Your views of the future of gaming?

[Com Fox]

I decided to make a thread based on the future of gaming.

My thoughts as of 04/07/13;

Sony will likely be in the money wagon after Microsoft screwed over the Xbox One. Even thougk the Xbox One is doing a DRM U-Turn, I still think it won't sell well as people have lost hope of Microsoft and some of my friends (who are Microsoft lovers) told me they are still jumping ship to Sony.

The Wii U is in deep trouble, it has been reported that the sales have increased due to the Xbox One but I don't think it is enough, I reckon it is a shame because after E3 2013, I reckon the Wii U is the better looking console as the games they showed looked amazing. People have said this'll be the end of Nintendo but I disagree, Nintendo does have the handheld gaming war title for a very long time and I reckon they deserved it, they are great to play. I don't think Nintendo will go down though for 2 reasons.
1. They'll likely learn from their mistakes and make a better console.
2. If they do move out of the home console market I think they will just stick to handheld gaming.

With the 8th-gen upon us, I have to say, what happened?
During the Nintendo and Sega rivalry, the fans wanted Bragging rights over each other and I thougt all there reasons were reasonable as each companys consoles had a different experience (well for me at least). Now, I can't see what the argument is about anymore as the Xbox and PS consoles feel similar to me and the exclusive games on the PS are similar to the ones on the Xbox (but not all) (Don't get me wrong I still like Sony), disagree if you want but I can't feel a different experience on either console, Nintedo is still having different experience on their consokes but it feels like it is shrinking. Now, the companys are trying to get the most power over another and people have been telling me bigger hardware means it'll have better games but I have to say, NO. Sure it'll means developers will get much more out of there games but with my favourite games of all time, 90% of them were in the 6th-gen or below. Now the games don't have the spark compared to previous gen game though there were exceptions (Pokemon Black for example) and if this keeps up, the entertainment value will lack,IMO.

Graphics wise, I can't see the big deal about it. The jump of the looks for 6th gen was huge but games now don't have much difference, sure there is HD but some SD games have still looked better to my eyes (New Super Mario Bros. 2 final boss, Mario Sunshine, Ratchet and Clank 3, Mario Kart Wii, Wind Waker etc.)
and 8th gen doesn't look any better.

You'll likely disagree with me but I am open to hear your thought and I would love to hear your thoughts on the future of gaming,

 

[Sharky.]

Glorious PC gaming master race.

That is all.

 

[Com Fox]

Glorious PC gaming master race.

That is all.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

Hard to take the Op serious with mentions of games like Pokemon and Mario.
If Gt4 looks better to your eyes than GT5 or Forza 2+ then you either need a new tv or need to get your eyes checked.

 

[Com Fox]

I didn't mean to type up GT4 , I don't know why I typed that up .

 

[Akira GT]

I'm not a fan of how gaming is becoming integrated with social media and how people will only be able to access some features of the game using a smartphone or tablet. It just seems unnecessary and pointless to me.

I find it weird that at E3 Sony were applauded on their DRM policies not being changed, i'm glad that they weren't changed but getting praise for doing nothing is slightly worrying. I'm glad they didn't use DRM like MS planned to but I think in another few years it will be all for nothing as most people with decent internet will probably just download games (If Sony and MS keep the same prices as retailers).

I do hope that consoles don't die off during the rise of mobile gaming because using a virtual controller on a screen is a horrible experience and playing games like GTA III on a phone/tablet doesn't feel right to me.

 

[sesselpupser]

I do hope that consoles don't die off during the rise of mobile gaming because using a virtual controller on a screen is a horrible experience and playing games like GTA III on a phone/tablet doesn't feel right to me.

You're in luck, Apple have added gamepad support in iOS7. Some games and iOS hardware have always supported controllers but there has never been a standard like HID or XID for the platform, this support will change that so you could conceivably have a controller case for an iPhone. That could be pretty big.


I could write a huge post about how I feel gaming will go, it's all pretty obvious stuff but I'll write it up later when I'm not on my phone. A virtual keyboard on a screen is a horrible experience!

 

[Samus]

As far as Nintendo goes they're just relying on the same IPs for too long. How many Mario games have their been now? 50? Yes I know the name is like the Hulk Hogan of gaming but like Hulk Hogan he's past his best and people want something new.

All of the consoles rely on certain IPs for a while but eventually they move on, Nintendo don't seem to. They have the diehard fans waiting for the next Mario or Zelda but sales of Wii U seem to suggest the general gaming world want new ideas.


A selection of exclusive Wii U games:

Game & Wario
Mario Kart 8
Mario & Sonic At the Sochi Olympics
New Super Mario Bros U
New Super Luigi U
Super Mario 3D World
Yarn Yoshi

Great if you still like Mario games I guess.

