Modern Gaming Feels Like a Chore

Very rarely these days do I hear “X game is 100 hours long” and not instantly think “Yeah, and 60 hours of is basically busy work”

That's exactly how i feel about gaming now as well. People contribute that to nostalgia constantly, but it really isn't. I wanted to test that myself and see if i'm actually just getting older, so i went ahead and played a bunch of 2000s games that i never played before. Gothic series, Witcher 1, Mass Effect 1, Risen,AC 1/2, Dark Souls 1 and i had absolute blast playing these old games. So no it's definitely not nostalgia for me, modern games just don't have the same feeling.

I think a big part of this is the shift away from “player experience” to “player retention”. Plus there’s a very loud & vocal minority of gamers that say a games value is directly tied to the number of hours. That only encourages developers to fill their games with mundane content to reach an “acceptable” hour count.

You pretty much described how I felt when I played Doom 2016 for the first time. Instead of the usual long cutscenes, inventory managment and tutorials, the game just hands you a gun and tell you to go shoot demons. And that was refreshing. I genuinely enjoyed that game and it reminded me of a time when games used to be fun.

there's a difference between "vastness" and "emptiness" there's a difference between "purpose" and "objective" there's a difference between "challenging" and "laborious" i think a lot of games get that wrong

Games nowadays aren't just trying to waste our time, their fighting for our time so that we can't play OTHER games. The solution is plain and simple: realize we don't owe these games this time investment and go find titles that respect us and our playtime.

I feel like the biggest problem with AAA gaming is that the people working on the games are not gamers, like you said. They aren't there to program a game they want to play themselves. They are there to code, nothing more. These people don't care about the product they are making. As long as the higher ups give you the green light, no matter how terrible your product is, you get your paycheck. That's why indie games are often so much more engaging, ground breaking or fun in general. Because the people who are making the games are making something they want to play and want others to play. The passion is missing.

I think something that factors in here is that “gaming” became part of pop culture. It used to be a much more niche activity with a lot less press, funding, and hype. The mainstream success of gaming has led to those outside the niche to start bringing their influence, which has led to a significant dilution of the passion and energy we used to see from the art form.

You take on modern gaming is spot on. I couldn't have said it better myself. We definitely need more games developed by gamers for gamers. Our time is valuable and shouldn't be wasted on meaningless busy work.

What's really helped me enjoy gaming again is playing games I truly want to play, I spent alot of time playing what was trending so I wouldn't feel left out. Once I switched to playing things I found interesting I've since stopped feeling super burnt out.

I love BG3 so much it affected my sleep schedule and social life. I realize part of it was because I didn't have to escort defenseless characters to safety, find 20 nirnroot for the local alchemist, rescue A, B, C and D in 4 bandit caves in 4 corners of the map to get accepted into some faction.

I love a grindy game that allows me to choose to grind or not. I’ll always compare it to doing chores. If I choose to do them then it’s fun, but as soon as my mom tells me I need to do them, I immediately don’t want to do them and hate the fact that I have to

Live service videogames were one of the worst things that could happen to this industry. Every modern game technically must imply grinding to progress (Jesus Christ with that daily missions and logins). The worst part is that I will never understand why the need to resort to ad hominem fallacies such as age (being 26 years old is already seen as something derogatory to invalidate someone's argument) to defend this industry that is falling apart with each passing year. As it seems that those morons feel a pleasure that companies treat them as something sadder than a slave.

I'd say you hit the nail on the head. Games whose designs are dictated by businessmen usually play like boring jobs.

I think part of the problem is that in the past the games had a target audience, nowadays everything has to be an enourmous success and to achieve that the game has to appeal to everybody, wich appeals to none

This video is extremely informative, this explains why I just can’t get into new games. I can always replay Halo 3, Fallout New Vegas, COD World at War, and Lost Planet 2 a million times, even though they have a fraction of the “playtime” that new games have. Awesome vid! Will def sub

Your headline resonates with me. I remember abandoning LA Noir because it started feeling like a second job.

Baldur's Gate 3 revived my love for gaming. I turned on my PC and ooof 5 hours went by. Created 3 Tavs already just to mess around with builds and romance options 😂😂😂 188hrs and have not finished any run yet.

Giving up gaming is incredibly liberating.

I remember when games were a fun thing to invite friends over to play, or bring them with you to college and get people in on them. The party game genre is basically non-existent now, which is what I remember having so much fun with. I took Towerfall Ascension to the community college I went to and we all had a blast. Castle Crashers, Mario Party, Halo 3 split screen, it was so much fun. None of those are really around anymore.