2014 for Gaming: The worst year since '83?

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I thought that 2014 was a good year for gaming but, to be completely frank, this is coming from a guy that doesn't care about what is happening in the triple-A gaming world or in games journalism. There's always a lot of cool stuff always happening in gaming that isn't immediately apparent, and I consider myself blessed that I've more thoroughly explored the world of indie games to find ones that provide a profound and unique experience. I have also found multiple YouTube channels over the last year that create content about games that is intelligent and interesting and, unless it's a comedy channel of some sort, informative. Maybe I'm just cherry-picking or I'm late to the party on the things that I've found, but I really don't see what happens on the surface level of gaming world to be of consequence when you're as deep in as I am.

The Squid thinks 2014 was awash with broken games such as Assassin's Creed Unity, The Crew, and LittleBigPlanet 3. Though only the latter of that list actually affected us. We aren't sure if it's the companies who are trying to push games out earlier without proper play testing, or if it's the public who are being rude and demanding such games come out sooner. Hopefully 2015's games will be properly tested and pushed back if need be for better performance. Thankfully the indie circuit has kept us entertained. Fingers crossed for WiLD (PS4), The Division (Ubisoft, so don't expect much), No Man's Sky (Small team doing Big things), and The Tomorrow Children (Looks Great!)

While I frequently throw out the term "filthy casual" or say things like "I stopped playing 'x game' because I stopped being a casual", I do so only jokingly. In reality, I think the only time anyone complains about casual games is when they are a disgruntled 20-year-old browser of a social media site that thinks that video gaming didn't start until the Nintendo 64.

Talking on slightly more serious terms, though, my "layman's observations" of the phenomenon are that as certain social media sites (like those with handy "thumbs up" and "thumbs down" buttons to mindlessly promote agreeing opinions and instantly judge and disparage things that you disagree with, respectively) were popping up and gaining popularity among young adults, mobile games and Facebook games were becoming a seriously popular at the same time, too. Then, these young adults, all of the sudden, thought that their precious video games industry (which has always made crappy games, no matter the era) was being upended by these "casual games", and that these games were cheap and dirty (the good ones were conveniently ignored), and thus a vitriolic counter-culture emerged. With its only base being the collective stubbornness and nostalgia of its members, they failed to realize that times change and that standards for the difficulty of games within certain markets will be lower to better appease their target audience, who are no longer just 10-14-year-olds with indomitable wills and the full mental capacity required to learn how to play a game near perfectly and use a controller like it's an extension of their body.

Hm, you sound similar to myself with all of this, and if you have that viewpoint that seems the same as my own, I can say: You arent missing anything by ignoring that part of the industry. Unless of course you're obsessed with graphics and all that gibberish, but other than that... there's better stuff to be found, and it's not actually hard to find, as you've probably discovered.

I did end up buying two of the new consoles myself, but then again, each of them had a game or two on them that I HAD to have, which would be Smash on the Wii U, and LittleBigPlanet 3 on the PS4. The XBone having nothing, I dont need it at all. The consoles still dont get used all that much, what with the fact that I still have only a couple of games for each, as opposed to the hundreds of games (and thousands of roms) that I have on the PC. Having seen alot of the other games on the consoles being played (often extensively), well.... my thoughts are that I'm not really missing much of anything at all. I would indeed consider it a mostly bad year for gaming if I was still focused on the consoles like I used to be a few years back.

Misery, you're like my alter-ego or something. We have a similar perspective on video games and, in general, enjoy them in similar ways but if I recall correctly we have very different tastes in the games themselves. It's an odd world.

Anyways, I blame the fact that I am a poor college student that I really haven't been paying attention to consoles recently. I have a nice-ish gaming laptop and, while it's not the perfect gaming machine, it's decent enough and I needed a laptop for college. I certainly wasn't going give up PC games altogether or buy a crappy netbook and a gaming desktop, so it's a nice compromise. If I am ever able to get a part time job or a temporary job during the summer, I could see myself buying a Nintendo 3DS but until then I'll stick with my "75%-off" games on Steam.

1983 was actually an EXCELLENT year for gaming. 1983 was right in the middle of the "Golden Age of Video Arcade Games."

For me, 2014 was one of the best years for gaming in a long time. It was the year of isometric CRPGs, one of my favourite genres that had been killed off by all the publishers chasing console dollars:

Divinity: Original Sin
Wasteland 2
Shadowrun: Dragonfall

Dragon Age: Inquisition was one of the best AAA RPGs in recent years, despite its crappy PC controls.

Dreamfall Chapters also made a promising start, although the jury is out on that one until episodes 2-5 are completed.

That may not sound like many games to get excited by, but compare that to 2013, where the list of games I actually cared about about consisted of:

Bioshock Infinite

...yep, that was about it. I'd almost given up on gaming.

Huh? How was 2014 a bad year for gaming? We got a new Smash Bros game, along with Shovel Knight and Goat Simulator, which are two of the best indie games I've ever played.

haven't these always existed though?

It's mostly mainstream titles that people are thinking of when they say it. Alot of the "big" games over 2014 were either flops in some way, or just mediocre, and it doesnt help that alot of them still copy each other as much as ever. Truly interesting releases like Smash were very few and far between. A huge number of gamers wont have the foggiest idea what Shovel Knight or Goat Simulator are, despite those games' apparent popularity. This fact irritates me. And those are two of the more well-known games right now... plenty of other superb ones are there, but even less know about those.

Totally agreed on Goat Simulator though, I love the heck outta that one. It's gotten a great many hours outta me, and I constantly come back to it. Freaking hilarious, lots of stuff to mess with, lots of entertaining glitches that just make it even more hilarious (absolutely love that they purposefully leave those in unless they're actually damaging the experience somehow) and I downloaded about a bazillion mods. Which combine together in all sorts of very entertaining ways, alongside all of the many existing mutators in the game.

Shovel Knight I havent played, but I likely will sooner or later.

And of course Smash is certainly grand.

Where do you get your Goat Simulator mods? The included mutators are fun, but I want to find more.

I just get them all off of Steam's Workshop thing; getting them into the game couldnt be easier. Find a mod in there, click "subscribe" (no, I dont know why it's "subscribe" instead of "download", makes no sense to me, but whatever), and bam, it's done and ready to be used, whatever it happens to be. There's both new mutators and maps and other special things; I've got tons of them now.