PC videos

[Poita]

I know dude don't worry. Colin theorised that such business practices would be illegal but i don't think it is.

yeah i think it's natural that the plans and motivations and strategies that companies let us see are not all there is to it. It's a fact of life.

Anyway when i want GRAW media on any platform it's you i put my trust in these days Brain hehe. You seem to be on fire with the trackage downage. Keep it up ma man.

[Cobblers]

Anyway when i want GRAW media on any platform it's you i put my trust in these days Brain hehe. You seem to be on fire with the trackage downage. Keep it up ma man.

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Who isn't using his GR:AW DeskCom?

[BigOlBrain]

Anyway when i want GRAW media on any platform it's you i put my trust in these days Brain hehe. You seem to be on fire with the trackage downage. Keep it up ma man.

Well I have been really slow at work so ya know....not much else to do.

I'm also on a lot of boards when I'm slow so when I see a new GRAW info posted on those boards I bring it here....both pc and 360 (what little I have seen of pc anyway).

I need a demo for the pc version asap. My gpu will have a hard time for sure but I need to see if I can slide by with it or not.

It played the new Rainbow 6 demo with no problems so I don't know.....man that was way off topic.

[Colin]

I don't thing it's illegl at all for companies to strategise their cross platform and cross title release schedules and marketing, i dont even think it's morally wrong or anyting like that.

May be True But.

It is if its proved neglegent in the way that it does it.

As I said before some of you are saying that Ubisoft are deliberatly ignoring the PC version over the 360 version. This if true would be neglegent, in accordance with Ubisoft financial plans 2005-2006.

It has certain obligations which it is legally required to do.

I don't consider my theory a 'conspiracy theory'. That label is just another way of saying it's 'whacked out thinking'. I think it's just the only thing that makes any sense as to why the PC PR is subdued.

You are saying the PC is being held back on the PR front.

Would this action cause the PC version not to sell so well ??

Lesen the hype lesen the sales.

We were told last week and also by ubisft the 360 sales and pr system has no bearing on the PC version.

Are we now calling game developers and Distributors LIARS.

I dont think so.

The PR schedual is just running the way its meant too.

No hidden agendas etc.

Below is just a couple of examples of IP agreements between Developers and Distributors:

CONTENT ACQUISITION AND RETENTION AGREEMENTS

The initial set of IP agreement any independent developer needs to consider are those between the team members and the developer itself. These sometimes overlooked initial agreements convey the IP rights of those contributing their work to the game to the developer. Under traditional principles of intellectual property law the creator of a "work" owns that work. So, for example, an artist owns the image he creates. If that image is a part of the game, the artist still owns it unless it was done while being paid as an employee. In that case it is considered "work for hire" and is owned by the employer instead. But at the early stage of many projects the team members are not yet employees, they are merely contributing their work to the project in hopes that funding will be obtained to make the game. So, the first IP agreement most independent developers should sign is one with the contributors conveying all right title and interest in the contributed "works" to the developer. Otherwise the developer may not own some of the assets, a serious potential problem later on.

THIRD PARTY IP AGREEMENTS

Many of the software tools used to create the game assets will be licensed from third party software companies. Some, like the license to use the operating systems in the workstations, are pretty straightforward and simple. Others, such as the high-end seat licenses for the graphics and animation tools are more complex. And the ever-increasing reliance on the licensing of third party game engines creates an even more complex set of IP licenses to deal with. If the developer creates its own engine, then it may end up licensing its engine to other developers for use in their games through another IP agreement.

Other licenses with third parties may be subject to extensive and detailed negotiations relate to IP licenses of non-game content that will form the basis for the back story to the game. Though often these licenses are acquired by the publisher and then assigned to the developer as part of the publishing contract. However, at times a developer may enter into an agreement to an IP license relating to a game. A strong third party IP can drive game sales and such an association can be a big help in getting the publisher to fund a game. Moreover, it may be possible to acquire a license to third party IP based on a share of revenue or royalties. These agreements are pretty much one off contracts that are negotiated and custom drafted for each specific deal.

Third party content contributors will have IP agreements is associated with them as well. It is common for developers to use an independent third party source to supply some of the game assets. The most common third party contributors involve sound design and music. Contributions of code into the design are usually accompanied by a "work for hire' type of agreement. Original music incorporated into the game will often be secured with a license agreement.

PUBLISHER RELATED IP AGREEMENTS

Of course, the main IP agreement that an Independent Developer signs is, of course, the Publisher agreement. [The section will not go into a great deal of detail in this here since the IGDA business and legal committee has released and is in the process of updating a White Paper detailing developer publisher agreements. So, those with interest in these agreements can get a great deal of information there [insert link here].] But the developer/publisher agreement actually has several IP agreements associated with it. The first in the process is the mutual Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) that should be executed by both the developer and the publisher prior to the developer presenting its project to the publisher for consideration. If the publisher is willing to sign the game and the developer and publisher come to an agreement as to the basic terms of their relationship, these terms are set out on the second IP agreement between them - the Letter of Intent (LOI). Though not necessary, a LOI can assist in confirming the core agreement terms prior to the entry into the formal agreement without getting too bogged down in the minutia that often fills the more formal final agreement.

