Falling out of love with gaming

Dumar's favorite game is Papers Please.

To be fair there are a whole lot of good games out there.

XCOM Enemy Unknown/Enemy Within.
Hundreds of indie games with really interesting concepts.

From the last ~2 years:
Skyrim, MineCraft, and others I can't remember.

TCG:
Hex, Hearthstone, SolForge


But unfortunately there's no "experience a dangerous world with its own complex economy shared with other players" (besides EVE Online?) kind of game (I will not call that an MMORPG because to some people MMORPGs means something that I'm really not interested in).

Seananigans_sl said:

Don't let them take that acronym! It belongs to the games that actually fit the title. These new games (and the abortions that some old ones have turned into), MMORPG's they are not.

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You know how to fix the problems with MMORPGs? is to change the name of the genre.

Not only you will not attract those millions of timmies that have no place in this genre to begin with. You will also eliminate any kind of comparison and anticipation. You will also have an easier time convincing your investors not to do something like WoW (since you're not doing an "MMORPG").

It will attract a sub-million niche audience and they will be happy.
Keep "MMORPGs" to that ~60 million players market share. Keep feeding them these lobby-instance-infested games with fetch-quests retarded game experience along with their twitchy game-play and "dynamic" events.

Yes, this is exactly it. Not nostalgia.

That's why when you refer to the 'golden days' of the late NES to early-mid SNES/Genesis era of console and PC gaming, it really, objectively was the golden days. Because the suits and bean counters weren't a major part of the industry, weren't a part influencing design decisions.

It really is a piece of shit industry. Woe to anyone who actually wants to get into it now.

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At least Nintendo is still making fun games, they don't have suits influencing how they make games.

Play the new Super Maro 3D World and Zelda: A Link Between Worlds if you want some magical, amazing, fun times circa 1996.

I had a rant here about taking away control from the player but I'm pretty sure I did that one already.

One thing you can easily see are AAA franchises taking less and less risk in name of broader appeal. When you throw that much money into a game you pretty much have to. You have Call of Duty becoming more and more of a rail shooter, with paths so narrowly defined that even WoW dungeon design seems open. There was even a map in Black Ops 1 where if you walked down the street instead of through some buildings the game would crash.

But I do enjoy newer franchises like Dead Space, Bioshock, Batman, The Witcher, Mass Effect - it's not like everything has turned to shit and nothing new and good is being made.

I don't think it's the quality of the games so much as it is simply jaded gamers. Also, entire genres I enjoyed going away for no real reason - space shooters (Star Citizen kickstarter, holy shit) and tactical RPGs (shouldn't X-Com's success have opened some eyes and wallets?) The audience didn't go anywhere, but publishers lost interest in the chase for larger profit margins.

One thing I'm doing more of is mixing in a good tv show instead of just coming home and playing game after game.

But I do enjoy newer franchises like Dead Space, Bioshock, Batman, The Witcher, Mass Effect - it's not like everything has turned to shit and nothing new and good is being made.

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Dead Space, Mass Effect, Dragon Age have all turned to shit in their latest incarnations. The newest Bioshock was pretty good but the ones between it and the original were garbage.

The Witcher is like the model of what a game franchise should be. But CD Projekt isn't controlled by some overlord demanding their games be this or that so they can make more money.

Kreugen_sl said:

One thing I'm doing more of is mixing in a good tv show instead of just coming home and playing game after game.

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Nailed it..

Sir Funk_sl said:

I really wish the Asheron's Call model would have taken off and been brought to the next level. It was gloriously episodic and if the genre could have been taken down that path, I think gamers would be a lot more engaged right now.

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Then there was the Atrocity that was Asherons Call 2....somewhere there are support groups set up for those poor players that bought in to that game

For cracked, it's a decent article.

Not sure about the budget argument. I get why the budgets are big but not why they can't try and scale back.

Ukerric_sl said:

'fess up: Who here wrotethat article?

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Not a suprise to me... for example the MMO industry as a whole has been really focused on how to capture RMT rather than improving the gaming experience.. which is why we will see more RIFTS and less games with staying power for a while... it has to come from indie now.

Honestly I find myself just playing old titles for the most part... anything that has come MMO wise since vanguard has been a horrible experience and a waste of time for me other than RIFT once i leveled one char and realized it sucked. I play DDO, vanguard and recently returned to EQ2 and I am enjoying it.

As much as I would love to see a AAA MMO come out with the depth and complexity of older games I have resigned myself to the fact that in my gamer lifetime I won't see it... so I play the older stuff.. graphics are not great but decent if you use injectors and such.

This thread is like those "I'm ugly" posts from girls on Facebook.

Ukerric_sl said:

'fess up: Who here wrotethat article?

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#5. We Put People Who Don't Know Gaming in Charge

The first thing that came to mind was that the current lead raid designer for WoW is a lawyer. Not saying if it is good or bad, just saying.

Ion Hazzikostas - Wowpedia - Your wiki guide to the World of Warcraft