My declining interest in modern video games.

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Dhalsim18
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My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby Dhalsim18 » May 4th, 2018, 8:44 pm

Let me just say that I have been playing video games since they have become a thing, and I will be playing them my entire life. However it has occurred to me that my interest has been fading for some time. I remember completely absorbing every issue of Electronic Games magazine, breathlessly turning each page. I would marvel at the ambitious advances with gleeful anticipation that would soon be coming into fruition. I would feverishly observe release dates, counting down the days until their release. I would even frequent Blockbuster in the desperate hope I could acquire the game I wanted to rent.

But things have changed, I am almost completely out of touch with modern games and there is a myriad of reason why. My interest in video games peaked with the PS2 generation, and began to decline with the PS3 generation. At this point consoles were starting to get more computer "esque" in the sense that online multi player was becoming a thing on consoles. While I have never had much of a interest in online multi player, it did peeve me that developers would often forsake the single player campaign in favor of online multi player.

I am also strongly opposed to the fact that downloads are slowly taking over. I do favor downloads in the case of indie developers and optional additional content. However I fear that one day video games in a physical media format will be a thing of the past. That you will only be able to play games if you are online. That "poof" a game can disappear on the whim of the developer, regardless if you paid for it.

Despite video games being incredibily realistic I find myself enjoying them less and less. Many games are simply over doing it with story. Featuring far too many cut scenes and in game interruptions. Am I playing a game or an interactive movie?

Many games are also far too easy. (Thank you Dark Souls). Which is akin to riding a bike with the training wheels on. Or bowling with the gutter guards in place. Always being prompted where to go what to do and how do it. Stop holding my hand! How can I enjoy playing a game when I feel more like a passenger then the driver?

To many of you I can assume that my ramblings sound like the ravings of a crazy old man. I am actually hoping that some of you will point out that I have many cracks in my arguments. Nonetheless I will always love video games.

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scotland
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby scotland » May 4th, 2018, 10:36 pm

Welcome on your first post.

Its been more than 40 years since the Pong days, and video games have grown in all sorts of directions and genres, become common for kids and adults, become pop culture and big business. There is no more reason to love all of video games than to love all movies or all tv shows.

I don't think people apologize for only liking modern games, so no reason to apologize if you prefer the games of 10 years ago - or 20, 30 or 40 years ago. Whether you love the old arcades, or the Switch, PS2, or Jaguar, Speccy, TG16, or 2600 or whatever, you'll probably find people here who applaud and appreciate your enthusiasm for the system or game.

DaHeckIzDat
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby DaHeckIzDat » May 4th, 2018, 11:36 pm

When I took up writing I found myself losing interest in video games as well. Not entirely (not even close!) but where as a kid I could literally do nothing but play video games from the time I got up to the time I went to bed... yeah that desire is long gone. It's still not odd for me to play an hour or so every day before/after work, and I'll still follow my my favorite franchises, investigate new games I want to try, etc, but even so gaming has definitely gone from my #1 pasttime to #2.

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Retro STrife
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby Retro STrife » May 5th, 2018, 12:28 am

Wait a second.. I've heard all this before... is that you VGC???

J/k, but I get the sense that you'll fit in just fine around here. I'm sure most of us can relate. Growing up, I'd check gaming websites daily for all the latest news and was always planning months in advance for what future games I wanted. Nowadays, it's nothing like that. This is the main place I get my gaming news now- if someone doesn't post about it, I don't know about it.

I've also taken some lengthy hiatuses from modern gaming here and there. But over the past year or so, the PS4 has really gotten me interested in it again. It ebbs and flows, but all it takes is one great game to bring you back into the fold.

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Stalvern
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby Stalvern » May 5th, 2018, 12:33 am

Dhalsim18 wrote:To many of you I can assume that my ramblings sound like the ravings of a crazy old man. I am actually hoping that some of you will point out that I have many cracks in my arguments. Nonetheless I will always love video games.

Nah, I'm more or less in the same boat, especially regarding the time frame of your interest's peak and decline. (In fairness, a significant part of it for me is that I ended up with a lot less time and money for video games after I started college in 2012, but that's not the whole story at all, and my interest in new console games hasn't recovered much over the years since.)

The biggest problem is that hardware has just gotten too good. On the 2600, a single programmer could make a really impressive game all on his own, but if you want to do anything substantial with the PS4, you need an army of modelers and animators just to take care of the graphical assets, to say nothing of the audio, let alone the reallly important stuff like the level design or the AI or the engine itself. Games cost as much as movies now, and they have to turn a profit greater than their cost, so they have to be playable by absolutely anybody or risk losing precious market share. This is also where scummy monetization practices like loot boxes come from; the machine needs constant money to keep running. If a game looks good enough and makes enough buyers feel "badass" for pulling off quick-time events, it's good enough for the industry, and if multiplayer can wring out indefinite revenue of its own, so much the better. Of course, this really describes only the worst excesses of the top budget tier of triple-A development, but it's dragged the rest of the industry with it on the same trends - games are increasingly less about active playing and more about passive "experience", and this has been progressing for a while.