MISCELANIOUS IP AGREEMENTS

The final formal developer/publisher agreement is, at its core, all about IP. The IP ownership might be retained by the developer and licensed to the publisher. It could be transferred to the publisher in its entirety. It might revert back to the developer if the project is terminated. Or, the IP may be a licensed property owned by a third party and the publisher agreement will deal with the remaining IP created and associated with the game IP.

If the developer retains ownership of he IP in the game, and the game is a smash hit, there may even be post release IP agreements such as movie, comic or even “action figure†licensing agreements. And then there are the expansion packs and sequels. Now that's something we can all hope for!

Its a minefield isnt it.

a bit more.

Trade Show Demos

Trade Show Demos are required to preview your game to the press and retailers. The press helps create the necessary ‘buzz†to drive initial sales. Previews by retailers establish the initial orders for your game. So, these demos are as important to the developer as they are to the publisher. The Trade Shows also provide an opportunity for the developer's spokespeople to provide interviews with on line and printed media to help promote the game prior to its release.

Trade Show Demos are not the demos that are included on Game magazine CDs. They are often not even fully functional. In early stages a Demo may be comprised only of a few key elements presented at the show by a development team member. At later stages of Development the Show Demos may be a fully functional "hands on" demo that can be played by those previewing the game. In either case, these Show Demos present a huge opportunity to promote the game. But they also require a substantial diversion from the straightforward completion of the game. It is the diversion from the game development that must be taken into account when determining the impact these Show Demos will have on the schedule of milestone deliverables and the cost of development.

It is not uncommon for a publisher to expect the developer to provide several key development team members to accompany the demo. The problem here is that the week or two that it takes to polish the Show Demo and the 4-5 days at the show can cut deeply into the resources available to the development of the game itself. Sure taking a few days off to go to E3 or ECTS sounds like fun. But, in reality, it just means a lot more work for the core members of the development team. It distracts from completing milestones on schedule and, if not properly taken into account when setting the timetable for deliverables in the development contract, can easily throw the development of the game over a month behind schedule. The result, not only can the publisher become upset because the deliverables are late, necessary advances are also delayed resulting in unexpected financial stress on the developer. So, the time necessary to meet these additional requirements, and what that time means in terms of your budget, should be taken into account when estimating completion time for key milestone deliverables and the contract value.

Conclusion

Make sure that as a developer you understand your obligations regarding both the Game Documentation and Trade Show Demos before you sign your development agreement with the publisher. If a publisher presents a developer with a contract that fails to take into account either the Game Documentation or the Trade Show Demos, as some do, it is up to the developer to raise these issues and make sure that they addressed in a realistic manner in the contract. If not, the impact of these two items will result in unforeseen issues when the time or ability to negotiate them has passed.

To round off.

Ubisoft have certain obligations to Grin.Inc.

Standing in the way of the PC versions` Press time is not one of them.

Its called a Schedual.

Colin

[Cobblers]

A marketing schedule?

[Sup]

Here is some fuel to add to the fire. The very same issue of MaxPC also did a Head2Head pitting an X360 against a gaming PC featuring an AMD64 FX-57 and a GF 7800GTX with 512MB of VRAM. The X360 won 2 of the 5 catagories and lost overall to the gaming PC.

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I'm amazed that a PC magazine wouldn't find in favor of the Xbox.

[BigOlBrain]

Here is some fuel to add to the fire. The very same issue of MaxPC also did a Head2Head pitting an X360 against a gaming PC featuring an AMD64 FX-57 and a GF 7800GTX with 512MB of VRAM. The X360 won 2 of the 5 catagories and lost overall to the gaming PC.

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I'm amazed that a PC magazine wouldn't find in favor of the Xbox.

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Yeah, it's not like I would take OXM's (xbox mag) word to heart if they were comparing the two either. I see lots of xbox bashing in pc mags all the time....PCGAMER being one of the worst.

Anyway that's not even what this topic was about and that did nothing but increase the odds of this turning this into a platform war.

Edited February 19, 2006 by BIGOLBRAIN

[JFSebastian]

Ubisoft is and is getting bigger every year, they must be doing something right.

The PR system Ubi uses is tried tested and successful, hence games sales for ther last 6 years. Face it people they are doing a good job on sales.

Some of you dont like the dirtection Ubi is going, lets face it who gives a RA, they sure dont, Our sales are doing fine thanks very much.

