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Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Warren Castille - 04-28-2015

I'm enjoying the discussion about the shift in gaming demographics and the concept of objective quality shifting away. Can we continue that discussion here?

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - OttoVann - 04-28-2015

I think basing the idea that BF5 is objectively worse than BF4 is suspect when using metacritic scores because it is a very common and borderline acceptable practice to nuke metacritic scores with bad reviews when the game plays well but online service is disrupted or down.

I also find it suspect that because adults spend more money than minors on videogames, that videogames aren't primarily driven and marketed to them and that a lot of games are made today with that demographic in mind.

I see no problem with 31 year olds spending more money on kids than 12 year olds on average, because they are buying games for said 12 year olds.

Does any of this make sense?

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Kellach Woods - 04-28-2015

BF5 is out?

I thought Hardline wasn't 5.

Also, most of the studies show play times being higher among the 30's crowd than the teens crowd.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Wymsical - 04-28-2015

I guess that depends on what you consider quality. I think a significant portion of the changes can be attributed to the age of gamers changing and the people targeted slowly widening. For example, a common complaint that I see is how much more difficult all games used to be and how a more 'accelerated' experience is common now. To be fair, 'easy' is simpler to make but I also think the aging gaming population is partially to blame as well; some of us simply don't have as much time anymore and we're buying games that let us take things at our own pace with more progress/success rather than agonizing over that nearly-impossible last level for hours.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - OttoVann - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:06 PM)Kellach Woods Wrote: BF5 is out?

I thought Hardline wasn't 5.

Also, most of the studies show play times being higher among the 30's crowd than the teens crowd.

Isnt BF5 the one that had a ton of launch issues?

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Kellach Woods - 04-28-2015

The "easy" part is also a shift in the intended goal of the game.
Most of the early console games were essentially arcade ports which essentially required people to put in coins in order to be profitable. If it wasn't profitable, no operator would buy it. Once that part of gaming essentially got whisked away, the main reason for the difficulty (dying = money) left as well.

Now (at least single player), games are about selling an experience, and difficulty often goes against that.

* * *

Nah, that was 4 - had a ton of launch issues. Hardline's launch was smoother but I think less people were interested in it since it was essentially "COPS IN TANKS AND ROBBERS IN APCS" with no real thought as to what that actually means.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Warren Castille - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:05 PM)OttoVann Wrote: I think basing the idea that BF5 is objectively worse than BF4 is suspect when using metacritic scores because it is a very common and borderline acceptable practice to nuke metacritic scores with bad reviews when the game plays well but online service is disrupted or down.

I also find it suspect that because adults spend more money than minors on videogames, that videogames aren't primarily driven and marketed to them and that a lot of games are made today with that demographic in mind.

I see no problem with 31 year olds spending more money on kids than 12 year olds on average, because they are buying games for said 12 year olds.

Does any of this make sense?

I follow. Let me play Devil's Advocate.

If a game comes out and is a solid A (Let's say it's a 90/100), people will play it and enjoy it. It's a good game, memorable, the sort of game you recommend when people buy the system it's on. "Man, you've gotta buy Save the Princess Happy Smile. It's genre-defining!"

It gets a sequel a year later. It's more of the same - still solid, but not a refreshing new game like the original was. Is that game better or worse than the original? How do you define that? Something like Portal comes out and completely bends how you look at first person puzzle navigation. Portal 2 does the same exact stuff as the first game, just differently. So... Is Portal 1 "better" objectively? All Portal 2 did was copy it. It could have been an expansion pack. How do you determine what's worth a new score or not?

Battlefield games (and CoD specifically, but that's been alleviated a little in recent years) are notorious for being Same Game, New Paint. It's the problem Madden has every year; It's last year's model with some new gimmicks, for better or worse (FIRST PERSON FOOTBALL! QB VISION CONE!). Is Madden 2015 better than Madden 2005? They're basically the same, barring rosters and graphics.

As for 31 year olds buying their kids video games: I'm not so sure about that. If that 31 year old had a kid right as they turned 21 that kid is 10. I know the reputation Xbox Live has, but I don't think there's that many 10 year olds buying the New Hotness every year. In my opinion it's a lot more likely that the kids who grew up playing their NES and SNES and Genesis and Playstations just kept at the hobby. The same people I would play games with after school are still playing games now, after all.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Mercer - 04-28-2015

Happy to, Warren. So the common misconception is that video games have ever been a children's 'toy'. Dating back to the late 70s and early 80s, video games have always been a predominately adult activity. It may not seem that way the average gamer today, as when we were born the NES had just come out and the market was just recovering from the Video Game Crash.

What has changed is the astronomical increase to video game development. This fancy graph from 2013 does an excellent job of showing the exponential growth of game design cost:

[Image: Factor_5_dev_costs.jpg]

Edit: Image at most post. 

Ok, so the other part of this is the publisher's taking a cut ontop of development costs. Afterall, publishers are the ones taking the risk of marketing and manufacturing the game. In the last five years, a new clause has come up in that relationship, that if a game doesn't hit a metacritic value then the developer earns even less money from the publisher.

