Drew Wilson soon be getting into reviewing modern games. He shares some of the things that he’ll be looking at.
If you’ve been following my adventure into gaming by reading my reviews or watching my first impression video’s, you’ll likely notice that the games I’m checking out has been gradually getting newer. The reviews themselves are getting into Steam games while the first impression video’s have been going through XBox One and Playstation 4. By some people’s standards, all of this is old stuff, but taking into the wider context of things, this is actually pretty new. The context being that I’ve reviewed games going back as far as the Atari 2600 which are games dating all the way back to 1977. That’s… a long time ago and puts into perspective just how far I’ve come along on these reviews and video’s.
People on my Patreon already have a really good idea where I’m going already as I’ve detailed what I plan on doing next year as well as the years to come. So, if you want a much better idea, feel free to subscribe.
What I think is safe to say publicly, however, is the fact that I’ll soon be heading into the modern age of gaming. Every year, I’ve upped the offerings by introducing a gradually newer console into the fold. For first impression video’s at least, the list of which I’ve introduced consoles is as follows: Playstation 3, XBox 360, Playstation 4, and XBox One. What is also safe to say is that I’ll be adding an even newer console in January. Through process of elimination, you can very easily determine that this will be a modern console.
Personally, I think things could get interesting as I might finally be getting a number of answers to some interesting questions. One of those questions is whether or not modern gaming really is as bad as a number of people have said it is. I’m honestly not really all that sure which direction I’ll end up going on that one as there is evidence leaning to both directions.
So, for the evidence I have that suggests that maybe the assertion that games are terrible today is exaggerated, I just look back at the criticism throughout history. I remember back in the late 2000’s when I heard the loud complaints that games have fallen off of a cliff in terms of quality. One criticism was that expansions never used to be about filling in large gaps left behind by the developers. Instead, expansions added to a complete work and added a sort of “extended play” by adding on a smaller game to an already complete experience. That led to the howls of how they don’t make games like they used to – looking longingly at the late 90’s gaming and saying those were better times.
Fast forward to the 2010’s, the complaints were that developers have added micro-transactions and made everything online only. This, for a lot of gamers, apparently ruined games. That led to many gamers howling about how they don’t make games like they used to – looking longingly at the games in the 2000’s and saying those were better times.
Now, fast forwarding to today, the complaints include how everything is gaming as a service and that games get shut down before they have a chance to cement themselves as a long running game. This while pointing to the increasingly long development cycles and saying that games of beloved franchises don’t get as many entries and, therefore, the game sector has lost it’s way. This brings back the familiar refrain that they don’t make games like they used to – looking longingly at the 2010’s and earlier and saying those were better times.
It’s a reoccurring pattern I’ve seen for the last 25 years. One of the things I set out to find was which generation of gamer was right and which one was wrong on that. What I ended up finding, at least so far, was that the quality of games overall has been fairly consistent. This isn’t to say that the criticisms were entirely wrong, though. I’ve encountered dead games, incomplete games, and abusive customer practices and I wasn’t shy about saying that what was done for that game was wrong. Yet, at the same time, I still find great games along the way.
What’s more, there is the illusion/benefit of hindsight. It’s easy to go back, say, 10 years, and assume that gaming was so much better back then. I see it time and time again where people say that there are lots of games made back in the day and in modern times, there’s just garbage games. The problem is that in modern times, you are experiencing development in real time. Which games are good and which ones aren’t may not yet be known and people are taking the good with the bad. When one looks back in the past, it’s often easier to disregard the bad games and sing the praises of whatever game you like. Filtering out the bad is much easier thanks in part to the imperfection of memory.
Indeed, there were bad games produced in every era. Whether that is 70’s, 80’s, 90’s, 2000’s, and 2010’s, I’ve encountered some seriously bad clunkers along the way. Honestly, how many people talk about gaming in the 80’s and say, “Oh yeah, that was the time games like Dancing Plate, Space Shuttle, and I Want My Mommy was released. What terrible times!” I don’t recall anyone saying that when binging on nostalgia. Chances are, those people are talking more about games like Space Invaders, Frogger, and Dig Dug. This could really be repeated for any age of gaming.
