Video games no longer appealing?

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I'm wondering if I'm not alone on this. Being an Aspie, video games were for a source of entertainment for me, for a long time. But in recent times that has begun to wane quite a bit (I'm 32 now believe it or not). They're either easy enough to finish in a few days, their multiplayer scene is elitist/dead/toxic, they use micro-transactions far too much, all of the above, or more.

Just curious if anyone else feels the same way!?

Have you tried looking in different places for them now?

One issue you might be running into is the way the AAA side of the market handles things now. There's alot of trends in place, and if you ask me, most of them arent very good. As you say, they're either easy, they use stupid microtransactions (ugh), and of course, with multiplayer games, you get piles of shrieking jerks as "teammates", if you can even call them that.

As it is, a few years ago, I was in the same boat as you. Tended to feel the same way. And I was always comparing recent crap to games from the past, that were just plain fun and challenging, and the new stuff just couldnt match any of it. Eventually, I got fed up, said "screw it" to AAA games in general, and started buying into indie games instead. Never looked back. Best damn decision I've yet made, when it comes to gaming and my interests in general. Went from buying new games very rarely, to buying them very frequently. I can find games of *any* genre, many of them, and I can find ones that have the traits I want. I prefer my games to be challenging (usually really challenging) and while plenty of these have stories to them I personally prefer games that dont focus on that (and finding games that DONT focus on story is damn near impossible when it comes to AAA games) since I focus on gameplay over everything else. Also these just dont cost even nearly as much, yet often offer way more. One thing I REALLY dont like: Games that are super short. If I'm going to buy one, I want it to be one I can keep coming back to. And I dont mean like an MMO; usually I mean singleplayer games. Alot of the roguelikes I'm into, for example: I can get 100s of hours out of them, and never get bored, and they never run out of challenge. That's the sort of thing you can get out of these, if you want.

And note that when I talk about this I dont mean the hyper-popular indie games that you hear about on the Net every 5 freaking minutes. I mean... anything. They could be well-known stuff, or they could be niche titles. There's SO MANY. I've even been fortunate enough to have been contracted to a developer to work on one (and an expansion for another). And the nice thing about indie development: No big giant publisher of doom hanging over your head. Major developers have rules to follow. Alot of rules. It often leads to the stagnant ideas you see in major games. Indie devs have no restrictions at all though. The game I work on, for instance. It is very difficult. Why? Because I bloody well wanted it to be, that's why. Nobody tried or needed to stop me on that one. All the head developer cares about at all is that it's good and fun, and so far, it's been very well received. As opposed to being under a publisher, where they'd scrutinize the hell out of everything, and if it doesnt fit a big damn pile of specifications, it has to be fixed/redone. Indie devs dont have to deal with that, which is why they can be as creative as they want.


If you'd like to try some (many cost very little), I could recommend a few, if you want to tell me what types of games you're interested in. MOSTLY I'm thinking of singleplayer games here. Dont get me wrong, there's lots of multiplayer games out there, but my own focus is on singleplayer titles, so that's where my knowledge is.

And if you're wondering about graphics, it varies wildly. Some games use extremely minimalistic graphics. Others use high-end stuff that threatens to blow your video card out the back of your machine. Though, with indie games in general, they really are best suited for those that dont focus on graphics too much (much wider range of choice that way, as there are plenty of devs who also dont want to worry about trying to look like a AAA game).

I will always love video games BUT I am picky and prefer those with good stories that get you INTO the game. I have very few titles that I hold on to for nostalgic reasons. Most I sell/trade once I'm done with them. With all the demands on my time affecting how much time I have for video games, I've not even bought titles I thought I wanted to play because I'm too busy to make time for them.

I've felt that way at points in my life. I loved old Playstation RPGs, or Game Boy, when I was growing up because they kept me busy, they stoked my imagination, and I could play them with family. But eventually I just got tired of them in my teenage years because I felt so busy and stressed, and I had very little money to spend on new games. So I read books instead.