 

[Joel]

Well the irony is that the internet gamer groupthink tries to shame anyone who admits they even kinda like Call of Duty games because "they're all the same", yet Mario and Nintendo are loved and revered.

 

[Luminis]

Glorious PC gaming master race.

That is all.

Ain't that the truth. Speaking of which, I'm eager to see AMD's new Radeon series. Can't quite get myself to seriously look into the 780 at the moment.

On topic: Gaming's not gonna change much. We're just out of the somewhat defining era during which companies discovered the casual market, during which Call of Duty became a roll model for AAA games, during which micro transactions became the thing and during which Steam matured from a piece of crap to a nice environment to game in.

That's not gonna change, not much, at least. Sony will soon start to milk their customers once their "good guy" reputation has been solidified, thanks to MS shooting themselves in the foot. Just wait and see. Aside from that, more Call of Duty clones, more Assassin's Creed, more Halo, more games that get millions of Dollars thrown at them that aren't really worth it, in terms of gameplay.

Meanwhile, the F2P market will grow further on the PC, thanks to games like Planet Side 2 and especially League of Legends being as successful as they are. Console manufacturers will try to swathe that trend and will continue to try and charge as much as they can for their games. I foresee project ten dollars turning into project twenty dollars for the upcoming generation, as companies will want to see whether they can get away of bumping the prices for their games up to eighty bucks a pop.

Nintendo... Well, they'll still be Nintendo, doing their own thing with handhelds and stuff. Pokémon, Mario, Zelda, they'll just keep pushing out games of their best known IPs. And whether those are actually any good or not (more likely than not, most of them won't be that good), they'll sell well enough to ensure that Nintendo can keep its head above water, that's for sure. Although, I'd think that, in the long run, they'll start to mostly provide games for mobile gaming devices, both Android and iOS and what not. Smartphones will become even more prevalent soon, and with them, mobile gaming. This'll bring about the end of handheld gaming consoles, aside from the enthusiast's market. Which, I think, isn't exactly the casual market Nintendo has been aiming for. That's gotta be nice for companies like Zynga.

Yeah, pretty much a dystopian future I'm imagining right now, but that's the conclusion I come to by assuming that the current trends are here to stay.

Luckily, though, there are at least some games that'll see me through the next few years. Project CARS will take the place of Gran Turismo and Forza Motorsport for me, and I'll still have the Souls series to keep me company, thankfully. It has been said by a lot of gaming journalists lately, I believe, but this is the best time to switch to PC gaming, in my opinion. It's not exactly a gaming nirvana either (and expensive, to boot), but it is the best option, in my opinion. At least when compared to the console market, which'll be consumed by micro transactions, Call of Duty clones and casual games.

/edit:
Forgot about the social media hype. Yeah, there's that, as well. Everyone wants a slice of Facebook's success, so that'll surely be a big thing in the future as well. Single player games will probably die out more and more.

 

[kennylmao]

Future of gaming will be more kids who play casual games on their smartphones, tablets, Facebook and call themselves 'gamers'.

I've one thing to say to them, "Go kill yourselves".

That's my pessimistic view on things.

EDIT: I was being an idiot.

 

[Joel]

Yeah, because Angry Birds is going to stop developers from churning out AAA games that sell millions of copies at 60 bucks each.

That's a big part of the issue right there, gaming is becoming partisan and it's just full of genre/platform elitists.

 

[niky]

Future of gaming will be more kids who play casual games on their smartphones, tablets, Facebook and call themselves 'gamers'.

I've one thing to say to them, "Go kill yourselves".

That's my pessimistic view on things.

So what?

What defines a gamer? The most expensive toys and equipment, or the fact that they simply game?

Such an elitist attitude is uncalled for, and appalling for a long-time member on a gaming board with so many members who don't play FPS's, RTS's or any of the traditional "gamer" fodder.

Gaming is such a wide field. You have social MMORPGs that appeal to a huge demographic of non-traditional gamers. You have casual games for the pick-up-and-play crowd. You have realistic racing/flight controls/rigs and games that bring in older non-gamers and car/plane enthusiasts who don't play anything else. And then you have the long-time gamers who play very specific subsets of games (or even single games) and nothing else.

And even in that small subset of "Casual" tablet games, you have RPGs, traditional strategy games, board/strategy games, reflex/skill games as challenging as the best of the 80's, and even some good FPS's and adventure games.

