Average age of gamers rising. Average complexity of games dropping. huh?

[galahadba]

There is the problem of time and patience for the people > 30 years

When you are younger you have more time and patience, to learn and discover the game, you can (if you want) pass hours playing the game, and if you exagerate you can always use an excuse to miss class the next day. I for example had finished phantasy star 3 in japanese (i don't know nohing of japanese) just by trial and error....

Today i play games that i know the mechanism or can easilly figure it out... if the game is more complex (and is not a continuation of a serie a alread know) it is very possible i give out play, becouse i dont have the necessary time to master it out... an example of it is Stell panther WW, the last one by matrix games, it comabts system is VERY GOOD, much details , etc... i tried to play it for 3 times... got throught the tutorial, etc... but gave up playing for lack of time and patience, i want to get the game and have fun with it.

And i belive i am not the only one that feels this way... so if the game public is now 30 age, it explains many things of why the games are getting simplier.

of course that there are alread many simpler games, so civilization could be one of the complex ones

 

[JLoZeppeli]

i'm 33. It's like a 30 years old can't play a chess game... I have time to play civ and to master it... it's an hobby, than i take my weekends and the late evening to play.. I work, i have my time with my girlfriend, i play... I think that most of the time is just an excuse selling that we don't have time to spent... If i like playing strategy games, i find the time no matter what... It's like reading a book or playing a boardgame with friends...

And if i find the time, the game must be worth of it, not the opposite...

So i think a lot of players use the time and the patience as an excuse... i was patienceless younger, not now... I was bind by time and parents a lot more when i was a kid than now (if i want to spent the whole night playing i can, of course is a bad thing 'cause i start to work at 8.00 AM, still if i would...).

The only thing stopping my play may be my own family, but also i think it's not a condition that could make me wishing a simplier game... But i may mistake because my girlfriend haven't any wedding program until the next two years probably (work stability is a thing we must be assured first)...

So i can't understand that statement, and i can say for sure that my friends, even the ones with a family, think the same, obviusly we manage our time to fit our personal interest and priorities...

 

[galahadba]

So i can't understand that statement, and i can say for sure that my friends, even the ones with a family, think the same, obviusly we manage our time to fit our personal interest and priorities...

Well, that is it... it means that for example i can't play until 3 a.m every day as i did before

i did not played dragon age to it end, becouse of time, i had to stop playing it for more than a week and when a came back i could not remember all the history, what were my objetives out of the main quest and so on...

But i am not saying that i agree that the games must be made easier.. . i like dificult and complex games as always, but it is true that i play less of then becouse i have less time, and playing less i buy less, that is somthing that companies that seek money think of...

And i am saying it for me, of course that there are many people that don't agree with it.

Said that i must say that,

1 .i don't agree that the games must be made easier, i just think that the public age have somthing to do with it

2 . i don't think that the games of the civilizations series are complex games and that it must be made easier... as a matter of fact what make me pre-buy civ5 was that i thought that it would be civ 4 with hex and better combat system.

 

[Ataxerxes]

I don't think the two are necessarily related. CIV is more complicated that CiV and both are more complicated than earlier Civ games. Also, a lot of the people who stick with CIV are the older ones as well. And, as was said early on, both are more complicated than the first Civ games. But I don't think it proves the opposite either, that games are getting more complicated because gamers are older.

Gamers are becoming older partly because, as the original gamers age and stay with it, there's more of an age balance. Very early on in the development of computer games, it was mainly younger people. It's going more mainstream now.

CIV is attempting to reach a broader audience by making it simpler and making the graphics better. I don't care for a lot of the changes myself, but that's a matter of personal taste.

I think the two are unrelated.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

2. The average complexity of games, especially noticeable in strategy games due to their inherent complexity, is dropping. This can be debated if it is a fact or not, but i'm pretty sure most of us agree. UI enhancements and streamlining is great, less mouseclicks to do the same thing for less effort (right mouse button to move and attack, rather than hit a redundant "move" and "attack" button on the UI). Great stuff.
However the thing im talking about is of course the gameplay mechanics, the variety and thought required.
:

???

I think it's way more likely that the players that "notice" this phenomenon are just becoming jaded and elitist. Or rather, that they've seen a lot more now and are harder to impress. How many decent PC games were there really when CivI came out?

 

[tonberry]

If someone want to understand what's happening to the videogame industry, I suggest we take a look at cinema.

At the beginning of the century, cinema is a curiosity, many people enjoy it but few get really passionnated by it. That's the equivalent of the Atari and Intellivision where lack of hardware made game a novelty, at best.

Then came sound and color, movies start to get more interesting to more and more people. Actor performance really start to shine as technologie start to be more able to transmit the emotions that good actor can muster. One particular movie took all that and push the industry even further, that movie was Citizen Kane.

The videogame equivalent of Citizen Kane is Super Mario Bros. When the little plumber start jumping around, videogame were no longer the same. Suddenly, changing level no longer mean that background would change color, it mean new surrounding, new monster, etc. Player would not just play to improve their score (that goal will almost completely disappear) but to simply see what going to happen, what the game will show to him.

Back to movies, the 60's and 70's are regarded as the golden age of cinema. Now that sound, color and acting performance were mastered and that Citizen Kane had it effect, movie were better than ever. Yet, while popular, cinema was not for everyone. Most people would see their favorite movie only a few time in their life because they couldn't own it. Among the people who like movie, a great part of them were passionate who like movies for what they are: acting performance with great writing supported by good special effects when needed. The industry was big enough to spend a lot of money to entertain people who were true movie lover.

The golden age of videogame is the 16 bits era and it's similar. There was lots money to make so lots of effort could be muster to create real gems. Yet, the people targetted was the same that play the previous generation. They wanted good, long games and didn't care if some were hard as hell.

Lots of money and a demanding audience is what define those 2 golden ages.

Then came Star Wars. Nothing wrong with that movie but suddenly, the focus of the industry shift to summer blockbuster. Movies became happening events, you go see them because it's the cool thing to do. To be successful, movies no longer need good actor or good script. Having enough shits blowing off will do. Directors want to please their audience more than telling the story they want to tell. For example, I don't think Coppola, when he direct The Godfather, decide to shoot a scene in a certain way because that what's people watching movie on a summer friday want to see but I'm do think this happen often on the sets of movie like G.I.JOE.

Videogame were a little different in that regard. The big change was 3D so developper had to cope with a new constrant while still trying to make complex game. Some serie thrive (Mario, Zelda), other almost die (Megaman is a glaring example). Another factor is that gamers were older. When the Nintendo64 came out, I remember reading a quote by Miyamoto saying it's wasn't a problem if less games would be release on the N64 than on the Playstation because people only buy 2-3 games per year. I respect the man very much but he was a bit out of touch this time. The kids who got his NES on Christmas at 8 years old was now 20, had a job and suddenly, 70$ for a game wasn't that much, especially if it's his favorte hobby. Gamer would buy more game and if one is too hard, he would switch to another.

So down went Nintendo (more or less) and they rise again by finding a new market: casual. While Sony and Microsoft lauch their HD-super-powerful console, Nintendo launch a modest hardware that would outperform them in sales.

Now gamers are like 70's cinephile, a minority. They are still many games that cater to them just like they were still many great movies in the 80's and 90's that were successful because of the acting and writing but, slowly, games like Wii Sports will take more and more market share to the point where, in a few years, a game like Mass Effect or Civilization will have the same importance than the movie The White Ribbon who won the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2009. Something that some will enjoy very much but be completely ignored by most, including those who list movie as their principal interest.

ps: geez, that was longer that I tough. English isn't my first language so if some sentence are hard to read, feel free to correct me. Also I realize that I've talk more about console than PC but I think my point is still valid.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I like your post but you might be taking the film "ages" too far. There were plenty of crummy movies before Star Wars, and we've had classics since then. Many say that the greatest year for movies (at least Hollywood/US) was actually 1939.

 

[bhavv]

In the Strategy Genre, there are very few games that are as complex as the Civ series, and other games like Civ (SMAC, CTP, Galviv). That may be plenty for other people, but I dont think its enough.

In other Genres, particularly with the RPG, there havnt been any games as complex, difficult and challanging as the Baldur's Gate series since BGII.

Looking at newer games released as sequels to older ones in other game series (Bioware RPGs, Bethsoft's Elder Scrolls), games are being gradually dumbed down and simplified more and more.

I dont however think that this has anything to do with the average age of gamers, I think it has more to do with the PC gaming industry becoming less and less profitable for single player games, so developers are dumbing their games down to the point that they will work on consoles and appeal to console gamers. Which is a huge shame.

 

[Maniacal]

I'm 21 and I play games from the more complex Hearts of Iron II, Europa Universailels 3, (will play Victoria sometime next year when I have time to learn it), the incredibly complex Dwarf Fortress (though not currently), to less complex games like Men of War (which is by no means easy), Sword of the Stars, the Total War series, Mount&Blade, Team Fortress 2, Fallout series (all), Metro 2033 and enjoyable but not complex games like Bad Company 2, Blur, Mass Effect 2, etc etc and I could go on and on with the other two hundred or so games I own. This isn't even including depth, some of which have more depth despite less complexity.

There are a lot more games aimed at the mainstream, companies (because that is what game developer and publishers are) tend to try and be successful and are often influenced heavily by very successful games. There are still plenty of non-Halo and Gears of War games.

 

[The_Quasar]

Well... I've been playing computer games since the mid 70s, 35 years. The first was moonlander on a DEC mini.

The first complicated game, iirc, was Elite, which I played at very long length! The games I've played since tend to be the more complicated ones, recently Alpha Centauri, Civ IV, Civ V, X3: Reunion and X3: Terran Conflict. I play them in vanilla, then mod them big time... I like a game to last! I also like a game to offer lots of challenges too...

I'm 59, and have no time for simple games, am I an exception? I don't think so. Trouble is, the games industry is getting poorer, because it's getting too simple... why? because it's run by kids, that's why! The growing trend is for guys like me who want things to be interesting and complicated, to be disappointed, because the newest games are dumbed down. The sooner the games companies realise that there will ALWAYS be a good market for complicated games, the better, because I will always look out for them, and I am by no means alone!

 

[luisfpf]

I'm 59, and have no time for simple games, am I an exception? I don't think so.

I have been playing computer games since Spectrum 48k I was seven.... now i am 35...

You are right, you are not alone... and to your game list i just whant to add EVE online.

For me the more complex cool.... just thinking in the adrenaline of create a 100 hub Space Station in X3

 

[Shorlin]

The older you get, the more casual you get.

 

[tonberry]

I like your post but you might be taking the film "ages" too far. There were plenty of crummy movies before Star Wars, and we've had classics since then. Many say that the greatest year for movies (at least Hollywood/US) was actually 1939.

Well yes, I agree. My post was already long enough so I didn't want to add anymore as I just wanted to show a general orientation that those two industry have taken.

But of course your right. There were plenty movie that were more posters than story in the 50's just as there were horrible games on the NES and SNES. I would even go as far as to say that today, no compagny would get away with releasing games as bad as Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

See, I just don't know that they're less complicated now or instead we're just used to it. Judging it with an open mind instead of just which one you like better, is CivV really "Dumbed Down" compared to SMAC or CivII? I LIKE AC, but is it really more "complex"?

Has anyone really gone back to Super Mario 3 or the original Apple Oregon Trail for the nuance and "Complexity" in the gameplay?

Like it or not, the original SimCity was a groundbreaking acheivement in gaming. However, was it really any more complicated than the average facebook game?

Oh, Tonberry, that wasn't a response to your response to me. I hadn't seen it come up until after I made my post. Thanks for the response though.

 

[Maniacal]

How do you have no time for simple games? I think one of the advantages of a less complex game is that you don't need tonnes of time to play it. NA hour or so at a time is sufficient. Strategy games in general usually take a lot more time per session (in the Total War games a single battle can easily last half an hour).

 

[Iranon]

@ tonberry: My hat's off to you, sir or madam - I share many of the sentiments but couldn't have put them as well. I think video games from around 1990 to today have undergone something comparable to the change from New Hollywood to the Blockbuster culture today: One from artistic maturity to technological to commercial maturity if you will.

@ PrinceScamp: You could believe that if something isn't going to be worth playing in 5 years' time it's probably not worth playing now. Life may be too short to dedicate a few hours of one's time to tic-tac-toe, but not to dedicate years to chess (or go, or poker, or any game that's been proven to still work at high levels of play... status as a classic not strictly necessary)

 

[Maniacal]

Depends, I've gotten lots of games for a few dollars off of Steam and GamersGate I wouldn't have otherwise gotten and they were totally worth it (like Mirror's Edge, excellent use of $5 for an actually decent game (even though it is very linear and doesn't have much replayability, I will reinstall it next year probably and play it again)). The advantage of tic-tac-to is that is can be played almost anywhere at any time, such as on a piece of glassed fogged up with condensation and especially when you have only a short time to play (like say 10 minutes). Hence the rising popularity of casual games especially for handheld devices like cell phones.

 

[John-SJ]

I'd like to address the misconception that simpler games necessarily have fewer strategic options than complex ones.

Games like chess or Go are both quite simple games. One can learn all that is needed to play through a game in an hour or less.

But I submit to you, both of these games offer far greater strategic options than any Civ game, or any computer strategy game for that matter.

And, as a hardcore gamer over the age of 50, I find myself, due to family, work, and other responsibilities, less able to expend large amounts of time to learn the basics of a game than some others.

I appreciate a game that is easy to learn, but still offers ample challenges. In many regards, Civ 5 is such a game, though, like most games, it is not perfect in that regard.

I still like it though.

 

[Horizons]

In Western nations, people are having fewer children (resulting in the average age rising) and taking longer to grow up ... a majority of people in their early-to-mid 20s still behave like teenagers.

 

[Zydor]

... a majority of people in their early-to-mid 20s still behave like teenagers.

Take cover ..... Incoming .......

Regards
Zy