Eventually I picked up gaming again with a couple people I met on forums and now they're a pretty fun social outlet and challenge again. There are definitely toxic communities (especially if you play MOBAs, and especially if you're a woman), but a lot of people are drawn to gaming and some crowds of people are actually pretty okay. It's certainly easier for me than "going out" on a regular basis and keeping up the show in-person.

There's no denying that today's video game industry is full of bad business practices and dangerous elitism, but I don't let it affect my enjoyment of video games.

The problem is that those things actually affect the development of new games.

If anyone wonders why major games are so uncreative and have so many problems that repeat over and over and over and over, THAT is why. Publishers get more and more lazy, more and more greedy, and when they have direct control over developers (which is always) this means that development is altered.

The worse those business practices get (and they'll never, ever get better, ONLY worse) the worse this will get overall.

Honestly? There's one very, very specific thing I'd REALLY love to see at this point: An industry crash. Like the crash of '83. A *big* one. Preferrably big enough to result in the total downfall of some of the big publishers like EA and Activision.

Which all may sound like a very destructive solution, but back in '83, the problems were very similar... and only massive damage to basically everything finally got idiots to stop being freaking idiots. Big companies only change when absolutely forced. Usually by reaching near destruction, and watching the annihilation of other groups at a similar level. That level of shock, as in, a major threat to the very existence of the jobs held by the higher-ups, is the only thing that ever seems to work. They're lazy and greedy as all hell... but they sure do care about themselves, after all.

At the rate things are going, another crash might be inevitable. People seem to be getting more and more fed up with things, faster and faster now, as I did. Even friends of mine, who are just about the most stereotypical gamers you'd ever meet, are starting to get tired of this crap, buying less and less games because new ones tend to suck. It's bloody sad. And *nobody* likes or trusts the big publishers now. Nobody. EA, Activision, Ubisoft, Capcom... the list goes on. All are hated, none are liked, without exception. And the hate just grows and grows. And the games they put out just get worse and worse. Less features, more microtransactions, more money-grabs, more lazy development... and so on.

I dont bother with games from any of those, but it's infuriating to even watch from afar.

I actually find a lot of AAA games to be really dull. Not all of them though. I rarely get new games anyway - I tend to be slow to go about getting things that look interesting, sometimes waiting years before actually trying a game I intended to. Also, I enjoy low-skill modding, so that really brings the shelf life of games up for me.

I would strongly look into indie games and/or older games if you can?

A few games I recommend: Darkest Dungeon, Don't Starve, Plague Inc, Spelunky, Witcher 3 and Deadstate.

I agree with most of what has been said above, however AAA gaming isnt as broken as people claim. Gaming is a huge business still- if most people hated AAA games, they wouldn't be selling. I do realize many gamers do tend to blindly buy any new sports game or any new shooter, which amounts to huge sales. But we are on the internet- so the vocal ones arent the ones usually buying the AAA games.

I've said this many times when this topic (or something similar) comes up: focus on games you enjoy, rather than focusing on games you don't like. Big name AAA games get a lot of hate, but many of the people bashing them- havent even played them! Sorry but you can't judge something completely without playing it yourself! I'm not sure if the trend of bashing AAA games is something people do to let off steam or its indy game elitism or what? (on a side note- I do play some big name games, but not many. However I don't need to endlessly bash them just because I personally don't play them all). Different games for different people.

I will admit gaming needs some change- but its going to take a few more years to achieve that (if it actually happens). Vocal internet people arent the majority of gamers and probably never will be. Plenty of gamers enjoy just playing games, having fun and not going on forums all the time to bash things...

Best not to make assumptions about others. There's no way to know where they're coming from unless they tell you.

I bash these damn things alot.... but that's partly because friends I know never shut the bloody hell up unless I agree to try the damn things (play them over at their house; as we have next to nothing in common, there's nothing else to do). On very rare occaisions (Overwatch for instance) this leads to something good, so that might be why they do it, but 95% of the time, it leads to just giving me more complaint ammo. Most of the games are, to me, exactly as I describe them here. I think the most recent one was... Dark Souls 3? Freaking hated it. I could rant for a couple of pages about the controls alone (talk about stilted...). But yes, many get tried.... THEN I rant.

