Topic: Have Games Lost Something Important as Technology Has Improved?

This is something I've thought about a fair bit and can also extend to other media, but I'll stick with gaming here. There is no correct answer as it is a personal experience kind of thing, but I thought I'd throw the topic out there to the floor as I think it is a relatively interesting topic.

While I have my own thoughts on the topic and they are towards the side of we have lost something, I wondered what others thought before I gave any reasoning and possibly influenced any replies.

Ohhhh that is a toughy.

I guess the answer depends on what gaming means to you as the individual (or us as individuals). It also depends on time - gaming means something very different to me now then it did when I was a child (and I have been gaming since before I was 4 in one way or another).

For me, the advent of technology has meant greater emotional immersion in my games. I enjoy narrative games of various types. If you had asked me as a young teenager if a game could make me emote other than excitement or frustration, I would probably have said no. The last generation and the current one have seen me more emotionally involved with characters and plots. Then again, that might be my age. A young me would have been bored silly by Gone Home, but the adult in me thought it was just great storytelling.

I would say that the cost of game development and the tiering of games (AAA etc) has meant that big games that showcase current technology are becoming more generic in some ways to appeal to the widest market. The same is happening in films with churned out comic movies etc. particularly for franchises. What I think it means we have lost is the amount of innovation that pushes the technological boundary.

I also think that gamers have split into camps a little more than when we were younger (I don't mean the Nintendo/Sega wars etc.) but by genre mp and communities etc.

Lastly, maybe as games become bigger, we have lost some fun in those releases. However, the indie community and some releases still have that fun element.

Yes.

My personal belief is that in a more globalised world, as more money is poured into projects, a lot of "AAA" entertainment is driven by quaterly or annual revenue forecasts, and therefore aimed at the most mass appeal globally, rather than be created art or fun. The motivator is profit over all else.

A lot of movies and games will have amazing technical aspects, but the characters and narratives will be very safe and generic. People called the Warcraft movie a flop by traditional "US Box Office" measures, but I think it did gangbusters in China and South Korea, so worldwide it made a good bit of money for the studio, just as the shareholders would have wanted, but a lot of people said "well, it's a well worn story with well worn tropes and characters : 6/10".

Most films I've seen recently are "mediocre to good" on my personal grades. (Independence Day 2, Ghostbusters, Bourne, Suicide Squad) probably for this reason.

There was the joke about video games being almost distilled to a grizzled 30's white man with stubble and a buzz cut looking down the sights of a M4 gun because that's whats most likely to "sell". Apparently Destiny got neutuered because the head honchos were worried about certain plot things being divisive, so the day 1 story was roundly described as vanilla and disengaging, because they decided to play it safe late into the build.

I think, that's why movie wise, the best films at the moment are a lot of animated films for the family. Pixar is brilliant at pulling the kids in with a movie on one level, but speaking to adults on another. Up! was a whacky adventure with talking dogs, balloons moving houses and Mr Cadburys Parrot for kids, but a tale of loss and finding people, the journey being the adventure, not the destination and learning to "live" again for adults, sells a lot of tickets but engages to multiple people very well.

Games wise, i feel cranking out a sequel annually or biannually with little to no thought behind it is the same thing. Sports games aside, how different does each iteration of Call of Duty or AC really feel? Rockstar genuinely seem to release a sequel "when they've got an idea worth doing" and letting each title breathe, but Activision and EA can just feel like it's a conveyor belt of taking your money routinely at times for very little thought and work.

I'm not against micro transactions, but am I right in saying that after you've spent loads of cash in NBA 2k16, Fifa or Golf, you have to throw all that progress in the bin and start again fresh next year? Surely a better design would be to import a prior year's character/team and get some kind of refund in "in game coins" to put towards this years game? I'm sure they'd still make a killing in packs , but you wouldn't feel like FIFA was just a sticker album, and you have to spend "£££" every year to buy the ultimate team stickers.

Just my two pence.

I wouldn't say games have lost anything, more that we have way more choice now. People rely too much on feelings of nostalgia while ignoring other credible alternatives (primarily indies) that fill the void left by the decline of consoles like the Mega Drive/Snes and earlier. Once upon a time a new Sonic game was the AAA, but now game like Fez, Hyper Light Drifter etc will go under the radar for a lot of people.

Whether you're playing modern or retro games I find you need to approach it with your "child like awe" hat on, or you just won't have any fun.

I can't help but feel this way, but for another reason as opposed to the above.

