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Teens Losing Interest In Gaming?
Survey firm Piper Jaffrey has results saying that teenagers are losing interest in videogaming. From the Gamasutra article: "Interestingly, almost 80 percent of teens indicated that they intend to spend less time playing video games in 2006 and nearly 70 percent indicated that their interest in playing video games is decreasing." What do you think could be causing this drop in interest from young people? Sequels? Mature themes? Sequels?
Radical idea. Puberty hits. Older kids get interested in girls. Making friends. Socializing.
I'd post more, but I don't want to frighten off Slashdot's majority population.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
I'm not suprised because I've never really seem the appeal of hard-core gaming. Sure, a game can be a nice distraction once in a while, just as a movie can. But in the long run, stimulating activities (books, athletics, social interactions, programming) are always more interesting.
Seriously, teens realized that the chances of getting some is increased when they actually go out to do the getting.
Growing up? I would think as people grow up, fewer people actually do gaming or devote less time to gaming if they still are.
Je ne parle pas francais.
Between the cost of gaming these days (prohibitive on the PC unless you have a new computer, outragious on the systems) and the sheer lack of anything decent new or inovating unless its by Nintendo out there. The writing was on the wall for another Video Game Crash.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
i didn't even RTFM but who needs anything but common sense to know that hormonal teens are less interested in gaming and more interested in fucking?
Just like in south park, the problem lies in the smug levels of the people buying these systems. They tout their systems (What are you crazy? I cant play on STANDARD definition) and feed the hype, but its an inflated level of 'coolness' that the games just cant hold up to. Flashy games are usally boring, half baked ideas. I can barely stand to play any of the games today, playing mostly old emulators (River City Ransom booyaa).
Also, I also like to believe that games were more fun and creative. When was the last time you played a game like Quest for Glory? How about Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure? I'm sure there are still creative games being made today, but it gets difficult to find the gems among the rest of what's being produced (I liked Katamari Damacy ;).
They are just growing up and have better things to do than sit in front a screen wasting time making pixels kill each other all day.
Perhaps they've discover this thing called "Real Life".
Say bad words about my book, in cold oatmeal, or I shall sue!
Of course people said they were "intending" to play less.
Smokers usually "intend" to quit too.
Saying it isn't doing it.
-- Should you believe authority without question?
I'd like to know exactly what was asked and the options given. I grew up with gaming and still play them enthusiasticly. Do I play less? Yes, that whole wife/family/job thing sort of takes up some time after all. Does that mean I don't want to play more? No, it just means I can't. As phrased, we don't know if these are kids planning on going to college, getting f/t jobs, married, etc. What conditions are they citing for not playing more? Or is it apathy towards gaming, which is what they seem to be implying without citing any reasons.
I will shred my adversaries. Pull their eyes out just enough to turn them towards their mewing, mutilated faces. Illyria
Well besides the fact of christian parents overreacting to video games and trying to ban them, poorly designed video games, game designers careers marketed off by colleges with dumbass commercials, and one of the major things, ALOT of games ive noticed lately are all marketed towards single player (besides mmo's which . If they do have multiplayer, their the poorly made video games anyways.
Interestingly, almost 80 percent of teens indicated that they intend to spend less time playing video games in 2006 and nearly 70 percent indicated that their interest in playing video games is decreasing.
Why does this sound strikingly similar to what smokers say about quitting?
Crap games:
Sequels:
Stupidly expensive Consoles...
Handhelds which are instantly outdated...
PC's which are cheaper than said console, do alot more than said console, and even cost less than said console.
Hum... i wonder why kids today play less games.
- http://www.milkme.co.uk
WoW is still HUGE, the Next Gen Consoles WILL sell like hotcakes, and people will continue to buy Madden well into 2020......
Physics is nothing like religion. If it was, we'd have an easier time trying to raise money!
I really think this is just the regular ebb and flow of the games industry. I have a hard time believing that people are becoming less interested in games, although the one thing that might contribute to it would be the increase in interactive media. Rather than play a game, people are browsing on YouTube, updating MySpace, etc.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
coz they're out getting laid?
We're just a generation of video gamers that's older now. Gen X-Y played/plays video games... This new generation doesn't. It used to be that target markets were 12-20, now we're older and its changed along side us to 18-30.
