That is awesome. Glad she is making her own studio was worried after hitting two walls in a row in AAA development she might throw in the towel on gaming forever.
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Amy Hennig has started indie studio, staying indie, aiming for 6-15 staff, thinking about VR games
- Thread starter Nirolak
- Start date
Taking the Kevin Levine approach I see. I hope it works out for her, I'll give what ever she does a try.
A company that has a history of shuttering subsidiary studios if one game performs poorly cares if they lose talent? Yeah okay.
Fuck me, she was a writer on the Legacy of Kain games? How the hell did she go from that to Uncharted? I was always confused when people praised her writing ability because I only knew about her work on Uncharted. This changes everything, though I'm not going to get excited yet just in case whatever she works on ends up being a VR game.
All for more VR myself. I find myself playing more and more of it as the games keep getting better.
People doing the old man yelling at clouds routine. Developers, seem to find VR an incredibly interesting platform to work with, full of possibilities. The way you can engage players, interaction capabilities and overall immersion has immense possibilites. It's a new medium, with new techniques being developed all the time. There's so much to learn, to try out etc. There's much more room to grow in VR than other gaming areas right now due to it's nature. (Well mobile can as well, but precedent has been largely set there due to the userbases expectations. Though VR will play an important part on mobile I think too).
Sure, it needs work, but the potential is there and I think most the industry sees it, even if many players don't. But in time, I think they trust that you will. Stop wishing it will go away, because it's not going anywhere. Just like 3D graphics didn't go anywhere despite people's misgivings about that.
Sure, it needs work, but the potential is there and I think most the industry sees it, even if many players don't. But in time, I think they trust that you will. Stop wishing it will go away, because it's not going anywhere. Just like 3D graphics didn't go anywhere despite people's misgivings about that.
Awesome. We need more visionaries behind VR tech anyways. Excited to see what her team comes up with.
Unfortunate to hear about her fall from grace. Hopefully she comes back to the triple A scene vs making little crappy vr experiences .
Wasted Talent.
But if any one could make a killer VR app, it would be someone as talented as her.
But if any one could make a killer VR app, it would be someone as talented as her.
Hm, I always thought the writing on Uncharted 1-3 were exceptional at the time. Still holds up well today.
It sounds like she wants to try VR immersive sims so unless the next LoK will be that, which idk if that's what the hardcore fans want, I don't see it happening.
I have faith. VR is still waiting for what Kings Quest was for adventure games in the 80's. Someone like her could definitely pull it off.
Unfortunately, it probably becomes somewhat of a balancing act for most people because what he or she wants may not be what the market wants in a sustainable quantity, and in this case, there would be 9-13 other people's employment that need to be taken into consideration.
If I was Sony out of goodwill I would throw some money at her and ask that the next game debuts on PlayStation but let her make whatever.
Not a ton of money, but like $5-$10M
Not a ton of money, but like $5-$10M
Look's like a pretty good gig if she manage to catch interest from one of the platform holder like Oculus or Sony
Writing is more than just the story. Uncharted's praise came for the characters and the banter between them.
I don't think she's rich enough to keep a AAA studio afloat on her own, and taking external investment would mean giving up creative freedom which she doesn't seem to be very interested in.
Since she's known mostly as a writer, it would be cool of she work on something story heavy that didn't require a huge team to make. Some classic adventure game, visual novel, or something like Ace Attorney
For indie studios? There's plenty of it. Budget Cuts and Beat Saber recently released and managed to be profitable several times over.
There's not that much profit in VR, but that isn't the same thing. If you want to get a small studio rolling, a check from Oculus is probably a good way to do it.
I had no idea she worked on this. I loved this game, even though most people hate it. It was really different at the time. It left off on a pseudo cliffhanger, so now I'm going to start campaigning for a VR sequel.
The only solace I have is that it seems to have at least somewhat abated the hate/fear common enemy away from PC. So PC related discourse has been slowly...very slowly. Getting better. But we're still a ironically regressive site when it comes to options of play.
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I'm not super interested in VR at the moment, but with Déraciné and a possible Amy Hennig written/directed title, that may start to change.
Agreed! It's giving them the opportunity to work in a new medium, explore its possibilities and to help lay the groundwork for how to design games in that medium. I can imagine that's more interesting from a creative standpoint than working on another streamlined triple A title that has to appeal to as broad an audience as possible.
Sweet, I love her work especially Uncharted. Looking forward to seeing what VR goodness comes out from her team.
Eh, a waste....
But at the same time I can't blame someone for not jumping back into the soul sucking AAA rat race after dealing with things souring at Naughty Dog and then literally wasting years of her life and nothing to show for it with EA.
But at the same time I can't blame someone for not jumping back into the soul sucking AAA rat race after dealing with things souring at Naughty Dog and then literally wasting years of her life and nothing to show for it with EA.
It's, prepare for an average kickstarter project campaing full of unkept promises and people backing because of project leader's name who thinks can afford something similar they made before under a big company like SEGA, Konami, CAPCOM, Sony....
She is great telling stories but her great projects are under astonishing cinematic graphics -like Naughty Dog-, and as she said make a competitive single player game is very expensive, VR? good luck with that.
VR sounds great to me. Something well-written using that tech could be awesome. And those saying there's no money to be made, why do you think so many Indies are currently making VR games? Now, I agree there is no money to be made if you're some 200 employee studio making a AAA VR game. But you have a sector of the market that is a fair few million strong now and thirsty as fuck for new, good content. There may not be many of them total, but most of them buy even the middling content that is released so I'd imagine attatchment rates are high. I think this is a good fit for someone who is clearly done with the AAA industry.
They treat Hennig's output as a commodity. Hell, these certain hobbyists treat gaming as a commodity, just like the casuals.