Video Games Becoming More and More Mainstream

[lanky316]

Yeah, the mobile landscape does have it's drawbacks but for every "Throne Rush" advertising on social media with Total War screenshots or Tower Defense clone there are loads of other good and different games. Although not really original I've also loved the accessibility of more niche products like board game adaptations. Talisman or Warhammer Quest aren't going to get mainstream release money but it beats paying out £40 for the actual boxed set. Although even they have micro payment elements but I guess that's an overall part of the landscape now. Nobody will top the Blood Bowl system by Cyanide though, where they didn't release DLC, they released whole new games just to add another team/pitch that wasn't compatible with the rest...

[Bobfoc]

Part of the problem relating to the idea of games being as mainstream as films that was brought up in the original, ten-year-old post is that there's more of a barrier to entry in the video game market. Almost anyone can go to a cinema to see a new film with some friends or family members, and most households now own some form of video playback device. Something like The Last of Us, for example, is often heralded as an example of a great interactive narrative experience, but what if you don't own a PS3 or PS4? Tough luck. Similarly, if your PC isn't powerful enough to run the latest processor whipping boy fodder, there's nothing you can do without splashing out money you might well not have. Then you've got all the people who won't play the next Xenoblade game because they don't own a Wii U.

Multiplatform games are becoming more common nowadays, but the dickwaving arms race between major companies still means that certain content is locked away to people who didn't happen to buy the right gaming system. Not only that, but if a game is too difficult for someone to get through, they're unable to access all its content, so when you're looking at something like Bloodborne, you'll need to find someone who both owns a PS4 and is as good at the game as you are to have a meaningful discussion on how the story progresses. Other forms of media have the advantageous quality of requiring the consumer to do nothing but press the "On" button or turn a page every few moments.

[Skummy]

As video games become more and more realistic, of course people will want them.

I know this is going back a decade (jeez...), but I think the exact opposite of this is more likely. The more "realistic" games get, the more alienating they'll be to people who aren't already invested in the medium. First-time "gamers" are far more likely to pick up a Candy Crush or a Tetris than a photo-realistic action game, because their expectations of the latter are that it'll be too complicated.

I think what we're seeing now - and this, to me, is one of the key points that doesn't get talked about around a lot of controversies surrounding "gamers" being dicks - is that the landscape has completely shifted and, consciously or not, the "geeks in their bedroom" crowd are trying to close rank. After decades of complaining that games shouldn't be seen as a nerdy, anti-social hobby, now that they are out in the open and more publicly acknowledged, the "geeks in their bedroom" don't like it. They want it to go back to being their's. And they're doing that by shifting goalposts, by trying to control the narrative, and trying to stake a claim on what it means to be a "gamer", or what constitutes a "game".

Before the Wii and the DS, I don't remember ever having heard the term "casual game". Now it's everywhere, and almost exclusively used as pejorative. But, really, what's the difference between a "casual game" like Candy Crush or Pyramids and a classic puzzle game like Tetris, Columns, Puzzle Bobble? It's the same basic principles, with largely the same audience in mind. But the crowd who seem convinced that they're the "core audience" for "gaming" (which, statistically, they're not) will tell you that Candy Crush "doesn't count", that a mobile game has less worth than a Nintendo game, and that a Nintendo game has less worth than an X-Box One game.

It's been going on for a long time, too - people argued about which was the bigger success or the better console, the X-Box 360 or the PS3. If you pointed out, though, that the Wii had outsold both of them - oh, well, the Wii doesn't count. The Wii's different.

But look at the "casual games" section on Steam. What does casual games mean? Sure, there's the odd "pick up and play" puzzle game that you can kill ten minutes on, but the Lego games are in there. Are the Lego games "casual"? Sure, they're accessible, but they're ludicrously in-depth, in places incredibly difficult and, as a game, not really functionally a million miles away from any number of AAA titles. Train Simulator 2014 is listed under "casual games" on Steam. Visual novels are listed under "casual games". So is Rocksmith. To me, it looks like "casual games" means "games we don't play".

