The Problems With Modern Video Games Today

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giggler99

giggler99

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Jul 5, 2011
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This is a good video that highlights my frustration and many others with modern games and gaming studios these days, delays, patches, road maps, season passes, micro transactions etc.. all schemes to suck the consumer in to pay more for originally less content. I understand not all games are like this but the trend with a lot of AAA games is that its all heading in this direction. It really is getting to a point where games are just a service now like the movie and music industry, worse a video game is no longer a possession you can buy and cherish anymore without it being completed with extra content to download and pay on top of already paying $70-$100 for the initial game. Is it lazy or deliberate from these gaming studios? Do players actually like this stuff keep paying for extra content on top of the original price? I don't like it but if consumers keep buying into it all gaming studios will just keep continue to suck them dry of their money for all eternity.

thoughts...

 
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I guess you could say games have always been like this though. We have always had to ignore the trash to see the good games. MTX, early access, and “live-service” are just new forms of the old “draw you in with pretty graphics and a promise” tactic that average developers have always done. It just seems that people are becoming more frustrated with it now since these new practices have become so common that they’re even being applied to older franchises that they loved like Halo.

And that guy in the video says “we are paying money for less content”. Yes, you are paying more money for less content… because you choose to! Seriously, if you are fed up with the BS that Halo is pulling, don’t waste your money and try a different game.
 
I literally never buy a game new anymore as why wouldn't I wait for it to be updated/bugs patched out and potentially even on sale so I can enjoy the game in a reasonable state compared to if I bought it day 1.
 

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giggler99 said:
This is a good video that highlights my frustration and many others with modern games and gaming studios these days, delays, patches, road maps, season passes, micro transactions etc.. all schemes to suck the consumer in to pay more for originally less content. I understand not all games are like this but the trend with a lot of AAA games is that its all heading in this direction. It really is getting to a point where games are just a service now like the movie and music industry, worse a video game is no longer a possession you can buy and cherish anymore without it being completed with extra content to download and pay on top of already paying $70-$100 for the initial game. Is it lazy or deliberate from these gaming studios? Do players actually like this stuff keep paying for extra content on top of the original price? I don't like it but if consumers keep buying into it all gaming studios will just keep continue to suck them dry of their money for all eternity.

thoughts...

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I always find the DLC = incomplete game argument to be lazy and inaccurate.

Let's say Spider-Man. 3 DLC stories were released. Were they part of the original game? No. They were quite different and wouldn't have fit with the narrative.

Did playing the base game without them mean you got an incomplete experience? No. Again, the base game story was great, and plenty long enough to justify being a full game, and the DLC stories don't match the story.

They were a little bit of extra life out of the game for people who'd finished it and wanted more. In "the good old days" the game was finished and that's that. In 2000 you would not have gotten those stories in the game. If you wanted more, you could wait 2-3 years and maybe they'd release another. Is it always the case? Probably not. But it's not a hard and fast rule that DLC = bad.

The whole "unfinished game" stuff is laughable too. Personally I've never paid a microtransaction in a game other than Rocket League. I got RL for free with PS Plus and they were cosmetics so yeah, support the devs. I've never had an experience in another game where I felt like I was missing out because I didn't pay for a MTX. If you're playing those games that are pay to win, then yeah, it's pay to win. He keeps going on and on about more money for less content. Yeah, because PS2 games had so much more content and work behind them than a current gen game.

I only watched 10 minutes of the video but that was plenty. He just keeps yelling the same uninformed rubbish over and over again. He has some points about Gran Turismo, with the always online stuff etc, but he's literally the definition of an angry gaming neckbeard. He's complaining that they keep releasing new cars and tracks after release and that compared to early GT games the range is "disgusting", and then completely ignores the difficulty in modelling picture perfect models of the cars by petulantly whinging "Have the graphics really got that much better?" while complaining that the PS2 versions had more content. Come on man. Just clearly a dude with no idea having a whinge and off setting his good points with an unhealthy amount of ignorance.
 