Metacritic is a very important part of today's developer culture because of the importance common gamers place in critic scores. A low quality game drops sales and lowers the pay out per game sold for the developer.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Desu Nee - 04-28-2015

One thing Yahtzee said and I agree is that, to survive in the AAA Industry, you either make a bland, grey mass of genres easily swallowed by anyone, AKA Call of Duty, or you make something niche that is so good that you become the House name of sorts, like FROM Software.

It's interesting to see these things, sometimes I actually wonder if Dark Souls will become a sub-genre on itself.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Desu Nee - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:19 PM)Oswin Wrote: Happy to, Warren. So the common misconception is that video games have ever been a children's 'toy'. Dating back to the late 70s and early 80s, video games have always been a predominately adult activity. It may not seem that way the average gamer today, as when we were born the NES had just come out and the market was just recovering from the Video Game Crash.

What has changed is the astronomical increase to video game development. This fancy graph from 2013 does an excellent job of showing the exponential growth of game design cost:

[Image: Factor_5_dev_costs.jpg]

Edit: Image at most post. 

Ok, so the other part of this is the publisher's taking a cut ontop of development costs. Afterall, publishers are the ones taking the risk of marketing and manufacturing the game. In the last five years, a new clause has come up in that relationship, that if a game doesn't hit a metacritic value then the developer earns even less money from the publisher.

Metacritic is a very important part of today's developer culture because of the importance common gamers place in critic scores. A low quality game drops sales and lowers the pay out per game sold for the developer.
Is the dollar value fixed? There is lots of variables, like inflation and modern coin value there...

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Warren Castille - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:21 PM)Desu Nee Wrote: It's interesting to see these things, sometimes I actually wonder if Dark Souls will become a sub-genre on itself.

FROM has that on lockdown at the moment, though Lords of the Fallen doesn't immediately come to mind.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Desu Nee - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:24 PM)Warren Castille Wrote:
(04-28-2015, 07:21 PM)Desu Nee Wrote: It's interesting to see these things, sometimes I actually wonder if Dark Souls will become a sub-genre on itself.

FROM has that on lockdown at the moment, though Lords of the Fallen doesn't immediately come to mind.
LoF was less of trying on the genre and more like a real rip-off to be fair. I've played it, and just felt like I was playing a more buggy, slighty faster paced Dark Souls II. The world and scenarios too ain't something to write home about.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Mercer - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:22 PM)Desu Nee Wrote:
(04-28-2015, 07:19 PM)Oswin Wrote: Happy to, Warren. So the common misconception is that video games have ever been a children's 'toy'. Dating back to the late 70s and early 80s, video games have always been a predominately adult activity. It may not seem that way the average gamer today, as when we were born the NES had just come out and the market was just recovering from the Video Game Crash.

What has changed is the astronomical increase to video game development. This fancy graph from 2013 does an excellent job of showing the exponential growth of game design cost:

[Image: Factor_5_dev_costs.jpg]

Edit: Image at most post. 

Ok, so the other part of this is the publisher's taking a cut ontop of development costs. Afterall, publishers are the ones taking the risk of marketing and manufacturing the game. In the last five years, a new clause has come up in that relationship, that if a game doesn't hit a metacritic value then the developer earns even less money from the publisher.

Metacritic is a very important part of today's developer culture because of the importance common gamers place in critic scores. A low quality game drops sales and lowers the pay out per game sold for the developer.
Is the dollar value fixed? There is lots of variables, like inflation and modern coin value there...

Dollar value is not fixed but according to inflation is about a 120% decrease in the value of a dollar. In 1985 $20 would equal $43.89 in 2015. This does in no way explain the the astronomical rise in development cost. Source - Inflation Calculator

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Warren Castille - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:26 PM)Desu Nee Wrote:
(04-28-2015, 07:24 PM)Warren Castille Wrote:
(04-28-2015, 07:21 PM)Desu Nee Wrote: It's interesting to see these things, sometimes I actually wonder if Dark Souls will become a sub-genre on itself.

FROM has that on lockdown at the moment, though Lords of the Fallen doesn't immediately come to mind.
LoF was less of trying on the genre and more like a real rip-off to be fair. I've played it, and just felt like I was playing a more buggy, slighty faster paced Dark Souls II. The world and scenarios too ain't something to write home about.

Oh, I know. I'm just saying that there are folks who've noticed.

RE: Video Games, Quality thereof and You - Mercer - 04-28-2015

(04-28-2015, 07:07 PM)Wymsical Wrote: I guess that depends on what you consider quality. I think a significant portion of the changes can be attributed to the age of gamers changing and the people targeted slowly widening. For example, a common complaint that I see is how much more difficult all games used to be and how a more 'accelerated' experience is common now. To be fair, 'easy' is simpler to make but I also think the aging gaming population is partially to blame as well; some of us simply don't have as much time anymore and we're buying games that let us take things at our own pace with more progress/success rather than agonizing over that nearly-impossible last level for hours.
This is a side effect of rising developmental costs. Games need to be more approachable to read a wider range of audiences. This coined the now famous term "We want the CoD audience".