I feel like there is too much of a focus on technology these days. While yes, graphics and frames are important to a degree, they're not (and I personally feel they shouldn't be) the end-all, be-all of a game. I've seen plenty of times where someone skipped a game because it didn't look good to them. I feel at times there isn't enough of a focus on the gameplay and delivering a complete experience. Graphics are just one part of the package. I know that's common knowledge, but it bears repeating, because the focus on how pretty it looks sometimes comes at gameplay's expense.

Look at King of Fighters XIV, for example. The main thing everyone railed on when it was revealed was how bad (bad for PS4 standards, I suppose) it looked. After it came out, it turns out to be a pretty good game. To use another fighting game real quick, Street Fighter V is a very pretty game. It's also one of the most reviled games of this generation. Why? A lack of crucial gameplay content. I've already seen complaints for Horizon Zero Dawn for it's graphics. Maybe my eyes are failing me, but aside from a few weird movements, I don't see it as something bad. The game's shaping up to be a pretty good game, both in appearance and gameplay. Order 1886 is probably an example I don't need to bring up, but I will. Pretty, pretty game. But would you give it a second go around? Even older games like Pac-Man, Super Mario Bros. 3, Crash, and Zelda Wind Waker may not have high end graphics today, but they were fun. In addition, the colors and art style helped whatever graphical shortcomings they could have.

Something like the PS4 Pro proves just how much there is a focus on the tech rather than the games themselves. Now, I'm not saying I'm against gamers who like having good performance, nor am I downplaying the significance of graphics and tech. All I'm saying is that the focus on looks and power can be a little much. And I feel we're losing the importance of playability as a consequence.

@DerMeister: Technology has always been a focus, being stuck on an 8bit system when your friends all had 16bit machines sucked. I felt like a hobo playing Sonic on my Master System when my friend down the road got a Mega Drive. Even amongst the manufacturers it was a constant pis*ing match. "Blast Processing" anyone? That's "Power of the Cloud" for the 90's.

@kyleforrester87 Yes, but was it that much of a focus as it is now? Maybe it was because I was younger, but I never felt I had to worry about framerate this, graphics that even last gen. Now, it's more present than ever before. More so than whether or not a game is actually enjoyable to play.

Games have become a lot easier to finish now rather than 30 years ago. But thats nothing to do with the technology its the games designers that have wanted to make gaming more accessible to everyone. I think gaming has gained as technology has advanced. I cold never have gamed online like I do now 20 years ago on consoles. I would have had to play with those sitting in the same room as me. We are now getting VR which adds a new dimension to gaming without the technology new gaming experiences would not have been possible. games are now created on a much larger scale and in more detail for me thats better. For me gaming is better because of the advances in technology. For me gaming is like the movies. Lots of ideas are recycled and just put in different packaging. No one type of game or movie is better than any other and you can never predict what will do well and what will flop. Technology for me advances games in ways that always excite me. Sure there will be dissapointments along whe way but hey thats life.

@DerMeister: If you read some of the stories it sounds like the arguments between manufacturers were pretty brutal back in the day. To be fair, websites like this and Digital Foundry and forums that a lot gamers to chat and compare are probably part of the problem too. I think if you ask younger kids about frame rates on their PS4 they don't give a crap.

@kyleforrester87:
I take your meaning, and I agree about nostalgia to a point, but I still think television proves that as a medium, the general bar can be raised. I feel in games and movies, the general bar has been lowered with sequels and rehashes and reimaginings. It's all subjective though, and it is nice this generation is giving players a chance to play good games at different price points and from small teams.

@Dichotomy: Again we may disagree as I think technology (in general) has actually added a lot more than we have lost. As someone who grew up in the with video games - starting with Pong, Space Invaders, Donkey Kong and PacMan, I have seen games develop and grow into the art-form it is today. Games were much more simplistic, as well as more repetitive and had little/no context and/or story.

The basic premise presided over the whole experience. Most games had the same basic level design and repeated over and over again with increasing difficulty.

Technology hasn't just allowed for more variation in level design but Sound has helped build up dialogue and conversation as well as put us in the middle of a 3D soundspace. FPS games use sound very effectively to put you in the front line, hear enemies and the direction they are in, even change the sound depending on the environment too.

Technology has allowed for more natural level design. I am not referring to just visual enhancement but the actual worlds we play in. The extra power has given developers the freedom to create wide open play spaces. Even last gen had to have narrow pathways/corridors to hide background loading to artificially make a game seem 'bigger'. These worlds also feel more dynamic, more 'real', that if you weren't there, the people would still be continuing on with their lives in the same way. The better lighting etc also adds to that solidity - makes you feel more a part of it and adds to the immersion.