Lets try and keep some of this specualation/theory BS out its mostly a load of drivel any way.

Colin

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In regards to the thing about collusive releasing of product, I have been Australasian sales and marketing Manager for one of the biggest Japanese companies in the world for several years, it doesnt need to be legal and it goes on all the time, and if you dont know that then u dont know as much as you seem to be triying to sell people that you do.

I am not sure but i get the feeling that you work for UBI with the "OUR Sales are doing fine" thing. And i understand that most of what I speculate about in this forum is drivel, as much drivel as UBI's delivery date projections actually, but If you do work for them, please let them know that I do understand I dont matter in the big picture, but I think their general business persona sucks BIG TIME, and I just like to come to this forum to vent my frustration to peeps who have some thoughts about this game too. I have never expected anything I post here to make a diff to ubi, but at least maybe GRIN listens to us and thats enough for me.

Kindest regards

JF

Edited February 19, 2006 by JFSebastian

[Poita]

Colin, if you really, truly believe that the marketing departments of game publishers don't decieve the public sometimes then you living in cloud cuckoo land.

You can qoute all the legal stipulations you want but anyone knows that in all forms of life there are ways to get around stuff.

'It's called a schedule'. Is that your only reasoning? Most games thow out tons of screen shots and media sometimes years before release. the magic word 'schedule' doen't explain anything exept that it's another word for 'you don't need to know our reasons'.

How can you be so naive as to just always trust the word of the publishers every time without question. Come on dude, don't be afraid to question.

I posted way before the last release date for GRAW on both platforms that it would never happen and that it would be pushed back. I was right but does that mean i am psychic? No. Do you think UBI didn't know they were gonna push it back till the last moment then suddenly told us as soon as they decided? No way. They knew a ways before but just kept quiet about it. That amounts to deception.

Look, we the game players know and accept that the game game involves a certian amount of bull. We take publishers anouncements about release dates with a pinch of salt exactly cause we don't trust or believe them totally. We just roll our eyes and say 'I'll believe it when i see it on the shelf'. We arn't getting all outraged here as if we have had a crime committed against us. But at the same time we arn't going to believe bull just cause it's fed to us.

There is not one single sensible reason why GRAW PC media hasn't been released except for the one i have laid out. Colin if you are gonna refute my theory then you need to have one to replace it and saying 'let's just trust that the powers that be have their own reaons' isnt gonnan cut it.

You can even sense the restraints on the GRIN guys in their forum comments and dev chats. It's obvious they have gag orders.

In fact i'll use your own argument against you. It's just not hard to grab some footage or gets some up to date screen shots and put them out. It doesn't take away from dev time or anything but it's a desert here as far as the PC GRAW media is concerned. A couple of decent screen shots bunched up with 14 other grain fest shots recently released doesnt make up for it. So either they have a reason for this or it amounts to marketing neglegence. I doubt it's the latter.

Fine, i'll wait for the footage and demo that will be released after March 15 as i predicted but i won't adopt some slavish attidute of absolute trust to everything the marketing guys say.

Give me one good, even half good theory that beats mine dude and i'll be happy to consider it. If not then mine is the only logic that makes any sense.

Edited February 19, 2006 by Poita

[deleyt]

I might agree, but I think I am on safe ground saying that they make more profit per unit sold for console titles than PC ones.

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Although sales on one medium are higher, it doesn't mean another can't still be profitable

[Tinker]

I might agree, but I think I am on safe ground saying that they make more profit per unit sold for console titles than PC ones.

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Although sales on one medium are higher, it doesn't mean another can't still be profitable

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Good point.

[Joseph_Q]

Today is 20 feb....

- no gamplay vids

- only ~30 screenshots

- no demo release date

- Ulf said that they add new thing to Diesel everyday

- Ulf evaded questions about dates during the chat

.... I can smell delay in the air.... :'(

[Tinker]

Unzips sleeping bag, shakes the bugs out!

[WhiteKnight77]

Bo is reading this as I type this, but I do not see a delay for the PC version happening. I am also sure that Bo has a video ready to go when Ubi wants to release one. After all, it is Ubi's decision to release it.

[Lysander]

The very same issue of MaxPC also did a Head2Head pitting an X360 against a gaming PC featuring an AMD64 FX-57 and a GF 7800GTX with 512MB of VRAM.

They compared GRAW on both systems? You mean there is already finished beta version of pc game. Could you give the link of that review?

[Cobblers]

but I do not see a delay for the PC version happening.

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Neither do I, which is why some of us here believe that this is the doings of UBI's marketing team. Why on earth would any company not be releasing more information regards a product which they wish to sell nearly a month before it's release? It does not make sense at all.

I am confident we shall see a release of this game next month. But something wierd is going on when we're still not shown, this close to a release date, even a 20 second video of in game footage!!!

