Why Gaming is Dead: The REAL Reason

[boomario]

Have you ever watched a game of football ?

As someone from Brazil just after the end of world cup 2014 is kind of hard never had watched. Also, i can kind of see the point where you getting into but gaming was never meant to be watched, contrary to football we see on TV and see the other playing kind of ruin the point of everything at gaming, it's just a video, you are not playing, exploring, thinking or at control, just watching,

Also, i feel offended talking with someone from Germany.

 

[Bimmel]

Let's Plays are lame and this whole thing that everybody can load their sh*t up on Youtube is horrible, I'm with you there.

But do they really destroy gaming? Not sure about that.

 

[Gahars]

Speaking of cancerous Let's Players, can we talk about the Yogscast? Because that's a malignant mass if I've ever seen one.

So first there was their Kickstarter, Yogventures, back in 2012, where they raised close to $600,000 for... well, their own shitty version of Minecraft, basically. They raise the money, promise their backers a ton of rewards and bonuses, state the beta will be available by December of that year, and then... nothing happens. They don't even update for long stretches of time; there was actually a solid year between two updates. As it turns out, they gave the task of developing the game to just one guy, who turned out... well, this:



Remember, this is the result of two years and $567,665.

Now it turns out that he burned through all the money and can't afford to actually finish the game. Fans still haven't received a lot of the promised backer rewards either. Did I mention that several of those fans spent more than $10,000 for this?

They're also incredibly shifty when it comes to disclosing whether or not content on their channel has been sponsored (the most provided is usually a message that reads "Thanks to [company] for making this possible" slapped on the end of videos). To make things worse, they're now beginning a business model where some developers will pay them a percentage rate of the game's total sales over a vague period of time. What's to keep them unbiased in their coverage of the game? Not a thing. What if it's another person's content that drives sales for a game and not the Yogscast's videos? Sucks to be them!

It's not the end of the world, but it's pretty sketchy and sets a terrible precedent. Game "journalism" is bad enough as is, but I shudder to think of all the quotation marks I'd need if this promotional model ever took off.

TL;DR: Yogscast isn't killing gaming, but they sure aren't helping it.

 

[Ryukouki]

>two articles written about a "dead" medium
>written on a growing gaming website

What does that mean, huh?!

 

[Taleweaver]

Back in days long lost when you could spend years trying to finish a game bought for a nickle, now you pay 60 euros for a game that isn't finished and you have to pay extra for every part that comes next.

You've got the two totally mixed up. I've played games back in those "days long lost". Late eighties, early nineties, the average game was around 1500-2000 Belgian franks (37-50 euro). Internet wasn't as commonplace (most people never even heard the term), so you were dependent on magazines and mouth-to-mouth as to what games were good. While there were certainly gems being made, more than a few totally terrible games were made even back then. Hidden and dangerous was so bug-ridden I had to save about every other minute because there were many places where you could just fall straight through the map. I remember buying a snowboard game that turned out to have only two tricks and was just one long tube with the levels being varying scenery. Console games were good, but even there you had to be careful. While the game was certainly finished, just about every game that became popular got cloned by some retarded studio (try googling Rival turf). the "years trying to finish" was somewhat true, but that was more because the idea was that games had to be unforgivingly hard and made you backtrack so much you only kept playing it because games were too expensive to just toss it aside.

Whereas to now? Sure, the newest of the newest have their flaws. But at the same time, you can get bioshock for as little as one buck (in addition to some other games). Even without over 20 years of inflation, gaming is cheaper than ever.

 

[enarky]

Retarded Let's play watchers are the same kind of people that support the other cancer that has infested gaming: pay-to-play, DLC and "early access" beta programs. Those are the people who are stupid enough to fall for those schemes.

EDIT:
http://www.dorkly.com/post/65536/how-every-awful-video-game-thing-was-born

 

[Bimmel]

Also, i feel offended talking with someone from Germany.

Don't be like that. It's a game after all - and there is always another chance to win.

..to complete my post from before: I don't think that Let's Plays destroy gaming - but it makes it look like the dumbest thing ever. And to get money for playing a videogame.. this feels just wrong.

Also I don't understand the motivation of some people. 300 views in 2 years, but 400 videos online where the person keeps babbling nonsense while playing. At that point you should just stop playing and buy yourself an "forever alone" t-shirt or something. I pity this people, I really do. But the big picture of gaming "suffers" under these videos spreading on Youtube like fleas.

Yeah, the people could use their heads and could understand that not everybody is the same as these people - but for the majority? Impossible task.
I can only speak of Germany as much as I catched it. Don't know how it is in your countrys.

 

[boomario]

Don't be like that. It's a game after all - and there is always another chance to win.

I was just joking, i never really liked football

..to complete my post from before: I don't think that Let's Plays destroy gaming - but it makes it look like the dumbest thing ever. And to get money for playing a videogame.. this feels just wrong.

Also I don't understand the motivation of some people. 300 views in 2 years, but 400 videos online where the person keeps babbling nonsense while playing. At that point you should just stop playing and buy yourself an "forever alone" t-shirt or something. I pity this people, I really do. But the big picture of gaming "suffers" under these videos spreading on Youtube like fleas.

Yeah, the people could use their heads and could understand that not everybody is the same as these people - but for the majority? Impossible task.
I can only speak of Germany as much as I catched it. Don't know how it is in your countrys.

