How different generations approach gaming

Have games really changed at all in the last forty years?

Videogames in the grand scheme have always contained the same core concepts. You play Modern Warfare 2 to gain higher levels and earn new weapons in addition to playing with friends. Games have always been social. Even in the early days of Ralph Baer and Bill Rusch making game concepts in the late 60's, their designs typically involved two players. Even games like Star Raiders or Fallout 3 that have literally no social elements still entice players to achieve an goal. Social experiences and chasing a carrot on a stick are the two core concepts in gaming that have existed since the birth of Tennis for Two.

Despite the videogames of today virtually being the same as the games of yesterday, how they deliver these two concepts have differentiated over the last forty years. You can directly fight against your friends in Super Street Fighter IV, or challenge their scores in Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. Games like Persona 4 have no social elements but offer players plenty of incentives to play such as leveling up and seeing the plot progress.

Older games such as Pac-Man, Smash TV, and Donkey Kong have the element of score chasing. The idea of beating your old score and possibly competing against friends or the arcade's leaderboards was the carrot needed for entertainment and the social portion all in one package. Whether it's gamer's taste or technology, videogames moved beyond the leaderboards as a focus. However, many rewards still revolve around a number getting higher. You can spend countless hours getting boots in World of Warcraft that give your Priest +235 Intelligence or play Avatar for an easy 1,000 achievement points.

This is a big reason why Modern Warfare is a huge success. Players need to see a constant flow of progression. All those +100 and +250 during a deathmatch add a lot to the experience. Some games like Bulletstorm are more upfront with their progression system, while games like Halo: Reach wait until the end of a match to show your progression.

A big way games have changed is the lack of utilizing scores as a central component. We all played Bioshock and enjoyed it. Bioshock didn't have an arcade mode or an RPG system, but instead provided an interesting environment. It's largely due to modern tools developers have to craft real enough looking worlds that can tell a narrative that every game that comes out is about beating a high score. Bioshock couldn't exist in 1980.

Early games were all about a challenge. These days it's about an experience. If I put in Mass Effect 2 and got the shit kicked out of me, I would be pissed. That's why I don't play Demon's Souls. Older guys may cry foul that games like BattleToads aren't made anymore. For me though, I'm in it for the ride not the challenge. And that's an idea the industry has nurtured the last 15 years. Hopefully the ride has decent gameplay.

I can't think of a better example of games bridging the gap between older and modern design than Pac-Man Championship Edition DX and Need for Speed Hot Pursuit. Pac-Man CE DX modernized Pac-Man. If someone came to me asking how Pac-Man can be modernized, I would throw my hands in the air and yell “MAKE IT HD AND ADD LEADERBOARDS!!!...and maybe think of a way to add co-op?” Namco Bandai added new fun mechanics that made the dusty classic icon fast, loud, and badass. Need for Speed takes score chasing to a modern level. The Autolog is a Facebook-style wall that summarizes your friend's accomplishments. When going through the game's singleplayer, you won't be chasing after arbitrary goals the game sets up. Instead, after every event it will compare you to your friends. In most cases, I went through the event again to move up on the leaderboard.

Social dynamics in games are arguably the most evolved element in the industry. It used to be all about competing against your friend's scores and maybe running through Double Dragon. Through the years we've had split-screen, LAN, online multiplayer, playing RockBand, and MMOs. In addition to that, we're entering a point were we can discus our different singleplayer experiences in games like Mass Effect and Heavy Rain.

Videogames are all about a sense of progression or social activities. Over the years, technology has allowed games to do more with presentation. Do you think gaming has changed much over the years? Yes we have motion controls, memorable characters, HD, 3D, mobile gaming, and so on, the core ideas stay intact. We can talk about how the dominant FPS games were twitch shooters like Quake and now they're games like Modern Warfare. I'm talking about the grand scheme. It's merely a matter of how the game presents itself to the player to pursuit these concepts.   

Have games really changed at all in the last forty years?

Videogames in the grand scheme have always contained the same core concepts. You play Modern Warfare 2 to gain higher levels and earn new weapons in addition to playing with friends. Games have always been social. Even in the early days of Ralph Baer and Bill Rusch making game concepts in the late 60's, their designs typically involved two players. Even games like Star Raiders or Fallout 3 that have literally no social elements still entice players to achieve an goal. Social experiences and chasing a carrot on a stick are the two core concepts in gaming that have existed since the birth of Tennis for Two.