At this point, my interest is mainly in the indie stuff on Steam. I do find the Switch very appealing for Nintendo's insistence on playing by their own rules, and I wouldn't mind having a PS4, but the indie market has matured into reaching an excellent balance between bedroom-coder individuality and the polish and scale that only money can buy, and I just don't have the motivation to spend a couple hundred on a current-gen console when I already have plenty of Steam games to get through as it is. (Plus, they're dirt-cheap when they're on sale - which is all the time - although I usually pay full price, to avoid exploiting the developers.)

GTS
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby GTS » May 5th, 2018, 7:28 am

Welcome to the forums. What you are saying is understandable, and I often feel the same. Time becomes more important the older I get, so it's hard to justify playing for long periods of time. The newer games can take a long time to learn, and even longer to complete. Besides, if every adult played video games for extensively, society would fall apart!

Since you wanted them, here's a couple of cracks in your argument. Online gaming CAN be better than offline gaming, especially if you have a group of peers who play the same game (other older gamers). No computer controlled opponent can duplicate the movements and reactions of a real human. It's also nice to have conversations through voicechat with similar-minded people. There's no substitute for the sense of cooperation you get when your team conquers an objective. Of course, there is the darker side of online gaming; the bullies, the racists, and creepy perverts.

Another counterpoint is that people have been making your same argument for decades. You can see it in some of the letters to the editor in old gaming magazine ("I'm not going to buy a Super Nintendo because I have no interest in the newer games"). That doesn't make your argument invalid, it's just a normal way to feel about things. Your current attitude toward modern games may be more about YOU than it is about the actual games.

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ptdebate
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby ptdebate » May 5th, 2018, 8:50 am

Welcome to the forums!

I can understand the sentiment, but there’s really no way to generalize modern games. With legacy-inspired titles like Shovel Knight and Persona 5 drawing in huge audiences, I think we’ll be okay for years to come.

Not to mention the ever-increasing convenience of accessing legacy titles. Consoles like the NES classic have proven that at the very least pure nostalgia, if not desire to actually play the games, can float classic gaming not only as an institution for a few hobbyists but also as a commodity for the masses.

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VideoGameCritic
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby VideoGameCritic » May 5th, 2018, 8:52 am

This guy definitely echoes MANY of the sentiments I've voiced over the years. Although I continue to play modern games I have grown far more cynical with the follow-the-money evolution I've witnessed.

I agree that time is a big deal. When you get older you have less time and in shorter amounts. In the old days you could literally pop in a cartridge to get a quick fix. Now you first need to boot up the console, which has become very PC-like. The load times for the game have not really improved since the PS1, and now you have additional extra headache of game installation. Finally, you're subjected to a bunch of unwanted updates. If your interest in modern gaming is waning, it's understandable! Join the club!

Fortunately Nintendo is helping to reverse this trend. The Switch games are on tiny carts, and while you can't just pop them in and out, I've yet to since through a lengthy installation or been forced to put my console online (no updates!)

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ptdebate
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby ptdebate » May 5th, 2018, 9:12 am

VideoGameCritic wrote:Fortunately Nintendo is helping to reverse this trend. The Switch games are on tiny carts, and while you can't just pop them in and out, I've yet to since through a lengthy installation or been forced to put my console online (no updates!)


It’s funny you say that, because since the Wii U I’ve found Nintendo to be on the worst end of the spectrum with regard to this. Not only were updates required for things like basic system stability and compatibility with new titles, but the download speeds were painfully slow due to Nintendo’s stone age servers. The console doesn’t even support 5G WiFi networks, so unless you are using legacy network standards you’re SOL when it comes to connecting at all.

The Switch is the worst offender. The cart size caps at 32GB, meaning that many games have to offload entire modes onto DLC. Doom, for example, and LA Noire have day one updates the size of which would make the Xbox One blush. And again, same old slow servers. This is not a way forward.

At least with PS4/Xbox One, I can count on any updates to be completed quickly. The Xbox One in particular supports high speed downloads better, at times, than my home PC. 400MB update? Done in 5-10 seconds. On the contrary, I’ve never gotten more than 12Mbps out of a Nintendo console.

Bottom line is, there are no consoles that are not dependent on the internet. The key factor is which ones function the best within this environment.

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VideoGameCritic
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Re: My declining interest in modern video games.

Postby VideoGameCritic » May 5th, 2018, 9:18 am

I was just thinking about how all the major "breakthroughs" of the past two decades have mainly been of benefit to the publisher side:

Transition from carts to discs - less expensive for publishers to produce games
Online requirements - allow publishers to have total control/ownership of your game
Updates - allow publishers to put out a mediocre/unfinished product, knowing they can always patch it later
User profiles - allow publishers to monitor your activity and target you with ads
Mandatory installs - developers no longer have to been efficient with their code
Download-only games - publishers can sell directly to the public
DLC - allow publishers to hold back on content to make an extra buck later

I suspect there are others you could add to this list!
It's very one-sided, with the customer benefit usually touted as some kind of "convenience".


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