Games Industry Things We Should Leave Behind in '07

MTV's Multiplayer blog has a list of nine videogame concepts we should be 'leaving behind', left to rot in the now-passed year of 2007. From the countdown clocks to Halo 3, their snarky list leaves no stone unturned: "The Phrase 'Next-Gen' - Ladies and gentlemen, 'next-gen' is now. Everyone from PR firms to development studios are still using this phrase. Please, I beg of you, stop using "next-gen" until the PS4, Xbox 4000, and the Nintendo Super Wii are slated for release. Those consoles will officially be 'next-gen.' The PS3, Wii, and 360 are the current generation of games. Now is the time to accept it."

Comments

Misogyny

[crosson]

I think one of the major barriers to the video-game industries quest for mass media acceptance is the stuck-in-the-1980s tendency to portray women as sexual objects with boys-club-only lack of shame.

Things I would love to see gone...

[Hamster Lover]

Recent game developments I would love to see dismissed forever:

• Non-interactive, long, drawn out, cinematic cut scenes. Just let me play the fucking game.
• Downloadable content that isn't downloaded but only unlocked on the game disc.
• Unrealistic release schedules.
• Timed exclusives.
• Rabid fanboi 360 versus PS3 frame by frame game comparisons. I love great games on any system.
• Shitty, utterly tacked-on Wii games.
• The yearly $60 sports games that feature incremental improvements and roster changes. We should be able to download roster changes by now; keep major changes to the game engine to a release every couple of years.

Re:Things I would love to see gone...

[antic]

- Cut scenes that you can't skip (hello Assassin's Creed!)
  - Game trailers that are 50% intro material, 30% outro and all of 20% actual game footage
  - Proper reviews from people that have played the full game (e.g., Gamespot's review of Assassin's Creed neglects to mention a questionable ending and how annoying it gets to hear "Please sir, can I have some money?" or townspeople being hassled by guards)

I say it every time, but...

[CelticWhisper]

Save points.

This absolutely retarded convention should have disappeared with the Genesis and SNES. Why is it, when I was playing Doom on my 486 back in 1994 and could save (and QUIT...you know... STOP PLAYING ) whenever I wanted, that I have to wait 20 minutes until I get to a magical spot blessed by the video game pope before I can save my game and turn off my Playstation 2 , a system that is orders of magnitude more powerful than the save-on-the-fly-capable PC on which I was fragging zombies?

Attention developers:

• Girlfriends happen
• Friends happen
• Dinner happens
• Fatigue happens
• Storms happen, at least in my region, and as a result...
• Power outages happen
• And frankly, me getting sick of playing during a given session happens

And sometimes I want or need to stop playing on a moment's notice. I don't really want to leave the console on eating up power and running up my electric bill, and I also don't want to lose hours of gameplay (some JRPG dungeons do last that long) because you assholes thought it would be cute to not let me save my game and do something else. Your game is not the only thing in the world I want to do for fun, and moods can change, especially after long sessions. Furthermore, I know you can do save-anywhere because SaGa Frontier, LUNAR, and Persona 2 all did it on the PS1.

Death to save points in 2008. Long live save-on-the-fly.