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

[LordTC]

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.

Apparently because your generation caused a massive recession that caused a huge unemployment bubble resulting in our generation having less money (hence more people in this age bracket living at home) we are apparently "taking longer to grow up". People living at home who can't afford to move out in this economy aren't necessarily less mature than those in your generation who did so when jobs were abundant. When 27% of people are unemployed or underemployed, you can't really blame people for staying at home. Also your generation is responsible for the legislation that forces our generation to compete with slave labour (prison labor in China) and child labour in many foreign countries so that you could enjoy your flatscreens and cheaper technology. Your generation also ran up the largest deficits in the history of the world both in total amounts and as a percentage of GDP. Protectionist policies (largely labour union stuff) protect even the worst in your generation from being fired, while companies are refusing to hire more talented people who will work for less in a younger generation (labour agreements generally prevent them from doing so). So its a free market as long as your generation is buying, but never when you guys are hurt by it. That sounds reasoned and mature, something about having a cake and eating it to comes to mind. And then there is this program called social security, which has massive problems, and instead of actually trying to fix them your generation wants its tax breaks, but god forbid our generation doesn't pay through the nose for your social security down the road, never mind that your generation only contributed a tiny percentage of what the program actually costs.

But apparently the ones who were too young to vote for the idiots who messed up the world are the irresponsible ones, after all they are the ones suffering most of the consequences. But its ok go back to your video games...

 

[Me_Myself_I]

The older you get, the more casual you get.

Not true. The older I've become, the more demanding I've become.

 

[Me_Myself_I]

...forces our generation to compete with slave labour (prison labor in China) and child labour in many foreign countries....Protectionist policies (largely labour union stuff) protect even the worst in your generation from being fired, while companies are refusing to hire more talented people who will work for less in a younger generation (labour agreements generally prevent them from doing so).

Some of your points are valid, but your complaint about labor unions seems misguided. Without unions, America once had child labor and sweatshops. Unions are precisely the only way labor can accomplish improvements in working conditions. Politicians and the wealthy who place them aren't going to do it of their own volition -- especially today.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Games shifting toward mainstream is overpowering any increase in average playing age.

 

[Aeon221]

Complexity isn't dropping, inanity is. We used to have to deal with tortuously designed interfaces that literally attempted to bend your dog over a chair and do vile things to it's behind, and game mechanics that rewarded degenerate play styles and months of memorization. Streamlined, practically standardized interfaces reduce learning curve inanity. Simpler mechanisms that do the same thing reduce manual anxiety -- I shouldn't have to go to page 257 and spend thirty minutes with a calculator to figure out the formula that buggered my last game.

Older gamers, who have jobs and limited disposable time, can't be having with that sort of thing. When I was young, I could blow months on a difficult game and really grok the huge variety of armor and weapons in older games. Now? If I can't figure the damn thing out to an acceptable degree in twenty minutes or less, it goes in the bin and my money goes elsewhere.

Plus, there are a ton of options out there. Why should I devote my time to learning a single complex game that's potentially mediocre when I could play three simpler games that don't frustrate the crap out of me over the same time period?

Basically, Dwarf Fortress. It's the greatest city builder ever, but I'm not wasting my time trying to piece together ASCII art AND that idiotic interface just to play it. I've got other things to do, and that's not one of them.

 

[John-SJ]

Some of your points are valid, but your complaint about labor unions seems misguided. Without unions, America once had child labor and sweatshops. Unions are precisely the only way labor can accomplish improvements in working conditions. Politicians and the wealthy who place them aren't going to do it of their own volition -- especially today.

While unions once had a place in America, we have long since outgrown them. The American people today would be much better served by the free market.

 

[Iranon]

Now? If I can't figure the damn thing out to an acceptable degree in twenty minutes or less, it goes in the bin and my money goes elsewhere.

Plus, there are a ton of options out there. Why should I devote my time to learning a single complex game that's potentially mediocre when I could play three simpler games that don't frustrate the crap out of me over the same time period?

Basically, Dwarf Fortress. It's the greatest city builder ever, but I'm not wasting my time trying to piece together ASCII art AND that idiotic interface just to play it. I've got other things to do, and that's not one of them.

@ Aeon221: Agree on the idiotic interface of Dwarf Fortress, but I don't mind the ASCII. It's a bit of a tradition (roguelikes) and arguably clearer and more informative when zoomed out once you learned how to read the Matrix.
Also, demanding a high degree of polish from something still in alpha makes little sense... it's a testament to its potential that many consider it the best game ever even in its current state.

I have a very different attitude to games. I'm more willing to spend a few weeks to get into one game that will remain interesting and challenging for years (even if I'm constantly trying to improve) than spending twenty minutes getting into a game that will have nothing interesting after a few hours of playtime, then keep myself occupied with equally insubstantial games until the sequel comes out next year.
I'll have a comparable intital bewilderment to confident gameplay ratio, the former will feel more exciting and the latter more satisfying, and it's considerably cheaper as well.

Streamlining is good as long as it removes busywork and lets one focus on the relevant decisions, and a lot of old titles could definitely use it. When it cuts into the games substance and leaves us with busywork while removing relevant decisions, the result can hardly be called a game any more.

 

[Palfouri]

The average age of gamers rises, but the older games are more cranky, demanding, and unaccepting of change then the rest, which is why they think games are being dumbed down.

