Your favorite generation sucks || Every age is the golden age

This generation, games are pathetically unimaginative anymore. Everything is a clone of each other. That "spark" just isn't there anymore. Gaming is dead.

You can't go onto a gaming forum without finding countless topics saying the same thing. It doesn't matter if the post is from last week or a decade ago, it will say the same thing. Do you often feel that the current generation of games is somehow less exciting than before? Let's take a look at what kinds of things people thought about previous generations.

I don't remember the arcade game looking like this...

The first two generations sucked. I mean, if I wanted to play games, I could just go to the arcade. The games I could play at home looked nothing like arcade games, and were nowhere near as fun to play. I mean a few colors, everything was a square, massive failures like E.T. ... How could anyone enjoy this and justify spending money on this when there were arcades and personal computers? No wonder the industry crashed twice.

But thinking back on it, this genesis of home gaming led us to what we have today. Nobody would even care about making the types of games we were playing in the arcade available from our living rooms without these pioneers. And even if they were behind their arcade counterparts, we were playing at home, and new types of experiences were now available to us. Games we never would have seen in an arcade. Sure, there were tons of bad games this generation, but a lot of my favorite games cane from this generation, too.

I think I've played something like this before...

The third generation sucked. We finally could play all those arcade-quality games in our home. But every game became Super Mario. Like. Every. Single. One. The generation was plagued with mediocre platformer and puzzler clones. And I constantly had to blow on my games and pop them in and out and stuff just to get them to work. And when they did work, I couldn't get past the second level because they were so broken hard. And I paid hundreds and hundreds of dollars for this little collection of games? And they wanted me to pay more for some gimmicky peripherals like foot mats and light guns? As if those had any future...

But thinking back on it, the capabilities of the NES and SMS led to longer games we before could only see on personal computers (which had a way smaller audience then) like the epic voyages across fantastical lands in games like The Legend of Zelda or Dragon Quest. No longer were games just about quick matches for a high score. We were telling stories and experiencing grand adventure. Sure, there were tons of bad games this generation, but a lot of my favorite games cane from this generation, too.

Breakthrough graphcis! Engaging, heart-pounding plots!

The fourth generation sucked. We took our plethora of jump-jump-pew-pew clones and made them have better graphics. And as we all know, better graphics means worse games. I mean, Sonic? Really? It's just Super Mario that goes fast! And speaking of clones and those long adventures from last generation? Yeah, everyone had to make their own Dragon Quest clone with the bigger storage space. No creativity at all! And games that generation were all about violence and not about fun. I mean four times more people bought the Sega Mortal Kombat compared to the Nintendo one. Obviously the market was full of shallow consumers with no taste and the developers were taking advantage. And let's not forget the cost of this stuff was still huge. Oh, I totally think the Neo Geo will deliver the arcade experiences that the vastly superior previous generations provided... Oh what? It costs almost $700?

But thinking back on it, a lot of famous franchises appeared or gained their popularity during this generations. And now that games could be bigger and have more detail in their graphics, storytelling took a more serious turn in games. We were now experiencing deep, rich plots full
of interesting characters that developed. And with more developers in the market, we found a new haven for games that weren't just about fighting enemies or winning a match. The emergence and popularity of games and apps like Mario Paint, SimCity, Harvest Moon, and more proved that gamers didn't just want to destroy and win, we wanted to create, nurture, and discover, as well. It was the beginning of new ways of thinking about what games could do. Sure, there were tons of bad games this generation, but a lot of my favorite games cane from this generation, too.

It's 3D, so it has to be good!

The fifth generation sucked. Companies still just cared about graphics. Now every game just had to be 3D, even if the game was already fine before. I mean, don't fix what isn't broken, right? So why make games 3D? We didn't need it before and we don't need it now. The same with discs. We already had cartridges. The developers didn't even care about the fans, just wanted to sell 3D games. I mean they couldn't even be bothered to put Luigi in Super Mario 64. And if ever there was a generation for uninspired clones, this was it. After Final Fantasy VII, every game wanted to be an RPG. Even the ones that weren't RPG's in the first place.

But thinking back on it, this generation opened up more to us than ever before. Games weren't just stories with some sprites bouncing along, they were cinematic. The combination of movies, music, direction, and voice let us experience stories like never before. And most importantly, now that we could move in three dimensions, entire new genres of games opened to us, and the old genres we played had all new mechanics and systems. And developers were being creative in all new ways. Now we were tapping along to rhythm games and turning the lights on when we were afraid of our horror games. Games were innovating like never before. Sure, there were tons of bad games this generation, but a lot of my favorite games cane from this generation, too.

Oh! My favorite part!

