Thoughts on the state of the gaming industry today.

This may be in the wrong section, (it is sort of general gaming?) But, I was wondering what you guys think of the state the gaming industry today. where are we headed? Success? Failure? another video game crash? Discuss.

 

To shit. We're going to microtransactions up the ass. and the worst part is if it's no longer available, you can't get it at all - Halo 2 DLC for example. Or certain Xbox Live Arcade Games (MK Trilogy). We're going in the wrong direction - that's for sure.

 

It's hard to say where the industry will be 5 years from now, but currently it's slowly taking a turn for the worse. The upcoming generation of consoles may very well determine whether there will be a crash or another unexpected golden age of games as with the NES. I've noticed that a number of game devs are turning towards kickstarter, this could be what keeps me interested as it's a way to have fans give input and see the creation process in detail.

 

I'm not entirely certain we're heading in a wrong direction.

The mainstream games are definitely going to shit, like most mainstream things these days (for example, music). The big industry still has some momentum because it's selling huge amounts of software with not much regard for quality, because currently the general public is buying Call of Duty.

On the other hand, there is an abundance of interesting, smart, intelligent, new, exciting games coming from the indie community. And that's what I have faith in. Between Kickstarter funding interesting projects (albeit almost all of the mainly publicized ones mostly relying on nostalgia) and the indie developers bringing some amazing ideas to the table (I'm thinking recent titles like Fez, Antichamber, English Country Tune, Hotline Miami, Dear Esther, etc), I think there's still some things to look forward to. Just try not to look at what most big game studios are producing, since it's embarrassing most of the time.

 

Games like CoD have helped ruin the industry imo. Don't get me wrong, I love that there are successful franchises out there with companies making lots of money, but the huge success of games like CoD has put pressure on so many other companies to try and emulate their success. Achievements like sales of up to 25 million units is possible but for most developers a completely unrealistic goal and no matter how hard they try they'll never be able to bring in that kind of money and success with most traditional video games. How do developers comfortably make new, unique and artistic experiences when they're constantly under pressure to make money and made to feel like failures when they don't break 5-10 million units? It's rough times for both the developers and the gamers.

 

I have to ask - WHY is COD ruining the industry? How is there NOT a regard for quality? The COD developers listen to what fans like, and cater to it. And every iteration does make improvements on the last. Is it more of the same? Yes. But that's what people like with sequels.

 

90s Gamer, I couldn't agree more. These pictures represent exactly what I think about modern game industry.
And my 5 cents:

 

I believe that we will see a video game crash, at least for the mainstream consoles and systems within the next 5 years. However, the Indie game scene will pick up even more than it has because of this. THAT, will be our new golden age.

 

Because they set a standard that everyone else wants to achieve, something which most of the time isn't realistically obtainable. If Kinect party games where you pop balloons with sheep were selling 25 million units, would other companies be trying to make farm yard party games? Of course they would, because that's what's selling and that's where the money is. Companies have to remain competitive, if that means tapping into the 25 million+ users who are buying war simulation games, then that's what they're going to do and anything that doesn't reach that standard is automatically a failure. It costs too much money these days to develop games and not enough people are buying them, it forces companies to take up other business practices to make up for lost costs, things which most people don't appreciate. If games like CoD didn't have such a huge success there would be less pressure on companies to meet those types of sales, there would be more high profile companies trying to express them selves through their art and there would be more unoccupied players to buy and enjoy these products.

What are other video game companies supposed to do to stay alive in this market with high production costs and low sales? It means less creativity and more imitation just for the sake of making money and surviving as a company. It's bad for the developers and it's bad for the gamers. That's why I think games like CoD are helping ruin the video game market, not intentionally or for any reason of the quality of their product, but as a direct consequence of their massive success. Listening to the fans doesn't matter if production costs are high, sales are low and the majority of the potential customers are too busy playing CoD, Fifa or GTA to even care.

 

So it's CODs fault that it's players enjoy playing a game?

Isn't that honestly, REALLY, what we want to achieve again? and get away from this save point chasing, microtransaction, casual game market that's flooding?

More imitation? Really? Because that isn't what has happened since the begining of the industry

Space Invaders begat Galaxian begat Galaga etc etc

Super Mario Bros begat tons of generic platformers

Street Fighter 2 begat how many clones

Hell EVERY GENERATION this happens.

Mario 64 created the 3D platformer collect-a-thon.

GTA 3 created open world 3D sandboxes.

