Has anyone else thought about how this gen was (is) on FIRE????

[DNgamers]

Random rant incoming. I'd be interested in your experience. I'm a 90s kid, grew up with the Gameboy, SNES and mainly N64. In my circle of friends I have often argued about how gaming has lost some of its "magic". It has become sone kind of meme with many people and I think last gen - meaning 360/ps3/wiiu is the reason for that. Yeah, there's UbiSoft and Activision releasing the same game in a different suit every year but all in all this generation is one of the best ever!

Let me put it this way:

N64 and PS1 were 3D-pioneers. (...Always count PC gaming to mentioned generations). It's kinda insane how much ground was broken from the 90s to the early 2000s. The next generation built upon this and there still was experimentation and bold moves in the AAA sector. Gamecube, Xbox and PS2 were a golden age for me when it comes to variety and quality for me.

The 360/PS3 generation was the first time I had the feeling that the industry lost its way a little bit. The struggle for graphics and set formulas for mainstream success really came to the forefront. Of course there were enough games trying something new, using new tech for new and different experiences. Also that gen saw the rise of indie games. I'll come back to that. The industry was breaking new ground again, trying things that didn't quite work yet. Do you agree? Nintendo became a company that shook things up from their own niche. Looking back it's interesting how things worked out, isn't it?!

All the different directions the main companys made somehow resultet in this generation that - think about it - made the best oft everything that came before it. The variety, quality and sheer mass of great games and ideas is through the roof today!!! Both in the indie and AAA sector the amount of games that excel in their own genres is simply amazing.

I haven't listed many games but everyone should be able to think of countless examples.

I just bought Subnautica, A Hat In Time and the roguelike shooter Monolith a few days ago. All of those would have been hits back then. Personally I'm fucking excited for Hollow Knight 2, Spelunky 2 and Elden Ring. It's a good time for videogames!

 

[dancingphlower]

Never been a better time to enjoy playing video games. It's great not having narrow taste.

 

[Jegriva]

I miss when I didn''t have to do research if a game will scam me or not.

Defintely NOT the best gen.

 

[Masoyama]

This gen is close, but not quite, to the level of GC/PS2. The games the embrace the style of play I like (short or medium single player games) are as good as they have ever been. But, this gen has also devoted way too much time and energy to GaaS and online multiplayer, which I don't care about at all. I don't feel that the PS3/Wii gen was that great, it was long and had some amazing games, but overall it was a disappointment to me.

 

[Magic Mushroom]

Yeah, it's a great time to play games. There is something for everyone, from AAA to AA to indie to VR, and lots of different ways to consume them where and whenever you want. 2020 looks insane, quality-wise.

 

[snausages]

It's better than last gen imo, which had way too much brown FPS and TPS for me.

The indie boom also felt kind of like a glut at the time, I think indies have hit a much better cadence this gen imo. Live Arcade set an artificial limit on the scope of indies for a really long time with how it dictated file sizes and games could only be certain prices, imo

 

[Lucreto]

I loved this generation as a lot of blast from the past game were released. Medievil, Spyro, Crash etc.

The revival of the JRPG which was dying last generation. Dragon quest XI, Heroes, Builders, World of Final Fantasy, FFXV, FFVII Remake etc.

My only disappointment it the lack of Ratchet & Clank games.

 

[Blade Wolf]

It's ok

 

[Alice]

N64/PS1 is just bullshit. Excluding the Saturn is a crime. It had a ton more great games than the N64 ever did. :T

 

[Chrno]

it's different, I'll say that much.

imagine if the internet was around like it is when MGS2 came out.

 

[MarcelRguez]

The industry is the best it has ever been in terms of quality titles and variety, but it has very little to do with the consoles currently in the market.

Also, as an aside: I know the Wii U was an awkward product, but it wan't a 7th gen machine.

 

[Strings]

I think the PS1/PS2 gens are untouchable (especially the brief window where the PS2/GBA/DS/PSP coexist), just because there was a much higher volume of good stuff, but this gen has been fab too.

