Adult Games, Child's Play?

Thanks to TotalGames.net for their gamesTM-reprinted piece discussing whether games are actually dumbing down in the industry's rush to produce mature titles. The editorial is concerned that "adding a spot of claret and some unguarded language to your game doesn't require any special artistic skill on the part of a developer." The writer then worries that "...those developers whose bread and butter has traditionally been more abstract titles where the gameplay is the hook and the graphical stylings are aimed at younger gamers, or at least at a general audience, are starting to find their games harder to sell." But original Grand Theft Auto creator Dave Jones thinks that "it's not violence that's selling but simplicity", even for his own series, arguing: "GTA has a very simplistic game mechanic - it is Pac-Man. The people are the dots you eat (run over) and the police the ghosts who chase you", although admitting: "What was different was the level of interaction within the city."

Comments

PacMan?

[Anonymous Coward]

...it is Pac-Man. The people are the dots you eat (run over) and the police the ghosts who chase you.

Ms. Pacman, then, would be the prostitute?

This is nothing new

[vasqzr]

Good graphics != good gameplay

Games with bad graphics, when they had to make the gameplay good, because thats all they had, are still played today.

I can think of a lot of games that had breathtaking graphics but you couldn't force me to play twice, because they were just so bad.

Re:This is nothing new

[thegrue76]

I dunno. My Atari 2600 felt pretty cutting-edge at the time. Never really thought of it as "all they had" at the time.

And, there were plenty of games back then that you couldn't force me to play twice, because they were just so bad. Limited graphics or not.

Designers will either take advantage of the tools available to them or not. That's what's not new. IMHO.

Re:This is nothing new

[vasqzr]

There were tons of bad Atari 2600 games. Remember a million cartridges buried in the desert? Remember the big video game crash of the 80's?

Not all games were good back then, just like now.

But, it wasn't the case where you could cram a CD full of snazzy FMV and try to pass it off as a game. Remember when CDROM drives first took off, and everyone wanted to make the next Myst?

Back then, they had to do it with flashy box art.

The good games HAD to have good gameplay, they couldn't have good graphics.

They didn't waste time and effort on 3D models, 24 bit textures, and such, disguising the horrible lack of a game underneath. They could spend all the time making original and intuitive games.

Re:This is nothing new

[brkello]

Good graphics != good gameplay

True.

Games with bad graphics, when they had to make the gameplay good, because thats all they had, are still played today.

I have to disagree with this. There is some stupid misconception that games back in the day were better because there was less emphasis on graphics. But guess what, the "bad graphics" you are talking about were cutting edge based on the system and the sophistication of the industry. Bad graphics != good games. Good games == Good games. Graphics and gameplay have nothing to do with each other, so get that out of your head. I bet you in 10 years when all of these games we have now have "bad graphics" people will still be playing them too.

I also think there is some sort of nostalgia effect for older titles. When Final Fantasy first came out and I played it, it was absolutely incredible to me as a kid. I can play that game over today and sitll enjoy it. I would never force a kid to play that game though, because even if he could see past the graphics, the game really pales in comparison to games that are out today. So just try to hold back a little and think when you say today's games aren't as focused on gameplay and games back in the day were more fun...are you looking through your childhood eyes that got more excited about everything (e.g. Christmas, new toys, new games) or are you being objective? Personally, I think there are many modern games out there that if I played as a kid would blow away my old Nintendo favorites.

Pointless but Fun?

[RancidLM]

Well ill have to say that in this day and age games are alot more simpler then back in the old days of Leasure suit larry and other Adventure games.. its strange.. i find that alot of the old games are my 386 are more challanging.. then the console ps2.. i can't say more effort needs to be put into game then graphics.. cuz as much as the old saying goes "Don't judge a book by its cover" its false in the video game industry.. So many of times i have walked into EB Games and walked out with something that Looked Good but to my supprise has a low IGN rating... i would have to say one of my Biggest gaming dissipointments would be Enter the matrix.. on PC where u can pritty much just run threw the game how ever i digress. Any how.. instead of pushing a game out in 6months more development time should be put in.

video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[*weasel]

GTA itself -was- pacman. it also sucked. it wasn't until Vice City that they really explored the full range of gameplay. With the depth they added, with the polish and the honest attempt to tell a story that just happened to fit with their existing gameplay, -that- is when rockstar struck gold.