Now, there’s no denying that those games were made back then, but it’s much easier to mentally disregard those games and say that the best games were actually the baseline for gaming quality back then – which is an easy mistake to make.
On the flipside, however, there is evidence that has me wondering is modern gaming really is as bad as people say it is. Indeed, games take much longer to make. For some franchises, when you might expect a new game every three years, well, the games take substantially longer. There are fewer big franchises where you could expect to see more than one entry in a given gamer lifetime. As such, the number of games made by developers with great reputations is smaller. This over top of the massive consolidation that has happened over the years in the gaming industry as a whole, making it harder for developers to push out quality games. This over top of the profit before quality mentality that seems to be so commonplace across multiple industries, not just the gaming industry.
As a result, I don’t really know which way I’ll end up going on this question. I could find the continued consistency in quality and find myself concluding that the truth is somewhere in the middle, but that’s what experimentation is all about, right? I don’t know until I try after all.
Another big question, albeit smaller in the grand scheme of things, is whether or not newer games attract more eyeballs. The conventional wisdom I’ve heard over and over again was that it’s only the fresh stuff that gets the attention. I’m already seeing data that indicates as such. For instance, the most popular video on a working game I’ve produced on YouTube is Forza Horizon 5. That is the single newest game I featured on the channel, being released in 2021. What’s more, the single most popular video on my channel is me showcasing the XBox One console – by far and away. That just so happens to be one of the most modern consoles I’ve showcased on the channel.
The problem here is that there is also plenty of noise associated with this data too. For instance, my video on the Playstation 4 got nowhere near the views the XBox One video did – and both consoles were released at around the same time. A 2014 game video, only got 4 views (Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare). The 2020 game, The Last of Us Part II, only got 8 views. These are not really old titles and they aren’t unknown titles either. What’s more, both examples had no restrictions placed on them. So, there is certainly data that suggests that newer games and newer consoles aren’t necessarily a shoe-in for success, either.
One thing that is in the back of my mind is that there are likely more people on YouTube producing video’s of newer games, thus saturating the platform of video’s on a game that could theoretically be popular. As such, even if I produce video’s on modern games, my video may never surface in the sea of other YouTubers with the same idea.
I can’t really lean one way or another on this because I have very limited data points on modern games. This will get more and more solved starting next year, however, because I will have more and more data points to determine whether or not modern games are the way to go in terms of determining which games to talk about in the first place.
Invariably, the question people will have is why it took this long to get on board with modern games in the first place. The biggest answer to that has to do with costs. As everyone knows, when you go into buying a modern game, you are invariably going to get hit with sticker shock. New games can go for anywhere around $65 to $90 each. This as opposed to buying games for the PS3 or even the XBox One where the prices can range from $3 to $30. Another factor is that Freezenet has a HUGE appetite for content. As a result, it’s not a case of just buying one or two games every once in a while (as would be normal for your average gamer). Instead, we’re looking at a game every month for a specific console. Ultimately, at that point, simple math takes over – specifically multiplication. Just try multiplying 13 (games) and 80 (cost) and explain why this is easily financially viable for your average person.
For me, it wasn’t financially viable to jump into modern games at any point until, well, next year. I’ve been collecting games for more than a year to provide a buffer and allow for some scheduling flexibility along the way. To say that this has been an expensive undertaking would be a huge understatement. The good news is that I am overcoming financial barriers at this point, permitting me to explore the modern gaming library like never before. What impact that has on the site and YouTube channel, well, I really don’t know for sure. At the very least, however, so you’ll be getting better content in terms of video game subject matter soon – at least that’s the hope anyway. Fingers crossed it’s more well received at least.
