(I didn’t intend for this to be a numbered list; it just turned out that way.)
1. Personal Taste
Even a best-selling, “Game Of The Year” award winner won’t be for everyone. People will always have preferences, and just because they spend 20 hours in Hades doesn’t mean they’ll do the same for Stardew Valley. (Also, while it’s good to expand your horizons, no one can be forced to like something they don’t.)
It could also be a generational thing. Someone who grew up on arcade games may not like complicated mechanics or long play times. Likewise, some modern gamers may think older games are too short or even too hard.
Personally, I like fast-paced, arcade-style games that are easy to pick up and play. While immersing myself in a long game can be fun if the game is good, I’ve reached a point in my life where I’d rather not spend countless hours sitting on my ass playing through fantasy novels (metaphorically speaking).
This segues nicely into my next point…
2. Aging
Just because you loved something as a kid doesn’t always mean you’ll still love it as an adult. People and tastes change; that’s just a natural part of getting older. Plus, as you grow older and gain more responsibilities, you may not even have time for video games. (Then again, some have been able to turn gaming into a lucrative hobby.)
3. Too Much Gaming
For some, gaming can be a fun pastime or hobby. For others, it can be an all-consuming lifestyle. Some may play games out of habit, even though it’s long since lost its pleasure. Some may spend more time gaming than they do anything else. There could be a number of reasons for this: maybe it’s a coping mechanism, maybe they just have an addictive personality, or maybe the game they’re playing was intentionally designed to get them addicted.
Which brings me to…
4. Corporate Greed
This could definitely be its own post, but I’ll try to be as succinct as possible.
Gaming has always been an expensive hobby: from quarter-eating arcade machines to $500 consoles and $60 games, it burns a hole in your pocket pretty quickly. The addition of microtransactions and DLC has only made things worse. For example, the base cost for Train Sim World 4 on Steam is $49.99, but if you include all the DLC, you’d be looking at over $2,400 for a game about driving trains. Likewise, The Sims 4 is currently free-to-play on Steam, but if you want all the DLC, it’ll cost you over $1,200. (Some games offer “Deluxe”, “Ultimate”, or “Complete” editions that include some or all of the DLC at a slight discount. Some offer “Season Pass” options that allow you access either to all DLC when it comes out or a certain amount of it, after which you’d have to buy another “Season Pass” to get the next amount, and so on and so forth.)
For clarification, DLC is short for “downloadable content”: extra content that can be purchased separately from the base game. Microtransactions are part of the base game and, in some cases, integral to the gameplay. Whereas DLC is limited, the amount of microtransactions can be unlimited, encouraging the player to spend up to tens of thousands of dollars over time. Although game companies have repeatedly been criticized for this, there’s no sign of them stopping anytime soon.
Also, consoles cost hundreds of dollars, yet they have a fairly limited shelf life. Consoles are usually relevant for about 5 years, give or take, and then a new console is introduced, rendering it obsolete. Thus, the cycle of buying a console and its games begins again, asking players to spend even more money.
5. Game Length
Video games, by and large, are much more time-consuming now than they were decades ago. Just because a game has content that will take dozens of hours to get through doesn’t always mean it will be a fun experience. Plus, considering how many games require 20+ hours of play time, that’s a pretty huge time sink. Players should only spend that much time in a game because they want to, not because they have to. (Games don’t have to be long to be enjoyable anyway. I finished Journey in a little over 2 hours, and it’s one of the best games I’ve ever played.)
6. Cinematic Storytelling
Video games can provide a more immersive experience than any other form of entertainment; yet, they often emulate the storytelling style of movies: voice acting, camera cuts, lengthy cutscenes, even orchestral scores. While not inherently a bad thing, I feel that they’re capable of so much more.
Take Gone Home for example: you play as a character who comes home to find her family missing, and the story slowly reveals itself as you explore the house and find items that reveal more about the family. While the ending is polarizing, you can’t deny that this unique form of storytelling could only work in a video game.
Again, I’m not against cinematic storytelling, but I do feel like watching long cutscenes with voice acting and such defeats the purpose of games, which is to provide an immersive, interactive experience.
7. Online Multiplayer
While most games are either fully offline or have offline options, there’s now a greater focus on online multiplayer, and when you look at the success of games like Fortnite, Roblox, Counter-Strike 2, and Grand Theft Auto Online, it’s not hard to see why.
I must admit, I don’t have much experience playing online. I used to play the WWE 2K games online, but it was incredibly frustrating, so I stopped. (Plus, when I had a PS3, playing online was free. Now, you have to pay for a subscription. There’s that corporate greed again.)
