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posted by
chromas
on Wednesday August 28 2019, @01:08AM
from the If-we-had-gone-to-the-gym-instead-we-would-be-so-buff dept.
from the If-we-had-gone-to-the-gym-instead-we-would-be-so-buff dept.
Due to popular demand Blizzard has brought a new version of World of Warcraft online that closely resembles the original version: WoW Classic. Some players already have access, and the rest of the world can go queue.
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Blizzard Re-Releases World of Warcraft Classic
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The last time I saw him he was walking down Lover's Lane holding his own hand.
-- Fred Allen
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday August 28 2019, @03:11PM (2 children)
People who played NES, SNES, PS1, etc. as kids are now spending cash as parents. They have nostalgia for the titles they grew up on, and might be lost when it comes to newer games (e.g. Super Mario vs. GTA V). The classic console releases are a convenient way to get a box with a number of games and HDMI output, so it will "just work". It helps that the companies can just take an open source emulator and ship it on an ARM SoC as an official product [wikipedia.org]. You also have old games ported to the Xbox, PS, and Nintendo [wikipedia.org] online stores.
At some point, graphics doesn't necessarily enhance the gameplay or fun experienced. Maybe you might not want to play some of the CGA/EGA graphics clunkers released in the 80s, but many thousands of games are playable and just as fun as they always were. And they accumulate. Today's games are competing against many other current games, as well as previous decades of games. You can boot up a game like Duke Nukem 3D from 1996, graphically enhanced by many ports/mods over the years, working on modern systems and higher resolutions, and with new content released in 2016. Or you can play NetHack. Any minute spent playing these is a minute not spent playing a current microtransaction-riddled AAA release.
A number of multiplayer games have broken over the years, but there are often efforts to run on community-operated servers. Sometimes supported by the developers, sometimes in spite of them. But in some cases, you see support over a long period of time, as Blizzard has kept Starcraft 1 and other games playable on Battle.net.
With WoW Classic and other MMOs, there is a community aspect mixed with the nostalgia. I'm sure people are reuniting with their old guilds, etc. There is a lot of interest for now, but the shine will probably wear off eventually, just as WoW has declined over the years. You can play a single player game from 25 years ago and enjoy it, but a massively multiplayer game depends on the community sticking around. Unless we start throwing strong AI (N)PCs into them decades from now.
Current games are a mixed bag. People love GTA V, Witcher 3, etc. Looks like Cyberpunk 2077 will be great. Bethesda used to be well regarded but their legacy has dimmed, with over a decade of buggy releases culminating in the Fallout 76 disaster. EA and Activision are on the forefront of microtransaction shenanigans, loot boxes, milking franchises to death, etc. Free-to-play multiplayer games with cosmetic items are a viable business strategy, as demonstrated by Fortnite.
Extra: There is a strong community [youtube.com] of people playing AOE2, a 1999-2000 real time strategy game that got several remakes and expansions from 2013-2019. Back in the 2000s, I would never have predicted this resurgence.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by black6host on Thursday August 29 2019, @01:36AM (1 child)
And some of the older ones are spending cash as grandparents I reckon...
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday August 29 2019, @01:49AM
They are buying pinball cabinets.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]