Slashdot Mirror
Coming Soon, Shorter Video Games
Hugh Pickens writes "Blake Snow writes that according to one expert, 90% of players who start a game will never see the end of it and it's not just dull games that go unfinished. Only 10% of avid gamers completed last year's critically acclaimed Red Dead Redemption, according to Raptr, which tracks more than 23 million gaming sessions. 'What I've been told as a blanket expectation is that 90% of players who start your game will never see the end of it unless they watch a clip on YouTube,' says Keith Fuller, a longtime production contractor for Activision. The bottom line is people have less time to play games than they did before, they have more options than ever, and they're more inclined to play quick-hit multiplayer modes, even at the expense of 100-hour epics. 'They're lucky to find the time to beat a 10-hour game once or twice a month,' says Fuller of the average-age gamer. 'They don't feel cheated about shorter games and will just play a longer game for as many hours as their schedule allows before moving on to another title.' Even avid gamers are already warming to the idea of shorter games. 'Make a game worth my time and money, and I'll be happy,' says Casey Willis. 'After all, 10 hours of awesome is better than 20 hours of boring.'"
So I can spend 50 -60$ on a 20 hour game? Yeah, that's EXACTLY what I'm after. Sounds like a good way to keep development costs low and reap in more profit. I call bullsh*t on this.
Where does the signature go?
o_O *actually* games are too short..
I'm potentially cool with a shorter game - If I get a lower price tag attached to it.
'After all, 10 hours of awesome is better than 20 hours of boring.'
That could be said for every other form of entertainment (including sequels, threequels, etc), work, relationships ... you name it.
Of course the real reason for this is paid DLC, but hey, we're just doing it for our customers.
Just as long as these shorter games don't cost $40-$60 each and have a storyline worth playing, I'd be open to trying shorter games.
For some reason, I feel like Bioware should have something to say about this. If most of the people who played Mass Effect didn't finish it, I will shit a brick. The type of game and how it's presented matters a great deal more than length. Failing to finish a Rockstar game is no surprise whatsoever; they're not necessarily bad, but an open-world game almost always has that one goddamn mission that makes you really want to quit it. I think San Andreas was the only one I've ever finished myself, and I don't have anything to do with my time but play videogames.
The best games are sandbox, where there is no end and you can keep playing. This way you get your money's worth no matter how long you can afford to play.
The problem with other games is, if they're too long for you, you never see the end of them. But if they're too short, you actually feel cheated because that character you spend time leveling up suddenly becomes useless.
Spending time on storytelling is also time taken away from content.
I had a long conversation with my brother about perceived value and video games compared with the value of a blockbuster movie. I am still concerned why games are still $60 where most Bluray movies are around half the price. Big blockbuster movies HAVE to cost more than the biggest game.
How are game publishers getting away with the $60 price tag?
It's the quality of the game.
Sure, you can "play" RDR. It has a halfway decent story. But it gets lost because of all the damn grinding, and getting lost, and generally farting around in the wilderness shooting birds and wolves. Or you take a weekend off and even with the mission hint system, you can't remember where the fuck you were in the storyline. It's even worse for all the goddamn JRPG's in the world. Or you have Celda Syndrome, where you play for a good 15 hours, and then spend 60 hours on "Hey Link, go sail a boat around the world looking for the 8 pieces of trash so you can make a goddamn macguffin and get back to the fucking story already."
Borderlands does a lot better about it. I can put that down for a month, come back, read the mission descriptions that actually carry some fucking backstory, and get back into my character easier.
Now, do we like shorter games if done well? Of course. Super Mario Bros. can be beaten in a few hours. The Megaman games, originals, had no save points but could be finished in a few hours. The key there is that they can be played over and over and over again, even after you've beaten them, and they are still goddamn fun to play. Just like how arcade games that generally only played for a few minutes - Joust, Galaga, Gyruss and more - were so fun and addictive that they could be played over and over and over again.
But the key is not making the game shorter. The key is not doing the things that make people bored with the fucking game. Avoid grinding. Avoid needless "now you need to run back and forth around the map 50 times for quest X" garbage. And that means a few changes to game design, like making your enemies scale somewhat so that they remain a challenge to a high "level" character while not being unbeatable for someone who hasn't spent 50 hours grinding in the side areas of the game (looking right at you, Final Fantasy series).
That is, to me, if I have two awesome games, and one is 10 hours and the other is 20 hours I will buy the shorter one. Just because it is more likely that I will get to see the whole story. If you want more content, flesh it out with optional stuff like sidemissions or different gamemodes.
If noone rtfa, then what's the slashdot effect?
Shorter games? Fine.. but also drop the price then.
Personally I like my games to be long. It's not uncommon for me to play a 6-8 hour single scenario of Sins of a Solar Empire or Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance.
But if they are going to change it like they did with SupCom:FA to SupCom2 where they made it shorter but also just dumbed the game down, then I'm going to be mad. I've played through SupCom2 once, but I still play SupCom:FA.
I thought today's games had already been severely shorted down compared with their olde counterparts? Some games for the Commodore Amiga could take one 1,000 hours to beat. You were truly elite to finish a computer game back then.
Now they want make games so sterile that they cost more per hour than visiting the latest block buster 3D movie? In part, structured gaming itself is dying in a social context where people are constantly multitasking and sociallising through damn cell phones and Friendface. If people are living lives where they can not dedicate any real time or thought into doing anything structured in their lives then they're not living at all.
Shorter Sex!
Studies reveal most men can't be bothered with this tiring and laborious process and would rather skip straight to the orgasm. As such there has been a sharp demand for drugs that actually induce premature ejaculation.
To sum up the article, people are after getting so bone lazy they can't even be bothered playing a game anymore.
Games with stories and epic gameplay that are worth a damn are what I want to play. I can't imagine I'm so special as to be among a 10% minority.
Great, that > sign fell of. The subject to the parent post should be "10 hours of awesome > 20 hours of awesome"
If noone rtfa, then what's the slashdot effect?
Since the advent of electronics and the pace of everyday life, the human attention span is dwindling down to nothing.
Why do people enjoy playing against a computer? I play COD, Quake Live, Battlefield, and several others, never touched the single person mode, can't stand playing a computer, it isn't interesting.
But playing people, much more fun (and aggravation) than any computer opponent, they learn and adapt, conversation is possible and the greatest blast of all, a pub game where your human team actually works together.
It should all be multiplayer IMO, but apparently some people like playing machines.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
I've already pretty much given up on console gaming in lieu of MMO's because I want more than 10 hours of content in a game, and now they're pushing to make games shorter??
Jesus. Gaming sure is starting to suck...
When I was a kid, I had time to master a game because I could play hours and hours, and hours. These days, I'm lucky if I get an hour of gaming a week and on bus/plane trips when I'm on vacation. So, take my last vacation: I advanced nicely on GTA Liberty Stories on my PSP (Yes, yeah, I know... ). I come home, go back to normal life. Would I pick it up again, I'd be stuck. Most of the story has been forgotten, the level of skill required is definitely not "in me" anymore and the only option I have is to restart the game.
Which is what I do... Ever seeing the "end" of GTA. Never gonna happen.
Sometimes, I just hit a hard wall within the game. I have Assassins Creed "Bloodlines" on the PSP. I played and now I'm simply stuck at a boss. I played for hours and hours, trying to beat that damned witch, but I can't. Back in my youth, I'd probably just have persevered, but now, I just put it aside. Haven't touched the game in a year, probably ever won't again as I'll have to start again and probably get stuck at the same "wall".
This, to me, is the nature of gaming at a certain age. Yes, I'd rather finish the games too, but I don't think making them shorter is going to help. A dynamic adaptation to the skill level of the player would be much better for players like me.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
I'm betting the "good" games have a substantially higher finish rate than the "bad" ones. So perhaps instead of making games shorter, you should make them not suck instead.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
"After all, 10 hours of awesome is better than 20 hours of boring."
Actually, I agree. I'd rather spend more money on less game-time if it meant a more awesome experience.
Having said that, it's possible to offer both. My all-time favorite games (Oblivion, Fallout 3, FO New Vegas) each gave me 200+ quality hours. Even considering that that's multiple play-throughs, that's an insane amount of value. I think one of my Oblivion play-throughs was 150+ hours all by itself.
Most games seem to try to stretch things out to reach those hours, and end up boring me into quitting a few hours in. I'd probably have enjoyed them if they'd shortened the game but kept all the real content.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
On the mobile front I agree wholeheartedly but for my at home recreation I completely disagree. The last couple of Modern Warfare single player campaigns frustrated the heck out of me they were so short. For me the games are an interactive novel of sorts. They need a good story to go with them or they are just run around point and shoot over and over. I really enjoyed Resistance, Fall of Man not because it was a great game but because I enjoyed the story of the game. That made it that much more disappointing when I played Resistance 2 only to find out they had ditched the character I had become and started from a completely different arc. That is also why I so enjoy the Mass Effect franchise and how every decision I make effects my game play even in the sequels. I have played through many times to see what my character can become (and who I can hook up with). I can't wait for ME3.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
Take Gears of War. All together, the three games are probably 24 hours of content. It's taken about 6 years to release all three.
