami, Ico, Red Dead Revolver and Phantasmagoria. Those games were made in a time where screw-ups on advertising were enough to tank entire studios. They became cult classics because most didn’t even know they existed. Whereas today it is a lot easier to get a game in front of eyeballs. It doesn’t really make sense for the amount of hype surrounding Hi-Fi Rush to not translate into sales.
AAA gaming, everyone. If you're not playing one of the four major titles, expect your favourite franchise to be scrapped because Battle Duty 84: Remake III needs more slop developers.
Broooo! This is my second video of yours I watched today after the my house video. I love your videos! New fan and sub! I wish you all the luck and success in your endeavors, on RUclips or otherwise. And thank you! For making these videos. Thank you😊
This was a beautiful video. Looking at the industry now, it is just so depressing. I hope we eventually get something good coming out of the end of all of this. Also, Happy Birthday!
Your use of God Hand music is so great here, not just because I've been thinking about the game again recently and it's what I want to listen to right now, but because it's another example of a great game that will (hopefully) never be forgotten, in spite of what happened to its studio and the industry not caring about it. Shinji Mikami made what he wanted to make, and seemingly him and his team had a lot of fun with it. I wish that was the norm. The interview with him about God Hand hit me harder than Gene could.
Happy Birthday, Jack! Thanks for the depression to go alongside my depression :D Joking aside, this video was heartfelt and beautiful, and very profound, even for one of your uploads. Brilliant.
Happy 30th! You've officially gone from not caring about birthdays to actively disliking them. Thanks for making this video and highlighting some of the... goings on. Not a fun thing to think about, but something that we shouldn't let slide into the expected normal. Even if it has been the expected normal for awhile now.
Beautiful video, So much to talk about. I used to play Tony hawk pro skater games back in my day and it always reminds me of those nostalgic youthful days of crazy taxi and dance dance revolution. I'm still upset with Bethesda over prey 2
So game dev studios shutting down than to have the core members of shutdowned studio to just open up a new studio has been a really common thing in the game's industry.
Oh shit, I got here early for this one! I remember having a blast on Pro Skater 3, this should be a fun watch. EDIT: ...well damn. It's funny, I played Prey for the first time not that long ago. I reckon I should leave a review on its Steam page when I get the chance.
1st off happy birthday man. i got real sad when arkane and tango gameworks got shattered... i will also pull in American Mcgee tried his hardest with ea to get his 3rd installment of the Alice franchise out but no good came out of there and he retired completely from the scene... Thank you for The Evil Within, Hi-Fi Rush, thanks for Prey and thanks for the alice series... thank you pak for this video
The quote "Why make things to make money when you can put all your effort in to one thing in trying to make all the money in the world." Is the truth that is killing modern media. Every single media company across every single industry is behaving in this way. From modern publishing only choosing to publish the already massive authors while Amazon eats everyone's lunch, to modern Hollywood only creating and promoting sequel blockbuster titles that have to compete with their other blockbuster titles, to TV and all the streaming services putting all of their money into being the next 'game of thrones' (or whatever moving target they're going for nowadays), and videogames, I fear we are in the deaththroes of our modern media landscape. Late stage capitalism at its finest - it's time to break up these mega media conglomerates.
I feel like we’re headlong into a massive bubble in the games industry again. Except this time with far more money and careers at stake. If we’re lucky we’ll just lose a few of the less sustainable massive publishers but that will still lead to even deeper concentration of the market. A big problem besides systemic ones like how easily we permit monopolies and insist on infinite growth in a limited world is that we gamers as consumers are collectively some of the dumbest consumers in all economies.
This video is important. There is a reason why video games from back in the day feel different. They had so much soul and passion, wacky ideas, memorable characters, great music... This unfathomable greed and the illusion of endless growth is killing off households and important opportunities. These money hungry corporations are shamelessly turning carefully crafted and beloved works of art into mindless pieces of numbing nothingness. Remember that you as an individual can help by supporting passionate devs, just as you can make a slight difference on your trip to the grocery store or record shop. I truly hope that the soullessness we have all had to endure for the past years will eventually die off.
