“Addictive”, “One more turn”, “Challenging”

When thinking about the past, those are the three phrases that most pop into my mind when talking about past games. However, there was also a high degree of ‘tech talk’ which, thank heavens!, is now mostly gone. Talk about polygons, resolution, colors, and on and on filled reviews. Most of that was due to stupid console war talk such as in the 16-bit generation or to technology-happy computer games.

I’ve noticed games, today, are talked about in terms of how enveloping they are. Today, games are described like a digital bubble bath that the player soaks inside like a digital spa.

“One more turn” was mostly described to games like Civilization but “One more go” was also described for many other action type games. Games had to be ‘addictive’. They were descendants from the arcades (and arcades tried to get a player addicted so they would keep shoveling quarters). ‘Challenging’ also was loved back then because there were no stupid unlockables or achievements. BEATING THE GAME was considered the achievement. Gaming has become like the Little League where everyone gets a trophy just for ‘participating’. It was quite common to have ‘challenging’ games back then. Play ‘Legend of Zelda’ today and you’ll notice that even the first quest has its challenging moments. Zelda II? haha. What about Blaster Master, Super Mario Brothers 3, Ninja Gaiden, Contra, or even Battletoads? Games were challenging which is why Super Mario Brothers’ warp zones became so famous.

THEN: “Look, I beat level 5! I am so happy!”

NOW: “Look, I am 34 hours into the game! Am I happy?”

One major component of New Generation is that its gamers do not want to leave the real world. They don’t want to be ‘immersed’ in some fictional world, no matter how it looks or sounds, no matter how cinematic. Keep in mind the arcades couldn’t really do ‘cinematic’ gaming. What would be the point to have someone stand there watching long cutscenes? The flagship Wii games may not have the immersion factor but they do register strongly in the arcade gaming sense. Wii Sports is very ‘arcade’ like as is Wii Fit.

One reason why the Wii keeps selling out in America is that America was once the cradle of the arcades. Just because arcades died didn’t mean the desire for them was extinguished. The desire was always there. Wii is the new arcade. The ‘house party’ phenomenon closely matches that of the arcades. Arcades were also extremely interface heavy which made the games so much fun. When you did a racing game in the arcade, you used a wheel. When doing a shooting game, you used a gun. Wii has tapped into that arcade pulse.