This last few weeks I have seen more Asset Flip arguments than usual. These arguments have been a lot more heated and personal than I have seen before. From what I saw it came down to different groups having different interpretations of the term “Asset Flip”.
So I was wondering what do you think constitutes as an Asset Flip? If, for example, I kept the graphics of an asset but had my own code at first glance would you call it a flip?
There has been more videos on YouTube this past few weeks about how bad a reputation Unity has gotten due to bad games. Well then, I had to put my own voice on the YouTube-a-tron
Jim sterling invented the term and it quickly caught on, now it seems it has a bit derived from game poorly slapped together with bought assets on an engine to make quick buck, to any game that has a visible bought asset.
Yeh it’s hearing a term and using it without having an understanding of what it should mean. Watching Jim Sterling he deviates from what he sees as a flip in my opinion
I hate to say this and I mean it in a non-demeaning way. But for the sake of argument, just don’t use asset 3d models from Asset Store. That’s the only things that players will care about.
I mean I know not everyone is a 3d artist and I get that. But you can avoid the entire situation by either A) Learning to 3d model, or B) Getting a 3d modeler to make something for you either free/paid.
The first step to solving any problem is admitting you have one. If 1,000 people use the same exact model for their game without any changes whatsoever to make it unique to that game, people will notice this, maybe 8 years ago nobody would have blinked an eye, but as others have stated, ever sense Jim coined the term, consumers are now aware of some of the shady practices that believe it or not, happen more so than not.
Only so many games can have the same exact main character, only so many games can have the same literal exact enemies, so what happens if one of these games become extremely popular (Idk how), but if one did, what then? Some new guy releases a game with the same exact main character, yet is a horrible game, well the original popular game is now going to have a tarnished image because the crap game ruined it because with how ignorant people are, they won’t put two and two together and realize they are two completely separate games. For the same reason Nintendo refuses to let there be any Mario fan games, or Zelda fan games.
I get it, 3d models on the asset store is a nice thing to have for the ones who don’t know how to model, and I can see it to be extremely tempting to just pay for the assets, just keep in mind, you and a million others (Exaggerated) have paid for the same exact asset with maybe only 10% changing anything about it, so in the end, with how consumers are today, they see these things when they become aware of it from people like Jim.
I failed my very first asset store submission, because I used the term “Unity 3D” in a document which was part of the submission. From that moment, every time I hear someone saying “Unity 3D”, I cringe
Unity should add proper terminology to their learning section though.
Yes and no. I think it boils down to proper use of anything. As a main attraction common assets are a bad Idea for obvious reasons. If 2 games have the same vase on a shelf or table in the corner no one really knows or cares. If its something that barely gets noticed anyway, filler for scenery and fits with the theme why not re use it. Film and games have been re using assets for a long time and its not noticeable if done well. The proper use of art assets is a good thing. Gobbing together a halfassed hodgepodge of crap with no input of your own is not. It comes down to how you use it not that you use it.
I hear hear ya on that man… I mean maybe its just me, I notice details like that. Not sure if that’s the developer part of me or the consumer part. I’d side more with developer side, because every time I play a game, I intentionally look for the faults that way I can try and learn how I can make something even better.
It can very expensive to get custom artwork. In the past I have had custom art work, but to be able to afford it, they were non exclusive. Which meant the artist could sell them on the asset store.
I have found that buying art from the asset store and then changing the textures is the best I can hope for.
Yeah it really just depends how you use the assets. Most people don’t even open a texture up in a paint program and just throw it in the game… Example - lets say they are in some apocalyptic scene, yet - orange street cones looking like they were just produced, nice and shiny when they should have at least some sort of weathering on them lol.
It almost sounds like that people like me shouldn’t think of making any games.
I learned the basics of 3d modelling and actually found it to be pretty fun. But the problem is I’m only trying to make a game in my spare time as a hobby, which means I’m the only artist/programmer/writer/etc of my project who can only work one or two days a week.
