In Face Off, PC Gamer writers go head to head over an issue affecting PC gaming. Today, Tom and Chris argue about annual releases of AAA games, and whether or not they re bad for gaming.

Tom: YES, it oversaturates the gaming market with unfinished and unoriginal games, warping the perception of gaming as a whole. When you make games for a deadline, the games don t get finished. Plain and simple. It s the reason I don t usually mind when a game is delayed, because the developer has recognized they need more time to finish it. But annual or biennial releases restrict a dev s ability to rethink the amount of time they need. Now, a game being unfinished on launch doesn t hurt gaming on its own, but these games are the ones being heavily marketed and inevitably seen and played by the average joe—not just gamers. Madden, Call of Duty, and Assassin s Creed now represent all of gaming to the mass market, and I wish it was represented better.

Chris Livingston: NO. No one has to buy annual AAA games, but they do, by the millions, which seems to indicate they re happy with them. Happy gamers are good for gaming, even if I personally think they re a little crazy for being happy. Not every gamer out there plays dozens of games a year, and not everyone eats, breathes, and lives gaming in general: I have friends who only buy one or two games a year, usually from an annual series. They don t love them all, but they enjoy them enough to keep coming back. If they re happy, I m happy. Why don t you want my friends to be happy, Tom?

Tom: Because your friends never invite me to any of their parties, Chris. I m not saying that AAA studios releasing big games for a wide audience is a bad thing—I love the idea of more people playing and having fun with games—but can t they vary the experiences they are selling a bit? The same gameplay in a different setting year after year is a poor representation of what games can be, and what I know a AAA budget can achieve. The lack of creativity is nothing more than a money grab, because you can save costs by varying gameplay as little as possible. It s the videogame equivalent of cartoon shows only animating two frames for someone talking. It saves time, but noticeably so.

Chris: I agree, variety is great, and I do wish my friends played more types of games. But you ve got to start somewhere, and as a jumping-off point, AAA games might not be a bad place to start. At the very least, playing a ho-hum shooter might leave someone wanting a bit more, at which point they ll really start looking for other titles. After all, most people s love of cinema doesn t begin with watching quirky indie films or foreign dramas but probably from watching big, popular, not-so-great movies, like 2009 s Fast and Furious. But it might spark their interest and get them looking for something better, until they eventually find a truly remarkable, deeply-nuanced film, like 2011 s Fast Five.

Besides, if CoD didn t come out every year, they might not play anything. I figure playing something might lead to someone eventually playing something else, and something better.

Tom: You don t get Joe Regular into indie films by showing him The Fast and The Furious series, you get him into them by showing him Drive. Look! It s got famous people, high production values, violence and action, but all of this is presented in a unique and interesting manner. That s what annual releases could be doing for gaming; they could offer experiences that a mass market is comfortable with in an evocative way. If CoD wasn t coming out every year, people would still be playing whatever Activision was making instead, because they have the marketing budget and the reach to get their games into as many hands as possible. They just aren t willing to jeapordize that position by doing something risky to make something actually good. Like Furious 7…or, hold on...

Chris: I definitely wish there was a bit more risk-taking and less formula to these games, but even churned-out annual games can wind up being sort of okay. I haven t played many Call of Duty games, and the ones I ve played have been far too linear, follow-the-guy, do-what-the-guy says affairs, but I can t say I didn t enjoy at least some parts of them. I stabbed a dude in the neck while running down the side of a building, and shot a terrorist in the face on a space station. That was cool. Stupid, but cool.

Besides, just because a developer waits years to release the next game in a series doesn t necessarily mean it s been completely rethought. Skyrim, honestly, isn t all that different from Oblivion at its core, and yet it was still good. Is it maybe that your objections come from the fact that you just personally don t enjoy these annual games? If a new Hearthstone came out every year, you wouldn t be a little stoked? If the delay between Half-Life games was only two years instead of infinity years, you wouldn t be down for that? Maybe enormous gulfs of time between games in a series isn t so great for gaming, either.

