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Am I growing out of video games?
Thunderclash
Member Posts: 10
Several years ago I had a blast playing any video game I got my hands on. It didn't matter if it had horrible reviews or did indeed suck, I enjoyed the hell out of it. I owned a HUGE library of games on every console. I loved the concept of gaming in general.
Now though, it's becoming the exact opposite. Even if gaming is what I put most of my time into, I only buy about a total of 5 major games a year. I'm interested in very few games now. Most of the time when I see a trailer for a game or a preview, I think in my mind, "Wow, that game is going to be aweful", even if I'm usually right.
So since I have interest in few games, I've been trying for several years to get into a mmo, but so far I can't find one mmo that I like. I've tried a very wide variety of free to play and pay to play mmos. I absolutely can't stand WoW, I tried it for 6 months, never liked a single minute of it. Right now I'm looking forward to GW2. SWTOR looks alright, but to me it's kind of a reskin of WoW. I really want to try it because I love Star Wars, but I guess I'll have to wait a few months until they release a free trial.
Because of my recent realization of my disgust of today's mmos, I've been trying to enjoy some rpg's. A few I think are alright, but I can't get my hands on one that makes me melt in my seat. Skyrim is alright, too repeptitive and little content (armor, weapons, creatures, spells) even if the map was HUGE. I loved Fallout 3 though, best rpg Bethesda made in my opinion. Witcher 2 was really good but my laptop can barely run it on the lowest settings. Red Dead Redemption was my favorite game for a while, and I will always remember it's story. I'm not going to sit here and tell you all the rpg's that I've played, but I think you catch my drift.
Is it just me or is the gaming industry going to crap? I mean look at games like MW3, BF3, Crysis 2, etc., how did they get good ratings!? Did reviewers realize that most games suck now and that these games should be rated high by comparison? Or am I just setting my standards too high? I'm longing for an epic game that will blast me away, whether it's online or not. Do you guys have any suggestions? Am I getting tired of video games?
Comments
For me the quaility of the MMORPG market started to descent with the release of WoW, I think right now were at the worst RPG are gonna be, with the release of guildwars 2 round the corner i feel the the MMO quaility will increase again with the release of GW2, another game im looking forward to atm is EQ next but that still a good year or two off but they claim there going back to the roots of the MMORPG and make it similar to Everquest 1 which was the game i enjoyed the most in my gaming history but only time will tell on if they keep to that standard or take short cuts like modern RPG are doing atm.
@OP
It's just you, when you played so many games. You be at a point you'll just generalized everything. For example, you said TOR is a re-skin WoW (which btw is a re-skin EQ). You felt you've experienced everything the industry have to offer, and indeed you are.
That being said, it's not entirely you though. Through the lack of innovative thinking, the industry is getting "stale". Much like the movie or the music industry.
edit: Suggestion? Leave gaming, do other stuff.
Your likely just feeling the lack of innovation that has been going around lately. For the last several years most games have been clones, or simplified versions of earlier games.
Since this trend has been going on I've just moved more towards indie gaming companies. They tend to be more innovative (because they aren't run by suits) and the games are cheaper on top of it.
Personally I think in a couple of years it will swing back and you will start to see more complex games becoming common again. I would say its ether time for you to try some of the admittedly strange sounding indie games, or take some time off gaming until something really interesting comes along.
What is it that you really want out of a game? Is it challenge? Discovery and adventure? Character building and class diversity? Storyline? Character customization? Jiggley breasts and squeaky anime voices?
Personally, I am completely bent towards character customization. It's the most important characteristic in a game for me, even more important then gameplay. So I'm playing APB Reloaded. It's a reasonably fun game to play, but the character customization is excellent. Lots of things you can change and unlock. It works great for me, the next person may very well hate it though.
All of my posts are either intelligent, thought provoking, funny, satirical, sarcastic or intentionally disrespectful. Take your pick.
I get banned in the forums for games I love, so lets see if I do better in the forums for games I hate.
I enjoy the serenity of not caring what your opinion is.
I don't hate much, but I hate Apple© with a passion. If Steve Jobs was alive, I would punch him in the face.
