Is Video Gaming Dead?

[Axeonelite]

 

I was unsure what subforum to put this in due to the topic being gaming in General. Mods feel free to move me if needed. 

 

This question is thrown around a lot by people who are not that enveloped in the PR Media aspect of Video Games.

 

And the question comes up because as a certain point in any "Gamer's" life they come to the realization during one of their gaming sessions where they realize they are no longer having fun, or rather as much fun as they used to with this game, or gaming as a whole.

 

Whether that’s because they have lost interest in a specific title or gaming as a whole. Maybe they not find themselves with other things in their lives that take priority so their gaming sessions no longer are the same immersive experience that the gamer is looking for.

 

So is Gaming Dead? Some people think so, but it depends on how you look at it honestly.

 

 

 

An Article written by Cyrus Sanati on Fortune.com claimed that gaming is dead as an industry.

 

The article does mention how “The Video Game industry is maturing - fast.” but then goes on to explain how the “Gamer” themself is a “Blessing and a curse for the industry”  It continues “It is a blessing in that as they age, their pockets get deeper, so they potentially have more money to spend on their hobby… But it is also a curse, because the industry it stuck in a time warp.”

 

Well what does this mean exactly?

 

 

Cyrus goes on to tell us that these “Content makers, who are [aging] gamers themselves, have become lazy.... They have failed to innovate on both the hardware and content side of the business, alienating potential young consumers while angering older gamers who crave something newer than just another Call of Duty.”

 

 

 

 

Now I would have to agree with Cyrus on this. As a gamer myself I know that I am not going to be interested in something that doesn’t speak to me. And by the 5th, 6th, or even in some cases 7th iteration of a game. It is no longer speaking to me.

 

The “International Podcast” over on ACG had a very interest conversation on Video Game Identity on one of their episodes.They were speaking specifically of Dead rising 4 and how certain Core Gameplay Elements and Story Elements that made the first few titles such a memorable experience, are nowhere to be found. Once a game is at that point it is no longer interesting to the player. Thus the Content Creator just cannibalize their own game, and drove off the existing playerbase.

 

 

 

 

But that’s the industry side. To get a better look at how the actual Consumer market is for these games we will turn to the “Entertainment Software Association’s” “Sales, Demographic and Usage Data” about the computer and video game industry.

 

In their 2015 information They show 51% of U.S households own a dedicated game console. Meanwhile in 2016 they report only 48%.

 

So why the drop in Console Owners? We can’t say that this indicated a shift to PC gaming or that it means that they have just given up on gaming because they also indicated 63% of U.S households as having at least one person who plays video games at least 3 or more hours per week.

 

But the interesting statistic if that the 2016 information shows 65% of U.S households own a device used to play video games.  So this could show us a shift to PC gaming or Even Mobile gaming as a primary platform.But they do show a slight drop in "Gamers" overall. Last year they indicated at least 2 "Gamers" in the U.S Game playing household, and this year that dropped down to 1.7.

 

Now granted this number could be skewed by the Gaming populace growing up and possible adding another household to the equation.Granted the “aging gamer” stereotype is not supported in the ESA’s information as we saw in the Fortune.com article. Between 2015 and 2016 the Average age of a gamer did not change. It remained at 35 through the year. Meanwhile Cyrus’s Fortune.com article shows the average age of a gamer as being 37 in the year 2015.

 

So take that with a grain of salt if you will.

 

 

But with that information how can we now look at the question, “Are video games dying?”

 

Well looking at games published in 2015 according to Game.Co.Uk there are over 30 NEW titles released. And that’s not including sequels or annual games either. So I would definitely say no on that front.

 

 

In Jane McGonigal’s book “Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change The World’ she explains: “The Truth is this: in today’s society, computer and video games are fulfilling genuine human needs that the real is currently unable to satisfy. Games are providing rewards that reality is not. They us bringing is together in ways that reality is not”

 

I agree One-Hundred percent with this statement. If you read her book she goes on to explain many more benefits of gaming, but also how to improve IRL (In Real Life). I would recommend giving it a few moments of your time.

 

Real benefits aside though I think Fortune.coms article sums it up quite nicely when it said. “It would be nice to see some real innovation in the core gaming product, as well as some fresh content aimed at a young subset of the population.

 

 

Any feedback on the writing of this article would be appreciated. Thank you for reading if you made it this far. 

Edited November 24, 2016 by Axeonelite
Added References and 2 Paragraphs.

[Katsunaka]

Can you at least remove the formatting so it's easier to read?

 

I use the night theme and that black text is hard to read.

