Assassin's Creed is a video game made and published by Ubisoft for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC consoles, Assassins Creed 3 is one of the most highly aniticipated game of the year as the huge franchise continues. Double Fine adventures is lead by Tim Schafer who proposed a Youtube video and began a campaign on Kickstarter in the hope to gain $400,000 from donators to create and bring back the "point and click" game. Having raised more than $3.45 million by the end of the campaign from 87,000 backers on Kickstarter the possibility of a new type of gaming became apparent. Crowd Funding is where people can browse sites like Kickstarter for people who are wanting to develop projects but lack the funds and chose to donate to this project in return for be involved throughout the creation process of the project. The totally opposite methods could possibly cause a big division in the gaming world as people could possibly rebel against the typical method of recieving a finished game and either enjoying it or not, to being involved in the game to create something more to their specification.
Using Assassins Creed 3 (AC3) as an example the publishing process differs completely in comparison to that of Crowd Funding shown through Double Fine Adventure (DFA). With AC3, which took around 3 years to produce, the Publishers decide the genre of the game and the direction it takes, the audience are passive. Kickstarter allows Crowd Funding and so the audience of the game are involved in the process and instead of having a game delivered to them with all decisions made such as the genre, they invest their money and put forward their opinions throughout the production if they have donated and so become active. The target audience of AC3 is already established as it is a franchise, selling 3.5 million units in the first week, but as a global company Ubisoft continually want to increase sales and this is clearly their main aim. DFA simply wants to receive the necessary money to be able to create the “point and click” game for the people who have shown an interest and consistently make it the way they want to and mould the game to their and theirs and their donators preference.
The games AC3 and DFA differ significantly when looking at the Design process. AC3 operates a "closed doors" policy and so the creation of the game is kept very much secret to possibly make the release of the game more anticipated. This closed doors policy can either hinder or benefit the game as the audience are intrigued to find out what the game is about and so eagerly await taster and marketing videos shown on places such as Youtube but ultimately they have no say in the game and how it turns out, they recieve a game that is totally produced is given to them. DFA operates in a totally different way as the audience who have donated to the production of the game are invited to watch taster videos and give their opinions towards things in the game and ultimately, alongside the producers, help to create the game. Ubisoft want to attract a huge audience to create profit and so they incorporate lots of genres into their game to hopefully attract a wider audience, wikipedia quotes "Assassin’s Creed is the next-gen game developed by Ubisoft Montreal that will redefine the action genre..". DFA's aim is to solely create a game to the needs of their donator in their initial campaign video they spoke of how they wanted to create a "point and click" game but were unsure whether there was other people who would appreciate this creation, they arent trying to create a profit they are just wanting to create an appreciated game.
Assassins Creed 3 has the most expensive marketing campaign ever, Assassins Creed 3 has the main purpose to bring Ubisoft and all the people involved in the process of making the game money and with the millions of pounds they spend on marketing for example they need to gain an even wider audience than before to bring back the money and make a profit, as a profit is their ultimate aim. Double Fine Adventure and its creators however do not need to spend a lot of money marketing their game to target a wider audience as this is not their aim, DFA have already accquired their audience with the money they have raised to make the game and this is their audience. Ubisoft's campaign for AC3 was three months long and adverts appeared in newspapers, magazines and on television adverts whereas DFA did produce posters but this was mainly to send as "freebies" for the people who have donated and no obvious marketing is found as they have accquired the audience. Ubisoft's
senior vice president of sales and marketing, Tony Key, said the game (AC3) would enjoy the biggest marketing commitment in
company history, Ubisoft has collaborated with several retail outlets
on pre-order bonuses available through several store chains throughout the
world.
The distribution of AC3 is online or broadband internet, copies of the game will also be found in games retailers such as HMV, online distributors such as Amazon and supermarket stores such as Sainsburys. There are platforms for selling AC3 these platforms, such as Steam (software), Origin, and Xbox Live Marketplace allow the target audience to download the games. DFA will use a different method of distribution as they have a smaller audience and so can use simple methods such as posting the games or emailing which is less costly due to their smaller audience, AC3 has to facilitate a very large amount of sales whereas DFA doesnt have this problem.
As we can see the gaming world now has two totally opposite methods competing as they offer different methods in creating a game and differ significantly regarding priorities. It is clear Ubisoft through the game Assassin's Creed want to sell a high amount of units to retain a high profit which is contrasted against Double Fine adventures who just want to make a high quality product. AC3 has to spend large sums of money on marketing to gain a larger audience and platforms to distribute the game to the large audience they have accquired whereas DFA does not have this problem. DFA does its marketing at the beginning of the project and if successful has gained all the funding, and more, it needs to create the game and so has the audience it needs with no real need to attract a larger audience. The contrasting creation process is where the real divide in gamers will occurr as AC3 and its "closed door" policy gives the audience no input into what goes into the game and the direction it takes, whereas, DFA offers the total opposite with the audience who have shown an interest in the game being involved consistently in the creation process offering their input into decisions. The large contrast between the different methods and the revelation of Crowdfunding made possible from programmes such as Kickstarter could change the way games are made completeley.
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The distribution of AC3 is online or broadband internet, copies of the game will also be found in games retailers such as HMV, online distributors such as Amazon and supermarket stores such as Sainsburys. There are platforms for selling AC3 these platforms, such as Steam (software), Origin, and Xbox Live Marketplace allow the target audience to download the games. DFA will use a different method of distribution as they have a smaller audience and so can use simple methods such as posting the games or emailing which is less costly due to their smaller audience, AC3 has to facilitate a very large amount of sales whereas DFA doesnt have this problem.
As we can see the gaming world now has two totally opposite methods competing as they offer different methods in creating a game and differ significantly regarding priorities. It is clear Ubisoft through the game Assassin's Creed want to sell a high amount of units to retain a high profit which is contrasted against Double Fine adventures who just want to make a high quality product. AC3 has to spend large sums of money on marketing to gain a larger audience and platforms to distribute the game to the large audience they have accquired whereas DFA does not have this problem. DFA does its marketing at the beginning of the project and if successful has gained all the funding, and more, it needs to create the game and so has the audience it needs with no real need to attract a larger audience. The contrasting creation process is where the real divide in gamers will occurr as AC3 and its "closed door" policy gives the audience no input into what goes into the game and the direction it takes, whereas, DFA offers the total opposite with the audience who have shown an interest in the game being involved consistently in the creation process offering their input into decisions. The large contrast between the different methods and the revelation of Crowdfunding made possible from programmes such as Kickstarter could change the way games are made completeley.
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