Why Modern Gaming is Dead

cthulhuiscool

cthulhuiscool

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This is basically a rant I've constructed about the errors of a medium of 'art' I have grown up with and feel at least some connection to. If you agree, cool. If you disagree, politely state your point.

As a gamer of 15 years (since I was 3) I have experienced many changes in the medium for better or worse. Doom presented 3d action games as a possibility, Battlenet revolutionized online gaming and gave my friends and I countless hours of fun after school in 4th-6th grade, games like Final Fantasy VII and Metal Gear Solid proved video games can present an intricate and twisting plot with compelling characters as well as nearly any novel or movie (debatably better), and games like Zelda: OOT proved games can act as modern mythology with an immersive and nostalgic world. It is because of my appreciation and respect for this interactive art form that I must now berate and malign what is given to us sheep now.

Any one reading this can probably label themselves as some form of a gamer. Whether a mountain dew drinking, lan party "pWning," fanatic or a casual, play the greats, gamer, probably everyone here has some background with gaming. While our backgrounds may differ, I assume we all can agree on the basic principle which makes games great: fun. While cliché, this is the basis for all games. Nobody plays games because they are forced to, all people play games in order to enjoy an interactive world which alleviates boredom, which gets me to my point; the purpose of gaming has changed. No longer are games designed for simple enjoyment as that is simply not profitable enough. Games are designed with a formula specific to each genre to fit the bill for a blockbuster. While this makes gaming an extremely lucrative enterprise, this has removed gaming of its soul.

As games have become more popular they obviously have been making developers and publishers a great deal of money. Companies have picked up on this and have begun churning out games to make money. Games must have GREAT graphics, realistic physics, a good soundtrack, celebrity voices, and a variety of other ingredients or else they will not be mass marketed. Likewise, competition has been forced upon all of us. Games have achievements and multiplayer matches and you simply are not a "gamer" unless your rank is high enough. Nearly every game has been designed to rank and evaluate us, while simultaneously replacing fun with realism.

I recently posted a "most memorable moment in gaming" thread and saw that the majority of people don't like view modern games fondly, they generally remember older games like doom, zelda, mario, or half life. I believe this is simply the fact that games simply are not as fun as they once were. Older games simply did not have the technology to be realistic so they instead had to lean on that unfortunate bugger called fun, and thus, are far more memorable than modern games.

I have to admit not every game suffers from this modern stigma. Metal Gear Solid 4 and Portal were both pleasant surprises to me. Unfortunately the vast majority of games simply try too hard to be realistic and removed unrealistic, fun aspects of gameplay. GTA removed dynamics which made the older ones to enjoyable and Crysis seemed to be simply built as a tech demo for a graphics engine with a lackluster plot and structure. Hopefully companies can pick up on this error and fix it before gaming is truly dead.
 
beating-a-dead-horse.gif
 
Old games were amazing, but, I only say that because I was like 10-15 age wise..

Original Wolfenstien (Mac version)
Descent
N64 007 golden Eye...
 
cthulhuiscool said:
As a gamer of 15 years (since I was 3)
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Come revisit this thread when your 30+ yrs old.

The thing that makes games not as fun as they "used" to be has alot to do with the people playing them.... everyone games nowdays... and alot of people get off on being a pain in the ass and rude and obnoxious.
 
heh. someone has issues :) (I don't care about multiplayer no have I thought of my self inadequate because my score or rank isn't high. Sounds like you do)

Explain the popularity of the Wii?
Why am I laughing as much in Sam and Max now as I was back when lucas arts did it?
WoW has good graphics?


Ya I have lot of gaming memories growing up. But there are a ton of games that had an impact on me. I never posted in your memorable gaming moment thread. Why? I just didn't care enough to post (I did now because this thread is laughable). Doesn't mean I don't have those same moments now that I did as a kid. Mass Effect and how the game ended was one of the best I've seen in years. Bioshock's twist moment and how it was all handled was so cool. CoD4 on veteran: The whole thing. Accomplishing the final stage in 50 seconds was fun. Pyschonauts and the stage where you are in the head of the party chick, and find a dark corner of her head where she locked away her demons.

Indigo Prophecy
FEAR
Silent Hill 2
God of War
Dreamfall
Tomb Raider Legend
WoW

Seriously I can keep going on and on.

You're not a kid anymore easily amused because you have nothing to do and just can play games 20 hours a week. The bar has been raised over and over again.
 
you changed, games didn't.

People who are 18 think they have massive perspective. Let us know when you hit your thirties.
 