People who play on tablets have just as much right to call themselves gamers as you do. Perhaps even more, as these are the people whose continued patronage and purchasing decisions are driving the development of a new breed of grassroots games. A refreshing change from big-budget, big-priced PC and console wars where many developers are too damn scared to try anything novel or different... instead churning out a dozen sequels of their main titles, or clones of other people's titles, and where 99% of the games on the market can be pigeonholed into musty old categories.

-

If you think people who don't share your "gamer" tastes deserve to die, one wonders why you're still on GTPlanet. Because a hell of a lot of us aren't your typical Halo/NBA2k13/GTA crowd. 👎

 

[kennylmao]

I am sorry, I was being an idiot. 👎

I just feel sad of the overall trend of most young people nowadays who play games on their daddy's iPad or mommy's tablet and they're most probably never gonna experience what it's like to play a Gameboy or a PSOne or just about any other dedicated gaming device and I'm afraid that this will eventually lead to the death of the Nintendo DS, Playstation and Xbox.

I just see a line dividing the traditional PC, console, dedicated handheld gaming device and the new smartphone, tablet.

I guess I'm just bad at coping with change.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

Personally I would not consider a phone for a gaming device. I mean it is ok to have some games on a phone and play them while setting in a waiting room or something but beyond that it has no appeal to me at all. The screen is far to small and they are very limited functionally, likewise gaming on a tablet does not interest me at all.

Consoles are ok and there are some good exclusive games out there for them so I have a few consoles. Never be a fan boy of any of them and have purchased which ever had the game(s) I wanted at the time. The list would be Atari 2600, 5200, NES, Sega Genesis, Saturn, PS1, PS2, N64, Xbox 360, PS3. I still have several of them in good working order.

By far my preferred medium for gaming is the PC and if a few of the exclusives were available for a PC then I would not have bought any of the consoles after the PC went to VGA graphics.

Even back in the early days of consoles I had picked up a 64C computer and that was a much better gaming device than any console on the market at the time not to mention that the games were cheaper for it.

 

[niky]

I guess I'm just bad at coping with change.

Mind you, I don't even like most smartphone games.

But I've seen what can be accomplished if you do it right.

Check this out:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/collection/promotion_3000069_best_games

Aside from the obvious shooter and racer, the list is reminiscent of games that we used to play back in the 90's, light-hearted comedy games, sur-realist games and weird funky riffs like the stuff we had to import from Japan... all co-existing and thriving in an environment where multi-million dollar budgets are not necessary, and the low price and huge userbase ensures steady profits, allowing them to churn out more quirky games.

An Android tablet costs almost nothing. The games sometimes actually cost nothing. Consoles cost an arm-and-a-leg, and games cost almost as much... when you're buying expensive games, buyer's remorse sets in pretty quickly if you get a dud. And duds can bankrupt a company.

With mobiles, if you don't like it, you've only lost a few bucks. Delete the app and get another one.

It's this easy accessibility that may someday make the current traditional console formula.

 

[Joel]

It is an interesting comparison. Mobile gaming seems to be the platform with the most diverse library. Lots of very different games and genres, console and PC gaming tends to more derivative of established genres and games.

I think it's mostly because of the costs involved for developing a mobile game vs a console or PC game. If a mobile game is a flop, it really isn't a huge deal, just churn out the next game and hope it's a hit. If a console/PC game is a flop, a developer and publisher are out millions of dollars, so we get a "New" Super Mario Bros. on every console and handheld, and dozens of Call of Duty sequels and clones because as Niky said, people are wary of buyer's remorse with games retailing at $60.

 

[Com Fox]

As far as Nintendo goes they're just relying on the same IPs for too long. How many Mario games have their been now? 50? Yes I know the name is like the Hulk Hogan of gaming but like Hulk Hogan he's past his best and people want something new.

All of the consoles rely on certain IPs for a while but eventually they move on, Nintendo don't seem to. They have the diehard fans waiting for the next Mario or Zelda but sales of Wii U seem to suggest the general gaming world want new ideas.


A selection of exclusive Wii U games:

Game & Wario
Mario Kart 8
Mario & Sonic At the Sochi Olympics
New Super Mario Bros U
New Super Luigi U
Super Mario 3D World
Yarn Yoshi

Great if you still like Mario games I guess.

Nintendo have two new IPs (X and The Wonderful 101) aswell as bringing back the beloved Pikmin.

Most of the new IPs of all 3 companys nowadays feel too similar to previous IPs and other games to me, tbh .

 

[Samus]

Two? It's not enough combined with weak third party support. Sure completely fresh ideas are few and far between these days but it's better than yet more Mario games.

 

[Com Fox]

It is important of third party support but it is only EA and 2K and I don't give a 🤬 about EA. 2K not doing it was a dissapointment . I'm actually a fan of Mario, some are great (Super Mario 3D Land etc.) some are totally unoriginal (Super Mario Galaxy 2 etc.) and sticking with old IPs isn't a bad idea for this consumer because of the similarities of newer games these days , IMO.

