11 replies to this topic

[wolfdemonrobbie_02]

I think I may have a hypothesis on why the quality of some games are going down. Some franchises got lazy and just decided to go the route of shovelware. There are some other programmers that have no clue on a certain franchise...or in the rare case, some have not had a new game out. Take the Killer Instict franchise for example. The game was very high quality when Rare made games for Nintendo...untill they got brought out by Microsoft.

[Hentai K.]

For game franchise, it depends on the current developing team whom may have continued with the project or is run by a new developing team. As per the topic's first example, final fantasy has seen a slew of different directors, music composers, programmers and so much more. Each would bring their own fresh ideas onto the franchise and change a lot of elements to each installation. This changes though are received either negatively or positively. For me, games as much as movies, books or any form of entertainment or bound to evolve so the quality of games are actually improving with one bad game or good game at a time. Creativity is still always there to implement new changes which is either poorly executed or well done. A game with a new way to play doesn't have to be instantly higher in quality to show this ideas. The classic super mario bros for example showcased the scrolling platform genre which many games have copied and implemented new kinks to the system. Up to this day, many games are still trying to copy nintendo's creative game play and incorporate their own mechanics to make their game stand out which is where the quality part of video games gradually improves over time.

[gameplayer5]

In my eyes,people would usually expect a certain criteria in each videogame series.Let's take your examples for this,Final Fantasy and Mario.Basically,Final Fantasy needs a creative and innovative storyline,completely original characters,and exciting gameplay.The latest developers are basically running out of ideas,and so the quality deteriorates to garbage.Mario just needs a whacky storyline,the same characters with only a few new ones,some type of difference in the exact same gameplay,and that's pretty much it.It doesn't take much to fulfill these criteria,as people would generally accept any randomly generated character.Thus,quality and popularity increases with this franchise.As you can see,people tend to expect too much of Final Fantasy and barely expect much of anything from Mario,which causes these franchises to fall and rise respectively...Of course,this is all just how I see it anyway.

[slegiar]

a large problem i've seen with games in the recent past is the focus on multiplayer, and the insistence to keep old franchise's running when they should have ended a long time ago. also there's been the whole uncanny valley problem where companies continue to try and make things realistic, but it comes across as strained. there have been very few games i've seen in the last couple of years that despite being in a realistic style, were at least fun to play. infamous, prototype, bioshock i still find fun even though its older at this point. the point is, there needs to be a balance, and right now, game companies aren't hitting it. as for the franchise's, realistic shooters, FF games, those are the major ones that irk me. but what i'd really like to see is some new innovation in the industry. give some money to the independents that actually come up with good games, instead of pumping more money into the ones that have too much and need to start a new idea.

[Ragamuffin]

a large problem i've seen with games in the recent past is the focus on multiplayer, and the insistence to keep old franchise's running when they should have ended a long time ago

Yeah, might have to do with people being obsessed with Facebook and such over the past few years. Everything is all about "networking' now. Also, the fact that many games focus heavily on multiplayer, yet shut down their servers within a year or two, severely cutting the replay value of a given game doesn't help matters either.Another part, IMO, is that many countries, especially the US, have become all about instant gratification. That, coupled with the fact that companies typically pander to the lowest common denominator to make a profit ensures that we'll have quantity over quality for years to come!...: