Gaming Isn't Fun Anymore 

You are correct

The real heroes of the gaming industry these days...are modders. They are the soul reason I still find enjoyment in older games. Thank you modders!

This stagnation of modern gaming is what made me decide to play retro games I never, ever got to experience trying out as a kid. Honestly, best decision I ever made, for the first time in a looooong time, I'm enjoying games again.

The best chance we have going forward is supporting indie devs and community driven content

I picked up an n64 for less than $100, a sega Saturn for about $150 and an NES for pretty cheap too. The games are so fun. Panzer dragoon, nights into dreams, old Mario’s, the list is almost endless. My family was broke growing up so these old games I am discovering for the first time. Although there is no online element, having the boys over to play golden eye and drink a few is still incredible in my 30s lol.

we need a second Crash of the Video Game Industry, where all those corrupted and greedy Corpos go Bankrupt and vanish

After seeing my 7 year old nephew playing and talking about fortnite, I think I finally “undeerstood” modern gaming: today’s games are built for middle class children who are completely unaware of how gaming used to be back then. They are growing up in an age where predatory monetization is normal and expected. What to us is considered evil and absurd will be considered trivial by the next generation. The opinion of us “OGs” doesn’t matter anymore simply because we are no longer the target audience, and the actual target audience is too immature to grasp what’s happening

Gaming becoming popular was the worst thing that ever happened to gaming. More opportunity for revenue = more opportunity to water down a product and still make a profit. I look at my games list and I’m like, wtf it’s looked the same for 8 years. Same games rehashed and made worse.

I've started playing older games again, and discovering their modding scenes. There's so much passion and creativity in mods, with complete overhauls or vanilla game extenders that it's just mindblowing. Finding a cool polished mod, kinda gives you that treasure hunt/great discovery feeling, and it's just made gaming exciting for me again.

The sad thing is, It's not only gaming, but almost every form of art has had this happen to them in someway

So many gaming RU-vidrs have made vids like this. When everyone is making these vids, but all of them are still raking views, you know it’s a topic that’s struck a nerve with most gamers.

For me it’s when we were all kids we had absence of mystery and an urge to explore. Getting lost in a game you know nothing about. Also we had free time to fully get lost in these for hours making great memories by ourselves or with friends. Also micro transactions ruin any gaming experience. Now we’re all busy with work, school, family to not allow ourselves to get immersed. With us growing up we understand what video games are so it takes away the mystery that was once held behind them.

I found this video out of the blue, and it echoes my exact thoughts. I remember 15 years ago there were so many choices of games on the shelves. Now the game sections are much smaller. One because digital is spreading but also there just aren’t as many titles being released like they used to be. I’m 45 and started when I was six. I’m always going to be a gamer, but I miss the passion that you mentioned that used to be in the space

It's a dark age all around: Video Games, Movies, TV shows, Music and Culture at large. They have become businesses more focused on monetary gains rather than entertainment value. The combination of all those things failing at the same time is making a whole lot of restless, anxious and angry people in the world.

AAA titles have hit the dark ages for me, which is no surprise. Companies will put quantity over quality if it makes them a quick buck. Indie games are what keep me playing, as well as replaying older titles. Plenty of these games have genuine effort put into them that make them endlessly replayable, at least for me. (Also hi Ciggy, good video as usual)

this can also be applied to anime, comic books, film, sci fi. once it becomes main stream and corporate greed takes over, and they start pandering to modern agendas, it loses the magic.

I've been gaming since the dawn of pc games. I was saying to a friend this week that I rarely find pleasure in games anymore and keep talking of old titles that trilled me so much. That was a very good explanation as to why I feel like that.

I feel like this is happening to all creative jobs. Once greed reaches them they lose their life

This probably explains why I have no motivation to pick up the controller anymore, and when I do the enthusiasm burns out very quickly.

Sadly I think this happens with anything that is successful and has potential - business people see an opportunity and step in and proceed to rinse it for everything its worth. The goal shifts from making a quality/fun product that people like to just make as much money as possible and quality is irrelevant .