Once you've played multiple games of the same genre new versions of the same thing don't have the impact they did when you first played them. It doesn't necessarily mean the games aren't as good.

Obviously you're going to remember your first shooter more than shooter number 12 out of 20 you've played.

Play more games outside the genre that you typically play the most often. Play around with mods, maybe even create some of your own.

Modern gaming isn't dead. There are more gamers than ever before. You've just gotten a little bored.
 
you changed, games didn't.

People who are 18 think they have massive perspective. Let us know when you hit your thirties.
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Come revisit this thread when your 30+ yrs old.

The thing that makes games not as fun as they "used" to be has alot to do with the people playing them.... everyone games nowdays... and alot of people get off on being a pain in the ass and rude and obnoxious.
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As much as I hate to discounting someone on the basis of age, I did think a lot less of this thread from the first line of the rant (although I was likely discounting it enough based on the title alone).

First, this topic has been brought up far too many times here. I've read the jabs specifically about how "PC GAMING IS DONE FOR" for years now, and even earlier than that years of raving about how movies and literature have degenerated from art to business. Yes, you are beating a dead horse.

Second, everything was better "back in the day" simply by perception, and in this case its especially attributable to the fact that most of us were children at the time of our "most memorable moment in gaming," and were much more easily captivated at the time. Playing some older games now will yield some nostalgic joy for me, but I certainly am not immersed the way I was playing the same games 10-20 years ago.

While I admit that I enjoy video games much less than I did years ago, its because I've changed, not because "modern gaming is dead."
 
To clarify I was talking more about very modern games (gta 4, Crysis, zelda, and bioshock) which I had high expectations for but felt let down about. I'll admit I was a bit glib but I don't think you can discount that there have been changes to games. Thanks for the input though I think bladevenom summed up my situation best "I am just bored". I took a 2 month break from gaming but I guess not long enough.
 
I'll tell ya, after playing metal gear solid 4: guns of the patriots, I have faith in games that have the ability to give me that familiar awesome feeling again. even being as jaded as i am. thats saying something, so don't give up on gaming.
 
Maybe you just need to try some genres you have never tried before. Try getting into flight sims and racing sims maybe. And I mean the more simulation type and not arcade games.
 
the most gaming i've done recently is replaying legend of zelda: a link to the past again.
old school ftw.
 
i understand wat he is sayin. all games on n64 seemed real innovative and fun and then the consoles after it never had the same quality of games, imo
 
The games are there , they are just getting harder to find in the myriad bullshit being released to make a quick buck.

I laughed when he said that battlenet entertained him and his friends in the 4th grade! It was NES for me back then!
 
I've been gaming steadily for 23 years (since I was 5) and I've gone back to where I started, Nintendo. About 75% of the games in the past few years that I have really, really enjoyed like I did as a child were on Nintendo systems. The Wii has been a very enjoyable system for me. The others have all been on the MS consoles. For me there the only gaming that is dead is PC gaming.

You're 18, you are at a transition faze. As a kid (which I consider anyone 21 or under) I put up with a lot more shit than I do now. If a game has major flaw or is frustrating, I don't play it. As a kid I would play it anyway. As you get older, you'll have less and less patience for the shit games and will start enjoying great games more and more. At least that is how things worked out for me.
 
I still love pulling out my Nes and Snes and popping in a game and beating it in a few hours.

I still can't get under 3 and a half hours for super metroid >_>
 
Met-AL said:
Come revisit this thread when your 30+ yrs old.

The thing that makes games not as fun as they "used" to be has alot to do with the people playing them.... everyone games nowdays... and alot of people get off on being a pain in the ass and rude and obnoxious.
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Revisit this statement when you're in your 40's. :p

As to the OP, modern gaming's population is growing geometrically. If I ever sell something to the masses I want it to die like that.
 
Nobody will probably read this, .......


but I thought the games in the past were more fun. Could it deal with maturity? Yes.. maybe or maybe they were more inviting.

I think back in the Original HL a game I fell in love with, that it had to be the childish humor they put in with it. The Scientist and Head crabs, who knows. That was nearly 10 years ago.. wow feels like yesterday I was running around the training area crowbaring the scientist for extra fun...

It does feel good to go back and re-play them, maybe I'm reliving some childhood memory.. but...........

Castle Wolfenstein
Half-Life
Aliens Vs Predator

Will forever be some of my favorites.

