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The Importance of Game Length
Gamasutra's regular 'Question of the Week' feature touches, this week, on the ideal length of games, and the importance of game length. While the overwhelming opinion was 'quality is better than quantity', there were a range of opinions along that scale. From the article: "I would say as a gamer on the more casual side (30+ years) the game length is fine around 20-25 hours. If you are having fun while playing. I never have time to finish anything longer. It makes me more satisfied to have played through the game in 20-25 game hours than never even reach half way. - Joachim Carlsson, Massive Entertainment"
...on the game genre, the target demographic, the platform, and lots more stuff.
A deep RPG could be a hundred hours long and some gamers would clamor for more. The best FPS would become tedious after 100 hours. Strategy games (especially real-time) vary wildly depending on the skill of the player; some people can sail through missions in ten minutes while others take hours.
A few generalized "ideal" game lengths:
FPS: 20-35 hours, with sufficient variation to avoid tedium and ways to finish faster for the dedicated gamer.
RTS: No more than 15-20 *missions* in a campaign.
RPG: At *least* 40 hours, but not much more than 100.
Adventure: 20 hours of actual gameplay, tops. Some people will spend quite a bit of time on certain puzzles.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
It's not the size that matters, it's how you use it!
Seriously, let me use GTA: San Andreas as an example. I finished that game months ago, but I still play it occasionally. There's nothing better than causing some nice explosions, steal a few cars and beating up some hookers after a frustrating day at work.
I love the freedom GTA: SA gives me and I'd probably buy more games that offer me that.
Beyond Good an Evil is a great game. Amazing story, and it's short. 10 hours to beat. I enjoyed every minute of it. Problem is, no replay value. (You can go around and take pictures, sort of, but that really isn't a game)
Tales of Symphonia, Amazing story... and then you're 30 hours in. You're tired of the same fights over and over again. The combat system has lots of variation, but once you find something that works well enough, why bother futzing around? And by this time, i forgot why the story even started. I'm going to rescue someone? No that was every zelda ever made.. trying to save the world? Yeah, I assume so. Save it from who? I can't even remember.
My point is, if I can beat a game in 10 hours, that's a week of after work play and I can still remember the plot elements from the first hour. But for me to buy another game it's going to need a 10 hour time frame from start to finish, but also have multiple paths and choices I can make so it'll be a different game the next time I decide to play it. Oh, can cut out the item fetching quests, they suck. Mind puzzles, that's where it's at.
I remember one of the Final Fantasy games where your little guy meets a bunch of kids playing jumprope. You can join in and mash buttons to jump. If you jump successfully 10 times, you get a reward. 20 times, a bigger award. And so on. I read a FAQ about the game which said that you could get the ultimate prize if you hit the jump button successfully 1,000 times in a row!!! Who aside from a caffeine-addicted 12-year-old has the time or patience for that?!? I don't mind longer games if the gameplay doesn't become "Fight bigger monsters". The classic Ultima games were a great example of long games that kept my interest from start to finish.
Yeah, I'm with you on this. For example, I still enjoy playing the original NES Contra, and Castlevania, even though I can more or less play through either game in in 90 minutes or so, depending on how coordinated I am today. I think you feel a (somewhat shallow albeit) sense of accomplishment from shorter games. At least it FEELS like something has been accomplished in video game terms. Game length is the reason I got bored with WOW after a few weeks. The firs two weeks that I played WOW, I loved it. I could sit down for 1-2 which is really all I can spare for a video game, and complete a small mission, or level up. As the game progressed however, I found myself never able to get anything done - it just took a few sessions. Now I understand that in essence, that is somewhat the point of 'leveling up, that game gets more difficult as you progress. It wasn't the difficulty per se, it wasn't the game was actually harder, it just more time to see a result. I have just come to realize that I actually enjoy 'simpler' games more than the ultra complicated ones. I thoroughly enjoy the Castlevania series on the DS also, for that reason. I can pop it on for 45 minutes, and something happens - you get a weapon, kill a boos,whatever. Maybe games have become too complicated for their own good? Or,maybe I'm just too old and don't have enough to 'properly' play anymore. Either way, I do think sessions length,not game length, is what matters to me specifically.
Et In Arcadia Ego