I know I will sound like an old man but back in my “hey day” games weren’t built with lots of hooks.  There was no DLC, patches, or extra content; whatever you bought is what you got.  Mostly due to hardware limitations, games didn’t have that OCD mentality that they have today.

When I was playing Red Dead Redemption there was so much other stuff going on in the background that it seemed hard to focus on the main story line.  What really grinds my gears about this new theme in game design is that half the stuff doesn’t equate to anything meaningful! Say I actually took the time to get the What About Hand Grenades? acheivement, what do I get for it?  A little trophy and a bump in the gamerscore.

Seriously, WTF! It never has nor will it ever be that serious.  As much as I love World of Warcraft, some times I wouldn’t locate a new cave, dungeon, etc. because once I located it, I’d just have to go inside. And I knew there was a strong chance I would spend an hour running through every nook and cranny to find a damn iron sword.

As I looked at the release list for this year and thought about my goal of playing more games I felt terrible.  Here are all these games and the best I’m going to do is get a sample of each one. I’ll probably finish a few, but the rest are going to get lost in the background.  The solution is pretty simple, just divide my time and play a little here and a little there.  The issue I have is that designers have done such a good job keeping me hooked in the game.  

It seems like gamers have gotten what they asked for, and not in a good way.  We cry at the price of games and continue to ask for more…and more.  And finally developers opened the faucet and delivered so much that it doesn’t make any sense anymore.  Just give me a game with a clear objective, some secrets, and with as little distraction as possible. Am I of the small minority of gamers who just want the experience?  I don’t care nor do I want to “brag” about my gaming achievements.  I guess I’m just not with the times, in that case someone point me to the nearest museum.