If they released them as 4 hour episodes for $30-$40, each with the full multiplayer experience, they could have probably done a release every year that most gamers would buy and play through without complaints.
I like short games and I like long games. I'll find time to beat the long games if they're compelling enough. Compelling is, of course, subjective but I think it's more important for developers to consider that games like "Red Dead Redemption" have mostly slow elements punctuated by action sequences or cinematic elements. "Final Fantasy", "World of Warcraft" and others make up time by level grinding or gold mining or other menial, time consuming tasks that most players are required to do but just doesn't have time to devote to staring at an animated character do the same animation for 3-5 days straight to advance the story. Maybe "long" game developers should have some accelerated play options, like gaining XP when the game is played after a week or two hiatus - game developers "rewarding" a returning player. After all, WE DO PRETTY MUCH FUND their existence.
In all but the most rigidly (mal)designed games, "length" has long been fairly fuzzy. Virtually every shooter, for instance, if it even bothers to have a single player campaign, won't be too terribly long(and if it is long, most of the 'length' might well consist of backtracking for keycards through recycled art assets slapped together by the we-just-don't-give-a-fuck intern); but it will have a multiplayer/bot mode of some sort or another that will keep people busy for as long as they want.
RPGs are often rather similar: In Diablo II, say, you started running into enemies that were just the same damn sprites as an hour ago, tinted a different color and shooting 'energy blasts' instead of fireballs, and the game was quite upfront about the fact that the dungeons being crawled were programmatically stitched together out of a set of tiles. On the other hand, while "original" content started to run dry within hours, the game provided the option to play, play again on harder difficulty(possibly two rounds of harder difficulty), play in "hardcore" mode, etc, etc.
RTSes usually have the same basic mechanics as FPSes: a fairly limited single-player campaign; but multiplayer/bot battles until you get bored of the whole thing.
If games start artificially force-quit-after-the-cutscene ending on you, just so you'll buy the unlock code for "Chapter 2, the DLC that isn't actually downloaded because it was on the disk the whole time", that would be unacceptable. If, however, the point at which the art/story people start just phoning it in and adding additional 'length' by changing the tints and HP numbers for new enemies is being slightly tweaked, that'll be a trend that goes back as far as I can remember, and has always been a touch subjective in terms of where "new" ends and "recycled" begins.
The poor bastards on the consoles, of course, are likely to get the worst of it; because many PC games have their novel lengths radically boosted by modders; whose works are often unavailable or DLC-ified on the console side...
I got bored out of my mind in this game. Ride here, shoot 5 things. Ride there, capture a rustler. Rider there, harvest 5 herbs. Over. And Over. And Over. Again!
On the other hand, last year I finished Arkham Asylum, all 3 of the Assassin's Creed games, Dragon Age Origins, and Fallout 3.
Red Dead might have been fun for others and given them the game play that they wanted. Those same people may have been bored by the games I _did_ finish. Different strokes for different folks.
. . . without some help. There was always someplace hard enough (or tricky/gimmicky enough) that I couldn't get past it, and eventually I just plain gave up. Then I gave up on video gaming, period, and went back to RPGs and board games with people.
This is why I love the old school Mario bro's games. They were long if you played all the way through but there were hidden shortcuts to get to the end faster. These where great becuase you could hurry up and beat it to get the gradification but if you really liked the game you could play all the way through with tons of new challenging levels that did not require you to play the same boring levels over and over again. This way they could keep both people happy. I feel riped off if a game I like is to short.
Please, stop making the game character die over and over and over and over in the same few f*****g spots in order to make your game feels as if it LAST LONG. Wake-up! We are not in the 80's where dying over and over was a requirement in order to suck in the next quarter. Also, how difficult is it to add a few program lines like so:
if ( num_deaths > 10 ) { transient_difficulty_level = RETARDED_NOOB_LEVEL_LOL; }
GODAMMIT!!&*&&@
The list of games that I was forced to give the tl;dr treatment to and have never been finished:
Final Fantasy 7
Final Fantasy 8
Bioshock
Deus Ex
Metroid: Prime
Metroid: Prime 2
Took me 15 years to finish Final Fantasy 1
The reason people aren't finishing contemporary long games is that they suck. Seriously: if a game can't hold most people's interest long enough to finish it, there is something wrong with the game.
Part of the problem here is that game developers are focusing overly much on story at the expense of the gameplay. A good story can grab people at the beginning and end, and at climactic points in the middle, but no story can keep that up throughout the whole game. Between those points of interest, the gameplay has to be able to deliver, or the player will get bored: often so bored that even the promise of more story doesn't hold them. And in many contemporary "story-based" games, the gameplay simply doesn't deliver: either gratuitous complexity kills the fun, or generic mechanics wear out their welcome, or the game gets so linear that it doesn't even feel interactive anymore.
That's why people aren't finishing contemporary, "story-focused" games: because they aren't good games. Story is nice, but it can't make a bad game good. Only improved gameplay can do that. The solution isn't to make shorter games, or even to ditch story; it's to make better games.
...started the practice of short games years ago, a 8-10 hour single player game, everything else multiplayer.
Looks like over 60% have gotten the achievement that is given during the final scene for single player, and over 25% for the co-op. Although thats just data from people who played it with Steam fully running on PC (and maybe the PS3...I don't know if that tracks the PS3 version if the PSN/Steam accounts are linked).
It's been my experience that I'm much more likely to finish a game that has a decent story behind it. I don't mind a little senseless grinding if there's a worthwhile payoff in the end. But so many games these days have only the pretense of a story. There's just enough to loosely tie action sequences together but nothing to really compel you to continue with the game. It's like watching a modern action film. Cardboard cutout characters moving around with big explosions and lots of flashy effects gets boring fast.
I guess this is a "get off my lawn" rant but I think that flashy graphics have ruined games. Without fancy graphics, the game developers had no choice but to make the games interesting. The first time I saw a new console game system with 3D I was impressed by the graphics but the game the guy had was nothing more than just driving around the game world grinding away at some inane monotonous task that didn't seem to have any purpose.
I don't know how many times I spent grinding through Diablo to the end. The graphics were decent for the time but it was the game play that brought me back over and over. I wouldn't have cared if it was done in ASCII art, it was a fun game to play. I haven't broken out a copy of Larn in over a decade but it was one of those games I wasted hours upon hours playing over and over again because it was a fun game.
A couple years ago I was playing one of the GTA games on an XBox. I spent quite a bit of time playing it but realized that I just didn't care about the endless monotony. The story wasn't interesting. And as it turned out, it didn't matter what I actually did on the side, the game forced the story in one direction. And that just made the grind feel pointless. And after spending quite a bit of time on it, I found out I was less than half way through the story. So I stopped playing.
I don't mind grind in a game if the grind has a real purpose. Grind for the sake of grind just isn't interesting. So I guess I'm glad game designers are taking it out and making the games shorter. But it won't compel me to buy and play the new games. They're still not interesting. And even though the cost to me is trivial, they're still not worth it.
But sounds like it's going to be a lot easier and/or at least shorter soon. Doom, Quake, The Half-Life series, Rainbow 6, Deus Ex, Mass Effect, COD and MOH... etc etc..., sure their single player games were different from online or MMO games, but I enjoy the pluses and minuses of them all. Not sure if it's pure economics, or just the rise of the ADD generation, but I for one will mourn the passing of the epic single player games like a dear old friend. Figured once you finished them on the baddest azzed difficulty, you were ready to take on the online realm if available without fear of embarassing yourself, and that tactic worked extremely well for me. Suppose I could play the same game 20 times to get proficient with shorter games, or just run around like a motard blowing myself up till i got the hang of a new game, but to me that runs the surest risk of game ending boredom.
"90% of players who start a game will never see the end of it" - because 90% of game content is garbage. Fortunately it's not evenly distributed, so some games are 100% garbage, and some have much less.
Personally I prefer games like the Elder Scrolls series. There's a main plot line that, if you stick to it, you can "complete" in a fairly short time. But if you like the experience, there's a lot of side-quests you can do to extend your playtime by huge amounts. Then there's player created content for free. Then there's expansions. And the potential for DLC.
