The Impact of Episodic Gaming 110
GameDailyBiz has a piece up looking at what episodic content is, and what it means to the future of the games industry. From the article: "Our age is one of aging. Mainstream gamers are now older on average than they have ever been. When you are single and unemployed, it is easy to play The Godfather for nine straight hours the day the game hits the shelf. When you are married, it becomes tougher. When you have kids, it might be impossible. It is difficult to slice some time for yourself. And in that slice, you have to carve a portion for gaming. It is no wonder casual games that require no more than 10 minutes to play continue to grow in popularity. This is why we are more likely to login to Call of Duty 2 on Xbox Live to play a quick five-minute Team Deathmatch and leave the Lobby."
Not a joke (Score:4, Informative)
Now, it has all changed. I got a 360 at the beginning of the month. I think I have played it a total of 3 hours. I have not played any PC games that I use to. I barely am able to log into Eve just to make sure I am still training something.
It's called growing up. I really do wish I could blow a few days in Battlefield2, and maybe in the future I will try to work that in. But right now, I just do a little Geometry Wars before bed (the demo version) or Blazing Angels demo (a lot of fun, that one).
Re:Not a joke (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not a joke (Score:1)
I now play DDO on occasion with friends late night friday if I have the energy to stay awake, and sneak in an hour or so of oblivion when I can.
I figure once the offspring are older, I can go back to more time gaming with them if they can stand playing with the old man and they have the inclination to play games at all.
However, I will try (and most likely fai
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Re:Not a joke (Score:1)
Besides, given a choice between playing with the kids and gaming, the kids are more fun (and get me to be more active--which is a feat in itself
Re:Not a joke (Score:1)
Your parents wanted to teach you that you are unable to moderate yourself and would instantly stop functioning as a human being if you had a video game system. Were they forced to buy only enough food for a single meal at a time for fear that, if food for more than one meal was available, you'd gorge yourself and eat
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Re:Not a joke (Score:3, Interesting)
The answer is, of course, no. This is just a way to start a game with little funding hoping that you will make enough money to complete it. It is what I'll call the current PC "patch model" of distribution taken to its logical extreme.
Here's what will happen. Most games will never be finished, and even the ones that do will f
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Actually, there are a lot of untried business models that eposodic gaming could use to work. Publishers could actually allow user generated content into the game on a regu
Re:Not a joke (Score:1)
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Patch model?
I thought most of (all?) the bugs in a game were in the graphics/physics/AI engine.
Designing good levels/episodes may not be easy, but I imagine it has to be a whole lot easier than getting a proper game engine written up.
Even games that use an existing graphics engine still have their fair sha
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
You are totally right about your Godfather example. Most games would never get more then a few chapters in before they lost so many players that they couldn't afford to finish. If you're not going to spend $50 on a 80-hour game, you're not going to spend $400 on 80-one hour games (selling for $5 each).
But the model can work. In fact, there are some MMOGs that are doing this now to a certain degree. Some MMOs are obvious about this and sell "expansion packs" while others give out "free" conten
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
The article addresses this issue, "We believe it is less about the big guy vs. the small guy, or the mitigation of risk in the face of escalating development cost. It is about controlling the subscription model for gaming."
Their contention is that this is all about redistribution of the value chain, or mor
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Re:Not a joke (Score:1)
And why's that? Am I not a grownup if I don't start my own company and get a wife and two kids (or get involved in amateur athletics), and then loudly complain that there's no time to play games anymore? It was your choice to invest your time in those things. The line of work I'm getting into will be something like a nine to five job (physical labour) which doesn't require me to do anything, like paperwork, when I'm not at work. I also won't be getting married. I guess I'll have lots
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Trust me, you will probably curse yourself one day for the time spent on the games when you could have been working out or growing a business. And it sounds like you are going down the 'work harder, not smarter' route.
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
I've found that I'm way too tired in the evenings to stay up past 11pm now to play UT2004 with my clan members... kinda sucks in a way, but I'm way more energetic at work.