.....Except JRPGs. Nobody gets me to try those. They're made of cutscenes. Even my friends arent so oblivious as to think I'd actually enjoy one.


That and Call of Duty. That's the one I *will* rant about yet will not touch, without it being a jRPG.


That being said, just because the things are selling, doesnt mean they arent broken or bad (in a generalized wide sense)... that's the other side of the line you said there. People often buy things that they then consider A: sub-par, or B: just bad. That's one of the problems with gaming, and it's why you get angersplosions like what happened with NMS. You cant REALLY know how a game you're waiting for is going to turn out until it's in your hand, and then it's too late: You've given them the money, it's done. What was another good example.... Watch Dogs, I think it was. That game was HYPED. Really hyped. And I'll not anytime soon forget the reactions when it came out: It was touted as the height of mediocrity and misplaced hype at the time. People were NOT happy with it. They didnt utterly loathe it, but it was more of "really, I blew $60 on this crap?". But of course, too late, they'd already bought it. ......to the point where a sequel is coming. The first game wasnt exactly good, but fortunately for the big publishers, a game doesnt have to be genuinely wonderful to be successful.

Same with Titanfall. EVERYONE knows how very dead, very fast that game got, shortly after release. Yet, TECHNICALLY, tons and tons of people had still bought it; but they didnt like it enough to stick with it. But it sold SO well that a sequel was announced almost instantly. Which also means that it had ALOT of people that bought it not liking it, because a community THAT BIG died THAT FAST. The good thing is that supposedly the sequel is dramatically better (and THAT is a rarity, a developer learning from their mistakes...) but that sure doesnt save the first game from it's fate. I personally didnt think Titanfall was bad... first non-cover-obsessed shooter I'd seen in bloody ages. But the devs were lazy as hell with it (it's a prime example of that). I intend on trying out the sequel... after giving it a couple of weeks to see if the community implodes again. Not making the same mistake twice.

I agree completely with Misery; AAA games are unappealing to me for a variety of reasons (with some exceptions).
A few open-world games are still interesting to play (skyrim and fallout 4 mainly), but only after altering pretty much the entire game by using mods,

I mainly play indie games indeed, they are often fresh ideas, have less toxic multiplayer (if they have a multiplayer at all), and i have yet to see the first indie with microtransactions.

Ah, yeah, mods really can help with some games like Skyrim (I often hear some people say that playing it with mods is the ONLY way they can play it). Of course the disadvantage is that you need a PC to use mods, but for those that like tons and tons of replay value and variety in their games, I think it's worth it. I play the PC version of Minecraft for the very same reason. It means I can change things up as I want.

Also you're right, I cant think of any indie games with microtransactions either.


There are a few AAA games that I've liked recently... Overwatch is very fun, and the new Doom is just... bloody fantastic (with the editor creating the endless replay value). Titanfall 2 looks like fun, IF it can hold onto it's freaking playerbase this time, I might pick it up. But... yeah. Those are definitely exceptions to the rule for me. Those are really the only 3 AAA games I've bothered with in a loooooong time (well, 3 if I do in fact get Titanfall 2). Not that I havent PLAYED others, but those are the only ones I thought well enough of to buy. Everything else, just... feh.

I feel a lot of AAA titles become real boring and reptitive quickly and tend to require a lot of grinding or going far distances while doing nothing and it ends up feeling more like work than enjoyment, I am sure plenty of people will disagree with me and like it this way but whatever. It is almost like the video game industry has copied the movie industry and no longer has any real substance to it, just a bunch of fancy visuals. Oh, and don't get me started on online multiplayer games, I do enjoy Rocket League though. There are some unique indie games out there or you could go back to playing some retro games from when you still thought they were fun. Don't bother with playing whatever is popular, play what you enjoy.