I also love DLC, in theory. But I don't want to pay $60 for a game, then shell out another $10-20 for add-on missions. What I'd prefer is a shorter core game (10-20 hours) that I can pick up for $30, followed by 3 or 4 good sized (5-10 hours each) DLC packs for $10 apiece. That way if I didn't care for the game, I'm only out $30. But if I like it, I can get that full-fledged 50+ hour experience for the $50-60 I normally would have spent.
...and after perhaps 100 attempts, I *finally* passed the Burn and Lap challenge, after which it didn't take me that long to finish Driving School, which unlocks the street races and Export / Import missions. This is after I've completed the storyline for the first time 4 years ago, and completed it again once after that.
Is six years too long to be stopped by one stupid challenge from unlocking a significant portion of the game?
YES!
Setting aside the issue of how many games are actually entertaining all the way through...
If a game has high replayability (which essentially means well-implemented, well-thought-out randomization), a 10-hour game would be fine for $50.
The problem is most video games play nearly the same every time through, in which case $50 for 10 hours of entertainment isn't as much of a bargain.
If I look at the titles I have for my Nintendo Wii, most of them are uncompleted. Even Kirby's Epic Yarn (which I finished) has challenges that I could complete... perhaps one day. The problem is, with everything else going on in my life (family, projects, freelance work, etc), I don't have hours upon hours to grind away at games. I prefer if I can pick up a game, play it during a free hour or two and then put it down.
My son, for his 8th birthday, got Lego Harry Potter Years 1-4 for the DS. He had so much fun playing it that I decided to give it a go. It's not an overly challenging game. Dying just means you move back a bit and you appear to have unlimited lives. Still, it's fun and that's what I'm really looking for. Something fun to entertain me for a bit.
There will always be a place for the takes-weeks-to-complete, consumes-your-entire-life kind of game, particularly for the hard core gamer, but there's a growing market for the can-finish-it-quickly-but-still-fun kind of game.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
I hate to think of how many hours I've dropped into Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion...Wait, no I don't, I just hate to think how long I'm going to have to wait for Skyrim. When's that coming out again??? *pant pant*
I'm a mission to finish every game I've ever purchased (and still own). I find myself often finishing games years after I purchase them. I often pick up games on the cheap on Steam and don't start seriously playing them for months but I do poke around with them a bit when I first purchase them. I've found the main reasons I don't finish games are boring games that are just bleh, technical difficulties, or just getting stuck on a part taking a break and coming back not remembering what the hell I was doing. I have on occasion found myself saying a game is too long but that is typically because it is boring to begin with. Really good games you don't want to end! If games are getting shorter I hope the prices are getting cheaper, ha fat chance.
It depends on the game. Games like Portal and stuff are fun and built for the game itself and if they were short, people would be pissed. Games like COD and Halo are built for multiplayer so if their stories were shorter and focused more on online gaming and challenges as they do, there wouldn't be a big issue.
'After all, 10 hours of awesome is better than 20 hours of boring.'
But aren't 20 hours of awesome even better? Those aren't the only two options. I stop playing games because they stop being innovative. Take Assassin's Creed for instance. I just got tired of hopping the same buildings and climbing the same towers and rescuing the same citizens etc... It was innovative for the first 10 hours but the next 10 were just all the same.
"Pain is scary."
1. Too much time between save points during difficult parts, this includes hour long boss battles. If I die, I don't want to replay the same long stretch again and again... 2. Forced time wasting. I don't mind big maps or mazes, just don't send me from one end to the other on foot. Give me a quick movement option. Don't put in stupid long cut scenes or fill the game with cut scenes every 5 minutes. I want to actually play the game. 3.jumping puzzles in games that shouldn't have them. I don't want to have to jump to a small platform, backflip off the ledge, swing off the pole and the land on the one rock on the lake. Especially because your camera sucks and your jumping controls were limited to jumping onto a crate the entire game leading up to this point. 3.
Xaotik Designs
I think Shadow of the Colossus is an applicable example here. Many people were somewhere between disappointed and pretty cheesed off that they had spent full price on the game when it came out and experienced how short it was. Of course, it's a great game even for something you can beat in a couple of hours, and as time went on people could buy it used or the Greatest Hits version for much cheaper, and the complaint about length got much quieter.
Video games (RPGs in particular) were doomed exactly when strategy guides became a decent source of revenue. Instead of challenging a gamer's problem-solving skills, this forced developers to artificially lengthen games, by either requiring the player to grind for experience points, or to grind in order to raise his/her skill level. Personally, I prefer to work on my skills in a game, but each is still technically grinding.
And sure, you could say "I don't buy strategy guides", but the damage has already been done. Games have changed.
So for everyone saying "20 hours or less? Not good enough!" - Be careful what you wish for. I'm glad you have enough free time, and you are obsessive-compulsive enough to grind your way through those extra hours. I sure don't, and the idea that your whining is actually being heard by game developers is SO frustrating to me.
According to the person in the article even a 10 hour game is fine with them as long as it's "awesome".
Hey game devs, don't go reading into this thinking you can charge $50-$59 for a 10 hour game.
30+ hour games are what I want for my dollar.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
Not everyone is a good novelist. Some people are outstanding when they limit themselves to writing only short stories, but they'd get completely bogged down attempting a "War and Peace".
The video game industry, by and large, has a problem because they've set expectations of how long a game "should be". Game writers should quit worrying about hitting any targets of a specific length of time to complete a game, and just concentrate on making everything in it as FUN as possible. When you run out of creative ideas, maybe it's time to end the game there and focus on cleaning up the details of what you already wrote!
Replay value is another factor to consider. If a game can be completed quickly, that doesn't necessarily mean it lacks value for its price. If it's designed the right way, some people who finish it will still enjoy it enough to go back through it again (just like some people will re-read a really good book). It helps if the game allows completion with different classes of characters, and is flexible enough to make things play out in very different ways when it is played through with different characters. That's a potential advantage a book author doesn't have, with books being static.
When you have a job and a life and can only dedicate a few hours a week to games, length starts getting really important. Case in point, I had to spend months playing nothing but Dragon Age in order to get through the game, and was real sick of it by the end. Diversity is nice, and if I have a choice between getting through a dozen unique 4-10 hour games per year like Limbo or Shadows of the Damned, or 3 grind-fests like Dragon Age and The Elder Scrolls, I'll pick the former any time.
you're comparing forms of entertainment. That is not the same at all.
Buying a video game is not even remotely similar to buying a movie ticket. If you are equating the two, then you are not completely comprehending what I am talking about. This isn't a $$ figure to entertainment total. You can buy a movie for $20 (DVD) and watch it more than once. Or you can download it and watch it infinitely without restrictions Look! infinite value!
reality: not really the same comparison. Your idea of $5/hour is also pure imagination, and nowhere do things ever settle on a regular amount within any trend of entertainment. A 3 hour movie that costs $9 for a ticket versus a 2 hour movie for $9 a ticket. Are you saying the 3 hour is magically more value? what if the movie sucks?
You've opened a can of worms that is not related to the discussion.
The answer to making games more interesting is for gamedesigners to allow mods. Games that allow modification of small changes to complete overhauls greatly extend the life of a game, and it's replay potential. For example, Dragon Age Origins, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series, Fallout3, Falout New Vegas, and Oblivion have someof the best, and most extensive collection of mods available. They've made those games much more interesting to play, without boredom.
If more games had the freedom to be modified, game length wouldn't be a big factor.
If you're going to stretch out a game for the sake of stretching it out, and it shows (which in most cases, it does), then no, people are never, ever going to finish.
However, if you make a genuinely good game that JUST SO HAPPENS to stretch out 100 hours? People WILL finish it.
The problem is the quality of gameplay, in most games, decreases the further you get.
Either because the story lacks any real interest "KILL THE BAD GUYS BECAUSE I SAID SO GO" or the gameplay doesn't ever change in the slightest past "Kill enemy A B and C to progress to the next area."
No one wants to play an amazing game for 10 hours, then the last 90 are utter shit that the game devs more or less recycled from the first 10.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
Just look at Bioware games, they are shorter than older titles. If this trend continues, i will surely not buy any.
Isnt Portal the best example of such a method?
I would be more inclined to BUY a short 10h or so RPG game if it costed at most 10€ And then only if it got rave reviews. I would never pay full price (50€) for a 10h game, however fantastic the story is... That simple. Then I would rather spend my money on MMO games (which I do) and play epic story lines together with friends online.
I'm one of those who likes gaming but doesn't have the time to finish some of these epic games. I've restarted Oblivion three times and never gotten very far. I'd actually like to see more games done in installments, like the Half Life 2 episodes or Sam & Max. I did finish the original Half Life 2 but it took me about six months to finally complete it. There are many dozens of games that I would have liked to finished but never found the time. But the basis is that the episode model should be cheap enough (say, $10 per episode) that if I like it I'll keep coming back, or move on to something else.