Despite the videogames of today virtually being the same as the games of yesterday, how they deliver these two concepts have differentiated over the last forty years. You can directly fight against your friends in Super Street Fighter IV, or challenge their scores in Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. Games like Persona 4 have no social elements but offer players plenty of incentives to play such as leveling up and seeing the plot progress.

Older games such as Pac-Man, Smash TV, and Donkey Kong have the element of score chasing. The idea of beating your old score and possibly competing against friends or the arcade's leaderboards was the carrot needed for entertainment and the social portion all in one package. Whether it's gamer's taste or technology, videogames moved beyond the leaderboards as a focus. However, many rewards still revolve around a number getting higher. You can spend countless hours getting boots in World of Warcraft that give your Priest +235 Intelligence or play Avatar for an easy 1,000 achievement points.

This is a big reason why Modern Warfare is a huge success. Players need to see a constant flow of progression. All those +100 and +250 during a deathmatch add a lot to the experience. Some games like Bulletstorm are more upfront with their progression system, while games like Halo: Reach wait until the end of a match to show your progression.

A big way games have changed is the lack of utilizing scores as a central component. We all played Bioshock and enjoyed it. Bioshock didn't have an arcade mode or an RPG system, but instead provided an interesting environment. It's largely due to modern tools developers have to craft real enough looking worlds that can tell a narrative that every game that comes out is about beating a high score. Bioshock couldn't exist in 1980.

Early games were all about a challenge. These days it's about an experience. If I put in Mass Effect 2 and got the shit kicked out of me, I would be pissed. That's why I don't play Demon's Souls. Older guys may cry foul that games like BattleToads aren't made anymore. For me though, I'm in it for the ride not the challenge. And that's an idea the industry has nurtured the last 15 years. Hopefully the ride has decent gameplay.

I can't think of a better example of games bridging the gap between older and modern design than Pac-Man Championship Edition DX and Need for Speed Hot Pursuit. Pac-Man CE DX modernized Pac-Man. If someone came to me asking how Pac-Man can be modernized, I would throw my hands in the air and yell “MAKE IT HD AND ADD LEADERBOARDS!!!...and maybe think of a way to add co-op?” Namco Bandai added new fun mechanics that made the dusty classic icon fast, loud, and badass. Need for Speed takes score chasing to a modern level. The Autolog is a Facebook-style wall that summarizes your friend's accomplishments. When going through the game's singleplayer, you won't be chasing after arbitrary goals the game sets up. Instead, after every event it will compare you to your friends. In most cases, I went through the event again to move up on the leaderboard.

Social dynamics in games are arguably the most evolved element in the industry. It used to be all about competing against your friend's scores and maybe running through Double Dragon. Through the years we've had split-screen, LAN, online multiplayer, playing RockBand, and MMOs. In addition to that, we're entering a point were we can discus our different singleplayer experiences in games like Mass Effect and Heavy Rain.

Videogames are all about a sense of progression or social activities. Over the years, technology has allowed games to do more with presentation. Do you think gaming has changed much over the years? Yes we have motion controls, memorable characters, HD, 3D, mobile gaming, and so on, the core ideas stay intact. We can talk about how the dominant FPS games were twitch shooters like Quake and now they're games like Modern Warfare. I'm talking about the grand scheme. It's merely a matter of how the game presents itself to the player to pursuit these concepts.   

video games are becoming a social hobby in life. it's becoming more social to play them.

Same shit, different day. 
 
But I mean, there have been some huge changes. Think about where gaming would be without games like D&D. I don't know a lot of the history, but I know that pen-and-paper RPGs and text MUDs were huge in leading gaming to where we have it now.

I think its an error to see difficult games sheerly for that aspect.  Specifically with regards to Demon's Souls, the attraction for a lot its players, me included, was not in fact the difficulty.  It was the atmosphere of the game, the experience as you so aptly put it.  There is a degree of foreboding each stage instills that makes playing it very compelling.  The difficulty merely matches the danger implied with danger that exists.
 
Disregarding the fact that the game isn't difficult so much as it demands a different play style to its contemporaries, its difficulty is not separated from the experience it instills, but rather supplements it.  One can compare it to Dead Space, a game that is suppose to be frightening.  That experience would suffer if the enemies were bested easily with little difficulty as it is contradictory to the feelings the environment attempts to instill. 