Tom: I suppose you are right (and that feels icky to type.) My problem might not specifically be with annual releases, but more with what those annual releases have turned into. I would be fine with a new Half-Life game came out every year if each one of them held up to the same standard of quality, but my point is that s impossible. Rigid, publisher mandated timeframes do not breed good games, they breed safe concepts that will be purchased. I guess there isn t anything inherently wrong with that—unless we keep getting glitchy, broken games on release—but my frustration stems from the fact that the developers doing this are some of the only ones who can afford to make large, envelope pushing experiences. And, for the most part, they aren t.

They aren t releasing a new game because they have a great concept for one, even if they sometimes do. They are releasing it because it s expected of them, by the public and their stockholders. Being stuck in that cycle isn t good for anyone and it s degrading how we think about games.

Chris: It is definitely a case of quantity over quality. It s like British TV versus American TV, in a way. With British TV you only get a couple episodes and sometimes years between seasons, but it s almost always better. Sometimes, though, it can be nice to have a ton (or tonne) of something even if it s not quite as well-crafted, for those weekends where you just want some noise and images thrown at you without having to actually think.

Here s at least one perk. AAA developers employ hundreds of people to make their games. Releasing games on an annual basis means they can afford to keep their employees on staff year-round. I think we all groan when we hear about layoffs hitting developers the moment their game is sold, simply because they can t justify the overhead because their next project isn t immediately underway. Or do you prefer when a dev lays off people as soon as their game is released? You hate my friends and you hate jobs.

Tom: I hate a lot of things, not least of which is that you make a pretty good point. Layoffs in the game industry happen far too often.

It might be petty, but I just worry about the long term effect this release cycle will have on the perception of gaming. I don t want the mass market to stop caring about games because all they know is annual rehashes.

Chris: No, that s a valid concern, and probably not one I ve considered until now. It would be great if the world at large didn t only see big annual AAA titles when they took a peek at gaming, but from the outside that s pretty much all that can be seen, and that s probably not good.

How about we bury our differences with a film? There s a wonderful quirky French indie film you should see. It s called La Fast et La Furious.

Tom: Sorry, I've gotta go see Fury Road tonight.

Chris: I think I'll wait for Fury Road 2. It should be out next year.

Neither Treyarch nor Activision said much about Black Ops 3 yesterday, aside from confirming (eventually) that it will in fact be the next Call of Duty game. Activision did say that "new intel" may be released prior to the full reveal on April 26, however, and apparently it wasn't kidding: The source code for the Call of Duty webpage contains a description of the game, which will take place in a "dark, twisted future."

The full bit:

"Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 is the first title for next-gen hardware in the critically acclaimed Black Ops series. Developed by Treyarch, the award-winning creator of the two most-played games in Call of Duty history. Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 deploys players into a dark, twisted future where a new breed of Black Ops soldier emerges and the lines are blurred between our own humanity and the technology we created to stay ahead, in a world where cutting-edge military robotics define warfare. With three unique game modes: Campaign, Multiplayer and Zombies, providing fans with the deepest and most ambitious Call of Duty ever."

It all sounds kind of Deus Ex-y, doesn't it? And as noted by Polygon, recent posts to the Treyarch Facebook page have covered topics including "biohacking," implantable technology, and laser weaponry, all relevant to the sort of future that Black Ops 3 appears set to present.

A new, purportedly-official Black Ops 3 image also came out yesterday, courtesy of Twitter user @ThaTiemsz, featuring a heavily armored soldier mimicking the pose of the guy on the original Black Ops cover in front of the III logo. Its actual officialdom hasn't been confirmed, but it's worth remembering that this whole business began yesterday with the posting of an unattributed teaser by YouTuber TmarTn. (And since we're basically conspiracy-theorizing here anyway, I can't help but notice the excess of Ts in "ThaTiemsz" and "TmarTn." What could it mean?)

It's starting to look very much like the next Call of Duty will be Black Ops 3.

The suggestion that the next Call of Duty will be Black Ops 3 first came to light earlier this week, thanks to a viral marketing effort on the part of Activision. Now we've got this trailer, leaked [Update: posted by, that is, though Activision hasn't confirmed its source] YouTube user TmarTn, and it seems pretty clear: Blops is back!

As Shaun mentioned on Monday, it's not entirely surprising: Treyarch is the Call of Duty studio for 2015, and Treyarch, as we know, does Black Ops. The teaser looks awfully legit, too, and fits with our expectations. It's not official confirmation of Blops 3, but I think it's fair to say we're getting there.