 

[Deleted member 679]

Not sure if it's the best, but it's great.

But I also think the PS3 gen was great, as well as the PS2 and the SNES. Not a fan of the PSX, but everything else is fantastic.

Either my specific tastes were always satisfied, or I like enough different stuff that I was always happy.

I think if I made a top 10 of all time, I'd very likely have at least one game from each gen starting from the SNES, even the PSX.

 

[QuantumZebra]

Never been a better time to enjoy playing video games. It's great not having narrow taste.

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Agreed.

Funny enough - all my favorite games are from the 95-03 era (I view as end of PS1/beginning of PS2, height of PC gaming) - PC had Baldur's Gate 2, Diablo 1/2, Starcraft 1/2, EQ, and WoW was getting kicked off. PS had FFVII and N64 had OoT.

*but* when it comes to gaming being a more inclusive, more accepted, and more mainstream hobby - we're in a Golden Era.

 

[DNgamers]

Yeah, it's a great time to play games. There is something for everyone, from AAA to AA to indie to VR, and lots of different ways to consume them where and whenever you want. 2020 looks insane, quality-wise.

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AA..You've got a point there I forgot to mention. I think that's why gamecube/ps2 was so cool to me. And AA has come back with vengeance.

 

[Ocean]

Easily the best gen. Never had so many titles I've loved.

Hollow Knight, God of War, Horizon, Destiny 1+2, The Witcher 3, Breath of the Wild, Smash, Resogun, and a ton of stuff I never would have played if it weren't for Gamepass.

 

[Jimmy Joe]

I think you could make a cogent argument that the indie boom alone makes this the best half-decade-and-change that games have had so far.

 

[CanUKlehead]

Was actually a bit disappointed. A lot of the new franchises didn't speak to me. I preferred last gen, but it also lasted like 9 years.

In before #okboomer

 

[nbnt]

Nah. Nothing will ever beat the GC/PS2/XB generation, the sheer amount of variety we got every year and from big companies was staggering.

PS360Wii saw some of that, and then this gen happened, with its focus on everything online and GAAS, no thanks.

Indies have never been better and I appreciate them, but when it comes to triple A titles, they've gone to shit this gen. Companies like EA went from releasing some the best games last gen to.. Anthem, Bethesda went from making influential titles to.. Fallout 76. So yeah, nope.

 

[Chivalry]

This gen has 0 new GTA. No bully 2. No Splinter cell. No prince of persia. Only 1 Uncharted. This gen kinda sucks.

 

[panda-zebra]

ps4/xb1/switch/vr - this is why it wins by default.

Only 1 Uncharted.

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Really? People often forget Uncharted 4 I suppose after the majesty of Lost Legacy. No probs, easily done.

 

[Slingles]

Not the best gen for having time to play everything though :(

 

[Stone Ocean]

I miss when I didn''t have to do research if a game will scam me or not.

Defintely NOT the best gen.

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This is my take as well. While indies are cool and numerous, I'd rather not think of a gen where I need to be constantly wary of how publishers will try to fuck me over as the best one.

 

[Quantza]

N64/PS1 is just bullshit. Excluding the Saturn is a crime. It had a ton more great games than the N64 ever did. :T

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Haha, I've actually just bought a Saturn for the first time.
Didn't even know it existed until a few years ago lol.

I voted N64/PS1 and Dreamcast/PS2/Xbox/Gamecube, as I don't think this gen has reached their peaks yet.

When indie devs start to grow and have larger budgets + VR takes off, we'll get there.
Still wary about subscription services (their incentives) getting in the way of this, however.

While indies are cool and numerous, I'd rather not think of a gen where I need to be constantly wary of how publishers will try to fuck me over as the best one.

Click to shrink...

.