Sound familiar? It's the same thing we constantly take the piss out of Hollywood for every time movies come up. At the forefront of this are the likes of Bethesda and Bungie - flashy graphics, sequels and series, micropurchases, and universally unsatisfactory gameplay saved only by a few major strengths.
This was my first thought as well. Who is going to admit or say they are going to play more video games or watch more TV?
Polls like this are almost next to worthless except when you use them to look at the disparity between what people say and reality (sales figures)
Imagine how the junk and fast food companies stocks would fall if people put stock into these kinds of polls for those things.
I joined an anime community a while ago, and while there is the typical mention of gaming, I don't see much interest about it. Specially when games offer you less than 8 hours of gameplay in average. Two boring weekends and you finished the game.
What I see in the forum, is lots of people talking about their problems and getting new boyfriends/girlfriends.
Perhaps there's a social implication in this - now people lose their virginity at a much younger age than before.
So I guess that nerds (who can't get a girlfriend as easily as everybody else) deviate their attention to two things: Videogames, tech stuff, and porn.
In Korea, only OLD people play video games!
For me, it was the fact that to play the latest computer games required you to keep shelling out a few grand each year to play the game at its best. Yes, I know most games scale according to hardware, but damn it, I want the game to look like it does on the box, and play like it should...SMOOTH, not choppy as all hell.
Now some would say, well why don't you get a console then? Um, I have a computer, and I like computer games. 'nuff said.
So rather than complain and complain about hardware requirements, I just decided to stop playing games. Problem fixed and now I have a 4-year old computer and aside from games, it runs everything I need it to quickly and without issues.
I'm guessing that money and value for the money are two big reasons they're planning to play less. The average price of a game they'd want to play is way to high.
- AMW
My siblings (11-13 boys) play plenty of video games. They just have no desire in the new consoles. They don't seem to be easily impressed by graphics (every game they have ever known has had good graphics), they want games that are fun. Combine that with the fact that 90% of their video game time is consumed by World of Warcraft. In a choice between convincing my Mother to buy them an xbox 360 or a 30 dollar game card, they opt every time for the game card. Molten Core beckens them, and all their friends. Run around Ironforge and ask how many people are under 16, its a lot of them. The 'gotta have it now' times are over for consoles, its not just kids, I feel it too (26 male). I feel lost in a sea of empathy for these new consoles. I blame lack luster game play and lack of fun games.
80 percent of people polled intend to loose weight next year.
The days of the digital watch are numbered.
I think it's somewhat normal for teens to play less games, since it's a normal time for social development to begin. There's many more opportunities to meet people and make friends now.
It could also be attributed to video games not being anything special anymore. I don't necessarily mean how games were back in the late 70s and 80s, but that certain excitement one had when playing their very first game. Couple this with the industry going more mainstream, and you have an audience that is enthusiastic at first, then apathetic. As another poster mentioned, it could also be due to a horrible lack of originality and focus on things besides graphics.
Furthermore, if I were still a teen and had asked my mom to get an XBOX 360, she'd most likely tell me to get the fuck out. Perhaps teens are playing less because they have to work their asses off just to buy the systems and all.
The existence of 4 million night elf rogues would suggest that this article is wrong. :)
Cost of gas: up
Cost of housing: up
Cost of utilities: up
Minimum wages up with living costs: nope
Cost of a tricked out gaming machine $2000+
Cost of the newest consoles: $300-700
Cost of games, addons, etc... well, you get the idea.
Could it be that modern teens just can't afford to cost of gaming given that it is expensive and the cost of everything else has jumped too?
Perhaps they've discover this thing called "Real Life".
Ah, yes, Real Life... Great on-line comic.
Sorry, you didn't mean something else, did you?
I intend to completely abuse "free mobile-to-mobile calling" in an effort to play Dungeons and Dragons 24/7/365. Who's with me?
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
I'm happy and sober.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
Sex ? What's that ?
Snakes on a Plane comes out in 2006.
o therfucking-plane.html
see also http://hucksblog.blogspot.com/2005/08/snakes-on-m
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My siblings (11-13 boys) play plenty of video games...
Now that you are 26 - 27, you're probably looking for a couple of wives.
Annoying, immature gamers are no longer as interested in gaming as they used to be? Good riddance. With the absence of a large, young market, hopefully we'll see more quality titles focused on gameplay and not entirely on flashy graphics/new hardware.
Older kids get interested in girls. Making friends. Socializing.
I'm confused. Please explain this "Making 'Friends'" you speak of? Will the standard gcc complier work? Where can I get the source?
I think people in general, not just teens, stop playing games as much in the summer because the weather is nicer, girls are wearing less, and there's generally more real life stuff to do. In my part of the country, today was a very nice day, and the two people in my dorm that stayed in to play computer/video games were asked "WTF n00b? The weather is so nice out, you should go do something!"
-William Brendel
I have a 9 year old (I know he's not a teenager) that would easily rather play Yugi-Oh or Vs than just about any game out there. I have been carting him to tournaments and events for the last six months or so to see crowds swelling from about 10 or 15 to 50 or 60 players. Not just kids either. By far the largest groups are 15-20 year olds, and not your stereotypical D&D or other tabletop type players either. The GenCon Yugi Oh event last year pulled in a few hundred players, and in Vs., you can win some big money playing the Pro Circuit.
Because teenage pranks are fun when you're about to die!
Back when I used to play games, there were these little things called creativity and originality that were the main focus in development. Dare I mention the word gameplay?
Back when I used to play games, people weren't so damn cut throat about making a profit - that the advertised game actually lined up with the gameplay! Amazing!
Back when I used to play games, it didn't feel like a gamble when I put down my $39.99 for a new game.
Back when I used to play games, the singleplayer was actually fun.
Back when I used to play games, the whole idea of a WWII game was still untainted.
Back when I used to play games, the clone didn't exist...
I could keep going on about this for hours, but that won't change anything. I feel like an elderly man rambling on and on from his rocker with zero chance of anyone important coming around to listen or even take it to heart. The game industry is screwed, and I hope games like spore change that. It probably won't, heh, we'll just get a bunch of spore clones.
I'm going to take a stab at this and say its the same reason I find myself playing less (or one of the two main reasons). There's just not much new out there I want to play. I haven't been excited by a game release since GTA:SA, and even that was muted since I knew it was more of the same. I have no plans to by a 360 or a PS3 (I own both companies current gen systems), because I don't see any reason to own them. It looks like more of the same, but with better graphics. The only system that I'm even paying any attention to is the Revolution, just because it seems to be the only one that has any potential for "new" games. Heck, I just installed Baldur's Gate II on my PC to play (never played it before) since there was nothing out there that I wanted to spend $40-60 on. I think this is a real problem for the industry. There's nothing truely new on the horizon, and there's a HUGE back-catalog of games for much less to choose from, that besides graphics, offer essentially the same gameplay and what's coming out.
> "Yes, in 2006 I plan to spend significantly more time gaming than I did in 2006!"?
A modern teenager is unlikely to utter such a sentence. Instead I would expect something like:
"Yeah, I think I gonna game less next year, 'cause o, like, girls, y'know?"
Yes, we all know Spiderman and the Hulk got into a fight and Chuck Norris won.
We also know that Chuck Norris passed a kidney stone and we now know it as the moon.
STFU
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
I swear this depends on the weather, winter in canada has been very mild with plenty of opportunity to go outside and enjoy the warm winterweather! they should do this study again with winters with minus 40 celsius.
...what matters is what you like, not what you are like...
Padron the botched quote. Perhaps the quality and variety of the games are dropping and players don't want to play version 9 of a game that was never really all that good to begin with.
1. What are these teens doing instead of playing games? Socializing is definitely a good bet. Maybe they're spending more time online in non-gaming pursuits. Maybe they're seeing more movies (probably not, I'm sure there's astudy somewhere showing movie attendence continuing to plummet even among the coveted teenage audience). There are only 24 hours in a day, and unless they're sleeping more, if they've cut back on games that means something else is more interesting.
2. What do the numbers say for the same age? The question, as they've framed it, tells you a lot about trends over age, but not over time. It tells you how this year's 16-year-olds have changed since they were 15, but it says nothing about the habits of this year's 16-year-olds vs. last year's 16-year-olds.
You could easily have a situation in which every single person surveyed plays games less than the year before, but the influx of younger teens into the survey's range keeps the overall levels of game play the same.
The amount of technology required to do this depends on the interactive needs of the player.
Personally, my gaming has very low CPU requirements. There is no need to stick on the upgrade treadmill. I have a P133 with no mouse that runs Angband OK. My online gaming experience is satified at 3k.org.
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for me, i still have an interest in gaming but have trouble finding any interesting games. gone are the classic platform games that were designed for gameplay first and graphics were a way to make gameplay better. now all games are tricked out graphics and the gameplay suffers. i just feel that current games are not fun anymore.
also, the mmorpg fad is pushing gaming down. people that play those games are not necessarily playing because it's fun, but because it is the only thing to play that has any gameplay at all steming from that fact that other humans play. these games MAKE a player spend many hours playing them to advance and some people can only take so much grinding to skill points to give up.
i mean really, home many times should you have to shoot a womp rat with a phaser before it dies? im sure skill gives a bitter chance at a 1-hit 1-kill but if i saw a phaser laying on the ground i could pick it up, point it, and pull the trigger and vaporize a womp rat in 1 shot!
The parent's fanboyism is pathetic.
I'm biased about console to PC games but...
I'm a PC Gamer. I played console games from way back to the Atari 2600 up until the PS1. I have a PS2 but I don't play it.
I don't play console games anymore. From my point of view, console games are generally all flash and no soul. There's very little 'game' in the videogames that come out for the console. It's all about graphics.
I may be biased not because I play PC games but that I remember a time when it wasn't all about graphics. I learned to love the games for what they are.
Eye candy is nice and I do enjoy it just like anyone else. But PC Games tend to be more involved. Some require dedication. Could it be that teens are getting sick of the same old regurgitation that comes from console?
Consoles can have their moment in the light with some games. But most of the ones that are marketed seem to be focused on visual. I can see this from Sony and Microsoft as they fight to the top. I applaud Nintendo for taking a new leap in console games and, quitely, cheer them on.
Coincidentally I was just thinking about something along these lines earlier today.
Most of the gamers today grew up playing some of the earliest consoles, a segment I'll end with the Genesis and SNES. Compare modern controllers with older ones, like the NES controller. An Xbox controller has 4 face buttons, 2 shoulder buttons, 2 shoulder triggers, 3 directional input devices, and the two thumbsticks click in acting as 2 additional button. An NES has 2 buttons and a dpad.
I'm wondering if younger children aren't being put off of games since they don't have anything equivelent to learn on. How easy is it for a 5 or 6 year old to pick up a Playstation or Xbox controller (juvenile jokes about size not withstanding) and start playing a game? The hand-eye coordination video games require isn't something innate, it's something that must be picked up.
This one is easy to explain. When I was growing up, I was playing games like Doom II, then Quake, then Quake 2, then Half Life, then Unreal. They were simple; I walked around, explored different areas, fought different monsters, and overall enjoyed yourself. But already I saw how games were maturing: Quake introduced "jump"; Half Life revolutionised WASD and online gameplay (you must admit: people competing online after Counter-Strike >> people competing online before Counter-Strike); Deus Ex and Morrowind revolutionised the FPS & RPG genre...
The game industry has grown up. No one wants to make simple shoot-em-ups anymore. (Painkiller is an exception.) Games now compete not only in graphics but also in physics, AI, gameplay, you name it. It's getting increasingly difficult to just "jump" into the genre; heck, even I get lost among all the new games that have been released. And I'm only discussing FPSs.
Marvel decided that it's a good idea to start the Ultimates story arc where all the characters are re-introduced, because kids of today have no way of reading up on 50 years of past comics. In the same way, teenagers of tomorrow will find themselves wondering in game stores, not knowing where exactly to start. (At least I do: whenever I'm presented with a new topic, I always try to go back in time to understand the mechanisms of the present.)
So as the gaming industry grows up, so do its fans. It's only natural.
Now with $500+ consoles, $60-$80 games, and monthly subscription fees that exceed what I used to spend on gas in a month -
Adult gamers are the cash cow of the gaming industry - teens are a secondary market.
This is news, how?
The original gamer-generation (NES and the like) can finally get back to quality-gaming with intelligent people instead of listening to 12-year-olds whining to their mum on teamspeak.
...to titles that interested them. We're without a GTA game this year, apparently, and not much like it. GTA has to be by far the longest game play of anything going out there...
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
We all know the real answer. They just need to start shipping games with a nicotine-intake-system.
What's that? You have 50000 points? Well here's an insane drug high!
PS: I don't reply to ACs.
I think its because of Xbox players. I'm not saying all of them, I'm saying the majority of them. They have no patience for a good game with an engaging story, they just want something they can blast through in 3 hours with pretty graphics. That's why we got a travesty like Oblivion-> great combat, beautiful graphics to be sure, but wtf happened to the story? What's with the n00berific armor? The n00berific leveling system? WTF was up with Deus Ex: Invisible War? The reason people are losing interest in games is because software companies are designing them for the lowest common denominator.
My personal reason for not playing videogames is that most games released today are way too time consuming to extract fun out of. My idea of a good game is something that I can sit down with some friends, all have us learn it in 2 minutes, and have some fun. While I did find it fun playing 8-16 person Halo tournaments, there would always be the guy who devoted his life to Halo and much better than anyone else, and then the people who play video games once a year and could hardly walk around let around shoot. This discrepancy in ability has led to less interest among those of us who are on the bottom of the curve. That is why game playing is declining.
I sincerely doubt the reason is that kids are "growing up" and moving on to other things. At the same time there are kids who are growing up and finding girls, there are kids gaining motor skills to pick up controllers and start playing. Normal flucations wouldn't lead to a big drop. I can see the price of video games leading to some of the drop, but I think the main reason is what I described.
This is why I'm extremely excited to see what the Revolution is going to do to the video game market, with it's online arcade or whatever and non scary controller, I think it could shake things up and gain interest outside of the video game stereotypical male 10-25 market. There will be games that have small learning curves, and everyone can pick up quickly, and I think it will be great for casual gamers, the market that is shying away right now.
Games are STUPID expensive now. The PS3 has a predicted retail price of something like $600, doesn't it? Who can afford to be a gamer anymore?
There's a line between what you spend on entertainment and what you spend on trying to see some girl's boobs. I know that when I was a teenager, boobs were way more important to me than games. You spend money on what's important to you.
I don't know if girl gamers are spending less time on games; I didn't read the story. Girl gamers seem to be more level-headed about the whole thing to start with anyway, though.
"Back when I used to play games, the clone didn't exist..."
Bullshit. What wasn't a clone in the 70's and 80's? If it wasn't Pong clones, it was Space Invaders clones, then Pac-Man clones...
Think about it. In pre-internet days, you hit puberty, you got horny all the time, and you tried to distract yourself playing video games. Now, you can get all the pron you want via the web, or even hook-up thanks to social networking sites. Who needs games when you can have that?!
This reminds me of an article posted not more than a few months ago. Things are no different now than they have ever been. Even back in video games' infancy, the general public lost interest in video games as they grew up. Some stayed, sure, but the vast majority of people veer from video games at varying speeds. This is nothing new, and it means little. Like I stated last time, talk to the people who WERE, say 16, and then talking to the people ARE 16, and see how THEIR interests compare.
No one dares to take much of a chance of producing anything but the big three (on computers), first-person-shooter, real-time-strategy, or MMORPG. There might be some mixing between the three, but in the last 5-6 years, just about every game produced fits pretty easily into one of those three categories. There are a few exceptions here and there, but there are just that exceptions, not the rule. So, for teenagers, these three types of games are pretty much all they have ever seen their entire gaming lives. It would get boring after a while.
Fancier graphics aside, what is really different between 1993's Doom, and say 2005's FEAR? Yes we went from 2D sprites in a fairly flat 3D environment to a true 3D environment with full 3D people, and FEAR has a slow-motion "bullet-time" type effect, and multiplayer, but truefully what is really truely different gameplay wise? If I picked 1994's Doom II, we would even have multiplayer in the mix.
The market is simply saturated with these types of games in the PC realm. Even on consoles it isn't much better. There are 3-4 other types of game consoles have, sports games (basketball, baseball, football, hockey, soccer), hack+slash, racing, and fighting. Some of these even get a PC conterpart, save the hack+slash and sports. These two rarely are on the PC because its a pain to play hack+slash without a good controller. And you won't ever see a sports game because the games are all about being able to sell you another next year with the updated teams, line-ups, etc., which would be too easily hacked/patched into a game on a computer.
Again, not a whole lot new or different year-in, year-out in the last 8-10 years. It has been extremely rare over the last 6 years to see a "new" game in the mainstream market. Too much is spent now for a company to risk something new. If that "new" game does not become a hit game, the company is pretty much dead. But if they make a repeat, they might simply just make some money, and that is really what it is about to the ones that are left. The days of the innovaters is pretty much over. It is next to impossible to create a garage game anymore. Forget about consoles due to licensing fees, API development kit purchase agreements, etc.
