Privately-owned companies with no ties to venture capitalists are just plain better than corpos that worry too much about “line go up”.
Facts.
Yes, it really does seem like shareholders ruin everything.
But what does it mean for the studio if line goes down? They still need to worry about if their team will be able to be paid.
You can have deep wells if cash if your profit doesn’t go to shareholders. This can help sustain your team when times are tough.
You don’t need to pay dividends to shareholders if it isn’t in the companies best interest. I don’t see how simply being publicly traded means you can’t hold a cash reserve
Yeah, most public companies hold big cash reserves. Its part of flexibility and long term growth, and the ability to weather downturns and be able to take advantage of opportunities.
Not everything is a rush to the bottom, it’s more of a middle ground. Not saying it won’t end up there, but like everything, it’s not so black and white.
Though I share your shareholders are bad sentiment, it ain’t that simple
Apple has the most cash out of any company in the world and they’re still “giving their profit to shareholders”
BG3 took 6 years to develop and because of all of that time spent on enhancing the quality, it was the most-hyped game ever in 2023, winning all of the awards and making a shitton of money. A corporation that is only focused on quarterly profits would never go for long-term planning like that.
Sure, but they don’t need to worry about the line going up constantly. They can take on longer term projects if they have the cash for it, even if that’s not necessarily the best way to make money in the short term or even overall. They can take time to build trust with consumers instead of shareholders.
The big issue with publicly traded companies is that the line they need to go up isn’t lifetime revenue, it’s quarterly profit. If they consistently make $1 million in profit every quarter, that’s a failure. They need to be making more profit year on year. Even if they’re consistently producing excellent products that make a lot of people happy, and are treating their employees well, that’s not good enough.