The biggest change that technology has given though, is Story and 'depth' of character. Uncharted for example, you know who Nathan Drake is as a person - no less so than characters in a movie or TV show. The level of detail in Uncharted 4, particularly the face and eyes, you can see the emotion etc - something that wasn't quite so evident last gen.

Maybe games have lost that simplistic charm but I think to some degree we have also out grown that - apart from the odd nostalgic trip back...

My overall response would be no.

Firstly, gaming is a much broader medium then it ever has been. And usually a lot of people refer to Triple A games mostly. Would I argue that parts of the Triple A space have not been delivering? Yes, but it's not due to technology improvements. I'd say they are reasons that are more to do with business and popularity, and the idea of what will sell well. This is exactly the same in film and literature too. It's nothing new.

When it comes to technology and games, I believe we've largely gained. When it comes to games made with traditional styles or approaches (e.g. Shovel Knight, Super Meat Boy, FEZ) I believe a lot of those games are on par or actually better than their influences, purely because they understand the elements of design laid down, but without having to sacrifice anything. For example, Shovel Knight is able to have far more space for content, a larger colour palette, greater resolution and is able to present the game in a way that was impossible by titles made long before it. Just even basic things like scrolling speeds were not at all possible on older machines.

Another example of this is Rayman Origins. That game is ridiculously smooth and precise in just about every way. It's able to take old principles and sharpen them up beyond any measure possible in the 80s or 90s.

But when it comes to games made with more modern ideals, storytelling and narrative structure has improved immensely. The ability to capture actor performances has added a sense of emotional authenticity that wasn't necessarily present in older games trying to capture something similar. Something like The Witcher 3 could never have existed before, and certainly not with the same gravitas. Also you now have newer game modes such as online play, leaderboards, voice chat and other features made possible because of technology.

And strangely, technology has allowed the independent scene to re-establish itself on a global scale in the digital age thanks to new methods of distribution. Because they don't need to rely on traditional publishing structures, the technology available has allowed games of a wider nature to take hold. There are games that never would've existed had it not been for modern distribution methods.

And when it came to arguing about specifications, it's always been there. When it came to earlier machines, people would argue about bits and memory - especially with home computers in the 80s. And it most certainly occurred when comparing PC gaming to consoles in later generations. Also, when it came to PAL territories, a lot of games ran physically slower (Sonic The Hedgehog is one of the most obvious examples) and this was a point of contention too. So it's always been there, it's just the focus has shifted as to what details are seen as important.

But overall, I think that as technology has increased we've received mostly benefits. And whilst some sections of the industry have become boring. There is so much out there to enjoy now we've never been able to before.

Wow, I wasn't expecting such a big response to the subject to be honest, I half thought it might just drop down the message board unnoticed, so thanks to you all for taking time to reply. Okay, so my opinion on the entire thing is probably pretty long, but I'll break down a few bits of my reasoning now to give you an idea how I formed my opinion.

Games have moved on a lot since I was a kid and a lot of the 8-bit era stuff I likely couldn't go back to, but during that time I was kept interested by innovation - it was a relatively new medium and there was a lot of things you could innovate. As we moved into the 16-bit era I continued to be impressed by advances made in gameplay, while getting my first glimpses of style over substance with the likes of Shadow of the Beast. It was also the first time we started to see gaming becoming truly cinematic with games like Another World and Flashback (you could argue this had for 8-bit first with Prince of Persia, but my first encounter with that game was on Amiga). I can still play a lot of 16-bit classics and enjoy them more than a lot of the games released today.

In 1993 I got to play Doom on a friends 486 (I think DX something or other) and later to play it over LAN - it was a milestone in gaming that I don't think has been topped since. I then moved through various consoles and hardware up to this day. All sounds like technology improved my experience, but I think there was a breaking point when the financial aspect of games moved us from innovation to iteration. The sheer cost of creating any game that takes full advantage of modern hardware is enough to break most companies if their releases are not well received. With that in mind risk goes out of the window, so we are left with the sequels of games released annually (or sometimes even more often), new franchises that don't really do anything new or remasters of games we've already enjoyed. On top of this, a lot of games have been simplified in the worries they won't sell to the masses if they're too complicated. We haven't just lost innovation, we've also seen,in some cases, the removal of some of the things earlier technology allowed us to add to improve a game.

