Whenever you see someone gripe about how uncreative the game industry is, the ‘observation’ almost always seems to carry a hint of nostalgia to it. It’s almost as if people want to suggest ~the good ‘ol days~ were so much better.
Gaming used to be so much more original! Right? Hmm. Judging by this picture of an old gaming mag tweeted by Frank Cifaldi, maaaaybe not.
Man, video games are nothing but sequels now. It’s not like the old days, look at all this 1992 originality! pic.twitter.com/dm3ayokfZ3
— Frank Cifaldi (@frankcifaldi) September 11, 2013
Excuse me. I’m going to go pick out a game from my library of vintage Pong clones to go play now.
Comments
8 responses to “What’s That? Modern-Day Gaming Has Too Many Sequels? Actually…”
Yeah people need to take their rose coloured glasses off.
I’m 33 and even I admit that we are living in EASILY the best gamign generation ever. I think the new one coming looks even better again.
Sequelitis isn’t a new disease. Neither are gimmicky add-ons and almost every other practice entitled whiners complain about these days. Hell, Capcom has been doing the Street Fighter version 57 thing since the 16-bit days.
And sometimes a story or character is big enough or good enough to warrant, or even NEED a sequel.
There’s a culture of misanthropy that’s widespread these days, where people feel they need to broadcast that game x is shit or movie y is terrible, and that if you enjoy x or y there’s something wrong with you. Sequelitis is a symptom of this.
Some guideance from an ‘old man’ on this:
1) As much as the circle-jerk may make you think otherwise, no-one cares. No-one.
2) Don’t focus on the negative so much, you’ll enjoy life more.
3) Ignore the stuff you don’t find interesting, there’s plenty of choice out there.
I’m 33 and I agree. Games today freaking rock SO hard compare to back in my teens.
Also, in regards to sequelitis and the COD effect, remember the days of Street Fighter? Every game was trying to be Street Fighter and the market was saturated with SF clones, it was like ‘oh, look, another fighting game, how original’. The shelves at the store were filled with SF wannabes. Everyone was chasing that fighting game money. The industry kinda revolved around one genre and it made things stale. People think COD is ruining things, but it’s nothing new.
Agreed.
People so easily forget. Everything they complain about now, existed 20 years ago. Except back then it was MORE EXPENSIVE! $120AU for Street Fighter 2 on Megadrive in the late 90’s.
Eternal Champions
Mortal Kombat
World Heroes
Fatal Fury
Art of Fighting
Time Killers
Killer instinct
Virtua Fighter
Tekken
Dead Or Alive
All attempts at getting Street Fighter money and Mortal Kombat was essentially Battlefield. A respectable number 2.
I think people forget that Street Fighter was CoD before CoD existed.
Yeah, MK was the only game to really take a position next to SF.
I gotta say I loved the original Mortal Kombat but the later games became harder for me to enjoy.
I got the new one and I’m loving how all the old moves permanently ingrained into my memory actually work again.
I don’t have an issue with sequels, obviously we loved the first one enough to keep asking for more. I just expect sequels to add things. And we’ve always had DLC except it wasn’t DL it was an Expansion pack.
Tentpole games are just like tentpole movies. Sequels are made because they’re easy money, which can then be gambled on new IP.
Definitely selective memory or perhaps aren’t old enough to even conceive the information.