...by Ethan Fox

Let's go back to that fact I shared up above, the one about the Quest platform outselling Xbox Series consoles in a similar timescale. We know this because of a leak:

In March 2023, a source at Qualcomm (who manufacture the primary chipset for the Quest headsets) said some things that clued people in to that the Quest had sold approximately 20 million headsets at that time. That was ~30 months, meaning that over that time, the Quest sold an average of 667k headsets per month (likely heavily weighted to the first 12 months, but still, just a mean average).

This leak was considered to be reliable, because there was the suggestion that the source was somewhat castigated for what they said.

This data-point isn't widely known among the general public. However, it's very well-known among VR enthusiast and developer circles, because apart from this... To say other data is sparse would be generous.

There are certainly people who want bigger, more elaborate games. So why aren't they getting them, outside of a few tentpole titles like Asgard's Wrath 2 and Assassin's Creed: Nexus?

It might be boring, but outside of small indie and enthusiast projects, what makes games isn't just people, it's money. Investment. And investment requires Forecasting.

Over the decades, game publishers have got pretty good with forecasting. Given, no-one can predict the future, and sometimes they get it wrong... But there are so many games on Steam on many of the popular genres that publishers can tell, with some degree of accuracy, if they make a marketable game, how many copies it might sell.

True forecasting is very involved, factoring in a great deal of market research. You've also got to try and predict not just how things are now, but how they might be in several years.

But before you do all that, any project needs to pass a very basic evaluation of its economics. If it fails this check, the bigger process is pointless.

I'm sure there are tons of different methods for this, but a basic one a developer/publisher might use is this...

First, is Total Addressable Market, which you could call TAM. TAM is the theoretical maximum they could ever sell. Generally they get this by looking at the most successful example close to what they're proposing to make, and finding out how much money it made. So if they're making an MMORPG, it's World of Warcraft. If they're writing a thriller book, it's an average of the top selling thriller books from the last few years.

If it seems weird, even arrogant, to work out TAM, just bear in mind that a theoretical maximum is important... Because if it's low, the whole idea might be a complete waste of time.

Second is Conservative Addressable Market, or CAM. CAM is a low-ball; they look at the sales for as many comparable things as they can, and then find the lower-sellers that are still considered a success (filtering out out-and-out failures, provided you can explain why they failed) and from that, they get a value which is much, much lower than TAM, but a more realistic idea of how many copies they might sell.

From this, they can conclude that, assuming they make a good, desirable, marketable product, they'll sell a number of copies between CAM (low-end) and TAM (high-end).

Next, they figure out their Product Price (you could even call this ARPPU); i.e. the average amount of money each player pays. Might include payments for DLC, etc.

They also factor in how much money they might reduce in a sale, and take a stab at what % of sales come at full price and what % come at sale price. Plus they remove tax and whatever % the platform holder keeps (I think Meta keep 30% of all sales).

After that, the basic formula is simple:

ARPPU x CAM = Conservative Revenue Estimate

... and from that, they can calculate their budget. Estimates vary, but if they want to have a 300% RoI (i.e. spend 1$ to make 3$ back), their Speculative Budget would be 33% of that.

Most companies have a "Person-Month Rate", i.e. the amount of money 1 staff member 'costs' for a given month; they can then use that to work out how much development time that budget buys...

... and that ultimately decides how 'big' the game can be, in terms of features and content.

If it seems a too simple... That's because it is. This is the most basic of forecast models. They're just trying to find out whether the game's even remotely worth making.

Because they need to be sure that they're not going to spend 50m on a game that, even if it's REALLY successful, could only make 25m - as in that case, phenomenal success == bankruptcy!

But I started this article by talking about a killer of VR projects. Have you spotted what it is yet?

Let's say we want to make a game for the Quest platform.

For the sake of argument, let's say it's a sci-fi adventure game, with steampunk environments and weapons, which plays like a mix of Skyrim and Half-Life Alyx.

First, we go to calculate TAM, and we immediately have a problem.

There are stats, given, for how many Quest headsets there are (the aforementioned 20 million), and there's the idea that the Quest 3 has sold over a million headsets...

... but these figures are not totally reliable, and suggesting you could sell 1 copy to every headset is too rudimentary logic, even for a TAM.

The alternative values are that Beat Saber has made >$250m (source) and the two Walking Dead games have made >$100m (source), which are encouraging, but they're practically the only figures we have, and that's dangerous, as a small number of points do not suggest a trend. These numbers are high-end examples (sometimes called 'vanity metrics').

Second problem. We can't calculate CAM properly either.

Because, to do so, we need to see figures for the success of various different VR games, to understand what constitutes a reasonable sell-through. This information is just too sparse.

There is data saying "more than x games have made y million", however this data is now several years old and not really relevant.

If you keep an eye on the VR community, you may have seen some figures... But there's also the problem of numbers which seem positive, but really aren't.

For instance, you could see that many Quest store apps have made over 1 million dollars, and think 'wow'... But bear in mind, if you're paying ~60k a year to developers (that's a number plucked purely out of the air, btw), you're talking at least 5k per developer per month. That's only going to pay 8 people for your 2-year period... And that assumes no extra costs like marketing, which isn't really a fair representation.

AAA game companies have projects that inflate/deflate in terms of staff count, but they might have teams that top out at hundreds of people, and might run for as long as four years.

It's a random example, but the quickest I could find on Google; more than 100 staff were involved in the creation of Dark Souls.

Finally, sale price. There is presently little-to-no conventional wisdom for what proportion of the sales of VR games are made at full price and sale price, and how much players will pay for an experience. If we make a AAA VR game and need to charge $60 for it, will people pay that?

So... Where does this leave us?

What is the killer of bigger VR games?

My belief is that a business case has started to emerge in recent years to make bigger, more fully-featured VR experiences. But that's only a hunch based on incomplete information. That's not to say the VR space isn't volatile; I believe it is. But I also believe that, as something of an "enthusiast sector", that making something genuinely good and innovative would be rewarded.

Unfortunately, due to the reasons mentioned above, this business case is difficult to quantify.

So the killer, then, is a lack of public VR sales & revenue figures.

It presently must be extremely difficult for a developer to approach a publisher or an investor with a VR title. Meta have the biggest platform, but, historically, they've been pretty cagey with their numbers, only releasing the few figures I've mentioned (sometimes involuntarily), because information is power (Meta understand this better than most).

There are sources of figures; aggregator services, but these are expensive to use in and of themselves... And even then, where do they source their numbers? Surveys? On the internet? In the 2020s?!

But this must be harming consumer VR, because it's preventing projects from getting off the ground. Even the most basic questions about forecasting can invite the most dreaded response an investor can hear:

"I don't know."

When talking to investors, they might hear "I don't know", but what they really hear is "I don't want to tell you the figures".

But given the sales of the Quest headset, and Meta's stake, presumably they have some figures that could paint this in a positive light for developers to use?

Developers and publishers can't really fix this. Even if a few developers gave figures, that's probably not enough - and they might be contractually prohibited from doing so.

Meta are currently the market leader in this space, so consumer VR needs to call on them. They've spent years and billions building the Quest platform into the definitive place for VR games.

They don't need to be an open book, but they just need to provide enough information to try and tempt more publishers and investors into the VR arena, in terms of software, particularly games. Because the longer they don't... The more people are going to assume, sight-unseen, that the figures are bad.

And the right time for this is now. New financial year, the Quest 3 is out, Stand-Alone VR has turned a corner. The hardware is capable, now we just need to give the would-be devs of VR's Skyrim or Bloodborne the ammunition they need to fight those boardroom battles.

Your move, Mark.

===

Ethan Fox is a VR enthusiast, indie videogame developer and long-time videogame industry observer, as well as creator of the award-winning Nina Aquila: Legal Eagle videogame series.

Ethan can be hired to consult on VR game design or marketing; click >here< to ask about that.

For those who haven't seen SEED, Flay is a controversial villain who actually caused a media furore in Japan when the series aired; Flay loses her father, blames the Coordinators (SEED's name for genetically modified humans), and the protagonist, Kira Yamato (himself a Coordinator) for his death. With no other means at her disposal, she starts to flirt with Kira, then finally full-on uses sex as a weapon to unseat Kira's emotions, in the hope that doing so will result in him being killed in battle (this isn't subtext, it's text - she literally says words to this effect).

This was partially controversial because while you don't see them get together, there are some scenes with suggestive shadows and silhouettes under bedsheets which make it very obvious that this has happened without needing to show anything - and that clandestine approach is a good creative decision on the part of SEED's creative team, as I think Kira and his friends are ~16 years old.

That being said, Flay's an unusual villain in some ways. Most villains see themselves as the heroes of their own story; but given her turn above, I'm not sure whether or not she sees herself as a hero, or sees herself as content to play the villain - like, after what the world has taken from her, she's fine just watching it all burn so she can dance amid the ashes.

