Getting tired of game industry trends

I browse games on steam, and see way too many games that are early access, games that have 10,000 DLC packs, and games that are online only.

I have also gotten sick of 10 year development cycles, kickstarter failures, and truckloads of cheap crappy cash in indie games. I wish these trends would stop.

@AlexKidd5000:

When I was younger I dreamed of making my own game - even it was just a small project.

Now it all just seems so pointless.

Only the big games impress me - and they generally require a huge team and budget.

There just too many shitty, self-indulgent craps being released in Steam and and mobiles. Some of them are based on shitty, short-lived memes like "Ugandan Knuckles" for examples. I think video games today are easier to make thanks to cheaper, more diverse assets available such Unreal engines and Unity for examples as well as the existence of crowdfunding sites such as Patreon, Kickstarter, Indiegogo and such.

Just like thereal25 said, I too used to think it will be cool to make my own game but with rise of shitty "indie" games that nobody wants to play in first place, I think those were made by bigger studios are better or at least never based on bad ideas to begin with. Sure, some good indie games do exists such as Legrand Legacy(which was developed by Indonesians), Dual Gear(which was developed by Thais) and Stardew Valley(which was developed by a single person) but the shitty ones outnumbered the good ones.

@AlexKidd5000: Try a console then, otherwise get use to it. Games like Undertale are what keep P.C. Gamers 'happy' outside the multiplayer scene. The developers are only giving P.C. Gamers what they actually buy. I personally like many Indie games so it's not really that big a deal.

Otherwise just Mod a Bethesda game or something_

I hate games that are online only. I have nothing against online playing but it's something I'm not interested in. Every game should allow the player to play by him/herself or online.

I agree about online only. I'm completely done with multiplayer only games. They just aren't fun at all anymore.

Yeah the big-budget, alleged-AAA games (AAA used to mean quality, now it just means "We spent way too much money, buy our DLC packs) have really gotten out of control. First off, a good chunk of them are all obsessed with big, boring, empty game worlds in the name of "Freedom", which might as well mean "we are following the trends and gimmicks of other studios and are too lazy to make anything of any real significane...here is an auto-populated, auto-rendered game world for you to gawk at because our coders are amazing but our artistry sucks".

DLC is getting out of control. Let me rephrase that: superficial, hollow, content-less downloadable "content" is getting out of control. Yeah yeah yeah, I know I don't have to buy it, but when we have A.) day-one DLC that should have been included in the base game, and B.) a significant amount of the community buys this pay-to-win bullshit, well...it's a problem. It adds very little to the actual content of the game, and generally just gives a player an advantage (in multiplayer) and maybe an hour or two extra content (in singleplayer) at a relatively insane price (when measured as a dollar-per-hour ratio).

Online-only--whether by being a multiplayer-centric game or requiring some sort of connection due to "service"--is also killing gaming. Yes, it's driving sales; no, it's not good for the industry. You're turning a craft into a commodity. And yes, I am still a socialist, so I know companies have to make a profit, but I just think if they were half as concerned with making a quality game as they were with selling copies and DLC, we would all be better off.

I don't think the current trends are sustainable, and you can already see the "DLC bubble" starting to burst. The game industry will come crashing down in the next few years.

Thank god for indie studios; yeah there are too many, but it's sort of a spray and pray thing, and fortunately for ever five indie titles that implode or never get out of beta, there seems to be one that gets out of beta and is a lot of fun, at a reasonable price.

What platform? You just need to do your research, and only take gambles on games you can afford and are far along enough that you can go "OK, even if they don't finish, I still had 10 dollars worth of fun from it".

But to have tried and lost than to never try at all, right?

Anyway, I love what's going on with indie games and early access. We have so many excellent indie titles available to us, and with early access we get to participate in development as well. It's a lot of fun, and providing feedback to a burgeoning developer or team is satisfying.

You can still make your own game, maybe you are just afraid of failing like so many have? Afraid of being "one of them" that you seem to hate so much?

Yeah, thank god Activision paid Josh Duhamel a few million dollars for ten minutes of dialogue and likeness, and hundreds of millions of dollar for advertising. That money definitely could not have been spent elsewhere.

Smartassery aside, I'd like to see what big studios could do with some modesty. Go back to the fundamentals. Take their resources and develop a really nice, optimised game engine. Develop a game that is less about pretty colors and cool cutscenes and wow factor, and more about amazing controls, creative gameplay, and compelling level design.

The latest CoD was incredibly disappointing, I'd rather just watch Saving Private Ryan for the 50th time than play an hour of that uninspired, hopeless mess. At least Infinite Warfare had some creativity to it, some neat zero-G gameplay, and a cool vision of the future.

@mrbojangles25:

With the proliferation of indie titles all over steam's store front, I imagine it'd be damn hard to get in on the scene.

You could literally put in thousands of hours into a project and it could just sink and go unnoticed - even if it's actually quite good! How to prove that it's good without advertising - which costs even more.

But I like the idea of modding a Bethesda title or something. If I had the time that'd probably be where I'd start - because much of the hard work is already in place - the rest is creativity and creating something inspired and original.

