Recently I've started noticing I've extensively lost a lot of the excitement and joy over gaming with titles coming out. Chalk that up to having a kid, probably, although I'm excited for her to learn about gaming when she gets old enough. Maybe chalk it up to possible depression, growing up, atmosphere, what's the possible theory?
To be fair, and this is mostly to see how many people will actually read this, I'm not saying games coming out these days are bad necessarily, I haven't formed an opinion on them. It's the simple fact that I haven't formed an opinion because it just seems tiring and like I don't have the time.
So, the objective of this topic: To find out if any of you are in the same boat/line of thinking, and/or what are your reasons you think this happens to some of us? Also, if you are the same way I am, do you find retro gaming to be a crutch to rely on to find that joy again? And do you think indie games have filled some of that gap with their characteristics for developing with passion and aesthetics similar to retro gaming?
Having less free time is certainly a factor. When my girlfriend moved in with me and we now having a dog, my preference in games have certainly shifted. If you can't immerse yourself for hours on end in a virtual gaming world anymore (our dog especially can start sniffing and begging for attention after ten minutes
), you start to see things differently. You start to see more filler and repetitive gameplay. Things being made hard for the sake of making it hard rather than challenging. Unskippable cut scenes and long loading times become more of a burden than it was. And so on. It's not that these games have changed*: it's you. And that's okay. The realm of video games** is incredibly large, and there's certainly something that'll fill in with what you like but that you haven't discovered yet.
In your post, you make it seem like retro gaming and indie gaming are somewhat the same thing, but...neither of these are really genres but more classifications. Retro games are "everything that is, say, 10+ years old" while indies are "everything that has, say, less than 10 developers" (I'm painting broad strokes here). We really should define things better to properly communicate.
For one: I can name quite some older titles that have a good premise and stick to that. One of the older games I'm replaying is Lost vikings (1 & 2): it plays quick, has loading times in the area of microtransactions, and thanks to savestates, when I'm playing the game, I'm really only doing just that. The game has a hook (in this case: use the skills of the 3 characters in teamwork to overcome the obstacles) that draws you in, and you're constantly on that hook while playing. I'm not saying newer games are bad in any way, but they are less focused on that. Sandbox games' appeal is "marvel at the world as you walk around in", which is pretty broad (and frankly: after a dozen sandboxes or so, they all seem rather alike...at least to me). Sidequests, occasional filler quests or quests you've already done before...they can be nice, but it's not why you play the game to begin with.
As for indie games: the benefit of being made by a smaller team is that they usually can't afford to burden the gamer with things that he doesn't really want. Why would they add in many cutscenes, filler storylines or a load of sidequests when they can be focussing on that hook I talked about earlier? That's why...erm...at least the good indie games seem like that "passion of earlier games". Back then, it was for technical necessity (the gaming audienc wasn't as big, PC's weren't as powerful and it wasn't known what got gamers addicted to their product as it is today); today they do it because their budget is smaller.
For some years, I make yearly top 20 lists of the games I've played. I'm clearly shifting toward smaller games. But I also play much MORE games than I used to (especially since mobile came to blossoming: I've played some great games while being a passenger in a car
).
*okay, they've changed too. But it's not because old games didn't have microtransactions or lootboxes that they were without flaws
**or even 'games' in general...I play quite some modern board games with friends, and can find similar joy in them as in video games.