But as the show goes on, she does experience some introspection, and grows beyond her initial experiences. That makes sense as most of the characters in SEED do this; anyone who has lived through the ages of 15-20 can understand that.

I don't think it would've been better. But certainly it would've been different. I'd have to think for a while how it'd work. Most characters in SEED have an analogue in characters from the original MS Gundam, but Flay bucks that trend - Amuro in the original book/show had romantic subplots with Sayla Mass and Matila Ajan, but both of these women were older than Amuro and ultimately Flay is pretty unique.

To clarify, I'm not one of those Gundam fans who hates SEED. Sure, I love the UC, but I'm not gonna lie, Wing was my genesis within the fandom so I'm as likely to watch G-Gundam as 08th MS Team, though I do lean towards the grittier side of the franchise, with War in the Pocket being my favourite entry.

But most relevant to this is that while I enjoyed SEED, I've always been critical of Destiny for some really bizarre plotting that, frankly, kinda left the CE timeline in a mess. Like many fans, with the show having been off the air for nearly two decades, I gave up on the idea the movie might exist literally years ago.

With all that out of the way...

The movie does exist. Finally. And is it good? Bad?

The weird thing is I don't know what to say, and that's weird for a writer.

It's awesome. It's terrible. It's goofy. It's clever. It's idiotic. It's bizarre.

But it's over 2 hours long and, honestly, I was never bored, which I guess is a success?

Perhaps most surprisingly, the movie expends ZERO ENERGY on helping you if you haven't seen the near-100-episodes of CE anime which came before this. Like, if you haven't seen SEED and or Destiny, you are just utterly fucked. The show wheels characters and plot-beats from the prior material in-and-out in a manner I could best call aggressive. I last watched Destiny about ~7 years ago, and I'm a self-admitted Gundam nerd; but even I had to look up a few things on my phone afterwards.

Then, fan-service. Of both kinds. All sorts of things get pulled out of cold storage for the movie... But it works. Though that also stands as a testament to how this is, in the truest sense, a 2004 anime throwback. I actually heard some people in the cinema groaning at some of the Gainax Bouncing going on; but then given the jiggly silhouette in EVERY OPENING TO SEED, frankly it would've been stranger if it had been absent.

I think the movie has loads of problems. Even by CE standards, some of the storytelling was really goofy and dare-I-say-it, "cringe". It recycles probably too much and certainly doesn't stand on its own as a piece of media (though that's not so much a failing as a clear, conscious choice).

Also... It has that "anime movie" thing where the plot feels a bit filler. The first time you have this new guy on the scene with shock-white hair, being all edgelord as he talks about war and destiny and fencing or some other weird metaphor you kinda see the entire movie unfurl before you. If you're a longtime anime fan this isn't so much your first rodeo as your daily commute.

From there, the story takes numerous predictable turns, dips liberally into melodrama, sets up some great Mobile Suit fights, with relatively few surprises (note, however, I'm not saying "no surprises", as there are some, and also, I'm not suggesting it's tedious).

And yet...

It's fun.

It's really, really fun.

That's the crux of all this. That's what really matters. And honestly, when that new theme comes out of the speakers, sounding in perfect key with the types of music that ran through SEED's run, and Kira's onscreen, and he's locking onto a dozen targets and beams are spamming everywhere and everything's exploding in that weird pink way that things in SEED explode...

Have you ever tried to play a videogame from the 90s that you haven't played in years? And do you know how touch-and-go that is?

Gundam Seed FREEDOM is, if I'm to compare it to anything, like that.

But thankfully, it's one of the times when your memories might have been optimistic, but they're not wrong. That game may be a bit crude, a bit rough around the edges, and have more boob and ass jiggle than you recall... But it's good. So good that you find yourself sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of your console, grinning like an absolute loon, until it's 2am and you can no longer feel your feet.

What's needed

Judge Tawny's roll only involves the following lines:

"Order!" - assertive, strong, angry? Shouted in court to quieten proceedings.

"Penalty." - Commanding, assertive. Said to Nina when she is penalised for presenting the wrong evidence.

We need 4 variants of each of the above lines.

"Not guilty." - Assertive, but relieved. Used at the end of each case.

"Guilty." - Assertive, strong. Used as part of the "game over" flow.

We only need one variant of these.