I'm also one of those who played 10% of RDR. And I didn't quit because I didn't have the time. Once you've hog-tied someone and left them on the tracks and got the Dasterdly trophy or whatever it's called, what is left to do?
Last time I played Zelda there was more then 10 hours of cutscenes that you couldn't skip. Each one was a "Well, I can't play Zelda now because of crappy plot. Guess I'll go do something else".
In short, I hope this forces game companies to respect their customer's time.
I have stacks of games that are years old I have not finished yet, some I have barely started, that doesn't mean I want them to be shorter in fact quite the opposite. I'm a collector, games are what I collect. I love long involved RPG titles, they are like a good novel or movie to me. I eventually make the time to get around finishing it but there are soo many good games out there and I have increasingly limited time, so it's no surprise how many of them I haven't finished yet. Also consider that games take skill to complete. I'm not the most skilled gamer but I'm willing to keep trying that one annoying encounter granted I may shelve the game for a few weeks or month before getting back to it. The reward in finally completing the encounter comes when I get to continue the story, it definitely causes me to be more engrossed when I have to actually work to progress the storyline What gets me about prices is how all new games are priced the same regardless of length or quality. A long AAA game costs more to make than the average movie so yes I expect to pay more in that case than a DVD or theater ticket. But not all games costs more to make than a movie. Why should someone pay the same price for a sequel to a shovelware game compared to a AAA title that actually took years to make?
How about a game worth playing after a month?
It's not just the price, though. Sure, if the choices was between 10 hours of truly awesome vs 20 hours of boring, and they both cost the same, well, ok, I might actually splurge on something that's awesome for a change. I mean, honestly, out of some games maybe a quarter of the time was actually fun, and the other parts were filler that didn't really bring anything worth my money. If I paid the same, but got only the parts that were actually worth my money, in the end I'd get the same value for my money, if not better. In fact not only I'd pay extra to have that filler removed, but I _have_ occasionally actually paid extra to be able to skip it. E.g., by buying a GameShark or the like.
But that's unfortunately just theory. Anyone want to bet that that won't happen?
I've seen games get increasingly shorter for two decades now, but I'm just not seeing that awesome stuff emerging. I'm not seeing many people actually cut out the parts that make a game boring, and leaving the juicy meat intact.
The metaphor that comes to mind is basically imagine buying a nice suit, except it has 20 pounds of lead sewn all over it, so the tailor can claim you're getting a whole 25 pounds of material for your money. It brings no extra enjoyment whatsoever, it serves no function that I'd actually want, and frankly it even detracts from my enjoyment of wearing it. Would I pay the same money to get just the suit without the lead padding? Hell yea. I'd even pay extra.
But now imagine that after hearing about how the customers don't want heavy suits, and lighter is the new way and all, you go to the same tailor, and now for the same money you get a shirt and jeans, and only 10 pounds of lead sewn to the pants. You got something lighter, but you didn't get the same for your money.
Now the next round of interviews goes by and you're reassured by everyone that THIS time they'll cut only the unwanted parts out, and you'll get only 5 pounds of suit for your money, but it will be just the awesome part. Except what you actually get this time is a T-shirt and some shorts, and 4 pounds of lead sewn to it.
That's been what's happening to games. Each time we hear them talk about how people don't want huge padded games, and how gamers would be ok with half the game, but only the awesome parts. And some of us would indeed. I would have paid the full again for some games, if I got a version with all the good stuff and without all the boring padding.
But then the next game does come along with only half the hours, but the percentage composition is largely the same as before. Now instead of an 80 hour game, out of which maybe 20 are interesting stuff, you get a 20 hours total game. Yippee, it will be just the 20 hours of fun, right? Wrong. Now you have maybe 5 hours of fun stuff and 15 hours of padding.
I'm seeing the same rhetoric happening again and again, and it looks more and more like a cheap excuse for gullible morons.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Wow. I heard this same crap ten years ago or so. 'Video games are too long', 'Video games cost too much', 'If the game is shorter, it'll be super awesome'.
Then, as now, it's all about charging more for less. Same Shit, Different Decade.
I'm a casual gamer. I spend quite a bit of time on games per week.. but I've went for days without playing a single game as well.
Now, the problem is not "People aren't finishing, therefore, we need to make it shorter". Rather, game developers need to make it better and like other people said, LESS FUCKING GRINDING! The few games I've finished recently have been:
1. Portal 2 -- There is no grinding. Storyline is very easy to continue after a few days of not playing
2. Fallout New Vegas -- There are so many side missions that it makes grinding not really feel like grinding, that and you're not running around in circles looking for enemies to level up. You are usually exploring things you haven't seen before. It's also sorta easy to continue the story line after a break
3. God of War 3 -- There are random hard levels that some people quit out on, but there is no grinding. It has a solid story line
I tend to play games for the sake of the story, lately. I play RPGs, mostly. There are a handful I never finished, but it was never due to the length of the game, but rather the content of the game. I've beaten 60+ hour epics because most of the 60 hours were fun and interesting. I've abandoned 10-15 hour games due to lack of interest. And vice-versa. The length of a game has no bearing on whether I'll finish it, but it usually does affect how much fun I have playing it, and whether I feel my $60 was a justified expense. If they want to shorten games, that's fine, but they'll have to lower prices to compensate or I'll just find other sources of entertainment.
Shortening games in hopes that more people will finish them is not the way to go. It's the easy way out, and it'll seem like a good idea at first, but it won't hold up in the long-term.
The "people don't have time to play long games" argument doesn't seem quite right either. I work full-time, spend a few weekends a month out of town, spend most weekday evenings away from my house (and thus my games), and still had time to beat three semi-long games this summer that I hadn't yet gotten around to playing.
I suck and get killed all the time, so I quit trying. Also, I'm more interested in discovering different ways to kill someone, and other neat facets of the game.
That is very easy with computer AI, but with a person you have fairly consistent damge (at least for each class of opponent). No cool stuff like shooting a tower and have oil barrels fall on the bad guy in a flaming death from above epic world destruction moment. Unless it's me, paying attention to something else and not noticing the shot you just took. You can take me out that way most days, easily, and then you realize I'm just as bad, if not worse, than an AI opponent.
When you play against people in deathmatch style things get kinda repetitive. Someone's shooting at you, try to duck, and then try to kill them. Ooh, different weapons, different respawn spots. Like playing the same sport with different equipment. This ball is more dense, this bat is better, differetn people today, but it's still baseball. You seem to like that, I don't. I'd like to play a round of golf, then learn how a bat behaves differently from a golf club, then figure out uses for a tennis racket. Experimentation on the world, not on people.
Half-life 2 is my kind of game. Plenty of people to shoot at, but you have to be reasonable about where you waste your ammo. Good choices lead to conservation, bad choices leave you nothnig but a crowbar. Also, some exploring while there aren't too many bad guys can get you surprises. I like the exploration idea, as long as it's not me finding every crevice of the game because I need some magic thing I can't find.
I got the Orange Box just for Portal, and started playing HL when Portal was over. BioShock is perfect, you can explore if you want or just follow the arrow and shoot everything. I think of each different enemy class as a different person, developing new tricks.
Team playing could be fun, but it's usually team against other team. I would enjoy the hell out of a multiplayer game where every human worked together for the same goal against AI opponents or traps or whatever. But you wouldn't.
I guess we're just different. Look, we should just stop seeing each other, okay?
In mid 90s 'gameplay hours' came as a 'value' from the marketing types to tout games over other games. 'our game gives you 30 hours playtime !! its better'.
and natural result of this has been increasingly lengthening games with time consuming, but less fun stuff in order to pump up 'gameplay hours'.
this result would have eventually happened.
compare the crap produced in our time by corporate behemoths that seek to tie people in front of a computer for longer hours, and tout game time to the fun games which gave you right thing at the right dosage at the right time, from the period 1990-1995. these were the games. actually, these ARE the games, since most of today's franchises are their descendants (directly too) or running on their gameplay concepts still, with little changed.
yes. i completely prefer Star Control 2 over mass effect 2. i would prefer it to mass effect 3, 4, or 324234 for that matter. the story was so captivating that numerous times i thought to myself, 'too bad, i played the game. if only i could forget it entirely and play it again' and then rescinded the thought, with the frightening prospect of losing the data of that spectacular epic story saved in my mind feeling as a great loss.
so. we came to this point at last. the question is, will the game studios wise up and sell people actual FUN entertainment, or will they keep doing the crap that marketing types shit around.
Read radical news here
Speaking of TV-esque , it would be interesting if games come up with weekly episodes. Leave the game at a cliff hanger, to be continued next week. With all the PSN and xbox live, this should be possible. Each week you come in, download the next episode, play. They can even charge per episode. Alternately, adverts can be put into the game strategically to keep it free.
(hope this counts as prior art when some bloke goes to patent it)
I actually finish all single player games I start, and they are never long enough.
no. this is simply wrong. even if i don't finish a game i enjoy it has nothing to do with it being too long. the vast majority of the time it is becuase real life interferes with my gaming activities for a long enough period of time that i forget the game controls and don't feel like starting over for the sake of re-learning (though, i recently did exactly that for oblivion).
further, games are about the adventure of getting to the end, not the end itself. sure, having a good end is the cherry on top, but nothing more. actually, oblivion would be a perfect example: i logged about 130 hours on my first play through, a few years ago. at some point i got too busy and by the time i had gaming time again i forgot how to play and was enticed by a newer game. but, becuase oblivion was SO epic i'm willing to go back and play it again in anticipation of the new release - skyrim. so, super long game that i never finished leads to purchase of next release. go figure (?) and here i thought it was common sense.
Why can't they do this with movies? So many of the recent films would be so much better if they didn't all aim for the 2 hour "normal" length. And since when did 2 hours become normal? I'm perfectly happy with 1 hour to 1:30.
I've played every Bioware game I've bought (which is their entire catalogue more or less) to completion. Most of them more than once. However I have other games I have not. I get tired of them and set them aside. Defense Grid is an example. Good game, not sorry I spent the money on it, however I was done with it before I finished all it had to offer. Some other games I have completed, but generally don't. Civ 4 is an example. I have played a couple games to the end, but I usually don't. I build up an empire, squash some people, get tired of that game and start a new one. More or less once I'm to the "it is a foregone conclusion" part I decide I'm done.
I fail to see how any of this is at all a surprise. First off, for me to want to finish a game it has to stay interesting. If I get bored I'll quit. Games are for fun, not for work. Then there's the simple fact that the more engaging and important the story, the more I want to finish. If I care about what is happening, I want to see the end. If I don't, maybe I decide I"m done sooner.
Plus Sandbox games are the ones people are least likely to finish because many don't give a shit about the missions at all. They buy the game to goof around in. I'm put a good deal of time in to Just Cause 2, and done very little of the story. I don't care about it, not only is it a lame story, but I got the game just to mess around. I run around and blow stuff up, that is what I got the game for. I may never finish the story because that isn't the reason to have it.
Take Bioware's recent RPGs like the Mass Effect series, and tell me how you'd do that multi-player. I suppose you could make it co-op so a friend could control one of the squadmates, but it would be rather lame for them. They wouldn't get to talk to anyone, they'd be a passive observer in the story, they'd have to follow you around, and so on. The way the game works it is just single player. You could accurately call it an interactive novel of sorts.
There's room in the world for both kinds of games. I love me some Bioware single player RPGs, but I also enjoy Battlefield Bad Company 2 online with random people. Neither one is the "right" way to do gaming, they are different experiences.
If the gamer sucks so be it, or doesn't have enough time so be it. I'm not spending 59 bucks on a game thats over in 10 minutes. If mainstream publishers start to pull this shit, I'll stick with Humble Bundles and such.
I haven't finished every game either, but thats the beauty of coming back to a title you already bought.
Fucking pussies.
It's so subjective and it's always used with the most expensive benchmarks. I figure I watch at LEAST 100 hours of TV a week and I only spent $80 on my cable bill. Does anyone ever use the 80cents/hour metric? I've got about 700 hrs playing time on Battlefield 2. Does anyone ever use the 7cents/hour metric?
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Yes, most people never finish games. I'm in that group.
Of the 350 or so games I've played, I've finished maybe 60. It's not about the game being awesome or not. It's only about time. I haven't finished a single rockstar game except vice city. I never finished a single elder scrolls game. It's only about finding the time to play. I don't have that much time.
I won't pay $60 for a shorter game though.
If "skyrim" were 12 hours I wouldn't buy it.
They're using their grammar skills there.
What about more hours of awesome? I went through the whole CoD MW2 in three or four days and really ended up wanting more, I don't care for multiplayer, I'm an analog and digital antisocial and I enjoy the months long Far Cry or Borderlands.
Games are not movies, You want them liying in your hard drive waiting for you to go back go on with the story. This is just a marketing ploy and astroturfing to make people believe that people are ok with this, and I really don't think they aren't going to really cut the prices.
Something that is skirted around in the discussion of grinding is the increasing difficulty of gameplay. This is one that bugs me - the Big Boss At The End Who Is Almost Impossible To Kill. It's a gaming tradition at least as old as Ultima, and it usually sucks. Yeah, it makes sense that you've beaten the minions, now you face the evil itself. Still, the skill requirements tend to increase linearly through the game up until that point, and then jump sky-high, making it insanely frustrating.
Some are done well: Shodan in System Shock was tough but beatable and the story drove you to that point. On the other hand, while I absolutely loved System Shock 2, I never finished it. I gave up after several nights of trying to get 30 seconds farther in the final Body of the Many fight. It ended up just being stupid. I don't care if winning the game causes Shodan to come out of my computer as a corporeal love slave - I can't be bothered trying to master that degree of twitch reflex, especially when it's completely out of line with the rest of the game.
Psychonauts? Finished it, despite the damned nets (and this on a PC with default key mappings!). I HAD to get the last chapter of the story!
So game developers, please: Don't say to me, "Oh you're 98% of the way through the game. Time to start throwing anvils!"
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
Some of the stuff in the Strat Guide OUGHT to be available in the manual. E.g. approx HP of your enemies in Oblivion cf the shiny sword you have. Helps work out whether you're going to be cramming the slamming or your Uuber Fireball is just a Damp Squib.
Dungeon Keeper Prima unofficial guide first half had things you REALLY had to know in order to work out whether you wanted to have a troll or train up your Warlock. The second half spoiled the game by giving you the maps.
for... more years then I'd like to count, and more then I can remember, I call bull#$%^ on this. Some games run on too much, past the point where their game engine is fun, and some have rediculous requirements, like doing the same thing 1000 times over. That said, there are a lot of great 100+ hour games, and I absolutely hate paying $50-70 to learn that there is only 10 hours or less of gameplay.
Multiplayer doesn't count, either. If I want to play a Multiplayer game, I'll play a Multiplayer game. I'f I'm playing a single-player game, I expect an actual single-player game.
Notice the connection to Activision, they trying to run gaming into the ground. Don't forget they're the ones who has forced the yearly creation and milked 11 Tony Hawk games, 8 COD games, and 24 Guitar Hero games. I just hope Blizzard breaks off and spins off a new studio like Infinity Ward did...
Here are some gems from their CEO, Robert A. Kotick:
"[they] don’t have the potential to be exploited every year across every platform, with clear sequel potential that can meet our objectives of, over time, becoming $100 million-plus franchises, that’s a strategy that has worked very well for us."
"In the last cycle of videogames you spent $50 on a game, played it and took it back to the shop for credit. Today, we’ll (charge) $100 for a guitar. You might add a microphone or drums; you might buy two or three expansions packs, different types of music. Over the life of your ownership you’ll probably buy around 25 additional song packs in digital downloads. So, what used to be a $50 sale is a $500 sale today."
"And Tony, you know if it was left to me, I would raise the prices even further."
WSJ: If you could snap your fingers, and instantly make one change in your company, what would it be, and why?
Mr. Kotick: I would have Call of Duty be an online subscription service tomorrow. When you think about what the audience's interests are and how you could really satisfy bigger audiences with more inspired, creative opportunities, I would love to see us have an online Call of Duty world. I think our players would just have so much of a more compelling experience.
WSJ: Is that coming?
Mr. Kotick: Hopefully.
WSJ: Are the customers ready for it?
Mr. Kotick: I think our audiences are clamoring for it. If you look at what they're playing on Xbox Live today, we've had 1.7 billion hours of multiplayer play on Live. I think we could do a lot more to really satisfy the interests of the customers. I think we could create so many things, and make the game even more fun to play. We haven't really had a chance to do that yet, so that would be my snap of the fingers.
"It's definitely an aspiration that we see potential in, particularly as we look at different business models to monetise the online gameplay," he said, according to IGN. "There's good knowledge exchange happening between the Blizzard folks and our online guys.
"We have great experience also on Call Of Duty with the success we had on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. A lot of that knowledge is getting actually built into the Battle.Net platform and the design of that. I think it's been mutually beneficial, and you should expect us to test and ultimately launch additional online monetization models of some of some of our biggest franchises like Call Of Duty."
"Our gamers are telling us there's lots of services and innovation they would like to see that they're not getting yet. From what we see so far, additional content, as well as all the services Blizzard is offering, is that there is demand from the core gamers to pay up for that.”