It's no different then someone claiming computing is being dumbed down because of GUIs lets "casuals" use computers. It's not as complicated as it was when you were young so it's bad.

It's especially bad in the hyper-defensive PC crowd.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

The average age of gamers rises, but the older games are more cranky, demanding, and unaccepting of change then the rest, which is why they think games are being dumbed down.

It's no different then someone claiming computing is being dumbed down because of GUIs lets "casuals" use computers. It's not as complicated as it was when you were young so it's bad.

It's especially bad in the hyper-defensive PC crowd.

That is totally true.

But GET OFF MY LAWN!!!

 

[Horizons]

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

Regards
Zy

I'm 28 and just recently I had someone tell me I was like a teenage boy -

To begin with I was filled with indignation and took umbrage at this uppity, uptight little madam who spoke those words -

But then I examined myself and realized that to be young, carefree, 'non-serious', and obsessed with sex and feeling good is a GOOD way to be -

And then I felt liberated

Only thing I will NOT do is still live with my parents, I'd rather live on the streets

 

[Fistalis]

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.

And some even older.. we are truly watching a generational epidemic of Puer aeternus.

 

[LordTC]

Some of your points are valid, but your complaint about labor unions seems misguided. Without unions, America once had child labor and sweatshops. Unions are precisely the only way labor can accomplish improvements in working conditions. Politicians and the wealthy who place them aren't going to do it of their own volition -- especially today.

I'm not criticising the entire history of unions, I'm criticising the way their present day policies have basically institutionalized age discrimination.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

While unions once had a place in America, we have long since outgrown them. The American people today would be much better served by the free market.

Yes, we have all witnessed the evidence for that the last few years.

 

[LordTC]

Complexity isn't dropping, inanity is. We used to have to deal with tortuously designed interfaces that literally attempted to bend your dog over a chair and do vile things to it's behind, and game mechanics that rewarded degenerate play styles and months of memorization. Streamlined, practically standardized interfaces reduce learning curve inanity. Simpler mechanisms that do the same thing reduce manual anxiety -- I shouldn't have to go to page 257 and spend thirty minutes with a calculator to figure out the formula that buggered my last game.

Older gamers, who have jobs and limited disposable time, can't be having with that sort of thing. When I was young, I could blow months on a difficult game and really grok the huge variety of armor and weapons in older games. Now? If I can't figure the damn thing out to an acceptable degree in twenty minutes or less, it goes in the bin and my money goes elsewhere.

Plus, there are a ton of options out there. Why should I devote my time to learning a single complex game that's potentially mediocre when I could play three simpler games that don't frustrate the crap out of me over the same time period?

Basically, Dwarf Fortress. It's the greatest city builder ever, but I'm not wasting my time trying to piece together ASCII art AND that idiotic interface just to play it. I've got other things to do, and that's not one of them.

The fact that they got rid of beaker overflow is a perfect counterexample to this. Now if you want to play well you end up manually tweaking specialists because extra science beyond what you need to discover a tech is just lost. Civ IV fixed this, and they just broke it again. Fortunately there is a mod that fixes it which most of the community now uses, but it seems like Firaxis really ought to get basics like this right in the first place.

 

[Fistalis]

Now if you want to play well you end up manually tweaking specialists because extra science beyond what you need to discover a tech is just lost. Civ IV fixed this, and they just broke it again.

This is perhaps my biggest complaint of Civ V. Its not so much the fact that they removed so much.. its that alot of what was in Civ IV was due to lessons learned in previous games. In making Civ V it seems they simply ignored all the lessons of gamplay/balance they had learned in the past decade of developing civ games.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

The fact that they got rid of beaker overflow is a perfect counterexample to this. Now if you want to play well you end up manually tweaking specialists because extra science beyond what you need to discover a tech is just lost. Civ IV fixed this, and they just broke it again. Fortunately there is a mod that fixes it which most of the community now uses, but it seems like Firaxis really ought to get basics like this right in the first place.

I'm sure the developers will fix it so we get beaker overflow and hammer overflow back. I think they were simply too rushed by management to have the time to include them. Of course it is very annoying that they are missing.

 

[LordTC]

double post

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Yes, we have all witnessed the evidence for that the last few years.

Haha, indeed, let corporations do whatever they want and nothing but good things will happen . . .

I honestly think there was as much added to the Civ as was removed, so I don't think it's a matter of "complexity" as far as that goes. Now, the components might not work as well as we might like, but that's another issue.

 

[zonk]

I fundamentally disagree on 'complexity is dropping'.

I play a lot of sports sims -- and it's precisely the opposite. The wonder of the old strat-o-matic board games has gone digital --- between OOTP and DMB, it's truly the golden age of sports sim complexity.

While more historical/strategy titles than 4x games - there's also Paradox's stable of games, which get ever more complex.

So far as complexity declining -- I think Civ is the exception, not the rule... more to their discredit, IMO.

 

[Aeon221]

The fact that they got rid of beaker overflow is a perfect counterexample to this. Now if you want to play well you end up manually tweaking specialists because extra science beyond what you need to discover a tech is just lost. Civ IV fixed this, and they just broke it again. Fortunately there is a mod that fixes it which most of the community now uses, but it seems like Firaxis really ought to get basics like this right in the first place.

I guess it'll shock you to find out I don't own Civ5 yet. I can be damn patient about a game when I think it's gonna suck for the first few years of its existence.