Before giving up on games entirely, I would recommend you check out gog.com. They sell good old games from the past for cheap. I just bought like 13 old games for 40 bucks for myself for Christmas, since there is a 50% off sale on most of the games.
Sounds like its time for some D&D.
It's not just you.
The majority of games being pumped out by the big name developers are rehashes of the same old crap with shiny new graphics. There's so much emphasis on making games "accessible" and "eye catching" to grab the attention of a wider audience. The result is that actual gameplay, enjoyability, and replayability take a complete backseat in development priority. The result is bland games that all start becoming copies of each other because they don't even try to do anything noteworthy.
Ironically, it seems to me that it's the indie developed games that have comparatively sub-par graphics, tend to actually be a lot more fun to play lately.
Not sure if you've tried them yet or not, but the Final Fantasy games are something I think everyone who considers themselves to be a gamer should have played.
Final Fantasy VII onwards (not the MMOs).. gamers heaven. Doesn't matter that they are old.
But you've probably already tried them or dislike jrpgs...
This,
for games like Planescape torment for $4.99 working perfectly on Win7, bargin:
http://www.gog.com/en/gamecard/planescape_torment
with a link to a really good mods guide in the description.
When you have played every game out there, its hard for you to find something new that excites you. You're constantly playing games, but never satisfied. You could always take a break from gaming of it has consumed your life for so long. Maybe a month or so. Then by that time maybe you will have missed gaming enough to come back and enjoy the simpler things in life. To be honest I play alot of games, although they are not as fun, because I am a fan of it. It takes time to find a really enjoyable game but I'm sure there is something out there whether you are a fan or just because the gameplay is fun. Try playing wtih friends it helps alot more.
something tells me you haven't tried out all the different genre of games out there. even the one's you don't expect that you would like. I tend to juggle around different genre's of games when i get bored and occasionally i find a diamond in the rough.
for example, generally speaking, i HATE F2P games with a passion, however after trying quite a few to broaden my gaming education, some of them are actually not that bad. even some of the Korean grinders had some innovative ideas that the modern AAA mmo's should incorporate.
another example, my friend just recently got hooked onto wizard 101!!!! i was like WHAT? isn't that something his little 5 year old niece plays? but apparently, it's not as bad of a game as I thought.(considering how hardcore of a gamer my friend is) if he said it's not that bad, I'll have to defer to his judgement since we've been gamers since back in the "new world computing" might and magic 1 through 9 days(not some of this new garbage they re-badged as might and magic.)
I've also reinstalled diablo2 at least 3 times over the years and played the entire thing over because there wasn't anything out.
it's a matter of broadening your gaming experience and try out different games/genres even if you don't think you'll like them.
if you want a game to try, give ARMA2 a shot, you'll absolutly HATE it in the begining because the interface is crap and difficult to learn, but once you get used to the game, you'll never look at FPS games the same again. everything else (in the FPS genre) would seem boring. basiclly think of battlefield3, but you actually NEED to learn how to shoot. not the rambo style spray bullets till something falls over, but actually stop, go prone, aim, hold your breath, aim better, compensate for target movement and bullet drop, THEN you squeeze off a round and 1.3 seconds later, the bullet arrives at your target THEN he falls over but not dead because you missed the headshot by about 8 inchs too low and got his shoulder instead:) (yes there is such thing as bullet travel time) it's one thing to spray bullet FPS style and see blood blinding your viser for 1.6 seconds. it's a completely different thing when you squeeze off the perfect headshot round from 1500 meters away while the target is moving and it took about 2 seconds for your bullet to even arrive at your target:)
the community of ARMA are adults and heavily influenced by military professionals. they use actual military jargon when communicating over voice. and they WILL kick you off their server if you dont behave like an adult.
Seven years ago we had Pc exclusive developers for single player gaming going for pushing the envelope with the Pc tech of the time, since then the cross platform age came upon with more able consoles which resulted in developers going for the middle ground compromises that has left Pc gamers feeling something is lacking from their gaming of old.
When Intel released their C2D cpu's in 2007, gaming stood still for people to be able to use this gen right up until today and would only have trouble with a couple titles with only a GPU upgrade at most, as that's how dry and stale it's been for Pc exclusives.