These must be cut up into individual files (ideally in lossless format, 44100Hz/32-bit PCM or higher), recorded on high-quality hardware and cleaned up to a good degree before being delivered. It is preferable that the samples are in stereo. Note that as we're creating this role mainly to allow someone to fill it, we will only actually use the samples if we get a submission that we feel fits the character and hits the necessary level of quality. In terms of style, Judge Tawny is a mature American woman, in her 60s, with a strong, assertive attitude and a commanding demeanour, as one would expect from a judge. She has southern origins (though with a mild accent). She's strong-willed, and not easily intimidated (at one point staring down a literal demon in court, with words to the effect of "you're not the first creature of darkness I've struck down in court and you won't be the last"). She's also somewhat cougarish. We imagine her as having a voice similar to Washu in the ADV Tenchi Muyo dub:

https://youtu.be/pdylnWc7A1s?t=104

... however, we're interested in any other interpretations that satisfy her character.

Terms

The samples in this role are to be featured initially in Nina Aquila: Legal Eagle, Season One, and may go on to feature in other NALE products. You'll be featured in the game's credits as Judge Tawny's VA. This is an unpaid role; we're going to modify the game's scripting to add situations where it would be used, mainly to allow a VA to get an additional credit under their belt.

Although this is no guarantee of future work, you would be considered as the first port-of-call were we to extend Tawny's role in future games to a larger, potentially paid role.

About Tawny

Judge Barbara Tawny is part of Fledge City's judiciary; strictly speaking these are chosen for trials at random from a pool, but as a conceit for the game, the player's trials are always adjudicated by Tawny.

Tawny is well respected, and considered astute, strong-willed and fearless. She's sharp-tongued and makes no apologies for it. Despite that, she is not known to be cruel; she has a caring, if curt, nature, but with her vast courtroom experience, she easily sees through mind games and crude attempts at trickery or obfuscation, and has zero tolerance for such things.

What's needed

Dylan's role only involves producing samples of the following line:

"Hey!" Angry, exclamatory, irritated

We would like 4 variants (the game will randomly choose between them).

These must be cut up into 4, individual files (ideally in lossless format, 44100Hz/32-bit PCM or higher), recorded on high-quality hardware and cleaned up to a good degree before being delivered. It is preferable that the samples are in stereo.

Note that as we're creating this role mainly to allow someone to fill it, we will only actually use the samples if we get a submission that we feel fits the character and hits the necessary level of quality.

In terms of style, we imagine Dylan has having a speaking/shouting voice similar to some of the more well-known English, young, American male voices present in "western boom" era anime, such as was used for the two main characters in Get Backers:

https://youtu.be/fPfUZUQutmE?t=368 (from 06:07)

Terms

The samples in this role are to be featured initially in Nina Aquila: Legal Eagle, Season One, and may go on to feature in other NALE products.

You'll be featured in the game's credits as Dylan's VA, as well as on the website for the game (we will need to know how you wish to be credited, and ideally have a high-res black-and-white face photo for this purpose).

This is an unpaid role; we're going to modify the game's scripting to add situations where it would be used, mainly to allow a VA to get an additional credit under their belt.

Although this is no guarantee of future work, you would be considered as the first port-of-call were we to extend Dylan's role in future games to a larger, potentially paid role.

About Dylan

Dylan's backstory is summarised as follows:

Dylan’s part in NALE starts in Chapter 2, when he arrives at the Aquila office and and begs Nina to represent his friend, Terry Scrubb.

Both Dylan and Terry's earliest memories are of their home, an orphanage, in which they first met. The pair fled the orphanage in their early teens, but soon found themselves in dire circumstances. They spent the next decade doing whatever they could to survive, but gradually drifted apart.

Dylan has told Nina very little about his past, and Nina hasn’t asked. However, from time-to-time, Dylan has revealed himself as having... Unusual... Knowledge and skills.

In terms of his personality, Dylan and Nina form something of a double-act. Whereas Nina is introspective, Dylan is brash, confident and loud. He’s tidy, cleanly and organised, making him an ideal PA. However, though he’s great at the big details, he has a tendency to miss smaller ones.

Finally, Nina has observed that Dylan is fiercely loyal to those who he calls friends... Though, in quiet moments, she wonders what formative experiences drove him to seek out and maintain such strong bonds.

NALE takes place in an alternate universe, though the setting, for dubbing purposes, can be considered as broadly similar to the US, more specifically the Midwest, though Dylan is not originally from the location in which the game takes place. Due to his unusual upbringing as a war-orphan, Dylan does not know his exact age or date-of-birth, but has a "legal" date of birth that would make him approximately 25 years old when he first meets Nina. He is also a biker, but has left that life, seeking more stability.

Here are a few images of the character, to help give an impression of who he is: