euskalzabe
[H]ard|Gawd
- Joined
- May 9, 2009
- Messages
- 1,478
I was playing Horizon Zero Dawn yesterday, and had an unpleasant realization about the current state of gaming dynamics in today's market.
A few weeks ago, I played Destiny 2. Fun game, despite me not loving online PvP, I enjoyed the story and grinding with some friends. Got to level 20 and power 272 on the base game. Then I played FFXV. Again, decent story, enjoyable game, played about 40h until I was at level 65, finished the game, put it down, finding completing the remaining side missions unexciting. Now, playing HZD, at level 12, I'll be grinding for a while to level-up until the appropriate 30some level for the final mission of the game. As I play HZD, I'm waiting on a nice discount for AC Origins to finally buy it and play what has been a critically acclaimed game.
And yet, the second I thought of that, my stomach sank. It'll be another game where I'll have to spend an arbitrarily chosen number of hours to level up to whatever is needed to progress in the story. Is this endless grind all that games have become? Because that is a sad, boring prospect for the industry. I play games "late" because my job doesn't allow me too many free hours, so I tend to be on a year-late cadence (side benefit: I buy everything on sales for anywhere from $10 to $20). I feel like for the past 3 months, all I've done is grind and grind and grind to level up and level up and level up, all while being served tiny pieces of storyline that count as a "fully developed" plot.
And you know what? I couldn't tell you much about Destiny 2's story. I'm fully aware I don't understand half of what happened in FFXV but it looked cool. I've started skipping dialog lines in HZD because every side mission feels like it needs to justify its existence with bland, irrelevant little plots that have no meaning or impact for the main story, other than being tangentially related (these bad robots from the main story harmed this little area, go there and help for a while!). And I know, some people will tell me now, "of course you're not enjoying the story, you're skipping those dialogs!", to which I'll answer, I'm not skipping the main storylines, only the garbage side ones where the writing is poor and the relevance towards the actual main plot is questionable, at best. They're palpable attempts at forcing you to grind some more, with a tiny shred of some for of plot to motivate you (barely) to keep going. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I actually remember the Mass Effect Andromeda story much better than any of those grinding games, because it actually bothered to make an effort and tell me a story directly. Sure, there was grind, but nowhere near as much as D2, FFXV or HZD. Or ACO for that matter.
You know what was the last game I played where I remember the story completely? Uncharted 4. I remember everything, because the game told me a story, and I didn't force me to gain XP for endless hours until an arbitrarily decided level so that I'm deemed worthy of receiving another sliver of story, cadence be damned. U4 had perfect rhythm and pace, and it "leveled me up" to keep a much more elaborate storyline going. I'm aware that I enjoy the narrative part better than many other gameplay elements, so it's easy to see why I enjoyed U4 more, but I'm worried that every AAA game now is becoming and endless level up grind with barely any story, sacrificing any shred of narrative pace that can make its story memorable.
I've been playing videogames for the past 25 years. Been building my PCs for the past 20. And it is now that I'm noticing a strong, pervasive generational change that very clearly demarcates the game types we're getting in the late 2000s/2010s. Heck, I remember the Half Life 2 story better than many games I've played in the past 2 years. And so I'm wondering, do you feel similarly unexcited about this endless grind to level-up tendency? Or have I just become a dinosaur of decades past, who enjoyed videogames for the same reason I enjoy movies, for their story, with the added benefit of exciting interaction? Because I can assure you, after killing the exact same robot-animal on HZD for the trillionth time to get a little more XP, it's not exactly my idea of fun.
A few weeks ago, I played Destiny 2. Fun game, despite me not loving online PvP, I enjoyed the story and grinding with some friends. Got to level 20 and power 272 on the base game. Then I played FFXV. Again, decent story, enjoyable game, played about 40h until I was at level 65, finished the game, put it down, finding completing the remaining side missions unexciting. Now, playing HZD, at level 12, I'll be grinding for a while to level-up until the appropriate 30some level for the final mission of the game. As I play HZD, I'm waiting on a nice discount for AC Origins to finally buy it and play what has been a critically acclaimed game.
And yet, the second I thought of that, my stomach sank. It'll be another game where I'll have to spend an arbitrarily chosen number of hours to level up to whatever is needed to progress in the story. Is this endless grind all that games have become? Because that is a sad, boring prospect for the industry. I play games "late" because my job doesn't allow me too many free hours, so I tend to be on a year-late cadence (side benefit: I buy everything on sales for anywhere from $10 to $20). I feel like for the past 3 months, all I've done is grind and grind and grind to level up and level up and level up, all while being served tiny pieces of storyline that count as a "fully developed" plot.
And you know what? I couldn't tell you much about Destiny 2's story. I'm fully aware I don't understand half of what happened in FFXV but it looked cool. I've started skipping dialog lines in HZD because every side mission feels like it needs to justify its existence with bland, irrelevant little plots that have no meaning or impact for the main story, other than being tangentially related (these bad robots from the main story harmed this little area, go there and help for a while!). And I know, some people will tell me now, "of course you're not enjoying the story, you're skipping those dialogs!", to which I'll answer, I'm not skipping the main storylines, only the garbage side ones where the writing is poor and the relevance towards the actual main plot is questionable, at best. They're palpable attempts at forcing you to grind some more, with a tiny shred of some for of plot to motivate you (barely) to keep going. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I actually remember the Mass Effect Andromeda story much better than any of those grinding games, because it actually bothered to make an effort and tell me a story directly. Sure, there was grind, but nowhere near as much as D2, FFXV or HZD. Or ACO for that matter.
You know what was the last game I played where I remember the story completely? Uncharted 4. I remember everything, because the game told me a story, and I didn't force me to gain XP for endless hours until an arbitrarily decided level so that I'm deemed worthy of receiving another sliver of story, cadence be damned. U4 had perfect rhythm and pace, and it "leveled me up" to keep a much more elaborate storyline going. I'm aware that I enjoy the narrative part better than many other gameplay elements, so it's easy to see why I enjoyed U4 more, but I'm worried that every AAA game now is becoming and endless level up grind with barely any story, sacrificing any shred of narrative pace that can make its story memorable.
I've been playing videogames for the past 25 years. Been building my PCs for the past 20. And it is now that I'm noticing a strong, pervasive generational change that very clearly demarcates the game types we're getting in the late 2000s/2010s. Heck, I remember the Half Life 2 story better than many games I've played in the past 2 years. And so I'm wondering, do you feel similarly unexcited about this endless grind to level-up tendency? Or have I just become a dinosaur of decades past, who enjoyed videogames for the same reason I enjoy movies, for their story, with the added benefit of exciting interaction? Because I can assure you, after killing the exact same robot-animal on HZD for the trillionth time to get a little more XP, it's not exactly my idea of fun.