The generations that grew up with gaming and getting older.

[Allthingsspectacular]

When I saw the whole "This year's E3 had too much shooty guns", all that I could think of was the possibility that we are just growing up and getting more mature.

Back in the day when I was an angsty teenager, I didn't think twice about the people I killed. But now in today's games whenever I see my character kill someone or something, I'm like "Oh my god! You did NOT need to kill him!"

What are your thoughts on this? Do you think this might be the case?

On a side note, I'm also witnessing my generation talk about the newest generation coming in with scornful remarks about how dumb or obnoxious they are. Which makes me really really sad.

 

[ResonanceSD]

No that's a good point. I was a lot more interested in Halo when I was 12 than I am now. It was cool, different and the trend plague of shooters hadn't picked up yet.

however, game designers are realising that they've got older audiences too. Therefore TF2 instead of CS, Deus Ex instead of Tomb Raider,

Of course, the idiotic crap games still get churned out, but it's our responsibility to just not buy the bloody things.

 

[Vegosiux]

Well, I suppose another reason is more "realistic" graphics. I mean, violence in games is nothing new, indeed. But, it's not as cartoony as it used to be. I suppose if it's very over the top and exaggerated, there's still a degree of detachment, as in "Yeah, this isn't real, it's not like something like that -can- happen because human body doesn't actually work that way".

With more "realism", things drift closer and closer to the uncanny valley, and that generally creeps people out.

 

[Windcaler]

To be fair, I think the industry needs to focus on making games that appeal for its older audiences as well as the newer generation. Its great seeing them try to appeal to new audiences because children and younger gamers are our medium's future

I think the OP is right though, as people grow up they change and so do their tastes in games. Its the same thing for any medium. When your a kid you dont tend to question the hows and whys but as a person grows they form common sense and critical thinking making them analyze things more closely.

Gaming as a medium is still pretty young so it needs time to grow and find ways to address such realities.

 

[The Madman]

Hard to say, I was never really into 'ultra-violence' even when I was younger. Is me not being a fan of that stuff now a result of age or just me getting more and more stuck in my ways? Dunno.

I will say I'm not a fan of the gory dark and gritty stuff in gaming. Generally not in movies or books either for that matter, but especially not in games. It's why the new Tomb Raider has me so grumpy for example! I *liked* the silly over the top Lara, I thought it was a fun globe trotting adventure. Now all this super serious stuff is just making the game look depressing, and frankly I get enough of that in real life that I don't feel I need it from my games as well.

But I'm probably just being a curmudgeon before my time. I'm sure there are plenty of gramps out there that delight in gibbing some poor asshat in their spare time.

 

[Dandark]

I don't dislike all the violence and such that they put out now, im just bored of it. It's gotten boring to just see "shoot guy with gun, guy dies". I still enjoy violence in my games though, I just finished replaying Prototype 2 and I loved it, enjoyed every minute of it and that game has plenty of violence.

The reasons a lot of people disliked this years E3 was because it was boring. It was all the same stuff we have seen before, there was nothing new. It was just the standard shooters and not much else.

 

[Scrustle]

It's not that people are being killed, it's the way they are being killed. E3 showed how violence in games is becoming far more sadistic and gruesome. Gaming is maturing, but slower than people do. It's in it's adolescence right now. Maybe it's going through a goth phase.

 

[BishopofAges]

To be honest, I haven't played many games in which I do useless killing (unless it's GTA: Vice City, sorry, but its fun to do when bored or in need of a quick buck.)

I don't really play 'realistic millitary shooters' because I don't want the experience to be real, I want it to be unreal. If that makes any sense, I honestly cannot wait for Bioshock: Infinite, and cannot believe the people who jump on the 'Duke Nuke: Forever' bandwagon when they hear it has been pushed back. I honestly think they are just looking for another asset to reference long development times.

I have thought about different ways to get around things than 'shooty shooty boom boom' since my childhood, but sometimes the classic approach works when all else fails.

Edit: As for E3 this year, all I can say is what I said last E3 except with 2 more 'Really's attached, I really, really, really want a Wii U and all that it comes with in the future.

 

[Nanaki316]

I agree it's somewhat to do with graphics. When we were growing up if we had to shoot something it was a couple of red pixels of blood, nothing compared to what we get these days. The more realistic these people look and the more fluid their movements as game engines improve it does have that "sadistic" feel to it. Some of it feels a bit un-necessary.

