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Other than graphics, are games today doing anything they couldn't do 10 years ago?

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padlock

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
867
Lately, I've been revisiting a few older games, playing things like Half Life 2, Civ 4, Starcracft 2, Crysis, and Sim City 4.

Looking at the latest examples of their respective genres, it seems that other than improved visuals, not much has changed in terms of game design, AI, world interactivity, etc.

Am I missing something, or have things really stagnated for the last decade or so? What, if anything, are you looking forward to in terms of new innovation?

Personally, I think cloud based computing could help provide us with new experiences, such as using speech recognition and synthesis to allow us to simulate conversations with NPCs (think Google Assistant or Alexa). Do you think we'll see something like that in the coming generation?
 
Plinkerton

Plinkerton

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Nov 4, 2017
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Its not a good game, but something like Assassin's Creed Odyssey wouldn't have been possible a decade ago. At least not looking as good as it does.

Put more generally, scope has increased massively, particularly in open world games, and thats only going to go further with next gen. You can argue whether that's actually a benefit or not, but its still something that couldn't happen before.

Also with the Switch, some of the types of games you can play handheld would not have been possible on a DS or PSP.
 
bionic77

bionic77

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Oct 25, 2017
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Things are software driven now and that's ultimately a great thing for the industry and its fans.
 

bell_hooks

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Nov 23, 2019
275
We have open worlds everywhere because modern hardware allow for better data streaming.
As far as voice processing goes, this gen started with Kinect...
 
OP
OP
padlock

padlock

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
867
Plinkerton said:
Its not a good game, but something like Assassin's Creed Odyssey wouldn't have been possible a decade ago. At least not looking as good as it does.

Put more generally, scope has increased massively, particularly in open world games, and thats only going to go further with next gen. You can argue whether that's actually a benefit or not, but its still something that couldn't happen before.

Also with the Switch, some of the types of games you can play handheld would not have been possible on a DS or PSP.
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But that's mostly due to graphics right? I mean you had games like World of Warcraft or Morrowind years ago, which had vast open worlds with a lot to do. I agree that certain types of games wouldn't have been possible on mobile until relatively recently.
 
Wrexis

Wrexis

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Nov 4, 2017
21,229
Porting would be a the big difference? With everything running x86 it's much easier.

Though in-game, yeah I don't think there's any difference. More stuff - more destructible, more NPCs.
 
ShutterMunster

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Oct 27, 2017
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GTA III and Red Dead Redemption 2 are staring you dead in your face.

But I'm sure someone will get reductionist about it and go "well, RDR2 is just a prettier open world." There are so many underlying systems in these games that were not achievable due to hardware restraints in prior generations. Many of them are in service of greater overall immersion.
 
Liam Allen-Miller

Liam Allen-Miller

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Nov 2, 2017
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Nintendo has been an absolute pioneer for alt-control stuff as far as big companies go. Games like RingFit, the various Nintendo Labo titles, ARMS, 1-2 Switch and many, many more are all doing fresh and interesting things with modern technologies!
 
Carn

Carn

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ShutterMunster said:
But I'm sure someone will get reductionist about it and go "well, RDR2 is just a prettier open world." There are so many underlying systems in these games that were not achievable due to hardware restraints in prior generations. Many of them are in service of greater overall immersion.
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Sure, but being the devil's advocate here: What exactly new things was RDR2 doing that RDR didnt? I mean, of course the world is more complex and there are more kinds of subsystems in play (and a great jump in graphics); to me you're still playing the same kind of game that has just become more expanded and more detailed.

I think I agree with OP; a lot of big franchises have been stuck with their own templates (also makes sense, since that template is often the 'winning formula' for a particular franchise or studio). That said, there also have been tons of game (but usually not in the AAA-space) that tried new things.

I hope the next-gen consoles can enforce some new things because of the SDD's and the greatly improved I/O-bandwith.

padlock said:
Personally, I think cloud based computing could help provide us with new experiences, such as using speech recognition and synthesis to allow us to simulate conversations with NPCs (think Google Assistant or Alexa). Do you think we'll see something like that in the coming generation?
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I don't think so; because to be honest, that doesnt sound like fun. I feel the same about the use of complex AI or things like fully destructable enviroments and those kind of things. I do think there is a lot to be won with procedural content; especially because games will become more and more expensive as the amount of detail that is expected keeps on growing.
 