Gaming itself has become stagnant. The innovaters were what made the gaming market so great in the 80's-90's. IT also helped that the technology was changing so much as well during that period of time. We went from 2D colored pixel blocks to life-like 3D renderings. From mono speaker beeps and blips to surround sound, studio/movie quality soundtracks (well voiceovers could use some acting skills work in most games, but that is more due to budget then the technology itself). But over the last 10 years, well, things havn't really changed all the much. Yes the 3D environemnts have more detail, round objects look "rounder", lights look more realistic, but in essence, nothing nearly as dramatic as the jump from 2D sprites to 3D objects and bit maps. In the past, the vastly different abilities helped bring new games all the time, but that isn't nearly the case anymore. Now we need the games themselves to be different, as the technology isn't changing as much as it has in the past.
On a side note, I think Nintendo is probably one of the only companies that is striving to inovate and invent right now. Everyone else is simply doing remakes...
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
Neither one of you intelligent, +5 Insightful posters seem to have a clue regarding how to analyze a survey or why this is just more Slow News Day hot air.
Guess the +5 Insightful are just having trouble with the +1 Fucking Obvious today.
--
Next on Slashdot - research indicates that as of today, Bush's remaining time in the Oval Office "decreasing steadily every minute"!
Slashdot posters: *500 post clusterfuck of a thread analyzing just why this is the case and what might be done to "recover" or "hasten the process", discussing everything from society's shifting views on war and abortion to the proportion of blue ties to black ties at GOP conventions to whether tin foil hats really work and whether they cause cell phone interference or not, and of course Sony vs. Microsoft vs. Apple vs. Linux*
As time goes by, this is what happens to games:
I could count the number of really good games released in the psat five years on one hand. But what I wonder is what will break the circle and when. I can't wait to play some really good games again. Someone please hear me.
Frog blast the vent core.
I'm seventeen and I'll say it because of this, new games suck, less people play the new games. My friends play less games now and watch more tv because the games just arn't good nowadays. I stopped playing Q4 because it sucked and started playing more guitar again. BF2 is a joke with its engine and arcadeyness. HL1 mods are too old. Source is crappy. Beat WoW (pre DWL). Console games suck right now as the old systems are dying and xbox360 has two good games(fightnight and oblivion), one which is five times as good on computer anyway.
What's actually the case is that fads, and popularity of things are generally determined by what other people are doing.
;-)
Wow. The last time I heard someone seriously imply that video games are a fad was in 1982. My grandmother told me that video games and Michael Jackson were just fads.
26 years and counting. Hell of a "fad". I guess Grandma was right about Jackson at least.
Actually I get the point of your post, but I think that the popularity peak/decline to stable level of which you speak happened two decades ago. Video games have become an entrenched part of our culture, much like television only with a smaller impact. That doesn't mean that they'll be around forever (in their current form, anyway), nor will TV. But I think they passed the status of "fad" around the time that much of Slashdot was entering school.
"Video games are not a fad."
-Tom Hirschfeld
"How to Master the Video Games"
1982 (First sentence of the book)
Boundless Expansion, Self-Transformation, Dynamic Optimism, Intelligent Technology, Spontaneous Order- BEST DO IT SO!
"Studies have shown that the average age of a gamer has gone up to the mid 30's."
Well, I'm a gamer right in the middle of the 30's, and I also find myself less attracted to games lately. So while this is just one guy, so not a statistic or analysis or anything, I'll still go ahead and post my impressions. Namely that it isn't "broadening", it isn't waiting for the next console, it's just interest seems to fade at my end of the market too:
A) less and less games are any good.
- Sequels, f-ing sequels. And verbatim clones of other games. That's been the story of the whole decade. I was for example one of the first to get fanatical about RTS back in the 90's, and... also among the first to get burned out and hate the whole genre, as every single bloody RTS was a verbatim clone of Dune 2. I find I'm getting fed up with other genres too, lately, for much the same reasons. FPS for example is another genre I'm not touching with a 10 ft pole any more.
- Games are getting shorter. Maybe playing 80 hours a week is bad, but getting 70-80 hours out of a game (spread over a few weeks) was actually getting good value for my money.
Games one can finish in 10 hours used to be considered too short even a couple of years ago (read some reviews of the first Max Payne or VTMR), while now they're the norm and going downhill fast. In another couple of years we'll probably look forward to games one can finish in 5 hours. Sorry, that's just not good value for my money. (And would be even less so for a teen on an allowance.)
And then there were the masterpieces, games like Fallout 2 or Arena, to quote just two, where I've spent hundreds of hours on each, just because they offered that many different possibilities. E.g., playing a diplomat in Fallout 2 was a _very_ different experience from playing a gunslinger, and that in turn was entirely different from playing a stealthy thief/assassin. There was a damn good reason to replay, because it actually opened new avenues to explore. Whereas for the 10 hour games of nowadays, once you've finished it, that's that.
- Games are getting less diverse. Everything is not just yet another RTS, FPS or action-adventure, it's the _same_ RTS, FPS or action-adventure I've played before. In the early 90's there were more than a dozen different genres, and countless variations and quirks inside each genre. Nowadays everything converges towards the same freakin' game that sold well last year. For example both RPG and platformers have already converged into the same "action-RPG" genre, as far as the western publishers are concerned. Not only the sub-genres of each (e.g., turn based vs real time, or team-based vs single-character) have disappeared, but the whole goddamn genres disappeared.
This lack of variety makes for a very boring experience. It used to be that each game I played was _different_ and thus interesting. There were new things to explore and discover, and new sets of tools to solve a problem with. Now it's like I'm playing the same game over and over again, and at some point it just gets boring. It also doesn' help that:
- Games are getting "dumbed down", so to speak. And don't give me the line that it's to make them accessible to casual gamers and female gamers, because that's not it. A simple intuitive interface is what casual gamers need, but what I'm talking about here is lack of content, which is an entirely different thing and won't make a casual gamer happier either. He'll get bored just as well.
A good game should be like chess: a simple interface and simple rules, but lots of ways to combine them. What we see today in the game market is the exact opposite: what went down is the number of things you can do with them. A lot of the complexity and alternate ingenious ways to solve a problem just disappeared, and you're left with a game on rails that doesn't even require any thinking.
E.g., the ingenious puzzles of the 80's and early 90's have been replaced by FPS "jump puzzles" that require exactly zero thinking, a
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
World... Of... Warcraft
Well games are far more advanced and money spent on their advertisements is greater. I used to spend an uninterrupted 10 - 12 hrs straight gaming but after pursuing higher studies and other stuff I now barely get 2 hrs a day to sit on my pc. It isn't about the games sucking or sequels or any of that crap....people nowadays spend on less time gaming and that's a fact
Individuals deciding to play games less is blatently not the same thing as "teens are playing less"; which implies teens from one year play less than different teens from the previous year. By the time they stop playing the games they might not even be teens anymore...
Getting some is easier today than ever. No real effort needs to be made, no special grooming... nothing. If girls had been as easy as they are today, I never would have played videogames.
/.
I'm 100% serious too, not just trying to be being funny on
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
In all I think if this report was repeated next year, (after PS3 release whenever) and after Windows Vista is released, it would pain a completely different picture.
Karem
When all is said and done, nothing changes...
Seriously, more people need to remind these kids that Jesus made cops out of meat for a reason. Sheesh. -PD
"If we don't change direction soon, we'll end up where we're going." - Prof. Irwin Corey
I'm an 18 year old male. I don't have nearly the amount of free time I did in middle school and junior high. I used to get four or five games for christmas and have them all beat by my birthday (Feb. 26th). Now I don't have much time. I can't sit down for four hours and play a long game of starcraft. Plus I have other interests now. I need to work to pay for car insurance. I have school work. There's girls to date. To be honest, I haven't bought a new console game in a year. I've gotten a few DS games (Advance Wars and Sonic Rush are my current favorites) but quite frankly, games like World of Warcraft or GTA require too much time. Now when I have free time, I read the news, read slashdot, then get out of the house to hang out with people, not sit at home and try and "catch 'em all".
1235 students in a nationwide survey of students who volunteered their time to take it.. that is just silly. Those numbers cant be taken seriously as theres no way that survey could show with any precision the point of view of american youth. Maybe if they even tried to break 10,000.. but 1235 out of the millions of teenagers in america, no telling how they were picked to take the survey or how things were worded.. Ive seen better numbers from college student surveys for class projects.
It's been almost two full years since the consoles were in their swing, it has even been over a year and a half since big PC games like WoW, HL2, Doom 3, etc were released.