 

[CrazyAznKT]

It's fantastic, I'm surprised there are people bored with this generation because I'm having trouble keeping up. I just bought like 20 games this weekend because I finally got a good paying job but even before that I had plenty in my backlog. There's so much now that I don't really have time to play fighting games like I used to last gen. And there's an insane amount of fighting games this gen compared to last too!

 

[Transistor]

This gen has been amazing, but we were definitely held back with the crappy laptop CPUs in current consoles. With SSD baselines and better CPUs, next-gen is probably going to blow this gen out of the water.

 

[TMC]

This gen has 0 new GTA. No bully 2. No Splinter cell. No prince of persia. Only 1 Uncharted. This gen kinda sucks.

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Yup, exactly what I was going to post. With PS3, we got Uncharted 1, 2, 3, and TLoU. Uncharted 4 sucked as well in my opinion. I think the PS3 generation was better than PS4. We've had some fantastic games this gen, but the quantity is far less compared to last gen.

PS2 / GameCube / Xbox generation is still my favorite.

 

[SinglePlayerFan]

With Horizon Zero Dawn, Uncharted 4 & Lost Legacy, God of War 2018, Marvel's Spider-man, Days Gone, Astro Bot Rescue Mission, Dreams, Ratchet & Clank and many more, the PS4 has been home to many of my favorite games of all time. It's been my favorite gen by a long shot.

 

[Metal Slugger]

All of the best games from previous gens are ported/remastered on this gen, so yes. The sheer breadth of software this gen is GOAT.

 

[mrmickfran]

Best gen since gen 6

Persona 5
Bloodborne
Breath of the Wild
A Link Between Worlds
Devil May Cry 5
Super Mario Odyssey
Spider-Man
Resident Evil 2
Resident Evil VII
Sonic Mania
Yakuza 0
Horizon
Sekiro
Xenoblade X
Monster Hunter World
Dark Souls 3
Nier Automata
Ace Attorney 6
God of War
Uncharted 4
DOOM
Celeste
Shovel Knight
Ori
Cuphead
Tropical Freeze
Mario Kart 8
Bayonetta 2

 

[Burbank]

Majoras Mask, Half Life + mods, Sim City 3, Age of Empires 2.

 

[catswaller]

this gen has been really good, not up to the heights of ps2/gcn/xbox though.

 

[Deleted member 24417]

128 bit era is simply unbeatable
IMHO PS2 > PS1 > PS3 > PS4

 

[No Depth]

I've felt there has been less innovation and greater disappointment in the AAA space, but indies and smaller budget titles have picked up the slack this gen.

3rd Party 'large budget' games have been a mess though, once titans in-line with first party releases of prior gens, this is the gen where companies like Ubi, EA, and Activision have pretty much played it too safe with a portfolio of less engaging and disappointing products that aren't innovating. Not that a few standouts don't release, but contrasting with output of prior gens, its not been great recently. Japan publishers have done better this round, but only slight with Capcom having a nice rennaisance but the rest floundering in many ways. Square holds success, but contrasting their output from the 16 and 32-bit era with today? It's a joke. Remasters, FFXV, and FFXIV.

First party has been solid, but in-line with prior gens. Mileage varies though as I don't have much love for many of them as I hold for prior work. Horizon, Spiderman, and GoW were fine but too flawed for me to look back with such starry-eyed adoration. Mario Odyssey was one of the weakest entries despite some nifty gimmicks(though much of Nintendo on Switch has been strong otherwise). Microsoft feels weakened despite the strength of gamepass.

Indies just really carried much of the gen. Switch has become the 'Steambox' that prior gens once hoped for. It's quite glorious really.

I personally have a bit more fondness for earlier gens like PS2 or 16-bit, and while this gen has an absurd amoutn of quality, much of it does feel mired in reliving the past both direct and indirectly. Remasters everywhere, while indie and AAA innovation mostly in terms of plundering back catalog of gaming history with a few new twists or ideas wrapped in a 4K HDR coat of paint.

But so many seem captured by the spell of Fortnite that none of this matters. That is gaming to them.