I love how the gaming industry right now feels like people who should know what they are doing keeps destroying itself as hard as possible and im hoping dev teams start breaking out of mega-corp exectives and realize they could be their own bosses and make more money than any mega-corp pushing garbage onto every game
Wonder how much of these layoffs are because these major companies are going to start using ai to produce at least parts of their games. After all, they have tons of data in their portfolios to feed to them to teach the machines to, well, not produce new or novel expiriences but these big studios have never really been about that anyway so nothing changes on that front, but to mulch out more crud faster and cheaper. Not that cheaper production cycles will be reflected in the pricing of the games.
These games were something magical. The Tony Hawk era was so SO prevalent (as you said, it got people into skating who never considered it before) and it's partly because of these games. They were fun and outrageous. The series winding down was a shame, but it's more the reasons around why these games are "a thing of the past" that make it leave a bad taste.
![Stromae, Pomme - “Ma Meilleure Ennemie” (from Arcane Season 2) [Official Visualizer]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/1F3OGIFnW1k/mqdefault.jpg)
It's my birthday and I get to pick the video topic
(Sadness and Kickflips)
12/08/24 EDIT: TANGO LIVES!
happy birthday boss
Happy birthday!
hey Power Pak can you um play Garn47 because um I loive youb and you love me that would be great thanks
happy birthday!
Sadness and kickflips is a sick title
Fun fact: Tommy Tallarico, who has worked on over 1700 games and who holds dozens of Guiness World Records, hand crafted the remasters of 1& 2.
His mother must be so proud.
@@DingusJoe64Another fun fact: he was definitely on MTV Cribs!
He even cracked his head open for this game, his mother is very proud
Fun fact: Tommy also created this RUclips video himself
He also made the defiantly released Intelivision Amico!
I'm still so sad for Tango Gameworks and Hi-Fi RUSH. So many studios and great projects being burned because of greed and the illusion of endless growth is infuriating.
I can only hope to God increased awareness of this BS eventually leads to something changing in the future.
No evil within 3 for us! 😢
The absorbed studios aren't dissolved/laid off I don't think? They said the intent was consolidation of management and resources instead of having 20 guys who only work for X studio on Y game
My biggest beef is that there’s no consistency. Arkane suffers through a flop -> fired. Tango makes a unique game that slaps and wins awards (despite no advertising) and they get fired too?
So wrong
@@NoNameBagu Tango's head left and formed his own studio meaning what was left of the "Evil Within" studio was mostly "Hi-Fi Rush" people, whose experience with Hi-Fi Rush is better served elsewhere within the greater company ecosystem. The whole thing is a nothingburger and just reshuffling people to where they'd fit better
Came into this expecting a fun video about Tony Hawk. Left saddened at being reminded at how many layoffs and shutdowns are happening right now in the industry.
It's happening in alot within the entertainment industry and it's pretty alarming tbh
The final death throes of late-stage capitalism, it sucks that this is how its supposed to work. But hopefully with people making their own studios the creative spirit of games can continue to thrive.
@@silikaspider I have hopes that, among companies seeking ever-increasing profits, and people slowly buying less, this investor driven model will die out, and life will get better.
the good part about all this is that those people don't disappear into the aether, you can always help them in some way, as the video itself explores they open new studios and are much better off on their own
although of course without the safety net of billions of billions of dollars
support them while you can, lest the flames burn out for their candle is the shortest
Vicarious Visions folding into Blizzard was painful. Their back-catalogue is huge, and riddled with incredibly competent work. If you played videogames, especially as a kid, in the 00s, chances are there's a VV game you consider a 'hidden gem' - they never made a big splash, but they did make good games. Sad to see them folded into a company that, these days at least, always makes a big splash with its bad games.
I am tempted to repeat the Smiling Friend's line: "It's MY IP to sit on and do nothing with!!!"
God I can only imagine the condemned souls of the COD mines clawing at VV shreiking in demonic voices "JOIN US!"
@@sammyjones8279it is insane how accurate and well aged that caricature ALREADY is
Current game developer navigating the storm. Just wanted to say, thank you for seeing us and telling us our work matters. You made one of my colleagues emotional watching this, so...thanks.
Can I ask what you're working on?
I just want to appreciate how you've labelled your chapters.