Aside from the trolls, cheaters, rage-quitters, and sore losers you’ll encounter online, my biggest issue is the limited shelf life compared to offline games. Online games run on a server, and when the server goes down, the game becomes unplayable. There always has to be people maintaining the server in order for the game to work, and if the developers decide to shut it down for good, then the game is lost forever. (Unless someone else is willing to keep it going, like with Toontown Rewritten.)
Speaking of which…
8. Lack of Preservation
To be fair, game companies have gotten much better at preserving older titles. Nowadays, a lot of classic games are widely available to play, whether they’re direct ports (Red Dead Redemption, Bully), remasters (Tomb Raider I-III Remastered, BioShock Remastered), or full remakes (Resident Evil 4, Spyro Reignited Trilogy). However, there are still a ton of games that aren’t available unless you have the original system and physical game (Def Jam: Fight For NY, the Viewtiful Joe games, The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, Burnout 3: Takedown, Midnight Club 3: Dub Edition, The Beatles: Rock Band, the list goes on).
Every other creative medium has been able to preserve their classics and make them widely accessible. The works of Shakespeare, for example, are hundreds of years old, yet they’re still performed and adapted to this day and are widely available to read. The Bible is even older, and every version of it is freely available to read online. Roundhay Garden Scene, filmed in 1888, is the oldest surviving film in history, and all 3 seconds of it are free to watch online. Yet, LittleBigPlanet, which came out in 2008, can only be played on a PS3.
As I alluded to earlier, online games come with their own set of problems. Online games need a server to function, and I doubt that every online game that ever existed will have people maintaining their servers for all time. So, how can those games be preserved? Can they be remade into offline multiplayer games? If so, will they?
Another issue is with DLC. Some games, like Dishonored and Sleeping Dogs, are re-released with all DLC included, but others, like WWE 2K22 (which only came out a couple years ago), have been completely de-listed from all platforms — meaning if you didn’t get the DLC when it came out, you’ll never be able to get it now. 2K22 is still available via physical copies, but the DLC can only be accessed online with a code that has likely expired, and the servers have been shut down. So, not only can you not use the DLC, you can’t play online or download custom wrestlers/arenas/etc., making for an incomplete game experience.
There’s also the issue of updates and patches, which are only accessible with an internet connection. With modern games, if you have the physical copy of a game but no internet, you’ll only have access to the game as it was at launch, which means important updates that fix bugs or add new content will be inaccessible. (Needless to say, all digital games will also be inaccessible.)
I don’t know what needs to be done, but there has to be some way to make games more widely accessible in their most complete form. Right now, the PC is the best option, as it has the largest library of games available that can be easily stored and transferred. (Backwards compatibility is another solution.)
One last issue is “console exclusivity”. Most games are available on all platforms, but some of the more high-profile games, like Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, are only playable on one console. I think this needs to end; yes, it helps boost console sales (hello again, corporate greed), but it hurts the overall accessibility of games in the long run. (Yes, Nintendo owns the Super Smash Bros. franchise, but I don’t think Super Smash Bros. Ultimate should be exclusive to a Nintendo console. It’s a crossover game anyway, so it would make more sense if it were released on multiple platforms. Plus, imagine how much more it would sell. I’m pretty sure one of the reasons Minecraft is the best-selling game of all time is that it’s available on every platform that exists.)
9. Lack of Variety & Innovation
While graphics have improved drastically over the years, I’d argue that innovation in terms of gameplay has stagnated. We have yet to fully explore the capabilities of video games, yet companies and developers regurgitate the same games that have existed for decades.
There are so many different kinds of games that could exist. We could have more virtual museums, virtual theme parks, photography games, art games, filmmaking games, or even game-making games! Imagine, if we thought outside the box for once, what kind of experiences we could make with modern technology at our disposal.
(This can also be blamed on corporate greed. After all, why do something different when you can give people the same thing over and over and keep making money?)
10. Broken Games
If you’re expected to pay $60 or more for a new game, it’s not unreasonable to expect it to be functional and stable at launch, right? Well, unfortunately, a number of high-profile games have been released in a broken or unpolished state. It’s to the point where it’s become unreasonable to get hyped for games now. Why get hyped when the game could be a buggy mess at launch?
Granted, games can now be patched and updated to fix the bugs, but that’s no guarantee every game will get such treatment. Plus, patches and updates take time to create and implement, so the player essentially has to wait for the game to get better (on top of the time they waited for the game to come out).
To be fair, there are a number of reasons why games are released like this: rush, management/development changes, lack of focus, lack of skill/experience, overworked developers, pressure from overhype, lack of budget, the list goes on. Whatever the case, it’s still not a good look, and it erodes the player’s trust, making them less likely to buy future games.