 

[Coxis]

Here's my view. Ever since the PS3-360 generation, gaming has become, in lack of a better term, more mainstream than it used to be. Games are easier than ever before to accommodate the influx of new casual players and games are excellent looking, but shorter than ever before. Unfortunately, with better hardware people demand better graphics, which take a deep toll on developing times, so games end up being shorter. I hate how games this generation are more expensive than the previous gen games, but I finish them considerably faster. I've come across people that consider themselves "gamers" because they play Facebook games.

Ever since I made the switch to PC gaming, I've discovered that indie developers are the ones I should support. Their games may not have the best graphics, but they more than make up for it in substance and gameplay. In terms of non-indie games, sandbox-type games, like Oblivion, Skyrim and GTA tend to stand out from the rest -- not the best graphics, but their games are lengthy and you get your money's worth.

 

[Com Fox]

^+1 I haven't moved to PC gaming yet but I agree, I just got NSMB2 ($60) and finished it in 1 day and other games are being the same.

 

[JohnBM01]

Let me answer this on a casually professional level from a number of perspectives.

When someone sets a standard, it challenges others to better a previously-set standard... or perhaps even set a new standard. Over time, I think consoles have gone from "just game machines" to all-in-one entertainment systems to borderline PCs. Games have gone from "just games" to games that are borderline movies or whatever. At this rate, any game is going to have to be more than just a game. A console is going to be more than just a gaming console. They are still games and still on game consoles, but the conventions and standards will be vastly different from when the gaming market wasn't so lucrative.

On top of this, you have to consider mobile/portable gaming as well. There will be a point where even mobile gaming will likely get to be as lucrative as their console and PC counterparts. You can only do so much with mobile devices. How you manage to harness the power of mobile gaming devices and mobile operating systems will ultimately mean even mobile gaming will one day be as successful as console gaming.

There is also the issue of gaming itself. What worked in the early 80s is common today. You have to evolve a genre and a brand in various games. For example, many racing games in the past have used the sort of Pole Position model in the way the graphics are displayed. When something groundbreaking surfaces, it's your job to try to better it while expanding upon what originators have started. Enter future racing games: Virtua Racing. Daytona USA. Ridge Racer. [The] Need for Speed. Gran Turismo. Burnout (before EA). Project Gotham Racing. GTR. Forza Motorsport. rFactor. Live for Speed. Project CARS. The main challenge is to try to grow and expand upon old standards. Can you still deliver great gaming experiences while pushing an industry forward? I am reminded of this when I am playing Minecraft Pocket Edition. Even a mostly voxelized and cartoonish-looking title, simple gameplay mechanics and simple gameplay feel remain solid and fun even if the graphics don't look like a Triple-A level game. Games don't have to be hyper-realistic to be worth playing. But to many people, you have to appease even to those who feel EVERY game has to be at current-generation graphics to be worth playing. They don't! Even the "ugliest" games that still deliver in the fun and function department are every bit as great as your precious current-gen games. Just because Minecraft doesn't have Crysis graphics or Farcry graphics doesn't mean it lacks playability and enjoyment.

Finally, I want to mention the independent scene (I try to say "independent" because I somehow think of India when I hear "indie"). Independent developers are surely the future of the gaming industry because even independent developers can make high-quality games to rival (or even better) most of the big industry developers and companies. This goes back to even the not-so-pretty games being every bit as fun or more fun than most high-end titles. It used to be that most people would make sorry games with some kind of game-making kit. These days, and with a lot of hard work, even small firms can take on and take down big-name companies and their games.


I think gaming will ultimately reach a point of do-everything while competing with or surpassing TV and movies in terms of market share and entertainment value. Consoles will almost basically be their own PCs. Mobile gaming and the independent scene will likely see improvements to try to take on the high-end console and PC titles. This is about as professional as I can describe everything.

 

[LeMansAid]

Future of gaming will be more kids who play casual games on their smartphones, tablets, Facebook and call themselves 'gamers'.

That's my pessimistic view on things.

Hmmm, I see that as actually somewhat channeling what a hardcore gamer used to be. Games where the only or main objective is score go back to the heart of what gaming was originally all about. Granted, if kids now had to walk or cycle around the neighbourhood picking up soft drink bottles to recycle and acquire the money to play, it might be different. Still....

I am as nostalgic as the next guy, but I found that Jetpack Joyride for example actually rather tickled my nostalgic fancy.

Bring on the new old I say. Especially as the new new seems to be moving at such a glacial pace.