Tired of the entire gaming industry?

The video game business is now just another facet of the entertainment industry. And industry whose most basic business model is the same as a compulsive gambler. You put up money (bet) for a project and sometime later you find out if you won. Sometimes you win really big (The Avengers, The Dark Knight) but most of the time you don't and you're happy if you can just break even at the end of the day.

And like the trend in movies to make sequels or remakes of older successful films or chasing currently successful genres like studios do for television, major game studios have adopted the same model. It's a way to reduce the risk of failure by sticking with what already works. Sure there's the occasional new title that does good or is critically acclaimed from the major studios but they're few and far between. Instead we get Sword and Sorcery MMO #12, pro sport 2012, period wartime FPS #4, modern wartime FPS #3 or scifi wartime FPS #32. I'm talking PC gaming here, there are still lots of unusual games on consoles from Japan.

LittleDavid posted an article from back in 2005 about the death of Origin at the hands of EA. It was pointed out that EA would rather have a few mega successes than a string of small but profitable titles. Also having a lot of projects in development means that you always had one or more somethings you could cancel for the tax break when you don't get a mega success that year.

Edit: Change development to business/major studio.

If you like a roguelike every now and again, I can recommend Dungeon Crawl: Stone Soup. Delightfully balanced, with a good-sized but not overwhelming set of options.

I'm getting sick of it yes. But it's not so much the money stuff. Despite the complaints, I don't see many games putting anything in that's pay to win. Besides, I don't mind paying for games that I like. Developers are people too you know. Everyone needs to make money.

My problem with the industry is that story is disappearing. Casual games are the fotm, and those don't even have to pretend to have a story. Then you have MMOs that claim to have story, but the story is "I'm having a hard time with these undead. Can you kill 5 of them? That'd make things a lot better." GW2 said they wouldn't be like that. They're worse. Their "revolutionary" no-quest system is just grinding that tells you where the enemies are. It's not even remotely story driven. CoH was one of the most story driven online games out there, was getting more story driven, and allowed me to make my own stories to my heart's content. And now NCSoft is closing it down so they can put out more junk

I'm really, really glad that some of the old RPGs are being remade. Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition comes out this month. I preordered it. It's been far too long since I've played a game with a decent story, and BG is right up there with the best of them. I highly suggest anyone with similar feelings try it out.

@Rorn ---- Blue Baron ---- Guardian

First thing, I'm pretty happy about F2P. It lets me try games that I wouldn't try otherwise. I always hated the limited time MMO trials, and being able to have an infinite trial is great. Let me pay what I'm willing to pay. Give me stuff that I'd want to pay for.

As for the gaming industry, I'm a big Kickstarter fan, and I think that's becoming a big part of where the gaming industry is. Games and genres that you think are long gone are making a comeback, and small developers with neat ideas are getting the money to finish implementing them. I expect to own quite a few great games next year.

Ooh, Dwarf Fortress is a good one. I definitely recommend using a graphics pack, especially if you're just getting into the game. I haven't played in awhile, but my last fort was in a haunted forest biome and suffered from blue dust storms that instantly killed anyone who inhaled the dust, so any time the dust storms began I had to order everyone inside. The fort was eventually overrun by a goblin ambush due to an unprepared militia and some clothes from dust storm victims forcing the doors ajar. Good times.

I'm with you about being tired of almost every major publisher, but there is still a lot of good out there. I'll also vouch for Bastion and Cthulu Saves the World. CSTW usually runs $2.99 on Steam, but is very often on sale for $1.50 and is available as a double pack for the same price with another game. Bastion just has amazing character as a selling point, including the soundtrack, visuals, and narration.

One game I've recently really enjoyed is a point and click adventure, Gemini Rue. If you like games like King's Quest with a sci-fi twist and interesting story, it's really worth it. There are a few shooting sections which (imo) aren't that great due to issues with responsiveness, but they are easily passed. It's $9.99 on steam but is also on sale frequently, or included in bundles. The characters, voice acting, and story (perhaps the strongest element of the game) all sell it, for me at least.

I'm also really looking forward to Torchlight 2 coming out. It's probably closer to mainstream than indie, but Runic Games has just been a great company overall. They went beyond any expectations I could have anticipated of them when I was hoping to find a way to play the original Torchlight on my Mac after buying it for Windows (at the time I wasn't using Steam).

Otherwise I'd recommend checking out the Humble Bundle sets, or other sets where you pay the price you want for a collection of really good games. I think the last one let you get games like Bastion, Braid, Psychonauts, and more for a really low price, and you can dictate where the profits go to (charity or development costs for indie gamemakers). Hope I don't sound like an advertisement for all of these games, I'm just very happy with them

Oh yeah! Almost forgot Starbound, this game looks like it will be a lot of fun! Randomly generated planets that you can terraform. It's by one of the guys who initially worked on Terraria, but left the company. It has robots powered by cats so it has to be good.http://playstarbound.com/

I do remember Doom... Mostly because I still play it today, in higher resolution, better graphics and with thousands of great user-made maps, thanks to id releasing the source code. Not like *some* other companies who just shut their game down and take the ball home.

Picked up Deus Ex HR during the last Steam sale. Had a blast playing through it. Pretty close to the original; almost *too* close.

Also grabbed Saints Row 3. It's like a spiritual successor to the very first GTA, sheer stupidity and ludicrous carnage.

Loving the video game industry right now. Most games are terrible, sure, but there's just so many games, even the "few" great games released are still more than enough to make the main issue finding time to play rather than finding something worth playing. With digital distribution and sales, games are cheaper than ever.

I like the F2P model too, if someone else wants to drop three hundred bucks on a shiny armor and essentially pay for my copy of the game, it doesn't lessen my enjoyment any.

Haven't tried it, though I should probably give it a look.

Bill: Re the MWO beta, You really should do it. It's a very small company...and it's a great franchise to support. Seriously it's not a "Nickel and dime" you to death game the devs for that game act with integrity and creativity. If they find something game breaking they TELL the community and say "Sorry we'll patch that ASAP" and they do it.

MWO is NOT an MMO. It's a PVP Mech Simulation. I mean..dude..it is SO CLOSE to MW3 or 4 with gorgeous graphics.

That's all I'm gonna say about that.

I reinstalled TIE Fighter the other night using a DOS Emulator. Now I just have to get a flight stick and actually find time to play it when I'm not working, going to school, doing homework, attending to my toddler, doing chores, going to three weddings in the next two months, organizing a bachelor party, finalizing the purchase of my house, finishing and moving into said house...

Kerbal Space Program.

I miss when first person shooters were like Doom and Quake, not Call of Duty and Battlefield. If TF2 ever came out with some sort of single player campaign mode, I'd probably never stop playing it.

Also miss when RPGs were like Final Fantasy 1-10, not 11-14 or Kingdom Hearts.