Good stuff. There’s only one problem in his talk: TV, like games got structural changes that pushed a couple of companies like HBO or Showtime to go against the trend of syndication and commercial breaks, creating better shows, right?
Well the example of Breaking Bad falls flat because it’s from AMC, which has commercial breaks and is subject to government and industry regulations (one “fuck” allowed per season for Walter White and his friends).
AMC has been capable of creating better TV (Mad Men, The Walking Dead, Breaking Bad are all critically acclaimed) within classic TV constraints.
How AMC did it? Their history was to broadcast classic films, without commercials. It didn’t work well. They went on full on new IPs, with commercial breaks. Massive success. Also, it took them almost ten years (they started original programming in 2002).
Which means that maybe, you can create better games within F2P constraints, right? Maybe it will take us a decade or more to figure it out.
It will be scary. Games are so much more powerful on the mind than TV ever could be.