:D

P.S. I go back to 1993 Frogger, Space Invaders, and some DOS game on those big floppies oh I forget the name.. was a Space Man and fought robots or something!

:cool:
 
Yes, this idea that has been discussed repeatedly, but that doesn’t invalidate your opinion on the issue – a good one at that. I’m almost 28, and I’ve been gaming for a very long time. As with everything in life you will find people leaning on one side or another with strong opinions. People try to use the typical “child’s mind” counter point in arguments like this. It’s a valid point, but what if it’s more than just simple nostalgia; and why are people afraid of being nostalgic?
Personally, I feel modern games are becoming less attractive as a whole. We’ve lost the majority of humor, color, unreality, story/characters, and creativity (This is not to say there are not games that are created with these exact variables).

So what would be a reason for if there are tons of people claiming otherwise? Market saturation and audience size would most definitely be a variable.

For example:

If there are 1,000 games made in a year and only a 5 are great, you’re most likely to think that the market stinks based off the small percentage of good games compared to bad ones. Now think about if 10 games are made in a year, and 5 are good. This good to bad ratio is at less disproportion in this example than the earlier example – so one would think the market is less stagnates. The first example represents the modern gamers market, while the latter exemplifies the older “nostalgic” market.

But then you must think of why the two different examples have different ratios – would they be the same regardless of time? The only think I could think would change the ratios would be time it’s self. Experiencing the advent of a video game the moment that it’s created and released is a wonderful thing. The original characters, themes, controls, stories are all variables that become the milestones and the originators. All future games are then held under scrutiny by these same variables. I’m in the same boat with many nostalgic people, by thinking that older games where apparently more fun. But I’ve come to a point in my life where I have come to understand that nothing is going to take those fun experiences away from me. I can still think highly of yesteryear games and still have fun with modern games – MGS4 anyone?

I think fans become bitter and protective because people disregard and disrespect on older things, namely older video games; stating that it wasn’t that great. My counter point is that if you weren’t there, you’d never understand the initial impact it had on all parts of the gaming world…

Being young and finding out new things that end up leaving an impression on us is always going to be ingrained in our heads as the highest standard. On the flip side, gaming came to be common place when the majority of us gamers where young. We’ve practically watched its birth into our world – so we’re very protective over what goes on. We spent a great deal of time playing levels, learning moves, and could probably time repeating patterns in games. Modern games today have so much going on in attempts to be realistic, that players probably never see certain levels, enemies, etc. There isn't any repeticious play that would leave you to pat yourself on the back...heh.
I can only hope, as probably with a few posters, that people do not disregard older games. The reason we have modern gaming is because of the great ideas of the past. Remember that life is up and down anyways, much like a wave. There are highs and lows and gaming is no different.
 
Nostalgia often clouds our ability to compare past and modern eras of gaming. The OP is just old enough to have experienced the heyday of video game advancement. The re-emergence of the console and the explosion of PC gaming. You didn't experience the horrible times in 1983 and 1984 when video games nearly, truly died.

My video game enjoyment is more defined by the people I play with than the actual game itself. Get enough of my friends together and Battlefield 2 is, without a doubt, one of the greatest games ever. I go on a pub server and the experience is frustrating in the least.

I think video games are changing, not really dying. They are becoming a social experience rather than a person sitting, alone, in front of a screen. If that is not the way you want to game, then you will always have those games from your past to bring you the same enjoyment they always did.
 
cthulhuiscool said:
I recently posted a "most memorable moment in gaming" thread and saw that the majority of people don't like view modern games fondly, they generally remember older games like doom, zelda, mario, or half life. I believe this is simply the fact that games simply are not as fun as they once were. Older games simply did not have the technology to be realistic so they instead had to lean on that unfortunate bugger called fun, and thus, are far more memorable than modern games.
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PSYCHOLOGY

The thing about the human psyche is that our memories are horribly distorted and untruthful and yet we always believe that they are 100% accurate. They are not. Also, we tend to massively forget bad experiences. Not forget so much, but forget the emotional negativity.


This is where nostalgia comes from. We tend to remember things in the past as being far, far better than they really were. We tend to forget all about the bad experiences in our lives. Think back to the worst thing that happened to you last year. Sure you remember the key details, but you can't now truly appreciate how bad it was then.


This is why when we look back at the games we played as kids we 'remember' how amazingly perfect they were when the really weren't that great. Mario Brothers was often really fucking irritating, so was Sonic. Doom had it's dull moments. Half-life isn't actually as good as you remember it (I recently replayed it and found that out myself). Don't get me wrong, HL was bloody amazing and I really enjoyed it, but right now, HL2 is simply a much better game. Better story, better pacing, better action. If I had to play either right now, it'd be HL2 without a shadow of doubt.

