Yea it's not good. We need to turn this industry around or we're screwed. How many times do you pick up a game only to think, "eh I could be doing something else." It's happened to a lot of my friends and my brothers who I play games with. The only recent exception was Elden Ring, and even then if you look closely at the assets you'll notice cut corners and bad programming. Games these days are uninspired cash grabs, and I didn't spend all this time learning art to fuel this mess.
Yea it's not good. We need to turn this industry around or we're screwed. How many times do you pick up a game only to think, "eh I could be doing something else." It's happened to a lot of my friends and my brothers who I play games with. The only recent exception was Elden Ring, and even then if you look closely at the assets you'll notice cut corners and bad programming. Games these days are uninspired cash grabs, and I didn't spend all this time learning art to fuel this mess.
Traditional game industry feels like it has already peaked and currently is in decline. Cultural importance of games is not the same. It was new and fresh thing that was exciting. Games were evolving and improving and gave players the sense of novelty. And now it's just another boring industry ran by corporate greed.
In the end people use games and entertainment as a way to get instant dopamine. And there are new ways to get dopamine these days. People are also social creatures. That's why social entertainment like instagram or tiktok wins.
I don't think that in the war for attention video games have a lot of room. Video games are a good addition to a normal calm life. But most people don't have it anymore. Our world in not the same as in the 80s or the 90s.
I recently ordered a VR headset, and it can offer much more than traditional video games. The future of gaming is definitely in VR. Clicking the mouse while sitting on a chair destroying ones health feels stupid. In VR you get some training at least. And the immersiveness is also a big factor.
if people dont have stable lives such that they can play video games, how will VR become the future of games?
and somebody doesn't want to vegetate in a chair after working all day? They'd rather work up a sweat?
what has social media won that games have not? Are they in some contest? is there only one winner? I thought social media was ads and data collection, while games are entertainment / gambling (which I guess counts as entertainment)?
is the video game industry growing or declining?
how will social gamers who like to play party games like mario kart do that with VR?
The video game industry has never been bigger. It's surpassed hollywood long ago in terms of revenue, and as result has greatly attracted the attention of people only interested in dollar bills & minimal viable product, and not in actually making a good game and long-term investment. The industry has and is literally being strip-mined. This is dumb as shit because:
1. Video games could and should be a lot more than this.
2. I'm basically stating the obvious, and anyone who's taken more than a passing glance will know.
One way to 'combat' AI (resistance is futile) is to expand outside of the art world. There's a lot of space for improvement in the industry, and despite the advancements in both tech and art, the bar is still low, or it's off kilter or skewed. You have games with insanely good art and absolutely terrible mechanics, and vice versa. So why then do we consider AI to threaten the industry when we have bigger fish to fry?
Alex_J said: what has social media won that games have not? Are they in some contest? is there only one winner? I thought social media was ads and data collection, while games are entertainment / gambling (which I guess counts as entertainment)?
Yes, it's a contest for attention. Human attention is finite. User retention is a real business measurement.
The thing that Zetheros said "I could be doing something else" is a common narrative nowadays. Games are just not that exciting. There are numerous videos on the topic that "games aren't fun anymore"
is the video game industry growing or declining?
The budgets are growing, but it has nothing to do with the quality of games as an art form. Can you name a recent game that has gained cult status? Can you even name an interesting game? Major studious are producing remakes. And indies are producing minimalistic and safe little games. The last project that excited me was Inscryption, but it suffered from low budget. I also liked FTL and Into the breach, they felt like real unique games, but they were super small and can be much better with bigger budgets and better writing. It feels like it's not possible nowadays to make a unique game with good gameplay, good writing and not aimed at 12 years old.
well it is a business and they are making more money than ever, apparently. So it's too bad if a fraction of the audience doesn't like the direction. I don't think numerous youtube videos counts for much. I mean it is great that we are able to find people with common interest and critiques but it's not a real measurement of anything. There is also the fact that controversy and drama gets clicks and gratitude doesn't. So the video creators have a huge incentive to be negative and inflammatory.
Personally, I never miss a title from FromSoft. I recently enjoyed Returnal when it came to PC - that was a very nice surprise. I only play like one or two games per year these days though. I'm sure there is plenty of good stuff out there still. A lot of the big multiplayer shooters would have consumed my life and look way better than the shit I played when I was into that. My major issue with games these days is that they require too much commitment and attention. That's actually a big thing I try to address with my own games. I want something that gives a good challenge for seasoned gamers, but doesn't require you to base your life around it for months at a time.