This is a rambling post, but my point is that the problem video games are facing now is that traditional video games - though even that is a way of framing things I have a lot of problems with - are no longer the dominant part of the industry. For every AAA mega-title, there's a new mobile game with millions more players. What constitutes a video game has changed, what constitutes a "gamer" has changed - you can't claim to be a "gamer" as if it's anything remarkable about you when my Mother's playing Candy Crush on her phone, my niece is playing Facebook games, my boss' secretary is playing Solitaire on her PC, or whatever. Everybody plays video games now, just maybe not in the ways that we're used to thinking of as video games. And the industry is struggling to keep up with that, as is the media surrounding it - we're still conditioned to see "video games" as something existing within a very specific set of parameters, and that just isn't the case.

It's no longer about games becoming more "acceptable" to the mainstream, it's about the games industry, and its supporting industries, to recognise how games have already become acceptable, which has largely been sneaking through the back-doors of Facebook and mobile gaming while the conventional "mainstream" - the big budget console games - have been trying to kick down the front door screaming and shouting about what a legitimate art form they are.

Part of the problem relating to the idea of games being as mainstream as films that was brought up in the original, ten-year-old post is that there's more of a barrier to entry in the video game market. Almost anyone can go to a cinema to see a new film with some friends or family members, and most households now own some form of video playback device. Something like The Last of Us, for example, is often heralded as an example of a great interactive narrative experience, but what if you don't own a PS3 or PS4? Tough luck. Similarly, if your PC isn't powerful enough to run the latest processor whipping boy fodder, there's nothing you can do without splashing out money you might well not have. Then you've got all the people who won't play the next Xenoblade game because they don't own a Wii U.

Multiplatform games are becoming more common nowadays, but the dickwaving arms race between major companies still means that certain content is locked away to people who didn't happen to buy the right gaming system. Not only that, but if a game is too difficult for someone to get through, they're unable to access all its content, so when you're looking at something like Bloodborne, you'll need to find someone who both owns a PS4 and is as good at the game as you are to have a meaningful discussion on how the story progresses. Other forms of media have the advantageous quality of requiring the consumer to do nothing but press the "On" button or turn a page every few moments.

I agree with a lot of this. In a way it reminds me of a quote about when TV became a viable medium - it was when it stopped trying to just make radio with pictures. As much as there is a place for great storytelling in games, I think people have been barking up the wrong tree for the past decade at least about how to make video games more "acceptable" - they've been trying to make movies you can play. They've not been embracing the medium for what it is and what makes it unique, they've been trying to turn it into a derivation of something that already exists.

Even if someone made the King Lear of video games, "great story-telling" will never be the major success of gaming. Too many people see a controller as a mess of unfamiliar buttons and get turned away from it - as an aside, that's why the Wii was such a huge success in many ways, it removed that element and reinvented the games controller based on what non-gamers would be comfortable with using, rather than trying to make a better "games controller". Then there's the technical constraints you mentioned - if I want to watch a new Warner Bros movie, I'm not restricted to only being able to watch that movie on a Warner Bros branded TV or DVD player, but that's a real problem in gaming, which is absurd. On top of that, the story to this game might be phenomenal, it might be video gaming's answer to Citizen Kane...but if I get stuck on the first boss and can't get past the first level, I'll never see that story play out. No one's stopping me half an hour into a movie and asking me to complete a task to be able to continue with the story.

Story will never lead to crossover success. Gameplay, capturing the imagination of the public, and mass appeal will. That's why Tetris is the best selling game of all time. That's why Minecraft, Wii Sports, Nintendogs and The Sims are up there.

