Are games today really that bad?

[Zhukov]

Level and gameplay design is better.

*starts laughing forever*

Wait, you were serious? Because in reality, level design is constantly getting worse. More linear, more simplified and more streamlined. Good level design is getting more and more rare each year.

These days, games try to hold your hand to an unreal degree. Take Megaman. Back then, nobody would have added "press X to jump" or "press A to shoot". Nobody would have added a message of "beware, this enemy could kill you!". Nobody would have caused a message to pop up, telling you in detail what an enemy is and what his grandmother ate for breakfast today.

Uh... right.

Telling players which button does what is not "hand holding".

Nor is having a level layout that actually makes sense, unlike the jumbled messes found in the shooters of yore.

 

[The]

It's just that nostalgia makes everyone's perception of that older game seem better. Today, as we grow, we begin to see flaws in new games but not in the older games. In fact, half the time these games are better is because nostalgia elevates them to greatness.

 

[TehCookie]

I'd say yes but mentally I'm still a child who is distracted by bright colors and can completely ignore plotholes if it's fun. The more realistic games try to be the more likely the plotholes/glitches stick out. I like ridiculous over the top and don't mind cartoons and most modern games aren't made like that. You may have a few indie titles, but I'd rather not dive into that pool of shit to find that one gem which turns out to be cubic zirconium.

I'll point out that map that's been floating out in here and say that's another reason. 1993 you were given a character and a gun and ran and and killed shit, now they're trying to make it a full experience with a story and everything. I like both, and that's exactly it. They're two different things played for two different reasons, I like diversity and being able to pick whatever I'm in the mood for. I don't want to be stuck with a linear game when I just want to walk around and shoot things and pick up shiny keys. I don't care why a rusty key is sparkling, just make it glow. Non-shiny keys annoy me for some reason.

 

[Kahunaburger]

It's just that nostalgia makes everyone's perception of that older game seem better. Today, as we grow, we begin to see flaws in new games but not in the older games. In fact, half the time these games are better is because nostalgia elevates them to greatness.

Here's an interesting experiment: play an old, universally acclaimed game you haven't played before. Prepare to be floored by:

A) how good it is,
B) how little some modern games seem to have learned from it.

It's not nostalgia - the classics are classics because they are really good games.

 

[dancinginfernal]

Dark Souls was one of the greatest games I have played in the last 10 years. So no, I don't believe games are becoming bad.

I believe that they are becoming different as they are introduced to mainstream media.

 

[ChupathingyX]

As far as I'm concerned it's all about how much fun you're having and I'm personally still having a lot of fun.

Problem is, everyone has a different opinion on what they find "fun".

Whether that be spending time giving points to various stats, setting up your troops in strategical positions, attempting to get past a difficult platforming sequence, racing down the highway at top speed, committing genocide by bashing one button, shooting people without giving a fuck or comparing the societal and political views of individuals and factions in a fictional world not like our own.

 

[Laser Priest]

Nope. There have always been shitty games.

It's just that there are a lot more popular shitty games now.

Either way, I sincerely doubt that older games were better or that there is any larger a proportion of shitty games now.

 

[Rad Party God]

Nah, as much as people like to bash "Generic Modern Shooter of Duty #7", this generation has a staggering amount of amazing titles.

It's just that the most popular ones are the loudest, but they certainly don't define the entire generation.

 

[Laser Priest]

Nope. There have always been shitty games.

It's just that there are a lot more popular shitty games now.

Either way, I sincerely doubt that older games were better or that there is any larger a proportion of shitty games now.

Again ppl. Nobody is saying that there weren't shitty games in the past. Herp.

It's just that the supposed best games now don't measure up to the best of the past. (unless cinematic experiences, linear shooters, hand holding, gay elf/alien sex or LARPing/hiking simulators,ect... is your thing)

Excellent job not reading past the first sentence.

The only thing better about old games is that adventure games seemed to exist then.

Now most games are Modern Military FPSs or "dark fantasy" RPGs.

