Has the bar been lowered too far?

I don't think I experienced more than one or two bugs in the last 6 Spiderweb games.
Can't judge Serpents. That one I never played as the graphics are to unpleasant to me.

I'm a guy who is super picky, so I don't look at most of the new games being released. For example, I don't like primitive graphics, so a lot of the indie rpgs that are meant for a niche market or other games that are very low budget, are not on my radar.

That said, there are always exceptions, and I have played and enjoyed a few rpg's with "primitive" graphics such as Eschalon by Basilisk games and Avadon: The Black Fortress by Spiderweb software.

Still, most of the time, I will be looking at AAA games with advanced graphics and eye candy - yes, this stuff is important to me. And I am only looking at certain categories. first person shooters (and third person shooters to a lesser degree), horror, science fiction, off road racing, mysteries, these are all categories I enjoy.

I automatically bypass any new games that are all about or focused on multi-player, co-op, or MMO - so this obviously filters out a lot of the new games right off the bat for me. Also am not interested in strategy games and Japanese style games.

But as a rpg genre fan, I also am paying attention to the important rpg developers - "the big 3" - Larian, Obsidian, and InXile, their games are always going to be of interest to me. (as long as they don't "do a Bioware" or something in future)

JDR13 said:

Wowza.. I'm surprised you actually finish anything if you're playing that many games simultaneously. I prefer to focus on one game until I'm finished especially when it comes to RPGs. For me, hopping back and forth between games makes it harder to be immersed in them.

There's also the chance that if I take too long a break from one game, I can't get back into playing it from where I left off, and then I end up abandoning the playthrough.

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Well I should clarify that at the moment all the games I listed I have played. The first time or two I play a game I focus on it completely (to do so twice in a row though it has to be a damn amazing game - only FO4 and Skyrim, for current games, ever let me do that but they are also so open ended its easier).

Once PK was patched up I played almost the full 140 steam hours steady over the weeks (I get about maybe 10-20 hours a week to play depending on days off and the like). I didn't play anything else although I screwed around a little in FO4.

Skyrim I have over 3K hours in and FO4 almost 2400 now. Played them enough that now they are like reading a favorite old book or watching a favorite old movie. They are comfort games. I also still write stories. My avatar here is my main character in Skyrim who I have played almost since the game came out. Don't play as much now as I retired him but I still do some stories with him and just started a new set of stories last week.

FNV I played for hundreds of hours when it came out. I recently modded it, got all the DLC, and a nice ENB preset … and slowly working through it. But while I love the game I love FO4 more and that scratches my FO itch. So I only play FNV in little bursts.

POE I played twice through in a row and POE2 once - but started another then decided to wait till all DLC was out. Now I am debating a new character but probably won't start till I finish my second PK play through.

So all games I have already played. After finishing PK I am not ready to immediately play it all again so I more or less am testing new characters and not playing dedicated.

Sorry I am rambling. TL;DR is that first time I play a game totally focused - unless I can't get into it but in that case I will never finish. Once played through if I like it enough I will play again but usually not with the same focus.

EDIT: And I have abandonded many a second or more play through for leaving it and coming back after too long and not feeling any connection to the character or lost where I was. Then I delete and try to decide if that means I am done with the game or whether worth trying again. Usually if I stay away too long it means my heart really isn't into another play through.

There's certainly more good games now and I'm finding them fine (thanks in no small part to this website). The sheer number of terrible games, though, is really stunning.

Here's an… interesting one: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1004350/Area_Cooperation_Economic_Simulation_North_Korea_ACES/
Pick your % for 8 economic stats for a year. Repeat 10 times. The system will use its "sophisticated" economic model to tell you how you did. And that's the whole game.

Arkadia7 said:

But as a rpg genre fan, I also am paying attention to the important rpg developers - "the big 3" - Larian, Obsidian, and InXile, their games are always going to be of interest to me. (as long as they don't "do a Bioware" or something in future)

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You mean like getting bought out by "XBox Studios"? (Yeah, that's the new name now.)

Ivanwah said:

Pretty much what Zloth said + early access. Early access is the biggest scam in the gaming history. Pay us so you can beta test our games, and we can deflect all criticicism by saying it's not finished yet. Fuck off, if it's not finished, don't release it.

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I love Early Access! I don't buy into them but others do, which makes my game better at (as near as I can tell) no cost to me! They're even easy to filter out. What's not to like?

sakichop said:

Nah, bad, buggy and broken games have been around forever.

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Nah, good, polished and well designed games have been around forever.

Sure there’s more now but that’s mainly because there’s more games over all. So while there’s more bad there’s also more good. Imo anyway.

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Not only. It follows that the bar was lovered.

Why would you focus on the bad anyway.

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Hard these days to tell when a vid product is a game. Makes the focus necessary.

Unless you’re someone who only likes one specific kind of game you should be able to find plenty of good games to play.

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Junk food designed to meet people's tastes still remain junk food.

My backlog is years long. Not bad games I don’t want to play either. Good games, that I’m itching to play but don’t have the time. There’s just to many of them.

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Nice prescient skills. Could be put to good use (monetized)

Has the bar been lowered too far?

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The Rule Of The NGE : Any MMO that has dwindling subscriber numbers will have an serious effort to dumb down gameplay in order to get new subscribers; always under the MMO Management's assumption that people left the game because it was too complicated.