I fill like the love of gaming is still alive in Nintendo. I had a blast playing Mario odyssey, Zelda BOTW, Luigi’s mansion 3, super Mario 3D world, pikmin 3 etc…

Sometimes you gotta do things yourself. While the indie gaming scene isn't immune to controversy there's at least some hope to be found. Development tools are also becoming more streamlined and user-friendly.

the 90s was the best decade in gaming. Most of the devs were gamers and you could tell from their games and how fun they were to play. Also the 90s seemed like the most innovative , every company was trying to outdo others and themselves with each installment and weren’t scared to try something new. Innovation is basically almost gone now , it seems like the only thing that keeps getting better lately is just the graphics which doesn’t make the game fun just pretty to look at. Also it feels like back then every studio had their own engine and thus made each game have its own unique look while now adays most games look very similar and they all use like the same 3-4 game engines.

I've watched a good few videos on the downward spiral of AAA gaming but this one specifically hit the spot. I feel like the corporate greed behind all these studios and console manufacturers isn't being called out enough. I hope to see more content from you on this topic considering it's somethign you're clearly passionate about. Maybe something about indie games and their potential to save the industry.

Underrated get this man to 100k . I do feel sad how gaming fell down so hard

The older I get the more grateful I am for having been a child in the 1980's. I got to grow up alongside the industry and basically experience every amazing game released over the last 40 years. Sadly, I have to agree. The greatest games have all already been made. The AAA market is headed for a crash, its completely inevitable. Whenever you see products increase in price and diminish in quality on the scale like what is happening with modern gaming, the bottom WILL fall out. Just ask General Motors. The same thing will happen with other major media conglomerates as well, like Disney. When you try and monetize everything the consumer interacts with, and pump out shitloads of mediocre content you enter into this death spiral of increasing cost and diminishing returns, which spurs cheaper content, and more price increases which perpetuates the cycle. Eventually consumers just get bored and leave. Its not rocket science.

I have been mainly focusing on playing indie games and older titles and I’ve been instantly having a better time in gaming.

Goddamn you get an automatic kudos for featuring a soundtrack from SMT3 Nocturne, one of the greatest soundtracks of all time (Not just for video games, just soundtracks in general)

"old good new bad" is that all you have to say?

That's why I love from software games, they always feel like they were crafted with love and passion.

Wow. Your video is absolutely 100% accurate in all respects. As a 60 year old gamer that spent years working in the gaming industry (Sega, Spectrum Holobyte, Microprose, Hasbro Interactive, etc), I can confirm that today's gaming industry is quite a different beast, one that pales in comparison to the Golden Age. Younger gamers of today have allowed early access and whatnot to be the norm. Sad state we're in, and I agree that indy developers are so much better than today's AAA developers.

Ty for mentioning indie games. That is where I find the passionate game makers.

I couldn't have agreed more with you. Although I still play some AAA games that I still find enjoyment in, I've been mostly playing Indies or playing older games more for the past 3 years or so. Also, nice FitGirl reference at 15:39

With few exceptions I play mostly games that are more than 10 years old, 90% of newer stuff is pure garbage

You're totally right. We need a new group of jaded cynics like Halo-Bungie to make games that we all actually wanna play.

You voiced everything ive been thinking for a while now almost to the letter. Hope as many people as possible get to see this video so that maybe people will stop handing over their money for a pile of broken garbage and maybe, just maybe studios will start putting in some effort to make good games again.

This is the sad reality of modern gaming. I increasingly find myself playing older titles ,such as Half Life or SS2. There is the odd exception to the rule, but by and large, gaming needs a kick in the slats. There's always hope that things can improve I suppose.