[Axeonelite]

3 minutes ago, Katsunaka said:

Can you at least remove the formatting so it's easier to read?

 

I use the night theme and that black text is hard to read.

Should be good now. I think. I don't know what I am doing lol

[Mykie]

As a gamer over.... pretty much my entire life (haha), I'd say no. It is not dead. 

 

Here's some of my thoughts in my head, that I think why it seems to be... "dying" and or... contents is "lacking":

 

1) The media gotten quite powerful in these days, they can deceive us, overhype things, and expectations are not going to be lived up as much. Thus letting many people down, such as No Mans Sky.

 

2) New ideas, innovation, is becoming harder, which in general is true. Because there is so many things that had been done.

 

3) Everybody for some reason seems to like going mobile nowdays, it is expected when mobile devices such as phones and gaming laptops started to come out, so eh... it's fair enough, but gaming is still a thing.

 

And that's all I have so far in my mind.

 

But I believe that gaming is still a thing, it's just harder for the company to constantly release things now, possibly that they've been repeating things too much. But keep in mind, some people have great ideas/innovations, like Star Citizens and couple more out there.

 

I think it's time to think outside of the box more for the next generation.

[Axeonelite]

1 minute ago, Mykie said:

As a gamer over.... pretty much my entire life (haha), I'd say no. It is not dead. 

 

Here's some of my thoughts on my head:

 

2) New ideas, innovation, is becoming harder, which in general is true. Because there is so many things that had been done..

 

I think it's time to think outside of the box more for the next generation.

I couldn't agree more. 

[stealth80]

I think the problem is that it is harder for games to captures peoples imagination as they age. I use MMO/RPG as an example of this. In my younger years I loved the Final Fantasy series. That series eventually pushed my onto World of Warcraft which took the concept and added interaction with other players. Ever since I switched I have found it immensely difficult to get absorbed by any of the Final Fantasy games, even FF14 ARR only held my attention for a couple of months. 12 and 13 i havent played past the prologue. On the flip side, I can now no longer play WOW for longer than a few months as the variety has been sucked out of the game to turn it into a cash big for Activision/Blizzard. In that time i've jumped on almost all MMO's to find they also offer no real immersion. 

 

 Every now and again a game is released that I really enjoy though. I never really played any previous iteration of Tomb Raider, but played RIse of the Tomb Raider in its entirety. VR maybe the push/new thing to get gamers interested again, personally I won't be touching it, but again it will need the right games for it to succeed, the tech could be amazing but if the game designers are making cash pigs > Early Access, crowd funding, DLC, Cash Shops, it will fail

[2FA]

Not dead, just kind of stale at the moment. Nothing really revolutionary has come out in recent years but hopefully VR and AR will be able to spice it up as their technologies mature. Hell, something similar to SAO may come about.

[Axeonelite]

1 minute ago, stealth80 said:

I think the problem is that it is harder for games to captures peoples imagination as they age. I use MMO/RPG as an example of this. In my younger years I loved the Final Fantasy series. That series eventually pushed my onto World of Warcraft which took the concept and added interaction with other players. Ever since I switched I have found it immensely difficult to get absorbed by any of the Final Fantasy games, even FF14 ARR only held my attention for a couple of months. 12 and 13 i havent played past the prologue. On the flip side, I can now no longer play WOW for longer than a few months as the variety has been sucked out of the game to turn it into a cash big for Activision/Blizzard. In that time i've jumped on almost all MMO's to find they also offer no real immersion. 

As a self diagnosed WoW addict I 100% agree to this. I had such an obsession with that game that can just no longer be found. 

[Mykie]

Yeah. I feel that it's not only spreading in the gaming culture. It become to the point where almost everything is already done. For example GTA, you know... same thing every year. Cars, explosions, guns, girls, whatever.

 

COD.... we all know that.

 

Battlefield actually made a little change.. Taking time in WW1, but.. still what's next? WW2? Vietnam? Sure, but they kinda already did that, and we don't exactly need another more of generic first person shooter in a new map. Just my thought. (BF1 seems to be awesome and far from generic for now, thinking about getting it btw! )

 

What's making things more interesting is that I noticed developers are listening to players a bit more now, which is good. For example Titanfall 2, when they agreed that there will be no DLC and ect.... Battlefield when they agreed that there should be something little... "different".

 

It's awesome. But still kinda generic.

 

I wonder what Red Dead Redemption 2 would deliver us... hmm 

[Axeonelite]

 

Added 2 paragraphs on the end of the article.

