Friday, May 9, 2008
Was 2003 the year of the great online multiplayer gaming flameout, or the year when a whole new approach to computer games finally gained real momentum?
Dec 23, 2003 | It's the best of times, it's the worst of times for video gamers. There are no interesting games, there are stacks of interesting games. Gamers are bored with games, they are excited about games.
The Entertainment Software Association reports that the average gamer is now 28 years old, and maybe that's part of the problem: We are not so easily distracted by shiny pretty things anymore. But how to resolve the contradiction that where some find ennui others wait with bated breath?
Jason Zada, gamer and designer, writes on his blog, "Video gamers should be extra happy this Holiday season. The quality and amount of video games that are coming out are pretty impressive." At the same time, Steve Bowler writes on the group blog I maintain, "I've purchased three games this past month, and although they all please in the average sense, nothing is blowing me away. I can't get past the negatives, nor the lack of anything truly innovative."
So which is it, as we look back on the past year? Are we condemned to nothing besides genre retreads and sequels or is there an avalanche of great games just waiting to be found? As usual, the answer is "both" -- we're just not hearing about the good stuff.
You hear about what is hyped, and the hype is built up around all the safe bets in the industry. The surefire hit, the Bruckheimer production of the game world, gets all the cash and glitz. The result is that the bulk of current games speak to the same old audience -- the guys (and they are almost all guys) who loved "Halo," "Half-Life," and "Deus Ex." Good, solid games, perhaps, but yet again, 2003 was another year in which gaming failed to break out of the gamer ghetto. The anticipated online gaming revolution never happened. Sales of key games -- like the buzz-worthy "Prince of Persia" -- are sluggish. Is it gamer malaise? Market fatigue? Too much rehash of the same old, same old?
Maybe we should look a little further, stand up from our keyboards and joysticks and peer into the distance. Out on the fringe wait the odd little games. The offbeat, the wacky, the strange games are available, but they're hiding under piles of overstocked "Tomb Raider."
Sure, most of these games won't sell more than 20 units; many of them will remain in France or in Japan and never be ported to North America. Most gamers may not even hear about them. But some of them will spark tiny trends and slowly carve out new niches in overcrowded genres. Some of them will pull gamers out of their chairs and back into their own bodies -- as disconcerting as that may sound to the true geek. And some of them will achieve what so many have tried and failed to do so far: They will bring new fans to gaming, non-hardcore gamer fans, especially the sought-after, ever-elusive female gamer.
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