 

[Sixcess]

I will say I'm not a fan of the gory dark and gritty stuff in gaming. Generally not in movies or books either for that matter, but especially not in games. It's why the new Tomb Raider has me so grumpy for example! I *liked* the silly over the top Lara, I thought it was a fun globe trotting adventure. Now all this super serious stuff is just making the game look depressing, and frankly I get enough of that in real life that I don't feel I need it from my games as well.

My thoughts, almost exactly.

I touched upon this in a short lived thread in OT a week or two ago, and several people pinpointed the problem I had with the new Tomb Raider, and by extension with the general direction of a lot of current gen gaming. It's not that I don't want to see games become more 'realistic', it's that what we're being offered is as often as not an adolescent view of what is realistic, and as I get older it feels not only out of place in what I want to be fun adventures, but a shallow and superficial attempt to deal with 'grown up' themes.

As for the violence itself, I'll agree with everyone who's saying it's also down to the more realistic graphics we have now, or more exactly how lovingly some games detail the kills. Crysis is a byword for superb graphics but steers clear of gore, whereas Fallout 3's obsessive fixation on gratuitous gore left me with the queasy feeling that someone was getting off on all those slow motion dismemberments and exploding heads.

On a side note, I'm also witnessing my generation talk about the newest generation coming in with scornful remarks about how dumb or obnoxious they are. Which makes me really really sad.

Don't worry. We do it to them now, and in ten or twenty years they'll do it to the next lot. Perhaps we resent them for reminding us that we're growing old.

Or perhaps they really are just dumb and obnoxious. Bloody teenagers... *grumble grumble grumble*

 

[More Fun To Compute]

The marketing of games has changed over time.

A lot time ago back in the Jurrasic era games mostly used to be just games made by nerds for nerds. Games that used gameplay and new tech to makes something new and exciting. Sometimes those things were ridiculously violent and intense. Other times they were not. This was a terrible primitive time for a marketing man who has been taught how to sell sugar water and running shoes to teens.

When people like Bobby Kotick talk about getting the packaged goods people into the games business and making it boring the result is exactly what we saw at the E3 conferences this year. They laser focus on a target group like the American teen male market and work on creating some sort of "cool" scene. This year that scene was nothing but stupid violence, the bloodier and more profane the better. In terms of marketing they want to create a boring homogeneous message about what gaming "culture" is so they can satisfy that mindless urge with a stream of reliable hit product.

 

[rob_simple]

Well, I suppose another reason is more "realistic" graphics. I mean, violence in games is nothing new, indeed. But, it's not as cartoony as it used to be. I suppose if it's very over the top and exaggerated, there's still a degree of detachment, as in "Yeah, this isn't real, it's not like something like that -can- happen because human body doesn't actually work that way".

With more "realism", things drift closer and closer to the uncanny valley, and that generally creeps people out.

I agree, and I also think this is why people should stop complaining about games not being as creative as they used to be (which isn't true anyway, but I digress.) The better graphics now mean that the kind of games we played in the 16-bit days would look utterly ridiculous when put through the HD ringer (a star with arms and legs and levels where you fight mice in their pyjamas that throw swiss cheese at you, what the hell even is that?)

In terms of the violence though, as ever, I think context is always important. I heard Heavy Rain had some exceptionally realistic violent parts but they were designed to make you uncomfortable not to excite you, but if they re-released a modern take on this...

I would consider it nothing but immensely bad taste and hugely fucked up.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

It's hard to know whether games are getting worse or my expectations are just changing. There was a thread around here a while ago that discussed a grittier Pokemon series, and while I would probably enjoy that, it is a kids' show and largely a kids' franchise. It shouldn't be expected to grow up with its original fanbase. In that way, perhaps games are just being taken more seriously now, to the extent that more adult and involving games are being made, and it's affecting our standards so that when we see one of the myriad shooters it looks typical and bland, maybe not because the game is bad, but because we're not the target audience (although the publishers and developers think we are). That said, there's still a disproportionately large amount of shooters being made, and that's going to be a problem, because one game becoming a bit more shooter-y is appealing to a wider audience; most games becoming a bit more shooter-y is limiting the market to people who can afford to buy your game on top of all the established shooters, not the genre or niche your game filled.

 

[Jaythulhu]

In the 16bit days? Heh, geez that was a breakthrough in technology. To show my age a bit, I started gaming when there was only text (and the occasional static ascii-image), and what colours it appeared in depended on whether your monitor was black & white, black & green or black & orange.