Great song 👍
On my Spotify, has been for years. Ska I'd my favorite genre lol
Maaaaan, let me tell you I fucking CRIED when you said "thank you." I'd been nodding along as you talked about "all the money in the world," but as you started to go through the parts about the modding communities, I could feel the tears welling up, and then the floodgates opened.
It's jaw dropping how many people's lives the c-suite psychopaths are carelessly disrupting. And to hear them talk about "long term commitments" just fills me with despair because I know their trying to set up their own infinite money printer. We can vote for our wallets, supporting those new studios that come together out of the layoffs, but that only goes so far.
Anyway, I also want to say "thank you," for this video.
Voting with our wallets is actually working, though. Middle Market is springing up and taking the place of big companies, mostly being formed by the talented developers still sticking around and refusing to give up even after getting layed off by the mega coprorations. They aren't long for this world, and the mass amounts of layoffs and other factors show that many of these companies, if they don't clean up their act, really aren't long for this world. I have very rarely bought games from mainstream companies like EA, Activision, Blizzard, etc. for almost a decade now, because I want to set my own example and standards for games I want to see. Everyone else could follow the same model, too, because ultimately you are still the consumer with the the money who has to voluntarily give it up, no one is forcing you to support these games.
Didn't we already go through this live-service trend 20 years ago? Everyone and their dog made an MMO and the vast majority of them face-planted because they couldn't steal WoW's audience. New players with new bank accounts aren't created when you release a new game, most of your potential audience are people who already have a favourite multiplayer game. Every studio can't have twelve Helldivers 2s because it's mathematically impossible.
We did, and thousands of great devs are going to get overworked and unceremoniously laid off to fuel this trend until it dies
🎉
Time is a flat circle and I want off the ride :D
Unfortunately for you (for us really) modern capitalism is structured on the fictional idea of infinite growth
They know, but they all think they're gonna be the one that makes it big cause they're all egocentric. Somehow they're all going to be the one that cracks the code and makes the big one that rakes in everything, by following the latest trend. This time it'll work, surely.
@@zachub034 ? I don't see how that part of the video has anything to do with MMOs or anything in my comment. What do you mean?
As someone in an industry that's also being horribly impacted by the "line go up forever, make the most money there ever will be" mindset, knowing the art that comes of it still matters means a lot, especially to those involved. Thank you for making this.
Ahhh, I can guess exactly what industry you're in! Goods and services. It's the worst.
I was at MCM London a few days back, and I remember seeing 2 cosplayers dressed as Chai. The first had gone all out, making the prosthetic and the sword using EVA. All to a high degree of accuracy. It took him about 2 days straight to put together, according to him. The second was a kid. The lad just wanted to rep his favourite game. His mum said I made his day when I recognised it. I was thinking about that when you brought up the fans of these projects.
Sure, cosplay may be small compared to the digital equivalent of refiring a dying star that is fan projects and custom servers, but the love is still there. That love is for the devs, that love is for the game. And going through the effort for no return on investment, just to preserve that, and keep it going, well it's like you said, the communities of these games will never let the flame die.
Also, happy birthday
So here I am
Doing everything I can
Holding on to what I am
PRETENDING IM A SUPER MAN
Wait she was dead the whole time??
I think it's really cool that games like this and SSX, Burnout, Guitar Hero, etc had such an impact on the music taste of so many people who played them! There are so many bands that would never have crossed my radar if I hadn't played along to their music for hundreds of hours in a video game. Wild.
You're absolutely right. It's great. If it weren't for the first Alan Wake, I wouldn't even know about Poets of the Fall and neither would anyone I know; Little Big Planet 1 & 2 also showed me the work of several artists I never would have known about; and Rayark's rhythm games Cytus and Deemo had the most examples of that.
I know right? Thinking back on it, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of our music taste comes from the games we played as kids. I was replaying Midnight Club 3 and I had a moment of realising that that game was where my love for drum and bass came from
Gta san andreas made up my entire music taste for the next 15 years 😂 that game did have the greatest ingame radio EVER
It has to be appreciated that the people who do sountracking for games can often shape the music tastes of generations to come. I can imagine that half of the songs on my spotify playlist woulnd't be there if I didn't play games growing up.
Well you got that right at 1:30 . Eric Sparrow, the most evil game character that proves you don't have to kill or cause deaths to be pure evil. Unless he endorses faulty skate gear that leads to a fatality but still pure evil.