It's nothing new.

I repeat.

It's.nothing.new.

 

I never said it was. But is it good for the industry? Is it good for the creativity of the developers? Is it good for the gamers who want a unique and/or traditional gaming experience? Why do you think casual games are flooding the industry? Because it's one of the only markets where companies can make easy money and remain competitive. It's all about sales and keeping up with the people on the top. If you can't make successful war games or sports games (popular genres right now) you have to find something else to make money, otherwise you're getting left behind to burn while others dominate. Companies are being forced to adjust by the huge blockbuster success of other titles and fortunately there's other potential customers out there who are willing to spend money in the causal experience. Things change and others either have to follow suit or are forced to adapt, that's just the way it goes. Unfortunately for us many genres, practices, developers and even publishers are being left behind or going bankrupt because of it.

 

A lot of us who grew up with the dozens of platformers and shooters were never complaining about the lack of originality. How many top down shooters were there made? We had Raiden, Aleste, Zanac, Xevious, GunHed, and tons of others...R-Type, Darius, Thunderforce, Gradius, and tons of others... And yet every single title was exciting, had an incredible soundtrack, was a great challenge and had a great replay value because the games were made from the heart for people who loved them like me. Very few titles give me the feeling of actual dedication these days...

Gaming has become too big in my opinion, too mainstream, too "hollywood". Plus the advancement in technology has a darkside as well, because of the unlimited possibilities on the visual level, there isn't anything left to the imagination of the player ("everything is seen" and "known" as it would be almost real-life)...

*still imagining the world of Hyrule of the Zelda 1 map*

 

I don't feel like we're moving as forward this generation as last time. I was really excited for the Wii, even though it had a stupid name, because it was something new. I still think it was a good system even though getting the motion settings right could be a pain in the ass. Same goes for the DS. On top of that, online services for consoles were finally starting to become the norm; things were changing.

I'm not really excited for this generation because I don't see any game-changing developments. All I see are touchpads/screens, which we have all basically gotten used to by now. Sure, the ps4 has a better interface, and downloads while you play or whatever, but that doesn't really change the way I play games. All I see is an upgraded ps3 with better graphics.

Also, I just feel like games aren't as diverse as they used to be. I'm tired of shooting people. I used to play the hell out of Spyro and Crash Bandicoot, and while there have been a lot of games with awesome stories, I haven't really played a game like that in terms of pure, wholehearted fun since the ps2 era. I only started realizing this when I bought FFVII today, and realized that I haven't felt this much joy and frustration playing a game in a really long time.

I'm not saying that there's no fun games anymore (Gta V is a good example of one of those), there's just a lot less. I like the idea of indie games but most of them just haven't done it for me I guess.

 

Pretty much said it man. Microtransactions even happening in titles like GTA it's a horrible turn, and oh day one DLC too. A lot of this industry is a joke.

 

Hahaha those pictures were gold. How the mighty have fallen.

 

Things I see as wrong with the games industry:
1.Lack of originality and diversity, especially in PC gaming
2.Unwillingness by anyone in the industry to try anything new or different
3.Micro-transactions and DLC everywhere
4.Multiplayer being forced into games that really dont need it *cough*Sim City*cough*
5.The disappearance of modding and mod tools and things (outside of FPS engines like Unreal and Source and a few games like Starcraft and Skyrim that have editing tools thrown in), modding is virtually dead except through the efforts of 3rd party modders. (and in some cases games developers and publishers who are openly hostile to mods and modding)
6.The belief that a game without massive amounts of money spent on making the graphics look so real you can see individual grains of sand wont sell
7.The removal of creative power from designers and developers and giving it to managers (i.e. "we want x and you will make it happen even if it ruins the game")

 

I agree with all of your other points, but I just don't think this is true. I mean, look at minecraft, and basically all indie games out there. Hell, even games like Dota 2 don't have spectacular graphics, but are praised for their style and gameplay. It's more that big companies are using their graphics as a selling point, which has been happening basically forever.

 

Thats the thing, the big companies need to realize that emphasizing graphics over gameplay is NOT the way to get gamers like me to play their games.
I play the games I play because they have good fun gameplay and not because they have high-detail graphics. Games like Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, Command & Conquer (basically all games in the series except the crappy unplayable C&C4), the Ghostbusters FPS and some others.
I used to play Diablo 2 but I stopped because I realized how much better Oblivion is.

 

In 5-10 years Disney will buy Nintendo with Star Wars pocket Change.