As I've gotten older I've found myself shying away from so-called "triple-A" games in general, as I've found them getting less interesting and more childish the older I get.
Video gaming has been around for well more than 30 years though (and at least a few years more than me), so to suggest it's still in its "adolescence" is kinda disingenuous. I think it's more a case of gaming going senile (especially after some of the gratuitously disgusting trailers shown at E3. What the bloody hell were the people behind the Hitman & Tomb Raider trailers trying to achieve? What kind of immature dope thought those were a great idea?).

I know I've lost interest in violence for violence's sake. If I can, I'd far prefer to find a way to avoid, or at the very least use non-lethal takedown methods for the opposition I encounter in games.

Perhaps I've just matured way faster than the hobby I grew up with. To me though, it truly does seem like gaming has taken some major leaps backwards and is actively trying to portray itself as an immature and childish industry where cheap titilation and thrills are the main aim.

Sorry, I've started rambling (it's something that happens to us older folks) so I'll sign off there. Hope I didn't wander too far off-topic.

 

[Frostbyte666]

True, younger age I didn't think too much on the killing but now as an older person I'd rather have a good reason for it, or somehow justify it, rather than they looked at me funny. Though my biggest gripe when playing some fps games is when you go to a place slaughter your way through it and then you have to listen to an evil baddy monologue while I'm virtually screaming KILL THEM NOW! before they use the death ray or leg it.
Generally its why I prefer rpg's because they usually give reasons for the violence even though sometimes its really stupid reasons.

 

[putowtin]

poping out a bloodier clone of COD or BF is easier and quicker than making a clever, well thoughout game that appeals to us, the generation of games that have "been there, done that, and still have the C64 to prove it"

 

[fealubryne]

Of course, the idiotic crap games still get churned out, but it's our responsibility to just not buy the bloody things.

This exactly. As much as gamers bemoan the repetitive and unoriginal sequels upon sequels upon sequels (or prequels), it's partially their fault as well. The folks throwing big money at games will only use their millions to back what they think will sell, and they're not willing to risk 60 million on "new and creative" risks. So as long as the gamers are buying the bajillion Halos and Resident Evils and whatnot, we're not going to see the unique and original stuff unless it's from the small indy companies with fractions of the budgets the AAAs have.

 

[Eclipse Dragon]

Well, I suppose another reason is more "realistic" graphics. I mean, violence in games is nothing new, indeed. But, it's not as cartoony as it used to be. I suppose if it's very over the top and exaggerated, there's still a degree of detachment, as in "Yeah, this isn't real, it's not like something like that -can- happen because human body doesn't actually work that way".

With more "realism", things drift closer and closer to the uncanny valley, and that generally creeps people out.

I'm reminded of Final Fantasy 7, specifically when Shinra HQ was attacked by Sephiroth, he left bloody chibi bodies all over the place, blood was spattered all over the walls, the president had a sword sticking out of his chest... and the game was rated T.

I imagine if the game existed with modern graphics true to it's original, the rating may well change.
-----------

OT: I actually grew up according to the rating system, not because my parents forced me to play those kind of games, but because those games are what I was interested in. When I was small, I played only E rated games, when I got a little older I played T and when I got older still, I started playing M games, but all that time I never played exclusively M or T rated games, my most recent purchase was Pokemon Conquest and I'm enjoying it probably more so now than I ever would when I was small, but what sold me on Pokemon Conquest was the idea of feudal era pokemon going to war with each other...

 

[Rastien]

Well, I suppose another reason is more "realistic" graphics. I mean, violence in games is nothing new, indeed. But, it's not as cartoony as it used to be. I suppose if it's very over the top and exaggerated, there's still a degree of detachment, as in "Yeah, this isn't real, it's not like something like that -can- happen because human body doesn't actually work that way".

With more "realism", things drift closer and closer to the uncanny valley, and that generally creeps people out.

I'm reminded of Final Fantasy 7, specifically when Shinra HQ was attacked by Sephiroth, he left bloody chibi bodies all over the place, blood was spattered all over the walls, the president had a sword sticking out of his chest... and the game was rated T.

I imagine if the game existed with modern graphics true to it's original, the rating may well change.
-----------

OT: I actually grew up according to the rating system, not because my parents forced me to play those kind of games, but because those games are what I was interested in. When I was small, I played only E rated games, when I got a little older I played T and when I got older still, I started playing M games, but all that time I never played exclusively M or T rated games, my most recent purchase was Pokemon Conquest and I'm enjoying it probably more so now than I ever would when I was small, but what sold me on Pokemon Conquest was the idea of feudal era pokemon going to war with each other...

Dont forget about Jenova and her twisted monster tittys!, honestly when i was 12 and playing through FF7 jenova scared the bejebus out of me on that boat! x)