Introduction

In recent times, especially over the last few months, I have found myself returning to older games. Some of which I played when I was younger, others which I could’ve played but didn’t own at the time. The experience so far has been somewhat eye-opening. I have noticed a clear difference between how I experienced these old games compared to the newer ones which are being released. I’m not sure entirely when things changed, but if I were to guess, the late 2010s would probably be around the time the feeling of playing games seems to shift. I’d still say the change was gradual and some games changed more quickly and noticeably than others.

I’ll just mention that I think indie games are a bit of an exception. They still tend to prioritise the same values which these old games did. Some of them might not, but you can find some which definitely do.

There also may be some big-budget games which don’t quite fall into the general trend, but I can’t think of any off the top of my head.

If you have been playing games for at least 10-15 years you may have also noticed a changing feeling. I don’t have scientific evidence/facts to back up this article, but I can discuss feelings and experiences in the hopes that they resonate with you and perhaps provide some understanding or insight to help explain what you may have been feeling.

Some Background Context

Firstly, to provide some context, I started using GOG sometime around the middle of this year. I also chose Heroic as my game launcher.

The aim of GOG is to provide you with DRM-free copies of games which you own, unlike other storefronts where a license to access the game is provided. Recent history has shown us time and time again what the significance of ownership is and how the “pay to access” models can be highly predatory/exploitative. As an example, just look at Sony’s desire to stop producing discs while closing some digital storefronts and combine this with the revocation of access to videos due to licensing issues. You should be able to get at least a rough idea of why licenses can be bad from these stories alone, but you can research this topic further and find that many companies follow similar anti-consumer practices.

Heroic is a relatively minimal game launcher which can integrate with Epic Games, Amazon Prime Games (both of which I couldn’t care less about), and most importantly, GOG. It’s open source, currently licensed under GPL-3.0, and provided me with all I needed; the ability to download games and play them. Working with a controller is a nice bonus as I sometimes use one on my desktop. I also sometimes use a steam deck (which I was lucky enough to get years before the current insane hardware prices).

“You’re Just Getting Older”

While perhaps there is an element of truth to this statement, I think it’s an oversimplification. I do believe that there will be some games you will only like as a child, and once you’re older you will move on, but I also think there are games that will retain your interest.

Especially with the ones I’ve been playing recently, I still like them. Maybe I’m not playing them nearly as much now I’m older and have other ways to invest my time, but at least I can continue to feel enjoyment when I play them.

Maybe another argument could be “it’s nostalgia”, to which I suggest to continue reading, because I have some other points to make.

Ownership

I mentioned ownership briefly in the introduction, but I wish to expand on it a little further. When you own something, there is a sense of comfort which you feel. You know that something is yours, you decide when to get rid of it, if ever. A third party cannot simply revoke your access.

We also experience nostalgia and may sometimes wish to return to something we did in the past. When you don’t own something, there is a non-zero chance that thing will be gone by the time you try to return to it. It may only exist as a memory and it’s gone no matter how much you wish for it to return. When you own something, because it’s within your control, you should be able to return to it.

Fidelity Above All Else

It seems like plenty of the recent high-budget titles seem to prioritise fidelity above everything else. Whether that be the art style, the gameplay loop, the story, character/world building, the voice acting, and even optimisation. The result we’ve seen is plenty of games which are completely empty. They have no substance to them, they’re extremely surface level, and often they die shortly after being released.

Something I found from older games is they tend not to fall into the same trap. There exist old games which have “good” fidelity for the time, but it doesn’t feel like that’s the main point, because they’re also fun and immersive. Examples I would point to are the 2000s era Tomb Raider games. They still look great, especially for the time they were made, but they also have engaging puzzle solving and platforming.

I also somewhat enjoyed the 2008 Prince of Persia game, which had “good” fidelity, but the style it chose was quite different to the Tomb Raider games.

How about the late 2000s and early 2010s where we had the Little Big Planet series. This series was extremely fun and creative, with an incredible OST to back them up, but they were never aiming for fidelity.

We need more games like this. We need to stop chasing fidelity, especially because of the hardware it requires (which feels near impossible to obtain with current market and general economic conditions), but also because the whole point of games is to be fun and immersive.

Optimisation

I just want to expand a bit on the optimisation point. I could write an entirely separate post about the issues I have with how modern games are engineered, but I’ll keep it short for now.

I’m completely fed up with the hardware requirements that new games have. I don’t know how they expect people to afford the components and even when people have them, it seems like some games run like hot garbage anyway. We have been shipped so many half-baked games in the last few years, we’re reaching a point where we simply expect a buggy and laggy experience from these companies. Sure, it may get fixed with time, but why should we be expecting a bad experience when paying upwards of £80 (maybe even more).

On top of this, the storage requirements are ludicrous. Not too long ago we would be able to fit an entire game onto a DVD, but now these games can eat through over 100GB of storage with ease. Especially linking back to the current market conditions, this is a quantity of storage which is unacceptable to be burning through over just one piece of software.

It forces you to be selective about what you have downloaded and any given moment, and if you aren’t well-off when it comes to networking speeds, it becomes extremely tedious waiting for that next game to install.

Achievements

Something which may seem undesirable at first glance is how Heroic doesn’t seem to display your achievements (at least I couldn’t figure it out without visiting the GOG store). I also didn’t seem to get achievement popups in games. Along with this, a lot of the games I chose to play didn’t even have achievements.

Reflecting on this, I think it’s a positive. When a game has achievements you may feel compelled to keep playing to grind all of them, basically treating these achievements as a to-do list, more like a task or some form of work.

Playing games without achievements, or at least having them be a far less significant aspect to a game, lets you focus more on the experience and immersion, which should be what games aim to do anyway.

Hooks

This point may link into achievements a bit, but I think it goes deeper. An experience I’ve had with modern games is the feeling of compulsion. When I played these games, it’s not necessarily because I genuinely wanted to out of enjoyment or a desire to immerse myself in that game’s world. It felt like a different part of my brain was activating, one which feels more like addiction.

When I went back to playing these older games, I only played when I truly wanted to and I could put down the controller at a moment’s notice. There was no inclination to stay on the game, I wasn’t missing out on anything if I stopped. I could come back at any time and it would be just where I left it. With modern games, they may have certain “hooks” that try to keep you engaged.

I can’t pin-point exactly what these hooks are, since it depends on the game. Some examples may be limited time events or items, maybe the concept of battle-passes, or maybe something as simple, yet engaging, as a number going up (think incremental/idle games).

Even though I may give these examples, sometimes they may actually be the fun part of the game. It’s hard to distinguish between a purely addictive mechanic and one which provides you with genuine enjoyment.

All I can suggest is to try some introspection to figure out why you’re playing a given game. If you’re doing it due to compulsion instead of enjoyment, maybe it’s time to step away and do something else.

Suggestions

Even if you may not agree with the points I’ve made, I would still suggest to try out some old games, or maybe some simple indie games. See how they play, feel how they’re different.

I also suggest trying to pay to own. Try to avoid DRM, it sucks. Also try to avoid games which rely on a server to keep running, because you may lose your time investment into that game when the devs/publisher inevitably decide to shut things down.

Try to aim for simple experiences, play when you really want to, and try to avoid falling for addictions. Games should be kept purely for immersion and fun, rather than becoming a full-time job.