I tried to play some of the classics that I liked as a kid and honestly they seem just as vapid and dumb as the modern games. I remember thinking the original ghost recon games were the height of tactical realism and tension. But literally the AI just stands in one spot and the only gameplay is to go super slow and see them first. That's it, nothing more deep than that. Of course as a dumb kid you want to believe fantasies so you see things that aren't really there.
But at the time they were novel and there weren't so many games coming out.
Also, as a working adult I'd think it is pretty normal to lose interest in games at least to some degree. Especially if the day job is in front of a computer.
Morrowind still hits the same for me even after all these years, especially with Tamriel Rebuilt. I've memorized the game long ago but it's still fun running along the bitter coast as a naked ex-convict argonian wielding a chitin spear and doped up on skooma. I'd play Diablo II: Lord of Destruction as well but the pixel resolution is hard on the eyes after awhile.
Neverwinter Nights is also good. The atmosphere of wandering a dark city, echoes of people in taverns and sick vagrants coughing in squalid corners still holds up today.
I played Elden Ring nonstop for a month after release. You pay once and you get a great game. Fromsoft clearly did not hire psychologists to find the best methods of extracting dollars from players.
I don't think anything other than game development philosophy has changed. Games have simply become big money and it is a constant of humankind to exploit anything of value for their own gain. Game art has always continued it's push for higher fidelity, but game design has succumbed to late stage capitalism.
About youtube videos, content creators & drama, these are all symptomatic of our industry's actions, not the cause. Asmongold spits hot takes, some true & some not... he's an entertainer first and foremost so I'd take anything he says with a grain of salt.
Can you even name an interesting game? Major studious are producing remakes.
Baldur's Gate 3 is coming out in less than 12 hours from now; not a remake but a sequel. Larian Studios seem like they have good heads on their shoulders and still know what a good game is. I'll be rolling a druid to see if I can consummate relations with a bear as a bear, seems like it'll be a romping good time.
How many times do you pick up a game only to think, "eh I could be doing something else." It's happened to a lot of my friends and my brothers who I play games with.
Never? I don't think that way. But, people change. Maybe you and/or your friends are growing up, having kids and careers? I don't know. Some of my friends have radically different gaming tastes.... because they have kids, and 30-45 mins at a time to play games - Enormous, narrative deep RPGs just aren't for them anymore. That's not the fault of the industry, and in fact modern game design is right up their alley, built as it is around those shorter game loops.
Please forgive my amusement; I'm old enough to have seen multiple cycles of "things were better in my day," in multiple forms of human expression. Music, TV, movies, games, etc. How many technological advancements have "killed" music?
The games industry isn't healthy in many ways but nostalgia for "the way things used to be" is just silly, because all it really means (as in the case of the boomer generation pining for 1950's suburbia...) is "things were better for me back then."
I think you might be missing the point here, it's not about nostalgia, and I'm only 30 so that aspect doesn't even come into play. I like modern games just as much as I do older games.
It's about corporate greed and how that negatively impacts game development by changing the primary goals of the company from making something fun to making the most amount of money possible, and how this is actually a much greater issue for our industry than AI. The end result is an inferior product that the customers understand is inferior, hence the 'I could be doing something else' mentality.
It's good to want money & make as much of it as possible, but we need to strike a balance.
Either way, sorry for derailing the thread. Lets get back to bitching about AI, it's more fun
An independent studio can employ the most talented artists/writers/designers/engineers to make a game and completely knock it out of the park (BG3), and still come under fire...for making something great.
I think you might be missing the point here, it's not about nostalgia, and I'm only 30 so that aspect doesn't even come into play. I like modern games just as much as I do older games.
It's about corporate greed and how that negatively impacts game development by changing the primary goals of the company from making something fun to making the most amount of money possible, and how this is actually a much greater issue for our industry than AI. The end result is an inferior product that the customers understand is inferior, hence the 'I could be doing something else' mentality.
It's good to want money & make as much of it as possible, but we need to strike a balance.
No, I get the point. I guess I got carried away making my own point at your expense, so apologies for that.
An independent studio can employ the most talented artists/writers/designers/engineers to make a game and completely knock it out of the park (BG3), and still come under fire...for making something great.
