Responsibilities of the Consumer in the Entertainment Industry?

[Kreekakon]

Ok, time for another nice happy discussion thread where you can throw your own two cents around! Been a while since my last one.

So here's a little topic my mind landed on when I was taking the train home today. I'll throw down the bare essentials out here in bold, and elaborate on it a bit later after that:

When it comes to media/entertainment does the consumer have a responsibility to try, and coerce the industry into making what they believe is better work, or is it just fine to let everyone like what they like?

Ok that was the tl;dr version, now comes the elaboration, and I hope to god that it doesn't end up too short to make the tl; dr completely pointless.

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Whenever we buy things in entertainment, be it novels, watching movies, or playing games we'll end up liking some of them, and hating some of them.

Sometimes we'll also use the opportunity to take a look at the respective industry to observe the state it's in. We'll be happy when we see it as we like it. Things get slightly more complicated if we don't like the state of it however.

I'm mostly thinking about this from the perspective of gaming, so I'll mostly be using those as examples primarily.

In the example of Call of Duty, which has been a yearly released game for some time now, is a game that some people deem to be a lackluster game. However it is still immensely popular, and has vast support from its production studio as a result to continue the trend of continued development as is.

Some people will view this trend of lack of innovation as a "plague upon the industry", and desperately are hoping that it changes so that our industry can use these resources, and talent to make more innovative, fresh, and ultimately more engaging titles for us to enjoy.

However, there is the second crowd of people who simply like Call of Duty for what it is, and will continue to buy, and support it each subsequent year it is released. Some people on the internet will go as far as to say "It is casuals like you who are dragging this industry down" to mock the supporters of what they believe is a lackluster series, and allowing it to continue to thrive.

Are these people (Fans of COD) at fault however for liking such a game? Say the naysayers of COD did get through to the publishers, and they did axe the series. There would be some very sad people who liked their COD who now no longer have their fix of the game.

Are we legible to dictate what is good for the industry based on our beliefs on what is correct, and scoff other people who "don't know better"?

That brings me to another part of the discussion regarding the direction of the industry being supported by people who supposedly "don't know better".

TotalBiscut has brought up this notion at least once in my memory, and he says that we should educate people who like "bad games" such as Facebook clicker apps, and the sort. Educate them to discover better games, and be set free from the lie that they were living.

From one point of view this would seem like a horribly elitist thing to say for "bringing the unenlightened to the REAL good games". From another point of view those were objectively bad games, and it really is a decent thing to encourage one to know better about it. How do we draw the line on such a thing?

The main point that I'm trying to get may seem a slight tad different at a glance from what I proposed in the beginning of the thread, but I assure you the core concept of it is the same:

Is it fine to try, and sway consumer bases into what we believe is correct in an industry, or is it just fine to let them continue what they're doing because there is evidently a group of people supporting them to continue doing so? And are these people "wrong" for liking what we view may very well be "objectively bad"?

Leave your thoughts below! I'd really love to hear all of your thoughts on this! Also if anyone has other thoughts regarding the "responsibility of a consumer" that I haven't touched on in this topic, feel free to leave thoughts about that to!

[BAndrew]

I don't get it. Don't get me wrong, but forcing others to like or not like something is fascistic. Let everyone entertain themselves however they want. Why would you care anyway? If people want to play "bad games" (which is a completely subjective view by the way) then what's your problem?

[eliasfrost]

Like Andrew said, whether a game is good or not is entirely subjective and there's no right or wrong way to consume a game based on entertainment value alone.

That said, what you mentioned about TB is not about good or bad games, it's more about educating gamers about bad business practices such as facebook clickers to generate money by exploiting patience, or the early access plague with unfinished, uncertain projects hitting shelves, it's not about the game per say but the way they market the game or try to squeeze money out of you, or charge for unfinished games.

And people who says that the industry lack innovation haven't looked around enough, I can't stress it enough: there are loads of indie games that is breaking new grounds, may it be through entirely new ways to play, narrative, ways to use sound and visual cues etc. The games might not be all that great on their own but the essential thing is that the game have a concept that is amazing and can be reused in other games to great effect, such as the survival genre which have found it's way into other games all over the place.

The AAA market is focused on making money and that's why you don't see a lot of innovation there, the indie scene is where it's at, the reason for that is that the indie developers must innovate to stand out in the crowd of other indie devs and therefore they push the limits of established concepts or make up new things all together. And the AAa market take what the indie devs discover, because they are too afraid to innovate themselves.

[Bridge]

To answer your question BAndrew, the problem is that the free marketplace, which is supposed to function so that good ideas are rewarded with patronage and bad ones ignored, has turned into a machine that arbitrates its ideas so as to perfectly coincide with demand, in other words they are artificially made to appeal to as many people as possible. This isn't how it's supposed to work - art without expression is meaningless. If you pander to the masses by injecting certain superficial surface elements without the internal consistency that (hopefully) comes with ideas that a few people or even one person feels very passionate about, you just defeat the purpose of the idea in the first place. It becomes a temporary amusement, to be discarded as soon as it has been consumed. It has of course always been like this after a certain fashion, but it has become especially catastrophic in this modern age where large corporations hold a monopoly on the market and have the power to determine what is on the marketplace.

