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 Hello everyone! This is The Alpha Jan here. I hope you enjoyed your weekends. Just to let you all know of schedules, due to unknown and unforseen conflicts from the other writers, bossman asked me to keep the articles flowing with whatever I am able to find. Usually, my expertise is advertising in media so I'll stick to media of all kinds plus anything of a sociologist view towards anything in the media or per say media related. Until we get more writers or until Patrick comes back, I'll hold it down from Monday through Thursday. I take a three-day weekend from ICE now. Anyways, later on at Midnight, Batman: Arkham Asylum will be available for purchase. There is a special Midnight selling of the game and I already have my pre-ordered so I am not going to push it. I'll just show up tomorrow with some other games I have for trade-in credit and start the game as soon as possible. This game is bound to be awesome from what I know from playing the demo, the articles I read, and the videos I watched but you never know right? Despite this, one major question seemed to flash before me when it came to this game. The questions is, "What will the developers compromise in this game?". Now I am unsure if you know what I am talking about but lets just say because of the diversity and demand of the gaming community, a lot of developers and publishers are starting to do some compromising when it comes to the games they make. Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you the article on the Game Industry's Compromise.
So now that I got your attention, what exactly is the compromise the gaming industry seems to put out as of late? Well to fully understand what I am talking about, let's take a trip down memory lane shall we. Before, video games were quite simple yet the formula worked. Games were decently long, difficulty was somewhat preferenced only to one difficulty and that was whatever the game was, and as long as the game was fun, that is all that mattered. Times have now changed and there are now three major things a video game is either required to have to either make or break a game. If the following three seems familiar to you, it is because almost all games will have one of the major traits listed below and be really lacking in another.
Difficulty vs, Time
Back in the day, games were one difficulty and that was whatever the game was made. Now there seems to be a movement that difficulty should now be a necessity. Now take it that I believe that the learning curve of a video game should be easy in the beginning while gradually getting difficult. However, with the selection of difficulty, that is really taken away. Before, you had to use more tactical improvision when the stages got harder. Now difficulty is now determined by quantity as in "How many gaps must you jump" or "How many people will be on screen for you to take out" or whatever else you can think of. Difficulty in my opinion really doesn't change much for the time required to put into a game. There are games that the time to beat a game is not worth it thus why the rise in prices but the shortening of games. The best way I can explain this would be a game where the difficulty is variable yet the story and game is fairly short compared to a game that exponentially gets harder but is longer. Now for my boss, he likes games you can complete in a short amount of time but he's not buying games at full price. There are a lot of people who like ownership to their videogames and thus buy them on release date. I myself like certain games just to keep my collection complete such as the VS. Series by Capcom. Nevertheless, this arguement seems to be a render to the gaming industry than a choice.
Quality vs. Content
Another big arguement a developer or publisher has to deal with is content versus quality. Now the best way for me to explain this is the games cosmetics and special features such as online capabilities, different game modes, graphics, voice-overs, and sound quality against the overall gaming experience the game provides. Back in the day, content wasn't such a big deal yet the quality was delivered in almost every game available. It was a lot of fun to play 8-bit games with crappy sound and hardly any extras to boot. Now, a game is made by how much you can pack into it, either it be junk or treasure is of no consequence. I'll give you an example of junk being packed into a video game: an online mode you have to pay for on top of the online subscription you pay for in the first place. Think of it as paying to use a game's online content along with the system's online capabilities and of course the fee to have internet in the first place. That to me is considered to be crap content because you're paying for something that is mostly free on almost all games. I can only think of a couple games just like that. All in all, shorten the game and cut back on the quality to add in content or expand the story, and its quality, by cutting back on content.
Too Online or to Not?
Another big one is if a game is needed for online capabilites or not. I can think of numerous games that have online capabilities that really don't need it such as Viva Pinata, er the first one I mean. Also, there was a game called Final Fantasy XI, which is infamous for being an "online only" game. That pissed off so many people who were not into the whole online thing since a lot of RPG players are not big with online gaming on a RPG story-type mode game. Now if it is something like WOW, then it is different. Online gameplay seems to be a big deal these days connecting people all over the world without any actually contact required. There are both pros and cons of this. Pros being able to play with a friend no matter what and cons being quite known such as flame wars and immaturity and people who take the game like life or death instead of a game. Nevertheless, this option is a big thinker for developers.
Now take note that the above three were done very quickly because the root of the matter is the gaming community are getting angry at the gaming industry over things they want to see in a game. I see this as a sociologist perspective and want gamers out there to be nicer to these people. There was this game that recently came out that got one of the lowest scores on a rating system and was hated by a lot of people but it had the potential to be such an awesome game. Why did it fail so badly? The gamers bitched. There is a constant civil war among gamers complaining and arguing over which system is better, online or not, content or quality, time or difficulty, and so on and so forth. It is like a bunch of monkeys fighting over one banana when there is a bunch for everyone to have. Simply put: why? Because of our impatience and our constant thinking that we can make a game better than any publisher or developer out there, we seem to put so much strain on the gaming industry. True the gaming industry is thankful for the fans and they try their best for the fans but what do fans REALLY do for the gaming industry. True some of us still buy video games to show we want a game and support the creators but most people now do the infamous "rent and burn". I got a question for you. Would you work for free? Think about that. I don't mind the renting part but renting and burning? C'mon there.
Despite the fact the gaming industry, along with all media industries with the exception of written literature (books, novels, etc.), are getting shafted by the people who support them. Piracy is a big deal and yet we want more from the people who make them. We want better graphics with excellent gameplay. We want time and content. We want online play. And we want it now. I show my appreciation and don't mind waiting for a game to be good because I know how hard it can be to make a game. You know that five pages of coding in C++ is like a pop-up with a button? That's it. It takes a lot of time to do graphics, motion capture, storylines, coding, programming, and the whole pressed sandwich to make a video game. Yet most people don't see that. It seems that the compromise in the gaming industry is this. We want you to make games with everything right now so we can rent it...and burn it...and not pay the price it takes to make the game. We rather we save money over you making money. Yet you have to spend more money to make better games for us that we won't spend money on. Once again, would you work for free?
W.W.A.D. (What Would Aslan Do?)
Alpha OUT!
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