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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Are We Living In A New Golden Age of Gaming?

The_Liquid_Laser said:
Are we in a new "golden age"?
Short Answer:

Movies - No
TV - Yes
Games - Maybe
Books - Don't Know

Longer Answer: To know if we are in a "golden age", it helps a lot to know what the previous golden ages were like. Does this era have the same kind of impact that the greatest eras of the past did?

Movies - Disney is doing great overall (ignoring Solo). Generally the other studios are nowhere close to Disney on the big budget stuff. There have been some decent smaller budget films coming out, so maybe movies are headed for a golden age in the long term if they keep improving, but they just are no where close yet. The late 70s/80s were just an incredible era for films. I kind of think Lucas and Spielberg raised the bar for film making in that era and then the other filmmakers rose to the occasion. That is the sort of thing that film really needs again.

TV - Netflix and the internet in general have shaken things up in a good way. Now you've got internet platforms: Netflix, Hulu, Youtube, etc... putting out original content. At the same time traditional TV has had to step up their game in response. TV is extremely good right now, all the way around.


Games - Let me be clear. Generation 8 has been a huge LOW point in gaming. XB1, Wii U, 3DS, and Vita have all been huge disappointments. The PS4 is isn't really that great either. It just happens to be unoffensive while all of the other platforms are offensive and disappointing. The best selling game of Generation 8 was also released in Generation 7. That is just how terrible Generation 8 is.

Also, the emphasis on rereleases, remasters, NES classics and the like DO NOT mean that we are in a golden era. They signal that modern gaming sucks and that people prefer the games of the past. A good sign that you are in a golden era is that people stop caring about the past. When the NES came out, no one gave a damn about the Atari 2600 anymore. That was a huge sign that the NES was a golden era for console gaming. I haven't observed this sort of thing since, although I will admit that Generation 6 & 7 were also fairly high points and Gen. 8 was a huge decline from that.

So, now that I've crapped all over gaming why did I say "maybe" we are in a golden era? Because the Switch is a new hope. So far, I've been happy with what I've seen with the Switch and its only been on the market for 15 months. I also think the Switch has a huge potential to shake things up because it is a home/handheld hyrbrid and these markets are going to get redefined. The video game industry really needs to be shaken up. That is where golden eras come from.

See the TV industry was just shaken up by internet streaming. Now TV is really good. Even traditional TV has upped it's game because it has to compete with Netflix now. The movie industry is mostly stagnant (except for Disney). They can make money following the same old formula, so they have no motivation to improve. The video game industry needs to be shaken up the most. Not only do we have remakes, but the industry relies far too much on sequels. There are too many Yakuza 16's, Final Fantasy 71's and Call of Duty: Postmodern Renfairs out there. In a healthy industry, new IP should come in and equal or outdo the old IP every year. Or at the very least small IP should explode and become huge like GTA 3. That is not really happening anymore.

I do have hope for the Switch to shake up things on the game side, but we'll just have to wait and see. I do think the Switch is an improvement from anything in Generation 8 though and that alone is pretty good.

I agree on your first two points, though I would lump TLJ's 50%+ drop from TFA in with Solo's outright bomb. Not fair to only include the bottom of the down hill slope.

 

But Gen 8 is definitely not a low. It's home to two of the three fastest selling consoles in history, as well as the first Hybrid Console (Switch) and first significant console refreshes (Pro and X). The indie scene is flourishing, PC gaming is relevant, and AAA titles aren't limited to bland shooters. The only lows are the underperforming Vita and Wii U, with the Vita signaling Sony's exit from handheld (due largely to phones and tablets) and the Wii U showing Nintendo's second generational Mulligan (the first being VirtualBoy). The XB1, while now doing worse than the 360 did, is still on track to maintain as least a decent marketshare in the US.

 

Remasters are also not a very large emphasis, and doesn't get much fanfare. Even Dark Souls Remastered, one of the most requested remasters, is only doing alright. You'll notice that a pretty big section of the highest rated games aren't remasters but are new entries in old franchises or new IPs. We've had more high quality titles in the past few years than SNES got altogether.