Got 7 minutes in, don't much like being yelled at.

I think his criticisms are pertinent for the section of the industry that only plays a narrow segment of games; FPS, online multiplayer titles, console and AAA mass distribution companies. But the industry now is just so much bigger than that; CD projekt red does not make games that way, fromsoft don't make games that way, team cherry don't make games that way. EA in addition to releasing their every year annuals like FIFA, Madden etc, but they also released Fallen order. The FF series from Square Enix hasn't been good for a bit, but Forspoken looks as though it'll take full advantage of the new console generation's hardware.

There's also the reality that games like No Man's Sky - which was skeleton at release - would have been genuinely impossible to recover in previous gaming environs, where it's blossomed now into something that almost lives up to the pregame hype. Ubisoft - despite their titles being not for me - manage to produce plenty of games others are absolutely happy with. Fighting games seem to continue to get a following.

My biggest problems with the industry have more to do with things like Pokemon ignoring their adult competitive fanbase and a lack of release titles for a while leaving me stuck playing the same games for a bit. I have no issue with DLC if it's good, and there have been an absolute abundance of good DLC over the last 10 years.

I think there's a lot of people who cannot seem to find the magic of their teenage years and think it's a reflection of the gaming industry getting worse rather than simply themselves growing up and their tastes evolving. You're not going to have that experience of walking out onto Hyrule Field for the first time in the same way at 35 as you would at 13, and that's okay.
 
Gethelred covered a lot what I would say.

The only thing that really genuinely irritates me is predatory micro transactions and pay to win crap. Opening up the main menu of the latest Assassin's Creed game only to have the storefront, specials on weapon and armour micro transactions etc shoved into your face is obnoxious as hell too.

Plenty of amazing games out there benefitting from the way the industry works now - Witcher 3 a great example. Multiple patches and bug fixes plus two incredible DLCs make it the absolute GOAT.
 
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Entertainment mediums in general are really struggling in quality these days - movies, shows, music. Comparatively I still find games more enjoyable though. I don't think it's as bleak looking as some believe.

In particular, the RPG scene still is promising. Starfield, Fable 4, Elder Scrolls 6, Witcher 4, Avowed, Dragon's Dogma 2 just to name a few all in development. Survival horror is making a comeback too. Watch for that in the next couple of years. When they stick to the story driven single player stuff they are fine. It's the shooters which plaster your screen with s**t outside the base game that pisses me off.

Indie games are about as enjoyable as ever imo.
 
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Cyber_punk said:
Entertainment mediums in general are really struggling in quality these days - movies, shows, music. Comparatively I still find games more enjoyable though. I don't think it's as bleak looking as some believe.
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I like blaming "the Algorithm" for that.

Google, streaming services and Youtube sorting algorithms have led to - if you consume content you like, don't randomly look at something different or weird - you constantly getting exactly the same kind of thing. If you look up 1980's hard rock/metal, it's what it'll regurgitate for you; if that means you like Fromsoft lore vids, it'll throw them at you; if it's people jumpscare reacting to FFNF, you're going to get that. If you've searched action or fantasy or sci fi on a streaming service or Google, you're going to get referred content that adheres to what you've informed them is your preferred genres.

Over time, the music industry has developed to the point where they don't look for 'new' sounds so much as new versions of the old ones; that's not a new phenomena either mind, but each new iteration adds refinement or minute difference. If you're familiar with the older version, it'll sound just that little bit worse; if you've never heard the old version, hearing it after a newer one is going to affect how you feel about it. By now, you've played enough games and consumed enough media that it's going to take something a) genuinely excellent or b) genuinely groundbreaking but not different enough to repel you for you to pay attention.

But the algorithm condemns you never to be exposed to that media, because it'll never take the risk of losing your attention. It's what it's been programmed to do; to keep your eyes on it to sell a game, a streaming service, ad revenue or an album or song. Music becomes monolithic, the games industry becomes a series of sequels, and movies/tv becomes a series of series all a vague mixture of superheroes, coming of age stories, hints of Stephen King horror with BtVS dialogue.

