Will shooters ever be anything else other than just military again?

[Altercator]

Until like 2008, we used to lament how all shooters look the same, never mind the different coating of science fiction, fantasy or whatever the devs can think of?

Now? All are the same, only they're all wearing camo, "real" and brown with titles like Call of Honor: Modern Battle. It's not just the jingoistic militaristic elements plaguing today's shooters, it's the lazy reliance on QTEs for boss fights; the neglect of single-player campaigns to focus on multiplayer; and of course the linear corridors AAA game devs have forced upon us, along with other bad decisions.

Yeah, we can always go back play old-school shooters like Painkiller, or Doom, but we're talking about the future. How soon will we get back to shooters where we can mow down hordes of enemies in a larger arena, take on gigantic bosses, and more importantly, more variety of settings beyond WW2 & modern warfare?

 

[Vault101]

no because trends do not come and go and things stay the same ALWAYS/sarcasm

there has been talk that we may be seeing the end of brown militairy shooters what with borderlands 2, facr cry 3 and spec ops (and the upcoming bioshock infinate)

 

[Xzithelost]

Once People stop buying these Excuses for games then it will stop So it will take some time but people will get pissed and leave them in the dirt Also Bioshock infinite YES YES 1000TIMES YES

 

[Christopher Fisher]

You should check out Hard Reset Extended Edition; it fits a lot of what you seem to be wanting, and ignore a lot of the older reviews for the game. The devs fixed just about every one of the complaints raised in reviews via the extended edition of the game.

TB's WTF of Hard Reset: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZeHWH_9sUg


Btw, it's a futuristic cyberpunk game--the world literally looks like Blade Runner.

Here's some of the boss battles:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mw-Ucb231Ms

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNL4U_BCc0s

 

[RedRuby185]

I have heard my friends say that Halo 4 isn't very military like anymore.

EDIT: also Dues Ex human revolution is a shooter that I highly recommend playing. it not military shooter either.

 

[Zhukov]

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing you over the noise of Borderlands 2. Max Payne 3, Bioshock Infinite and Farcry 3

And that's all within a single year.

 

[Vault101]

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing you over the noise of Borderlands 2. Max Payne 3, Bioshock Infinite and Farcry 3

And that's all within a single year.

max payne 3 isnt a first person shooter......

 

[Altercator]

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing you over the noise of Borderlands 2. Max Payne 3, Bioshock Infinite and Farcry 3

And that's all within a single year.

max payne 3 isnt a first person shooter......

Well, I didn't mention first person at all, just shooters in general.


But I agree, this year has been great for a lot of non-military shooters.

What should've been a concern is whether this variety would last, and for how long before shooters become military again?

 

[CityofTreez]

Borderlands, Hitman, Far-Cry 3. Bioshock Infinite...

Not sure what you mean.

 

[Windcaler]

If you take a good look outside of Modern Military shooters there are plenty of games out there that dont fall within that kind of game. Two that come to mind are Blacklight: Retribution and Planetside 2. Both games have a futuristic feel but the former is more cyber punk as you play an agent in a kind of post apocolyptic setting where you work for various companies and the latter more science fiction based though I cant speak to its lore

As for the future, i think there will always be FPS games that try to be different. I remember when borderlands came out it was heralded as the Anti-MMS. Since then we've gotten some painkiller games (none that were good though), some nice futuristic games, Serious SAM 3, and more.

If you dont want MMS games then stop looking at solely the AAA side of the industry and more importantly stop looking at consoles and focus on the PC market where most of the really different and awesome shooters come out

 

[ShinyCharizard]

Why do people complain about military shooters being ever so dominant. For fucks sake there isn't even that many of them. Just a few big ones.

 

[Zhukov]

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing you over the noise of Borderlands 2. Max Payne 3, Bioshock Infinite and Farcry 3

And that's all within a single year.

max payne 3 isnt a first person shooter......

It's a shooter.

The OP didn't specify first person.

 

[Nieroshai]

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing you over the noise of Borderlands 2. Max Payne 3, Bioshock Infinite and Farcry 3

And that's all within a single year.

Escapist needs "Like" buttons. I second this.

 

[General Twinkletoes]

Please, name all the successful modern military shooters of the last few years.
Battlefield 3, the Call of Duty series.... and? Most others were massive flops. Homefront, Medal of Honour, SOCOM 4, almost all of them. There aren't even all that many to begin with. There are probably more shooters that aren't Military ones.

People love to rant about how every successful shooter is a grey-brown tactilol borefest, when they aren't. Call of Duty and Battlefield succeed, but 2 franchises being popular does not mean all military shooters are.
And even if all successful shooters were military, this is sort of a dumb question. Of course they aren't, when has any trend in video games stayed for very long?

Military shooters are nowhere near as important and genre eating as you seem to think.

 

[Soxafloppin]

I don't like Shooters all that much to be honest, but that Planet side 2 looks pretty interesting. Its definitely a Beautiful game anyway.

 

[Doom972]

If you only look at pure shooters, military shooters seem to be many of them. The Shooter genre has been stagnating for quite a while, but there are still enough non-military shooters that just don't get enough attention.

As for Shooter hybrids, like Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Mass Effect 3 and Bioshock Infinite, There are few military-themed ones.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The military have always been involved in games. The very first games were designed using military technology. At their core, games are about offense and defense. Some studios even produced military training aids (RIP Pandemic). It only seems natural that games should be so tightly bound to military themes. I have no qualms with it. And like other posters are saying, they're not even close to dominating the market.