The new company map features one business unit focused squarely on the Call of Duty franchise, another overseeing Activision-owned brands such as Tony Hawk and Guitar Hero, and a third unit to handle licensed properties. Blizzard Entertainment rounds out the fourth unit but interestingly, Blizzard's Mike Morhaime now reports directly to newly appointed chief operating officer Thomas Tippl, who in turn reports to Activision CEO Bobby Kotick.
"This is an important change as it will allow me, with Thomas, to become more deeply involved in areas of the business where I believe we can capture great potential and opportunity," Kotick said in the employee memo.
Kotick noted that in the past he changed the employee incentive program so that it "really rewards profit and nothing else." He continued, "You have studio heads who five years ago didn't know the difference between a balance sheet and a bed sheet who are now arguing allocation
Going to movies every weekend, thinking that entertainment is worth $8/hour, and being impressed with a $60, 10-hour game 'cause it's "only" $6/hour on the average. When I was your age, we almost NEVER went to the movies, and when we did, it was the matinee showing, cause that's what we could afford. We bought our movies from the bargain bin at Walgreens for 50 cents and watched them 10 times, or we borrowed them from the public library. Or we'd READ. Books, you know? Dead trees bleached and pressed into sheets that were imprinted with a sort of hieroglyphics using a dark carbon-based dye, then stacked and bound together along one edge. Similar to those e-book things you have nowadays, except they had real pages that actually turned, not just a fancy animation. And the rest of the time we had to amuse ourselves with throwing pointy sticks and rocks at the girls. Or was it frogs and worms. I don't remember. Well, that and we also had our whiffle-ball bat and ball, croquet set, football, baseball and glove, swingset, tree house... AND WE LIKED IT.
DAMN KIDS.
And I'm not even 30 yet...
"Only 10% of avid gamers completed last year's critically acclaimed Red Dead Redemption, according to Raptr, which tracks more than 23 million gaming sessions."
I would like to know how they were tracking us and why we weren't told about this.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
I have to disagree as well. My favorite game of all time, Oblivion, is partially that because it basically never ends. I had 300+ hours into a character that I lost when my PS3 died. I am now starting a new one (as is the rest of my family) after seeing the Skyrim promo. I am having just as much fun this time around.
I also liked Fallout 3, but was disappointed when I finished the main quest and it ended at about 80-100 hours of game play. I have been thinking about starting it again and not finishing the main quest till everything else is done, but it doesn't have quite the draw Oblivion does. Anyway, the answer isn't necessarily shorter, it is less dull/dragging.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
Only more mounts/pets/gear sets/raids/cheezements.......by Malfurion, I hope I'm able to xfer those things over to the 'next Blizzard MMO'.
Throwing my $0.02 in the bucket.
I can count how many games I've finished. Super mario bros 1, & 2, Loom, Space quest 1, Monkey Island 1, & 2, Leisure suit Larry 1, 3, & 5, Day of the Tentacles, Civilization 1, 3, 4, & 5, MoO 1, Doom 1, & 2, Diablo 1, Braid, Plants vs Zombies, Starcraft 2.
I can't count how many games I've started but never finished, but it's a list of most of the popular games released for ninetendo/pc since the 1980s.
15 hours a day of TV?!
Nobody has mentioned Sturgeon's Law yet, so I just did. Once again, it holds true.
Of course. That's why minecraft and terraria are a great success.
Now this is why I play games that don't necessarily have an ending - the Football Manager series being a prime example.
I'm *still* playing the 2010 version of the game (which was released in Autumn 2009) and I dread to think how many hours I've racked up.
"I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different." ~ Kurt Vonnegut Jnr.
I don't think all parts are that debatable.
E.g., I've yet to meet many people who think that running back and forth for hours is AWESOME. Is there anyone out there who actually quit WoW when they gave horses earlier, because, dammit, without running on foot for half an hour the game ceased to be fun? Do you see many posts on single player game boards going, "God dammit, I thought I'd have to run 20 minutes from quest giver to the objects to fetch and 20 minutes back, like in all the good games, but this POS lets me get straight to the interesting parts and I want my money back"? :p
E.g., while cut scenes can be a matter of personal taste, I don't think anyone but the criminally insane would find it a turn off to be able to optionally skip them, especially when the last save point was before a long cut scene.
And for that matter, can those brain-dead quick-time events in cut-scenes die a horrible death already? The only thing worse than not being allowed to skip a boring cut scene, is being forced to stay there and watch it because it's an instant failure if I go take a piss during a fucking cut-scene. The only thing worse than that is a cut-scene I have to watch again and again and again until I press the right button sequence. Adding that kind of stupidity doesn't make cut-scenes more exciting and interesting, it makes the more annoying.
E.g., even for cut scenes, I can think of a couple of types that are almost universally not wanted by anyone. Take for example the dumb tech-demo interruptions in FF-X, which seem to be there just to show some character posing, so they can sell their game engine. I'm ok with cut scenes that show complex story scenes or interactions between characters, but that game interrupted me several times during a short walk between a city and a beach just so some character can pose against the sky while delivering some line. What's wrong with actually walking AND talking if it's supposed to be banter on the road from here to there? I mean, it worked well for The Witcher 2, didn't it? Why did Tidus and the other morons in the party in FF-X HAVE to stop and pause for every other line? Are they so dysfunctional and unable to multitask that even operating their mouth and feet at the same time was too much?
E.g., sure, minigames can break the monotony when they're short and awesome. But then you get games like the same FF-X where 90% of the time sunk in them was spent just running down some hall carrying some orb from here to there. I'm not particularly picking on that one game, but it was one of the first I know of which actually padded the padding. Invariably it wasn't even some great intellectual puzzle. If they just put the orbs and holes within 1 ft of each other, it would have taken seconds to solve every single such puzzle (short of being drunk, stoned AND having a seizure at the same time.) But no, something that was already padding, got padded with having to run down corridors carrying an orb from here to there. WTH?
So, yes, some things are a matter of taste, and some things are subjective, and some things are a matter of comparison. But there are things that are reviled by everyone except maybe a small lunatic fringe. If even that.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Sometimes, I like not to finish a book or story, because it lets the story live in my mind longer. Once it's done, it's like it's dead, and I only have fond memories.
As one other poster mentioned, I call BS on this. Just another reason to make shorter games.
I want to cut back on content so that I can hire more hookers to crew my yacht. How would you feel about admitting to being lazy slob Joe? You'd feel just peachy keen, huh? You'd be happy putting your name to a ridiculous strawman about choosing between 10 hours of good content and 20 hours of sucky content, because apparently that's the only options available to $60 AAA titles? Well, thanks Joe, you just sign there while I sliiiiide this paper bag under the table.
Really, games industry? This is the best that you can come up with? "We're giving you exactly what we wish you wanted!"
Are you following this, Ford? Meet the 2012 Fusion: we listened(*), and it's now 100% free of A/C or heating across the range, at no extra cost!
(*) To Mandy Frozenpants, Anchorage, and Bob Sweatyballs, Phoenix.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Gave Newler has played 800 hours DOTA2.
Some average WoW players have played the game for more than 365 *days*.
I have played APB more than 400 hours, and Battlefield Bad Company 2 about 130 hours.
I have about 80 hours in Fallout New Vegas, and maybe 40 hours in S.P.A.Z.
How much hours have the people still playing Diablo 2 or Counter-Strike? only god knows.
Gamers find time to enjoy his games. Games with terrible replayability get few hours. Games with high replayability (think Morrowind) or games with a fun multiplayer component are played 100+ hours.
The article is full of shit.
-Woof woof woof!
The final kill in the RDR *is* pretty satisfying. :)
Agree on the multiplayer thing, I'm an open world RPG fanatic myself, but Borderlands gave me a real taste for cooperative co-op. Looking forward to the new horde mode in GOW3.
Does a longer movie make it better?
Like a movie, a game really isn't satisfying unless you finish it. If its too long or too difficult or too boring to finish then it really is a waste of money.
The original Portal won me over on the idea that short and sweet is a better game experience (of course a short and sweet price would be better too)
One of the most aggravating things a game designer can do is force the player into a hunt-the-pixel challenge, where landing on or jumping from exactly the most miniscule and impossible to find position is the only way to proceed in the game. Furthermore, putting the save point miles and miles and miles before that challenge . . . the Banjo Kazooie designers used to do this all the time, which is why I have never finished a BK game and would actually like to fly to England and punch the living shit out of their faces. I invested hours and hours into those games and then came to a point where the fun was just sucked right the fuck out of them. I AM the kind of person who finishes games. I rarely start a game that I do not finish. But if I can't finish it because of something stupid like that (grinding, or near-impossible tasks with long chains of also-perilous events in front of them that must be repeated over and over again), I start to hate the developers with the heat of a thousand supergiant suns.
