Why on rail shooters are dimished?

[greenmedic88]

Part of it is player tastes change over the years.

Personally, I used to love arcade style on rails, pre scripted, pre timed shooters. Having the plastic guns was an integral part of the experience and these were really best enjoyed at arcades.

But as arcades diminished during the 6th console gen as arcade cabinet hardware was essentially the same as what could be played at home, the relevance of on rails shooters seemed to diminish as well.

I still enjoyed playing Namco's Time Crisis on the PS2 along with a few on rails shooters by Capcom, and it was pretty cool having essentially the same arcade experience at home, but for some reason, playing these at home didn't have the same appeal; one just didn't have to go to an arcade to experience it was all.

Fighting games lost quite a bit of their luster with the slow demise of arcades as well. By the beginning of the 7th gen, they were no longer breaking sales records or drawing the same crowds at arcades.

I think I bought one on rails shooter on the PS3 (Time Crisis 4?) with the updated gun that used IR LEDs for tracking since most people had stopped using the older CRT light gun tech. I don't think Namco released any other games that used the redesigned gun.

I don't know what all this mumbo jumbo is about labeling FPS games or TPS games "on rail shooters." If you played in arcades, you know what they are.