11. Casual vs. Hardcore Gaming
Some people play games as a fun pastime, not really taking it seriously. Others devote themselves to a game, sharpening and improving their skills to compete with others. Sometimes, there’s a clash between these two groups: one arguing the other takes the game too seriously, and the other arguing they don’t take it seriously enough.
I don’t play games competitively, so this doesn’t really matter to me, but I’ve heard some accuse companies of making their games easier to appeal to more casual players. To some degree, this backlash is understandable: the harder the game, the more satisfying the victory. However, the fact is there are more casual gamers than hardcore gamers. So, from a business standpoint, it makes more sense to appeal to them. (Damn you, corporate greed!)
At the same time, if a game’s mechanics are altered to make it easier for casual players, it kind of ruins the sense of competition, because then, everyone would be at or near the same level all the time. Also, it makes the game seem more boring because it doesn’t offer any deeper mechanics, and it robs newcomers of the satisfaction of getting better at the game.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with certain games having a high skill ceiling. I feel like there should be games for everybody, both casual and hardcore, and if you’re a casual gamer complaining about a hardcore game (or vice versa), the game wasn’t made for you. (Some may call this “gatekeeping”, but I’d argue that’s what keeps video games from becoming homogenized.)
12. Anti-Consumer Practices
They say, "The customer is always right in matters of taste," but game companies haven't always gotten that memo. Over the years, companies and developers have made creative and business decisions that were met with considerable backlash. For example, when asked on Reddit why Darth Vader was locked behind a paywall in Star Wars: Battlefront II, an EA spokesperson claimed it was to give the player "a sense of pride and accomplishment" for unlocking him. This is currently the most downvoted comment in Reddit history.
In 2023, Skullgirls was updated to remove Nazi-like imagery, various lines of dialogue, and several panty shots years after the game's initial release. Despite accusations of censorship and the game receiving thousands of negative Steam reviews as a result, the developers stood their ground. (I've never played Skullgirls, but, to me, this is similar to George Lucas changing scenes in the Star Wars movies. As the saying goes, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it.")
There's also the recent Pokémon GO! controversy, where player avatars were altered in a way that makes them look "uglier", according to players. Niantic, the company behind the game, has yet to comment on the backlash, but several of those who worked on the game have since been laid off, though it's unclear if this was the reason why. (It wouldn't be hard to believe.)
On top of the backlash it received for its story, The Last Of Us Part II received criticism for its deceptive marketing. The trailers seemed to promote it as a lesbian revenge tale, and a number of scenes were altered from how they actually are in the game.
Lastly, at Blizzcon 2018, it was announced that a new Diablo game would be coming to mobile devices. For context, Diablo is a PC-based franchise, its fans are mostly PC gamers, and the most recent Diablo game came out in 2012. Obviously, this was met with backlash from the audience, with one guy asking if the announcement was "an out-of-season April Fools' joke". When asked if there'd be a PC Diablo game coming, they said there currently weren't any plans for it, and when the crowd booed, they responded, "Do you guys not have phones?" (The game, Diablo: Immortal, was released to overwhelmingly negative reviews from fans and mixed reviews from critics who criticized its monetization system.)
I could go into other things like the Warcraft III: Reforged controversy, Nintendo copyright-claiming YouTube videos of their games, shutting down fan games, and trying to suppress the competitive Super Smash Bros. scene, but this post is long enough already.
13. The Culture War
I saved the most contentious for last.
The culture war between the progressive left and conservative right has seeped into all forms of entertainment, including video games. One side is calling for more diversity and representation, and also claiming that certain elements of games and game culture are “problematic”. The other side believes games don’t need changing, and that diversity and representation are actually ruining video games. Both sides are set in their ways, taking themselves way too seriously, and neither are willing to talk to each other.
I hate politics with every fiber of my being, but it’s sadly unavoidable. There are a bunch of people you don’t know who have control over the lives of every person in this country, and what they do can affect your life, whether you want it to or not. It sucks, but that’s just how it is right now.
For the longest time, entertainment was seen as an escape from politics. However, the fighting over diversity and representation has ruined that escapism almost entirely. It’s two sides flinging shit at each other, and no one is winning. It’s a fucking mess, and it needs to end. (There are much more serious issues that warrant such vitriol. Video games should not be a political battleground.)
There may be more reasons out there, but this post was not intended to be comprehensive. I think I’ve proved conclusively that video games not being fun anymore isn’t just a subjective feeling, but a reality we’re all dealing with. Let me know what you think.