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Azuren said:
The_Liquid_Laser said:
Are we in a new "golden age"?
Short Answer:

Movies - No
TV - Yes
Games - Maybe
Books - Don't Know

Longer Answer: To know if we are in a "golden age", it helps a lot to know what the previous golden ages were like. Does this era have the same kind of impact that the greatest eras of the past did?

Movies - Disney is doing great overall (ignoring Solo). Generally the other studios are nowhere close to Disney on the big budget stuff. There have been some decent smaller budget films coming out, so maybe movies are headed for a golden age in the long term if they keep improving, but they just are no where close yet. The late 70s/80s were just an incredible era for films. I kind of think Lucas and Spielberg raised the bar for film making in that era and then the other filmmakers rose to the occasion. That is the sort of thing that film really needs again.

TV - Netflix and the internet in general have shaken things up in a good way. Now you've got internet platforms: Netflix, Hulu, Youtube, etc... putting out original content. At the same time traditional TV has had to step up their game in response. TV is extremely good right now, all the way around.


Games - Let me be clear. Generation 8 has been a huge LOW point in gaming. XB1, Wii U, 3DS, and Vita have all been huge disappointments. The PS4 is isn't really that great either. It just happens to be unoffensive while all of the other platforms are offensive and disappointing. The best selling game of Generation 8 was also released in Generation 7. That is just how terrible Generation 8 is.

Also, the emphasis on rereleases, remasters, NES classics and the like DO NOT mean that we are in a golden era. They signal that modern gaming sucks and that people prefer the games of the past. A good sign that you are in a golden era is that people stop caring about the past. When the NES came out, no one gave a damn about the Atari 2600 anymore. That was a huge sign that the NES was a golden era for console gaming. I haven't observed this sort of thing since, although I will admit that Generation 6 & 7 were also fairly high points and Gen. 8 was a huge decline from that.

So, now that I've crapped all over gaming why did I say "maybe" we are in a golden era? Because the Switch is a new hope. So far, I've been happy with what I've seen with the Switch and its only been on the market for 15 months. I also think the Switch has a huge potential to shake things up because it is a home/handheld hyrbrid and these markets are going to get redefined. The video game industry really needs to be shaken up. That is where golden eras come from.

See the TV industry was just shaken up by internet streaming. Now TV is really good. Even traditional TV has upped it's game because it has to compete with Netflix now. The movie industry is mostly stagnant (except for Disney). They can make money following the same old formula, so they have no motivation to improve. The video game industry needs to be shaken up the most. Not only do we have remakes, but the industry relies far too much on sequels. There are too many Yakuza 16's, Final Fantasy 71's and Call of Duty: Postmodern Renfairs out there. In a healthy industry, new IP should come in and equal or outdo the old IP every year. Or at the very least small IP should explode and become huge like GTA 3. That is not really happening anymore.

I do have hope for the Switch to shake up things on the game side, but we'll just have to wait and see. I do think the Switch is an improvement from anything in Generation 8 though and that alone is pretty good.

I agree on your first two points, though I would lump TLJ's 50%+ drop from TFA in with Solo's outright bomb. Not fair to only include the bottom of the down hill slope.

 

But Gen 8 is definitely not a low. It's home to two of the three fastest selling consoles in history, as well as the first Hybrid Console (Switch) and first significant console refreshes (Pro and X). The indie scene is flourishing, PC gaming is relevant, and AAA titles aren't limited to bland shooters. The only lows are the underperforming Vita and Wii U, with the Vita signaling Sony's exit from handheld (due largely to phones and tablets) and the Wii U showing Nintendo's second generational Mulligan (the first being VirtualBoy). The XB1, while now doing worse than the 360 did, is still on track to maintain as least a decent marketshare in the US.