Jeez, PC Gamer reckon this game will get released some time this year!!! So UBI must be very confident that this game will sell via word of mouth as no one else appears to be pushing it for towards the PC gamer. And how many of us are there who are really interested in this game where the word will spread that fast, so first day sales can't be that important to UBI, which leads us on to the XBOX 360 theory, which leads us on to this whole thread...or like others stated, we are in fact looking at a delay, in which case let us know so the dissapointment doesn't get bigger and bigger,

Be more open with your customers and they will deal with hearing bad news and willing to take it without the need for too much flaming. But right now, with the release being so close, the idea of a delay (even for me who's be a strong supporter of UBI/GRIN since GR:AW has been spoken about) would be very hard to take indeed.

[Lysander]

Well, I checked maximumPC site and it looks to me like nvidia/amd fanboysite (kick ass style), they didn`t even mention ati x1900 gpu.

About stats MS sold together about 1.5 mill consoles up to 29. december; and about 250 K unit in north america (or usa, not sure) in january, so with everything else sale is approaching 2 mill.

[Kingkat]

Its quite obvious that the "lack" of PC related material is puzzling. Especially to myself.

Do games that are sold across all the platforms, (PC,XBox, PS2, etc) released at the same time ..?.. do worse than games sold at different times? (CoD2 comes to mind) BF2 also had some time between BF2 and its console game.

Does it confuse purchasers of games if they must choose between PC and Console games?

The less openended content of SP missions, (LD comes to mind) seems to be more focused to console gamers and toward a trend to MP Team vs Team play.(?)

It just is odd that NOTHING has been really advertised yet. They are obviously pushing for the XBox360 stuff.

Are they afraid that the PC "could" outshine the Console game? (either in graphics or game play elements...?) or is it the OTHER way around?

All I know is that over the next six weeks a lot is going to happen. I just wish , like when I got my copy of the Sears Christmas cataloge, I could look at what I wanted..........make endless lists of what I wanted.........................look some more at what I wanted................(until the pages literally wore away from my fingers).............six weeks makes it ....oh just about Thanksgiving......and I am praying that it doesn't turn out to be a real turkey afterall.

[Poita]

I'm glad to see that there are some who agree with me on some of my 'theories'.

The release of '2' screenshots 'padded' out with 14 old ones reveals alot.

We can't for one moment blam GRIN at all though. They are under contract/agreement whatever and they can only do as much as UBI allow.

I'm still waiting to hear any theory other than that UBI have been convinced by MS that it is to their long term advantage not to hype GRAW PC until the Xbox360 is well underway with GRAW360. An 'anti thunder stealing' initiative by Microsoft is the only plausable explanation.

Im quite confident that the 'end of March, 06' release date for GRAW PC will be met though. (unless that is MS decide then need an extension on their 'anti thunder swiping dealy').

[yttocs1966]

Ah, yes the days of the Sears Christmas cataloge. You old fart. LOL

[Sup]

About stats MS sold together about 1.5 mill consoles up to 29. december; and about 250 K unit in north america (or usa, not sure) in january, so with everything else sale is approaching 2 mill.

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Pretty much every unit of the 360 has sold, so far.

[desertranger12]

Ah, yes the days of the Sears Christmas cataloge. You old fart. LOL

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i think they still do that...

[Cutter]

I am not sure but i get the feeling that you work for UBI with the "OUR  Sales are doing fine" thing.

Didn't catch that before, got me wondering now.

[desertranger12]

I am not sure but i get the feeling that you work for UBI with the "OUR  Sales are doing fine" thing.

Didn't catch that before, got me wondering now.

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lol, u might have slipped up there...

do i smell a spy?

[newman]

with the new outpour of 360 vids, and the lack threreof for the PC, does anyone have any predictions as to when the PC vids will start streaming?

ok, now the admins are gettin ready to close this thread, but hold on.

in the 360 vids, we have seen MP, SP, and many different aspects of the 360 game. but i want to know what you think will be put on the PC videos.

i think rhere a couple of options:

1. its another trashy, no good vid like the shaky camera one from a while back

2. its an okay video, but just as youre getting into it, it ends

(now these options are what i think the 1st video will be like, because they will most likely improve in quality as more and more come out)

3. it will be a good video of only one aspect of the game, and will not show anything on the other ascpect of the game, leaving us drooling for more, and holding us over for a little longer.

4 and it may be a great video like the recently released video for the 360 covering all aspects of the single player, and going into some great depth about the game.

just wondering what yall thiunk, and please add to the list

DR12

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This thread is wacky!

Good question though

Single Player

I would like to see a 3 minute video of an engagement in singleplayer that shows tactical play. please not a rock video with fast clips.

Coop

Same as single player.

Multiplayer

anything would be nice ! are there differnt ghost operative models? (like the 360?)

is the other team OPFOR looking?

Maps size?