That's not to say that new games or media are not being produced, just that you have to go looking for them. And that's no bad thing anyway.
 
Gethelred said:
I like blaming "the Algorithm" for that.

Google, streaming services and Youtube sorting algorithms have led to - if you consume content you like, don't randomly look at something different or weird - you constantly getting exactly the same kind of thing. If you look up 1980's hard rock/metal, it's what it'll regurgitate for you; if that means you like Fromsoft lore vids, it'll throw them at you; if it's people jumpscare reacting to FFNF, you're going to get that. If you've searched action or fantasy or sci fi on a streaming service or Google, you're going to get referred content that adheres to what you've informed them is your preferred genres.

Over time, the music industry has developed to the point where they don't look for 'new' sounds so much as new versions of the old ones; that's not a new phenomena either mind, but each new iteration adds refinement or minute difference. If you're familiar with the older version, it'll sound just that little bit worse; if you've never heard the old version, hearing it after a newer one is going to affect how you feel about it. By now, you've played enough games and consumed enough media that it's going to take something a) genuinely excellent or b) genuinely groundbreaking but not different enough to repel you for you to pay attention.

But the algorithm condemns you never to be exposed to that media, because it'll never take the risk of losing your attention. It's what it's been programmed to do; to keep your eyes on it to sell a game, a streaming service, ad revenue or an album or song. Music becomes monolithic, the games industry becomes a series of sequels, and movies/tv becomes a series of series all a vague mixture of superheroes, coming of age stories, hints of Stephen King horror with BtVS dialogue.

That's not to say that new games or media are not being produced, just that you have to go looking for them. And that's no bad thing anyway.
Click to expand...

Also because of these streaming services, we have an explosion of shows, and therefore writers that have no experience and get hired on well known franchises. There are some 'good' shows around, but none that compare to some of the legendary stuff from the 90's/00's, I was really into Snowpiercer's first 2 seasons, currently watching season 3 and it's been absolute garbage. It's like they replaced the entire writing team.

It's the ADHD generation. You look at the comments on a Xbox game pass/gold added games video and any game that isn't a triple A huge studio shooting game is automatically s**t according to people. They miss out on a huge library of indie games as a result.
 
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Gethelred said:
Got 7 minutes in, don't much like being yelled at.

I think his criticisms are pertinent for the section of the industry that only plays a narrow segment of games; FPS, online multiplayer titles, console and AAA mass distribution companies. But the industry now is just so much bigger than that; CD projekt red does not make games that way, fromsoft don't make games that way, team cherry don't make games that way. EA in addition to releasing their every year annuals like FIFA, Madden etc, but they also released Fallen order. The FF series from Square Enix hasn't been good for a bit, but Forspoken looks as though it'll take full advantage of the new console generation's hardware.

There's also the reality that games like No Man's Sky - which was skeleton at release - would have been genuinely impossible to recover in previous gaming environs, where it's blossomed now into something that almost lives up to the pregame hype. Ubisoft - despite their titles being not for me - manage to produce plenty of games others are absolutely happy with. Fighting games seem to continue to get a following.

My biggest problems with the industry have more to do with things like Pokemon ignoring their adult competitive fanbase and a lack of release titles for a while leaving me stuck playing the same games for a bit. I have no issue with DLC if it's good, and there have been an absolute abundance of good DLC over the last 10 years.

I think there's a lot of people who cannot seem to find the magic of their teenage years and think it's a reflection of the gaming industry getting worse rather than simply themselves growing up and their tastes evolving. You're not going to have that experience of walking out onto Hyrule Field for the first time in the same way at 35 as you would at 13, and that's okay.
Click to expand...
I agree with you for the most part.
I genuinely believe that all the games we play these days are already reviewed and analysed to the smallest degree before we even start playing so even the slightest imperfection is already well known to us.
We can't just jump in and play without having any preconceived notions about how good or bad it is.
Back in the PS1/2 days you just grabbed a disc off the shelf and played whatever you liked the look of and just enjoyed it for what it was.
 
