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An observation on the gaming industry!
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14-03-2012 6:22pm#1It is with growing unease that I write this post but I fear that the glory days of gaming are finally coming to an end! Don't worry, the gaming industry is growing at an alarming rate, so have no fear, you'll always have your xbox fix.
However, what I am referring to is how the gaming industry is focusing more at the general public than actual gamers these days. For example, Mass Effect 3 and Skyrim, both role playing games within strong franchises that have been dumbed down in order to appeal to the mass public, instead of it's original solid fan base!
Sadly, this is the way the industry is progressing! As the gaming cash cow fattens each year with increased revenue and both "Hollywood" and the music industry are suffering from pirating/loss of revenue, major investors probably look towards console gaming as the one place where copyright infringement can be actively monitored and controlled... and ultimately avoided.
Add to this the cost of actually making a major title like MW3 or BF3 ($25-$60 million), how can a small studio with great ideas possibly expect to keep up with the likes of EA and it's expectant shareholders? Even if a small studio managed to get backing and make a successful and unique game, they'll be forced to make it even more successful for the follow up and ultimately, by appealing more to the mass market!
My hunch is that the convergence of movies and gaming is getting closer and closer. Soon, you'll buy a game, sit back and watch an endless stream of cut scenes with very little interaction. This may be brilliant for those new to the gaming culture but it leaves a sour taste in the mouth of any long time enthusiast
My fear is that the glory days of gaming are coming to an end and all we'll have to look forward to is mediocrity. We have already witnessed the huge yearly title updates to both first person shooters and sports games and from their strong sales, it seems that the general consumer seems to be fine with this idea of tweaking a game slightly and reselling it twelve months later to a frenzied customer base.
I shudder at the thought that the games industry has become a victim of it's own success. When corporate suits suddenly make the decisions of how an RPG game should end and not the games own developers, who end up distancing themselves from it.
Perhaps it's time for us old timers to open our curtains and walk out into the sunlight... it won't be so bad... most of the public will only be entering their gaming caves now so we should have the real world all to ourselves
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I'm not sure the gaming industry has ever been anything but exactly what you fear ...
If you go right back to the early arcade days or the home computing boom in the early 80's.. companies came out with a new concept, had comercial success and kept churning out the same concept dumbed down a little to appeal to a wider audience.. Companies like Ultimate, Ocean etc churned out the same games over and over almost afraid to try something new in case it was a commercial failure and eventually became commercial failures themselves. When you grow so big, anything less than the previous best is seen as failiure in terms of sales.
BUT (and this is the BIG But
) right behind those companies there were companies who didn't need to have mega sales to exist (as they were smaller), and they became the big players in the industry.. and the cycle began again..
There are literally hundred of new gaming companies who have come into existance in the last few years.. and they don't need to "beat WOW" to be a great success.. In 10/20 years they may be the current EA/Bioware etc, and the cycle will begin again.0 -
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This really annoys and your totally right in general. Most friends of mine play fifa and as soon as the newest one is out they have to rush out and buy it, I,ll ask them why they do it and they will tell me it has this or that and that its a thousand times better than what they played yesterday but its not, all they really do is update the teams and add a few tweaks but its fundamentally the exact same game, its almost as if their brainwashed to run out and buy itTheMooseInNam wrote: »
We have already witnessed the huge yearly title updates to both first person shooters and sports games and from their strong sales, it seems that the general consumer seems to be fine with this idea of tweaking a game slightly and reselling it twelve months later to a frenzied customer base.0 -
I agree to this, but this has been happening for a long time.
I think I've really stopped to get exited about new games since the PS1 days. Nearly 70% of games I got for the PS2, Wii and Xbox were an utter disappointment and I played them just for the sake that I had them and wanted to finish them.
Silent Hill Series, Resident Evil Series, Dino Crisis Series and some fun shooting racing games on PS1 always got my blood running and exited about playing them endlessly for nearly 24 hours cause they were cool back then. They were adventurous and exiting. Cant say I got that feeling for any Xbox 360, Wii, PS2 title that I ever got. Some of them were good, but just good.
God I miss those times
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Patsy fyre wrote: »Lads ye are just getting old, need to stop living in the past and move on with the times!
Perhaps I just come from a time when kids knew their place and didn't back answer their peers!
As for moving with the times...
I'm all for progress and change, as long as it's positive. Unfortunately, the changes I'm seeing aren't beneficial to true gamers and are instead aimed at the general public's cash, at the mercy of true gaming depth.
If that's the kind of change you're happy with, then it's a sad day for us all
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Patsy fyre wrote: »1. Therefore developers designed games to their liking and little thought was given to what needs and wants of the customer were. What developed then were arkward, clumsy games that had limited lifespans.
