| The_Liquid_Laser said: Since the film industry couldn't rely on technological improvements to entice people to the theatres, they started focusing more on telling good stories. I kind of think that the games industry is at this transition point now. Improvements in technology are at a point of highly diminishing returns. The studios that will see the most success in the coming years are those who focus on improvements in gameplay much more than improvements in graphics. |
You're so fatally wrong about Cinema that I'm wondering if we are even living in the same reality. The only box office hits nowadays are the big budget blockbusters, good graphics and special effects is pretty much the only thing that convince people to take of their butts from their couches and go to theaters. Lower budget movies destiny is streaming, simply because the experience from big screens is far superior on theater compared to home media for blockbusters, but not as much for smaller budget movies. That's why cinema market is plummeting and streaming market is growing.
Gaming is a bit different because you need to be invested in the gameplay for quite a few hours before beating the game. It's something more akin to book series or TV shows, production value can be often overlooked if said thing is fun enough, otherwise you will just drop it. This is even more true in subscription model.
However imo this is a double edged sword. I personally don't think games need to bring immediate pleasure and satisfaction, I appreciate games that take their time to really show their colors, there are some games you need a time to grasp the mechanics and design, and a market that will drop that game to something else because it wasn't fun enough in the first 1 hour is not what I believe to be the best course for gaming, but it is what it is I guess...
This also, opposing to what you seems to think, making gameplay more and more formulaic rather than innovative. That's because is much easier to catch someone showing something a person already like and know than something new, specially when talking about new IPs.
It may not seem very intuitive, but technology in other hand can help to sell a gameplay, because technology itself is exciting, even if the gameplay is not, think about Wii Sports vs Switch Sports.
