When Homebrewers Produce Crap

[+DZ-Jay]

Thanks for that, but the link works for me, so I don't see the problem. It should take you to the "Free ROM Download " section with the file links. What are you getting?

Wait, I misread your post. There's a prominent link in the " How To Buy" section. As a favour to the producer, LTO, who is still selling the game, the site is meant to promote sales. The free download link is an extra, and usually part of the yearly competition promotion material, which is why there is no section or page dedicated to it.

 

However, point taken, I can clean it up a little.

Thanks,

dZ.

[+Gemintronic]

..did we just re-enact constructive feedback for homebrews? *chuckle*

[Nebulon]

No, that's still totally on the buyer..

You don't have to buy it...

 

If you decide to buy something without seeing it play (because you HAD to pre-order or you wouldn't get it) and it sucks, that's still totally on you...

 

desiv

I'd have to say that it's not totally the buyer's fault in a case like that. Unless there's a playable demo available, how is the potential customer supposed to get a read on the game's quality level and playability prior to the last day of the pre-order offer?

[desiv]

I'd have to say that it's not totally the buyer's fault in a case like that.

Yes, it is..

Unless there's a playable demo available, how is the potential customer supposed to get a read on the game's quality level and playability prior to the last day of the pre-order offer?

He doesn't have to get a "read on the game's playability." He can just not buy it...

It's still 100% the customers decision to buy or not. If the seller lies, then yeah, it's his fault. But if I'm selling a game, and I'm not showing anything more than a screenshot, and you still buy it.. That's all on you. You don't have to buy it...

 

Yes, it's true that if you don't buy it then, it might be a limited run and you won't get it later..

OK.. Then either don't buy it. Or, buy it, and the risk is all on you...

It's still 100% your choice as a customer..

 

Let's say you are walking down the street and you walk by a theater and there's a sign for a new Sci-fi movie showing right then ONLY.

It might never show again...

You see a guy there and he's the director. You ask him about the movie. He shows you a poster with a screenshot that you can't really tell much.

You ask him about it, he says it's kind of like that other movie that was around when you were a kid. But he doesn't answer any other questions.

 

So, it's up to you to buy a ticket or not..

 

You buy the ticket, because you don't want to miss what might be a good movie..

 

You watch it, and it's cheesey. Guy obviously made it with an iPhone and some Stargate action figures..

 

Is it that guys fault you bought the ticket for a bad movie?

No.. You had the option of not buying the ticket...

Yes, if you didn't buy it, you might have missed the only showing of a great movie. Oh well..

 

desiv

Edited April 24, 2014 by desiv

[+Gemintronic]

I think it is ultimately the buyers responsibility. Having said that, the time pressure for limited releases is on the publisher. Limited runs are a fact of life but solutions do exist: like the ROM DZ-Jay was allowed to post.

[Nebulon]

Yes, it is..

He doesn't have to get a "read on the game's playability." He can just not buy it...

It's still 100% the customers decision to buy or not. If the seller lies, then yeah, it's his fault. But if I'm selling a game, and I'm not showing anything more than a screenshot, and you still buy it.. That's all on you. You don't have to buy it...

 

Yes, it's true that if you don't buy it then, it might be a limited run and you won't get it later..

OK.. Then either don't buy it. Or, buy it, and the risk is all on you...

It's still 100% your choice as a customer..

 

Let's say you are walking down the street and you walk by a theater and there's a sign for a new Sci-fi movie showing right then ONLY.

It might never show again...

You see a guy there and he's the director. You ask him about the movie. He shows you a poster with a screenshot that you can't really tell much.

You ask him about it, he says it's kind of like that other movie that was around when you were a kid. But he doesn't answer any other questions.

 

So, it's up to you to buy a ticket or not..

 

You buy the ticket, because you don't want to miss what might be a good movie..

 

You watch it, and it's cheesey. Guy obviously made it with an iPhone and some Stargate action figures..

 

Is it that guys fault you bought the ticket for a bad movie?

No.. You had the option of not buying the ticket...

Yes, if you didn't buy it, you might have missed the only showing of a great movie. Oh well..

 

desiv

Which is precisely why I haven't purchased a number of the homebrew releases.

 

No playable demo = No chance of getting $$ out of me.

[desiv]

Which is precisely why I haven't purchased a number of the homebrew releases.

 

No playable demo = No chance of getting $$ out of me.

Exactly!

 

Me either..

 

It's kind of like SPAM (the e-mail kind).. There wouldn't be as much SPAM if some people weren't clicking that link in the e-mail...

 

The problem isn't the guys putting out something with no info and no time. As long as no one buys, they won't do it (very often at least).

The problem is the people who actually buy because they are afraid of missing possible great game, even tho there was no good info.

