I do not understand why AAA would be lumped together in such a soulless bag. Like superhero movies, some are done by the numbers, some are done without inspiration, some without talent, and yet some are brimming with soul, passion and dedication. That outcome is usually defined by their leaders and context; AAA games, blockbuster movies, and large productions in general, by nature don't let most of the individual developers' souls show visibly in the final product, but that soul is very much in there.

"Many older AAA games yet only a few current AAA games" I suspect is more due to rose-tinted glasses and survivor bias. There was plenty of crap back then, and plenty of greatness today.

Because when people say AAA, often they are talking about the cookie-cutter, churn-it-out yearly titles, like FIFA and Madden and Call of Duty.

The other comparison with Hollywood is the unrelenting sequelitis. It's even reached the point now where game developers are planning trilogies from the start, like StarCraft II and Medieval Total War: Warhammer.

When I hear most people say AAA, they tend to mean "big budget" (which usually implies fancy graphics, big musical scores, voice acting, mocap etc -- things that lower budget games can't afford).

Is there any reason to believe this 'soul' you're talking about has to come from the programmers? It's not clear to me that the designers of the game, and the programmers of that design, have any overlap in people -- and just because the programmers get replaced by contractors, it's not clear that the designers do, as well.

In the past games were made less like manufaturies with everybody polishing an itsy-little-bit of the product. In the past, when games were smaller teams were more crossfunctional: programmers also were somewhat designers, and the game manufacturing was less of a process involving silos.

That doesn't really answer his question. In today's world, if you hired passionate designers and outsourced talented (but not necessarily passionate) programmers, wouldn't you still end up with a quality game?

I would argue that having the designer put the "heart and soul" into a game is possible, but not ideal. When an artist or developer is also a/the designer they can make changes and decisions more smoothly to create certain effects.

There is no way a game like the first Portal could have been designed by a game designer, it started as a research project by a developer. Then there are games that do very innovative with the art blending it seamlessly into the design in unconventional ways, like Antechamber. I think there are plenty examples of games that buck the mold too hard for a conventional designer to have been able to make them.

My favorite example is Minecraft and its procedurally generated infinite world, much of the art is in algorithms that create the biomes. Cresting the top of a mountain to see the scenery on the other side for the first time is so simple to do and easy to enjoy in this game. The programmer had to be the designer and the artist to pull this off. I know Notch worked with others but this one facet had to be singular or iterative, not communicated from someone seperate after "designing". This was communicated in code and programmers and artist saw what existed and tried to build something and sharing. There is no good way for a conventional designer to convey the details of an algorithm to build forests and cave systems. It is not a fundamentally unsolvable problem, it is just presently unsolved in my experience.

"if you hired passionate designers and outsourced talented (but not necessarily passionate) programmers, wouldn't you still end up with a quality game?"

Perhaps, for certain types of games. But for many types of games there's this subtle overlap between design and programming that defines how the game "feels" to play.

eg. How do digital/analog sampled inputs exactly map to character movement and camera control.

This is an area where having a small core group that understands the technology at play but also has a handle on the design side of how to implement for "fun" can be a huge difference maker.

From a high level design point of view, most action "platform" games have basically the same controls. But anyone who has played, say, Nintendo's Mario games versus most other platform games realizes there is some special sauce in the "feel" of the character movement that is equal parts design and programming/low-level-implementation that wouldn't get conveyed properly in a higher level outsource-ready design document.

This is what I tried to express. You can get a quality game. But you may not get a game that people will love, will replay to discover nice little things. The game will be like a movie you watch only once. You pay for it. You get a decent product. You are happy, but you won't feel that itch to take a look at it again. Or you may, but the chances are slimmer in my opinion.

Isn't that kind of what happened with Daikatana?

I agree with the parent comment, but also agree that "soul" could come from writing, voice talent, assets, etc. Deus Ex and Mass Effect are two games I can think of that offer an amazing experience, despite the actual programmed game being fairly shallow. They were unique and well written, which was enough.

Indeed, but I find that large games which try to tell stories may be well written, but are not so appealing to me as smaller (often indie) games.

If I want to be told stories I usually prefer books, films. (Though I liked Baldur's Gate for eg. which is an opposite of what I usually prefer)

Games are a "hits business", like movies and music. People mostly have predictable, conventional interests. If you don't want to be a one-hit wonder, you must continue to provide what the audience is demanding.

Many game makers mistakenly conflate any kind of success with an endorsement of their game creation skills and assume it will transfer. If the next product doesn't hit the necessary behavioral hooks, it's going to fail, no matter how well your first or main product was received.

Just as in movies and music, the big players rehash the same stuff over and over again because it sells. The dividends from these formulaic products pay for the small fraction of experimental/non-formulaic ("soulful") projects, which typically lose money.

The newest AAA game I have bought in the past few years was Fallout 4 and even though I bought it in November, I still haven't installed it yet.

A few weeks ago, I started another new game of Carrier Command.

It's still the same game it was more than 25 years ago when I first started playing but I'm not the same gamer that I used to be so this play-through is much different.

I can't imagine that most of today's AAA titles will still be enjoyable in 25 years. Madden or NBA 2K17 aren't going to have people re-playing them. The Fallout Series probably will but most won't. I'm going to be an old guy again but these games don't feel like someone poured their heart and soul into them the way the old ones did.

You're describing exactly what is happening.

Take a look at the release list for the last year, it's sequel sequel sequel.

Once in a blue moon a new IP comes, and people drop their pants like it's the second coming, forgetting that this is how the games industry used to be.

Well, in general this is true of entertainment - the best usually has that "little extra special bit of love" injected into it, and when something is a pet project, it shows, even if the end result isn't good. This happens a lot with movies, and it's probably why the comparisons between games and movies are so common; for larger productions in both mediums, no matter what you do you have to treat it like a somewhat industrial process due to the sheer number of people required for each production. A smaller team can of course have a more personal touch, but this usually means longer release times and more limited resources.

A lot of the time it just really depends on the motivation behind the director. Keep in mind that some of Nintendo's most successful games were from simple observations on the parts of their creator, like Miyamoto watching ants while he was gardening and coming up with the basic concept for Pikmin. Most yearly release games will suffer just because they are yearly release games. Same with yearly release movies.

I was wondering if someone was going to make the comparison to movies as movies are almost entirely crewed by contractors.

The difference might be that the contractors in the film and TV industry are all union.

As a former member of the Cinematographer's Guild (Local 600) I can assure you that the unionization is both culturally strong and plays an important role in workplace safety. Movie sets are dangerous places: explosions, heavy equipment, high powered lights and electrical cords all around...

There was a distinct jump in professionalism (and acknowledgement of safety) when I started working union shoots vs non-union.

I'm sympathetic to the game developers, but unionization has been pretty strong eroded outside of traditionally hazardous occupations.