Okay, so I wanted to pick a different title for this that would get across what I'm talking about but I ended up with too many words so I shortened it. Today I'm actually going to be talking about why I believe the 6th generation of consoles, specifically the Playstation 2, original XBox, GameCube, and to a different extent the Dreamcast, was the best generation of consoles and why I'm currently attempting to be an Indie Game developer rather than go into the AAA industry. And, before you ask, yes, these two things are related.
So before I begin, I want to get my biases out of the way first so you guys have a better understanding of where I'm coming from. I grew up with a Playstation 2. Though I did get a chance to play on an N64 and a Playstation 1, as it is now, I am not old enough to have enjoyed gaming on consoles any earlier than that. Likewise, even with those two consoles, I got so few games for them that I can count every single game I played on both those consoles put together on just two hands. So suffice it to say that I have no experience with older generations of gaming, though I do acknowledge that they have their benefits and, likely their drawbacks as well.
I also didn't have a lot of experience with the Original XBox or the GameCube. While I was aware of the existence of many of the games that were out at the time, the only experience I have with the XBox were Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, and Halo 2. As far as the GameCube, I don't actually remember playing any games on that, though at the time I was aware of the existence of Luigi's Mansion and Wind Waker. So, suffice it to say, this post is going to be largely Sony-centric as that's the only line of systems I'm familiar with.
I'm also not a competitive gamer. While I will be talking about competitive games a little bit, for the most part I'm simply going to be referring to them in a broad sense because I don't have a lot of knowledge of competitive gaming or E-sports. I play video games to have fun and, because of that, I'm not aware of a lot of strategies for beating certain games, except the ones I've played so extensively that I know them like the back of my hand, which are primarily single player games anyway.
Now that my biases have been accounted for, I want to talk about gaming as I saw it as a child and how I see it now, because there is a great disparity between how I grew up and how I deal with video games now.
When I was a kid, I spent ass-loads of time playing video games. Particularly, in 4th and 5th grade, I was home-schooled and my mother gave me the deal that the faster I finish my work, the more time in the day I have to play video games, watch anime, or do whatever. It was in this period in my life that I got the most gaming time, for various reasons, though home schooling was one of the factors.
In this time, I played the Jak & Daxter games and found myself beating my head against a brick wall trying to overcome enemy waves in Jak II or gather enough Precursor Orbs for infinite eco stores in Jak 3. Back then internet wasn't all that great and my mother would only allow me on the computer for an hour each night anyway, so I didn't really have access to tips or strategies that may be commonplace now. Because of that, I played all my favorite games with attempts at going through with the most ease but also the most style.
I found myself trying to find the most OP tricks in Jak II's Jet Board course to get that Gold rank, I attempted and failed to be awesome at Devil May Cry 3, I cheated in Sly 2 by skipping to the last level and going to the beginning to unlock the entire store of abilities before they were required. I played Mortal Kombat Armageddon with the character creator trying to make my own character with the limited skill and resources I had. And I tried as hard as I could to beat every single aspect of Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3 while pretending that I was playing as myself whenever I would use Goku in Dragon Arena.
These were some of my best memories of gaming and they were the times that I would just not stop playing them. Even games that weren't that great I could still derive some pleasure from. I enjoyed Dragon Ball Z: Sagas purely for the opportunity to run around at super speeds in Super Saiyan 2. I played Mortal Kombat: Deception to cheese the Chess Kombat mini-game, which I still enjoy to this day.
However, eventually, games for the Playstation 2 were slowing down production and we decided, me and my family, that we had to get a new console. We ended up getting a Playstation 3 and that's where a lot of my gaming time started going down the drain.
Sure, early on, it wasn't that bad. InFamous was my introduction to 3rd Person Shooters and, at the time, it was really fun. I also got to play Ninja Gaiden Sigma and Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 and, regardless of what anyone says about them, I thoroughly enjoyed both of these games. I also eventually got a hold of DOA5 which proved to be better than I expected and hoped.
However, other than these minor experiences, I can't say there was a lot on the Playstation 3 that I thought was worth playing. In my mother's home I have every Assassin's Creed game, I have Uncharted 1 and 2, I have Prototype, I have Final Fantasy XIII, I have DmC: Devil May Cry and Devil May Cry 4, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, and I also have The Last of Us. However, none of these games managed to capture my attention the way my old favorites did.
Initially, I just thought that I wasn't looking in the right places. When my brother would ask me why I don't game as much anymore, I tried to justify it any way I could but I didn't understand myself. Then I went back and played Budokai 3 again. And I enjoyed it just as much as I always did.
Sure it had a few problems but nothing I wasn't already aware of from my experience playing it as a child. Every single aspect of the game still functioned the way it's supposed to and I enjoyed every second of it. That's when I started to have an epiphany.
Games that I want to play simply aren't being made anymore. That's when I started to think about things. All those years, games with no-fun attitudes, shallow gameplay, graphics-whore mindsets, and desire to be taken seriously had all hampered the games that were being made. These were things that I had always noticed but had never questioned.
What had happened? What happened to the fun loving atmospheres of games past? What happened to gameplay that was designed to be engaging and deep without sensory overload? What happened to the quirky writing that these games used to have?
There's a number of reasons but all of them link to the same thing: the desire to be taken seriously.
The desire to be taken seriously led developers to attempt to reach broader audiences. These broader audiences required something to get them playing besides just gameplay, hence a focus on graphics. These graphics cost a lot of time and money to make, which means that a lot of games not only required enormous budgets and sales to break even but it also led to a lot of these games being not all that good overall in any capacity. The only exceptions were the remakes and remastered ports and specific niche developers. This then leads to an even greater spike in sales that needed to take place to increase the bottom line so they wouldn't go bankrupt.
