Welcome to your own Game Dev Studio! How will you run your own offices and ascend to greatness in the gaming industry?
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(This review is part of an upcoming list I'm working on ranking games about making games from best to worst. Enjoy!)
Game Dev Studio realizes something that most games on this list do not: the creative process is anything but a power fantasy.
I enjoy games like Game Dev Tycoon because of their wish fulfillment factor. I like games, I'd love to make them, and I wish it were easy. But it's not. In fact, games are actually harder to make than movies. Any hack can pick up a camera and make a decent short film if the script they're working with is good enough. To develop games, you have to know significantly more about what you're getting yourself into.
In Game Dev Studio, you can choose to take the path of the solo developer. But a crushing reality hits you as soon as you decide to go down that path: you are not a living multi-tool; you are a person with vulnerabilities and strengths in different areas. If you want to be able to do things "right," you have to be part of a team. Teams cost money, though. You have to take care of everyone that's working for you, or they'll all leave you in the dust. If your company goes under, they're the first ones to jump ship. They lose motivation over time and will occasionally quit working out of no obligation but to keep themselves working on things that they like. And then, when it comes to the games themselves, those are fragile, too. You can have a total gem on your hands that'll flop if you fail to market it enough. They can take years to create, and technology will not wait for you. And on top of that, they can be pretty expensive to make. If you're not dealing with development costs, you're handing the game over to QA enough for it to take millions to recoup your development fees.
Game Dev Studio is a fairly intimate portrayal of how games are made and makes you consider the value of the artist in a way in which few games in this subgenre do. It's near the top of this list for this reason alone. It's far from a perfect game, however, and if the developer who made it ever decided to go back for a sequel, there's a lot he could improve on. Once you know your way around everything, Game Dev Studio becomes incredibly easy to cheese. The idea of employees being people with flaws and strengths isn't explored to the extent that it could have been, and they never have serious conflicts with each other. Past a certain point, the game loses a lot of its challenge and does become the power fantasy it's trying so hard to condemn. The game also has many features that either don't feel polished enough or feel outright pointless in execution. Conventions are good while you're starting out but practically pointless by the time you've reached the endgame. Bribing reviewers is funny in concept but doesn't do much to say anything about the way games are reviewed and rarely changes as the years go on. You can also slander and sue the shit out of your rivals, which I've almost never done because the game does nothing to force you in that direction. You can straight up ignore all of the companies trying to poach your employees with almost no repercussions.
Other than that, though, Game Dev Studio is an admirable effort that gets very close to perfection within this subgenre. If it were named anything else, I could see the game having seen more success than it did when it first came out. But hindsight is 20/20, and it's not hard to see why the game is so close in title to Game Dev Tycoon when it's essentially a statement against that game.
Game Dev Studio realizes something that most games on this list do not: the creative process is anything but a power fantasy.
I enjoy games like Game Dev Tycoon because of their wish fulfillment factor. I like games, I'd love to make them, and I wish it were easy. But it's not. In fact, games are actually harder to make than movies. Any hack can pick up a camera and make a decent short film if the script they're working with is good enough. To develop games, you have to know significantly more about what you're getting yourself into.
In Game Dev Studio, you can choose to take the path of the solo developer. But a crushing reality hits you as soon as you decide to go down that path: you are not a living multi-tool; you are a person with vulnerabilities and strengths in different areas. If you want to be able to do things "right," you have to be part of a team. Teams cost money, though. You have to take care of everyone that's working for you, or they'll all leave you in the dust. If your company goes under, they're the first ones to jump ship. They lose motivation over time and will occasionally quit working out of no obligation but to keep themselves working on things that they like. And then, when it comes to the games themselves, those are fragile, too. You can have a total gem on your hands that'll flop if you fail to market it enough. They can take years to create, and technology will not wait for you. And on top of that, they can be pretty expensive to make. If you're not dealing with development costs, you're handing the game over to QA enough for it to take millions to recoup your development fees.
Game Dev Studio is a fairly intimate portrayal of how games are made and makes you consider the value of the artist in a way in which few games in this subgenre do. It's near the top of this list for this reason alone. It's far from a perfect game, however, and if the developer who made it ever decided to go back for a sequel, there's a lot he could improve on. Once you know your way around everything, Game Dev Studio becomes incredibly easy to cheese. The idea of employees being people with flaws and strengths isn't explored to the extent that it could have been, and they never have serious conflicts with each other. Past a certain point, the game loses a lot of its challenge and does become the power fantasy it's trying so hard to condemn. The game also has many features that either don't feel polished enough or feel outright pointless in execution. Conventions are good while you're starting out but practically pointless by the time you've reached the endgame. Bribing reviewers is funny in concept but doesn't do much to say anything about the way games are reviewed and rarely changes as the years go on. You can also slander and sue the shit out of your rivals, which I've almost never done because the game does nothing to force you in that direction. You can straight up ignore all of the companies trying to poach your employees with almost no repercussions.
Other than that, though, Game Dev Studio is an admirable effort that gets very close to perfection within this subgenre. If it were named anything else, I could see the game having seen more success than it did when it first came out. But hindsight is 20/20, and it's not hard to see why the game is so close in title to Game Dev Tycoon when it's essentially a statement against that game.