Originally posted by: GradualGames
I decided to re-read your post this morning and I found this. I think this is what SGP wants to discuss. I don't believe I addressed these points in my earlier post, they probably got lost in the surrounding wall of text. Perhaps there's a psychological component to amount of text which makes something seem like a complaint, which clearly this was not.
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I'm trying to imagine what would have happened if I could have never sold Nomolos on cart. My belief is I would have finished it anyway and distributed a free ROM. After all, I started before I was even aware this was possible. I had already begun working on hobby coding projects 3 evenings a week and had had a momentum, and already planned to take 5 years to create Nomolos regardless of the outcome. Powerpak, cartridges and finally sales have been incredibly fun icing on the cake. That icing on the cake did not influence how I made Owlia, except perhaps having felt "encouraged" to do so.
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I read your email this morning and got to thinking before looking at your full post. Thanksfully you brought up the example that I focused on
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There were certainly several clauses in the OP that were written with you specifically in mind . You represent an extreme pole in the community, and I am not quite sure there is anyone like you. That is a compliment by the way, but part of your position is that you began longer ago than most of us. You are unique, not in that you’d do this regardless of the money involved, but that you began at a time when the very idea of putting a game onto a cart was unknown (or mostly unknown). You made a game and then found out that a cart release was a possibility, whereas most of us have seen and been inspired by physical releases and had them firmly in mind. Would as many of us still have made games? Maybe. Is the release the goal? Not necessarily. Does being able to release a game on cart push many people to finish projects? I’d wager a hearty yes! I think that many people would have tinkered with projects and either not finished them or not polished them to the same degree.
Then again, we can draw parallels with ROM releases, though many of the facts have not been established. Questions like, have those increased or declined from the point in time when games could easily be put onto cart? When I say easily I mean by not using donors. The availability of hardware has had an unexplored affect on the community, and has shaped the face of the scene.
That “shape” can have many forms. Even in your case, would Nomolos have seen a physical release if the economics could not have supported it? Would the initial run have been smaller if interest had been less? Would it have been re-released as a regular edition? And would it have been redone/reprogrammed and re-released yet again without economic support?
Not all of these questions can be answered, since we do not know for certain (and cannot know) what the community would look like without that economic backing/interest. Although, it should be noted that games were being made for a decade as ROM-only affairs before The Garage Cart was released and carts got underway. Regardless, I do not think that folks would be building runs of a hundred all at once though if there was not any interest. I certainly do not think that games would be seeing re-releases to the same degree either. What we would likely see is either an on-demand system, or small releases among groups of friends. The shape and face of the community would be radically different, even in cases where there was no economic priority.
Does all of that affect the act of creation? I think to a degree yes, even for someone on the far end of the pole where the act of creation itself would exist apart from any reality of a physical release. The only people who I do not think that it would affect would be those who are intent on ROM-only releases, and who take measures to prohibit repro makers from selling their work (even a “free” game has an effect if it is being sold alongside others). I think that these folks are nearly non-existent at this point, due to things like the NESDEV competition. Many people who have been against the types of releases found here on NA have now joined by contributing to the competition’s physical releases.
All of that to say, I understand what you mean when you say that you would do this apart from economics, but those same economics have come to determine the shape in which your games are released. Even without LEs or re-releases, even a simple one-and-done release is affected by economics. Would that supposed run consist of five, ten, fifty, or a hundred? What mapper would it use if there were not new parts available, or it was not being made with a release in mind? Again, not all questions that can easily be answered since the community has progressed to its current state.
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On the other end of that pole are those who make games solely for economic gain. Their releases are quite obviously shaped by economics, and they exist in the same milieu as those games that are released with them as only an afterthought. These are the face of the community as much as the opposite. Out of the 100+ games on my shelf, I’d guess that less than 10% would have seen a “release” without economic backing. I’d also guess that about 40% would not exist at all if someone had not had economics as the top priority, and that number excludes re-releases. In those cases the project only exists because someone was willing to pay for it, or someone thought that they could profit through a physical release. There are other, less-idealistic motives too, besides economics, but I would tend to lump these in with economic gain since they place something outside the act of creation as the primary motivating factor.
Both ends of the pole have their purposes, but as a buyer I find myself asking several questions before throwing down money these days. Is a game being made solely to make money? Is it being made solely for the act of creation? To what degree is it (always) a combination of both, and to which does it lean? Can an awesome game be made with economic gain as the first and foremost goal? Yes! Can a passion project end up being so-so or not my cup of tea? Sure thing. But it all comes back to, what do I want to support? Do I want to support someone realizing their dream, or do I want to support someone hoping to make a quick buck? Do I even care? I do of course, but there are many that do not, which is perfectly fine (and a reason for this thread, since how else will we know).
All questions to ask and things to consider for those that purchase games based off of more than just the gaming experience. Very few of us, I think, only have A+ titles in our collections. We buy games we like, but we also buy others of varying quality, either to collect or try out. Anybody who buys a limited version when a regular also exists tips us off to this fact, and this is a collecting website so that comes as no surprise. Same too with games that have also been released as ROMs. Why buy something on cart when the ROM is free? Some people like the feel of carts, but many of us also realize that our purchase supports an individual, and that support can help them monetarily or simply in terms of motivation and encouragement.
Many, many things to think about. Thanks for all of the thoughtful replies. The hobby and scene can and will go many directions, but conversations like this can also help steer it into safer or more dangerous harbors. Do we all need to think about these things? No. Can some of us have a decent conversation about them? Thankfully yes. Do our economic decisions as buyers affect things? For certain. The scene is going somewhere regardless, might as well take a look over the bow and see where we’re headed or where we might go, and if you don’t like it, push it where you want it to go with your support.
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Edit: WOW! These are some amazing replies! The entirety of this response was written without reading any of them, and now there is a ton more to think about. Never a bad thing!