I’m pretty sure that I’m not the only wannabe game developer who’s stuck in this kind of a situation, and if I’m not mistaken, the success of Unity has something to do with its Asset Store which have made it a lot easier for indie developers like me to achieve their dream of making their own video games.
It’s understandable that seeing the exact same looking player characters in two different games might give people who play them negative impressions. But I don’t think too many people would notice if some backdrop buildings, or some generic NPCs were purchased from Asset Store, unless they play tons of other indie games or specifically trying to find out such similarities between games, so they can proudly announce that the creator is just an abominable ‘asset flipper’ so you shouldn’t waste your time playing their games.
I’d understand if those who have much experience in Unity, or such critics or hardcore gamers who play large number of indie games might become more sensitive to such an issue.
However, I think that being an indie developer means one would make such games that appeal to certain niche in the playerbase, as one cannot compete with AAA games and satisfy everyone.
So, if using store purchased assets would make it look more like a polished game to more number of people than such critics, or hardcore gamers who might notice the origin of the assets, probably it wouldn’t be so bad even for the reputation of the game.
Personally, I wouldn’t care too much about seeing familiar assets in a game, if the game itself is any good. And I’d certainly prefer looking at some professionally made assets to those ugly models that some indie developer who just learned how to use Blender made in his spare time.
What about games that flip their own assets every couple of years, full price, say WoW expansions, perhaps? … or is Blizzard too big to criticise, and one must attack the small developer, the easy prey?
Seems like the internet hasn’t thought this through as usual. This logically means you should disrespect the term Asset Flip, it’s origin and all associated meanings as being pure noise, the sound of stupidity. If it were given sound. A sort of monotonous dull drone that faintly irritates.
I’m kidding, anything to liven up such a dull subject.
@mysticfall : I don’t mean it in a way like that, I mean it’s okay, is it something I’d do on a 3D Model level? No, I’ve got tons of assets, granted none but a few are models (And only grabbed them because they were free when I was Pro user), so why do I have tons of assets? Because I love to learn how they were designed (Such as Editor Tools). If they aren’t closed source and I can actually dive in and learn how it was made - best teaching experience ever. I don’t mean copy-pasting and ripping code. I mean learning the methods as to why things do what, how they were engineered and can they be optimized better within the Unity Environment? I love to take these tools, tear them apart piece by piece (If they interest me), sometimes I buy a tool because it looks cool and never use it lol.
But at the end of the day, by learning the stuff I have, I end up creating my own stuff, so I know the in’s and outs to every single thing in the game, and this includes my art and models. But honestly though, as mentioned - there’s literally nothing wrong with getting 3d assets and such, in fact I encourage others to do so,however - with the way tech is today, there’s a decent free option for everything now practically. There’s really no excuse for putting your foot down and diving right in and learning whatever it is you’re missing. I know all the well the fears of going into Coding, or Art - there’s so many new things that it can become overbearing at times. But I can tell you with 100% certainty - you will feel so much better about the things you create, because they are so personal, you crafted every single pixel, line of code, it’s a work of art. Eh that’s just how I feel lol.
Don’t blame the victim. I think some religious org or whatever had unity.com, but UT finally managed to buy it off them.
Activision in general are pretty bad at this. If you put a multiplayer screenshot of each Modern Warfare game next to each other you won’t be able to tell them apart easily, especially on consoles (all were released during the same console generation).
Outside computer games there is one particular huge company which uses the same assets over and over something ridiculous: Fantasy Flight Games. All of their games in the same universe (Star Wars, Arkham Files, Lord of the Rings etc.) share the same images far too often. A little less now, but buy any base game in the same universe and you’ll basically see no new pictures anywhere going from one to the next. I hope the artists negotiated royalties or a per game contract!
The CoD case is closer to an asset flip though. It’s basically the same game with a few small tweaks, a few extra multiplayer perks and a different single-player campaign (the bulk of the real work). Maybe it’s a good thing, because when they tried to upgrade things drastically they made the buggiest games in the series…