 

The good news is that most homebrew developers are very good at demos or at LEAST lots of screenshots and/or vids...

I'd take it as a sign that no good info means it's likely to be a bad game..

 

desiv

(Dang.. Now I want to see that iPhone movie with the Stargate action figures...)

[GroovyBee]

This way, commenters can be free to post honest feedback without any concern about retaliation or damaging their relationships with other members.

Its an admirable idea but given the maturity level of some people on AA I can see it turning into an "open season" on some game developers. At least if you pass comment on something publicly (in the normal AA game dev threads) there is accountability.

[carlsson]

I thought producing physical copies of your games was so expensive and took so much work that few people would go through the process without being entirely sure they got the community support, or at least enough customers to cover the expenses. Whether or not one can actually make money on selling homebrews, I haven't studied but perhaps for very good games that can be produced in exceptionally large quantities and at a price just below the threshold what people would be willing to pay, there is money to make. Otherwise it sounds counter-intuitive to release more than one "under-developed" homebrew, as with a market that grows larger for every day, fewer and fewer collectors will feel the urge to invest in every game published, no matter if they like it or not. Thus the issue with "crap" homebrew would likely solve itself within 1, max 2 years time.

[+Gemintronic]

I thought producing physical copies of your games was so expensive and took so much work that few people would go through the process without being entirely sure they got the community support, or at least enough customers to cover the expenses. Whether or not one can actually make money on selling homebrews, I haven't studied but perhaps for very good games that can be produced in exceptionally large quantities and at a price just below the threshold what people would be willing to pay, there is money to make. Otherwise it sounds counter-intuitive to release more than one "under-developed" homebrew, as with a market that grows larger for every day, fewer and fewer collectors will feel the urge to invest in every game published, no matter if they like it or not. Thus the issue with "crap" homebrew would likely solve itself within 1, max 2 years time.

 

The trap here is people who are negative without providing constructive feedback - those who make indirect comments or abstain from critiquing are included in this. The developer is more likely to put out something not attuned to his market and the buyer left uninformed by his peers. Time does not heal under those conditions.

[Mr SQL]

 

Games that are created to be offered as commercial products are a different story. One of the reasons that homebrew has become so big is because some see it as a quick way to cash in on the retro gaming fad, and unfortunately, rapid development tools like Batari Basic only make this easier. We all know of the more cynical attempts, such as N.E.R.D.S. and The Last Ninja. As Nathan Strum correctly says in his negative review, those games turned out so badly in part because they were developed in a vacuum, without exposure to constructive feedback. His review was a kind of "feedback" that had to come after the fact, but I think it was an important service, because it helped to steer collectors clear of those particular games.

 

As I've said, feedback can help to improve a game, but sometimes it can (and should!) be used to help kill bad games before anyone unwittingly spends their hard-earned money on them. If a bad game gets nothing but unconditional praise from the community during its development, out of fear that real criticism would hurt the author's feelings, collectors who then pay for it would have a right to feel let down by the community and probably wouldn't be too eager to buy another game, which only hurts the hobby as a whole. Games that are destined to be offered commercially should be held to a higher standard, for everyone's sake.

 

Excellent perspective jaybird3rd!

 

What happens if "feedback is being used to kill an awesome game" by an excellent homebrew developer who is basically making stuff up?

 

I'm a professional programmer and I put thousands and thousands of hours and innovative new technologies into my last homebrew as a labour of love! I'll never make my money or time back on this game and that's not what it's about - it's about celebrating the release of my first commercial game under my own software label in 1984, 30 years ago!!! :)

 

While everyone else liked the game (I got a ton of awesome feedback) the homebrew develper warned people that I had posted videos that didn't match the gameplay and was ripping people off.

 

This just wasn't true and when I released videos of Revision2 with even better gameplay and enhanced special effects, the homebrew developer followed up by posting videos of his own on youtube and elsewhere to illustrate the gameplay was defective so that people would know:

 

 

His videos are simply misleading; there is more than 128 bytes onboard the VCS (!) and I used the extra paddle RAM. The game isn't defective he was using a Sega Genesis controller - it pretends to be a paddle as anyone whose tried to use it with the Harmony is well aware. Since the developer is technically inclined and has left the videos up this seems like a lot of determination to kill an awesome game.

 

When I posted a screenshot of the gorgeous artifact colours and shadow and lighting on the main character the developer shared his expertise to let people know it wouldn't be possible with a properly adjusted television set:

 

These technical claims aren't true either; my set is perfectly adjusted with a clean signal and two monster chunks of ferrite on the line; the 4-switch models just show better artifacting than the six switch and the Jr.