Jroc

Jroc

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Jun 9, 2018
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Dead Rising 1 was the last time I played a game where the core gameplay seemed impossible on previous generation hardware. I remember the Wii port only had a couple dozen zombies onscreen at once.
 
Team_Feisar

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Jan 16, 2018
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I would say game could do a lot more than they did 10 years ago but mostly don't exactly because all the available resources go into graphics.
 
Onlygames

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twisted89 said:
Sounds like you've somehow missed the entirety of VR?
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padlock said:
Actually, I'm quite a big fan of VR, and I believe you're right, VR is doing some new and interesting things. But I consider VR a separate medium. My initial question was inteded for non vr games.
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What is VR doing differently for games? All it does is change the way you interact with the medium, the games themselves are still the same? They don't feature radically advanced AI or other simulations do they?
 
Playboi Carti

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Jan 1, 2018
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ShutterMunster said:
GTA III and Red Dead Redemption 2 are staring you dead in your face.

But I'm sure someone will get reductionist about it and go "well, RDR2 is just a prettier open world." There are so many underlying systems in these games that were not achievable due to hardware restraints in prior generations. Many of them are in service of greater overall immersion.
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giphy.gif
 

bell_hooks

Banned
Nov 23, 2019
275
padlock said:
But that's mostly due to graphics right? I mean you had games like World of Warcraft or Morrowind years ago, which had vast open worlds with a lot to do. I agree that certain types of games wouldn't have been possible on mobile until relatively recently.
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Newer open world games can have a ton of system piling on each other, that requires cpu power and memory. It directly feeds into gameplay
 
zoggy

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Oct 28, 2017
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How common were massive online shooters like fortnite destiny pubg etc in 2010?

Or asynchronous multiplayer like death stranding?
 
pswii60

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Oct 27, 2017
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I'm always disappointed with interactivity in games these days.

Like in 90s FPS games I go up to a drinks machine and a can will come out. I go up to a toilet and it will flush. In modern games I go up to things and fuck all happens, it's just scenery. Meh. Give me flushing toilets. Yeah we've regressed. At least Prey had flushing toilets I guess.
 
ShutterMunster

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Carn said:
Sure, but being the devil's advocate here: What exactly new things was RDR2 doing that RDR didnt? I mean, of course the world is more complex and there are more kinds of subsystems in play (and a great jump in graphics); to me you're still playing the same kind of game that has just become more expanded and more detailed.

I think I agree with OP; a lot of big franchises have been stuck with their own templates (also makes sense, since that template is often the 'winning formula' for a particular franchise or studio). That said, there also have been tons of game (but usually not in the AAA-space) that tried new things.

I hope the next-gen consoles can enforce some new things because of the SDD's and the greatly improved I/O-bandwith.
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Like clockwork...

Of course it's the same kind of game. It's a third-person open world action game, they're not inventing a new genre. The complexities and subsystems dramatically improve and expand upon the gameplay experience in ways that simply were not possible in the PS2 era. Even the examples the OP suggested wouldn't do what you're demanding of us. Being able to supply your own responses to an A.I in a RPG title wouldn't fundamentally change the nature of that RPG experience, it would expand upon that framework and make it a more complex and immersive experience.

VR is the main example from this generation of technology being used to create wholly new experiences and genres we haven't seen before.

The leap in number of audio responses we could have NPC respond with from GTAV on PS3/360 to RDR2 on PS4/XBX was so vast and it dramatically boosted how real and lifelike the world was. That was possible due to technology improvements on the hardware.
 
higemaru

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Nov 30, 2017
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Death Stranding has really great asynchronous online features that could not have been done ten years ago. That's about all I can think of though.
 
MrNewVegas

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zoggy said:
How common were massive online shooters like fortnite destiny pubg etc in 2010?

Or asynchronous multiplayer like death stranding?
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Came to say FPS/TPS lobby size.

In 2014 it was a revolution that BF was finally going to have 64 players in a console server. This was a massive feat at the time.

Now we have Warzone rocking 150 player servers on console.
 
DarthBuzzard

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Onlygames said:
What is VR doing differently for games? All it does is change the way you interact with the medium, the games themselves are still the same? They don't feature radically advanced AI or other simulations do they?
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They do actually. AI is based off situational data at the end of the day. VR greatly multiplies the amount of data you have on the player, which means you can infer information such as their body language. This allows AI to interact more deeply with players by responding to actual gestures that you perform.

Not too many VR games do this yet, but Wolves in the Walls in a great example of one that does.

VR also brings out the full power of physics, which radically changes what games can achieve.

Changing the way you interact with the medium is the single biggest change you can make to the medium because it affects all other aspects.
 
Ashok

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Jan 24, 2019
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OP, did you totally sleep through Half-Life: Alyx? It's the most revolutionary experience I'd had with gaming short of playing Space Invaders for the very first time in the 1980s and Wolfenstein 3D in 1992. If that's not a big enough gamer changer for you, idk what else you want outside of being able to jack into a game Matrix style thru a brain interface.
 
Adryuu

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Well I remember when Mass Effect 3 didn't let you holster your weapon during combat missions because there wasn't enough memory to have that animation ready.

Nowadays games are not only bigger, but can have more actions and animations because there's more memory available. I guess you can have more movesets without loadings, and have more actors on screen with unique appearance and behaviour than in already mentioned Dead Rising.

Thinking of The Last of Us Part 2 and the footage we've seen, all that possible animations probably wouldn't have fit in the ps3 with an environment as big without loadings everywhere.

padlock said:
Personally, I think cloud based computing could help provide us with new experiences, such as using speech recognition and synthesis to allow us to simulate conversations with NPCs (think Google Assistant or Alexa). Do you think we'll see something like that in the coming generation?
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No.
 
wafflebrain

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Oct 27, 2017
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Not sure if this really counts for gameplay but smooth transitions from different areas like in NMS (space to planet surface) feels like a boon for a more seamless gameplay experience. But no the mechanics themselves have not changed. Things like the procedural gen in that weren't really a thing 10 years ago in games either.

The general experience of something like Outer Wilds likely wouldn't have the same impact without being able to simulate that clockwork mini solar system with all sorts of mechanisms operating at once such as the changing planet conditions, and those are integral to the gameplay and progression. It probably could have been done 10 years ago albeit in a much more primitive looking package (the original version was indeed that).
 
Onlygames

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Zehzin said:
I like how you answered your own question
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Zing!

But no really, even if you insert VR into the mix the games themselves aren't doing anything differently from 10 years ago. Obviously there have been advancements and you could argue that a lot of evolution these days comes at a much slower pace (still waiting on proper AI reactions to emergent events in the stealth or RPG genre for instance) but Beat Saber is still just Guitar Hero but instead of pushing buttons you flail your arms about.
 
Adryuu

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zoggy said:
How common were massive online shooters like fortnite destiny pubg etc in 2010?

Or asynchronous multiplayer like death stranding?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Destiny run on a ps3 (and MAG!) and Demon's Souls too, which arguably is the first game that had what we understand now as asynchronous multiplayer.
 
EvilBoris

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MrNewVegas said:
Came to say FPS/TPS lobby size.

In 2014 it was a revolution that BF was finally going to have 64 players in a console server. This was a massive feat at the time.

Now we have Warzone rocking 150 player servers on console.
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Yeah, remember when it was such a big deal that the PC versions of Battlefield had 64 players are consoles had a measly 32bit. It's almost one of those things we take for granted now
 
Onlygames

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DarthBuzzard said:
Changing the way you interact with the medium is the single biggest change you can make to the medium because it affects all other aspects.
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I haven't seen this yet myself but I eagerly await all of this.

(And at the risk of veering off-topic VR for me still is a non-event with its many requirements. Too pricey, too niche and its barrier-to-entry still too high)
 
Carn

Carn

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ShutterMunster said:
Like clockwork...

Of course it's the same kind of game. It's a third-person open world action game, they're not inventing a new genre. The complexities and subsystems dramatically improve and expand upon the gameplay experience in ways that simply were not possible in the PS2 era. Even the examples the OP suggested wouldn't do what you're demanding of us. Being able to supply your own responses to an A.I in a new RPG title doesn't change the RPG title from what it is, it's just a more complex and immersive version of that same experience.

VR is the main example from this generation of technology being used to create wholly new experiences and genres we haven't seen before.
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Oh don't get me wrong, I perfectly understand what the differences are. But still; a lot of those games have become a lot more complex, but I think I enjoyed San Andreas and RDR more than GTA5 and RDR2. Obvious graphical improvements and insane production values aside, I don't consider a lot of these AAA games to be a 'big leap forward' for their respective genres; its just (well made) more of the same thing. I think smaller games like Outer Wilds are a lot more interesting on a conceptual level.
 
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