Then again, most of my older games, if I played them more than once, it was more out of me having no other games to play more than a desire to replay them.

There are plenty of shitty games in the mainstream now, but there were just as many shitty games back then. Even the good games of back then can barely hold a candle to the shitty games of now.

This is just taking the worst of today's games and comparing it to some absurd idealization of the old.

 

[Jadak]

That has less to do with anything current sucking and more to do with the fact that nostalgia a natural thing that people do, not the result of an unbiased comparison between the present and the past.

Same deal with music and why anyone over a certain age will call all new music trash that doesn't compare to "the good stuff they had back in the day". Nearly everyone does this, about all kinds of things and it's more about your brain simply not being as able to appreciate new things in the same way as you get older.

 

[TrevHead]

Chess isnt a good game its just ppl's nostalgia *rolls eyes*

 

[Indecipherable]

No, they aren't. Go out to any game shop that sells old PS1 and PS2 games (and so forth) and marvel at the utter depthless crap that we were offered alongside the actually memorable games of those eras.

That's the thing. Most of the games made today are crap but that isn't really any different from any other generation going back to the intellivision.

However, one thing that's gotten worse is the money grubbing. Hasn't been this bad since the arcade days.

Well to be fair, games were much more expensive then than now.

Doing a bit of quick research (I played NES games but was too young to buy them myself so I don't know the pricings off hand), games were around $45 to $60. SNES got up $80, and N64 up to $100.

Looking at the N64, you can basically double that in modern terms (5% inflation for 15 years) so that's a game at $200.

For NES, you can over triple the cost. 25 years is a long, long time.

There's a lot more that goes into it than just this very brief glance - development costs were much lower, but the market was a great deal smaller, and cartridge costs much higher - but $ for $ we get games far cheaper than ever before.

Yea, the problem with inflation however is that it's a myth. Most things actually don't go up with inflation, like entertainment or the average salary for that matter.
I have no doubt that games have become more expensive to make, it just troubles me that the ones that really play the schemes referenced in the image above aren't the small struggling dev studios but the big publishers who were already making huge profits before they started chopping up releases.

You have no clue what you are talking about.

 

[Waaghpowa]

Every generation has crap. What annoys me about this generation though is games are generally shorter, and safer. I hate how this gen insists on rebooting everything into FPS games or constantly remaking old games into HD. Would it have killed EA if they remade Syndicate into a strategy game or at least a good shooter rather than the committee safe, bland pile of shit we got?

 

[NinjaKirby1322]

I'm going to disagree here, as a good amount already have. There's nothing wrong with today's gaming industry. There are plenty of great games still coming out. Sure, I'll go back and replay Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Castlevania, but that doesn't mean I think that generation of games was better. You just have to know where to look.

Just to show, my five most played games on Steam in the past two weeks are Civilization 5, Total War: Shogun 2, Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale, Waveform, and Audiosurf. Audiosurf is the oldest of the games listed, being released on February 15, 2008.

Both Civ 5 and Shogun 2 have Metacritic scores of 90, and were pretty heavily publicized on Kotaku before launch, and I agree that both of these games are amazing. Plus, as a fan of Civilization, I think Civ 5 is the best so far. For the rest, though, I just stumbled into Recettear and Waveform, playing the demos before buying them, and had someone suggest I try Audiosurf. These games are extremely entertaining, and quite original.

Recettear, for example, has you running an item shop (hence the subtitle) in a town that has JRPG-style adventurers looking for work. Waveform, just released a couple days ago, has you controlling a ball of light as it travels from Pluto to Sol, but the only way you control the ball of light is by controlling the wave it is traveling on.

I also have Psychonauts and Half-Life 1 on Steam (both purchased two weeks ago), but I haven't played them recently because the other 5 games have been that much more enjoyable.

I know all my arguments have been anecdotal, but I'm just trying to show that you can't say that all games are suffering because one or two genres that are extremely popular don't fit your tastes. Go out into the fringe every once in a while. You'll find something you like.

 

[Don Savik]

Tribes: Ascend

Proof that hardcore PC shooting still has it.

The game is amazing. Team work oriented and skill based....and looks pretty too. Probably the best multiplayer you're going to get out of a shooter these days.

Sucks for the linear level design in single player games though, its quite a shame Though, Bioshock Infinite is showing us that it has very open environments with lots of options for combat, so that could be our answer to the dilemma. If you're a Bioshock fan.

which you should probably be. Just sayan.

 

[Wonderland]

Bushnell (creator of Atari) said that games today were a suckish mesh and that is terrible for the industry.

...


WHAT?

 

[Twilight_guy]

Judging the quality of something artistically objectively is very hard if not impossible. I'd say games are roughly the same as they have always been. People are the same all over though, I know that for sure, and I know that people are going to ***** without cease no matter how good or bad things are. Ignore the hordes of uninformed ignorant clods who populate the internet and believe what you want to believe.

 

[xDarc]

Undeniably worse, nostalgia having nothing to do with it. Vidya games are eclipsing other mediums in the entertainment business now and like all large commercial endeavors, they are shallow, soulless and average.

I remember getting my mind blown by how games came out with new mechanics, strategies, styles like every 6 months towards the end of the 90's. Things were evolving, changing, it was fun and challenging.

Now many games from 2006 and 2012 are nearly indistinguishable from one another. Thank you xbawks.

Yeah, i'd say today they are definitely worse.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Shamus Young, a contributor to this site, has revealed some interesting things [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/experienced-points/7652-The-Final-Fantasy-VII-Remake-is-a-Fantasy] about this subject. Fact is, the time taken to produce the 'complexity' of what you showed there pales in comparison to the amount of time taken to make the game look shiny enough to be accepted in this generation. The high standard of good graphics means that we cannot go back to that level complexity without some massive innovation in game design in general.

I partly agree, and partly disagree. The case Shamus Young made in that article was actually that things like game design are pretty trivial in cost next to graphics. So I don't think it would actually be much more costly to implement mech-style controls vs. the standard console FPS button layout.

On the other hand, you definitely do have the issue where large developers get very risk-averse with their bigger, more cost-intensive games. However, I think we're actually fine now as a result of the indie scene - the barrier to entry for making a vidya game is lowering, and therefore I think we're pretty likely to see innovation continue to come from the lower-budget games.

 

[veloper]

Plus, as a fan of Civilization, I think Civ 5 is the best so far.

Are you sure?
The civ5 AI has become a complete tactical joke that cannot get anything done under the one-unit-per-tile rule.
Emperor used to be a decent difficulty setting. Emperor is now a walk in the park. The AI needs even bigger cheats and advantages to pose any challenge.
Stacks of doom in civ 3 and 4 the AI could control properly atleast. 1 UPT is too much for it too handle. Civ5 replaced the stack of doom with a carpet of doom.
Players were outmanouvering the AI so badly, the devs nerfed the flanking bonusses and everything else that made 1 UPT and hex tiles tactically interesting in the first place.

On a strategic level the AI is just random. Doing crap like backstabbing their own allies when they are at war with the player. The AI doesn't even properly estimate the strenght of other civs when declaring war.
War and diplomacy is random now. In civ4 the AI atleast made sense, even if it was somewhat biased against the player.

On the economic level, the devs tried to balance the choices by making everything equally uninteresting and unappealing.
Gone is the variety of Civ4. No more specialist/hammer economy vs cottage spam vs super capital wonderspam, which were all valid economic strategies
given the situation. Civics used to have a very big impact on the game without unbalancing it.
Civ5 promotes only one thing and that is horizontal growth. Happiness limits cannot replace the maintenace costs of civ4. Many small cities with only the cheapest, primitive buildings, because everthing becomes progessively worse the higher you go on the ladder. It's a worse situation now than the science/tax farms in civ3.