2. This freedom that game developers had meant that every now and then a game was brought out which has a sheer brilliance about it which had not been witnessed before.
3. However as time went on more money became available and companies started to conduct market research to gain an insight into what the thoughts and opinions of people were. They realised an entire mass of people who were gaming oriented but could not deal with the poor, clumsy design of games.
4. What resulted were more user friendly games with wider availability. The good games that developed were simply repeated over and over again while the poor games went by the way side.
5. Point being that while you enjoyed games in the past, the gaming industry are simply getting the games that they have always asked for, hence why the gaming industry has grown to what it is today.
Thanks for your contribution to the thread. However, I think you were almost right in what you wrote but not quite. I've edited your quote into points and shall tackle each individually
Firstly, actually the complete opposite of that happened. Gamers and game developers were the same people. They made the games exactly as they wanted them and that current wave of gamers loved them because of that. Sure budgets were low but also the tech/software was limited too, hence why games were clumsy and awkward. It had nothing to do with developers lack of regard to the customer, it just wasn't possible to make games like you see today but also that gamers and developers originally came from technology oriented people because the general public just didn't have consoles or home PC's back then. That type of tech was expensive and it scared people. It still scares the general public! That's why consoles, like the Wii, became so popular. Just plug it in, insert the disk and point at the screen. Idiot proof
With regards to your second section, what hadn't been seen before? How long ago are you talking about? "Gaming" as we know it has only been around since the mid-eighties and really didn't kick off properly till the early nineties. Before that there was only twister and monopoly.
In your third section, you were so close to making a valid point but the "They realised an entire mass of people who were gaming oriented but could not deal with the poor, clumsy design of games" kinda just ruined it. The general public didn't game because it doesn't like to have to think too much (look at your current media, how dumbed down it is too... however, this isn't the forum for that argument), so the point you should have made was: "They realised an entire mass of people who were gaming oriented but overwhelmed when faced with games that required cerebral involvement."
In your fourth section, you've mistaken "good" games for popular games but I think we've already covered that.
Lastly, in your fifth section, you are correct that the gaming industry is finally getting the games they want which are huge cash cows with incredible revenue streams. However, the gaming industry is run by huge corporates and they are only concerned in profits, not the actual gamers or the quality of the games being developed. Larger profits doesn't mean better games, it just means they've moved more units and appealed to a wider audience.
As we've already established, a wider audience means games have to be "dumbed down" in order to appeal to the general public.
My work is done here 0 -
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It makes very standard games look very good, & stuff like CoD, while, good, shines like the best game ever.
Interesting point.
It sparked the idea in my head that games have become sugar coated, bland sweets. As in, all gitz and awesome graphics but no real substance to them once you lick the coating off 0 -
You're playing the wrong games and paying too much attention to the big chart games then. It's no different than the music industry, there's plenty of fantastic content out there, you just need to look for it.the groutch wrote: »there's no creativity in the gaming industry anymore, it's just the same games rehashed year after year
For instance, three of my most eagerly awaited games right now are Fez, Gunpoint and Thomas Was Alone. As a matter of interest, had you even heard of these?
Of course, that doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to major releases such as Max Payne 3, Darksiders 2, Dragon's Dogma and Lollipop Chainsaw either. I just feel that there's plenty of room for both. 0 -
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I have a strange hatred of Fifa. The idea of sitting down and playing a sport on your Xbox that you could easily play outside is just ridiculous. I always thought of gaming as a way to do things you might not have a chance to do in real life. I just don't get why people would chose something so mundane as soccer.This really annoys and your totally right in general. Most friends of mine play fifa and as soon as the newest one is out they have to rush out and buy it, I,ll ask them why they do it and they will tell me it has this or that and that its a thousand times better than what they played yesterday but its not, all they really do is update the teams and add a few tweaks but its fundamentally the exact same game, its almost as if their brainwashed to run out and buy it
And why do hey have to buy a whole new game to update the teams!? That's the only difference I can see between half the games, is it not something that could be acquired as DLC for a fraction of the price!?
Fez and Gunpoint both look awesome, hadn't heard of Thomas was Alone though. Looks interesting.For instance, three of my most eagerly awaited games right now are Fez, Gunpoint and Thomas Was Alone. As a matter of interest, had you even heard of these?
Of course, that doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to major releases such as Max Payne 3, Darksiders 2, Dragon's Dogma and Lollipop Chainsaw either. I just feel that there's plenty of room for both.
Another one that looks intereseting is Sir, You are Being Hunted, but that's partly because it seems kind of ridiculous.0 -
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