We just can't have nice things
Sure we can! The controversy exists only in social media and games journalism built on ad revenue - Generating controversy is in its best interests. Once everyone moves on the success will speak for itself.
Sure we can! The controversy exists only in social media and games journalism built on ad revenue - Generating controversy is in its best interests. Once everyone moves on the success will speak for itself.
This, one hundred percent.
A young coworker also said something about how 'Blizzard shat all over Larian' etc, and... I didn't even have to look into it to know that nothing of the sort happened. He spent too much time on Reddit getting angry, where some poor devs comments got amplified way beyond the intended circle and it was now being spread as outrage bait for clicks.
I don't even think it was Blizzard who dissed Larian, it was somebody no one's ever heard of on twitter. Social media is honestly cringe af sometimes. Now I keep getting video recommendations that are like "OoOo Game Devs Hate Larian for Overachieving?!11!1"
Replies
In the end people use games and entertainment as a way to get instant dopamine. And there are new ways to get dopamine these days. People are also social creatures. That's why social entertainment like instagram or tiktok wins.
I don't think that in the war for attention video games have a lot of room. Video games are a good addition to a normal calm life. But most people don't have it anymore. Our world in not the same as in the 80s or the 90s.
I recently ordered a VR headset, and it can offer much more than traditional video games. The future of gaming is definitely in VR. Clicking the mouse while sitting on a chair destroying ones health feels stupid. In VR you get some training at least. And the immersiveness is also a big factor.
One way to 'combat' AI (resistance is futile) is to expand outside of the art world. There's a lot of space for improvement in the industry, and despite the advancements in both tech and art, the bar is still low, or it's off kilter or skewed. You have games with insanely good art and absolutely terrible mechanics, and vice versa. So why then do we consider AI to threaten the industry when we have bigger fish to fry?
Yes, it's a contest for attention. Human attention is finite. User retention is a real business measurement.
The thing that Zetheros said "I could be doing something else" is a common narrative nowadays. Games are just not that exciting. There are numerous videos on the topic that "games aren't fun anymore"
Can you even name an interesting game? Major studious are producing remakes. And indies are producing minimalistic and safe little games.
The last project that excited me was Inscryption, but it suffered from low budget. I also liked FTL and Into the breach, they felt like real unique games, but they were super small and can be much better with bigger budgets and better writing. It feels like it's not possible nowadays to make a unique game with good gameplay, good writing and not aimed at 12 years old.
About youtube videos, content creators & drama, these are all symptomatic of our industry's actions, not the cause. Asmongold spits hot takes, some true & some not... he's an entertainer first and foremost so I'd take anything he says with a grain of salt.
Baldur's Gate 3 is coming out in less than 12 hours from now; not a remake but a sequel. Larian Studios seem like they have good heads on their shoulders and still know what a good game is. I'll be rolling a druid to see if I can consummate relations with a bear as a bear, seems like it'll be a romping good time.
"All modern games are trash except the ones I like. Things were better in the past."
Never? I don't think that way. But, people change. Maybe you and/or your friends are growing up, having kids and careers? I don't know. Some of my friends have radically different gaming tastes.... because they have kids, and 30-45 mins at a time to play games - Enormous, narrative deep RPGs just aren't for them anymore. That's not the fault of the industry, and in fact modern game design is right up their alley, built as it is around those shorter game loops.
Please forgive my amusement; I'm old enough to have seen multiple cycles of "things were better in my day," in multiple forms of human expression. Music, TV, movies, games, etc. How many technological advancements have "killed" music?
The games industry isn't healthy in many ways but nostalgia for "the way things used to be" is just silly, because all it really means (as in the case of the boomer generation pining for 1950's suburbia...) is "things were better for me back then."
It's about corporate greed and how that negatively impacts game development by changing the primary goals of the company from making something fun to making the most amount of money possible, and how this is actually a much greater issue for our industry than AI. The end result is an inferior product that the customers understand is inferior, hence the 'I could be doing something else' mentality.
It's good to want money & make as much of it as possible, but we need to strike a balance.
Either way, sorry for derailing the thread. Lets get back to bitching about AI, it's more fun
Sure we can! The controversy exists only in social media and games journalism built on ad revenue - Generating controversy is in its best interests. Once everyone moves on the success will speak for itself.
This, one hundred percent.