[Axeonelite]

11 minutes ago, DeadEyePsycho said:

Not dead, just kind of stale at the moment. Nothing really revolutionary has come out in recent years but hopefully VR and AR will be able to spice it up their technologies mature. Hell, something similar to SAO may come about.

I agree it is stale at the moment but I don't think VR is the savior we need it to be. Although it might be like 4k and just need some time for adoption and price reductions. 

[TetraSky]

"is Gaming Dead"
No, it's not.

 

Gamers are growing up, their priorities go elsewhere, it's called life... and guess what, new will gamers replace them. Because kids are growing up too.

They might not play the "same" games as "we" did but they are still playing games. Even if it's just some trashy mobile game, it's a different form of gaming.

 

But really, this is just like people claiming PC is dead because PC sales are down... Seriously, a good PC can last you YEARS and more and more people are wisening up to the fact they can just upgrade one or two part of their old PC, for a fraction of the cost of a new PC.

It's not dead, it's just that the longevity and the use of it changed over time. Back in the early 2000s, tech changed so quickly that you didn't have a choice but to buy a new machine. These days, a 5~6 year old CPU is still more than capable enough for anything you can throw at it. You couldn't say the same with pentium 3 vs a dual cores when they first came out. (1999 to 2005)

[fjdhdhcyfhf]

I just wish people still play quake. servers are empty as hell

[Axeonelite]

1 minute ago, TetraSky said:

"is Gaming Dead"
No, it's not.

 

Gamers are growing up, their priorities go elsewhere, it's called life... and guess what, new will gamers replace them. Because kids are growing up too.

They might not play the "same" games as "we" did but they are still playing games. Even if it's just some trashy mobile game, it's a different form of gaming.

 

Quite frankly I would sooner say that Cable TV is dead as an industry, now that we have Netflix and other on-demand services for a VERY low cost compared to traditional cable TV... But again, Netflix can technically be called "TV". It's just a different form.

 

But really, this is just like people claiming PC is dead because PC sales are down... Seriously, a good PC can last you YEARS and more and more people are wisening up to the fact they can just upgrade one or two part of their old PC, for a fraction of the cost of a new PC. It's not dead, it's just that the power, longevity and the use of it changed over time. Back in the early 2000s, tech changed so quickly that you didn't have a choice but to buy a new machine. These days, a 5~6 year old CPU is still more than capable enough for anything you can throw at it. You couldn't say the same with pentium 3 vs a dual cores when they first came out. (1999 to 2005)

 

Again all things I mentioned in my article. I feel as if you might have just skimmed it, but regardless. I do agree. Priorities do get shifted and no I do not believe gaming it dead myself as I concluded with. I would change that 5-6 year CPU period to 4-5 because most of the times other parts will die out before then (at least on OEM, pre-built PC's) causing most people to upgrade long before than. The experienced builder with the cash flow will upgrade almost every 2 years if not sooner depending on the releases by Intel and AMD.

[2FA]

5 minutes ago, Axeonelite said:

I agree it is stale at the moment but I don't think VR is the savior we need it to be. Although it might be like 4k and just need some time for adoption and price reductions. 

I don't plan on buying into it for a long time since everything for it right now is more or less a tech demo. Just a possible path that the industry may take depending on how far the technology advances.

[Axeonelite]

Just now, DeadEyePsycho said:

I don't plan on buying into it for a long time since everything for it right now is more or less a tech demo. Just a possible path that the industry may take depending on how far the technology advances.

Well put. Agreed. We had an Oculus but sold it very quickly. You're right. It felt like a novelty. 

[Yoinkerman]

I've been gaming almost 30 years and I'm still having fun.  So, no, it's not dead.

[Arc_Jester]

If anything I think the gaming community is growing.

[Katsunaka]

42 minutes ago, Axeonelite said:

As a self diagnosed WoW addict I 100% agree to this. I had such an obsession with that game that can just no longer be found. 

I was hardcore WoW for a long time, but now I try to jump into it to take a look and can't do it. I log in and see my old characters lying dormant, and I remember everything that I did with them, and then the next thought is, nope don't want to do all that over again.

 

43 minutes ago, DeadEyePsycho said:

Not dead, just kind of stale at the moment. Nothing really revolutionary has come out in recent years

This. 

 

The new game ideas are probably hiding on kickstarter/early access/beta. As a community we've seen the good and the bad come out of that. Personally to me, I see the game that come out of it as both a blessing and a curse. Some games work (star citizen) and others fail and the community moves on but doesn't forget what happens to some that rise from that toxicity.

 

31 minutes ago, Axeonelite said:

I don't think VR is the savior we need it to be.