LennyHayes77 said:
I agree with you for the most part.
I genuinely believe that all the games we play these days are already reviewed and analysed to the smallest degree before we even start playing so even the slightest imperfection is already well known to us.
We can't just jump in and play without having any preconceived notions about how good or bad it is.
Back in the PS1/2 days you just grabbed a disc off the shelf and played whatever you liked the look of and just enjoyed it for what it was.
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I can remember eagerly opening the box to take out the manual for N64 games, and reading them from cover to end before I'd even gotten home. I almost prefer that instead of the in game tutorials we get these days.
 

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LennyHayes77 said:
Physical maps and booklets with character bios were the best!
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It was always something to cherish like you're buying something important and valuable. Some when buying a music CD back in the day with the song lyrics and band photos in the inlet booklet etc.. Now all you get is the case and the Disc and a promo flyier which makes it feel so cheap yet still paying the some price or more.
 
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games are better than theyve ever been. i admit this even if most of the titles that i tend to play are older classics

you dont remember all the garbage that was released when you were a kid because time is the ultimate filter. all the cream has risen to the top for games made 20 years ago. for every system shock 2 there was a pile of junk nobody cares to recall

now we actually have tools to fix games post release whereas in the past a buggy mess would remain that way forever (look at Vampire Masquerades Bloodline - how good would it have been if that game was released in an environment where we had the tools to have post release patches be easily accessible?)

the indie game market has also exploded and theres so many gems to be found there which wasnt really the case in the past
 
Cyberpunk 2077 is an interesting example to look at in this context. 15 years ago would it have been an unfixable mess forever or would it have simply never been created as it was too ambitious?

Online delivery of ongoing technical support and significant patches is arguably enabling some developers to reach their potential and be more ambitious than ever. On the flipside it's probably the publishers that are now enabled to be lazy and push a game out knowing they are making most of their money from pre-orders and day one sales.
 
i agree with others who suggest games are better than they've ever been. absolutely there's disappointments, horrible design decisions, titles released too early or shitty monetisation etc, but we have unparalleled access to media for any game we're interested in these days so it's really not difficult to be more selective. i built a $5K PC specifically for cyberpunk, but i held off the game for months because it just wasn't what i'd hoped for. nobody is holding a gun to our heads to pick up a game, so if it's not offering what you're after => get something else.

many also don't seem to acknowledge how much cheaper games are compared to the supposed golden era to which they compare. the vitriol from gamers (at least on PC) when a game dares to retail for more than $60USD is embarrassing. i remember some master system games in boutique stores retailing for more than $350 (in 2022 dollars). even if we're getting less content (i disagree), we're paying far less also. the primary cause of AAA games moving in shitty directions that gamers hate is due to game prices not having shifted an iota in 30 years while development costs have ballooned. market growth/saturation was helping to take that edge off for a while but if you're stuck at a max product price you'll eventually hit a limit.

daggerfall might've been a million times the size of skyrim, but it wasn't nearly as engaging and most of its content felt copy-pasted (though i can't claim to have explored its 10,000+ cities of boredom).
 
Long Live HFC said:
i agree with others who suggest games are better than they've ever been. absolutely there's disappointments, horrible design decisions, titles released too early or shitty monetisation etc, but we have unparalleled access to media for any game we're interested in these days so it's really not difficult to be more selective. i built a $5K PC specifically for cyberpunk, but i held off the game for months because it just wasn't what i'd hoped for. nobody is holding a gun to our heads to pick up a game, so if it's not offering what you're after => get something else.

many also don't seem to acknowledge how much cheaper games are compared to the supposed golden era to which they compare. the vitriol from gamers (at least on PC) when a game dares to retail for more than $60USD is embarrassing. i remember some master system games in boutique stores retailing for more than $350 (in 2022 dollars). even if we're getting less content (i disagree), we're paying far less also. the primary cause of AAA games moving in shitty directions that gamers hate is due to game prices not having shifted an iota in 30 years while development costs have ballooned. market growth/saturation was helping to take that edge off for a while but if you're stuck at a max product price you'll eventually hit a limit.

daggerfall might've been a million times the size of skyrim, but it wasn't nearly as engaging and most of its content felt copy-pasted (though i can't claim to have explored its 10,000+ cities of boredom).
Click to expand...