With gaming as mainstream as it is now, we're left waiting for the next gen of consoles for the gaming envelope to be pushed once again, whilst in the meantime we get tossed a few bones every now and then from developers like those behind The Witcher, and of course we all know how the MMO side of things have gotten for a lot of Pc gamers. There is hope though, 2012 is the year of Planetside 2, a name to install excitement into any Pc gamer, a true MMO using our Pc tech of today incoming!
I feel your pain. Well somewhat.
I love empire building games and have done since the days of Bullfrog and their games like populus 2. Railroad Tycoon, sim city and recently Europa Universalis are my all time favourite games. However I'm less patient than I used to be, if a game doesn't grab me within 30 minutes I just won't bother playing it. An example would be the latest Civilization game, I was pretty excited by it and it had rave reviews. I loathed it from the start it felt more like a boardgame than an empire building game. I haven't even looked at it since.
I like my games to havr large maps, long timelines and complexity. I don't really see things like that comming from mainstream publishers like EA or Sony. They tend to focus more on pure entertainment rather than taxing the brain. To be fair their games are polished, very accessible and less time consuming. It's a sign that gaming has become more mainstream and less of a hobbyist passtime when it was just you and a friend playing a game in your bedroom after school. Although gamming is still a mostly male passtime it's audience is a lot larger than it once was. Anyone from the age of 4 to middle aged men are playing them. So it's the demands of that large audience rather than gammers like me that come first.
The best example of how gamming has evolved is the developer and game designer (and legend is his own mind) Peter Molyneux. He worked in some great games, particularly early on. Populous, megalomania, Dugeon Keeper and Syndicate.. All great games in their own right. Simple, well designed and well presented. Now he works on that god awful game, fable 2 and 3 and hypes them for all they are worth.
Although there are games out there that cater for my taste they are done on smaller budgets and therefore I sometimes feel these games are not as polished and as great as they could be given the resources and constraints these indie companies have. And so I sometimes feel I'm being given second best. Sign of the times I guess.
I've tried to give this game a shot a few times, but the last time I tried to install it from Steam, it crashed to desktop when I started fiddling with the graphics settings. Second try and my computer bluescreens (and it doesn't do that otherwise).
Brilliant game, I'm sure, but the devs could put in a few hours of work into making it work on most PCs first and then think about pushing the next buggy sequel out of the tube.
I feel the same way. I can't stand new MMOs. That's why I spend the majority of my online gaming time playing English Priston Tale. It's nostaligic for me as it was my first MMO. Compared to MMOs now it's awful. But it's really challenging as most of the conveniences in new MMOs don't exist in it. I do have high hopes for GW2 though, I just hope they aren't dashed...
why do you wanna to do that, I do not think it is just for you
Thanks for the site! Going to buy Descent 1 and 2. My all time favorite games. Just wondering where I can connect to other people online for the multiplayer part of the game.
I sometimes feel the same way, i used to get into these games so much... Final Fantasy 7-10, Dark Cloud, Actraiser, Super Mario World, Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, Shadow Hearts1, Shadow Madness, Legend of Dragoon, Jade Cacoon, almost every rpg game out there since SNES to Playstation 2... it starts to died down on me when i play the xbox 360 games out there, and noticed that most games are becoming more shorter, more fusterating, lack of quality and content, it's like developers lost there brains and just shit out games for money (if you understand what i'm saying).
I remember the time that games like Breath of Fire IV took me about... 2 weeks to beaten the game for me. Diablo 1, 2-3 weeks. Now with new games like modern warfare 2, 1 day. Saints Row? 1 week. Skyrim? 1 week. Oblivion? 3 days...
you see where i am going? Dispite how popular and attractive most of the big indestries out there, they really don't add much logevity into the game from progress to be beaten. I want a game that take me at least a month to be beaten (like WoW when I got up to level 85 and already did most of the 85 dungeons and raids out there). If only I got the skills to make a certain game, I will make my games more fun, with each and every other patch. a storyline as strong as Final Fantasy X and Star Wars: knights of the old republic, from great cinamatics that blizzard entertainment made on Starcraft 2. I want someone long, kickass, addicting, and fun... like the good old days.
