Its not the same anymore

I'm currenlyt playing through AC:Black Flag and loving it. First game I've played for a while that's got me waiting to come home and do some gaming. There's so much to do in single player, not even tried multiplayer.

Tomb raider is another great game, really enjoyed completing that.

Just thought I'd add I love Goldenye, still got my n64 and occasionally load it up fir a couple of hours :D
 
I went back to my roots recently after getting fed up with Planteside 2, Battlefield etc

Clocked up 30 hours of Quake Live over the last 2 weeks, absolutely loving it.
 
I agree it's not the same for those who have been playing for a long time, I remember the first game I tried to run on my crappy Cyrix 300 was the demo of the original Tombraider back in 1996 & it stuttered & froze up all the time but bit by bit I climbed up to the tower & got attacked by Crows & Tigers:p
First full game was Jedi Knight Dark forces & spent hours playing it & then Quake after I upgraded the PC to the first of the Geforce cards to come out. Now I still enjoy playing but it's not the same thrill anymore, looking forward to Farcry4 amongst others however :D
 
^^ Jedi Knight Dark forces was my first PC game too :)

I completely agree OP. I used to love the day when we used to get lots of fantastic games released all the time (almost too many to play at times). There are none that I am looking forward to at the moment and very few that give me enough of a thrill to get into. So many titles that I would love to see return, but would probably get massively dumbed down :(. Maybe it is just my age?
 
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Definitely agree, it's not the same really, it's rare I get into a game that much I can sit hours in front of a screen playing it. Though occasionally one will come along and grab me, but then eventually will get bored and keep moving between games again.
 
You lot sound like people who say. "All music now is crap, the 80s was amazing."

Nope you just remember the best bits.

Plus it's your expectations that have risen not games getting more rubbish, I mean if golden eye was released now you would all be saying "damn that game is linear". Or tomb raider would be "there are only 1 or 2 enemies at a time on screen and they are only animals... So lame.". There are plenty class games out there AAA and indie, they just don't hold up to the first exciting experience you had as viewed through rose tinted glasses

You
 
You lot sound like people who say. "All music now is crap, the 80s was amazing."

Nope you just remember the best bits.

Plus it's your expectations that have risen not games getting more rubbish, I mean if golden eye was released now you would all be saying "damn that game is linear". Or tomb raider would be "there are only 1 or 2 enemies at a time on screen and they are only animals... So lame.". There are plenty class games out there AAA and indie, they just don't hold up to the first exciting experience you had as viewed through rose tinted glasses

You

Expectations haven't risen, just stayed the same. There was a time where innovation was king, when a new game would come out and you'd think "Wow, that's amazing" which was something which you'd never seen before. What is gaming now? A new Assassins Creed? A new CoD every year? Where's the innovation? Oh they added a dog, oh they have power suits - we didn't see that already 5 years ago. Innovation is dying, but not because we've hit a wall with it, there's lots more you can get out of gaming, companies just won't do it, they would rather stick to taking assets from previous games, sticking to a tried and tested formula to maximise profits, and that's what gaming is now, profit, profit, profit. Basically "innovation" now is improving the graphics of a game and including some free DLC. The ONLY companies seemingly trying to innovate, are Indie companies, it's obvious why, because they need a hook to reel people in, something different, but that's what gaming needs, the big companies won't even bother to attempt it because that will actually take time, effort, and eat into profit.

People used to love making games for the enjoyment of making games, now it's all about the money, which is a sign that the gaming culture has truly changed from what it used to be, you can tell with the popularity of freemium and in-game purchases what gaming really has become now. The days have gone from when you bought a game, you actually got the entire game, now it's all pre-order bonuses & day 1 DLC, things so they get as much money as possible. Do you honestly think this is an improvement over what gaming used to be?
 
There are plenty class games out there AAA and indie, they just don't hold up to the first exciting experience you had as viewed through rose tinted glasses

You

Nope.

I go back to the best arena shooter of all time because there is nothing like it nowadays. Nothing to do with rose tinted glasses, the game is just plain better than anything similar today.
 
.... The days have gone from when you bought a game, you actually got the entire game, now it's all pre-order bonuses & day 1 DLC, things so they get as much money as possible. Do you honestly think this is an improvement over what gaming used to be?