I distinctly recall late gen SNES games and a number of N64 games retailing for $100-$120 which is about $200 these days. Wouldn't catch me dead paying that money for a game now, even if today's games are dramatically bigger and move expensive to develop.
 
Long Live HFC said:
i agree with others who suggest games are better than they've ever been. absolutely there's disappointments, horrible design decisions, titles released too early or shitty monetisation etc, but we have unparalleled access to media for any game we're interested in these days so it's really not difficult to be more selective. i built a $5K PC specifically for cyberpunk, but i held off the game for months because it just wasn't what i'd hoped for. nobody is holding a gun to our heads to pick up a game, so if it's not offering what you're after => get something else.

many also don't seem to acknowledge how much cheaper games are compared to the supposed golden era to which they compare. the vitriol from gamers (at least on PC) when a game dares to retail for more than $60USD is embarrassing. i remember some master system games in boutique stores retailing for more than $350 (in 2022 dollars). even if we're getting less content (i disagree), we're paying far less also. the primary cause of AAA games moving in shitty directions that gamers hate is due to game prices not having shifted an iota in 30 years while development costs have ballooned. market growth/saturation was helping to take that edge off for a while but if you're stuck at a max product price you'll eventually hit a limit.

daggerfall might've been a million times the size of skyrim, but it wasn't nearly as engaging and most of its content felt copy-pasted (though i can't claim to have explored its 10,000+ cities of boredom).
Click to expand...
Full of quality points. N64 games were often $100-120 rrp. For dev time plus just the sheer number of people that now work on games, to be still paying that in 2022 is insanely cheap in comparison. Didn’t something like 15 people work on Goldeneye?

Thus guy just personifies the never satisfied toxic gamer community. Seems just like kind of guy who would post “PS2 graphics” on new game screenshots. Gamers are more toxic and entitled than ever.
 
So the NBA issue was EB games forgot to add the digital code for use series X version.

Downloading but checked out the Normal version looks good and I don’t play my team on any of the 2K, Madden or FIFA games so VC and the money grab means nothing to me. Happy with the franchise modes.
 
Nicho50 said:
So the NBA issue was EB games forgot to add the digital code for use series X version.

Downloading but checked out the Normal version looks good and I don’t play my team on any of the 2K, Madden or FIFA games so VC and the money grab means nothing to me. Happy with the franchise modes.
Click to expand...

They animated Herb Jones shooting right handed

I mean, what the actual f**k
 
ioppolo said:
My biggest problem with modern games isn't any of this stuff. It's the size of games these days. I don't have time for that s**t anymore. Open worlds with 80-100 hours just don't appeal at all.
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The thing is, that is exactly the kind of game I like, but the problem that I suspect most of us have is adulting = time poor. I love to get lost in a deep RPG, but when I only have a few hours on the weekend to play, I'm more likely to reach for something a lot shorter just so I can complete a game without having to spend months dipping in and out and having to refresh my memory of the story line every six or seven days.
 
James Colorado said:
The thing is, that is exactly the kind of game I like, but the problem that I suspect most of us have is adulting = time poor. I love to get lost in a deep RPG, but when I only have a few hours on the weekend to play, I'm more likely to reach for something a lot shorter just so I can complete a game without having to spend months dipping in and out and having to refresh my memory of the story line every six or seven days.
Click to expand...

I'm with you. If I have a big chunk of free time for a few weeks, I'll sink into an RPG. But a lot of the time I love me a good 12-30 hour game. Prey, Control, Resident Evil, Outer Wilds etc.
 
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