why gaming of the future (starting in the present) will (does) SUCK

[Darren Dirt]

The 6 Most Ominous Trends in Video Games
http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-6-most-ominous-trends-in-video-games/

Our generation will be remembered for our video games. Every generation is remembered by its popular art; when you think of the 60s you think of Woodstock and hippie music. When you think of the 80s, you think of Miami Vice and the birth of music video. So when your grandchildren think of the 2010s, what will they picture in their minds? Let's put it this way ** :



( ^ But hey, less blood-splattered than last year!)


The problems with gaming go beyond the fact that every major blockbuster game coming in the next year seems to involve looking through glass sights at a terrorist or zombie.


Now, coming up on the sixth anniversary of the Wii's debut, Microsoft is promising us the absolute nadir of video game motion controls: Star Wars Kinect.

See, the Kinect is completely button-free. You just swing your arms around. Therefore, it completely wipes out about 90 percent of your input options. Things like the ability to actually move your character. Seriously.

For most of the game, your Jedi stands there like a jackass while stormtroopers stupidly amble into your flailing lightsaber.

@%&# you! Gaming was more interactive than this in 1979!


In the future, you're not going to have the ability to just play the games offline in single player while you wait. The tethering of all games to an online account is coming. And with that will come annoyances.

...That's your future, gamers. Take a good look at it. It will work like this:
A. Eventually, all gaming must be online in order for publishers to make money;
B. It is next to impossible to secure gamers' online data without many annoying security measures;
Therefore,
C. All future gaming will come with many annoying security measures.

The difference between the games you played as a kid and the games you'll be playing in the coming years is the difference between owning a car and having to pay for a cab every time you want to leave the house.

Instead of making games that explore new worlds and experiences, design becomes all about addiction and repetition. Games that are all about making the player endlessly grind for the purpose of earning items that can only be used for one thing: grinding for more items. Forever.

There will, with time, be zero reason for game companies to spend substantial money on games that can't be stretched out with multiplayer or downloadable episodes. How can they justify single-player, story-driven games? It's leaving money on the table.


**The reason every major game (that doesn't involve dragons) looks the same is because of the Modern Warfare series. So far we have two games and a spinoff that each took in as much money in the U.S. as Avatar.

This isn't about any lack of creativity among game developers, artists, writers or anyone else. It's about money, and the fact that the market has trapped games in a @%&#ing creative coffin (and developers will tell you the same). Everybody complains about sequels and reboots in Hollywood, but holy @%&#, it's nothing compared to what we have in gaming right now.


As the man from Epic says, "If there's anything that's killing us, it's dollar apps." Meanwhile, the most profitable game company right now isn't Activision/Blizzard or Nintendo or EA, it's Zynga, the makers of Farmville.

How does it make sense that we have the guy from Epic -- someone who makes $50 million budget games about space marines chainsawing aliens in half -- complaining that his business was being stolen by iPhone Tetris and Angry Birds?

The future is that what we're now calling video games will cease to be a thing, and will break up into several different art forms, each with their own medium. We'll have true "games" where we perform simple tasks to kill a few minutes or get a high score (Angry Birds, etc) that will cost a dollar or two. We'll have interactive stories that are less about "winning" and "losing" and more about relating to characters and following drama (LA Noire, Heavy Rain) and they will not be called games, because it never made sense to call them that.

Those titles should be priced like what they are: long rendered movies with some interactivity thrown in as a bonus, that the audience will only sit through once. Then we'll have competitive multiplayer games as their own thing -- those will probably be a subscription model, with no $60 game up front but with an infinite amount of @%&# for the most obsessed to blow their disposable income on.

The industry will realize those all need their own business models.

And then, maybe somebody will invent a lightsaber game that @%&#ing works.

[Melbosa]

DD you really need to add your views on these posts.  I am beginning to think you are on disgruntled cynical dude that reads all the wrongs in the world.

Now on topic; I've played some of the most enjoyable innovations in game play over the last 5 years, most notably in terms of story writing and immersion outside of the RPG genre where it always was.