I think still some gems out there Bioshock 2006, Stalker 2008, Darkfall mmo 2009, The Witcher 2011(bit short tho)(all tho it was ignored by all gaming sites when GotY pop up) Skyrim 2011(not worth 10/10 or 100% but around 9/10 overall gameworld design and dungeon worth 10/10). Zelda OoT 3DS 2011 still worth mentioning and worth playing.
RPGs last few years worth mention are Divinity 2 Ego Draconis+expansion, Risen.
But its a matter of taste ofcorse and what your gaming history is.
I only played PC games and avarage 4 to 5 games a year so prolly less burned out then OP hehe.
Hope to build full AMD system RYZEN/VEGA/AM4!!!
MB:Asus V De Luxe z77
CPU:Intell Icore7 3770k
GPU: AMD Fury X(waiting for BIG VEGA 10 or 11 HBM2?(bit unclear now))
MEMORY:Corsair PLAT.DDR3 1866MHZ 16GB
PSU:Corsair AX1200i
OS:Windows 10 64bit
If you like story then you'll like SWTOR just for that feature alone. Trust me on that.
For the first 30 levels I was really enjoying the story aspect of the game, then it shot up in scale so epically that I went into wow-overdrive (and I don't mean the game, wow). This is the best story game I have played...ever!
The community has been a bit of a let down. There's no/little open world PvP (so far) and the community is pretty much made up of lots of pre-pubescent kids talking about bonking. All that really is overshadowed by an amazing game and totally mind-blowing story though.
It's nothing like WoW in my opinion. Well, okay, it naturally has comparisons with WoW because they're both MMOs, but if you were to ask me if SWTOR was a copycat of WoW then I'd say a big, defiant no. For one thing I just did the Foundry, and it's hard. WoW was never hard. There are group bosses as complicated as a Ward of Elements raid in EQ2. Honest.
As for periods of gaming disappointment, as I'll call it, well it happens to us all. A friend at work recently went a good period of time without playing games, then he got Skyrim and fell in love again. We all have those moments where we just can't be damned to do it anymore. Take a break, read a book, watch a film or go outside. Maybe try a new genre. Get in to something else.
I recall a few years ago I was having a similar period of time. I wasn't quite to the extent of the OP's problem but I was getting less fun from the games I had. Then a friend gifted me Half Life 2 on Steam. I had never really been a fan of shooters but I thought what the heck and jumped in. Wow, was that a blast.
I still wasn't really a shooter, per se, but he talked me in to buying L4D2 too. I loved that game so much. I'm even still not really a huge shooter fan but I can jump in to a game like that and have a good amount of fun. Maybe not the realistic shooters, but certainly the fun ones. It also gives me something else to get my head round if I fall out with the strategies or the role-players etc.
If you like adventures switch to a grand strategy like Europa Universalis 3. Learning it alone will keep you absorbed, and you might like the game. I did, and I'd never really played something totally like that before. Grand startegy is a whole new barrel of fun...so apart from even Civ.
.
Your tastes are changing. I just turned 30 not too long ago.
And what you are describing is exactly myself. Heck the games you listed such as Fallout 3 and Red Dead Redemption are also some of my favorites and I buy around 5 games a year or so. It takes the very best to please me.
Perhaps its more that you are a mature gamer. You've played a LOT of games, and you have played some of the better ones in recent years. Once you've played some of those better games you've begun to expect that type of quality. You want that great gaming experience. You've learned even at a subconcious level to expect that.
Does it really have anything to do with being older or out growing the gaming genre? Perhaps but I think more so its our experience in gaming thats led us to know what games are actually capable off . We might not expect a game to cause the sky to fall or the earth to shatter with its pure awesomeness, but we've played amazing high quality games. We've enjoyed them and we want more of that. And thats what we've learned to look for and buy.
Does that mean you are out growing games? Heck no. Anything but that. Your standards have increased as you've played games that went beyond your previous standards. You know games can be amazing because you've played them. And anything sub par no longer seems like a valid use of your time.
Right now you could go to a go kart track and have a good time. Right? But what happens when you become a NASCAR driver and have a career in that and do it for a decade? You might still enjoy the go kart track....maybe with your kids or something. But as far as your own personal enjoyment? Its no where near what it was back before you joined NASCAR.