Plenty of development teams were dissolved or sold for this reason. Little Red Devils and Clover Studios were shut down and eventually came to form Platinum games. Vigil Games was dissolved after the release of Darksiders II to form Airship Syndicate who are now an independent studio.
Plenty of developers ended up going indie or just quitting the industry in general, occasionally both. This even happened to Hideo Kojima relatively recently, though I'm not certain of the specifics, it would seem the divide was mutually beneficial.
There's a bit of a strain on developers, publishers, and their relationship in the AAA industry. AAA game developers have a more stable income, true, but they also have to abide by the wishes of their publisher, which is usually to make more money. Publishers don't want to take risks, which is a bit of an oxymoron when you consider that it would be less risky for these publishers to limit the budget the developers are allowed to have to decrease risk of financial loss.
Graphics are easier to market than gameplay, which is why Publishers are pushing for that now but lower end graphics cost a lot less to make and require fewer people to be paid. And here in lies some of the lessons I've learned.
The games that I love that I endlessly replay and want more sequels and remakes for also cost a lot less to make than games that are a lot more meh and, while pretty looking on occasion, also run like garbage.
"But gaming has been great for PC!"
You're right but there are a number of factors that contribute to that that are not tied to money or device power.
First of all, most PC games come with settings options that allow you to adjust whether you want a sturdier framerate or higher end graphics and while two people with the same machine may choose one or the other, lack of hardware limitations at higher ends mean that these people generally have to worry about that less and can choose both if they want.
Also, the existence of mods, modifications not moderators, means that not only can a game with cheap graphics be given graphics upgrades, like Skyrim, but it also means that there are a plethora of developers for content or mechanics that a PC game can have that the Publishers or developers don't actually have to pay. Just set up donations or a patreon and you're good to go. It's a slippery slope but you can away with it.
Also the existence of emulators means that, even if you only have a PC and never get a console, those emulators can allow you to play games that you previously missed, and while I have argued the legality of such creations previously, whether they're legal or not doesn't change the fact that they exist and PC gamers can use them.
Also access to better internet browsers and touchscreen or mouse and keyboard controls allow some games, like Candy Crush or other 2D indie games to make money without having to worry about install-bases all that much.
And finally, the vast majority of game engines out there are specifically built for PC. While some engines, particularly Unreal Engine 4, can be used to make games for mobile, portable, or consoles, it's an engine primarily made for PC. Engines that are made specifically for a console you want to make a game for are usually private and therefore you won't get access to it until you work for the company in question. If you don't then more than likely that engine is probably for a console that nobody is making games for anymore regardless.
"Well, maybe you should've gotten a Wii U/Wii/Switch/Other Nintendo Console"
Yeah, no. Nintendo is another problem in a way. While it's not necessarily THE problem, it is certainly not a solution. You see, the Wii isn't as powerful as the other consoles from that generation because of how expensive the motion controls were. The Wii had to have exponentially less power than the other consoles so manufacturing wouldn't render them bankrupt.
While the motion controls did result in some unique games, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and No More Heroes proved that a controller can work for a lot of these games, and Skyward Sword proved that games that rely so much on motion controls that a controller wouldn't work are games that have very little going for them outside of that, which is more or less the same issue.
The Wii U, in a lot of ways, was like the Wii in terms of overall power, strategy, and gaming content, it was just a lot less successful with the approach, which is the only reason the Wii U is considered different from the Wii in the first place.
Now, I want everyone to remember that, yes, the Wii U had a lot games that you probably already had on the XBox 360 or the PS3. But, the Wii had a lot of games that you probably already had on the Playstation 2. And from the looks of it, the Switch doesn't seem to be solving any of these problems.
Sure, Nintendo may not be as graphics reliant as Sony or Microsoft consoles, but they are a lot more gimmick reliant which inevitably leads to a lot more of the same: more money spent, less significant gameplay made.
However, the Indie Scene is proving to have some potential for a number of reasons. The first of which is that, without a publisher breathing down their necks, they don't have to worry about limiting their creativity. The drawback to that is ultimately that without publisher funding, you have to rely on other sources of income to fund your project, such as Early Access, Kickstarter, or Patreon. So, many have to make a choice, either the more solid income or creative freedom. There are circumstances where you can have both or neither, but generally most developers have to pick between one or the other and, personally, I like my freedom.
However, going the indie route also has some other benefits that one may not consider. First off, and what's most significant to me, is that going the indie route has gamers be a lot more forgiving of games that don't look all that great. For anyone who's going to play an indie game, willingly anyway, as long as they get good gameplay, their problems are solved. This does mean that there will be fewer sales overall but it does open the way for less expensive game development, as well as more experimentation with gameplay concepts.
On top of that, if an indie developer has a large enough install-base, mods can be implemented for an overall more solid gaming experience. And if these mods are made known to the developer ahead of time, they can pick and choose some mods to be released officially as free DLC, or even some paid DLC with some revenue going to those who contributed to it. While some things may not be feasible for every game or every device, modders who are making gameplay innovations, new characters or costumes, or in any other way contributing content to the game, can extend a game's life-cycle, improve the rate of development of sequels or remakes, improve rate of bug fixes, and even have some plausible extensions on lore or plot.
That's why I'm working on Indie Games. Though admittedly not every indie game is as successful as others (looking at you, Minecraft) it's still the ideal choice for me.
Have a wonderful day.
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