VR wasn't meant to be. We all wanted immersion, and it gives us that. Instead of moving our fingers and arms, we're moving our bodies and become that character we play.

 

It's just the band aid to a bigger problem, and eventually, the band aid gets removed and we find something else to enjoy.

[SteveGrabowski0]

I think gaming is pretty strong right now. In the last couple of years Witcher 3, Dying Light, GTA V (PC), Rise of the Tomb Raider, Bloodborne, Dark Souls III, Uncharted 4, Battlefield 1 have been great. And then I am really looking forward to God of War, Red Dead Redemption 2, Mass Effect Andromeda, Horizon Zero Dawn, and Days Gone. I have been a PC & console gamer since the early to mid 1980s and I think gaming has steadily progressed forward over that peroid of time. Of course there are some years like 2007 and 2013 that were unbelieveable and much better than their succeeding years, but overall I think the trend has been very positive for the quality of games for 30 years now: basically, ever since the release of the NES.

[SteveGrabowski0]

1 hour ago, Mykie said:

Yeah. I feel that it's not only spreading in the gaming culture. It become to the point where almost everything is already done. For example GTA, you know... same thing every year. Cars, explosions, guns, girls, whatever.

I thought GTA V was such an amazing advance. I remember the first thing I did on that game when I got it at launch for my XBox 360 is go hike up the mountains around the Alamo Sea. I was just blown away by the views on a game, it reminded me of going and hiking up the mountains like San Jacinto around the Salton Sea. I think gaming is so awesome now. When I was a kid playing NES games in the 80s I used to wish I could go around these game worlds after I beat the game. I wanted to be able to do things when I chose instead of following a linear script. Now there are so many amazing games that are exactly what I wanted back then. GTA V, Skyrim, Witcher 3, Red Dead Redemption, Assassins Creed 2 & Brotherhood, Far Cry 4, I mean modern games just blow me away now.

 

Sometimes I think people love the hardware more than the games on this forum, which makes no sense to me since we can play the games but we're not the ones designing cpus and gpus. I don't get being hyped on hardware. As a gamer it's just a means to an end. I don't understand how there is so much negativity towards gaming here right now when there are so many creative games out there. Even small budget games are great right now. I loved the storyline in Firewatch, and the art style and dialog were both really well done. Inside and Unravel were a lot of fun. I can't wait for Cuphead, a sidescroller that looks like it's straight out of 1930s animation. Who has ever done that before?

[SteveGrabowski0]

44 minutes ago, Yoinkerman said:

I've been gaming almost 30 years and I'm still having fun.  So, no, it's not dead.

Yeah, I think the only time gaming has ever been on a downhill trajectory was the crash of 83-84. So many games were terrible in that era. It was a complete minefield back then when anyone could make an Atari game and there was no WWW to tell you what was worth buying and no Blockbuster/RedBox to rent from. The only time you knew if a game might be good was if it was an arcade port, and then you had to wonder whether the port was any good.

[Axeonelite]

14 hours ago, SteveGrabowski0 said:

Yeah, I think the only time gaming has ever been on a downhill trajectory was the crash of 83-84. So many games were terrible in that era. It was a complete minefield back then when anyone could make an Atari game and there was no WWW to tell you what was worth buying and no Blockbuster/RedBox to rent from. The only time you knew if a game might be good was if it was an arcade port, and then you had to wonder whether the port was any good.

Yeah the Shovelware was intense.

[XenosTech]

I won't say gaming on a whole is dead but that devs would have a great game and not add anything new or challenging to keep players hooked to the game. Warframe for example Me and a bunch of friends were hooked on that day and night trying to gain all the content and make our stuff powerful but after we got to that point, the game itself felt dead because there wasn't much to do... PvP is shitty and PvE is basically a grind fest with the same enemies but at a higher level. Gaming isn't dead just devs don't innovate the games enough to keep a player hooked to it like they did when they first started.

[Axeonelite]

Just now, XenosTech said:

I won't say gaming on a whole is dead but that devs would have a great game and not add anything new or challenging to keep players hooked to the game. Warframe for example Me and a bunch of friends were hooked on that day and night trying to gain all the content and make our stuff powerful but after we got to that point, the game itself felt dead because there wasn't much to do... PvP is shitty and PvE is basically a grind fest with the same enemies but at a higher level. Gaming isn't dead just devs don't innovate the games enough to keep a player hooked to it like they did when they first started.

I agree here. I would say people are looking for Game play innovation rather than the story innovation. I myself am a fan of the story so I would like to see some games in the future that capitalize a little more on that.