I think overall that piracy is good.
It returns control over media, instead of being bound to specific platforms or stores.
It allows you to test things on your hardware, before committing to a purchase.
It makes it possible to recover old media that you physically lost.
It makes your media portable, able to copy it to a new device or hardware without being locked out.
It makes things sharable, able to give a copy to a friend to have them try it out.
But one thing I find difficult is just the sheer amount of things that exist nowadays.
I don’t know how you guys manage it, but I have more media on just my laptop (external drives and such excluded) than I could really enjoy in my lifetime. How to even make choice of what to watch, play, read, next?
I know, very much a first-world problem. But still, it boggles my mind.
I first had this when I was a kid and got an R4 DS cart. I used go get a handful of games a year and play them to death. Since getting the cart I barely finished any games.
I had the exact same card. I would have endless movies, games and music on my DS on the way to school with the train.
It was amazing, but it soon made all kind of media feel less valuable and magical.
Its so easy to start a game, but then lose interest. But when you do find one that grabs you, you’ll finish it. I found that I will still pay for games and get enjoyment out of them. But so often the gameplay loop doesnt fit the same way it did in the past. Ill replay old games too. Games that I would play for hours and they just dont do it anymore.
But thats because we’ve changed what we do with games. There was a time where like you said, youd get a few games a year and you would get every penny out of them. But now we consume them. We enjoy the gameplay or the story. Do I need to 100% this game? Do I get some enjoyment out of grinding every single corner of the map, and collecting every item? No. Im not going to. My time has value too.
I wonder if that’s an age thing. When I was at college i’d actively choose games based on length. Now it’s all about experience vs value.
I don’t want to grind through an Assassins Creed game, but i’d happily play a 8 hour streamlined story version of the same game.
That makes perfect sense. And I look at the cost too. I will spend full price for a game that I am going to enjoy for 80 hours. But if reviews have said that time is padded with nonsense, hand holding, generic collecting etc? Maybe not. I really appreciate the How Long To Beat database. Since it shows the difference between HLTB and completion. There are lots of games that you can beat in 8 hours but to complete will be way up there. Sometimes their mechanics are so satisfying you go back to them.
I think that makes sense. But at the same time I frequently found myself playing games which don’t necessarily respect your time. Especially nowadays there is a lot of filler and grind added to otherwise great games.
That’s why I also feel ok with people using cheats in singleplayer games. So they can adjust or even disable parts of the game that are just not fun for them.
I tend to enjoy the short 7-10 hours story focused games the most these days. But I still get dragged into roguelikes or crafting \ survival games from time to time.
I totally get that. And it really depends on what you are interested in. Some times I want a game that rewards skill, others I want a game with strategy. Then there are some that really only reward time spent in the game. And the ones I dont play at all, the games that punish time away from the game. Always plugged in, if you dont max out on gameplay this week you will miss a timed unlock etc. That is work.
Im fine with longer games so long as the story is gripping. The God of War titles were amazing, Great story, gameplay loop, rewarded variety etc. But again, like someone else mentioned. Another Ubisoft collectathon? No thank you.
I even struggled to get into breath of the wild, and horizon zero dawn when they came out. Because they reminded me of those generic open world games. But the story pulled me in both times.
The new God of War is actually still on my wishlist. I definitely want to try it. And I think games like that are great when they’re focused very much on the story and the gameplay.
Yeah, I think I stopped playing games like Warframe and Guild Wars 2 when I realized that it was too much about just logging in every day and to get all the rewards and stuff.