What all does he do?
Every project Vicarious Visions worked on just oozed reverence and care. They were too good for Activision...
Congress actually did an extremely good thing on this front recently. Non-compete clauses in employment contracts have been struck in the United States. You can no longer expel a team from this industry, as was extremely common before this point.
"oh, a fun video about Tony Hawk! This will be perfect to watch during my lunch break!"
I am now eating pasta mixed with tears.
Thank you, Power Pak.
This is the saddest Tony Hawk Pro Skater retrospective video ever, great job!
I hope every Dev that truly cares about Their work sees this:
Thank You, so, so much. I love You.
GRAAAAAH HAZE PS3 MENTIONED! I FUCKING LOVE YELLOW FOG! WHAT THE FUCK IS A COLOR PALETTE?!?!!!
In my calculus class someone used this game in their presentation as an example of sine waves in real life and I’ll never know it for anything else
Had to update now that I'm done listening to the video. It's a wonderful surprise to see this kind of subject be approached. I work in the game industry and most of the studios I have worked at were founded off the same kind of "Originality Not For Sale" sentiment you approach, thanks to this kind of experience in the industry. And thankfully, people are starting to see the results of those studios founded off former pillars of some of the bigger players of the field not being tethered by corporate greed. It's also terrible to see the way investors are treating those studios though in the current years.
Once again, another reason why you are rapidly becoming one of my favorite creators. Thank you
I hope that eventually the games industry will phase out the concept of giant publishers and companies that buy them up. I don't know any game developers personally, but making a game sounds like HELL, just from the side of coding one and making it WORK. It's hard, there's no one right way to do it, you pour your heart into it and then you get laid off because you got sold to a giant entity that wanted to appease their shareholders. Sounds ass, gotta have huge guts and ambitions to see all this and still wanting to be a game dev.
The AAAAAA videogame industry is depressing right now, it's true, but look on the bright side: because the big studios are racing to the bottom, the indie scene's blown up. You introduced me to one of my favorite FPS games ever, Cultic, and I'm chomping at the bit for Chapter 2 to be released.
PS: Happy bday my dude
I know it won’t happen but I hope that the insane success of balders gate 3 gets it through the heads of some higher ups that YES quality games will get insane love and still make an insane amount of money. Happy birthday man here’s to another year of silly shit
This was a wonderful video, thank you
The ever abundance of creativity will always be gorged by the great leviathan of greed.
What a fantastic retrospective/postmortem on the industry. This was one heck of an introduction to yout channel. I can't wait to binge the rest of your stuff.
This Video man. It just hits.
The whole situation over the past year has been really sad. I'm watching a weekly show on public broadcasting and they have been excusing themselves because EVERY WEEK they need to start the news section with another layoff. Thank you so much for making a Video that for some reasing gives me hope
Damn, for your birthday you decided to make us sad huh
Gg, I will definitely be following Magic Soup Games
This industry is fuckign cooked man. Not even the indie game scene is gonna last, since we can't get new blood while drowning in debt and needing to put food on the table, or get bought and and dismantled the moment their fluke success doesn't equate to lasting impact. See what happened to Mane 6, who made a beloved if niche fighting game Them's Fightin Herds, got bought out, were rushed to put out new characters instead of the story mode they were previously working on for a season pass, and then shut down before proper playtesting could happen.
Ah, a TFH player. Interesting to find you here.
Great video. I didn't expect to get so emotional, but it was
Happy birthday, PP!
Loved the Tony Hawk games. Thank you for delving into them. Got a great nostalgia hit from this video.
I feel like naturally become more of a nihilist in these recent years but I think one thing is very important to remember. Big studios are there to make a product, but more than anything they are there to make money.
As sad as the story of the Tony Hawk series is (as well as the entire state of the video game industry in the 2020s), I’m very thankful that the franchise got one final hurrah. 1+2 is a great remake and it is truly amazing just how well it turned out. Pro Skater 5 being the last game was depressing but 1+2 is a much better sendoff for the franchise. Vicarious Visions deserves huge props for doing such a good job after the franchise had seen no quality titles in an extremely long time.
The story of the Tony Hawk series also makes me think about SSX. Another amazing extreme sports series which fizzled away and didn’t even receive the comeback it deserves. The last SSX game came out over 12 years ago, the franchise has now been gone longer than it was alive and that makes me very sad.
Man, what's sad is the part at 16:37 that lists trends corporations tried to chase is missing other shit like MOBAs. I remember when they tried capitalizing off the popularity of League of Legends and DotA. Remember things like The Witcher: Battle Arena? Does anyone even know Dead Island: Epidemic existed?!
I also really hate the Battle Royale trend we're in now. Everything has to be BR now, it's crazy. Like I can't believe long dormant franchises like Marathon was announced to come back as a damn BR. I'm also so very upset about the closure of Tango Gameworks and that might be the most this industry has disappointed me in recent memory.
I feel that hitting with the depressing news kind of undermines the inspirational music video at the end. I would think giving us hope for something would have made that moment sweet. All I feel is just sad listening to it.
I didn't play the original game, because I didn't have a console, but THPS 2 came on PC and half of my high school was playing it. I remember that I ripped the music out of the game, burned it on a CD and played it during the school dance. Seeing 1000+ kids bounce together was as close to the world peace as we got that year.
I love the detail of you playing silent hill music when discussing a game series that went on for too long being mired down my corporate desires.
Thank you for also being a human who puts their everything into creating things
what a superb video! the notion of infinite growth is foolhardy, and it astonishes me that none of these corporate executives can figure that out. nothing is infinite, as it just cannot be. gaming has been a huge part of my life ever since i was four years old, piggy backing off my mom's NES titles. there's been games over the years that have made monumental impacts on my life, shaping not only my group of friends, but shaping who i am as a person.
it's not just the developers that are treated at expendable. it's us, the consumer, as well. and it's frustrating to see and feel.
My experiences with Tony Hawk probably started with the Pro Skater 4 demo, but I later went on to play 2 and 3. (also happy birthday)
I don't believe that we are "too small" to make a difference. We're only "too small" to make a difference because we're playing THEIR game, playing by THEIR rules. They wouldn't last very long if they were forced to play a different kind of game, one with higher stakes and scarier rules. "Why make some money, when you can make ALL the money?" is a question that has gone largely unanswered, when it needs a very good and very STRONG answer, in order to convince the corpo to be content with SOME money.
Thing is, that approach doesn't need to be the ONLY approach, much like laid-off game devs forming their own new studios doesn't need to be the ONLY approach. The desolation of the corpo needs to be a multipronged attack, striking from multiple angles at once, so that even if the corpo is able to defend against ONE prong, they are still being jabbed by the other prongs. Much like the creation of video games, the destruction of evil requires multiple disciplines working in tandem, and is very hard work indeed. But it is work that needs to be done.
I MISS TANGO GAMEWORKS AND HI-FI RUSH :(((( [also happy birthday!!!]
That Song
I'm not crying
You're crying
.....
*HUGS*
Speaking of Sony... According to Jeff Ross (formerly) of Bend Studios (the Days Gone and Siphon Filter devs), they went to the higher ups of Sony with what they thought was an amazing sequel for Days Gone...
But not only did Sony shut their idea down, they also took the bulk of Bend Studios dev team and put them on the development of The Last of Us: Part 1, and Factions 2. They even proposed the idea of them developing a new Uncharted game.
Jeff Ross went on record and said he was SERIOUSLY concerned that Sony was trying to make Bend a Naughty Dog support studio (He left Sony Bend for Crystal Dynamics in 2021).
Crazy, because Sony's ACTUAL ' support studio', known as *_The Visual Arts Service Group_* handled principle development of LoU: Part 1 Remake with Naughty Dog's oversight, before eventually handing it back to them... So it's weird that Sony would want to use one of their flagship studios in that capacity, rather than letting them make what they want.
But Bend Studios are allegedly working on a new IP that _"they're very passionate about"..._ So, take that fornwhat it's worth.
Seriously love all your work, but this one got me in the heart. Beautifully done.
Hearing Making Things Is Hard To Do again absolutely wrecked me. I forgot about the details of that song. The lyrics hit so much differently now.
When I clicked the notification for this video I didn't think it would end with me crying at my work desk. Great job.
Happy birfmas man! Im so glad i found your stuff from the My House video (which ultimately made me try the mod out myself). When you mentioned Respawn, all i could do was shout in agreement. The Tango shutdown hurts my soul. Keep making good videos but also take care of yourself!
Stuff like this is why I need to be better about actually reviewing all the games I have on steam
Eric Sparrow sacrificed the Peralta skate team while kickflipping into the eclipse
Belated Happy Birthday, thanks for making me cry.
Thanks for this. I'm trying to get into game dev myself (partly due to Blizzard being heroes of mine back in the day) and I've been constantly hearing and "doomscrolling" the bad news about whatever's going on in the game industry on . It's a bit refreshing to be refocused on what truly matters, and what even the 'little guy' can do; Say thanks.
I do wonder how much the FIRST comments by Microsoft about Hi-Fi Rush's success were putting a brave face on things. They were very non-committal about actual metrics for that success, and didn't tout new Gamepass subscriptions or sales for the game. Later interviews also made it clear that it cost a lot more to make than people think. It might legitimately have been an expensive, good game that only produced a very small ripple when it landed.
It could be like Psychonauts (one of my favourite games), a game that everyone loves and everyone seems to remember but apparently nobody played. So many games like that which are acknowledged to be great but weren't as popular as you remember them being.
@@ApocalypticRenegadeThat’s the point of a “cult classic”. Something valued by the weight of its impact as opposed to its sales. The same with Ōkami, Ico, Red Dead Revolver and Phantasmagoria. Those games were made in a time where screw-ups on advertising were enough to tank entire studios. They became cult classics because most didn’t even know they existed. Whereas today it is a lot easier to get a game in front of eyeballs. It doesn’t really make sense for the amount of hype surrounding Hi-Fi Rush to not translate into sales.
AAA gaming, everyone. If you're not playing one of the four major titles, expect your favourite franchise to be scrapped because Battle Duty 84: Remake III needs more slop developers.
This video is how I learned there was a sequel to Tony Hawk Ride
Pyrocynical adjusting his lighting setup wearing a helmet and knee pads: 😰😰😰
Pyrocynical
Pyrocynical
Pyrocyclical
Pyrocynical
This is an incredible video. Thank you.
Well thanks for making me cry with the song and montage at the end..
Broooo! This is my second video of yours I watched today after the my house video. I love your videos! New fan and sub! I wish you all the luck and success in your endeavors, on RUclips or otherwise. And thank you! For making these videos. Thank you😊
Amazing video man, great way to use your platform. You were already one of my very favorite you tubers but this just solidified that.
This was a beautiful video. Looking at the industry now, it is just so depressing. I hope we eventually get something good coming out of the end of all of this.
Also, Happy Birthday!
Gleaming the Cube was my into.
40 yrs later.. still can't rail slide.
Your use of God Hand music is so great here, not just because I've been thinking about the game again recently and it's what I want to listen to right now, but because it's another example of a great game that will (hopefully) never be forgotten, in spite of what happened to its studio and the industry not caring about it. Shinji Mikami made what he wanted to make, and seemingly him and his team had a lot of fun with it. I wish that was the norm. The interview with him about God Hand hit me harder than Gene could.
Happy Birthday, Jack! Thanks for the depression to go alongside my depression :D
Joking aside, this video was heartfelt and beautiful, and very profound, even for one of your uploads. Brilliant.
thank you for amazing video, as always.
Didn't expect a Power Pak this early since the last upload. Sweet! Happy Birthday!
YOOO THE DISCO ELYSIUM MUSIC
Imagine getting asked a music question and not immediately taking the opportunity to recommend Captain Beefheart.
woh
You made me cry.
Thank you.
Happy "heel-flipping metal grinding" Birthday, Mr Power Pak.
I'm interested, but I'll have to check later.
Outside your usual but I liked it. Always good to see a new video from you!
Happy 30th! You've officially gone from not caring about birthdays to actively disliking them.
Thanks for making this video and highlighting some of the... goings on. Not a fun thing to think about, but something that we shouldn't let slide into the expected normal. Even if it has been the expected normal for awhile now.
0:01 I will never escape Guilty Gear, as intended
Happy birthday! And hopefully next year isn't full of unfair layoffs and suits burning goodwill. :')
Thank you for the video as well.
Hey man I dont even know if you will ever see this but thank YOU for making these videos you are highly underrated
Beautiful video, So much to talk about.
I used to play Tony hawk pro skater games back in my day and it always reminds me of those nostalgic youthful days of crazy taxi and dance dance revolution.
I'm still upset with Bethesda over prey 2
Not to sound completely black pilled but I genuinely think this will only get worse. I literally am only looking forward to the new deltarune chapter.
"Multiplayer is here, online and offline" boy do I wish that were true
Good stuff, dude.
Real talk was needed.
So game dev studios shutting down than to have the core members of shutdowned studio to just open up a new studio has been a really common thing in the game's industry.
Happy birthday! Thanks for making me cry :'')
Oh shit, I got here early for this one! I remember having a blast on Pro Skater 3, this should be a fun watch.
EDIT: ...well damn.
It's funny, I played Prey for the first time not that long ago. I reckon I should leave a review on its Steam page when I get the chance.
1st off happy birthday man. i got real sad when arkane and tango gameworks got shattered... i will also pull in American Mcgee tried his hardest with ea to get his 3rd installment of the Alice franchise out but no good came out of there and he retired completely from the scene...
Thank you for The Evil Within, Hi-Fi Rush, thanks for Prey and thanks for the alice series...
thank you pak for this video
another great video! keep up the good work pp
The quote "Why make things to make money when you can put all your effort in to one thing in trying to make all the money in the world." Is the truth that is killing modern media. Every single media company across every single industry is behaving in this way. From modern publishing only choosing to publish the already massive authors while Amazon eats everyone's lunch, to modern Hollywood only creating and promoting sequel blockbuster titles that have to compete with their other blockbuster titles, to TV and all the streaming services putting all of their money into being the next 'game of thrones' (or whatever moving target they're going for nowadays), and videogames, I fear we are in the deaththroes of our modern media landscape. Late stage capitalism at its finest - it's time to break up these mega media conglomerates.
I feel like we’re headlong into a massive bubble in the games industry again. Except this time with far more money and careers at stake. If we’re lucky we’ll just lose a few of the less sustainable massive publishers but that will still lead to even deeper concentration of the market. A big problem besides systemic ones like how easily we permit monopolies and insist on infinite growth in a limited world is that we gamers as consumers are collectively some of the dumbest consumers in all economies.
This video is important. There is a reason why video games from back in the day feel different. They had so much soul and passion, wacky ideas, memorable characters, great music...
This unfathomable greed and the illusion of endless growth is killing off households and important opportunities. These money hungry corporations are shamelessly turning carefully crafted and beloved works of art into mindless pieces of numbing nothingness.
Remember that you as an individual can help by supporting passionate devs, just as you can make a slight difference on your trip to the grocery store or record shop.
I truly hope that the soullessness we have all had to endure for the past years will eventually die off.
I love how the gaming industry right now feels like people who should know what they are doing keeps destroying itself as hard as possible and im hoping dev teams start breaking out of mega-corp exectives and realize they could be their own bosses and make more money than any mega-corp pushing garbage onto every game
Wonder how much of these layoffs are because these major companies are going to start using ai to produce at least parts of their games. After all, they have tons of data in their portfolios to feed to them to teach the machines to, well, not produce new or novel expiriences but these big studios have never really been about that anyway so nothing changes on that front, but to mulch out more crud faster and cheaper. Not that cheaper production cycles will be reflected in the pricing of the games.
You know I would have loved the Tony hawk's underground remaster I absolutely love that game
Pro Skater 3 is still the GOAT of skating games
I spent an unholy amount of time playing that game
Happy birthday you beautiful bastard!
I COME BACK WITH WONDERFUL NEWS
TANGO SURVIVED
From the devil's mouth, to another. I would wait before getting all excited
@@mlgcactus1035 Dude them surviving is good news, it means it's possible.
Multiplayer is back ??
Excited to see Pyrocynical talk about this!!
I just bought 1&2 on steam and this popped up in my recommendations right after
These games were something magical. The Tony Hawk era was so SO prevalent (as you said, it got people into skating who never considered it before) and it's partly because of these games. They were fun and outrageous. The series winding down was a shame, but it's more the reasons around why these games are "a thing of the past" that make it leave a bad taste.
This might be your best one yet. Enjoy your bday.