Ridiculous take
This has been by far the worse time for games:
- Games not only cost more, they also ask you money after your purchase. Skins that would be a secret or a challenge reward are now shipped on an online score.
- Games now sold its identity/mood to sell shitty silly skins/effects so they can get more money. Aesthetic integrity is throw up from the window so they can get more money. And even worse, even if you buy a game at first they can (and probably will) fuck it in later updates. Case: with MW19 they promises to maintain the aesthetic of the game. This lasted like 3 months.
- Everything is seasoned impulsed with FOMO. Most of stuff challenge is gated with a timer so you MUST play THIS video game. Got something else to do? Too bad, unless... you can spare a coin ofc. Playing a game is almost like a work now.
- We are full of activists that not only impulse their ideas on other people, they usually have crap ideas and parade them like they are the brightest people in the world. Sometimes they even hijack others people work and use for their own agency like what localization have been doing.
- Invaders/Tourists are now joining communities only to stir drama and political issues transforming places were you can talk about something the game into a place full of insufferable new comers. GG Strive (and probably the whole IP) will never recover from these past years.
- Ownership of games have been almost destroyed... on PC it is almost impossible to actually own the thing that you pay. Yes, Steam is awesome and GabeN an angel that loves games. But he is not forever. And on a similar topic: Always online games will just close their servers and good bye to your crap.
- Games just optimized to being a consume product rather than something to enjoy: Corpos have decided that games are not to be enjoyed, they are to be consumed. This way just having endless content is way better than just a 1 release game. Example: on previously Gran turismo games you would just finish what you liked and then, when there is nothing more, explore. Try events with cars that you didnt like. Not any more, you will just get more content. On paper is awesome, but in reality it makes games and endless task and forces devs to just push content rather that a good designed game. And this have fried "gamers" as well, people will claim "[X] game failed because season 1 was too long/delayed/bad"... no, a game doesnt need infinite "seasons", you are just addicted to getting a flash screen with "NEW!" on it. Counter-Strike still uses the same map, people still exploring the world of Oblivion/Skyrim, or crafting new stuff on Breath of the Wild.
-Expanding this point, corpos have discover (with like CoD 4 tbh) that they can trigger your brain to make you addictive to their products with possitive feedback. Why there are always "legendary", "epic" and "common" types of shit even if they get outclassed immidietly? because the system must reward you from time to time. This is why you level up and games are easy. They werent the first, but Destiny 2 started exploiting this on a proffesional level even hiring a psicologist to develop a better "engagement" with the player.
- You can just take your time... You really liked a game? You better rush it. Just now, people are already posting spoilers and video with all secrets/endings/characters of DooM The Dark Ages... and the game is not even out. The same happened with the last DLC of Eternal, people will try to get the views/likes/reposts by blatlanlty puting spoilers of whatever game is trending. And if you have lapse in judgement and take the bad decision of just googling/searching a video a review or just liking some official posts of it, you are on the algorythm now. So now you can just take your time (add this to the endless task of live service games ofc) to finish a game or just enjoy it by doing all side quests. No, you must dedicate your time to it and finish it as soon as possible.
-Standarization of games: 2000s games were awesome because devs had enough money and tech to try to make new things. Devil May Cry 1 can show some weird stuff that Capcom tried to do with a clearly RE engine. Demons Souls was even doubt it as something that would resonate with players but was greenlighted. Now everything is standarized so it can appeal to as many people as possible, lowering the difficult bar even more so anyone can thrive. Games are becoming simplier so it can be easier to consume and it can attract more people. A good example of this are MMORPG, specially FFXIV, they abandoned the "virtual world" vibe to become an instant reward machine (told by Yoshi P btw) and following what WoW did instead of being true to what it was with the core designs of FFXI.
"but... there are some great games!"
Yes, but if you look at the 90s-2000s you will see many incredible great games that makes you wonder "why did this blow up!" and then realize that weeks laters another incredible game that become a classic launched, followed by another classic. We used to have incredible quality in games, and even have room for more. Now, there are great thing these times as well. And on the game side just this year we already got some great games like Monster hunre Wilds, Xenoblade Chronicles X and Oblivion remastered (and im missing a lot ofc).
But like you say games are more than graphics and more about fun. Idk if you were there, but community games were great, casual lobbies games were great, midnight release were you will meat other people just as exited as you to play a game were great.
Most games today are better products, but not better games even with all its technical advancement.