The sixth generation sucked. Everything was just clones of the last generation but with shinier graphics. Even though I was going online with my computer for a long time now, going online with my consoles was near impossible. Microsoft wanted me to shell out tons of money just to play, I had to jump through flaming hoops to get my GameCube to play online, no one played the one PlayStation game I owned that even had online functionality, and the Dreamcast got discontinued before I even got to the store to buy one. And now that discs have taken over the market, we moved into an age of load times. Why do I have to wait for my game to load? Can't I just play it? They should really work harder at programming these things. And remember how I thought previous generations were all about clones? Well don't get me started on the ShooterBox, RPGStation, and Mario Party Cube. Console wars fanboys were rampant online defending their favorite of the three, annoying players everywhere.

But thinking back on it, the emergence of more serious competition in the market led to a bigger diversity of games and the big fight for killer exclusives, meaning manufacturers were pressing for the absolute best games to be created. The standard of cinematics and voice acting that had emerged led to more intuitive experiences for new and old gamers alike. Games were also getting a larger install base in general, and even though it wasn't widespread, people started playing their games online. Sure, there were tons of bad games this generation, but a lot of my favorite games cane from this generation, too.

The most powerful hardware yet brings us...???

The seventh generation sucked. Games are now lackluster and boring because I've played them all before. Everything is a sequel, spinoff, or clone. Online is full of obnoxious idiots who I don't even want to play with. And all of this DLC nonsense is just developers trying to suck our wallets for everything we have. And now everyone has jumped on the waggle bandwagon, as if we really need a new way to play. Give me a joystick and a start button. I don't need more choices. They just help grandmas play. And they don't deserve games because gamers are an elite race and only the already-initiated can enjoy this media.

But thinking back on it, now that this generation is coming to an end, games are now connected more than ever before. We can play even obscure games online with other players, compare our progress, and share user-created content with the world. Games are now creative tools and social experiences. We are able to buy new games, rent trials, see trailers, and read reviews straight from the console. And now it's easier than ever for independent developers to get their games out into the public eye, making an even more robust creative market. New control mechanisms have broadened the types of people who can enjoy games, so now the market can grow in more directions. This means more variety, more developers, more genres... Just like music or movies. Sure, there were tons of bad games this generation, but a lot of my favorite games cane from this generation, too.

And now the eighth generation is underway. You know what we should do? Complain about how a lot of games are similar to the last generation, just with better graphics, even though that has been true for every single generation so far. We need to whine about how games are no longer innovative or new, even though every generation has expanded the market and audience for the medium, giving birth to new genres and new ways to play. And we'll talk nostalgically about how wonderful the PS3, 360, and Wii were, and how last generation was just so much better than this one.

It has happened every generation so far, and never has all the crying ended up being justified. Sure, there are valid complaints sometimes, but "gaming is dead now!" is all in your head.
Every generation comes with a lot of great new things. And as with any market, that means a lot of knockoffs, too. We just have to keep playing the games we like and demanding new and innovative things. But no generation is inherently better or worse than any other.

So why do we do it? There are many factors that contribute to this phenomenon. Mainly, the way we change and don't change as a person, and the way we remember the past.

Our tastes tend to sway toward things that remind us of the things we grew up liking. We develop our tastes as children, and things outside of this tend not to intrigue us nearly as much. It's the same with every generation. All of us have heard an older person say they can't understand kids today. That our music is bad, our movies are bad, whatever. When we say we hate this generation but like the older ones, we're doing the same thing.

Most importantly, though, is the nostalgia filter. When we think about the past, we remember the best of the things we like. We don't remember ever single pizza we have ever eaten. But we remember the best pizza we've ever had. We remember the pizza we had the day we got engaged. We remember only the best times.

We like games. So when we think about games, we think about our favorite games. We think about the great experiences we've had with games. We didn't remember that one forgettable game with whatever in it that ended up not being very fun. Why not? Because it was, well, forgettable. But we do remember our exciting adventures into colorful Hyrule, because we had a lot of fun doing that.

But every generation had its own slew of terrible, miserable games that really turned us off. And we hated them then just like we hate the bad games of this generation now. But that doesn't mean gaming is dying or the current generation is inherently bad somehow. We're in the present right now. So we're noticing all the bad things, and we're looking toward the future thinking about the things we hope come soon. When we remember the past, we don't have to think about those things. We just think about the fun.

So next time you start to write that forum post, remember that you're saying something that everyone has said before about every generation. And remember that when the next generation rolls around, you're going to be singing the praises of the one you're bashing now. And yeah, maybe you'll grow out of games by then and blame this generation. But the fact remains that it's not the games--it's just a normal part of life.

Screenshots used are not my intellectual properties and are for illustration purposes only.