If you think I'm way off on this, go start playing the original Half-Life this evening and you'll see that once the nostalgia where's off you'll probably quit it after an hour or two where back in the day you would have pulled an 'all nighter' just to finish it off.
 
spine said:
Half-life isn't actually as good as you remember it (I recently replayed it and found that out myself). Don't get me wrong, HL was bloody amazing and I really enjoyed it, but right now, HL2 is simply a much better game. Better story, better pacing, better action. If I had to play either right now, it'd be HL2 without a shadow of doubt.
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Blasphemy!

(I did what, my fourth run through HL this spring (Op4, BS included) and it was awesome despite looking like absolute poo at 2560x1600.)

I agree with everything else though.
 
the angry video game nerd remembers all the negativity from games he played many years ago. he hated simons quest with a passion then, and he hates it with a passion now!
 
To add a bit more perspective (I'm old) I used to work at Software Etc. back in the mid to late 1980s. This was a golden era for games that other oldsters are nostalgic for because it was the birth of so many great games, like the Ultima series as well as home for legends like Wasteland.

I could take any game for the C64 I wanted home to play, and I could try the PC, Apple, Amiga and Mac games on the machines in the store. It was a quiet store and I had plenty of time for screwing about.

The percentage of quality games was about the same then as it is now. Usually just one or two really good ones, a handful of decent ones and the rest left no impression. And it's not about graphics, or technology, or AI. It's just entertainment value. A game like Starflight or Phantasy could entertain for hours in the same basic way as a modern game.

Despite the proliferation of game platforms in the end you still have the same slim picking we've always had. The only thing that changes is one's attitude toward gaming and value.
 
Spine hit the nail right on the head. In 10 years, when we are playing photo-realistic games, we will look back at the games of today and say "Now THAT was an awesome game." We remember when technology was ground breaking, like with the original Half Life, we don't remember the 14th game that was made with the HL engine.

I remember games that were awesome back in the day because EVERYONE remembered them for what they were at the time.

A long time in the future I will probably say to my friends "remember playing crysis at 20FPS because it was so beautiful that computers crapped their pants every time it loaded up?"
 
I still play Operation Flashpoint from 2001. Has shit graphics for todays standards, but you can't beat its military simulation gameplay.
 
Have you tried actually going back, and replaying these games since you beat them?
I had that feeling for a long time, that the games just weren't being put out like they used to be, but I went back and played the games I had so much fun playing before.

Megaman(NES, SNES), I realized wasn't as hard as I remember it, the controls were just so awful your character couldn't move to evade the attacks. The actual game itself was simple, and I quickly beat it.

Mario? There's no variety, you had 2-4 buttons that you were using that you went around and did different things with. Super Mario for the SNES was extremly fun, but again going back it's very easy. Just run and jump on top of guys. The main appeal it had for me when I first started playing was that it introduced new features I had not seen in a game before, such as all these hidden paths, having to keep and save powers from different levels to take advantage of them, and of course the ability to sacrifice your yoshi just so you could make that extra jump. Poor lil guy. N64 was neat, but the bosses were all the same. It had a huge world you could explore, which was definetly something new, but how many games let you just run around? MMORPG's are pretty much exactly this, so of course you're not going to feel the same way if you have ever played one of those, with it's high interaction with others.

I tried playing Mario for the wii, and totally wanted to shoot myself in the head. I honestly didn't really give it much of a shot, having to deal with all those little mushrooms being main characters and nannies in the first world just made me turn it off and put in smash bros. It was just a test run, so I can't really say whether it was good, better, or worse than previous generations of Mario.

Goldeneye, god of games, amirite?! I admit, I got it release day, played it through, beat the entire game on max settings, made sure to get every single cheat(and dear god getting the invincibility one was insane to get- complete the level in 2:06 seconds? I ended up doing it with 2 seconds to spare, and you had to keep resetting until the doctor was in a room that was on your way, what a timesink) and mastered all the multiplayer levels, knowing layouts, secret passages, where weapons liked to spawn, everything of the sort. Does that make it the best, just because it's the first fps I liked, and was well designed? Not really, although I haven't played it, Halo and Half Life seem to be fairly well accepted and acclaimed, with the introduction of online play easily eclipsing Goldeneye.