You've become accustomed to a better quality of gaming. It means you have diserning taste. Thats a good thing! No worries. Im just like you. And I still love gaming. I just want the cream of the crop is all. Why should I mess with anything sub par compared to that?
I don't believe I can say I'm growing out of video games but I am growing out of playing the same game in a shiney new wrapper over and over again. This first happened to me in the FPS genre of games as I get bored rather quickly with them these days. It took me a while to figure it out but the issue is that they are all the same game in a different setting. Lets face it there is just so many ways you can present 'Point gun and shoot' before they all seem like the exact same game.
I've found that in the last 5 years or so the MMORPG genre is getting to the same point. Every new game seems to just copy 'n' paste the EQ/WoW formula. There is almost no innovation in the MMOs released in the last 5-6 years. They are all the same game in a shiney new wrapper. I played EQ for 4 years and WOW for 2 years. I don't need to play them again... and again... and again... and again... you get the picture.
Developers need to realize that the gameplay is the hook that keeps people subscribed. If your gameplay is stale because it's exactly the same as every other game that has released in the last 6 years or so people aren't going to stick around very long. Having a great world is only about 25% of the game... well written stories are about another 25%... Gameplay is the other 50% or more as this is what your players are going to be doing 100% of the time they are playing. Story and setting are just a backdrop for gameplay. This is why newer games seem to have a real problem with player retention. After the 'oohs' and 'aahs' wear off from the stories and the settings all that is left is the gameplay and if it's the same ol' stale crap thats been around since EQ people are gonna jump ship fast.
Bren
while(horse==dead)
{
beat();
}
Responding to "shooters are old and boring."
Bought Serious Sam 3. Loving it more than any Call of Duty game I've ever bought except for the ones that had Zombies mode in them. Hosted my American based server (oldschool client server hosting! press ` to open the dev console!) and got all sorts of people from europe joining my server. Even though they all had >200ms we all had a really good time. I also have performance issues with Serious Sam 3 because it freezes for one second at random sometimes so the game has some real problems on my computer but I loved it. I probably played for three hours of just deathmatch. Probably one in singleplayer.
Has nothing to do with nostalgia. This is just the type of shooter I enjoy. Movement is fast and feels powerful. Jump as much as you want and have air control while you do it. It also added a few modern elements like ADS, sprinting, and reloading but the way they added them fits well in the game for me. There are even different melee methods in the game.
It's like when you grow up riding horses as your favorite thing to do with your life would you ever stop riding horses or trade horse riding with something else? Would you ride camels if you didn't want to ride camels? No! You want your horse riding and you want people to leave you alone. That's my dad by the way and he loves horses and cows. Try to make my dad play video games instead of play cowboy and he would kick your buttocks. Different people different tastes. Games thankfully never die like a horse but they do get old and boring which is basically what a game death is. But cowboys ride till they die. Gamers game till they die. And similarly, try to make farmers and cowboys stop being farmers and cowboys. You'll get guns pointed at people. I feel the same way about gaming. This is surprising to people because gamers didn't exist really until fairly recently. While it's not as prestigious and manly as being a cowboy, it's still a way of life that people will die for. I'd fight a war just to be able to game. Just look at the reaction people had to the SOPA bill. People were willing to travel to Washington because people were afraid their INTERNETS was being taken away. Gamer for life.
Mayan prophecy or not, this year is looking to be quite unusual: western economies going down the drain, world war 3 around the corner, presidential elections in the US and france (my country), popular uprisings everywhere you look, religious fundamentalism on the rise around the globe etc....
I'm personally having a hard time immersing myself into video games with all this sh1t going down around me.
OP maybe something is weighing on your conscience that makes it impossible for u to enjoy video games anymore, dunno, just sayin' ...
I think it's natural for tastes to change as we get older. I certainly don't look for the same things in games that I did 20 years ago. While I'm certainly not growing out of gaming - in fact, I'm growing more 'into' gaming (since I can afford the hardware now
). My tastes certainly aren't the same. I'm less focused on having epic gear on my toon than making sure my sons have epic grades. My fun was always with the relationships and community rather than the 'purples' anyway. But if proving greatness was based on game performance, then I see how a person could grow out of that considering how many things are so much more importnat in life.