Re:Not a joke (Score:2)
Most important to you now is diet. South Beach or Atkins. No alcohol.
Maybe look into some races or sign up from a marathon that is 6 months away. Good luck.
MGS3: Subsistence... (Score:1)
Why is it about older gamers? (Score:2, Informative)
Wow, what games have you been playing? (Score:2)
Ugh (Score:5, Insightful)
I hate newspeak. I buy games in order to play them. This has worked fine up until now. I can buy a game for $50 and play it for 4 or 5 years. I'm happy with that.
The main problem I see with this push toward "pay us via subscription" is that there's only room for a handful of successful games with the kind of monthly charge they're expecting. $1/month? Fine. $20/month? Homey don't play dat.
Re:Ugh (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Ugh (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah - I'm kinda puzzled by this idea of "Of course you'll want to complete the game you paid for, as quickly as possible."; if a game lasts me a month or two, it's a good thing! In particular, when I hear episodic gaming, I think Half-Life 2, and I think SiN. I don't know how SiN will turn out, but the idea of buying something shorter than Half-Life 2 is absurd - I completed the game in 3 days, and would neither consider myself particularly skilled
Marriage Vs. Single (Score:3, Insightful)
But, in all seriousness, it is true. My life no longer focuses on, "What should I do tonight?", it became, "What should we do tonight?" Otherwise, if I was to tell my wife that I was going to sit down for a few hours and game, my marriage would not be as happy as it is. I enjoy spending time with my wife much more than gaming.
In fact, my wife isn't opposed to games. She grew up with the same games I did - old school DOS Games like Commander Keen or Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure. Or, we'll play FloboPuyo or Jump N Bump together. Sometimes we'll fire up DOS-Box and one of us will play those games for a while. Or, we'll even fire up the NES and play Mario for a while. My wife plays my old Gameboy Advanced more than I ever did, and sometimes we'll link them up and play against each other. However, we play more board/card games together than electronic games.
But, I don't feel that I'm missing much, especially with newer games. Mediocre titles and long gameplay are factors that turn me away. If anything requires that I have to spend over an hour focusing on, forget it.
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:2)
Frankly, you show the classic signs of an immature relationship with an overdependency on each other.
Many is the time when my ans
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:2)
From An Tir, Greetings.
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Thanks, but I don't need marriage counsel from /., especially when people try to demean my life by calling it 'immature'. Go ahead and live your life how you do, and I'll live mine.
If by overdependency you mean we work together as a team, then I suppose your view of dependency is skewed. I view marriage as a partnership - two people working together to bring happiness to each other; not two people doing t
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:3, Interesting)
I've actually told my wife that before. It doesn't get you very far, what being a negative statement and all.
It is depressing when you have a hobby (gaming, music, cars, whatever) and my wife felt like pestering me... "You don't spend enough time with me!"
After communication and working through life's issues, though, I've found that we have "our time" and "quiet time". I now have my time for hobbies, and we still do things together.
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Now I game and am celibate. I can only assume these two life truths will hold until I die or get divorced. Enjoy it while it lasts. On the upside, it won't be too terribly long before you have a lot more gaming time on your hands once again. That is an upside, right?
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:2)
Otherwise, if I was to tell my wife that I was going to sit down for a few hours and game, my marriage would not be as happy as it is.
If you honestly can't tell your wife that you're going to game (or do anything else, for that matter) for a few hours by yourself, then perhaps you should consider whether something's wrong there.
Speaking as someone who's wife is also a gamer, and much more so than yours sounds t
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Sorry if you misinterpretted. I never tried to imply that I cannot do anything without her when she's around. However, I won't let her be bored out of her mind while I'm in my own world. We both recognize the need for personal time every now-and-then, but we enjoy spending time with each other moreso.
Combined
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Re:Marriage Vs. Single (Score:1)
Let's see, during the day my wife plays with our 5 year old and plays WoW. I came home yesterday to see the 5 year old playing WoW for the first time. :-) When the 8 year old gets home from school, she chooses to watch TV, play with her sister or play her hunter in WoW with Mommy after her homework is done.
