Valve’s public distancing from Sony hardware is branded foolish
Gearbox president Randy Pitchford has once again fired a series of extraordinary criticisms towards fellow developer Valve, reports suggest.
Pitchford apparently likened Valve’s reluctance to develop for the PS3 to the trivialities of common fanboyism, before going on to imply that the success of Steam has blinded the Washington-based developer with arrogance.
“[Valve VP of marketing] Doug Lombardi had to take a swipe at the PS3 again, and I thought it was foolish,” offered Pitchford when speaking to UK game magazine OPM, as cited by news site AnalogHype.
“I read it the same way I read fanboys,” he added. “Like there's a guy who brought the Sony platform and he's a Sony guy, so he decides he's going to spend a certain percentage of his time bashing Microsoft. And there's a guy on Microsoft doing the same thing. Those guys are childish and narrow minded; It's the same kind of thing.”
Numerous staff at Valve have in the past made criticisms of the PS3’s powerful yet complicated hardware – often as an explanation as to why the studio rarely releases its titles on Sony’s flagship console.
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Pitchford’s newest condemnation of Valve follows his previous claim that Valve’s often-praised Steam service has a ‘conflict of interest.’
Now Pitchford has warned Valve that it shouldn’t lose sight of its reliance on other publishers.
“Valve think their own stuff is the only stuff that matters,” he said, “to the point where they have their own distribution platform.
“It’s like, I don’t care about retail, about Marketplace, or PSN, I’m going to have Steam. It’s cool, it’s good, and they’re doing a good job but at the same time they’re reliant on the rest of the world.
“They had to do that [Left 4 Dead] deal with EA. When I see the L4D ad on the television I don’t see a Valve logo, I see an EA logo, and when I bought it, I bought it at a store.”
i don't disagree with what this guy's saying, as a PS3 owner i'd love to see a Valve title on the PS3 (and not just a half-arsed port).
Valve have been a progressive force in the industry and it's a shame to see them shun what Naughty Dog have shown is a great piece of hardware when you use it properly. that said they've not made a bad game, which is more than came be said for most devs, and it's starting to sound more like sour grapes from this guy.
at first i was like "OK maybe he has a point" now i'm like "yeah whatever dude". perhaps he should shut up and make good PS3 games.
So why isn't it Pitchford attacks Insomniac's ‘fanboy’ X-BOX 360 neglect?
I believe that Insomniac are part owned by Sony aren't they?
Also they never bash the platform. Two totally different situations I believe.
Pitchford doesn't target them as it's more edgy and controversial to target Valve, which garners more PR.
I have no particular love for Valve but having worked with the PS3 I can see why one might avoid using it. Perhaps it's their belief that if enough big companies shy away from the PS3 over development issues it will force Sony to readdress the level of support and documentation provided.
Insomniac has an exclusive partnership with Sony, for the moment at least. Valve - at least as far as we know - doesn't have any such ties to a particular company. So it's 'expected' they'll support multiple platforms. Their reasoning for not supporting PS3 has bordered on the fanboyish, I think. Throwing your toys out of the pram over documentation, for example, seems silly when you're talking about 40% of the HD console market - and growing.
No one expects Bungie to support PS3, because they have an exclusive relationship with MS. But Valve isn't the same as Bungie, or Insomniac.
You can't underestimate how important it is to have a simple API for developers to get to grips with and good documentation and support.
Go back 15 years and we had exactly the same situation with Sony and Sega. Sega had a complicated parallel processor system which was really difficult for developers to work with. Sony were at the time one of the first platform holders to make their system as easy as possible. Sonys enabled developers to use a familiar language (C++) whereas to develop for the Sega platform you had to be expert in assembly language.
This time around we have Sony offering an overly-complex system with inadequate support, and we have Microsoft offering what is essentially a PC in a console. There are thousands upon thousands of programmers out there who are very comfortable working with DirectX on a Microsoft platform, so naturally they will gravitate towards what they're familiar with.
Whatever you think about Microsoft, nobody can deny that they are the best in the business when it comes to providing developer tools and support. That's one thing they are *very* good at, and that's why developers favour them.
He says this as his own recent game (Borderlands) stands as Steam's top seller this week.
Way to go, Randy. Make yourself look like an ass more.
Valve can do what they like, it's there loss and the other developers gain.
Valve are also a developer, any a lot of multi format titles are made by separate developers.
Valve are just sticking at what they're good at.
But I would ike to know why EA has never made a L4D game in-house ALA The Orange Box.