The industry has nothing BIG. Oblivion is decent, but it doesn't have the same momentum as a wider-audience game series like Quake / Doom / UT / (War)(Star)craft, and the cost of entry is VERY high (either an Xbox 360 or a relatively well-specced PC). With the unimpresive, high-priced start of the Xbox 360, and with a similarly high-priced start expected for the PS3, what does your average gamer (who can't afford or justify a 360) have to look forward to? Interesting new releases on existing consoles are rare compared to a couple years ago.
To put this in perspective: this is the second generation in a row where mainstream gaming system prices have gone UP significantly. Before the PS2 / Xbox, most gaming systems debuted at around $200-250. When you took inflation into account, that meant the system was always cheaper than the previous generation.
But the PS2 / Xbox pushed that envelope to $300, and the Xbox 360 and PS3 are pushing that number to $400 or more (yes, you can buy a $300 Xbox 360, but it will really cost you $340 with the official memory card, and well over the $400 mark if you add a hard drive in the future). Gaming is getting significantly more expensive, and it's no wonder people are playing less games. People have done the same thing in response to high prices, say, in theaters.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
I'm sure studies would also find that teenagers are spending a lot more of their time making online journals, establishing online contacts, and posting personal information along with attention-whore photographs of themselves all over the Internet ;)
pornking
I play through the Doom series every couple of years. I never get tired of that game, it's just too well designed.
How many of us know gamers that neglect their families and health just to get a few hours of good gaming in? Growing up and out of games doesn't make sense to me. There are simply too many addicted adults. What is it then?
As more of the video game industry becomes infiltrated by the movie studios (Chun Yow Fat is starring in a game), the plots and gameplay will be more influenced by the movie industry... known for precanning cliche plotlines and bending to irrational fears about obscenity. You can bet that Anacondas the game will be just as lame as Anacondas the movie, if the same studio is producing it.
This isn't a problem with reaching the audience or demographics. Games, for the most part, are boring and uninventive. I remember years of ripoff side-scrollers with various movie themes during the 80's and 90's. None of these stands out for any reason at all. They were money grabs. Same game, different theme. It's part of the reason the entire industry crashed in the 80's (although, economic depression did help).
When something groundbreaking does get released, it makes news and people buy. No one's losing interest in games any more than they're losing interest in music. Perhaps people are tired of paying $50 (average new game price) for garbage. The price and quality of music certainly caused the masses to "lose interest."
Because the gaming industry is such a booming industry, you're going to get more companies producing games. Sadly, the majority of these will be bad and uninspired. Youth demands that games be interesting, entertaining, and not condescending. Can the industry really expect to keep the attention of the masses after the 28,392nd first person shooter?
"Interestingly, almost 80 percent of teens indicated that they intend to spend less time playing video games in 2006"
Research among growing kids show a consistent tendency of them learning to use the toilet and therefore not pooping their pants. Pampers manifacturers in shock.
And it's an exception, not the rule. There's not a whole lot of it; two really popular games with a bunch of expansions.
What do you think could be causing this drop in interest from young people? Sequels? Mature themes? Sequels?
They'd rather be on myspace?
I mean, the quality of video games has decreased steadily. Amidst all the crazy video laser light shows that grace our monitors, gameplay has become a sad thing of legend, that comes out now and again like BigFoot, or intelligence in politics....
I'm 31 and I've begun to realise that pissing your life away on virtual achievements is slightly a waste.
Amybe these teenagers have been exposed to games for so long that they're really seeing the true worth of gaming in regard to life? I.E. Time not well spent.
Why spend 100 hours grinding MC when you could use those 100 hours to enrich your life and perhaps learn something real?
Still, even though I know it's a complete waste of time I still do it, because it's so much fun. And I've been doing it so long that my brain is conditioned to provide that dopamine hit through gaming. So I'm screwed really.
Maybe there's still time to save the coming generations and rebuild those communities that dies due to people not going out and enjoying each others real life company any more?
Or is this just me?
Remember what happend to Atari in the 80's. Games have become repetative and there is little originality left. Once you've seen the same thing for the umpteenth time I'm not surprised that teens would lose interest.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
DOOM (Ultimate DOOM, DOOM ][ and Final DOOM) are still my overall favorite games. I've been playing them since they came out (I'm 24).
One thing I would highly reccomend is using DOOM Legacy. It really improves on the graphics and gameplay.
Also try this level: School DOOM. That was one of my favorites during high school...
Securitron is also awesome, especially if you're a fan of Fear Factory (it's based on the song).
"It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks