IamLEAM1983 said:
It's just sad to consider that what once was a hobby shared by a niche of passionate folks, some twenty years ago, turned into this big corporate enabler that tries to justify its own excesses with online passes, gateway fees and other ridiculous opt-in purchases.
I miss the days when a team of two or three, a Pizza and Coke budget and some patience could deliver little games that would get passed on via floppy discs. In the triple-A business, if you're not siphoning the equivalent of a fraction of a single State or province's yearly budget into the cost of producing a SINGLE game - you're apparently doing it wrong.
And some people wonder why innovation's dead. Of course it's dead; the only way to make money is to play it safe and use your millions to, oh, sharpen up the textures in places and maybe - just maybe - keep your level designers busy for a year. That's when you're not releasing map packs.
Innovation is not dead, you are just searching for it at the wrong places.
Nowadays, it's popular to accuse people who bash "the mainstream", with claims that those are just hipsters, but really, in that regard, they have a point:
If you are looking for dedication, artistic fidelity, and styles and themes that feel like they are made directly for you, then go and find your own obscure niche, instead of drooling over whatever the "AAA" industry and the main gaming media is hyping at the moment.
A mainstream blockbuster industry is, by DEFINITION, soullessly bland, CEOs are intentionally trying to dumb it own to the Lowest Common Denominator, it's only purpose is to reach as mony people as possible.
To identify that monstrous side of gaming as "our" gaming, as the serious, hardcore, high-quality, AAA, call-it-what-you-want industry that we are supposed to care about the most, is it's own foolishness.
Just because you are interested in literature, doesn't mean that you have to judge the past years based on Twilight and 50 shades, you can always find some postcyberpunk adventure, or an epic Fallout/My Little Pony fanfiction novel written with amazing talent, whatever floats your boat. Just because you like music, doesn't mean that you have to listen to Bieber and Lady Gaga, there is always some christian industrial death metal band or some alternative J-rock that you will like.
The same with games. No one says that you HAVE TO care about the mainstream, or identify with it as if it would be made for you. There are also some incredibly enjoyable games made, (and not even just ironically pixellated 2D indie games) only slightly behind the front lines. Look them up.