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RE6 Happy Birthday RE6!

I've also seen some re6 haters stating that the game's sales are a failure but according to capcom; the game is a success.
The "RE6 failed" article was goddamn clickbait.
From none other than Jim Sterling himself (which is why I don't like him).
All Capcom said was about the game failing to meet its projected sales.
Whether the game broke even or not is a totally different story.

Anyone who isn't stupid should know that projected sales and recouping costs are two different things.
RE7 failed to meet projected sales twice in a row but managed to recoup its development costs.
 
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RE7 failed to meet projected sales twice in a row but managed to recoup its development costs.

Talking about such things is a bit pointless when RE7 recouped the development costs a month after the release. Since then and until today, the game brings a net profit to developers, and this, in fact, is very good money.

I don't believe that Resident Evil 6 failed, but I do believe that this is a big game, a lot of money was spent on development and everything related to the game, so it will be more profitable for Capcom to release more modest products that will sell several times more than the cost price.
 
Talking about such things is a bit pointless when RE7 recouped the development costs a month after the release.
Recouping early or not, it's still a solid evidence that failing projected sales and recouping are two very different, very separate things.
Back then, haters claim that not meeting projected sales means auto-failure and not profiting forever.
Good thing a lot of RE6 haters were coincidentally RE7 fans, so they shut up about the "failed sales projection" after RE7 failed its own projection twice.

It's actually possible that RE6 recouped its cost from their initial 4.5 million copies shipment.
The only difference is that nobody asked if RE6 recouped, unlike when Capcom was interviewed for RE7.

a lot of money was spent on development
This was brought up a lot but nobody can actually prove that RE6 has an "astronomical budget" that was difficult/impossible to recoup.
When asked, nobody could provide a source, so it's yet another fable that popped out of nowhere.
 
Everything I am about to write is more my personal empirical observations than objective reality or absolute truth.

The horror genre is a niche genre. For example, Alien: Isolation was a rich game by the standards of the genre, but it was not a commercial success enough to satisfy the publisher and launch the series. This is the reason why you, as a publisher, do not want to invest good money in a scary game, so now the indie industry has taken over the development of the genre. We have very few big-budget horror games today, and the cost of developing games is only growing.

As far as I know, photogrammetry is a great compromise between quality and time and expense. When the development of Resident Evil 7 was just beginning, the Director compared this situation to Sam Raimi. He said Sam Raimi shot the classic for little money, so that's what we should focus on.

Of course, this doesn't mean that Resident Evil 7 is a cheap game. No, of course not. But this is a relatively small game for a specific part of the mass audience.

And I believe this also applies to new remakes. More specifically, I believe that the reason why they are re-imagining is because the development strategy has changed.

When you are working on a classic game in the series, you have a small team of artists who can make any background. The geometry of the locations is very simple, so any kind of enemy will fit there, even if it is from the previous game. You don't need to think about contextual animations. Moreover, the combat system is very primitive: if in the old games you could kill crows, if you raised the gun up and did not even hit them, then in the new format you need to take into account the speed of enemies, the complex geometry of locations, and, I think, the player's waste of resources on combat. Moreover, in the classic games, crows, spiders and other enemies were used from the first game, when you need to create them from scratch for the remake. You also don't need to think about hiring and paying a group that works with actors for cutscenes, and then editing this material, making for each camera frame individual lighting in the game. So the old games had different game scenario systems and non-linear elements: they were easy to add, but they served as a way to stretch the game.

When we talk about remakes, these are different games and other difficulties. During the planning stage, employees have to take into account the time and cost of development in order to optimize production. Hence the many compromises, since the game is based on another game that was made differently: for example, the fact that Carlos took Jill to the hospital, so we didn't have a clock tower. The clock tower wasn't even meant to be part of the game, you can see that from the way it's designed. To realize the full volume of the original content, they need to spend a lot more money, and according to many factors, this may not be worth it. Or it might be worth it. We don't know, it's a matter of risks.

I think this is the reason why there will always be a big gap between developers and players if they continue to make remakes. The series is now at the stage where games can be released on an annual basis. They will be of high quality, but small. I believe this also applies to Resident Evil Village, although insiders speculate otherwise.
 
This was brought up a lot but nobody can actually prove that RE6 has an "astronomical budget" that was difficult/impossible to recoup.
When asked, nobody could provide a source, so it's yet another fable that popped out of nowhere.

That's not the point. It is clear that Resident Evil 6 is not Star Citizen or, I don't know, another Shenmue. But this is a big game that is designed for the maximum audience and involves famous actors like Troy Baker.

When the development of Resident Evil 7 was just beginning, the director compared their situation to Sam Raimi. He said Sam Raimi shot the classic for little money (The Evil Dead), so this is what they will do here.

One of the reasons why photogrammetry is used for new games is that it's a great compromise between quality and time and cost. This decision may also be due to the fact that in modern reality, almost no one makes large-budget horror games. There were some cases like Alien: Isolation and The Evil Within, but they didn't make a lot of money. The main function of developing the genre is now taken over by independent developers or small studios.

I also believe this question is about new remakes. I don't think these are bad games, but it is very obvious that with this development strategy, they are not able to realize the full amount of content of the originals on which they are based. So the developers make all sorts of compromises: Carlos brings Jill to the hospital instead of the clock tower, and the dead soldiers from the U.B.C.S. wear the U.S.S. uniform.

Although, of course, it doesn't make much sense to discuss anything when we don't have actual numbers, but I think Capcom is going to release small games on an annual basis. This, of course, does not mean that these games are cheap. They're just small. I think Resident Evil Village won't be very big either, so we're not shown much information about this game, although insiders speculate otherwise.
 