 

Remasters are also not a very large emphasis, and doesn't get much fanfare. Even Dark Souls Remastered, one of the most requested remasters, is only doing alright. You'll notice that a pretty big section of the highest rated games aren't remasters but are new entries in old franchises or new IPs. We've had more high quality titles in the past few years than SNES got altogether.

I want to say that I am not including Switch in Generation 8.  That is why I said "maybe" for gaming being in a golden era.  It's too early to tell, but we may be heading that way.  Indie scene is also promising, but it needs to come to the forefront more to be included in a true "golden era"  As for the rest of your post:

Wii U was not a mulligan.  Nintendo supported it for 5 years.  That is basically a whole generation.  It was disappointing as hell, but Nintendo didn't abandon it like they did the Virtual Boy.  3DS and Vita were also disappointing compared to any previous handheld generation.  They both had a smaller library than their Gen. 7 counterparts (or any Nintendo handheld for that matter).  Any way that you cut it, Nintendo was at an all time low for Gen. 8 and the handheld market in general was at an all time low.  It also is very clear that XB1 is a disappointment especially when compared to XBox360.

That just leaves the PS4.  The hardware is selling well, but what about the games?  The best selling game on the PS4 was also released on the PS3 and XBox360.  GTAV is itself a remake.  They released it again with extra content.  That really shows how terrible Gen. 8 is because nothing in it can compete with a Gen. 7 game.  "AAA is no longer limited to bland shooters".  I am not sure what you are including in AAA.  Uncharted 4, God of War 3, Dark Souls 3, Monster Hunter World, Fallout 4?  All of these franchises were actually present in Generation 7.

Most importantly Generation 8 has done anything really new compared to Generation 7.  Generation 4 introduced fighting games and other games that needed more than 2 buttons.  Generation 5 introduced 3D and more importantly CDs which allowed for much bigger games.  Generation 6 introduced large open world games and more importantly disk games had much better action and speed than Gen 5.  Generation 7 introduced both motion controls and made online gaming mainstream.  What did Generation 8 do?  Nothing.  Better graphics is not enough.  Every generation has better graphics, but a new generation needs to do more than that.  It needs to actually advance gaming in some way.  Wii U, XB1, 3DS, Vita and even PS4 are all huge disappointments.

But I still give a "maybe" to gaming, because maybe Switch will turn things around.  It at least has the potential to do that, because it is trying to advance gaming.  It is trying to change things up and do something different.  Now the games have to be good too.  It is too early to tell on that front, but Switch looks promising at this point.



Flilix said:
Alara317 said:
I swear nobody has actually read the original post. I'm seeing so many posts using the arguments and points I already debunked, such as the whole 'shitty game practices' stuff.

Honestly, I thought I made it clear that, while there is some shit out there, it's only a small percentage of the games released in any given year.

People don't seem to like long posts. If you want your thread to be successful, you need to make your OP as short and controversial as possible.

I blame Wii Fit.



John2290 said:

Yes. I made a thread on this and I believe so, many disagreements here on VGC though.

 

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=235989&page=1

As you can see only 9 of 53 agree. :(

Personally I've never had so much fun gaming...sometimes a little too much fun to the point of neglecting real life to a degree. Last time I even touched on anything close to that, taking nostalgia and an easily mindblown mind of a child out of the matter was the second year of ps3. Sure playing NES and ps1 was more impactful but the favt that ps4 games can blow my mind as an adult as well as VR says something to their quality and aside from that there is always something to play and if you choose carefully you can almost avoid bad games entirely. Not counting VR which is basically a reset of everything and a childhood gaming experience without the ease of having a parent pay for games, back in he day it was much more difficult to avoid bad games, now it seems as if the road has been paved smooth at least if you keep up somewhat with the internet gaming culture and be smart in where you choose to put your money.

Golden age indeed even with all the obvious business BS on the surface.
.

You and I had a very similar conclusion while taking vastly different paths to get there. 

I guess that just reinforces the strength of today's gaming landscape.