Sega and Gearbox Software are the defendants in a lawsuit claiming the two companies falsely advertised Aliens: Colonial Marines with unrepresentative trade show demonstrations.
If you don't know anything about this; basically the promotional material wasn't representative of the actual product, and the actual product turned out to be a big steaming pile of **** which very few people liked. Oh, and apparently Gearbox outsourced the game to another studio and spent some (read: A lot) of the publisher's (Sega) money to fund their popular hit Borderlands 2.
I hope this lawsuit destroys Gearbox, they ruined both Aliens and Duke Nukem, to focus on, what - Borderlands? I enjoyed the first Borderlands but the novelty got old quickly. I can't believe they prioritised it over Aliens..
To be fair, Duke Nukem wasn't their fault really; it was vaporware for a good many years and it was never going to live up to expectations, even though the game itself wasn't very impressive anyway.
I personally hope it doesn't destroy them; they made good expansions to Half Life and I really enjoyed Borderlands 2. I think for them as a business their choice to focus on the latter was the best decision for them to make, but needless to say I don't agree with it or appreciate their dishonesty.
Speaking as someone trying to develop a game right now, it radically shifts your thought process on games development and what it really means to develop a game. It's not what you expect at all. I can't really formulate a coherent point with all these ideas but I reckon I would done the same thing in general. In the end money drives the industry and if you knew how few games turn a profit you would understand why publishers and developers do what they do.
Duke Nukem Forever didn't turn a profit because it was poorly made. Aliens: Colonial Marines didn't turn a profit because it too was poorly made and like all video games based on movies, the devs tried to coast by on the reputation of the film it's based on rather than focusing on making the game good. Poorly made games simply don't sell. With a few exceptions, nobody wants to watch spectacularly bad movies or buy spectacularly bad games. And why should they?
What I find both intriguing and appalling is that there are relatively few GOOD games being made anymore, and most studios have fallen into the habit of misdirecting the blame elsewhere when a game flops. When a game flops, they try to wash their hands of it by pointing fingers at their favourite scapegoat, file sharing. If a game doesn't turn out to be an exploding success, all we hear is UGH WE COULD HAVE MADE A TRILLION DOLLARS OFF THIS GAME IF IT WEREN'T FOR THOSE PIRATES MAN. LET'S HAVE OUR LOBBYISTS WHINE TO CONGRESS ABOUT IT SO THEY PASS THIS INTERNET BILL. The sad thing is, they'll eventually get their way and then I predict good games will go the way of the dodo since they won't even have to try anymore.