Have to say that ruins games for me.
 
Expectations haven't risen, just stayed the same. There was a time where innovation was king, when a new game would come out and you'd think "Wow, that's amazing" which was something which you'd never seen before. What is gaming now? A new Assassins Creed? A new CoD every year? Where's the innovation? Oh they added a dog, oh they have power suits - we didn't see that already 5 years ago. Innovation is dying, but not because we've hit a wall with it, there's lots more you can get out of gaming, companies just won't do it, they would rather stick to taking assets from previous games, sticking to a tried and tested formula to maximise profits, and that's what gaming is now, profit, profit, profit. Basically "innovation" now is improving the graphics of a game and including some free DLC. The ONLY companies seemingly trying to innovate, are Indie companies, it's obvious why, because they need a hook to reel people in, something different, but that's what gaming needs, the big companies won't even bother to attempt it because that will actually take time, effort, and eat into profit.

People used to love making games for the enjoyment of making games, now it's all about the money, which is a sign that the gaming culture has truly changed from what it used to be, you can tell with the popularity of freemium and in-game purchases what gaming really has become now. The days have gone from when you bought a game, you actually got the entire game, now it's all pre-order bonuses & day 1 DLC, things so they get as much money as possible. Do you honestly think this is an improvement over what gaming used to be?

Of course expectations have been raised, you can't watch the same car chase 5 times in a row and it still give you the same thrill, it has to be bigger, better, more clever for that level of emotion to be engaged again. You know its true or you would be still playing with a baby rattle, because once, that was the most amazing thing you ever saw and it held your attention for hours. You can only have a first time ONCE.

Saying that the games you mention are treadmill, but only to people who have played the previous versions. Don't buy them, its simple. There have been rehashed games since the beginning. Piles of Unreal Tournaments and the FPS arena glut of the early 2000s. You have to engage brain at some point and take responsibility for what you are buying.

Some my favourite games of all time have come out in the past few years. Witcher 2, Last of Us, the new tomb raider, Starcraft 2 just a handfull of the games that had me hooked until the end not to mention the indie games.

There always has and always will be bad, boring, treadmill games. There were good games then and there are good games now. Nothing has gone downhill.
 
I have to say there has only been half a dozen games or so that have made me go wow and get excited about gaming.

I sometimes end up in a rut and flit from one game to another not really enjoying them.

Top ones for me have to be Goldeneye N64, Halo 1 xbox, cs1.6 pc, WoW pc and AOE2 pc. I have enjoyed some other games such as Rust, the new Tomb Raider and as previously mentioned AC:Black Flag just to name a few but they haven't excited me as much as the others.

I must say the games that are coming out on a yearly basis such as CoD, bf4 etc are stagnating big time for me. I don't think i'll be buying any of those on release again. And you only get 20% of a game these days for your money, they release the rest over a 12 month period as 'DLC' and expect you to pay more for it. I'm glad i haven't played the other AC games otherwise i probably would have felt the same about black flag.
 
Expectations haven't risen, just stayed the same. There was a time where innovation was king, when a new game would come out and you'd think "Wow, that's amazing" which was something which you'd never seen before. What is gaming now? A new Assassins Creed? A new CoD every year? Where's the innovation? Oh they added a dog, oh they have power suits - we didn't see that already 5 years ago. Innovation is dying, but not because we've hit a wall with it, there's lots more you can get out of gaming, companies just won't do it, they would rather stick to taking assets from previous games, sticking to a tried and tested formula to maximise profits, and that's what gaming is now, profit, profit, profit. Basically "innovation" now is improving the graphics of a game and including some free DLC. The ONLY companies seemingly trying to innovate, are Indie companies, it's obvious why, because they need a hook to reel people in, something different, but that's what gaming needs, the big companies won't even bother to attempt it because that will actually take time, effort, and eat into profit.

Dark Souls
Divinity Original Sin
Minecraft
Europa Universalis IV
World of Tanks
Dota 2, LoL
CS:GO
The Witcher
Borderlands
Tribes: Ascend
XCOM
Amnesia
FTL
Sins of a Solar Empire

Just a handful of games, of the top of my head, from the last few years. You've got indies, evil publishers, legendary developers or unknown ones, all in that list. You've got high quality games offering anything from text adventures to amazing graphics and ,at the same time, brilliant gameplay, as well as plenty of innovation. I've been a PC gamer since the early 90s, the industry has never been healthier, it has never offered so many quality products that cover such wide range of preferences.


