Funny how that happens when people don’t have any money.
And when so much of gaming is shit.
Honestly, this has been a great year for games. The past 5 years have been pretty great.
Agreed. Many good games dropped this year. Expedition 33, death stranding 2, oblivion remastered.
Dark Souls 4 DLC was p great.
It’s a two part answer.
One, gamers have less money to spend, along with everyone else.
Two, expensive AAA title games these days tend to be shit, from a graphics, code, community, and content standpoint. If you want good games, cheaper is usually better.
Last AAA title game I bought was Borderlands 3, and I don’t see myself buying anymore in the next two years or so.
I got shadow of mordor on a huge discount and it still barely felt worth it.
I lost my last nerve with Gearbox when I had to figure out how to remove ads in a Borderlands game. No way they’re going to subject me to an ad for a game I would have otherwise bought.
Don’t forget about microtransactions, they might be a significant portion of the decline.
And now BL3 is literally $3 on steam. I paid fucking $60 or $70 for it. Whatever it was.
The hobby is getting more expensive while income left over after cost of living is going down. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone.
They’re charging more money for lower quality games. Glad less people are buying.
Older games are better plus gamers can play all our existing games.
This is why publisher’s are trying to derail “Stop Killing Games.”
When they are done with a a game the don’t WANT you to continue to play and enjoy it…
…they want you to forget about it and buy the next product they have and financially engage with the microtransaction ecosystem
I don’t need the 7th iteration of the same game dressed up with new graphics for the price they’re charging.
I guess it’s the over 25s buying all those Switch 2s then?
youtubers and twitch streamers who spent the past 6 months complaining about how games shouldn’t be that expensive
Even then I knew they were all still going to buy them.
I’m not young or American, but I can tell gaming has been changing. I can’t even remember what was the last “AAA” game I bought, because it must have been a couple of years ago.
Most games I buy are 40€ connoisseur titles or 20€ indie games. I don’t hear about any “must-play” AAA titles through the grapevine these days. I do hear about interesting indie stuff all the time, though. Most of the 60€+ games I hear about are kind of niche stuff.
Any AAA game I got in the last decade I waited till it was dirt cheap. Red Dead 2 was the last one I bought and played through was maybe 15-20 bucks or something?
Back in the early 90s I would walk into a store, buy a game that came in a box with a manual, take it home and it was mine.
I bought the 1st Civilization like this. I still have it. No Internet needed.
That’s the way it should be. All the online, dlc, mini boxes, group play, create online accounts…fuck all that shit.
Games are 70 and 80 dollars now. Young people can’t afford them. I can’t either, but I would refuse to pay that price regardless, anyway.
Can’t afford a home, holiday and now videogames.
Maybe they can ask their AI to inspect the size of everyone’s nose? Maybe that’s the trick to get us to buy more AI chips in our games and TVs and phones and cars and in our fruit probably. There’s gotta be AI in our food somewhere.
We are ripe for another Luddite movement with this giant AI grift the Tech Bros are forcing on us.
That’s because most of them are playing F2P video games on their mobile devices.
In addition to other’s comments, I think that we just have enough good games by now that a lot of people can find a game they enjoy enough to sink hundreds or thousands of hours into. Minecraft, Factorio, Satisfactory, Hollow Knight, Elden Ring, etc.
I’m not young, but I know mine has gone down. I’m not playing less games, though. 🏴☠️
*i .