When you abstract Vice City out to the level of 'pac man', then everything is pacman. Get the power up, win the game.

right now, gaming only has (predominantly) kids and young adults - and they (predominantly) are more into slickly produced action, sex and sports than, say, a good noir detective story. so clearly that's where publishers are going to pit their efforts. do you see movie studios backing anything truly new?

if we try to impose some sort of artificial limit on what is good content and what is 'pandering' - then we marginalize the entire industry.

the mainstream American Comics scene managed to marginalize itself entirely with the Comic Code of the 60s - 90s. Contrast the current american view of comics (no matter what the story, a guy holding a comic book is an immature dork) versus the japanese view of anime (where it is the content of the anime itself that matters).

Porn and Predator do not diminish all 'mature' film - so why should bmx xxx, or quake 3 diminish gaming's legitimacy?

Right now, gaming is dominated by big publishers, like film is dominated by big studios. We don't have an underground scene yet, and quite frankly we are only recently able to attract actual actors and writers to work in our media.

Innovation will happen, and 'mature' content will find its niche and push the media. In the meantime, yeah, predominantly it's going to be the 'formula', and slight variations that get pumped out.

And quite frankly, that's probably the way it will always be. The only difference we can hope for, is that after enough true gems come out these articles will stop claiming that when a publisher produces DOAX that it is proof that all video games are only shooting for that audience, and only fit for that audience.

People thought early cinema was a bastardized media, incapable of telling a story like a good novel or a play. and partially they were right. The thing is, by being able to explore they eventually found stories they could tell that no traditional medium could.

All this is, once again, is the old guard trying to convince everyone that this new fangled stuff is all rubbish and incapable of telling a 'proper' story. Time will be on our side so long as we don't fall for it.

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[bconway]

You do realize Vice City was exactly the same as GTA III, but in a different setting, right?

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[robson]

GTA itself -was- pacman. it also sucked. it wasn't until Vice City that they really explored the full range of gameplay. With the depth they added, with the polish and the honest attempt to tell a story that just happened to fit with their existing gameplay, -that- is when rockstar struck gold.

This strikes me as so preposterous that I almost can't tell if you're serious. Yet...

When you abstract Vice City out to the level of 'pac man', then everything is pacman. Get the power up, win the game.

That's exactly right. In fact, most narrative media (including games) can be abstracted down to conflict-climax-resolution.

[Snip a bunch of stuff I agree with]

Porn and Predator do not diminish all 'mature' film - so why should bmx xxx, or quake 3 diminish gaming's legitimacy?

Perhaps we need to establish a distinction between "mature" content and "sophisticated" content. Or, if that sounds snooty, then some other way of describing the difference between Predator and Glengarry Glen Ross.

Right now, gaming is dominated by big publishers, like film is dominated by big studios. We don't have an underground scene yet, and quite frankly we are only recently able to attract actual actors and writers to work in our media.

As another poster noted, I think gaming does have a thriving underground scene, but it's an amateur scene rather than a commercial one. Some of the most interesting stuff is beind done in mods and in interactive fiction, but I'd argue that they're able to do this because they don't work under the pressures of the marketplace. This always results in more experimentation and risk-taking.

How do we get some of that risk-taking into the commercial arena? Tough to say. In visual art, for example, you often see innovations appear in fine art and then slowly make their way into commerical art, presumably because said innovations represent less of a risk once they've been time-tested in another context. (Another way of saying this is that underground/indie efforts serve to provide some measure of R&D to commerical efforts, where those ideas can be exploted and reach a large audience. This may well be a natural and beneficial cultural cycle. If memory serves, Dave McKean's essay Storytelling in the Gutter dealt with this issue eloquently.)

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[mausmalone]

you hit on a lot of good points, but it's not all about the story... it's not all about the content. You can't say that any one thing makes a great game. You can't boil down the essential elements. If you do, then FF3 was just a game about getting items and picking stuff from menus.

I know that people tend to fall in for graphic polish or beautiful music and they miss a lot of deep gameplay. Well, I'll be the first to stand up and say that I'm a graphics whore. I love games with pretty graphics... or rather I don't like playing ugly games. I also don't like playing games with boring music, or games with boring gameplay, or games with lack-luster stories. The truth of the matter is that the game has to be solid all-around to be good.

Saying that gameplay is king is really only half the story. It's definitely a critical component, if not the most critical component. But it's not the entire game.

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[*weasel]

haven't played gta3. i'm an xbox owner and only recently got the doublepack.

i played gta1 and 2 on the pc and was not impressed.

if the leap from blind mayhem to story-supported mayhem happened from gta2 to gta3, then ok.

but i maintain that just adding in the rpg elements made all the difference in the world.

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[*weasel]

i thought GTA1 sucked. if that's preposterous, i don't know. it's my preference, it's the way the game struck me when i played it. It didn't have the unifying attention to detail and theme that vice city had - the right balance of story, nonlinear action, polish and gameplay that pulled it up above mindless violence (just as half-life pulled fps beyond simple quake fests).

GTA2 struck me as a slight update on GTA1. Along the lines of q2 as an update to q1 -- some new stuff, sure, but not 'new' on the whole. i honestly didn't play GTA3, so i can't really comment on that. (i got the doublepack and haven't been able to put vice city down)

as for Predator vs Glengary Glenn Ross ... 'sophisticated' is absolutely a better word choice. i used 'mature' to take a stab at the article's author. he tried to parlay that label as somehow alluding to sophistication, when clearly it doesn't.

A game is marked M just as a movie is marked R. when the publisher feels the need to let parents know 'if you get offended, you can't say we didn't warn you'. It has absolutely nothing to do with content sophistication. It sticks simply to sex, violence, and language. Nothing more.

The mod scene -is- fairly underground, but my point was that it doesn't seem to be -legitimized-. there isn't a community that covers mods in the aggregate: that reviews mods, discusses mods, talks to mod-makers - let alone map-makers or gametype tinkerers. And when there is a small zine that half-heartedly covers mods, they stick zealously to mods in their preferred engine, and then they only talk about the successful ones.

No-one is providing a mod maker some attention, or creating a dialogue on what works, what doesn't and -why-. We know counterstrike works. but why? the simplicity? guns? team-focused gameplay? more 'realistic' combat and setting? goals? a gestalt of all those things?

where's the honest dialogue on why it resonated, why it worked?

And what about the single player mods? half-life with Zombies, half-life with Cowboys, Sven Co-op, Neverwinter modules... no-one really talks about them. Sure, their respective game-engine focused communities mention them, and let people know when new releases happen. but no-one is creating much of a dialogue about how the ideas come about, what the mod maker was -trying- to do, and whether that worked or not. most importantly, no-one is discussing -creative- alternatives that might make the mod 'work'.

I honestly don't think that the underground style of risk-taking should occur in the commerical arena. It's bad business, and its not helpful to the industry in the end. If the 'Deus Ex 2's or 'Half-life 2's have to support a dozen more low-budget 'risky' projects, eventually a bad bunch of risks will all fail, and the profits on the mainstream game won't be able to support the company. at some point the publisher's investors will simply put their money elsewhere, and that's not good for anyone.

no, experimentation -should- remain no budget. it should be left up to individuals working purely from passion, without the pressures of deadlines or commercialization. when they strike a chord, they can be co-opted into the mainstream.

the missing element is simply a couple focal points for the community that treat the underground scene with respect as a legitimate form, at least as important as mainstream gaming itself. (preferrably without the art-house snobbishness that accompanies the film parallel, but i'll take what i can get)

someone needs to dare to aim for the nonexistant market. ignore bungie, id, and valve. ignore rockstar, ea, and eidos. they're being covered to death. only by joining the community in the aggregate, across all engines, mods and hand-coded creations, and taking the whole thing seriously can we create a 'legitimate' scene that's worth participating in, in and of itself. whereas right now, the mod scene seems to be 95% about cracking the mainstream dev industry.

sure, some indy films are simple pitches for mainstream acceptance. but many of them could care less. they create the movies they want to watch regardless of whether they get paid for helping move the art form forward.

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay, everyone who brought this guy up to +5, turn in your moderator badges.

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[Anonymous Coward]

because clearly you're the keeper of the One True Opinion, right?

Re:video games -are- growing up. if we'd let them.

[robson]

i thought GTA1 sucked. if that's preposterous, i don't know. it's my preference, it's the way the game struck me when i played it. It didn't have the unifying attention to detail and theme that vice city had - the right balance of story, nonlinear action, polish and gameplay that pulled it up above mindless violence (just as half-life pulled fps beyond simple quake fests).

Just a quickie -- I apologize for that. Many folks use mean "GTA3" when they say "GTA", and I mistakenly presumed you were doing this.
Personally, I didn't really dig GTA(1), mainly because of the control scheme they chose...

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[Snowmit]

yeah now that game play is starting to return to games (metroid prime, kill switch) they are totally sacrificing game length. back in the 80s a game took you at least 2-3 times longer to beat as they do today.

That's a feature, not a bug. I don't want to take 120 hours to play through to the ending of your (padded) game. 20 or even 10 hours is fine. If we're talking about mass-market then you want short games because the mass-market does not have the time to obsessively play a game for that long. If we're talking about artistic value then, again, what other medium has ever made you sit through even 40 hours of artistic expression to get the good stuff?

The idea that greater game length == a better game is so wrong. I mean, a game of chess takes, what a few hours? Clearly it's a bad game. They should have included multiple story-missions and at least two or three other multiplayer modes.

There should be more short games. I want games that will entertain my friends at a party. I want games that I can play in the few hours I have after work that aren't spent doing other stuff. I don't want to devote the next 6 months of my life to your one game. No bok demands that much of my time and no movie does either.

If most of your customers will never see the final two-thirds of your game, why are you wasting your resources on it? Save yourself some effort and time as a developer and start work on the next great, short and tightly-focused game.

Mature = Porn = Who Cares?

[Slider451]

I think the article's author just got hung up on the word 'mature'. A game with an M rating reflects content you're more likely to see in an X-rated movie. Last time I checked X-rated movies weren't winning any Oscars for writing, directing, or acting.

So, yes, the article is correct. 'Mature' really should be 'Sophomoric'. But, since we all know what it really means, who cares?

Re:Mature = Porn = Who Cares?

[nearlygod]

Midnight Cowboy.

Re:Mature = Porn = Who Cares?

[Slider451]

Midnight Cowboy

The exception that proves the rule. :)

And it's certainly possible for an M game to get that level of quality, depth, and maturity. But right now the rating itself appears to be the goal.

Re:Mature = Porn = Who Cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Many M rated games certainly do not fit into that category. Serious Sam and Deus Ex, for example.

Re:Mature = Porn = Who Cares?

[IIRCAFAIKIANAL]

Not quite. The ESRB has a separate rating for adult games ("AO" or adults only).

Mature is somewhat comparable to "R" and a lot of "R" rated pictures receive accolades so it is fair to compare "M" rated games to mainstream cinema. I do agree that many M rated video games are unfortunately quite sophomoric - rather like R rated exploitation flicks. There are some good M rated games, however, like Half Life, MGS, and System Shock 2 that do not rely on boobies and crude humour.

See here for a breakdown of the ratings and what they mean in terms of content.

Re:Mature = Porn = Who Cares?

[redgopher]

Thats exactly how it translates to the cinema ratings.

I'd just like to add to the list... Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Halo, and most definetly Max Payne 2 (first game I've ever heard any game use the full range of profanity, including the f-bomb... go Rockstar!) rank as some of the most incredible games I've ever played that were rated as Mature.

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[musikit]

a movie costs $20 and last approx. 2-3 hours. a book depending on interest and speed 1week to 2 weeks for $7. a video game is $50 and most today end inside of 10 hours (metroid prime record is 90 minutes with 100% complete rate). i;m not saying 120 hours/game all i'm saying is if i'm wasting $50 on a game i don't want to be completed with it in a week.

Stories, Gameplay, Graphics?

[GospelHead821]

No single element makes a good game. However, any one of story, gameplay, or graphics can define the audience that is appropriate for the game.

Consider a game like Descent 3. The graphics and the story are pretty tame. Nothing there would prevent an 8 year old from playing the game. In order to play the game well, though a sophisticated grasp of controls is required. That is not to say that an eight year old can't have this level of control (and I'm sure it's becoming more common that they do). However, I've found that my experience with games is that I've become more skilled at adopting new and more complicated control schemes the longer I've played. So in this case, the gameplay alone probably dictates that Descent 3 is a game for a more mature audience.

Consider Duke Nukem 3D. The gameplay is elementary and the story is, with little censorship, perfectly appropriate for kids (at least, what I remember of it). On the other hand, the visuals presented by the game, with featured decapitations and scantily clad women everywhere, certainly make this a game for mature audiences.

Now, consider American McGee's Alice. The gameplay is elementary. The graphics are generally pretty tame. But the story is downright disturbing. Madness, fear, and angst are all prevalent themes. They would either be too frightening for kids or would be lost entirely, defeating the real appeal of the game.

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[Incoherent07]

Are you sure that's not just because the controls sucked or because you couldn't save your game?

The trick is not length, but making it WORTH that length. Some RPGs are better at this than others, although as a genre they tend to be longer games. Examples of games worth their length: FF6 (because it had two completely opposite halves of the game), Ogre Battle games (which tend to have a good story to string you along).

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[JGag21]

If I order a 12 oz. steak, I want that to be good to the last gib. Hey maybe you should order the little 7 oz. to suit your needs, obviously you don't need as much. Maybe if we can work the price of a 7 ouncer into games.......nah they'll never go for that.

And, To Me, Boxing is Like Ballet...

[EvilXenu]

...Except There's No Music, No Choreography, and the Dancers Hit Each Other.

Re:And, To Me, Boxing is Like Ballet...

[Rellik66]

How about WWE wrestling?

There's choreogaphy, some music, and the dancers hit each other

Thanks Mom

[ArmenTanzarian]

Yes Mom, all movies today are just bad language and gratuitous violence... sure Dad, no good rock has been made since the 70's... yeah Grandpa, kids today are much bigger trouble makers than ever before... blah blah freakin' blah...

People have been yacking about this to get attention forever. Remember all the hoopla about Pulp Fiction? Well guess what? Pulp Fiction had a lot of violence, a lot of bad language, and also happened to be an incredible movie!

But back to the main argument:
People have always thrown useless elements into media in an effort to turn a quick profit. Books, movies, whatever... Ever heard of Deus Ex Machina (not the similarly titled video game)? Yes, grand sweeping plays that would just have gods come out of nowhere to resolve the plot. This certainly didn't help the flow of a play, increase the richness of the experience, but it got the audience home at a reasonable hour and it certainly made the authors some money.

Yeah, people throw in bad words and violence to sell a couple extra copies, but don't blame video games or video game culture. Cost vs. content is as ancient as the idea of conveying thought and I hate it when someone portrays this as a new or exclusive concept.

Actually I think of GTA3 as

[M3wThr33]

I tend to look at GTA3 as a game similar to Zelda. You have a complex world, free roaming, and some dungeon/quests to complete in order to get new items.

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[quandrum]

back in the 80s a game took you at least 2-3 times longer to beat as they do today. Maybe you took that long to beat a game, but the games weren't that long. This is the 80's! 90% of the games didn't have a save game feature. How long would a developer really make a game that you couldn't save? The crown jewel of the NES era, SMB3, took 8 hours the first time through. Except you couldn't save so you had to do the same things over and over and it just seemed a lot longer. Metroid Prime should take you longer than 8-9 hours, but you get to save, so you end up only playing 10 hours total. Want more play time? Try giving up the ability to save.

Comparisons.

[DrEldarion]

"GTA has a very simplistic game mechanic - it is Pac-Man. The people are the dots you eat (run over) and the police the ghosts who chase you", although admitting: "What was different was the level of interaction within the city."

Yeah, and Mario Sunshine is Pitfall, Gran Turismo 4 is Pole Position, and Super Monkey Ball is Marble Madness.

Of course games are going to be like each other. Platform games are platform games, racing games are racing games. The difference is the level of complexity - how can he say that GTA3 is anywhere near as simplistic as Pacman?

Re:Comparisons.

[tibike77]

He just said the game mechanics is "Pac-Man"-like, and what differs is the level of complexity...

Re:Comparisons.

[Black Hitler]

how can he say that GTA3 is anywhere near as simplistic as Pacman?

Because he's not talking about GTA3.

Re:Comparisons.

[calebtucker]

Uh, I don't know about you, but I remember marble madness being more difficult than super monkey ball. I think I even loaded it up on an emu recently to see if I could play it, but I had trouble getting past the first stage.

I might be speaking too soon though... I just bought super monkey ball the other day, and I'm only on advanced level 21. So far, I love the game. It's difficult but seems much less frustrating than marble madness.

Re:Comparisons.

[Frizzle Fry]

It's difficult but seems much less frustrating than marble madness

You're very, very wrong. The master mode/ master mode extra stages (is this monkey ball 1 or 2?) will make you cry. I have watched a friend lose hundreds of lives on one of those (Planets) before finally giving up.

you sound like Katz

[Anonymous Coward]

GTA itself -was- pacman. it also sucked.

WTF are you talking about?? "sucked"??? The original GTA is still, to this very day, incredibly entertaining.

We don't have an underground scene yet

Again...WTF? First of all, you should not be using the word "we" when you refer to the gaming industry, because you have absolutely no grasp on it. And second, half the PC gaming content is underground...what the hell are you talking about?

Re:you sound like Katz

[*weasel]

Where is this underground scene? without any sarcasm whatsoever - i honestly would like to know where i can find it. Maybe i missed it, maybe i'm too cynical. maybe we mean two different things by 'underground'. i dont know.

Where are the independent games that are turning out nontraditional or innovative gameplay or storytelling? an rpg told from the point of view of the captured princess? where's the fps that doesn't feature powerups, a health meter, or a shotgun? where's the action game that is about -preserving- life and property? where's the strategy game that covers conflict between nontraditional opponents (eg. rebels, terrorists, seperatists, etc)?

the IGF thus far has been mostly independents seeking to emulate the established genre games, to try to break into the industry. were it not for underfunded overseas companies competing in America for lack of a native market, there wouldn't even be a decent number of 'independent' games made in a year.

the Mod scene is the closest thing we have in the end, because it gives the best chance for good production quality to a small team that's trying to innovate the gameplay or story.

but most of that is 'me-too', and lacks any sort of recognized legitimacy. aside from counterstrike's undeniable success, does any press even honestly -review- mods? let alone maps, gametypes, etc.

is there an independent gaming rag i can refer to, that covers games and developers that i haven't heard of yet? that reviews the independent games and offers a soapbox for independent game makers?

if by 'underground' you mean that half the pc gaming content is under-marketed, i'd agree. but that's hardly the same thing. part of what makes independent film so inaccessible to the mainstream is that it is not only underfunded and thus lacks the glitz and the attention - but that it covers topics, stories, and storytelling methods that the mainstream hasn't tried yet.

Where are these underground pc games that do this? I honestly hope i'm wrong. I'd love to find an underground culture for people who are getting a little tired of yet-another-fps, yet another rts, yet another rpg.

I just haven't found it by myself.

Isn't it obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

Any kind of art that doesnt follow the latest trend (and doesnt come with a good advertising campaign) will of course have trouble getting an audience and ranking sales, everybody went to see "Revolutions" the first day it came out, how many people do that when a great unknown film hits the teather? (donnie darko, the original matrix?)

Unfortunately this topic is beating on a dead horse, theres no way to make all gamers "telepathically" know a game that didnt had proper advertising and theres no chance they are going to get excited about a game they dont know instead of one that they were "over hyped" about.

You have to remember each game is a $50 buck/ time investment so they always go for a sure bet (hyped, similar to what they liked). All art forms have the same problem . Fortunately at the end, only true masterpieces survive the pass of time and "fads" come and go. (anyone remember the "mecha" games fad on the xbox 1 year ago?)

Those developers whose bread and butter has traditionally been more abstract titles where the gameplay is the hook and the graphical stylings are aimed at younger gamers, or at least at a general audience, are starting to find their games harder to sell.

10 years ago, a good majority of gamers were kids around 5-15 (thats when nintendo was king) who had never played games before, those kids have grown up and still play games, the majority of gamers this days are around 15-25 years old, and their interests have changed. they no longer want to play a game that looks like a game -They want visceral and realistic gaming experiences. Games that look more like movies or real life simulations. not cartoons or puzzles(unless they are extraordinarily good) if you check the top ten games in sales you will see it reflects this situation.

Additionally games that require a manual to be played are a thing of the past, games must be intuitive and easy to play so anyone (even not gamers) can enjoy them, thats not a fad or dumbed down games thats gameplay progress and it must be common knowledge among developers.
Gamers want game experiences to be enjoyable and fun but also they want them to be a challenge (easy to learn, hard to master).

What game developers have to do is to simply realize times have changed, you can no longer release a game because is "good" it must be extraordinary, if possible it must have a target audience or a niche to fill in (as some people say it must have "legs") otherwise they are shooting an arrow in the air, will it be a hit or not? who knows?

Anyhow at the end If a game is extraordinary it will sell. how many of you arent curious to see "ico" just to see what is all about? (after all good critics can also make good hype)

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

"The idea that greater game length == a better game is so wrong. I mean, a game of chess takes, what a few hours? Clearly it's a bad game. They should have included multiple story-missions and at least two or three other multiplayer modes."

Its all about replay value. If you can only play a game once before it gets boring then of course you want it to be long. I can beat quake1 in about 45minutes, but I can play it again and again and its still fun(even sans mods). Compare to a game like HalfLife:BlueShift, which I beat in, oh, 4hours? Never touched it again after that.

Your basic math lesson...

[tibike77]

It is said the average IQ of the human race is 100 (at least that was the ideea when they came up with). Under 80 and you're "too dumb for school" and anything above 120 and you're a intelligence beast... anyway, it's distributed as a "gaussian bell curve"... in case you don't know what that is, google it.
No really, this was necessary.

The world's population is almost 7 billion.
The population having access to computers is (let's go out on a limb with assumptions) about half, let's say 4 billion.
People that USUALLY buy games (or have games bought for them) are somewhere between 15 and 30 years old. The closer you get to the 18-22 zone, the more games they "consume".
So we can safely say, that out of all people using computers, only about 10% purchase games once a year, even less.
So, that leaves us with about 400 million people in the "I'll buy one game this year" pool (yeah, some buy more, but really only Japan and USA persons buy more than 2 games a year on an average).

The number of titles showing up that are worth buying are about 200 each year. So that leaves us with about 2 million possible buyers for a certain game.

Now, look for some tool/graph anywhere that can integrate (as in the mathematical function) the bell curve distribution surface right-side of a certain number. Play with it for a while.
You will see something startling come up...

IQ=100 required to play and enjoy a game = 1 million copies sold
IQ=105 required to play and enjoy = 800 thousand copies sold
IQ=110 required to play and enjoy = 500 thousand copies sold
(and that goes exactly the same the other way around)

Except for extremely aggresive marketing campaigns and/or "heavy brand name recognition" and/or an "exclusive niche" in a genre... the above rule pretty much holds true.

Do you still wonder WHY games are intentionally "dumbed down"???
It's just the allmighty dollar at work here.

Move along, nothing to see...
DISCLAIMER:
1. The numbers, the logic and pretty much anything except the basic ideea followed in this post... were intentionally exagerated (to prove a point).
2. No mathematician was seriously hurt while making these calculations
3. If you use these numbers to compare best-sellers with their gameplay-IQ, I should not be liable for anything that the lawyers throw at you later :P

Re:Your basic math lesson...

[Anonymous Coward]

My IQ is 147. And I like Spelunker.

Re:Your basic math lesson...

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm.. your equation sounds right but that doesnt explain why Half life (in its time), Kotor, Wind Waker and Halo are or were top sales games instead of "roadkill","backyard wrestling" and "xtreme sport X" (with the exception of tony hawk and SSX which are superior quality games).

Gameplay is evolutioning into something that anyone (even so called not gamers) can enjoy. it looks like its being "dumbed down" I admit. but consider this example, a complete non gamer could never in a thousand years have finished (or even enjoyed) the original prince of persia, but this days you can actually pass the controller to just about anyone in your household and they will do a pretty good job in the new Prince of Persia. (the controls are most intuitive Ive ever seen ) they probably wont be able to finish it in a sitting but you can bet they will enjoy it.

Gamers have developed skills over the years, we can time a jump perfectly, aim at an enemy with or without an sniper a few hundred feet away and hit it on the first try we can strafe through a 3d room avoiding bullets as we do, we know what a "hadoken" and "haryuken" moves are, and we can execute it perfectly at the first try. Non gamers DO NOT have those skills! a new batch of games which not require them is at hand and although for us they look pretty silly but for the new genrations thats how games ARE.

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[bigman2003]

You may have skewed the numbers a bit to make your point. I tried to compare 'first run' books/movies/games to be equal. ($20 movies, and $7 books? What is that- porn at an arcade, and comic books?)

Movies (first run) are usually about $7.50-$9.00 (American) and take about 2.5 hours.

Books (hardcover/early paperback) are about $14-$28 and take anywhere from 5-15 days.

Games are about $50, and usually take 15-100 hours, but can take much, much more.

I think that books are one of the best entertainment values out there- but video games are good too. I hate to re-read books, so the replayability on a book is zero for me. Depening on the type of game, you can choose to spend very little, or TONS of time. (How many hours of practice does it take to finish Metroid Prime in 90 minutes?)

Some games are story driven- lets say 'Return to Castle Wolfenstein'. You finish the story in a certain amount of time (took me about 40 hours) and then you can basically say you are done with the game. Yes, it had online play, but I want to gloss over that for now.

Or, you can get into a different type of game- let's say Top Spin for the Xbox. The 'story' mode can take 10-15 hours. But then you can play against your friends at home, or on Live- and you can do this for many, many hours- hundreds if you really like it.

Also- other games like Diablo II can easily suck up hundreds of hours if you let it- because there really is no 'finish', until you have the BEST of every possible type of item.

So, to me it depends on the type of game. An RTS? Oooohhhh, maybe I can do THIS different, and lets see what happens (for the next 4 hours). But a STORY type game definetly has less replayability, but the intensity of the experience is usually much greater.

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[Snowmit]

a movie costs $20 and last approx. 2-3 hours. a book depending on interest and speed 1week to 2 weeks for $7. a video game is $50 and most today end inside of 10 hours (metroid prime record is 90 minutes with 100% complete rate). i;m not saying 120 hours/game all i'm saying is if i'm wasting $50 on a game i don't want to be completed with it in a week.

Assuming that you're willing to pay $20 for the movie then $50 for 3-5 times as many hours of entertainment is good value for your dollar.

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[scot4875]

Very true. Not only that, but if you take the grandparent post's example of Metroid, the argument falls flat. The best players in the world can beat Super Metroid in roughly 45 minutes. The (currently) best player in the world can beat Metroid Prime in roughly 1:45. I don't claim to be the best original Metroid player in the world, but I think I can finish it in roughly 30-45 minutes.

It just took me about 8 hours to get through the latest Prince of Persia. The original (from the 80s!) had a time limit of what, 1 hour? Mega Man could be beaten in an hour, I'd be really impressed if someone finished Viewtiful Joe in that amount of time.

Note that all of these are single player games -- once you add in multiplayer, who cares about game time? You can play forever if you want.

Personally, I'd rather go through a game that has its action densely packed into a few hours than something that drags on just for the sake of lasting longer.

--Jeremy

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[mausmalone]

Ever play Bucky O'Hare? I agree, not the best game of the 80's, but nevertheless, it shows exactly how a game on the NES took an absurdly long amount of time to beat.

A friend of mine and I played through it again recently (mostly him, since I suck by comparrison). I swear... we got to the final boss, whom he shot continuously for over 45 minutes before getting killed, and the boss showed no signs of slowing down (other than the "you hit me" blinking). After that, we just turned it off and walked away. Screw 80's games and their longevity

your basic IQ lesson

[overbom]

the problem with your analogy is that video games span multiple age ranges, therefore combining multiple 'iq' values.

e.g., a 14 year old with an iq of 120 may not be as smart as a 25 year old with a 110 iq may not be as smart as a 45 year old with a 100 iq may not be as smart as etc. etc.

IQ is derived from a person's perceived 'intelligence' as compared to their AGE GROUP.

The problem will solve itself as the young set grows up and demands more mature (in the not-porn sense of the word) and intelligent titles.

disclaimer: IQ is a shite way to measure intelligence

Maddox said it better...

[Stormwatch]

http://maddox.xmission.com/contra3_owns.html

Re:sacrifical totem pole

[Frizzle Fry]

The crown jewel of the NES era, SMB3, took 8 hours the first time through

If this topic is on your mind, you need to watch this:
http://homepage3.nifty.com/nura/images/moSMB3.wmv
It will change your life.