People used to love making games for the enjoyment of making games, now it's all about the money, which is a sign that the gaming culture has truly changed from what it used to be, you can tell with the popularity of freemium and in-game purchases what gaming really has become now. The days have gone from when you bought a game, you actually got the entire game, now it's all pre-order bonuses & day 1 DLC, things so they get as much money as possible. Do you honestly think this is an improvement over what gaming used to be?

Things change, yes. As industries grow, money become ever more important, yes. But that doesn't mean games are not what they used to, they are much better and constantly evolving. What we play now is great, I can't even imagine what we'll play in 10 years.

It's just that this hobby, gaming, isn't for anyone of any age. You've grown out of it, I haven't and never will, to each his own. ;)
 
Of course expectations have been raised, you can't watch the same car chase 5 times in a row and it still give you the same thrill, it has to be bigger, better, more clever for that level of emotion to be engaged again. You know its true or you would be still playing with a baby rattle, because once, that was the most amazing thing you ever saw and it held your attention for hours. You can only have a first time ONCE.

Saying that the games you mention are treadmill, but only to people who have played the previous versions. Don't buy them, its simple. There have been rehashed games since the beginning. Piles of Unreal Tournaments and the FPS arena glut of the early 2000s. You have to engage brain at some point and take responsibility for what you are buying.

Some my favourite games of all time have come out in the past few years. Witcher 2, Last of Us, the new tomb raider, Starcraft 2 just a handfull of the games that had me hooked until the end not to mention the indie games.

There always has and always will be bad, boring, treadmill games. There were good games then and there are good games now. Nothing has gone downhill.

But that's not a rise in expectation, it's a relative progression. My expectation of playing an RPG today, is the same as what it was years ago, engaging story, enjoyable dialogue and good game play. For example if I played a 2D isometric game years ago, you can argue now-a-days my expectation has risen because I want a game to have 3D graphics, but at that time 2D graphics was normal, like-wise now the expectation is that the game will have 3D graphics because now that's normal, but there is no rise in expectation, it's relative to the technology available at the time.

What we have now is a slump, there is still a rise in technological progression, but not a rise in innovation, we have the same types of games from years ago with no new features or selling points, it's a big surprise when there's something new brought to the table, some companies will push new features to bring new life into a genre (simple things like destruction in Battlefield), but the majority will not, CoD today is essentially the same as it was when MW1 was released, which was 2007. It's coming on to 7 years, and one of the biggest selling games is still the same as it was back then.

I totally agree that there are always gems which come out, Last of Us is a personal favourite of mine, but the norm now is to just take what a company knows sells, and pump out as much of it as possible, Nintendo are known for reusing the same popular characters, but the games still feel fresh, they don't feel like the same game you've played before, you don't play Windwaker and feel like it's a clone of Ocarina of Time.

I don't have a problem with buying popular games like CoD, so long as it is something new and exciting which will engage me, but it never happens, it's always the same.
 
Is playing SP by yourself not gaming then?

it is but limited in fun.

with others even bad games can be better than the best single player. mp is gaming and extends the variety you can have and fun.

dont be scared get a mic join a group and have fun. thats what keeps gaming fresh.

i dont even play single player games :p
 
Aaaagh what has this thread started? i am in my early 40's and also become disillusioned with today's games. Even tonight I felt no interest in DOTA2, Borderlands 2 or even Rome Total War 2 (heavily modded). So I ended up watching "The Patriot" on tv and now reinstalling Empire: Total War... Damn you Middlelife Crisis!
 
it is but limited in fun.

with others even bad games can be better than the best single player. mp is gaming and extends the variety you can have and fun.

dont be scared get a mic join a group and have fun. thats what keeps gaming fresh.

i dont even play single player games :p

Well, thanks for breaking it down for me.
I've been using a mic in online multiplayer, including managing racing leagues for quite a few years now, so don't worry about my fear of strangers :p

You're missing out on some very good stuff if you don't play any single player games. Shame...
 
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