One day I feel I'm ahead of the wheel / the next it's rolling over me / I can get back on / I can get back on
So with the decrease in content of course we can expect a corresponding drop in the price of games then.
No? Thought not.
Whoops, that should be 100 hours a MONTH!
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
In fact, the attrition (or bounce rate) of video games is pretty pathetic.
This line is pathetic in of itself. Some games aren't that exciting; not finishing it because of that is hardly a "pathetic" situation. Other reasons for not finishing games? Family, friends, work, school, other hobbies and commitments... What would be pathetic is feeling you have to finish the game despite all that.
Games are entertainment or a distraction. It's not a necessity to finish it in order to gain some enjoyment or benefit from it.
If the expectation is that almost every game made should make you want to finish it to the end, then... wow... what a dumb expectation. Even in an "ideal" game world. //yes I've finish Red Dead Redemption, among a couple others...
As an avid gamer who doesn't really get to play video games much any more, I can say that this idea appeals to me. However, only if the games are priced accordingly. If my options are $10 for a 10-hour good game, or $60 for a 60-hour good game, I'll probably go with the $10 one. However, if they're talking about $60 for a 10-hour game versus $60 for a 60-hour game, then I have two words for those developers: frak you.
/Luthor It's the difficulty curve. Allow me to skip a boss if I want after 5 goes and the problem is solved. All other listed factors in the article are secondary.
That's an open-world game, a very crappy example. I've never finished Morrowind yet I've pumped in about 40-50 hours of dicking around and doing side-quests... that don't mean I want shorter games, especially not for my 60$. Make shorter games and charge 20$? Yeah, that I can handle.
~Syberz
IMO: You buy a game and are bedazzled by the new graphics/story line.. But the glitter wears off soon and you realize that the game just isn't very FUN..
Pretty sad considering that Red Dead Redemption had one of the best endings of any game I've ever played.
Sure some people dont complete games, but I actually seek out long games. In the past 5--6 years my absolute favorite games are things like Oblivion, Fallout 3, etc. I have logged over 100 hours in Fallout 3 alone and I dont play that often, its just something I keep going back to. I realize that developers are looking for ways to reduce cost and increase revenue, but if they dont think there will be a "fallout" of their own they are delusional. I simply won't pay $60 for a short game even if its a "good" one...when those come out I wait until it hits bargain bins. Most gamers I know are the same way. They are already working on ways to kill off the used/rental market, now they want to offer less for the same price...I'm starting to think the game industry is trying to kill itself.
Board member A "Hey I know, lets find a way to convince everyone that paying high dollar for less game time is cool!"
Board Member B "Yah lets make a WoW Clone!"
Board member C" No no that will never work. How about we come up with false interviews and false data to show that no one really wants to complete a 60 hour game anyways?"
Board Member A B C : "YAH!"
Most of my own sentiments have already been worded here in one form or another... But if anyone's still reading, it's about quality, not quantity. If I quit the game 2 hours in because it SUCKS, then the other 98 hours are kind of useless, aren't they? And as far as cost effectiveness goes, even the shortest games (20 hrs) are still cheaper than other forms of entertainment. So make it GOOD, and I'll actually buy it over playing the cracked version.
So our quality has gone way down, we shall spin doctor it as "Players want shorter games".
Publishers/Devs:
Win for us as we can get even a better price point aka higher profits than ever before!
We will make microtransaction games and they will thank us for it! Soon our plan of a never ending $$$ feed trough for gamers will be complete. They will either subscribe to our gaming cloud or they get nothing.
Queue the Pink Floyd Money song. Also don't forget to kiss the ring of your lord and emperor Gordon Geko on your way out...
How the hell are they tracking 23 Million gaming sessions of those companies that host the games are "keeping your data secret"???
Yet again those with the attention span of an ant, and the intellect of a toaster find a new and inventive way to f*** me.
Avid gamers? No, the new crop of "gamers" with a casual interest in their hobby lack the focus to actually complete games. The Angry Birds generation.
If I ended up with something that was at least 95% good gaming experience, as opposed to 40-50% game, 50-60% grind, and 10% unskippable-introduction-to-how-to-play type crap.
One of me fond memories of some of the better RPG's was that there were lost of truly *optional* side-quests (that weren't DLC). The quests themselves added nice details to the story, but weren't necessary for completion (though they did make the bosses easier). They tended to involve a little grind but the story addition was nice.
This is as opposed to Mass Effect's (and especially ME2) mineral scavenging (otherwise it's a good game, but could use more actual storyline content that's not DLC), Final Fantasy's (recent games) lame leveling and "not useful in game/plot but looks pretty" item gathering, etc.
One of the last good games I played that seemed to capture this fairly well was "Lost Odyssey". Some of the more grindy parts weren't actually necessary unless you wanted to collect some powerful spells/items/weapons, but you could complete the game without those items well enough. I think that LO had some of the old FF devs on the team though. I don't suppose anyone else knows of games from that team, or of similar quality...
I don't know about anyone else here, but I am firmly committed to finishing minecraft!
Where's the scientific study proving that "people have less time to play games than they did before"? Sure, that's true of people that have *grown up*, but guess what, there's a new generation that has tons of time to kill. It's always been true that few people play a long video game to completion.
First of all: and it's not just dull games that go unfinished. == "After all, 10 hours of awesome is better than 20 hours of boring." so redundant department of redundant redundancy aside...
I'm looking forward to a game so big I can't finish. That is assuming there isn't so much DRM bullshit to wade through I decide not to buy the game. 200 hours of boring is better than 2 hours of installing the game, the root kits, and signing up for accounts on privacy destroying shit hole web sites.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
The information in this post is common knowledge for everyone working in production in the game industry. It's considered standard nowadays for most AAA titles to schedule and design for ten hours of non-repetitive gameplay. I suspect this is only a surprise to people who don't work in the industry.
People do not consider replayability when purchasing a game. People purchase games based on advertising, game reviews, word of mouth, and tie-ins to existing franchises. Game reviews typically only consider the first hour or so of gameplay.
There's a lot of people on this thread demanding 40+ hours of gameplay per game. The truth is that VERY FEW gamers actually play their games in this style. This is one of those cases where, as a game developer, you have to ignore what people say, and watch what they actually do.
The quality of games are pretty fucking low at the moment. They will likely be released buggy and require patching, they'll be the 4th, 5th or 6th sequel in a series, it will rely heavily on violence to cover up the fact the acting and story sound like something written by a 5 year old and to top it off it will be $50 or $60. No wonder people don't finish games. You can't tell half of them apart. Of course you're going to get bored.
Shortening the game and still charging $50-$60 is not going to go down well.
When the article says that only 10% of people finished Red Dead Redemption I can only assume they mean 10% of players reached a completion score of 100%. It took me around 20 hours to beat Red Dead's main story line. I never complete a game to a 100% completion or unlock all of the trophies/achievements in a game, however I do finish main story lines of games, and whatever side quests I feel like doing. When I complete the main story line of a game I feel that I have beat it. GTA is another perfect example. I play the story lines out, but it will be a cold day in hell before I deliver 100 pizzas, taxi 100 people, catch 100 criminals, etc just to get the 100% completion score.
But since I can get 100+ cable channels for 30 a month , which works at about, say, 4x7x30=840 hours
You actually watch 840 hours of TV a month? If you watch even half of that you seriously are missing out on life. Learn what opportunity cost is, turn off the TV, go outside and play.
This smacks of really poor - or deliberately biased - data analysis.
HOW the game ends doesn't matter, the problem is THAT it ends.
Red Dead is one of the few games that I HAVE finished in many years purely because I didn't realize I was finishing it. But in doing so, I was able to see how most people probably wouldn't finish it because the trigger for it would most likely be ignored by story followers.
-- A change is as good as a reboot.
You think I'm paying full price for a ten hour game? Get real. I'm old enough to remember the super long old 90s DOS games like Ultima, Wizardry, etc. maybe 10 hours is ok for a shooter with a strong multiplayer aspect but for a single player RPG? I'll just play old abandonware and save myself some cash.
This was the same bullshit that was brought up during the "rise" of episodic games. Look, some games need to be long, some need to be short, and others need to be in the middle. I don't want to play 6 hour RPGs and 80 hour FPS campaigns. Besides, games are already shorter, they make you pay for anything outside a straight-up campaign via DLC. And even then some charge you for epilogues and chapters that flesh out situations/characters but claim "Oh you didn't really need that to fully enjoy the game." This is just another money grab. Or maybe they want to make shorter games because they can't seem to finish the games they put out *cough*Fable3*cough*.