" Early games were all about a challenge. These days it's about an experience. If I put in Mass Effect 2 and got the shit kicked out of me, I would be pissed. That's why I don't play Demon's Souls. Older guys may cry foul that games like BattleToads aren't made anymore. For me though, I'm in it for the ride not the challenge. And that's an idea the industry has nurtured the last 15 years. Hopefully the ride has decent gameplay. "

" @EpicSteve said:

" Early games were all about a challenge. These days it's about an experience. If I put in Mass Effect 2 and got the shit kicked out of me, I would be pissed. That's why I don't play Demon's Souls. Older guys may cry foul that games like BattleToads aren't made anymore. For me though, I'm in it for the ride not the challenge. And that's an idea the industry has nurtured the last 15 years. Hopefully the ride has decent gameplay. "

And challenge can't provide an "experience" or a "ride", or help elevate "decent gameplay" to "masterful game design"? Isn't a ride filled with intense challenge and the fear, relief, triumph et cetera that comes with it far more engaging and exciting than one containing none of that? "

" @Icemael said:

" @EpicSteve said:

" Early games were all about a challenge. These days it's about an experience. If I put in Mass Effect 2 and got the shit kicked out of me, I would be pissed. That's why I don't play Demon's Souls. Older guys may cry foul that games like BattleToads aren't made anymore. For me though, I'm in it for the ride not the challenge. And that's an idea the industry has nurtured the last 15 years. Hopefully the ride has decent gameplay. "

And challenge can't provide an "experience" or a "ride", or help elevate "decent gameplay" to "masterful game design"? Isn't a ride filled with intense challenge and the fear, relief, triumph et cetera that comes with it far more engaging and exciting than one containing none of that? "

A game that sells itself based on challenge vs. a game that revolves around an experience like Heavy Rain or Assassin's Creed are different. Most game have challenging components, but specific games like Super Meat Boy revolves around challenge. Those games aren't very common anymore.  "

" Bioshock couldn't exist in 1980."

Even though I grew up in the generation of score chasing, I was never really huge on it except when it came to adventure games, and then I'd spend hours hunting down every little action that would give me those elusive last few points.  That was dropped sometime around the early 90's, though, and I wouldn't care about them again until the advent of achievement points and games like Monkey Island being re-released.   
 
For me, the biggest attractor of any medium to me is the stories told.  I know games have a long way to go in the plot and writing departments, but the worlds we've experienced have been absolutely breathtaking and keep me coming back for more.  Stuff like Fallout, Mass Effect, Elder Scrolls, Final Fantasy, Suikoden, Dragon Quest... I love all those worlds.  Hell, even something silly as Conker makes me want to explore the universe. 

I approach games with a glass of whisky in hand and fat joint hanging out of my mouth.

This is pretty interesting.  I think you might be confusing some concepts here.  To me, saying every game has a progression is sort of like saying "every book has a progression."  Sure, every game is going to progress in some way. 
 
I like the point, Bioshock couldbn't have existed in 1980, and the comment from the other user, yes it could have, you just needed more imagination.  Sure, and that fits in precisely with your original point.  We used to use score chasing because the technology offered little in the way of incentive.  You keep playing Pac-Man to beat your friends score, not to see another blue maze with four ghosts.  You beat Bioshock to see the new environments, find out what happens to the characters, not to see if you can beat a score. 
 
Also, while it is true that Need for Speed and Pacman DX use the same "score chasing" I think the way technology presents it makes it an entirely different experience.  You used to only compete with people who lived immediately near you.  If no one lived near you played the game, or if they played much better, or much worse than you, you were pretty much playing by yourself.  The way the Autolog and friend leaderboards work is such a vast improvement, it is quite possibly not even the same experience.

I would start in say i don't think the core idea of a game will ever change and we will always see some form of these old game rules show up in games for years to come. Much like what drew said that a "game is a challenge wrap up in a experience". But i do think how we play games and what games are have changed a lot then back in the day.  Much of what you said is true and  that is why games are very different in nature now, it 's all about personal progession now more so then challenge.  Socal gaming has added to that based on the fact that social networking is so big and made social gaming even more of a focus. But i still think because games can tell stories better then they could ever have before and now that pesonal progession can make a "non Gamer" / "gamer" grind to better their stats,charecter,farm, weapon it makes gaming much more exciting to a person who is not your normal gamer.