Conclusion? I'm trying to say that sure, the older games introduced new features that hadn't been seen before, but newer games have the ability to incorporate it better into an enjoyable experience, just like you had before. Go back, play those games you're saying are just so awesome, and find what it is that makes you enjoy them. Did you like being able to move around freely in Mario 64? Maybe you should check out some kind of mmorpg. Was it the 2D graphics with the side scrawling fighting that you liked, where the background interacted with you. Paper Mario would probably be good for you. Was it the chains of boss battles, that pushed you to your edge, turn based style games, free moving interactive battles, there's a variety of everything out there.
 
spine said:
PSYCHOLOGY

The thing about the human psyche is that our memories are horribly distorted and untruthful and yet we always believe that they are 100% accurate. They are not. Also, we tend to massively forget bad experiences. Not forget so much, but forget the emotional negativity.


This is where nostalgia comes from...
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BINGO! That's lock the thread, we are done.

At 40, I have playing since pong and the fact is, games were not better in some gold age. They are as they have always been some great games and lot of average to worse. If anything the general quality of games has improved. Let's face it there was a lot of crass junk released for the 2600, NES systems.

So enjoy the best of what there is but this all of gold age of gaming thing is just not true.
 
I'd say the OP is bored. If you think about it games are mostly the same within their respective genre. Compare River Raid (2d overhead scrolling shooter on the Atari 2600) to Crysis (3d shooter on top-of-the line, quad core SLI rigs). It's still the same enemies in the same locations doing rougly the same thing. RPGs are usually the same fight+level+better equipment grinds, with plot. Etcetera.

But... It's a hobby and hobbies can be repetitive. If you're bored take a break or try something new.
 
hey OP, your just growing out of it, some do, some dont...i did to a certain extent, but not really

and seriously...both me and my little brother (whos 10yrs old) play TF2...I love it..he is addicted...

and 10 years from now,,,when he starts growing out of gamming a little..he is going to make the same post..cept..hes going to say...

"what happend to quality games like Tf2? Portal? COD4,bioshock ..the games i played when i was younger"
 
Do you know how big the gaming industry is right now???

I'm not even going to read your post, the very idea is stupid.
 
I will grant the OP two points. Most games are no longer created for the games sake, but for the expressed intent of generating as much money as possible.

We all remember our first ____. Whether it was your first FPS, your first MMO, your first adventure etc. As we get older and older we tend to forget the drawbacks and problems with the older games as we liberally glaze our memories with nostalgia. The old games are no better and no worse than games created today. The difference is that in the '80s and early mid '90s we had to accept that the games were not going to look real so we tend to remember the games not looking horrible. Gameplay hasn't gotten worse, its gotten better. I read an article by Yahtzee a month or so about old adventure games. Where he states that the games were great in spite of their gameplay, usually through writing. I still have my SNES and my N64. I would still have my NES if I didn't lose in my move to Arizona. I have tried to go back to most "classic" titles to find them not nearly as good as I remember. They were usually plagued with bad control issues and piss poor framerates ( Perfect Dark ). I tried going back to play Goblins, or Corncob or Gorf, I find it amazing the stuff we would put up with.

I have come to realize the golden age of gaming for me was somewhere between 1996-2004. The OP states that games have become more realistic, I claim that newer games just provide the illusion of realism. Not that I don't love new games. I loved Crysis, I loved Mass Effect, I loved Oblivion. I fully enjoy the new worlds that are rendered for us.

The second point I agree with the OP is that most games have a reliance on Multiplayer for their enjoyment. Multiplayer IMHO is the ultimate downfall of gaming. The more MP games we have, the less the developer has to be bothered with those pesky details we like to call a plot, storyline. They replace the sense of accomplishment for completing a storyline with an endless quest for better "unlocks". Furthermore people just plain suck and will inevitably break the game through exploits, cheats, hacks, aimbots, griefing. Once this happens the online community evaporates, and you are left with a game that is almost completely worthless. Very few MP oriented games last the test of time. I gaurantee you will not be able to go back 10 years from now and find very many servers for CoD4.

In closing by STALKER Clear Sky. I know I will.
 
Duro said:
Second, everything was better "back in the day" simply by perception, and in this case its especially attributable to the fact that most of us were children at the time of our "most memorable moment in gaming," and were much more easily captivated at the time. Playing some older games now will yield some nostalgic joy for me, but I certainly am not immersed the way I was playing the same games 10-20 years ago.
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Bingo.

And, yeah, revisit this concept when you can rent a car.
 
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