Going back to the multi-platform title/technical limitations issue, I think we're approaching the end of traditional home consoles. They're just going to cease to be a logical business model in the form they're in now. The PS4 is trying to do too many things, leading to an awful controller design and the clunkiest, least intuitive menu system imaginable, because they're trying to have their finger in too many pies - they still want to be identifiably a Playstation and a games console, but they want to offer you the world as well. Sooner or later something's got to give. And when you're expected to fork out a couple of hundred quid for a new smart-phone, a new tablet, a new smart TV, a smart watch, and whatever else is going to be vying for your leisure money over the next few years, it becomes less and less justifiable to pay £300 or however much for a games console on top of all that. So as mobile gaming improves, the future will be about how to integrate mobile gaming into home gaming, into social media, and into a wider entertainment system - and I think Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have all fumbled around those ideas for a long time without any of them really hitting a home run. And, ultimately, I think whatever the end result of that will be could - and should - spell the end of exclusivity, and lead towards (probably digital-only) software developed to be playable on a single system, or one of two very similar options. It'll be closer to an Apple app versus an Android app than to X-Box version vs. Playstation version.

[gunnar hendershow]

Adding to that Skummy, remote play is in its infancy but it's definitely a technology phone companies (Sony in particular with the Xperia Z3) have been trying to integrate. The biggest hurdle tablets have had to overcome is that they aren't phones, and it's just one more thing to lug around. Laptops before them had the same problem. But a 5'5" screen is just small enough for people to take with them. They have HD screens to watch Netflix or Hulu, cloud storage to have all your pictures and files available anywhere, messaging apps to constantly communicate with people, and they make phone calls. A huge reason Twitter succeeded over countless other social networks in the late 00s took off was because of its mobile support. And that was during the infancy of smartphones in the mainstream consciousness. So you get remote play to become commonplace, you put the game out and people can download it on their phone. But they can play it anywhere. Regardless of whether they're in the comfort of their own home on their big screen TV with their console and controller there, or off on the run with just their phone. It's how things are going to have to go for home gaming in the future, it's going to have to include some mobile element to avoid stagnated growth.

The future of entertainment is very much in the mobile sector, and a lot of the complaints about "freemium" and "pay to win" games are valid. But there are highly creative games that cost very little money available on a phone you already have to own since it's 2015 and smartphones are lifelines.

There will always be a market for at-home gaming, and there will always be a market for PC gaming. Those aren't going away and there will be daring, creative titles on each. On top of that there will be big budget games with a hefty price tag. But there are too many people who can't afford or don't want to pay that price when they already have a smartphone. And developers of games are going to increasingly look closer and closer at mobile gaming as the new market, the one where their work can reach the widest audience. A lot of those games have been made, but as the freemium model is much more lucrative and able to advertise itself much more effectively they haven't gotten a lot of publicity. At some point that will definitely change and the "console era" will be just that.

[Quom]

I don't really know about that. I think if anything it's mobile devices which are over-promising and under-delivering. At the end of the day the key feature to me in a mobile phone is the ability to communicate with people. I carry my phone when I go out purely in case anyone needs to contact me. The ability to play games and music would be great except for the fact that if I do so and am out all day my phone will easily die before I get home leaving me without the feature I actually bought the phone for. On top of that the store on Android is just a mess. Touch gaming is also really shit for a lot of games.

[gunnar hendershow]

Yeah it's still in its infancy. We have to look at this in economic terms. Where is your product going to have the widest available audience? Is it going to be on a console priced at a few hundred dollars, requiring a home internet connection to use as well as a television? Or is it going to be on a smartphone, something you have with you all the time? Kids use their phones like we used our PCs growing up, that's the medium of choice now and as that generation grows up and graduates college over the next few years the market is going to turn to catering to them. And at that point a lot of the technology will be in place as well. It's just, again, simply the way things are headed. What millenials were the internet, post-millenials are to the smartphone.

And the arrival of QI wireless charging is going to make plugging in a thing of the past. Pretty soon you'll just set your phone down on the table at Starbucks and it'll charge up. As time goes that's going to be put in more and more places, just about everywhere already has plug-in spots. It's even easier when you can just put it in a table. We have many tech giants today, but unlike 20 years a big fat zero of them are rushing to make a home video gaming console. That is incredibly telling.

[VerbalPuke]

It's been going on for a long time, too - people argued about which was the bigger success or the better console, the X-Box 360 or the PS3. If you pointed out, though, that the Wii had outsold both of them - oh, well, the Wii doesn't count. The Wii's different.