It's not impossible to seek out entertainment that veers from the mainstream of course, but the mainstream does consist more or less of an artificial amalgam of the demand of the market which hurts the people to whom it doesn't appeal. The personal touch is often lost, with companies bowing to the market's every will in order to maximize profits. The result is often a mess that may have certain aspects that appeal to people on a superficial level. There might be some people that like action movies, some that like romance, some that like light-hearted comedy, some that don't watch movies unless they end on a good note, some that like mainstream music, etc. Whatever you can think of - and the result is that the majority of movies have all of these aspects. It isn't a concentrated effort, where every element points toward one incontrovertible purpose, it is just a mess of elements with no point. This isn't how commerce is supposed to work, it's been and continues to be deliberately doctored. Only my observations of course.

[BAndrew]

the problem is that the free marketplace, which is supposed to function so that good ideas are rewarded with patronage and bad ones ignored, has turned into a machine that arbitrates its ideas so as to perfectly coincide with demand, in other words they are artificially made to appeal to as many people as possible.

Why can't I see where the problem is? Good ideas are more likely to be rewarded than bad ones (FG is an example of this) and I find it very logical for companies to want to appeal to as many people as possible. If they succeed then there is probably a good reason for it. Also, they don't force people to buy their stuff, they convince them.

[Bridge]

the problem is that the free marketplace, which is supposed to function so that good ideas are rewarded with patronage and bad ones ignored, has turned into a machine that arbitrates its ideas so as to perfectly coincide with demand, in other words they are artificially made to appeal to as many people as possible.

Why can't I see where the problem is? Good ideas are more likely to be rewarded than bad ones (FG is an example of this) and I find it very logical for companies to want to appeal to as many people as possible. If they succeed then there is probably a good reason for it. Also, they don't force people to buy their stuff, they convince them.

Might I ask that you read my post again? In it are counterpoints to all of your comments.

The work itself should be the ultimate reward - the money is only upkeep, an unfortunate prerequisite for future projects, and perhaps an opportunity for expansion. This has been reversed in the corporate world so that the objective is money, and the work of "art" is the means.

[BAndrew]

The work itself should be the ultimate reward - the money is only upkeep, an unfortunate prerequisite for future projects, and perhaps an opportunity for expansion. This has been reversed in the corporate world so that the objective is money, and the work of "art" is the means.

So what? I read this in your post, but you can't blame corporations for wanting to make money. It may be their primary objective, but I don't see a problem with this. If I don't like their product then I won't buy it. It's that simple. I don't care what their goal is. All I can judge is the outcome (product).

[Romulator]

While it may not be directly related, I think that consumers are shaping the market, and pretty much take whatever is thrown at them. With that said though, our next generation consoles I feel are going to raise our expectations greatly.

Game Theory (Matthew Patrick) did a segment on something similar. Might be an okay watch:

[eliasfrost]

the problem is that the free marketplace, which is supposed to function so that good ideas are rewarded with patronage and bad ones ignored, has turned into a machine that arbitrates its ideas so as to perfectly coincide with demand, in other words they are artificially made to appeal to as many people as possible.

Why can't I see where the problem is? Good ideas are more likely to be rewarded than bad ones (FG is an example of this) and I find it very logical for companies to want to appeal to as many people as possible. If they succeed then there is probably a good reason for it. Also, they don't force people to buy their stuff, they convince them.

Might I ask that you read my post again? In it are counterpoints to all of your comments.

The work itself should be the ultimate reward - the money is only upkeep, an unfortunate prerequisite for future projects, and perhaps an opportunity for expansion. This has been reversed in the corporate world so that the objective is money, and the work of "art" is the means.

Actually, one of the reasons why I like the game industry is that developers are more keen on making good games than they are to make money, the publishers are the bad guys in that regard, with restricted creative freedom, not enough time, too narrow development scope and rushed releases. There's a reason why there's an exodus from the AAA market, big name developers are practically fleeing the AAA world to realize their true dreams as developers: to make good games.

The recent Game_Jam fiasco is a great example of how developers (especially indie devs) care far more about their projects than they do about money or image. There's no room for compromises when you're pouring your entire soul into a project that is about artistic integrity and personal goals. Even though the Game_Jam thing was about a reality tv thing going wrong, it shows just how much indie devs care about making games more than anything else.

[BAndrew]

Point is this:
Developers of course don't care so much about the profit (as long as it is ok). They love their job and they want to create the best game possible. That applies to other professions as well. It is the companies that want to maximize profits and you can't really blame them because if they don't make enough money they are going to close.

There's a reason why there's an exodus from the AAA market, big name developers are practically fleeing the AAA world to realize their true dreams as developers: to make good games.

That's the proof that good ideas are rewarded. People are tired of how ridiculous some big name developers are.