I've seen a number of "gaming isn't fun anymore" videos lately. This is one of the best, as it goes through the recent history of the industry and clearly presents the problems. I have been playing video games since the late 1970s, and this isn't the first time I've seen the industry go through a dark age. Back in the early 1980s, shovelware was a huge problem. The Atari 2600 was an open system, and numerous fly-by-night indie developers were making horrible games for it. When the shovelware problem spread to the AAA developers, the industry was in trouble. Pac-Man for the Atari 2600 is terrible because the console doesn't have the technology to support a decent version of that game. (The Atari 400/800 version is perfectly fine.) Then, there was the infamous E.T., which was the straw that broke the camel's back, and the industry in the U.S. and Europe crashed. Ultimately, the crash turned out to be healthy, as it cleared a lot of garbage out of the industry and cleared the way for PC gaming and Nintendo to do well in the subsequent years. These days, predatory monetization, corporatization, and general laziness have wrecked the AAA segment of the industry, and mobile gaming has nearly always been a parade of suckage, but as stated in the video, the indie scene is a bright spot. Since the early days, the indie scene has always been plagued by shovelware, and it certainly still is today, but it is far easier to weed out the shovelware nowadays than it used to be. AAA gaming may be in a dark age, but certain niches within the indie space are in a golden age. I've been a big fan of city builders since the days of the original SimCity. After the wave of historical city builders in the early-mid 2000s died out and EA, the destroyer of franchises, demolished the once loved SimCity, that genre descended into a dark age. Nowadays, indie and AA developers have brought back the city builder genre and have augmented it with related types of simulation games. RimWorld and Factorio have been highly successful. Dawn of Man and Nebuchadnezzar have breathed some new life into the once-moribund historical city builder sub-genre. The Tropico series brings some light humor to the genre. There are some problems, however. Though Cities: Skylines and Surviving Mars are solid games at their core, Paradox has an unfortunate addiction to DLC spam, and when they update games to accommodate new DLC, bugs and software bloat are inevitably introduced. Still, Paradox's questionable DLC practices are nowhere near as bad as what is commonly encountered in AAA and mobile games. There might be some hope for the fancy big budget games that many gamers love. Though I won't play Elden Ring because I detest challenging action combat, I am encouraged that it released without too many bugs, it isn't loaded up with microtransactions, it is clearly the product of a passionate team of developers that, first and foremost, wanted to make a good game, and the corporate suits didn't get in the way. Baldur's Gate 3 is looking promising. Larian has a good track record, and hopefully, they can keep it up. I'll wait and see on Starfield. Bethesda seriously messed up with Fallout 76, but maybe there is some faint hope that they learned some lessons from that experience. I think the likelihood is high that Starfield will be a bug-filled, microtransaction-riddled mess shipped complete with Denuvo anti-tamper, but I certainly hope I'm wrong. I think Todd "It Just Works" Howard and his team still have passion for their games, but can they pull it off, and will the beancounters and investors get in their way?

Speaking of the golden age, I think 2007 in particular was in my opinion such a perfect year. The literal peak year of gaming if you ask me. Halo was at it's peak with Halo 3, Call Of Duty just exploded with COD 4, Valve released the Orange Box, WoW got The Burning Crusade which many still consider as it's best expansion, and it was also the birth of so many franchises that ended up becoming a big deal, Assassin's Creed was born, Uncharted was born, Mass Effect was born, Portal was born, Team Fortress 2 was born, Crysis was born, Bioshock was born. The AAA really knew what the fuck they were doing, you got hit after hit after hit that year.

I totally agree. I've gone back to playing a lot of older games that I either never got around to or just replaying my favorites. Just as fun if not more and way more satisfying

With the indie developers hopefully we can weather this storm

Don’t confuse mismanagement for “laziness”. Game developers are not lazy, they are just rushed.

I love that you're using SMT IV music early on.

Started growing out of gaming these past few years, I’m pretty sure the factors you mentioned also played a part. The fact I’m getting older also isn’t helping. It sucks but that’s life I guess.

there was also a point in time (maybe even currently) where games were in early access hell, and people would buy them being at v0.1 and the game would never really make it to v1

I remember the 2000s and under Being the best times of gaming and I was mega lucky to be in the 2000s I’ll never get sick of playing my favorite such as halo 2 gears of war 3 Mario kart Wii lego Indiana Jones and Last but not least Mario galaxy 1 & 2. I wish there was a way I could relive those days as in you know be in that time period again So I don’t have to be in this generation Well at least I can say I’ve been in the golden generation of video games, TV 📺 shows and movies 🎥 .

Since you mentioned the indie space, I'd recommend Signalis (it's available on Xbox, PS4, Switch, and PC). This Steam review I found put it best: "It's like they took everything good from Resident Evil and everything good from Silent Hill and covered it in anime". If you're into cyberpunk and survival horror games you'll like this. Indie games are what really keeps me coming back to gaming.

Thank you for this... Usually these types of videos are done by people who just blabber on and on about stuff they've read online, but your video is precise, well informed and feels honest... Subscribed to your channel, please keep up the great work! 👏👏

Video games are too popular, I know that sounds weird but I think it plays a role as to why modern AAA titles feel so watered down and factory produced. Mainly the broad appeal & easy money attitude from execs that came from its popularity, this is what lead to the uninspired, non risk taking games.

Probably one of the best things to do is to play and buy indie games

YES, this is part of the reason the SNES will always be popular (kids born decades after it came out play it).

This is really comprehensive and well-written. Excellent job. Only correction I have is that the Dreamcast was 6th generation.

Well I've been having loads of fun on the indie scene I was forced into it by my condition as a 3rd worlder that can't afford a high end PC, and to be honest I'm thankful for it. Over the years I went from not being able to buy AAA games to actively staying away from them even if I could. The indie scene seems to be where the old passion ended up, and there's plenty to choose from!

This sorta stuff is why I prefer indie games with no micro transactions, games like Hollow Knight, Mindustry, and even Ori to an extent, you can tell that the people who made them poured their hearts into their work, and the outcome is something that is more enjoyable than anything most of these big corporations have been crapping out.

The retro, indie, and modding community is the lighthouse in the dark void that is modern gaming.

When I was kid, the games I played had so much charm and vision. Like when I played Zelda: Ocarina of time, Turok 2: Seeds of Evil and Okami for the first time. Sadly, gaming began to lose its appeal right around 2012. But the 5th and 6th generation consoles were sublime and the experience often felt magical, like unearthing a rare gem. The current gaming industry, however, feels heartless and devoid of experimentation.

Started playing Devil may cry 1 & 3 a few months ago. I could clearly see those games were built different, no bullsh1t and straight to the point action with challenging foes and gameplay. Having such an unmatched experience so far.

i could tell you were passionate about the topic even before you mentioned it the script, the editing, it all plays out like a passion project also please keep advancing our relationship with the subscribe button i'm ready to pop the question to it

I've been gaming since the late 1980s and was a teenager and young adult during the timeframe of this video. This video Brought back a lot of great memories and made me extremely sad . It won't ever be like it used to be.

I started playing the gears of war franchise with my son. The Xbox 360 versions.i can't believe how good they were all the way down to the voice acting. We also play a lot of the older call of duty s and left for dead. I believe Gameing was fun because games were co op slit screen and good story's that kept you wanting to play.

So essentially they took what made MMORPG's addicting, the monster flavored skinner boxes of EverQuest yore, and turned them into insta-gratification transactions? Pretty dang sinister.

The Golden Age of Gaming was the start of Gen 4 to the end of Gen 7 (or 1991-2012).

Remember when you'd go to the local game store, read the box art of a bunch of games before deciding what game you wanted to spend your birthday money on, then going home and playing the game, and forming your own opinions about it without the influence of the internet, then finishing the game without it feeling like a chore? Pepperidge Farm remembers...

Shout out to people that were on Xbox 360 live from 2007 to 2012ish, that in my mind was the absolute best era of games for me personally!!! Some of the best memories of my life were spent staying up all night playing modern warfare 2 with my friends!!

What an insightful and nuanced video! You've so eloquently articulated my frustrations over the past (almost) decade, dude. Subbed

To me the future of gaming looks pretty bright, cause there are a lot of tools making it possible to produce a game on your own. I believe that indie games are, for sure, a future

I recently got tired of my ps4 games, and wanted to go a few generations back... now I find that I have installed a ps2 to my gaming setup, with hopes of reliving the "golden age" of gaming. You have made a very informative and revealing short video essay which i think deserves more attention. I applaud

3:09 i was like 12-14 around this time. Man man man, there will never be an era of gaming like this anymore.

If I’m being completely honest, I’ve bought a bunch of “classic masterpieces” on steam which I’ve seen big RU-vidrs play and I haven’t touched a single one of them. Also hi Ciggy 👋

I dont care if most games nowadays are bad, since there will always be enough good games for me to play, old ones as well as newer titles.

Really great video!! I just got finished playing some MW2 and a couple of valorant matches and I realize that playing these games are more like a chore then actually entertaining to me. There really is no more incentive to create polish in games as long as companies make their money. Videogames used to be my main source of making friends and having fun and now I feel like it’s time to move on from them which is very disheartening to me and probably a lot of other people who grew up with them.

Excellent video! My roommate and I were just had a conversation about this. You’ve earned a subscriber for sure

Something important to consider is that the price of full games has not gone up with inflation. We've been paying 60usd forever. To get a developer paid what they used to be paid, games would need to be over 100usd which no-one wants to pay. So microtransations are unfortunately mandatory to get paid.

Glad you made the point you did in the beginning of the video. When I started gaming... you were a straight up outcast if people knew you played video games. You didn't talk about, you certainly didn't brag about it... it was almost like a drug you did in secret. Even though your family knew you played games, they didn't talk about it lol. I remember dating girls and never telling them that video games were a hobby of mine simply because it was seen as so nerdy at that time. Then in the early 2000's, I remember the people who would take pictures of themselves on myspace while holding an xbox controller to show their "gamer cred". Suddenly, being a "gamer" was the "in" thing, and everyone wanted to be a part of it, Fast forward 5-10yrs, and suddenly, gaming is passe. To say you're a gamer would be no different than saying "yeah I breathe to stay alive"... people went from treating you as an outcast because you gamed, to treating you as common and boring because it's what everyone does. It truly blew my mind.

This is a well made and immensely informative video. Thankyou for creating it! I've been so tired of playing games lately and was wondering if maybe I was the issue? Glad to know that its not just me that thinks 99% of games now are stale and predatory to the gamer. Im going to go buy an xbox 360 and play halo 3 with my partner! Again great video man, liked and subbed :)

You’re absolutely right on so many levels. Instead of going for AAA games now. Greed and plain apathy for consumers is just the overall reason for gaming today. We should go support indie developers that put way more love and effort in their games. (Well there are big companies that make good games such as Fromsoft etc, who still put effort and care in their products) Another point are modders, definitely the heroes in this dark age.

damn this channel is super underrated, very nice video essay and i completely agree with you and have felt the same way about gaming. truly a shame what has happened

I'm still having fun, I feel. Yes; admittedly, the games I play are old or indie. But, as long as modding/creativity in general exist, modern gaming still has potential in my opinion. This is really all about perspective. Do you feel games are bad now compared to how they were back even a year ago? Do you prefer AAA, AA, or A games? Are you getting older/interested in different hobbies?

Part 2 pls! It’s interesting seeing this industry being dissected. I’m a mostly comp shooter gamer so it’s interesting to see how these problems have effected all parts of the industry

Remember the days when games are released COMPLETE as it is...without major crashes and announcement of upcoming worth $70 DLC's, back with the PS One days I enjoyed Vigilante 8 & Twisted Metal without having to worry that my savings ain't enough to buy the separate characters or items which the devs did on purpose to squeeze the juice outa you...I also enjoyed those days when we had to literally grind to achieve a certain level to unlock the amazing Characters or maps, and Remember the days when you also have to buy the "Tips & Tricks" magazine to enhance your skills.

Brilliantly said sir. I agree 100%. As a life-long fan of games (quite literally, my first console was an Atari 2600), It makes me feel not only incredibly sad but incredibly angry that the state of the games industry is what it is today. I rarely buy games anymore and if I do, I'll wait a year or 2 until the game is complete and fully functional. I can happily play my existing games library over and over again, but there inevitably comes a time when I wish for something new and different and with the exception of a good game here and there, they are few and far between nowadays. At 50 years of age, I sometimes wonder if I will ever in my lifetime see games return to the glory days of the industry that I've loved so dearly. I hope so. But somehow I doubt it.

When companies turned gaming from a product to a service truly marks the dark ages of gaming.

15:45 "There are more than enough excelent games new and old to play and enjoy" - I agree with most of what you said , and i personally am burned out on most modern AAA games. I get my gaming enjoyment from modding , or from playing old retro games i never played , by making challenge runs of older games that i still love , or from the ocassional non-AAA non-Indie game that releases in a good state.

The RU-vid algorithm is doing a great job on recommending me videos that have been helping me understand why, on my recent return to gaming, I started off two titles I had pending on my list simultaneously to "test the waters" and found myself bored to death with AC Unity's repetitive side quests and undead open world after just a few hours while I am constantly and madly grinding Celeste. Great video!

I ve seen videos on topic before but it's like they somehow not able to explain why it isn't fun anymore, your video is pretty good focuses on the question itself and not the nostalgia.

The worst of it all is the good old random loot box transactions. They make such a killing off that and there is no way we can gage it. They can tilt the loot boxes to their favor without us knowing our odds. That's the dirtiest of all

While I have to agree with the main killer of the gaming industry is the greedy and uninspired creations of today, but there's also some other issues I found at least in my personal life. First I would play WAY too frequently to the point it was no longer a reward but almost a requirement even when I wasn't enjoying myself. Take a break find some new hobbies or play a lot more sparingly and you'll find the love of gaming and the enjoyment from it never left just how you interacted with the product did. Second we need to start branching out and giving game genres we think we would never like a try. Now we are so spoiled in choice that we can play a specific genre of game and find plenty of options to try. I know many who only play shooters for example, I wasn't as extreme but lately I have been branching out to games I never thought I would ever play or enjoy and I am thoroughly enjoying myself but also finding myself lost in the game losing multiple hours to the immersion I experience again. I would find it a struggle to even enjoy a couple hours of gaming let alone enjoying myself a full 8 hour binge session, After all is said and done my personal experience and it may not fit for everyone but I do think this is a huge part in why gaming is no longer enjoyable at least on a personal level and not the corporate side which isn't something most of us can control. I wish us all the best in our journey to find enjoyment in our favorite hobby again, and my prayers to making greedy company's fall.

Indies is where it’s at 100%. I’m constantly discovering interesting new experiences from the indie scene. Recently games like Friends Vs Friends, Pocket Bravery, and the New Cycle demo are just a few that I’m having a great time with.

Great video, man. Hope your channel keeps growing.

People wonder why there is so much money and hype around remakes and remastered 20 year old games. We remember those games working! These days half the Singleplayer games release buggy and the multiplayer is even worse.

Being a kid in the 90s and teenager in the early 2000s was an awesome time to be alive, for a lot of reasons compared to the present, but staying on topic a great time to be a gamer. I got a Game Boy with DK '94... probably in 1994 haha, got a Genesis in '95, N64 in '97, PS1 in '98, Dreamcast in 2000 and finally an Xbox in early 2002. My best memories were playing Halo 1 online with my friends before Xbox Live was a thing on my 1meg "high speed" cable internet over GameSpy and once more of my friends got their own Xbox's and copies of Halo we'd round up 3 or 4 tvs and xbox's and as many friends as could fit in my apartment and play all day linked with ethernet cables... good times!

I would love to see a video of you listing out the best games of each year , decade or by gaming console. There are many ways for you to do it but i would enjoy to see what your thoughts are of the best games to play right now. From the past and today.

I feel like your actual tastes have a big impact on how dire you think the situation is. I recommend you look around at genres you haven’t tried, Because the situation is not as dire as you think, Rather it’s concentrated in certain genres

Anyone still remember that ‘oh my car’🥲 moment? I WANT THAT ON A TSHIRT!!!! AHHHHH🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

Oh god bejeweled between flightpoints in wow... That's a core memory

I wish we never had to get to this point. If I was the ruler of everything (childlike I know) I would ban all microtransactions, dlc, and advertisements in game. Sure they would lose a bunch of money but let's be honest the people that would lose the money deserve it and those that don't use these tactics would be unchanged and companies would be forced into making good games

This is something I see in a lot of industries now: companies shell out inferior products/services because they know people will still use them, because these massive conglomerates are allowed to just buy out the competition and their shareholders always want costs lowered to increase profits. I also think in a way that modern technology is somewhat of a detriment to these games now. You mentioned the high barrier of entry for the gaming industry now, but also back then, companies HAD to make a complete game in the cartridge/disk because it was gonna be hard to add patches or improvements to them after launch. Hell back in the day you had to go in person to GameStop for a Pokemon distribution event that was physically downloaded onto your game cartridge, now you can just do it online anytime. This incentives companies to rush out an incomplete product that they can just improve later, but either way you're still paying for an incomplete product now.

i recently bought a cheap 50" tv and speakers off marketplace purely for my ps2, ps3, genesis and snes. I'm glad I was born in the 80s, to witness firsthand and experience everything from tape base amstrads, apple IIe, my 386 PC, 8 to 16 to 32 bit consoles, windows 95. Knowing a time when you didn't buy completely broken games and playing through a run of Tenchu: Stealth Assassins or Resident Evil II had you on the edge of your seat. Hours spent creating CAWs on Smackdown or even WWF attitude, before 'technology' broke the games. You really need to be from that era to understand and appreciate where we've come from and where we are now.

That second sale option was very clever. Truly a fitting end.

My entire family goes back to Halo 3 and Reach for solid multiplayer gaming. Heck, we even went back to the old Gears of War games for some fun horde fun. Right now I've been playing the first two Crackdown games over and over. The leveling up and fighting are so addicting. That tells you the devs made it so you don't need to buy DLC and wait for them to finish developing the game. With that being said, I don't think any of my family play any newer releases. I don't remember any of my siblings buying a new game. We all went back to playing older games. Sometimes 6 player Fortnite when we're feeling competitive. But other than that I, myself, don't even play anything new. Maybe the new Monster Hunter Rise game can be considered? But still, anything with micro-transactions is a big no-no for me.