Is gaming dead? Review Or Summary

[Azuwi]

Have gaming become dead or reached it's stale period? Here is my thoughts, opinion, review, and summary on why.

Based on TTV and Steam Charts, among others, let's go through the stats for the games (period) of April 02/03 2024.

The most played games on Steam right now is:
1. Counter-Strike 2, with 468000 players, where it has peaked up to 1.5 mil previously (less than 1/3 of it's peak rate), this game was also released (CS:GO) in 2012, with minor/major updates depending how you see it, a 12 year old game.

2. Dota 2, 231k players, also had over triple amount of players during it's peak rate and a 11 year old game, released in 2013.

3. Helldivers 2, this is the first new game on the list, released this year 2024 in February, but has already lost over half of it's max player since then, is it gonna be like most other new games and die out?

4. Stardew Valley, came out in 2016, a 8 year old game, recently had a major update, so many players returned, but already about half have stopped since the big update, went from ~260k to 130k. Couple more months, and will be back to normal(?)

5. Tom clancy rainbow siege, released in 2015. A 9 year old game.

6. Call of Duty, well it's CoD.. maybe never dies out but not the biggest game either.

7. Baldur's Gate 3, came out in 2023, have dropped about half it's player base since the release

8. PUBG: Battlegrounds, released 2017, 7 years old, not also the biggest game, guess it's always gonna keep the player numbers around 70-80k, but far from it's peak one time at 750k+

9. Path of Exile, just recently had a new league launch, sitting at 71k players online, but will fade away as the league gets older. maybe to 15-30k. Came out 2013, 11 years old.

10. Apex Legends, came out 2019, 5 year old game, sititng at 64k players, always gonna have around I guess 70-80k players aswell (including the ones on EA platform)

That's the top 10.. Summary:
Most games are 5+ years old, exception new CoD, Baldurs Gate 3, Helldivers 2, odds are Helldivers 2 and Baldurs Gate 3 are slowly gonna lose player numbers as time goes on, all numbers in the list have lost over double of it's peak time. 7 games out of the 10 is 5-11 years old.

Twitch.tv:
Popular streamers who use to have 20k+ viewers have now only around at top 10kish viewers, including summit1g, shroud, etc. The most mainstream played games are GTA 5, released 2013, again a 11 year old game, rainbow six as mentioned earlier, Valorant (2020), League of legends (2009), Fortnite (2017), talking about Fortnite, who also had to use it's old OG map and game to draw in players from losing most of it's peak, Cod, Dota 2, CS2(GO), WoW (2004 - 20 years old) who had to bring in WOW Classic because also lost a big playerbase, TFT (part of LOL), Dead by daylight (2016) which is nothing more then a horror among us game in a mediocre unreal engine where all you do is repair generators or play as the killer, Apex legends, Minecraft (2011) , and others like Path of exile, Rust, depending on if there is a new league/launch event or a Twitch drop/Rust event ongoing on raising the viewers for a week or so.

Epic Store / EA Games / Ubisoft :
I think only a small fraction use these clients where Steam is the majority.

Conclusion: There is not a single new game that is "main stream" today that have came out in the last 3-4 years, exception Helldivers 2 which I think is not gonna be mainstream anymore in 1 year. Twitch viewers have dropped 100-200%, and majority of games that are being streamed is old games between 5-10 years old, Steam most played games aswell.

Example:
Go back in time to 2012, we had a major game came out that became main stream (and still up to this date) CS:GO, year after Dota 2, same story, plus Path of Exile, GTA 5, we had just some year earlier Minecraft came out, League of legends, fast forward 2-3 years, Rainbow siege, Stardew valley, Dead by daylight, year after PUBG, Fortnite, only 2 year later, Apex legends, year after Valorant.

What did we get the last 3-4 years? Nothing.
Revamp of CS:GO > CS2, revamp of Overwatch > Overwatch 2, revamp or reintroduce of WoW > WOW Classic, revamp or reintroduce Fortnite > Fortnite OG. Still most played games are 5-10 years old and lost alot of players since then, player numbers at peak low, viewers on twitch at peak low.

Still waiting for the "Next big game" that will make the list and stay there.

[76561199648916059]

I think gaming is hitting a wall in terms of ideas and innovations, much like the car industry has for the past 50 years, another words a car is still a car it has four wheels and requires a power source.

They recently changed the power source requirement from gas to battery charge.

Compare it to video gaming changing the required hardware specs, the games are still the same, yet require a newer system, often at a hirer cost, much like today's cars.

The video game industry can be seen as stagnant, games like csgo-2 are identical to csgo even 10 years later, no innovation at all, games like cs1.6 is identical with zero new innovations added to new releases, the same concept with better graphics higher resolution and renderimg is all we get anymore.