Twinstiq, game news
I have finished Baldur's Gate II 3 times. It takes nearly 200 hours per play. I finished Fallout 3 after a few months. It took me 2 years to do Fable 2, because I lost interest, forgot, and only came back later to finish it. I never finished Bioshock, but I will get around to it.
I also play MMOs, which ostensibly don't have an ending. The games with an ending that I love, I have finished, but I would not necessarily equate finishing a game with whether or not I enjoyed it. I finished Mafia 2... meh.
I don't buy the short games, because usually they are multiplayer focused and I am not as into that. Quite frankly, I have skipped games because they are too short. I waited for Alan Wake to be discounted for that very reason.
Go ahead and make shorter games, but I am not paying $60 for 10 hours of story, unless that story is about how I found $40 after 10 hours.
I am almost embarrassed to say it, but I've probably spent over 100 hours playing Bejeweled Blitz, a game which only lasts 1 minute per play.
Completion rates for games have a few factors, looking only at the length of the game is not going to give you the whole story.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
More like $10 for a 5 hour game. Try Bastion or Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
This actually brings up an interesting thought for me. I wonder how well it would go over that, if you saved and walked away from a game, when you came back, it gave you one of those TV-esque 'Previously, on [game]...' intros (skip-able, of course).
Actually, they already do that. The Final Fantasy XIII save game loader screen displays a short synopsis of the current plot event. I found that very, very helpful when I got back to the game after a week or two of other things to do.
The best games make it nearly irrelevant whether you `win`in aconventional chronological sense, they just run and u enjoy playing with the system. Like skate by ea, or street fighter. The best games have killer implementation of a fun and interesting system... winning or going thru a storyline is secondary. Whoaorno.com
"Even "avid gamers are already warming to the idea of shorter games""
Yes, sure they are. Is that it? A pathetic personal post by some dickwad, and that supposedly means that "avid gamers are already warming to the idea of shorter games"?
Yes, of course! ONE dickwad says he wants shorter games, so apparently we ALL do! LOL.
What sort of moron puts up a link like that and pretends that it supports their position, when clearly it does not?
I've been saying this for awhile now. I only finish a handful of games a year and give up on many more. I actually finished RDR but feel it would have been a much better game if they took half of it out.
I, personally, can't wait until the average game length is 10 hours. I play games for the story and every game seems to have the problem of dragging the story with pointless side quests just to get the game over 20 hours long. I'd gladly pay a little less for half the game if that means the stories are tighter and more fulfilling.
I think if games are to get as mainstream as movies, they need to be shorter to take into account that adults only have so many hours of the day to watch/play your stuff. Playing a game these days is like reading an epic novel - you either need to plug away at it a few pages/minutes at a time for months, or you take a week off of life and grind though it like a full-time job. I'd like more options where I could finish a serious game (like RDR, not like Angry Birds) in the time it would take to watch a few movies.
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
So they can't start it and play it when they have time (and eventually finish it)? If they're not doing that, then I'd say that they're just bored of it. If they have any time to finish the games at all, then they'd be able to do it eventually.
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
How many people completed Manic Miner, Jet Set Willy, or a whole host of the other CLASSICS?
Many of my very very favourite games I either never completed, or they didn't actually have an ending.
They were classics for a reason, you could keep coming back to them time and time again, and they always presented a challenge, a fair challenge, but a real one.
A game I can complete without trying, in the space of a few hours isn't a game at all. It's an interactive DVD.
I skip dialogue all the time, but that has more to do with reading the subtitles even before the camera angle changes and the sound loads. I wonder how they collect these statistics. Is any attempt to move through dialogue faster counted as a skip even though I may have already read it?
I also wonder if soldier seems to be the overall favourite because it's the default and a lot of people may just want to start playing the game rather than customizing their character. I am one of those people. Mass Effect has a fantastic story and I couldn't care less about the RPG elements.
Personally i just think that people are being lazy when they don't finish the campaign (yes, i do realize the irony in calling people lazy for not finishing the campaign) i have finished the campaign on every game i have bought, especially the Read Dead Redemption campaign, that was very entertaining. However, i do agree with the 10 hours of awesome vs 20 hours of boring. In the case of shooter games i think they need to make the longer, the MW2 campaign only took 6 hours!
of entertainment. That's right. We're at the dawn of the age when real artistry will express itself through games. Some titles have already shown the potential (Half Life, Enslaved, Shadow of the Colossus, etc). But as players and designers learn what works and what doesn't, they will improve.
Next up is the obvious post-sale moddable game. The clunky control interface you don't like? They'll send a patch and update it. The boring part that feels like a waste of time? Axed.
After that you'll have strong writing talent, refugees from the failing TV and film models, moving in to create vibrant story lines and complex characters.
From there you'll see dimensions added as optional mods to teach you Chinese or mechanical engineering and once you've completed it you'll find out you've earned college credits.
Perhaps you'll have some enterprising, daring designers rolling something like Tron out, with live-action and virtual components depending on where you are in the game.
There are probably many other, better things that visionaries are dreaming up out there. We've only scratched the surface.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
The 30+ crowd thought Heavenly Sword was more fun than Fallout 3. Not because the Fallout developers had done anything qualitatively worse, but because the 30+ crowd already has a full time job, and doesn't want to make a second one out of getting to the end of the story already.
I want LONGER games... CASUAAAAAAALS!
Not that I'm denying that most attention spans + lifestyles just aren't suited to long, invested, time-intensive playthroughs of long games...
-But-
You always hear how devs on AAA titles end up in 'crunch-time' pulling insane work hours to meet a release schedule. How much of the end-game content gets built in that time, and suffers for it? There are plenty of games that, in the beginning, play great. But by the end you're running into NPCs without speech files. The boss battle is some rehashed Hit Switches In Order To Reveal Weakness puzzle. And when you beat it, you're treated to a 5 second CG of the castle/base/floating-island/whatever exploding, followed by a few frames of static text overlaid on some concept art they've been showing since they announced the game half a decade ago.
So of course I'm going to stop playing. I've already sucked out all the juicy bits, why stick around to gnaw on the rind?
Welcome, to Short Attention Span Theater.
Less hours in a game? No way then you might as well rip us gamers off! I think your charging enough for those damn games $59.99 is not cheap! Heck I remember when video games were $49.99! and if you go back to the NES days $39.88!.. If you want to make our money worth the time and effort stop making boring confusing games! Also there's way to many 1st person shooters! Trying adding more variety for us older gamers! I'll tell you this much the younger generation is killing off my generation with there stupid games on the market today Be it Pokemon, Bioshock, Call Of Duty Black Op's, Body Count, Halo franchise the list goes on! Enough already! I think its time for something better and new! But don't decrease the hours spent on a video game! Cheers
I am all for shorter games so long as the games are cheaper or there was some kind of value added. I mean, portal was an amazing short game,but it also came in a bundle- more of that and I think that ppl wouldn't be as turned off to the purchase of them.
'After all, 10 hours of awesome is better than 20 hours of boring.'
And 20 hours of awesome is better than 10 hours of awesome... good grief, compare apples to apples please!
When I saw the title I was obviously mislead.. I was thinking of analog-sh games like pinball. To me it boils down to time available and replay value. I can spend 5 minutes on a pinball machine.. or play 10 games and walk away a short time later feeling fulfilled. To get a high score or reach the wizard modes of pinball machines takes time, dedication and mad skills and it's worth the many, many hours of effort to do so.
The thing is this, this discussion seems to be all about how long a linear game takes to do a walk-through. I assert many of the best games are those where a player can be fulfilled messing with it for 20 minutes, but also entertain someone for 10's or 100's of hours. How many digital video games truly fit this mold?
Interesting that they don't look at the data differently: this suggests to me, at least with RDR, that the game obviously had a lot of successful marketing, enough to get a much larger buy-in from gamers than just those who intended to play the game to completion. It also suggests that despite the critical acclaim for the game, it clearly wasn't as appealing to the vast majority of those who bought it. The data isn't saying, "most people don't want long games," but rather, "most people who bought this game did not find it worth their time to continue playing." Also, the data appears to assume that a very long game like RDR is somehow going to be played in short order. So if only 10% of the player base for RDR finished it in the first 18 months, I wonder how many more people finish it in 36 months? Hell, I've been playing Fallout 3 at least once or twice a month for the last few years now and I'm only just beginning to reach saturation point for that game....and I still have unexplored areas and two DLC packs I've haven't seen! Plus, I own RDR, I fully expect I will finish it by 2014 or so. But if Rockstar expects me to rip through that game in two weeks or so, I hate to inform them, but I have: A: a life that demands my time, and B: I like my wild west in small, measurable doses of 2-4 hours tops. So I figure I will get to it when I get to it, and that will hopefully be sooner than later now that Fallout 3 is (finally) reaching saturation point for me!