Gaming has gotten better this decade imo

[NightmareFarm]

Last decade focused too much on progressing graphical fidelity at the expense of a good frame rate(hence why most games were 30fps rather than 60) and making games overly cinematic. I feel like since around the time 9th gen consoles came out the state of gaming has started picking itself back up and reversing these trends. There's also a bit more variety now whereas last decade a huge chunk of the popular games were open world or cinematic walking games or soulslike or a combination of either of these three genres.

Edited September 18, 2022 by NightmareFarm

[Withywarlock]

I think it's more that the focus has shifted from chasing graphical fidelity to chasing other trends, probably because there's more to marketing a game now than high resolution screenshots like touting hours of content, monetisation means, and other not-unique unique selling points (USP). There's still a lot of homogenous dross in the so-called AAA space, and when they choose to spend as much as they do it's only natural they try to make that money back by playing it safe.

I don't want to suddenly turn this into an indie reverence circlejerk but the indie scene has blown up considerably. It's done well to shake off the reputation of being just faux-16bit platform games with attempts at tugging at one's heartstrings. Now there's a lot of fun ideas being developed, and there's much more empowerment to put those ideas out there even if they're not particularly well executed. Allowing anyone to use an engine like Unreal or Unity, no longer having to rely on a limited selection such as Quake, Source, or RPGMaker, is a huge plus for aspiring game developers.

There's resounding celebration for middle-shelf games from the likes of Spiders, one of my favourite studios. I put this down to people missing rough edges and jankiness minus the game being broken. With how middle-shelf games are turning up, the terms 'Indie,' 'AA,' and 'AAA' ought to be revised.

I won't say the industry has improved, but the communication of its faults has, if only slightly. We're now far more aware of wrongdoing with crunch culture, tax avoidance, sexual misconduct and more. It's a given these things were happening a decade ago but we at least know about it now so people can be better advised and aware of what our money gets us, stress casualties and all.

I can't say that gaming is better for me or the people producing our games, but at least we know with certainty where it can improve.

Edited September 18, 2022 by Withywarlock

[NightmareFarm]

25 minutes ago, Withywarlock said:

I think it's more that the focus has shifted from chasing graphical fidelity to chasing other trends, probably because there's more to marketing a game now than high resolution screenshots like touting hours of content, monetisation means, and other not-unique unique selling points (USP). There's still a lot of homogenous dross in the so-called AAA space, and when they choose to spend as much as they do it's only natural they try to make that money back by playing it safe.

I don't want to suddenly turn this into an indie reverence circlejerk but the indie scene has blown up considerably. It's done well to shake off the reputation of being just faux-16bit platform games with attempts at tugging at one's heartstrings. Now there's a lot of fun ideas being developed, and there's much more empowerment to put those ideas out there even if they're not particularly well executed. Allowing anyone to use an engine like Unreal or Unity, no longer having to rely on a limited selection such as Quake, Source, or RPGMaker, is a huge plus for aspiring game developers.

There's resounding celebration for middle-shelf games from the likes of Spiders, one of my favourite studios. I put this down to people missing rough edges and jankiness minus the game being broken. With how middle-shelf games are turning up, the terms 'Indie,' 'AA,' and 'AAA' ought to be revised.

I won't say the industry has improved, but the communication of its faults has, if only slightly. We're now far more aware of wrongdoing with crunch culture, tax avoidance, sexual misconduct and more. It's a given these things were happening a decade ago but we at least know about it now so people can be better advised and aware of what our money gets us, stress casualties and all.

I can't say that gaming is better for me or the people producing our games, but at least we know with certainty where it can improve.

There's more indie games now so there's more overall variety rather than the same rotation of generic AAA games every year like it was back in 8th gen. 

[Yaramaki]

Depends really while i agree with the framerate being much better compared to last gen well apart from the switch that is, a couple of framerate drops here and there i can take but certain games on the switch my god are running like shit with framerate constantly dropping or houses that take a few seconds to load in. I feel like the switch is starting to show it's age.

Another thing of note, that has changed over the course of 10 years is that most big publishers aren't willing to take a gamble on something new in fear that it's going to flop, i fear like sony is also going to start playing it safe instead of coming up with a new ip every once in a while. I get it making games is expensive as fuck and money has to be made so there is not a whole lot you can do about it other then going the safe route and make something that people are familiair with and will buy instead of you know something like days gone exellent game btw but that games was a gamble and apperently diden't sold well enough according to sony. 

On the other hand indie games are thriving while big publishers have lost their ways, maybe it's time big publishers start taking an interest in developing more smaller games themselves instead of sequel after sequel.

But i don't know man this generation is weird because after nearly 2 years, console availability is still scarce and aslong as developers aren't going to ditch developing ps4/xbox one versions for their games, i feel like we never going to see what these current gen machines can do. Up until now my ps4 pro and xbox one x can do pretty much the same as a ps5/xbox series x it may not run as smoothly but it can run all the same games nonetheless apart from a few exeptions.

imo 9th generation hasn't properly kicked off yet, like we are in the middle of a transition so it's too early to say wheter it's going to be better or not. 

 

[NightmareFarm]

4 hours ago, Yaramaki said:

Depends really while i agree with the framerate being much better compared to last gen well apart from the switch that is, a couple of framerate drops here and there i can take but certain games on the switch my god are running like shit with framerate constantly dropping or houses that take a few seconds to load in. I feel like the switch is starting to show it's age.

Another thing of note, that has changed over the course of 10 years is that most big publishers aren't willing to take a gamble on something new in fear that it's going to flop, i fear like sony is also going to start playing it safe instead of coming up with a new ip every once in a while. I get it making games is expensive as fuck and money has to be made so there is not a whole lot you can do about it other then going the safe route and make something that people are familiair with and will buy instead of you know something like days gone exellent game btw but that games was a gamble and apperently diden't sold well enough according to sony. 

On the other hand indie games are thriving while big publishers have lost their ways, maybe it's time big publishers start taking an interest in developing more smaller games themselves instead of sequel after sequel.

But i don't know man this generation is weird because after nearly 2 years, console availability is still scarce and aslong as developers aren't going to ditch developing ps4/xbox one versions for their games, i feel like we never going to see what these current gen machines can do. Up until now my ps4 pro and xbox one x can do pretty much the same as a ps5/xbox series x it may not run as smoothly but it can run all the same games nonetheless apart from a few exeptions.

imo 9th generation hasn't properly kicked off yet, like we are in the middle of a transition so it's too early to say wheter it's going to be better or not. 

 

Switch is to be expecte dthough since it's even weaker than last gen consoles. 

However the first party games run butter smooth, it's only the 3rd parties that have to sacrifice fps to even run the game which was built for much more powerful rival consoles. 

I used to think we were still waiting for 9th gen to kick off but tbqh i'm now convinced that 9th gen is going to mostly be 60fps polished versions of 8th gen games until like 2025 or 2026 when the 10th gen consoles are about to release anyway. Sony has came out and said they are not making next gen games until 2024/2025 and MS said all their games are also going on Xbox One and/or PC. The pandemic gave other studios an excuse to not make any next gen games which I guess is here to stay despite COVID being in the rear view mirror. 

[Ajibusu]

The competition between Sony and Microsoft has helped pushed each other to improving on the games that they let run on their devices. Developers are doing more to gameplay and storyline since lots of developers are now good with graphics. It's a win win for players at the end of the day. 

[killamch89]

On 9/18/2022 at 2:41 AM, Withywarlock said:

I think it's more that the focus has shifted from chasing graphical fidelity to chasing other trends, probably because there's more to marketing a game now than high resolution screenshots like touting hours of content, monetisation means, and other not-unique unique selling points (USP). There's still a lot of homogenous dross in the so-called AAA space, and when they choose to spend as much as they do it's only natural they try to make that money back by playing it safe.

I don't want to suddenly turn this into an indie reverence circlejerk but the indie scene has blown up considerably. It's done well to shake off the reputation of being just faux-16bit platform games with attempts at tugging at one's heartstrings. Now there's a lot of fun ideas being developed, and there's much more empowerment to put those ideas out there even if they're not particularly well executed. Allowing anyone to use an engine like Unreal or Unity, no longer having to rely on a limited selection such as Quake, Source, or RPGMaker, is a huge plus for aspiring game developers.

There's resounding celebration for middle-shelf games from the likes of Spiders, one of my favourite studios. I put this down to people missing rough edges and jankiness minus the game being broken. With how middle-shelf games are turning up, the terms 'Indie,' 'AA,' and 'AAA' ought to be revised.

I won't say the industry has improved, but the communication of its faults has, if only slightly. We're now far more aware of wrongdoing with crunch culture, tax avoidance, sexual misconduct and more. It's a given these things were happening a decade ago but we at least know about it now so people can be better advised and aware of what our money gets us, stress casualties and all.

I can't say that gaming is better for me or the people producing our games, but at least we know with certainty where it can improve.

This - I couldn't agree more. The mentality of gaming studios has become more focused on profit instead of quality (EA, Ubisoft, 2Kgames) so that really isn't an improvement. Games being released with lots of bugs and then being subsequently patched after release is also a step backwards from a decade ago. With the rise of social platforms which allow for independent gaming journalism, gaming companies can no longer cover up their mistakes by manipulating mainstream gaming media.

[NightmareFarm]

32 minutes ago, killamch89 said:

This - I couldn't agree more. The mentality of gaming studios has become more focused on profit instead of quality (EA, Ubisoft, 2Kgames) so that really isn't an improvement. Games being released with lots of bugs and then being subsequently patched after release is also a step backwards from a decade ago. With the rise of social platforms which allow for independent gaming journalism, gaming companies can no longer cover up their mistakes by manipulating mainstream gaming media.

Devs have been chasing profits over quality since gaming started. 

Also many games were in atrocious states when it comes to bugs and the overall optimisation side of things if we're looking at 7th gen which is about a decade ago now. Drakgengard 3, inFAMOUS, Metal Gear Rising, Assassin Creed 3, etc.

Edited September 19, 2022 by NightmareFarm

[Heatman]

52 minutes ago, killamch89 said:

This - I couldn't agree more. The mentality of gaming studios has become more focused on profit instead of quality (EA, Ubisoft, 2Kgames) so that really isn't an improvement. Games being released with lots of bugs and then being subsequently patched after release is also a step backwards from a decade ago. With the rise of social platforms which allow for independent gaming journalism, gaming companies can no longer cover up their mistakes by manipulating mainstream gaming media.

Everything boils down how these game companies are so much in a haste to rush and release half baked poorly developed games all because they are too eager to get gamers money off their pockets. It's why a lot of their games gets broken at launch. 

[HowHammerYou]

During 8th Gen, devs focused way too much on using the consoles' power to render increasingly massive worldspaces at the expense of every other aspect of their games. As a result of this, the few games that bucked the trend (such as Until Dawn) tend to look far more visually advanced than open-world games which released 5 years later. The open-world concept, which had been fun in 7th gen when worldspace sizes were far more manageable, grew to become one of the greatest blights video games have ever seen. Thankfully, I've begun to notice a trend very recently where big devs seem to be moving away from the open-world concept or at least reducing the sizes of their worldspaces. This makes me very happy.

[NightmareFarm]

23 minutes ago, HowHammerYou said:

During 8th Gen, devs focused way too much on using the consoles' power to render increasingly massive worldspaces at the expense of every other aspect of their games. As a result of this, the few games that bucked the trend (such as Until Dawn) tend to look far more visually advanced than open-world games which released 5 years later. The open-world concept, which had been fun in 7th gen when worldspace sizes were far more manageable, grew to become one of the greatest blights video games have ever seen. Thankfully, I've begun to notice a trend very recently where big devs seem to be moving away from the open-world concept or at least reducing the sizes of their worldspaces. This makes me very happy.

Yeah, I don't get why everything needs to be open world these days. 

[Withywarlock]

1 hour ago, killamch89 said:

The mentality of gaming studios has become more focused on profit instead of quality (EA, Ubisoft, 2Kgames) so that really isn't an improvement.

It's always been that way. The 'bedroom programming' of the late 80s/early 90s remains impressive but is heavily romanticised especially when brought up during a controversy in today's gaming. It's easy to forget how arcade machines traded artistic integrity to gobble up people's quarters. Home console adaptations of arcade games were similar: a very short and punishing game that only has a long lifespan due to the fact that it's so hard to reach the end. Not to mention the video game crash of 1983, a catastrophic event which - thankfully (and bizarrely) - has not yet been met in games history.

We can rightly point to big publishers, but it's too easy to single out three (who, in my opinion, don't register anywhere near as awful as Tencent and Konami) and call it a day. What makes them worse than they were a decade ago? Who has improved, who has surpassed them as worse? Gaming's rogues' gallery is a lot more visibly complicated now than at least a decade ago.

1 hour ago, killamch89 said:

Games being released with lots of bugs and then being subsequently patched after release is also a step backwards from a decade ago.

Agreed. The implementation of online components is a double-edged sword, allowing convenience for both makers and consumers of video games. We can buy, collect and play games easier than ever before... and we can also get them patched just as quickly if the developer(-to-publisher relationship) is so inclined. Which of the two below is more desirable?

1. We go back to the days of games unable to be patched through launchers, requiring them to be fixed through dialling up a bulletin-board system (BBS), having them delivered by snail mail, or waiting for mods/expansion packs to introduce bug fixes? That's if the developer can afford $40,000 to update it. This would however mean that some games may never release because delays are not enough as the project is too much for the developers for whatever reason (financial, competence, time constraints, all of the above), and will not be officially fixed.
2. We stick to what we have?

I prefer option 2 because consumers are as informed as we choose to be. Previews, reviews, interviews are available from all manner of sources depending on your preference, discounts are more frequent and consistent than have ever before been in the industry, and refund policies are constantly improving as we usher in a potential all-digital age. Most of all patience has and always will be free, and we have enough games in existence to play whilst we wait.

This isn't to excuse broken releases but there's enough people out there with modding experience, enough money going around for safe bet games (ironically they're the ones that frequently and indefensively have issues...) and again enough information to just wait for someone to fix it. If the game doesn't have someone who is enthusiastic about it being fixed, it probably wasn't worth the ire about it being broken in the first place. Until we collectively get our acts together, patience is the only solution and we ought to use it while we still have mod access and clasps on our wallets.

2 hours ago, killamch89 said:

With the rise of social platforms which allow for independent gaming journalism, gaming companies can no longer cover up their mistakes by manipulating mainstream gaming media.

Agreed. Games journalism, if it could be called that, was horrendous when it first started out. I'd call it laughably corrupt if I had proof of said corruption; the consistently glowing reviews in magazines were suspicious and in my opinion clearly made as marketing material rather than serving their readership well. Since Jeff Gerstmann's firing from Gamespot, publishers walk on eggshells to curry favour with expensive review camp events and other exclusive goodies.

I won't get into the independent versus mainstream, both have their merits, demerits, romanticising and demonising. I will however say that it's going to be an uphill battle to continue uncovering mistakes: from the beginning the industry did a very good job of not only controlling the message, but creating it. There needs to be a lot less cloak and dagger, and I think the first thing we can do about that is not abusing developers and publishers because they're not giving out release dates. More needs to be done besides parroting press releases, and since the Totalbiscuit passed away few seem to have a clue on how to do that.

[Empire]

I’m going to say games are better now because (1) the OLDER games have often been really well remastered with new features (eg. Day of the Tentacle, Black Mesa) and (2) the newer games have huge size, there’s more indie games, the sheer range and scale of what is available, and the addition of mods, customisation and achievements.

As much as it surprises an older gamer to say it, games are actually getting better. And remastering old games means they are getting better too. So it’s a win win. Who’d a thunk it.

[Heatman]

17 hours ago, NightmareFarm said:

Yeah, I don't get why everything needs to be open world these days. 

I think that it's something to do with the feeling that more gamers are more likely to be interested in playing video games which gives them more room for exploration. I might be wrong though but it's how I feel. 

[NightmareFarm]

7 hours ago, Heatman said:

I think that it's something to do with the feeling that more gamers are more likely to be interested in playing video games which gives them more room for exploration. I might be wrong though but it's how I feel. 

Even in non open world games theres still plenty of exploration possible with the stages in it. The modern DOOM games for example aren't open world but is absolutely packed with collectibles, secrets and fluff if you decide to explore the stages.

Edited September 20, 2022 by NightmareFarm