 

[unicornKnight]

I don't play as much as I did in my younger days but I feel that objectively gaming is now better than ever.

 

[Deleted member 3017]

It's a great time for video games.

Gen 4 (16-bit) and 6 (PS2/Xbox/GCN) remain my favorites though, as every major platform had dozens of exclusives that made them unique and worth owning.

 

[alr1ght]

It's a good time because you can play old games and the few new games that don't suck.

 

[logash]

Absolutely. Nintendo is killing it, Sony is killing it, Microsoft seems to be on the right track next gen, JRPGs are back, Capcom is back, fighting games are back, Indies are just as good if not better than AAA releases, the best Star Wars game in years just released, Square seems to be on the right track with FFVII remake, and next year is shaping up to be the best this gen has ever seen.

 

[Cookie]

The best gen is always the current gen.

 

[Deleted member 10737]

yep. gaming has never been better.

 

[Nameless]

I still have Gen 6 slightly ahead, but if 2020 hits the way it's looking like, Gen 8 will take it going away. But even that speaks volumes about how great things are right now. Didn't expect to see another Golden Age but here we are.

 

[Yappa]

The fact that no longer most japanese "niche" titles stay untranslated makes this gen a great one.

 

[SmashN'Grab]

It's really great these days, on an overall basis. I still think that the early-to-mid-00's (basically the PS2's heyday, as well as Xbox/GameCube) were particularly amazing though. It just seemed like there were way more games out and many more different types.

 

[Yuntu]

Yeah this generation has been amazing. Many of my favourites are from it except FF9, RE4, BL2 and XCX.

 

[Duxxy3]

I wasn't a big fan of this generation. Games were more cinematic and more open world. FPS and TPS campaigns were in a serious shortage the entire generation. The base hardware was/is shit. A lot of the franchises that I love took a downturn or disappeared entirely.

Looking back at this generation, I might as well have just stuck with my PS3 until 2015 and then upgraded my PC. The only exclusives that I really would have missed out on was God of War, Spider-Man and Bloodborne. Three games for an entire generation.

I wasn't a fan of this console generation and I'm looking forward to it going away.

 

[Pargon]

Can't really agree. This generation, more than most, has left me wanting for games to play.
AAA's obsession with cinematic third-person open-world games, chasing GAAS and predatory microtransactions, has meant there's been very few of those games I've wanted to play. And of the games I did play, a lot of them had significant technical issues.
For me, I think the most interesting AAA games have been Prey, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, and Dishonored 2/DotO.
There's been many good indies, but the prevalence of "roguelike" mechanics has ruined a lot of these games for me (few do it well).

Indie games scratch a different itch than AAA games for me though, and I think they're far more interesting when they are doing their own thing; e.g. Gone Home/Tacoma, A Short Hike, Return of the Obra Dinn, The Witness than when they are trying to make a "new retro" game.
For as good as many of those are, it's just not the same as games with a real budget by a team of veterans.
Many of the retro-styled indies that people say "could have been a AAA ___ generations ago" really don't have the same feel. I'll still go back and play Quake every few years, or have a great time with a game of that era which is new to me, but few of those Quake-styled indie shooters hold my attention at all.

 

[GobHoblin]

N64/PS1 is just bullshit. Excluding the Saturn is a crime.

Click to shrink...

This...

For me nothing will beat those early years. Games felt magical back then, as did everything else when you're a kid.

 

[LukasHeinzel]

Please grow up little Xbone People, who think this is funny.

 

[Burgess_101]

The best thing about this gen is the fact Sega managed to bring all mainline Yakuza games to the PS4 (obviously not forgetting FOTNS and Judgement). Just a shame it doesn't seem like we'll be getting Kenzan or Ishin.

 

[Deleted member 16657]

Despite the rise of microtransactions/lootboxes/etc with this gen, we also got tons of premium AAA single player experiences and just as good indie games to match. It was a really fantastic gen.