I used to work for THQ years ago and how it went was this: THQ was a publisher and would come up with a game concept and bid it out to developers, the developers who got the gig would have to meet certain milestones during the process (bug count and severity and features) and if they made those, then it went to standards from console companies to see if the game made those demands. So the stakes were high if you were a developer and wanted to get paid. What is happening now, publishers and buying up dev houses and doing everything themselves to save money and most games are buggy. As long as they meet console standards and its relatively playable, they don't care.