Pressure
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- Joined
- Jul 3, 2003
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Over the last few minutes I've been thinking to myself about video gaming and how it's been lately for me. The reason why is in the past during my free time I would play video games and they had long lasting value but recently that hasn't been the case. Now it seems if a game is great it'll last me almost a month. After that the game is uninteresting and I can't play it anymore. If it's a good game it lasts me two or three weeks.
I think it might be that I've been playing FPS and TPS games as of late. To me nothing really sets set apart these games anymore. The biggest selling point of all these games seems to be the graphics. Everyone says, "Damn that game looks great!" But I wonder, how good is the game play going to be and what's it has to offer that's new and/or different to provide me with a new level of immersion and game play so it will give me the best possible longitivity. This is why I was interested in HL2 and although I enjoyed it it only lasted me a week (14 hours). After that I haven't touched it, infact I've uninstalled it because I KNOW I'm never going to play it again.
Next are RTS games. I like RTS games because they require skill on multiple levels. You need to be able to think on your feet from second to second making strategies and defending against others. You need to be able to plan out what you're going to do and if your plan fails you have to be able to rebound quickly and try something new. It also requires quickness of the hand. You need to build buildings fast and you need to have unit micro. But a RTS game is only as strong as it's development team. If a game is extremely unbalanced it tends to take away from the game. In recent years that tends to be the case with almost all RTS games.
I think about my past in gaming and I think about games that have given me the best longitivity and kept me hooked and wanting more everytime I played. There are only two games that have ever given me what I'm talking about. The first is a game called Shattered Galaxy, which is a MMORTS game. I played in early beta phases for almost 3 years until it went commercial. The other was Diablo 2 and it's expansion pack LOD, which I played for over a year. Other than this I can't think of any other games that have lasted me this long.
I sit here now wondering why I can't find more games that give me this kind of gaming experience. I've literally have played well over 400 games and only two have ever hooked me like that. I've heard from people that MMORPGs are really good for what I want but I've played over 6 of them an none of them have peeked my interest to play over the free month. FPS games don't last me long at all and are only good for a month at maximum. RTS games are fun but they get boring after a while. I'm guessing what lasts longest for me is multiplayer games with an RPG element.
I want a game that makes me want to continue, not one that I will play only because I'm bored. It has to draw me in, I have to want to play it. It needs to give me the drive to become better and to keep going forward. In RPGs you have that drive only lasts a little while because theres a limit to as far as you can go. There's the best items, best class, best race and best armor/weapons. Once you obtain these what else is there? You can only go so far until you hit a brick wall.
I want a game where no matter how long I play it I always have something to achieve. The thing is I have to want to achieve whatever it is or else the game isn't fun at all. With most games what you need to achieve is usually easy to get or doesn't take long to get or it's so lame you don't want to get it. I need something that keeps me coming back for more. I haven't played any games in years where I want to keep coming back, where I want to keep going to get what I want.
The game also has to be multiplayer for me because that adds a level of competitiveness, which for me is a plus. You look at someone higher level than you and you say you want to be better than that. You want to strive to get higher than them, get better stuff than them and overall just be better than them. This is one factor for me that helps with the drive of continueing that game for long periods of time.
Most importantly the game has to be fun. What good is a game with these elements if it's not fun? Do you want to feel like playing the game is a job? I know I don't, I want to sit here with a smile on my face because I know what I'm doing is fun. Now games can be fun for short periods of time but for me what plays a giant role in how fun the game is is change. Who wants to play the same three monsters throughout the whole game? Who wants to upgrade what they have if it only takes the same amounts of hits to kill as a monster from earlier in the game? What I need is change. Something nee everytime I move forward in the game. If everything is just cookie cutter then the longitivity takes a gigantic nose dive.
It's been three years since I bought the computer I have right now and it's about time I got a new one. But right now I'm questioning as to wether or not I should. If all games in the future are going to be the same thing as what I'm playing right now but with better graphics, new levels and one new feature that no one cares about I don't think it will be worth it. Why waste my money on games and a computer if all I'm going to get is the same thing over and over.
I could just cut gaming out of my life and put more time into my other hobbies like jogging, sports, guitar and friends but I don't want to. Gaming doesn't take out a huge chunk of time in my day but it sure is important. There's a part of me that just can't let go of it. It's brought joy to me and my friends for so long that I have faith that one day a company will make a game that will get me hooked. So for that hour or so of my day will be one of a new fun experience.
Until then I will continue the hunt, sifting through hundreds of games looking for "the one." Until then games will only bring me extremely short bursts of joy then fizzle out. When a game will last me two years or more I know I got what I payed for. Hell I wouldn't mind paying $150 to $200 for a game that would last me that long. The question is in todays gaming world, will I ever find that game?
I think it might be that I've been playing FPS and TPS games as of late. To me nothing really sets set apart these games anymore. The biggest selling point of all these games seems to be the graphics. Everyone says, "Damn that game looks great!" But I wonder, how good is the game play going to be and what's it has to offer that's new and/or different to provide me with a new level of immersion and game play so it will give me the best possible longitivity. This is why I was interested in HL2 and although I enjoyed it it only lasted me a week (14 hours). After that I haven't touched it, infact I've uninstalled it because I KNOW I'm never going to play it again.
Next are RTS games. I like RTS games because they require skill on multiple levels. You need to be able to think on your feet from second to second making strategies and defending against others. You need to be able to plan out what you're going to do and if your plan fails you have to be able to rebound quickly and try something new. It also requires quickness of the hand. You need to build buildings fast and you need to have unit micro. But a RTS game is only as strong as it's development team. If a game is extremely unbalanced it tends to take away from the game. In recent years that tends to be the case with almost all RTS games.
I think about my past in gaming and I think about games that have given me the best longitivity and kept me hooked and wanting more everytime I played. There are only two games that have ever given me what I'm talking about. The first is a game called Shattered Galaxy, which is a MMORTS game. I played in early beta phases for almost 3 years until it went commercial. The other was Diablo 2 and it's expansion pack LOD, which I played for over a year. Other than this I can't think of any other games that have lasted me this long.
I sit here now wondering why I can't find more games that give me this kind of gaming experience. I've literally have played well over 400 games and only two have ever hooked me like that. I've heard from people that MMORPGs are really good for what I want but I've played over 6 of them an none of them have peeked my interest to play over the free month. FPS games don't last me long at all and are only good for a month at maximum. RTS games are fun but they get boring after a while. I'm guessing what lasts longest for me is multiplayer games with an RPG element.
I want a game that makes me want to continue, not one that I will play only because I'm bored. It has to draw me in, I have to want to play it. It needs to give me the drive to become better and to keep going forward. In RPGs you have that drive only lasts a little while because theres a limit to as far as you can go. There's the best items, best class, best race and best armor/weapons. Once you obtain these what else is there? You can only go so far until you hit a brick wall.
I want a game where no matter how long I play it I always have something to achieve. The thing is I have to want to achieve whatever it is or else the game isn't fun at all. With most games what you need to achieve is usually easy to get or doesn't take long to get or it's so lame you don't want to get it. I need something that keeps me coming back for more. I haven't played any games in years where I want to keep coming back, where I want to keep going to get what I want.
The game also has to be multiplayer for me because that adds a level of competitiveness, which for me is a plus. You look at someone higher level than you and you say you want to be better than that. You want to strive to get higher than them, get better stuff than them and overall just be better than them. This is one factor for me that helps with the drive of continueing that game for long periods of time.
Most importantly the game has to be fun. What good is a game with these elements if it's not fun? Do you want to feel like playing the game is a job? I know I don't, I want to sit here with a smile on my face because I know what I'm doing is fun. Now games can be fun for short periods of time but for me what plays a giant role in how fun the game is is change. Who wants to play the same three monsters throughout the whole game? Who wants to upgrade what they have if it only takes the same amounts of hits to kill as a monster from earlier in the game? What I need is change. Something nee everytime I move forward in the game. If everything is just cookie cutter then the longitivity takes a gigantic nose dive.
It's been three years since I bought the computer I have right now and it's about time I got a new one. But right now I'm questioning as to wether or not I should. If all games in the future are going to be the same thing as what I'm playing right now but with better graphics, new levels and one new feature that no one cares about I don't think it will be worth it. Why waste my money on games and a computer if all I'm going to get is the same thing over and over.
I could just cut gaming out of my life and put more time into my other hobbies like jogging, sports, guitar and friends but I don't want to. Gaming doesn't take out a huge chunk of time in my day but it sure is important. There's a part of me that just can't let go of it. It's brought joy to me and my friends for so long that I have faith that one day a company will make a game that will get me hooked. So for that hour or so of my day will be one of a new fun experience.
Until then I will continue the hunt, sifting through hundreds of games looking for "the one." Until then games will only bring me extremely short bursts of joy then fizzle out. When a game will last me two years or more I know I got what I payed for. Hell I wouldn't mind paying $150 to $200 for a game that would last me that long. The question is in todays gaming world, will I ever find that game?
