It’s getting close to the start of a new generation and things seems even more volatile than usual. Giant mega corporations muscling in on gaming, gormless influencers being paid millions to act as second-hand car sellers, and a general sense that while games are getting bigger variety and innovation is actually shrinking.
That’s what a lot of my friends have been complaining about lately but I honestly don’t think it’s true. Yes, there are problems and worrying trends but if you look at the games themselves I don’t think things have ever been better. Big name games like God Of War have been genuine classics, sequels that you would’ve thought would never get made, like NieR:Automata have actually been major hits, Japanese games are great again and everything from Persona 5 to Devil May Cry 5 has not only been great but successful too.
Games as a service titles are, in general, actually pretty consumer-friendly and companies like Ubisoft have actually got very good at making them fair and balanced. After all these years Call Of Duty is still somehow good. The biggest games in the world – in Fortnite and Apex Legends – are not only free but actually pretty good. Nintendo has had their best generation since the SNES era and their best console ever. Sony’s first party games have never been better either and they’ve been great in their support of VR.
Microsoft has had a difficult time, granted, but they’re making all the right noises now and their support for backwards compatibility has been fantastic. There’s a lot to worry about, sure, but I think overall things have never been better.
Kavinsky
