Great read! I don't expect to be in the majority on this, but I've been re-assessing a lot of things in my life over the last decade - my participation in consumerism, the ecological footprint of tech industries at large, and the preservation of games. I also think often about the recent study that found that 60% of gamers are playing games that released 6 years ago or longer.
The last decade of gaming saw the release and push of countless big titles with ongoing content schedules and online communities that have proved to have impressive longevity. A lot of people found their communities and the games that speak to them during this time period, and while there are always new and exciting things to try out, if your favourite game still has new seasonal content and people are still playing it, why ditch it?
The industry pushed hard for these games as a service titles over the last decade, and while it's a trend full of costly cautionary tales, there are also many titles still stand as a testament to the success of the idea when it hits and the community stands by to support it. People are still enjoying a lot of these games (I say this as someone who still plays Destiny 2 and primarily does so on a PS4), so it feels like a statistical change the industry should have expected, that these longer-term experiences may result in fewer people looking to buy new titles month after month, and this isn't even touching the economic factors that see most working class people having less disposable income and less downtime due to working longer hours/multiple jobs.
The ongoing popularity of previous-gen hardware and titles that aren't brand-new is something that to me illustrates something I'd love to see the games industry embrace more - legacy. Enduring enthusiasm for older games, access and celebration of these titles, and the hard work that goes into making them. Orgs like the Video Game History Foundation Library do incredible work, and I really hope we see more archival work done to preserve media and keep it in people's hands. Innately, I think that will mean the broader gaming space moving to more community-run efforts to keep things preserved and accessible, and I hope we see publishers and rights holders become more willing to hand off their IP once they're done supporting it, so those games can live on in the hands of the people who love them, lest a unique era of the medium become lost media that is much trickier to preserve than simple ROMs of offline classics.
Stephen, thank you! Great article and I definitely learned more than I expected to. Also, to @AndroidisaLoser's point, I definitely think having the option of multiple systems, each with several hundred games' worth of backlog is a "thing" that game companies haven't really come to grips with, in ADDITION to 2 points made in your article, Stephen (and in many others as well):
1) Cross gen support has gone on much longer between last gen and this gen then it did previously, really evers.
2) Graphical fidelity is arguably at it's least different now between the generations then it has ever been. Nintendo to Genesis/Super Nintendo? My eyes wept. N64 to PS2? Mother of God, angels descending from on high! PS4 to PS5? Which game is it, what are the console settings and, I mean, I guess Spiderman swings a little smoother and the uniform looks a little crisper...
Great read! I don't expect to be in the majority on this, but I've been re-assessing a lot of things in my life over the last decade - my participation in consumerism, the ecological footprint of tech industries at large, and the preservation of games. I also think often about the recent study that found that 60% of gamers are playing games that released 6 years ago or longer.
The last decade of gaming saw the release and push of countless big titles with ongoing content schedules and online communities that have proved to have impressive longevity. A lot of people found their communities and the games that speak to them during this time period, and while there are always new and exciting things to try out, if your favourite game still has new seasonal content and people are still playing it, why ditch it?
The industry pushed hard for these games as a service titles over the last decade, and while it's a trend full of costly cautionary tales, there are also many titles still stand as a testament to the success of the idea when it hits and the community stands by to support it. People are still enjoying a lot of these games (I say this as someone who still plays Destiny 2 and primarily does so on a PS4), so it feels like a statistical change the industry should have expected, that these longer-term experiences may result in fewer people looking to buy new titles month after month, and this isn't even touching the economic factors that see most working class people having less disposable income and less downtime due to working longer hours/multiple jobs.
The ongoing popularity of previous-gen hardware and titles that aren't brand-new is something that to me illustrates something I'd love to see the games industry embrace more - legacy. Enduring enthusiasm for older games, access and celebration of these titles, and the hard work that goes into making them. Orgs like the Video Game History Foundation Library do incredible work, and I really hope we see more archival work done to preserve media and keep it in people's hands. Innately, I think that will mean the broader gaming space moving to more community-run efforts to keep things preserved and accessible, and I hope we see publishers and rights holders become more willing to hand off their IP once they're done supporting it, so those games can live on in the hands of the people who love them, lest a unique era of the medium become lost media that is much trickier to preserve than simple ROMs of offline classics.
Stephen, thank you! Great article and I definitely learned more than I expected to. Also, to @AndroidisaLoser's point, I definitely think having the option of multiple systems, each with several hundred games' worth of backlog is a "thing" that game companies haven't really come to grips with, in ADDITION to 2 points made in your article, Stephen (and in many others as well):
1) Cross gen support has gone on much longer between last gen and this gen then it did previously, really evers.
2) Graphical fidelity is arguably at it's least different now between the generations then it has ever been. Nintendo to Genesis/Super Nintendo? My eyes wept. N64 to PS2? Mother of God, angels descending from on high! PS4 to PS5? Which game is it, what are the console settings and, I mean, I guess Spiderman swings a little smoother and the uniform looks a little crisper...