I really think numbers speak to this as well.  The game industry exceeds the movie industry in revenue, that alone should give credit that there has to be something new for people to flock to video games the way they have.

All IMO.

[Mr. Analog]

Yes, there are a lot of crappy clones of popular games and there's certainly a lot of feature inbreeding there, but I think this has been with us since the 70s when the first Pong clones started flooding in trying to seize opportunity. Have things innovated since then? Well DUH! Will they continue to innovate and evolve? I'd like to think so.

The only real danger is to the big publishers that can't put out a game for less than $20 million, they may indeed collapse under their own weight if they can't innovate. But unilike the crash of '83 there is a much bigger diversity of publishers, so if anything a burst "gaming market bubble" might move some of the more radical game concepts in the spotlight.

[Darren Dirt]

The only real danger is to the big publishers that can't put out a game for less than $20 million, they may indeed collapse under their own weight if they can't innovate.

DD you really need to add your views on these posts.  I am beginning to think you are on disgruntled cynical dude that reads all the wrongs in the world.

lol.

my view: gaming ain't what it used to be. Business/profits have eventually taken the air out of the Tire Of Creativity, although happily the Casual/Mobiling Gaming genres have been an outlet for those who don't want to spend 3 years being part of a team of 100 directed by Suits to make Sequel #X of Franchise Y. So there's hope. Indeed, like the end of the above mentioned, the future should result in multiple ways of enjoying gaming, each with its own logical pricing structure (including "free", funny the timing, with CoH/V and TF2 this week!)

[Mr. Analog]

I disagree with that, I think there's more variety in gaming now than ever before.

[Darren Dirt]

I disagree with that, I think there's more variety in gaming now than ever before.

Well, I think it's similar to films.

There's a huge increase in independent and small-release productions that are tops in storytelling, or cinematography, or even SFX ... but Joe Public rarely is exposed to them, only hears about the Big Releases. Gaming has become like that too, and the retail stores aren't exactly helping, just look at Big Release Day at EB or whatever, a large percentage of floor space is taken up with literally hundreds of copies of a single title.

Not expecting things to be different, I guess -- bookstores are the same too. Music, less so (but that's a dying industry anyway).

Just kinda miss the feeling of excitement when I stumbled upon a lesser-known title (game, movie, CD) and found myself pleasantly surprised with how FUN the experience was, often having fond memories literally DECADES later.

Can you imagine something like Lemmings or Populous getting Big Release when most of the games at the time that are selling huge are like FPS style? Makes me wonder what Great Ideas are being overlooked in this era.

[Mr. Analog]

I'm hearing more and more about the little guys though, they're gaining traction for exactly some of the reasons you state. The same-ness of the big publishers titles is diluting their impact and their importance on gamers as a whole.

[Bixby]

Go Analog baby.

My wife and I have over 650 board games now and hardly ever play video games.

Board games increase social interaction.
Board games go great with beer.
Board games aren't rendered retro or obsolete when the next board game is released.
I still play board games I used to play 10 years ago.

The defense rests.

[Darren Dirt]

Board games and card games: EMP-proof social fun!

[Lazybones]

Go Analog baby.

My wife and I have over 650 board games now and hardly ever play video games.

Board games increase social interaction.
Board games go great with beer.
Board games aren't rendered retro or obsolete when the next board game is released.
I still play board games I used to play 10 years ago.

The defense rests.

I love board games, and we even host board game nights at our house via a meet-up group however.

- Board games require other people to actually show up at your home, some have minimum player requirements of 4 or more, we sometime have no shows at board game night.
- Video games are also beer compatible...
- Board game parts sometimes where out and can't be replaced once out of print ( I own several games out of print/ release)
- People play video games based on board games they played 10 + years ago too.

Just saying.. I am not anti ether.. I love both. It is much easier for me to play video games with my buddies in another province than it is board games

[Darren Dirt]

don't forget that card games are more fun when beer is involved!

[Mr. Analog]

don't forget that card games are more fun when beer is involved!

The same is true with Team Fortress! lol