In the evening, we have dinner together, maybe watch a TV show (Dirty Jobs is a family favorite), or the girls will play outside or in
Not really a new idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Back then I thought it was a dumb idea, but now that I'm in my thirties I know exactly what he meant.
Quake 3 Arena (Score:3, Insightful)
You know, in Quake 3 Arena, you can hit Single Player, Skirmish, pick a map, hit Next, pick your opponents, and set a Time Limit and no Frag Limit. Like say for 15 minutes. And that's when the game ends.
I've been doing that for years.
Re:Not really a new idea (Score:2)
Most games nowadays implement something called "Saved Games". Good or bad, you can save the game at any time aft
Re:Not really a new idea (Score:2)
You can't just save the game in any old spot, just certain locations. If you are in the middle of some tedious part between saves and you get bored or simply can't keep playing, the only options are 1)keep playing untill you eventually hit the save point 2)eventually replay the game or 3)give up the game completely. Then there are games like Black that take it even a level further... There are checkpoints that you will respaw
Re:Not really a new idea (Score:1)
I find that it is a 50/50 split - some saves use the save-point system, some others use full quick saves. For the PC, the games that go by save-points are generally less popular than the quick save counterparts. There are exceptions (e.g. FarCry and to a lesser extent, PainKiller), but these are generally more common with console games (or on old computer systems.)
Re:Not really a new idea (Score:2)
Re:Not really a new idea (Score:2)
Basically I don't play a lot of RPGs anymore because the 45min + time investment for progress cannot be guaranteed to me.
I AM the Godfather... (Score:2)
When I was younger, we used to watch The Godfather for hours at a time. (Or was that Conan The Barbarian on the VHS tape that got worn out.) Anyway, sheesh... these kids and their interactive entertainment these days.
Section Length Can Stop You, Too (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem isn't going to be fixed with edispodic content. As long as the game makers keep placing checkpoints farther and farther away to increase difficulty, then the problem will always persist.
Re:Section Length Can Stop You, Too (Score:1)
Re:Section Length Can Stop You, Too (Score:1)
Re:Section Length Can Stop You, Too (Score:1)
I've since abandoned it again, however. The final level is difficult in the cheapest possible ways; right from the off it steals all your weaponry so you have to do it on fo
Need more gaming time?? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Need more gaming time?? (Score:1)
Re:Need more gaming time?? (Score:2)
Now you're rooming with your single buddy who never stops partying and broke the PS1 your ex didn't know about and always watches porn on the 9" TV you found in the appartment dumpster. Sure sucks to be you.
Compatibility Check (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Compatibility Check (Score:1, Informative)
Group B has three options:
1) Spend the rest of their lives alone
2) Settle for someone who isn't nearly as interested in gaming as they are (and possibly hope to encourage an interest in games, with no guarantee of success)
3) Hunt down the people like you who made it in
Re:Compatibility Check (Score:2)
I'm not that obsessive of a gamer, and I didn't even think to bring it up with the woman I was dating (who is now my wife). This was an unfortunate mistake on my part. It wouldn't have bee
Hrm... I see the problem here. (Score:1, Offtopic)
Ahhh... So the problem is the kids, then the wife, and then the job.
Well... I need a job to support my drinking habbits so I can't really give that up.
But the wife and the kids I could do without.
I came close to getting married and then realized I was a horrible person when it comes to being loyal and later discovered the joy of being in a per
Re:Hrm... I see the problem here. (Score:1)
Children can provide -"A"- purpose to life. Children are not -MY- purpose in life.
I'd rather start a (or several) business(es) - create jobs & wealth for others, and if I'm -very- lucky perhaps leave some art behind that a few people might find some value in. It's how you build and devote your life and apportion the time. I'm hoping to free up more time in the future so I can enjoy my game collections. But I've even put casual dating on hold until my first 50 canvase
Same here. (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason you, a single guy with no g/f, have less free time is because you are unorganized. Here, do this. Put 15-minute blocks for the whole day in MS Excel (96 total). Now fill in what you have to do in those blocks. i.e. 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of work, 1 hour of commuting, etc. The blocks that you have not filled in are your free-time blocks. It may surprise you how much time you have. Maybe you waste time surfing
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
As for dealing with big files, why not ask about using Microsoft Remote Desktop? Just connect to your Win XP Pro PC at work from your Win XP Pro PC at home. Or you can use VNC if you desktop is Linux.
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Re:Same here. - no free time lost (Score:2)
Oh crap that's bad (though I'm sure there are worse). Myself, I work 8 hours a day with at most an hour of commute/shopping/etc which works out to 4-6 hours of free time every weekday. This is why I would not even consider moving to a town with longer commutes. Occasionally I have to do a day in the next town which is 2 hours away, but I refuse to do that very often.
one of the main reasons for episodic content IMHO (Score:1)
The impact summed up in one word... (Score:3, Insightful)
Especially at the 20 bucks a pop method that I keep hearing rumored Valve will use. Particularly when it will just amount to a few linear shooter levels.
Meanwhile I continue to play Gal Civ II over and over with all the different outcomes for 29.99. Or even Civ IV for 50 bucks is a better investment.
Re:The impact summed up in one word... (Score:2)
I agree. As it stands now, most new games debut at $40, $50, or $60 for an entire game. But if you wait just 3-5 months you can usually pick it up for $20-$30. There are hardcore gamers who "must have the game" and will pay nearly any price to get it. They are the low hanging fruit. Once you have sold copies to all of them at $60 in the first week
Re:The impact summed up in one word... (Score:1)
For established businesses, this is the ONLY trick in the book.
Oblivion (Score:4, Interesting)
So if this article got a point this superlong game would not be selling. Except that it is.
So the story is complete and utter crap.
What is "important" for people with other demands on their time is the ability to segment their gaming. Or in other words. Save anywhere.
Call of Cthulhu is another Betsheda game yet while it is much shorter (except for some fake replay forcing) I can play it far less. In Oblivion I could play for say 5 minutes before saving and doing whatever is demanded of me. CoC would mean I had to quit and next time do whatever I did over again because I had not reached a save point.
The online 5 minute FPS section offcourse can't be saved but then again doesn't need to. Same with MMO games wich in way save CONSTANTLY.
I think the most important lesson game companies should learn is that older players with real live demands on their time will have less patience for being forced to play from savepoint to savepoint. Being forced to replay a game if they want maximum difficulty (what the fuck is up with that? Consoles are weird) or all the goodies.
Putting out games in small bits is not going to solve anything. So what if the godfather was segmented into 1 hour episodes. That STILL would not meet your 5 minute game session time.
I just wish gamemakers would wake up and realize that savepoints are a leftover from the days consoles didn't have enough memory to save a full game.
It is a tech limit NOT a design feature. I paid for the product, I decide how to play it.
If you think about it savepoint system is like that recent Philips patent to disable your TV controls during ads. It is the content maker telling you how you should play. Fuck that.
Re:Oblivion (Score:2)
IMO this is one thing that the MMO games haven't yet come to grips with.
I played WW2OL for 4 years straight, and loved it (still do, actually) but as the realism and fidelity to the actual military experience increased, it became le
Re:Oblivion (Score:1)
Meanwhile, I've got Black sitting virtually untouched, because I don't have time to play the whole second level in order to reach the next savepoint, and I never actually managed to get past the opening cutscene of MGS2.
Re:Oblivion (Score:2)
Man, that reminds me how much I *hate* that damn "checkpoint" system on so many console games.
That was the one downside to Halo 1 & 2. Drove me abosultely *NUTS* (especially when in "Legendary" mode). I'd work my butt off, finally clearing that notorious hanger on legendary setting, only to have some Elite ambush me before I could make the checkpoint.
It left me with the constant feeling of just having wasted a lot of time. I'd complete whole gaming sessions with absolutely NOTHING to show
Adventure games? (Score:3, Insightful)
With, say, an FPS, as long as you stop playing when you finish an area/level, it's easy to pick up again on the next day. With an adventure game, it can be pretty crucial to have a lot of things fresh in your memory, like "I've definitely tried using my rabbit's foot with that checkout counter" or "I think the blind hermit mentioned something about frogs and WD-40 being an explosive combination".
Otherwise, trying things over and over again in separate gaming session gets really old really fast. So older folk don't have the time to enjoy playing them, while the kids, dumbed down by TV and MySpace, don't have the attention span.
Episodic gaming,Casual gaming (Score:1)
for example if i like i can load Starcraft and Play a single map for half-hour(not melee) and leave.
Episodic gaming is widespread because,
there few reasons:
1.Lack of time.
2.Games are not interesting after you
familiar with them enough.I.e. no novelty factor in spending time on old games.
3.Games aren't important enough to use up free time.If there is something else it takes priority over gaming.
4,using games as recreation isn't much fun
The Original Doom (Score:1)
Portable consoles (Score:2)
Plus the fact that I've got
Diablo II (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Diablo II (Score:2)
Also, that character is my alt. On my main, I log in three nights a week and participate
Casual gaming (Score:1)
double-speak (Score:1)
Re:nine hours? (Score:1)
Re:nine hours? (Score:3, Interesting)
That's crazy. I play to have fun, and playing games for more than a few hours can get really boring for me, besides the fact it's terrible for your health if your too obsessive to take breaks, and excessive marathons have cause one or two otherwise mentaly ill people to die.
There, now your post is more accurate, and isn't judging the whole of the gaming community by your own personal standards.
Re:nine hours? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:nine hours? (Score:1)
Re:nine hours? (Score:1)
Re:nine hours? (Score:2)
That was when I was 17 - today, the occasional all-nighter might still be in - but they're rare....
Re:nine hours? (Score:1)
Christmas 1985(??) - I received my first console, the 8-bit Nintendo. I started playing Legend of Zelda at 6pm and finally stopped the next morning at 9am when everyone started getting up. To me it felt like 3 hours.
1990 while at college, Ultima VI was released. A few days before it was released, I vowed that I should play back through Ultimas I through V to remind myself of the world and the philosophy. Fo
Re:On top of old-foggie. (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically, yes.
Those of us who grew up as the first generation of video gamers are growing older. Sure, there's all sorts of new gamers, but we're starting to see gamers in their thirties who started on video games in elementary school. As a result, there's a lot of navel-gazing about people who still love games but can't play all the games they used to as a kid.
I'm a big console RPG gamer. When I was a kid, I used to regularly rack up over 50 hours on a run through FF4, and I probably played the game from start to finish over 8 times. I'd disdain strategy guides on the first run or two while trying to find everything myself.
Now, as a gainfully employed adult, I'm lucky to have enough time to play through one of my RPGs once. I don't have time to get everything I missed on a second run, so at this point, I'm hitting FAQs from before I start the game and using cheat codes at the end to bypass some of the tedium of finishing side quests. I have a lot of games that I've bought thinking that they'd be great that are sitting on my shelf unopened because I just don't have time anymore.
I also haven't played a good 4X TBS game in ages because I just can't see myself spending a week to finish one play-through.
That's a demographic shift for gamers that does actually mean something in terms of what kinds of products we buy, and since we're the money makers now, the industry is catering to us. That's why you're seeing so much about this.
Re:On top of old-foggie. (Score:2)
Give me something that rewards me in short sessions and allows me to save anywhere and anytime. Also, give me a good quest log so I can easily re-immerse myself in an RPG or adventure game after some time away.
Do all those things and you can have large portions of my kids' coll
Re:On top of old-foggie. (Score:1)
The standby feature is quite handy: need to pay some attention to the significant other during a boss-battle? Push that button, and done... game saved in memory. No more 10x "5 more minutes hunny...".
Switching games in the middle is not possible, but now games like GTA or Untold Legends are manageable.
I carry my PSP everywhere (baggy pants with 400 pockets) and play in 3min-slices while picking up somebody for carpooling, waiting in line at the supermarket,...