Over the years, I’ve been pondering the state of video games and whether or not, we as a gaming community, have gotten soft. What I mean by this is, games that show a moderate level of difficulty immediately gets labeled “Dark-Souls like” by almost every gaming media journalist out there and I feel like this has gotten outta hand. Yeah, some of them are for the MEME but most of them are serious.
You see, I’m a 90’s kid. I’ve got that stereotypical gamer background. Grew up with the NES, played Pokemon, knew the joy of having EVERY content available on disc and what not. Back then, when a game was difficult, it was one of few things. Either:
- You sucked at the game, plain and simple!
- You didn’t give it enough time to learn the ropes!
- Or the game design was horrible and unplayable!
And that was it. Nowadays, games are intentionally made easier when in actuality they never needed to be in the first place. To me, I feel like it’s the so called “gamer journalist” that are partially to blame for the is absurd trend. Think about it. You release a game, a well known journalist reviews the game, they claim it to be too difficult (most of the time, that’s not the case) and not fun to play and because of this, rates the game lower than it should be. Other developers, fearing that their game will get a low score, pander to these types of players who may not in fact represent the actual demographic that play games.
It’s gotten to the point now that developers sale items or attributes to you that help you cheat through the game itself. An example would be accessing a top tier weapon by simply pre-ordering the game or offer booster packs to those who are unwilling to grind.
Now, if you’re a working man/woman with a 9-5, I can understand that maybe you just ain’t got the time and just you want to finish a game fast but that’s as far as I’m willing to accept that argument.
I really think that gamers these days have gotten soft and maybe even a tad bit entitled. No one’s willing to just learn the mechanics, use some basic problem-solving skills and adapt to what the game is throwing at them. Everyone just wants everything handed to them. And these are just my thoughts on this matter! I’d love to hear your thoughts on this subject.