Yes the new graphics are nice but the fundamental aspect of gaming is stale. Example I will use is dragon dogma, I just put dragon dogma on my PC, increased the rendering it looks very nice, it's a 11 year old game I enjoyed on my PS3 for a long time.

Dragon dogma 2 has a high price and a high requirement spec for hardware, so it's outta the question in terms of use for mel however what's really been added to dragon dogma 2 vs the vast amount of content dragon dogma one has, the real answer is very little other then skins of character build, the over all fundamental aspect of the game is the same, with no new amazing features added the set the two apart other then story and creatures, the fundamental aspect is the same game with a reskin and a new txt based reading, sure new areas to explore, but it's still a 3rd person action rpg combat game

[stmpunk]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Chompman:

Steam keeps hitting record numbers so I am unsure where you are coming up with this.

It's not always about the newest games only as we have seen for a long time or just a select few that have been popular for a long time.

There is far more options then ever and this can simply mean the community is split all over across multiple games.

You can view twitch numbers at sites similar to this:

https://twitchtracker.com/statistics

Streamers at 20k viewers are very rare and really you cannot rely on just those for many reasons.

if you only serve rancid food in a room full of famished people there will never be left-overs on the platter.

Diposting pertama kali oleh Majestically Awkward:

I think gaming is hitting a wall in terms of ideas and innovations, much like the car industry has for the past 50 years, another words a car is still a car it has four wheels and requires a power source.

They recently changed the power source requirement from gas to battery charge.

Compare it to video gaming changing the required hardware specs, the games are still the same, yet require a newer system, often at a hirer cost, much like today's cars.

The video game industry can be seen as stagnant, games like csgo-2 are identical to csgo even 10 years later, no innovation at all, games like cs1.6 is identical with zero new innovations added to new releases, the same concept with better graphics higher resolution and renderimg is all we get anymore.

Yes the new graphics are nice but the fundamental aspect of gaming is stale. Example I will use is dragon dogma, I just put dragon dogma on my PC, increased the rendering it looks very nice, it's a 11 year old game I enjoyed on my PS3 for a long time.

Dragon dogma 2 has a high price and a high requirement spec for hardware, so it's outta the question in terms of use for mel however what's really been added to dragon dogma 2 vs the vast amount of content dragon dogma one has, the real answer is very little other then skins of character build, the over all fundamental aspect of the game is the same, with no new amazing features added the set the two apart other then story and creatures, the fundamental aspect is the same game with a reskin and a new txt based reading, sure new areas to explore, but it's still a 3rd person action rpg combat game

Well, if they are in fact hitting a wall, than the current Game Designers should all be fired and they should start hiring talented creative people who never got a chance to pull off their genius ideas, because good ideas that can work still exist, though the minds behind said ideas are never given any opportunity.

Now, to correct your mistaken take on the matter, the problem lies with corporate culture, not with creative limitations. It's always about the money, spending bare minimal (if possible slave-work) and profiting as much as possible (stripping games out of content only to sell that as DLC later, rushed production deadlines to attempt earning from specific dates, shoehorning of microtransactions in detriment of core-gameplay features.) - that's where I have high criticism towards capitalism on a core-level. Yes, profits must happen, but there's a difference between needed base profits + merit earnings (things like 150% up to 300% profits) and obscene greed (500% up to 5000% profits, where AAA gaming industry lies somewhere around 1000% most of the time, which is split between company heads and shareholders alike - and which division is almost never fairly done) - Today in gaming we have the vast majority of developers over-worked and underpaid where they often are forced into illegal working hours (sometimes double the legal limits) through cohesion and threats, and being paid less than the acceptable market standards due to corporate lobbying and "stardom" of certain key people or job positions - So they sacrifice 1/4th the salary of over 300 people to overpay pieces of crap like Todd Howard.

[BJWyler]

Diposting pertama kali oleh stmpunk:

Well, if they are in fact hitting a wall, than the current Game Designers should all be fired and they should start hiring talented creative people who never got a chance to pull off their genius ideas, because good ideas that can work still exist, though the minds behind said ideas are never given any opportunity.

The Indie scene vehemently disagrees with you. Today, more than ever, it is easier for anyone to create some kind of game, for a low cost. I have seen Steam users in this very forum who are putting money where the mouth is and going through the process of making a game. If the talent is out there, nothing is stopping them from building their dream.

[veracsthane]

yes and no.

did the world end if you died? no the world kept going. same with gaming. the legacy dinosaurs are rightly going extinct

[veracsthane]

Diposting pertama kali oleh BJWyler:

Diposting pertama kali oleh stmpunk:

Well, if they are in fact hitting a wall, than the current Game Designers should all be fired and they should start hiring talented creative people who never got a chance to pull off their genius ideas, because good ideas that can work still exist, though the minds behind said ideas are never given any opportunity.

The Indie scene vehemently disagrees with you. Today, more than ever, it is easier for anyone to create some kind of game, for a low cost. I have seen Steam users in this very forum who are putting money where the mouth is and going through the process of making a game. If the talent is out there, nothing is stopping them from building their dream.

most of which isnt woke cash grabs with customer service issues. most of the issues it does have is things like having too few servers because they didnt think it would make it so big.

[FafnirChaos]

Gaming popularity could be shifting - but who really cares - arcades used to be "the thing" way back - then home gaming - then online - now streaming - which in turn brought in politics(for w/e reason)

Everything always changes - if you don't like where it's going - you have the option to move on from "new age" and play games during your time - The mindset of having to get the newest thing fades with age/time - other factors can contribute to it as well.

So it could be that those people are probably getting to that stage.

Probably other factors also, but who knows, I've stopped worrying about popularity in gaming since the PS3.

[MonkehMaster]

people simply need to vote with their wallets and stop enabling these big companies, its very simple.

give your money to developers who care about their customers, who put effort in their games and dont ask for every penny you have, no politics, no ads, ect..

[Friends with Benedicts]

no, its very much alive, more than it ever was.

[Zefar]

Man if gaming is dying, I'd love to know what numbers are needed to be alive?

[BazookaHDZ]

Fortnite has more players then all of steam combined

[MonkehMaster]

we all know that isnt true

[Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser]

Industry revenues have increased year over year consistently for decades now and continue to. The number of people actively playing video games (and no, it doesn't matter what you or anyone else considers "real" video games vs whatever you think doesn't count) has also continued to grow. Some of the most critically acclaimed games of all time have released in the last few years.

The "death" of video games has been prognosticated since the inception of the industry. I was here for the ostensible video game "crash" back in the day. Do you know what the practical effect of that crash on everyday video game consumers was? Virtually nil. Games and hardware were still on shelves. People still bought and sold and played them. Some stuff got put on clearance and there was a lot of shovelware. Average consumers playing the games themselves barely noticed. Then Nintendo "saved" the industry with the NES, and most consumers went, "Oh, that's cool!" and continued on as per usual.

I've been around since before home consoles existed. I've been around since before the arcade amusements to home entertainment revolution. And I can very, very confidently say that video games aren't going anywhere. It will continue to have up and down times, and people will continue to act like whatever is happening at any given time represents the worst thing imaginable and the death of all that is good about the medium. And it will continue to exist despite all of that.

[xBCxRangers]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Aikido:

Industry revenues have increased year over year consistently for decades now and continue to. The number of people actively playing video games (and no, it doesn't matter what you or anyone else considers "real" video games vs whatever you think doesn't count) has also continued to grow. Some of the most critically acclaimed games of all time have released in the last few years.

The "death" of video games has been prognosticated since the inception of the industry. I was here for the ostensible video game "crash" back in the day. Do you know what the practical effect of that crash on everyday video game consumers was? Virtually nil. Games and hardware were still on shelves. People still bought and sold and played them. Some stuff got put on clearance and there was a lot of shovelware. Average consumers playing the games themselves barely noticed. Then Nintendo "saved" the industry with the NES, and most consumers went, "Oh, that's cool!" and continued on as per usual.

I've been around since before home consoles existed. I've been around since before the arcade amusements to home entertainment revolution. And I can very, very confidently say that video games aren't going anywhere. It will continue to have up and down times, and people will continue to act like whatever is happening at any given time represents the worst thing imaginable and the death of all that is good about the medium. And it will continue to exist despite all of that.

Well, i def agree games are here to stay, and would say this is, one of the "down times" as you mentioned. Sony is laying off, Xbox in bad shape, big gaming studios, Epic, Ubi, EA, Activision, CD Project all laying off.

And Mr Newell, the one eyed monster in the land of the gaming blind, with his Steam Deck.

It's def a bad time, but that's not to say people can take advantage of it.

[peppermint hollows]

Diposting pertama kali oleh dazza0511:

You know devs are out of ideas when they copy each other. Content Warning copy and pasting Lethal Company also battle royales in every game.

That's always been a thing, though, and not just in gaming. It's just people trying to ride off the success of something popular.

[veracsthane]

Diposting pertama kali oleh dazza0511:

You know devs are out of ideas when they copy each other. Content Warning copy and pasting Lethal Company also battle royales in every game.

spoiler everything is a clone of a clone now.