It's the same thing everywhere, the language doesn't really matter, also i agree with you, it doesn't destroy gaming but it makes a pain when you are looking for something about game "X" in youtube and just find these guys laughing hard at something pretty stupid. Also, at first i really liked minecraft because exploring and everything but when it started to came this thousand of videos about it i lost interest on game completely.

 

[Hells Malice]

Welcome back everybody to THIS weeks installment of "Gaming is dead"

Tune in next week where we see "X" blame "Y" !...AGAIN!

 

[jonthedit]

Welcome back everybody to THIS weeks installment of "Gaming is dead"

Tune in next week where we see "X" blame "Y" !...AGAIN!

Yup
I suppose saying "Gaming is dead" was a bit harsh, but it catches the eye and makes my point.

 

[FAST6191]

Retarded Let's play watchers are the same kind of people that support the other cancer that has infested gaming: pay-to-play, DLC

What is wrong with pay to play, also what is wrong with DLC? Both are concepts dating back if not to the dawn of gaming then certainly over two decades ago.

 

[Kane49]

What is wrong with pay to play, also what is wrong with DLC? Both are concepts dating back if not to the dawn of gaming then certainly over two decades ago.

I honestly have no idea, somehow content on youtube makes people really angry
Did you know snookie is pretty now ?

 

[Issac]

I just don't agree with this. Watching a let's play doesn't keep me from playing the games myself either. Actually it makes me more likely to try it out myself if it looks fun.

 

[Lumstar]

Sigh. Different era, different problems.

I tend to blame NDAs for what we've faced recently. Companies have a shield against accountability for questionable decisions.

 

[Taleweaver]

What is wrong with pay to play, also what is wrong with DLC? Both are concepts dating back if not to the dawn of gaming then certainly over two decades ago.

Erm...no?

The "pay to play" enarky is talking about obviously isn't about the way games are traditionally distributed but the tendency of supposedly free-to-play that is bugging you into paying to do anything useful.

I'm really curious what early nineties games you can find with actual payable downloadable content, as I doubt there are any. Keep in mind that DLC got that name because is was different than the traditional expansion packs of that time, in that these were NOT reasonably large (an extra campaign in C&C, complete with cutsènes, to name one).

 

[enarky]

He's comparing it to mission packs that were available separately back then. That's a completely different concept, though, in my opinion, as you still "owned" what you bought, you got that stuff on a physical disc and could do what you want with it. Just look at the state of DS DLC if you want to know what I mean.

EDIT:
And I remember people complaining about them back then, too, so there's that. Still, these were valid additions, not just a gun for 2.99 here, a hat for 1.99 there, stuff that should've been included as unlockable from the get go. Or 0day DLC.

 

[Veho]

If the game is such garbage that watching someone else play it will make people not want to play it themselves, the fault lies with the game and the game makers, not the viewers or makers of LP videos.

 

[FAST6191]

Erm...no?

The "pay to play" enarky is talking about obviously isn't about the way games are traditionally distributed but the tendency of supposedly free-to-play that is bugging you into paying to do anything useful.

I'm really curious what early nineties games you can find with actual payable downloadable content, as I doubt there are any. Keep in mind that DLC got that name because is was different than the traditional expansion packs of that time, in that these were NOT reasonably large (an extra campaign in C&C, complete with cutsènes, to name one).

In that case enarky was being overly broad, I have many issues with things like pay to win (though possibly there something could be done), what is paid for/given for payment in things and all sorts of other things in that arena. Pay to play/free to play as a concept I am not all that bothered by and can not see why people would be. Equally as bastard hard/cheap as some of the coinops were at the time I am going to use terms like "functionally identical" when comparing it to several things in the pay to play world.

If I ignore the downloadable aspect, though there were a few paid sites to download and foster the creation of new maps for some of the Heroes of Might and Magic series, I could buy a fair few booster packs for games in actual game shops, age of empires having a lot here, and depending upon how you want to frame it a lot of the early services were paid on top of the phone bill (though being full games, if small ones, that changes things a bit) though going a bit further into the PC world there were some things like this for FPS games (not all that successful but they did exist). Granted new skins and characters were usually unlocks or the gold (hyper alpha donkey) edition released the year after* so I suppose there is that. Early 90's might be a bit of a stretch though.

*several times the updates would only take you so far and you would have to buy the gold edition to get the rest.

I might also look into some of the things Lemmings did, sure I might have liked them and technically they would have been standalone games but such things would be a fairly minor distinction.

 

[Drink the Bleach]

Now the new trend is paying for incomplete buggy games.
But I'm still living in PS2-era days when the term DLC wasn't a term. PC gaming is also too obnoxious and expensive. You feel like you need to have a better setup than anyone you know so you can be condescending and drool over PC component with support for some new graphic feature-oday, but won't be utilized by software for 2 years. I just want to play Chrono Trigger.

"Oh my god you guyz my GPU has super awesome shader 8.delta" Cool what game uses that O:" "Nothing right now! :D" "OMG future! :D"

 

[FAST6191]

There were loads of buggy and incomplete games in the arcade/cartridge era.

Also if that is your experience of modern PC gaming then I fear you have been hanging around in the wrong circles -- everywhere I go it seems to be people enjoying having the specs required kind of stall out with the consoles and possibly in general.