By Todd Russell
There are a lot of games to play, too many an anti-gamer might argue. The truth is there are already too many games for any one person to play in his/her/their lives. This isn’t the end of gaming life as we know it. We’ve covered that topic previously using specific numbers here: With 270,000+ games, Gamers are hopelessly outnumbered + National Card Playing Day — but what about how good the games are. Let’s cover that.
For gamers, it’s all about how good the game is to play. If it’s fun to play, if it’s a good game, it doesn’t really matter how old the game is, how long the game has been around, how unpopular or popular it was, how much it sold, and/or if the game is brand new.
Unfortunately, greedy publishers think that gatekeeping older games, keeping them behind lock and key increases their new game sales because, presumably, gamers will play new games if they can’t play the older games.
“The specific quote is that “there would be a significant risk that preserved video games would be used for recreational purposes.” This explains why people like Jim Ryan hate retro games. They think these older games would cannibalize sales from newer releases.” via Publishers Have Finally Said The Quiet Part Out Loud About Retro Games
This is stupid and nonsensical. We can never, ever have too many good games to play. Again, it’s not about the age of the game, it’s about the quality of the game. Gamers don’t care how much money was spent making the game, how long it took, we only care if the game is good.
There are already hundreds of thousands of video games. That’s way more games than any one human being gamer can ever play in a lifetime. And yet there are new games that gamers flock to and play.
Publishers: It’s quality, not quantity. If you make fun games, gamers will play them. We will find them. We know what we like. You can play whatever shell game you want with trying to hide the old games from us, lock them behind some walled garden, whatever, but we’ll find and play them. And if we want to play those games instead of your lousy new game you spend millions making, so be it.
There are way more books and movies than any one person can read and watch — and yet they keep creating, keep writing and making new stories and movies.
Quality, quality, quality. Yes, this is subjective, but it’s never been about volume, except to publishers that think we’re that simple-minded. Shame on you, publishers. Worry about making good games, that should be your focus, not trying to limit the good games of the past from being available to play in the present.