Totally agreed.

And I can give you the reason why AAA games require alot of grinding: Grinding is "lazy yet lengthening" content. The developers have to put very little work in to create grinding situations, since it just requires a certain type of balancing, AKA, setting numbers in certain ways to force the player to do things like level-up alot to advance, instead of the developers actually having to code and design new gameplay areas entirely to lengthen their games. They can say "80 hours of content!!!11" without having to DO much, because 60 of those hours are the player being forced to grind.

As for your comment about games trying to be movies, well, that's the OTHER side of things. AAA games that dont use grinding tend to try to be movies instead, which... ugh, dont even get me started on that. I expect to PLAY the damn games... not WATCH them. I'll never, ever, EVER understand the appeal of games with lots of cutscenes. I just... I just dont care.

Particularly since I remember the time when gameplay really was king, and when THAT was what held your audience. And the games that are often considered ultimate timeless classics that changed the industry are all about this. Particularly the older ones; games like Pac-man or Space Invaders were ENTIRELY about gameplay that got the player hooked, and those games had major effects on the industry as a whole. Same with much later games such as Doom, for instance. Doom didnt need big cutscenes and story to do it's job. It didnt even HAVE any. Instead, Doom was just plain fun, and was designed around game mechanics and ideas that just really worked; AND they supported things like level editors and whatnot so that players could create and trade their own content, giving the game even more value, yet at the same time they didnt use that as an excuse to have less "official" content... the game had TONS of sprawling levels with secrets everywhere and stuff to do. The community-generated stuff was just a bonus. Those sorts of ideas are what really make a game great for me.

But now? No. Shiny graphics and lots of drama scenes! Bah. I dont get it. I dont WANT to get it. I'll go back to Space Invaders on the freaking 2600 (or basically anything on the 2600) before I'll play the latest cutscene-and-drama-filled JRPG or whatever that was farted out by the AAA devs. And that's not a sarcastic statement, I still do in fact go back to games like those (often) and I get the enjoyment out of them that I DONT get out of most AAA releases.

Doesnt help that alot of consumers dont like thinking or researching for themselves when it comes to their purchases. Going PAST the AAA games requires that you do both of those things quite a bit, because the developers and publishers of things like indie titles dont come jumping and screaming at you like the AAA guys do. You have to look for them, browse around, stuff like that. So alot of people not only stick to just the Big Games, they actually think that's all there is. Alot of my friends are like that. It's rather infuriating. Hell, I dont even discuss gaming with them anymore these days... what's the point?

Bah. Whole thing is just irritating. But at least there really ARE alternatives now.... lots of them. That's a very good thing. Very good indeed.

The day I find the capital wasteland no longer appealing is the day I'll hike up to chernobyl and try to find the ghost of that black lava gloopy elephant's foot radioactive monstrosity and take a good bite out of it, wait around until I perish without valor, life's no longer worth living without blasting some super mutant punks in the dim depths of a cursed wreck of a previously perfectly ordinary building.

....I'll be honest, I didnt understand a word of that.

I agree somewhat. However- grinding levels has been a thing for RPGs for ages. If the game is fun- grinding isnt a big deal. Plus many many games, you can get overpowered by grinding but its not required. They don't simply force it upon you. Open world games like Skyrim, Fallout and so on- you have many many options and its a big draw to people.

I strongly think people need to play what they enjoy instead of complaining about how the industry is so repetitive and AAA games are boring, etc. Way too many "self entitled" and just whiny gamers these days that think the industry must revolve around them. Freedom of speech is one thing- but just being self entitled and whiny really isnt needed. Its easy to focus on stuff you like, rather than just endlessly complaining about stuff you don't like. I think I used this example before but it still works- this is kind of similar to the people that bash movies they havent even seen! They look at tiny details about it, look at the director and say "oh thats crap because he directed it, and this actor is bad" or whatever. (Note- this isnt a reference to your post, just the type of gamers that tend to frequent video game forums these days).