There is certainly a large group in the gaming population that do miss what used to be, the success of the indie scene helps to highlight this. Graphics have become a new benchmark in judging a game by many though and it is this that is truly saddening. While there have always been arguments about which system had the best graphics, it was an aside to the other point of which had the best games. Without the internet to throw the fuel on the fire of such arguments though, they didn't mean all that much if you was having fun (and still shouldn't, but going on forums they really do). The thing is I don't need amazing graphics and must strongly disagree with the idea that they are required for a proper emotional response. As an aside, books generally are much better at portraying emotion and narrative than film. I'd even go so far to say voice acting is a distraction, have you ever watched a subtitled movie and thought it was badly acted? In the same sense a game like Final Fantasy VII or Planescape Torment did a lot better job at getting an emotional response from me with much more limited tools at their disposal. Our own brain's ability to fill in the blanks is a far more powerful tool than being spoon fed facial expressions and the like. Maybe it is the uncanny valley nature of them or something more basic within us, but it is much harder to empathise with a voiced computer character.

Ok, I've typed enough for now and feel like I've only scratched the surface on why I feel modern technology may not have been so great for gamers. As always the question is an openly debatable one so remember neither what I say or anyone else says is fact so don't get angry if you disagree with something

@Dichotomy: My short answer is Yes. The person no longer has the need to project imagination into the experience. Full sensual experience (aside from olfactory and tactile)is provided without the need for imagination. This gap will only increase as technology progresses, furthermore, ensuring loss of the individuals own capability to be in touch with its self. Hence, new gaming technology will lead to an increased alienation from ones own subjectivity through further objective immersion.

@BodyW-outOrgans: Amazing reply.

Games have lost soul, amazing music will always be produced by no more than a few people. This goes right the way back to classical, one man predominantly wrote the music. Bands rarely have more than one or two primary writers and these tunes will always trump music written by 150 people quality controlled by question and answer groups and progression ticked off on a flipchart. This analogy has happened with the advent of AAA games production.

@Dichotomy: Good thread man. Doom was bettered by Unreal Tournament though lol.

Nah. Old games can still be played and enjoyed and new games are constantly pushing the boundaries to new limits, with improved storytelling, impressive graphics, and slick interfaces with online play a huge feature nowadays (though I much prefer to stick to single player games mainly).

As someone who still plays right through the eras from pre-PS all the way to the PS4 there's probably too much choice now if anything. I don't feel that gaming has lost anything, it's just finding the right games for the right people.

@themcnoisy: It may have been bettered by it, but it didn't have the same impact on gaming. The comparison there should have been between UT and Quake 3 Arena anyway which is a much harder match up. One thing I always remember about UT was all the free map packs they used to put out as a thank you to the community, I couldn't believe it when the first CoD map packs came out at £12 a pop lol.

I see in the new Quake they are going for classes and unlocks. No weapons scattered about the map, you just start with a couple and a special ability. This was after them saying they knew what players liked about the original Quake experience and they were working to recreate that. Why does every shooter now have to come with classes and leveling up? What is the point?

@roe: I would say that storytelling has taken a hit, the move over to voice acting and the added cost of implementing extra scenes has meant we get streamlined stories or stories spread over multiple games that used to be told in one (even the FFVII remake will come out in multiple parts as the cost to create it using today's technological standards will be immense).

Online play is convenient, but local multiplayer has always been the most memorable and fun. It is something Nintendo knows, but it is something that requires a bit more effort so rarely happens these days - the more we are connected the less we interact seems to be how technology has effected people. There must still be some call for it though as I seem to remember a bit of a stink over Halo 5 not supporting local co-op. I used to lug a PC base unit around just to play games over a LAN, it may have been a pain, but it was always worth it.

Better level design, better story telling (not always) and better immersion has seen a huge leap and improvement since the days of my Binatone console, Commodore 64 or Atari 2600, but do I get the same joy now, as i did then, well yes and no.

Certain games transcend time and technology for me, but it tends to be a personal thing to each individual. I love (and still play) Streets of Rage 2. back then it was an absolute masterpiece. Yuzo Koshiro's musical score along with some of the finest beat-em up mechanics of its time hold up well today . Is it a technical marvel by today's standards, well not anymore, but If the individual love for a game is such, it doesn't matter.

Take for example cars or planes.... the first car, the first plane was revolutionary and special, filled the world with a sense of wonder. Today's cars and planes are better in every respect, but only iterations of previous inventions, by comparison banal and lacking inspiration. the same is true of video games, you are hard pressed to find something that hasn't been done before, which makes stuff like Pokemon GO really stand out (sorry). New video games are better in every quantitative way, but generally not new concepts and not as 'special' to the world.

Also, the video game industry has become a primary form of entertainment (WoW did alot to make it more mainstream, credit where due), and the line between movies and video games is much more blurred than it was back in the day, which changes the picture alot.

@Mega-Gazz: I disagree, the quality of games has clearly dropped in recent years. Graphically games look better, but most games aren't very creative in-terms of gameplay and stories are constantly being recycled and or lack any imagination whatsoever.