On PS4 it's shooters endless sequels open world games dlc games a service. I'm not interested in any of it. Gaming is getting stale developers just don't take chances anymore. If it don't make a billion dollars to them it's a failure. I play games because I like to see new and exciting games. When COD4 came out it was ground breaking. Now there's been 10 COD games since COD4 and the series just keeps getting worse and worse yet it's the biggest selling game every year. I'm still playing games from 15 years ago because it's better then the shit coming out now. I've been playing video games since 1980 and this is the worst generation I've ever seen.

I hate people regurgitating something a gazillion YouTube channels have hammered on already and pass it off like it's their own. I also hate mob mentality. There's enough good games to keep me busy for several lifetimes, it's also really easy to discriminate between good games and crap, takes like two seconds of looking at screenshots and store page.

There’s definitely a lot of shit out there and shitty practices, but that just makes it easier on deciding what games to buy and which ones to ignore.

Gaming is becoming too expensive for me. I decided to stop buying 5-10 games per month.

I am switching to more casual gaming. I am getting older and slowing down. I honestly only want to play AAA games. I start yawning at garbage indie games 20 minutes in and never finish them.

You are right! All are repeating something or not worth.

One of the my favourite game of this Console Generation is Inside, which is quite simple. You use the control stick and two bottoms (jump + push), and you don't need anything more to play. I am waiting for the psysical edition of Sonic Mania to purchase it, which reminds me to old good times

I am currently playing to old fashioned 2D plattforms like Yoshi´s Island, DKC and many more from 16 bits Console Generation and although I have finished up them so many times I still having fun.

I have spend a lot of money in PS4 games and I have only played a few of them (Uncharted and Nier among them).

Same now it's just all about how much microtransactions they can squeeze out of you. I miss the days when MP games took skill and not pay to win.

Square-Enix already announced that 4 more DLCs for FFXV planned for 2019 release. This mean either FFXV is not yet finished or they just shamelessly milking the game for many years to come. It already had a mobile version, F2P smartphone game, VR fishing game and to mention countless of patches and updates that come out almost every month. If you had an older PS4 it's a bad news you had to delete some of your older games because it takes too much space. If you were planning to play the PC version and get ready to buy a 4 terabyte HDD to deal with constant updates and patches. If you bought the 2016 version and you probably spent your money on DLCs almost as the game itself(60 dollars).

FFXV is a terminally ill patient who begged his doctor for a quick, painless death and yet the doctor continue to drug him, wired him to many life support machines in order to increase his lifespan because his family, friends and other people keep visiting him, paying the doctor as they do.

Too much shit thrown at us gamers. Online-only video games, DLC, season passes, loot boxes, day one edition, add-ons, updates and etc. Video game disc + extra $$$.

The days when games were complete on a single disc and only had to pay just once are long gone, except those who are patient to wait for the complete edition with all DLC.

i played a game earlier that when you boot it up it goes to a screen that says press any button, then takes you to another screen that says press any button, then takes you to the main menu. i mean wtf?! two button presses just to get to the main menu? i was fuming. sadly all too common these days

@lembu90: FFXIII was cursed and passed on to FFXV.

Getting tired seeing these DLCs get released in small chunks. If they do story DLC with KH3 and FF7, Square-Enix is dead to me.

The last acceptable Final Fantasy game was XII, the storyline was bland, but the gameplay was enjoyable and memorable.

I'm getting tired of gamers nonstop bitching and moaning in about every little thing. Gaming is more varied and robust then it's ever been, yet we see daily threads crying over everything and anything. Don't like dlc, don't buy it. Don't like online only games, don't buy them. There's more then enough other games you could be playing and ENJOYING that all the complaining is just getting old.

Ironically, you don't have to voice your disdain for bitching in a thread about bitching either. Yet here you are. We're glad you enjoy gaming, really. You're not adding anything to this thread though.

I think many people, myself included, want to see major publishers take more risks, but ofc the nature of being a large public company means we'll probably never see a return to those days, unless publishers choose to go privately held ownership. That could happen if more indies get big enough to pose a real threat to the big 3 or 4 publishers.

@vfighter: I have no problems with DLCs but rather shady business practices behind the DLCs. For example Final Fantasy XV is by far the worst DLCs practices after the infamous lootbox fiascos in Star Wars Battlefront II. The game itself released nearly two years ago and four major DLCs has been released and it still far from complete. In fact four more story DLCs already planned for 2019 and beyond proves Square-Enix still not done milking FFXV. If you bought the 2016 version, you probably spent at least 80 dollars on DLCs alone if each of them worth 20 dollars per piece. Not to mention the VR fishing game which may cost 10-15 dollars more. Add more 80 dollars if you planning to buy 4 more DLCs in 2019 and then another 80 dollars spent. At this point you may already spent 220-230 dollars including the base game itself. Add more 30-40 dollars more if you bought the special or collector edition that come with statues, steel box, art book, audio CDs, etc.

The game itself is a mess. It just a glorified product placement for camping equipment and instant noodles. It only purpose is to grab cash from lonely, tumblr-addict fujoshis than anyone else. Its rival Atlus already stopped milking Persona 5 and move on to their next big project unless I don't count the upcoming rhythm/musical game that is pretty much skipable anyway.

7 days to die is a friggin awesome game. one of the best I have ever played.

early access, indie

There's been a lot of bad trends going on this gen. Online only games, games as a service, paid loot boxes, pay to win games, season passes and all 3 console makers want people to pay to play online if people want to play online at all are quite bad.

I'm cool with indie games though. With how 2017 and early 2018 went it should be easier to avoid the bad trends.