Update 2: Treyarch has all but confirmed that Black Ops 3 is coming, and that the April 26 reveal date is legit. "It feels good to be back," the studio tweeted a few minutes ago, accompanied by an image of the "III" that appeared in the trailer. "It feels even better to be #BackInBlack. Let's do this."

Update 3: And now Activision has nailed it down with a tweet of its own. "It's official—@CallofDuty Black Ops III is coming this year from @Treyarch," it wrote. The tweet also contained a link to an Activision blog post confirming the April 26 reveal date, and hinted that, while the cat is now out of the bag, "new intel" may continue to turn up between now and then.

No need to act surprised, but there's almost certainly gonna be a new Call of Duty game this year. That's not news per se because for all I know, the apocalypse will arrive tomorrow (hopefully after breakfast!), but there's little doubt that the world's most reliable franchise will arrive again this November. The big question is: what sub-brand will it be? Modern Warfare? Advanced Warfare? Ghosts? A return to World War 2?

It looks like we'll see a return to the Black Ops series, if new viral marketing evidence is anything to go by. Activision has sprinkled Snapchat links throughout Black Ops 2 during a recent update, according to the above video by YouTuber Drift0r. The Snapchat link which works like a QR code links to the official Call of Duty Snapchat account which suggests that maybe, just maybe, we'll get an announcement via that social media platform at some point in the future. Could it be true?

It makes sense: Black Ops studio Treyarch is developing Call of Duty in 2015. The big question, after ten years of annual Call of Duty games, is whether it will feature an actual dog. That'd be cool. Perhaps a German Shepherd, with realistic fur. Wouldn't that be something.

Paradox CEO Fredrik Wester and COO Susana Meza Graham discussed the future of the games industry at a media round table last week, focusing particularly on the viability of big-budget game development, the challenges facing an exploding digital market, and why a game about pinging a goat off a trampoline is preferable to the biggest shooter series in the world.

"Competition is really fierce," said Wester. "You have to have an edge in there, and that's why I say 'more Goat Simulator and less Call of Duty' for Paradox, because we need the edge. It's easier to get out and market, it's easier to show what you're doing.

"People are tired of explosions and dubstep music. We've seen it a million times now, like, stop doing it. No more."

Paradox' bosses aren't planning to muscle in on the farmyard animal flap-about genre any time soon, but they are thinking hard about how to stand out in increasingly packed market of small and mid-tier releases. It's not surprising that they'd look favourably on a quickly produced viral hit like Goat Simulator, they've had success building niche games with relatively small teams, and are wary of the one-upmanship that accompanies big-budget blockbuster development. Susana Meza Graham thinks the arms race can't last.

"I think we're going to see a little bit of a scaling back as well. As an industry we've just tried to top each other every single time we release something, it's going to be bigger, better, bigger productions, bigger marketing budgets, whatever, whatever. Then all of a sudden it's released and we still can't meet consumers' expectations because some things don't work maybe as planned, the plans were too ambitious."

 People are tired of explosions and dubstep music. We've seen it a million times now, like, stop doing it. No more.

Assassin's Creed Unity provides a recent example. Wester has another that highlights the sky-high expectations developers and publishers set around their landmark releases.

"One signal there is when Square Enix shipped [Tomb Raider], the latest edition of that, it's like 'it's a new record for Square Enix! Shipping 5.3 million units day one!' And it's still 1.2 million units under their target. Then I feel like 'okay your target is 30 percent more than you've ever done before ever ever ever, and that's your target' There's something that's a bit strange here."

"You can always dream," Susana adds. "And there's reality, and at some point the two need to start meshing together a little bit more. Maybe it's easy to sit here and say—we don't face those realities on a day to day basis—but I just think it's gotten to a point where it's a rollercoaster, it's not going to be able to continue like this."

Paradox has had its own setback recently, cancelling their Norse mythology RPG, Runemaster, to refocus their efforts on other projects. Said projects include the wizardy co-op game, Magicka 2, Cities: Skylines, Hearts of Iron 4 and a new expansion for Europa Universalis IV. They're also publishing Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity, due out next month.