When the development of Resident Evil 7 was just beginning, the director compared their situation to Sam Raimi. He said Sam Raimi shot the classic for little money (The Evil Dead), so this is what they will do here.
I found an RE7 article where Sam Raimi is mentioned but it's not made clear if the director himself made the comparison or it could be the columnist's own thoughts on the matter.
When the interview is done in an "essay" format like this, I make sure to ignore the columnist's own words and only stick to quotes directly from the staff.
People mixing up who said what in these "essay" styled interviews is how you get a lot of misconceptions sometimes (just like that "RE6 failed" article by Jim Sterling).

Is this the article you were talking about or is there another one?
I can't actually say the director himself made the comparison until I see a direct quote from him.
 
These words were quoted by Peter Fabiano at the presentation. The director sits next to him and participates in it:
Uh... sure...

But could you timestamp exactly when the relevant quote(s) are said?
I'm not gonna sit through a 59 minute video for a short quote.
 
Also check 22:56.
There is no direct statement about "using less money".
"Efficiently" could still mean that they have about the same or more budget than RE6 but the funds/resources are used in a more efficient manner, with more yield.

I don't want this to degenerate into a quarrel but my advice is to not misinterpret what the developers say and stick to direct quotes.
Misinterpreting what the developers say into something else is how misconceptions and unwanted quarrels occur in the RE community.
 
"Efficiently" could still mean that they have about the same or more budget than RE6 but the funds/resources are used in a more efficient manner, with more yield.

And how? Photogrammetry is popular because it automates production, takes less time, and does not require you to find an employee with high sculpting skills so that the asset meets a high quality standard.

What's written on the slide is what's happening now: they release games on an annual basis that don't have a lot of content. But these games meet a certain quality standard, because they have effective tools that allow them to optimize such production.

Resident Evil 6 was hand-sculpted, there's a lot of content and a lot of cutscenes, and Troy Baker is playing there. I will never believe that Resident Evil 7 can have a bigger budget, although I will believe that the difference between them is not as fantastic as it may seem to some. I also never said that the reason for the change of direction is related to sales specifically Resident Evil 6. I just think that the strategy of annual release of small games can bring more revenue. Especially for the horror genre, this is the best option.

my advice

If you don't want a quarrel, you choose the wrong tactics for it.
 
And how? Photogrammetry is popular because it automates production, takes less time, and does not require you to find an employee with high sculpting skills so that the asset meets a high quality standard.
According to an article about the RE Engine & photogrammetry, just Nero's jacket (from DMC5) alone costs "as much as a small car".
That probably explains why we're not getting extra costumes that much these days with the RE Engine, unlike how you can unlock several costumes in the original RE3.

So photogrammetry for character models sounds like it costs a whole lot more than what they usually do.
Also, if you stick around the credits for both RE6 & RE7, RE7's outsourcing is slightly longer than RE6.

And let's not forget that unlike how RE6 was built on a ready-made engine (MT Frameworks), the RE Engine was built from scratch for RE7, taking up a portion of its development time.
Wouldn't it cost much less and take even less development time if they just used a ready-made engine?
Making one from scratch can potentially bloat the costs a bit more.

You want to believe that RE7 is some sort of "low cost" game but without actually looking into its development deeper for confirmation.

Combining all the factors above, I am not convinced at all that RE7 is some sort of "low cost" game as you are making it out to be.
 
I'm talking about all the games in the Resident Evil series on this engine and did not take into account the development of tools. Obviously, you need money to create tools.

And I never said it was low-cost games. I said that they are small and this is done in order to match the annual strategy, although they could give the games more time, more resources and make a bigger game.

I'm also well aware of Nero's jacket, but I don't think every character's clothing is ordered from London. At least they don't make such expensive orders. Ethan doesn't wear clothes that can't be found and bought cheap.

There is no difference between you and me now: we use different knowledge and present it through the lens of our own empirical experience. But for some reason you pretend to know more and dig deeper, despite the fact that I have read all these sources, watched the credits of all the games, and even watched 50-minute presentations that you didn't hear about before talking to me. What makes you think I know less than you do? You don't know anything about me.

The problem with the Resident Evil community is not that someone misinterprets something. The problem is that someone thinks that they are interpreting correctly, when we have a huge number of cases in which it is impossible to know for sure.

As I said, we don't have any direct numbers to confirm anything. If that's what you wanted from me, I don't have these sources: I just made a hypothesis based on my observations. If you've worked on games, you know that even model creation and UV mapping are two different processes, and there can be complexity between them. And photogrammetry simplifies even this task, because it models complex objects along with textures for them.

But if hypotheses are a good reason for you to quarrel, then you need to think less about stupid haters who need to be shut up, because it seems to me that this is your main motivation in this topic. Maybe I'm wrong.
 
As I said, we don't have any direct numbers to confirm anything. If that's what you wanted from me, I don't have these sources: I just made a hypothesis based on my observations.
That's the problem here.
No matter how knowledgeable you are, it means nothing if you talk about intangible things that can't be proven.
I usually only talk about things I can link to on the fly.
Like if I wanted to prove that main characters of RE1 used to be all cyborgs in its early stage, I can instantly link to the interview where the scenario writer mentioned that.
If I have no tangible link or sources, I'd either not talk about it or tell the other person that they don't have to take my word for it.

At least you provided sources when asked.
I did watch that 59 minute video before but I don't remember every second of it and needed to be reminded of the "be like Sam Raimi" quote.
I did remember parts like "stick to deadline", etc.
 
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