This statement also makes me wonder, why do people care which console outsells the other? I never understood grown men swearing an allegiance to a particular gaming console as if it was their child. Ya know, cool man, X-Box/PS3/WII is your favorite, but why do you insist on saying one or the other is shit? I don't know, it gets weird to see how wrapped up people get in one particular system. I personally prefer PS3 but I don't really care to tell X-Box or Wii users that their console is shit (on the contrary, all three have their good attributes). Like you said, they act like Wii doesn't count rather than have the attitude of "Good for Wii, I still prefer the other system".

Oh, and hopefully you realize that's not directed at you Skummy, it was a good point that made me think of the weirdos on facebook loling at other peoples preference in video game console.

[Quom]

It's been going on for a long time, too - people argued about which was the bigger success or the better console, the X-Box 360 or the PS3. If you pointed out, though, that the Wii had outsold both of them - oh, well, the Wii doesn't count. The Wii's different.

This statement also makes me wonder, why do people care which console outsells the other? I never understood grown men swearing an allegiance to a particular gaming console as if it was their child. Ya know, cool man, X-Box/PS3/WII is your favorite, but why do you insist on saying one or the other is shit? I don't know, it gets weird to see how wrapped up people get in one particular system. I personally prefer PS3 but I don't really care to tell X-Box or Wii users that their console is shit (on the contrary, all three have their good attributes). Like you said, they act like Wii doesn't count rather than have the attitude of "Good for Wii, I still prefer the other system".

Oh, and hopefully you realize that's not directed at you Skummy, it was a good point that made me think of the weirdos on facebook loling at other peoples preference in video game console.

For the same reason people compare/favour brands of cars, or phones, or sports teams or loads of other stuff which they deride others for not following.

[Skummy]

Yeah, it's a tribal thing that happens to almost any product with a close competitor, but in gaming the companies involved definitely encouraged it, particularly going back to Sega and Nintendo, where Sega's advertising a lot of the time was genuinely just taking pot-shots at Nintendo throughout. It's got a little subtle since then, but it's still a big part of the marketing for Sony and Microsoft.

Also, if you're going to put down a few hundred pounds on a product, you're going to need to start convincing yourself you made the right decision.

[lanky316]

It fascinates me that this school playground thing carries on well into adulthood. You can still see forums dedicated to people arguing over whether the Spectrum or C64 were better (everyone knows the Amstrad was shit ) or which conversion of an 80s game was best and it remains now through the generations. The outright hostility to the notion of someone buying item A or B is always baffling to see coming from someone over the age of 8.

[Bobfoc]

The school playground thing is what the Internet is built around. Being aggressive about your subjective opinion is what online discussions are all about. Your choice of the word "playground" is particularly appropriate because children often act pugnaciously around other people because they probably won't get any meaningful punishment, just as people insult others online because the threat of real consequences aren't apparent. Judging people for which games console they play, what music they listen to or which books they read is, of course, silly and juvenile, but "silly and juvenile" would describe many online forums.

[peteypirahna]

This statement also makes me wonder, why do people care which console outsells the other?

It's fairly simple actually, games cost a lot to make and they cost a fair bit to port over or develop versions across multiple platforms. A system selling less than another system means that developers will spend less time polishing it when they could dedicate resources more to the one with the higher market share. It happened frequently at the start of the last gen with the Xbox 360 and PS3 wars because the 360 was easier to develop for and was selling more so it was easier to develop for the 360 first and then port it over and iron out the cracks, leading to inferior PS3 ports (Red Dead Redemption, Skyrim, New Vegas etc.)

I mean just look at the Wii U, it's a great console with some pretty good first party games but because it's not selling so good publishers are wary of porting multiplats to it, a game without some of the latest games (like watch_dogs) coming out means that it becomes a 'secondary' console and not someone's 'priority' console, so sales are even worse and leads to less games being developed.

Nobody wants to buy a console and then realise they've bought a dud, especially when most console purchases at the start are based on potential rather than actual quality, which can lead to some amazing consoles having no games and some terrible consoles selling a truckload and having the best exclusives.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

Who needs videogames when you can have a stick, a cup and a ball. These youth today with their ADHD and their thumbs.