Are Modern Games Being Dumbed Down?

[MaydaX]

 

It's so true and I seen that so fast when I played Black Mesa. Forgot what a challenging game was.

[surfy]

Depends on ya definition of dumbed down... . Personally I think games are being dumbed down due to stories being too lightweight or non existent, most people can't handle a story. Just like modern films being dumbed down to one action sequence after another.

 

If its soley about difficulty, well pfft if ya playing a game for a story then you don't want to be thwarted by overly difficult sections. If ya playing just to play a game.. hmm can't relate lol.

[HSMagnet]

yeah they are

 

and thanks for reminding me about black mesa. i had gotten stuck and set it aside and then BL2 dropped etc etc

 

just loaded it up and the way forward was painfully obvious with a fresh look

[Chaos1907]

Games these days have very short campaigns but gamers always play multiplayer for more interaction. It's nothing like The Legend of Zelda. Its only single player but its campaign takes many hours of commitment to beat. AM I RIGHT?!?!! It will be epic if a fps game had around 40 missions for its campaign alone but semi challenging.

[MaydaX]

I feel games are more like and results in then repeat :P

 

I also recall this when I first see the video:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RULv6HbgEjY

[buttscratcher]

I like the pew pew guy :P

[Knives*]

I've heard modern games are more expensive to make than a blockbuster movie.

 

Moving from CoD several years ago to BF3 last year, I was excited to be playing something so graphically superior. After playing the same game mode and map, players got bored, including myself. I've read many message boards about all the empty promises that EA had made that were either supposed to be included in the game or added later, with EA deciding not to deliver after all. This was quite upsetting. Providing mod tools so that players could have created their own maps or used VoIP would have been very benneficial, yet they were never included so that when the next "big thing" comes, gamers would be hungry for it after being somewhat neglected, unless they paid $50 for that Premium apatizer to tide them over.

 

These clever strategies of dumbing down an ever-evolving experience for the sake of moving along quickly has become a new trend. For example, Microsoft recently decided to no longer provide Service Packs so that large companies get so frusturated and overwhelmed with updates that it becomes a time-burden to not update to the next version of Windows. And then we have Mozilla, where a few years ago they deliberately tarnished the traditional meaning of Firefox version releases (e.g. 4.0 to 5.0) just to appear to be progressing faster to keep up with Chrome. Google is no better. It's all just an illusion. Unless code has been completely written from the ground up, no piece of software should ever have a brand new number at the start. That's now how it works.

 

I don't mean to get off topic, but basically with all the pressure to deliver, yes, games are dumbed down due to cost, demand and marketing. Greed and desperation makes corporations do weird and stupid things. There are a few exceptions out there such as Valve and their TF2 game. The only thing that keeps them supporting TF2 is their expensive virtual-items. It was a great idea and it pays off with them in turn providing continuous updates/fixes.

Edited November 7, 2012 by Knives*