I am always amused by comments like this. You have no idea what development practices they follow (neither do I) but it's hilarious to read your tone.
GTA has achieved tremendous success both as an entertaining game and as a business. It's enjoyed by millions of people and generates billions in revenue. As per this article, it has startup problems (which don't seem to actually really hurt the overall product but I agree sound annoying) but the bigger picture is: it's a huge success.
So - Rockstar has nailed it. What exactly is your platform for analyzing/criticizing their processes or even having a shot of understanding what they are? What have you build that anyone uses? (not saying you haven't, but.. have you been involved with anything remotely close to that scale?)
You can be right in many places and still wrong in some, and enjoy enormous success as a result of all you have done well. That does not mean nobody can criticize you for something that you have clearly done wrong.
Successful people and businesses can be wrong. You are not making a case for why those development practices are okay, but are simply appealing to authority.
I and most other customers would argue that 6 minute loading times are atrocious, and if there is an easy fix like this, it makes me lose a lot of respect for the developer who doesn’t fix it. It maybe would even make me avoid them in the future.
A reputation is built over years, but can be lost pretty much instantly. Companies have to continue serving their customers to enjoy ongoing success.
They didn’t make an appeal to authority but an appeal to commercial success, and they’re right on.
The fact that GTAO is so popular should make most HNers rethink what they know about the commercial necessity of optimization vs building a compelling product.
The loading times were not initially that long and then the slow CPU makes a big difference.
This really only goes to show how much you can get away with if you have an outstandingly popular product that has no direct competition. Chances are that your product is not that compelling, if it performs poorly, that will hurt adoption. It will never become outstandingly popular in the first place.
I don’t need to be successful to have a platform to be outraged. It doesn’t matter that it’s Rockstar, if anything, the fact that they’re so successful and couldn’t be bothered to save so many people literal hours of their lives in loading time makes it worse.
GTA is fine ... but the storytelling is meh. Missions keep repeating, and there's little to draw you in. You drive somewhere, somebody gets whacked, you drive back. Rinse and repeat. The makers try compensate with shocking and crass violence and humor, but at some point it just feels kind of juvenile.
Maybe it got better in recent releases, I kind of stopped following after GTA4.
GTA has achieved tremendous success both as an entertaining game and as a business. It's enjoyed by millions of people and generates billions in revenue. As per this article, it has startup problems (which don't seem to actually really hurt the overall product but I agree sound annoying) but the bigger picture is: it's a huge success.
So - Rockstar has nailed it. What exactly is your platform for analyzing/criticizing their processes or even having a shot of understanding what they are? What have you build that anyone uses? (not saying you haven't, but.. have you been involved with anything remotely close to that scale?)
And if not, whence he high horse?