 

Boisy Pitre and Bill Loguidice's awesome CoCo book The Colourful History of the Tandy's Underdog Computer describe artifact colours in detail for anyone who is interested in the technique; I used it in all of my 80's video games!

 

I think Atari fans can judge for themselves if the techniques you've described to kill a bad game are being misapplied

[+grips03]

just make sure feedback is constructive, it also helps if it can shared before the game is complete so that adjustments can be made if possible

[+Gemintronic]

 

Games that are created to be offered as commercial products are a different story. One of the reasons that homebrew has become so big is because some see it as a quick way to cash in on the retro gaming fad, and unfortunately, rapid development tools like Batari Basic only make this easier. We all know of the more cynical attempts, such as N.E.R.D.S. and The Last Ninja. As Nathan Strum correctly says in his negative review, those games turned out so badly in part because they were developed in a vacuum, without exposure to constructive feedback. His review was a kind of "feedback" that had to come after the fact, but I think it was an important service, because it helped to steer collectors clear of those particular games.

 

As I've said, feedback can help to improve a game, but sometimes it can (and should!) be used to help kill bad games before anyone unwittingly spends their hard-earned money on them. If a bad game gets nothing but unconditional praise from the community during its development, out of fear that real criticism would hurt the author's feelings, collectors who then pay for it would have a right to feel let down by the community and probably wouldn't be too eager to buy another game, which only hurts the hobby as a whole. Games that are destined to be offered commercially should be held to a higher standard, for everyone's sake.

 

I'd have to disagree with the opinion that batari BASIC enables crap homebrew. The person behind the keyboard enables crap homebrew. You can't blame assembly. You can't blame C. You can't blame the ease of development for a certain mindset that will produce crap.

 

Novices will produce sub-optimal experiences because they are novices. Determination and the help of a great community will turn that novice into a producer of quality work. Lack of feedback and prejudice against modern development tools kills that. batari BASIC enables. period.

[doctorclu]

I think the best advice to give to homebrews is to either download the demos or free roms, or if they are selling the game, your greenbacks in buying the game.

 

Other games I do not support I let move on as something others like, and happy for that at least.

[+Gemintronic]

Maybe there should be a new category of software distribution called:

 

Feedbackware

 

The developer could put out a game in two binaries. For the cost of providing feedback they could give you the second half of the game

[doctorclu]

I like!

 

If you check, that is happening a lot in the Intellivision at least. And in the spirit of that I see that going on in other areas. You see someeone make a binary for download, it gets tried out, and from the feedback more binaries are made.

 

But I like the term "Feedbackware."

[+DZ-Jay]

I'd have to disagree with the opinion that batari BASIC enables crap homebrew. The person behind the keyboard enables crap homebrew. You can't blame assembly. You can't blame C. You can't blame the ease of development for a certain mindset that will produce crap.

 

Novices will produce sub-optimal experiences because they are novices. Determination and the help of a great community will turn that novice into a producer of quality work. Lack of feedback and prejudice against modern development tools kills that. batari BASIC enables. period.

I agree with you, theloon, but jay's point was that better tools lower the barriers to entry. This is by design, of course, but it is a double-edge sword: more people can contribute to the community, and more bad apples can abuse it.

 

That said, you have to take the good with the bad. There's no point in bitching about a larger community attracting negative elements--for the alternative is to remain obscure or undiscovered, where only your close friends and colleagues play your games.

 

To the original point, feedback and reputation are most important. There will always be an element of "buyer beware," but good programmers providing quality games will always rise above the chaff, as long as they request and welcome feedback.

 

dZ.

[+thegoldenband]

I agree with you, theloon, but jay's point was that better tools lower the barriers to entry. This is by design, of course, but it is a double-edge sword: more people can contribute to the community, and more bad apples can abuse it.

 

I'd go a step further -- it's not just better tools that do this (because a good tool can also be very powerful and low-level), but specifically tools that allow users to abstract away some of the fine technical details of a medium, enabling them to work at a more "zoomed-out" level and not sweat the small stuff.

 

Tools like that inherently enable unskilled contributors to put out product -- which is a double-edged sword, just as you say. It opens the door to newcomers who, because they can get something going without endless hours of torture (and having to build their own tools), are stimulated to work harder and learn more. (I'm certainly one of those, at least when it comes to making music on the Atari; I wouldn't have gotten anywhere with pure assembly.)

 

But it also facilitates the creation of poorly-thought-out crap, especially when you combine it with lots of prefabricated items (e.g. score display routines), which users will naturally use, human nature being what it is. And something about that process of abstraction -- not getting one's hands really dirty, not knowing what you're doing at a low level -- can be damaging in the long run, I think.

 

To be clear, all this is true of every field. For example, the advent of GarageBand, and other tools that democratize musicmaking, has inspired lots of people to try their hand at music. Some have put together some great stuff (I've written a few nice songs in GarageBand myself, despite having access to more powerful tools). It's also facilitated a lot of mediocre crap and encouraged a lot of tendencies that I find problematic, e.g. people unwittingly training themselves to think only in terms of loops, or in terms of what GarageBand does well.

 

I personally think it's a good thing that GarageBand exists, just as I think it's a good thing that bB exists, but I don't think it's possible to deny that both of those things enable dilettantes and half-assed work. Of course they do: in a way, that's the whole point of these tools! But the quintessence of dilettantism is a low tolerance for frustration and hard work, combined with a disinterest in learning the fine points of a field -- and as I've said before, those two factors are front and center in the creation of crap.

[+Gemintronic]

I've seen plenty of highly technical crap made by highly technical people. It's myopic to assume tools specifically made to be accessible are the definitive factor in crap.

 

It's more likely that we as programmers assume our favored tool is correct. The language we use and its structure becomes the truth. Making development artificially difficult only narrows homebrew to a specific set of developers.

 

We really need to stop pointing fingers at the tools and focus on how better facilitate a wider development community.

[+DZ-Jay]

I've seen plenty of highly technical crap made by highly technical people. It's myopic to assume tools specifically made to be accessible are the definitive factor in crap.

 

It's more likely that we as programmers assume our favored tool is correct. The language we use and its structure becomes the truth. Making development artificially difficult only narrows homebrew to a specific set of developers.

 

We really need to stop pointing fingers at the tools and focus on how better facilitate a wider development community.

I'm with you, theloon. That's why I said it is pointless to complain about a potential negative side-effect of lowering the barriers, when the benefits are much more pronounced.

 

As you said, crap programmers make crap games, and abusive or greedy people abuse the community.

 

I don't agree that it will ever be the case that collectors or players will stop purchasing quality games because of too much crap. What will happen is that people will become more discriminant on how they spend their money.

 

This is a good thing, really. Moreover, this is where feedback comes in: as a programmer, ask your potential customers, how can I convince you that my game is worth the money, if in fact my reputation is not enough?

 

"Will action screenshots help? How about a video or a single level demo? Will third-party reviews sway you? Tell me how to make it better."

 

After one or two releases, your reputation will play a bigger role.

 

dZ.

[+Gemintronic]

There needs to be more skilled developers contributing to our collective ability to make great games. Fred Quimby (batari BASIC) and DZ-Jay (P-Machinery) should not be a rarity. I'd argue that Gary Kitchen has made a greater impact with his GameMaker than any of his other work combined. Enabling, accessible tools broaden the base of developers. Each new homebrew creator brings his own creativity, viewpoint and insight to a field now dominated by statistics and money. I'll take the beginners, short-sighted, shills and professionals all because the potential is so overwhelmingly profound.

 

On the consumer side we really need to ditch the generation Y passive aggressive behavior. The choice isn't simply "crap" or "zomg great!111!1". The choice is to commit enough effort to provide constructive feedback to something you care about - be it negative or positive.

 

Those who have been around the block need to stop self censoring for fear developers and publishers will walk away. If you feel you cannot currently contribute then help build a different, better community.

[+5-11under]

As you said, crap programmers make crap games, and abusive or greedy people abuse the community.

 

I would say that crap game designers make crap games... although that's probably just semantics.

I consider myself a mediocre to average programmer, but hopefully a somewhat better game designer.

[+Gemintronic]

 

I would say that crap game designers make crap games... although that's probably just semantics.

I consider myself a mediocre to average programmer, but hopefully a somewhat better game designer.

 

This is actually part of my point, too. One can design a crap game whether in assembly or BASIC. Great coding and great games are not necessarily the same. It's the creativity that the game maker expresses - hopefully with the support of the community to hone his craft.

[Der Luchs]

There could be some personal reasons for someone to think the homebrewer only produces crap.

Maybe the homebrewer has written something that makes you angry or the homebrewer is acting like an A*****e.

That could influence your state of view of his Games.

[+Gemintronic]

Did you ever come across a thread on a forum here or there where a homebrewer posts a video of a game they're working on and you think it looks like utter crap yet there's reply after reply from people saying "look's great" "great job keep up the good work!"?

 

..

 

I won't mention by name, but there's a homebrewer that's been turning out games at a rapid clip and every single one of them looks bad. No doubt this person has programming skills above and beyond what I have but I just don't think they get what makes a game fun.

 

Looks like VectorGamer has a particular Vectrex homebrewer in mind. Notice his comments as opposed to the constructive and positive reception overall:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/220332-vectrex-ave-maria/?do=findComment&comment=2897468

 

Sounds like an issue that should have been taken up in private.