It's interesting to see so many titles coming out that are blockbuster budget, high expectation games.  When I look at next-gen gaming with $25+ million budgets,  phenomenal graphics, intense visual art styles. etc., I wonder if we are witnessing the financial undoing of the industry as a whole.  Sony is now joining Microsoft in the "lose billions" on their next-gen platform (hardware-wise).  We now have a few very high budget games this fall that have not performed well...  I won't name titles but there are some obvious ones that come to mind... Where I'm going with this is that I've recently purchased several games that are amazing graphically but fall very short in terms of content.  The multiplayer aspect is there, but I don't do that... We are seeing way too many 6 hour single player $60 games for me to continue this.  I bought these games on Toys R Us's buy 2 get 1 free sale so my net was actually $40/title which is better, but still $40 for six hours is STEEP.  Minimum-wagers need not apply.

The industry, in my opinion, needs to return to gameplay fundamentals.  First, a solid story.  Second, solid gameply to back up the story.  Third, enough content to keep the game engaing through AT LEAST 20 hours of gameplay.  Lastly come graphics and sound to round out the whole.  Yes, graphics are important, but if the game ends up being 6 hours because the budget was blown on graphics/art/sound, I'm not interested.

This isn't a "gaming over graphics" argument though it may seem that it is... What I'm saying is that I think developers have become far too focused on presentation and are leaving real gameplay behind....  The current generation seems to be guilty of taking this trend to the extreme... 

Well I\'d have to say that were also (at least as far as the PS3 is concerned) in the first year of the "next" gen, this is where company\'s try to flex with all that new headroom. So they spend big dollars to push theyre own capability\'s much further. Once the tech flattens out some the dev cost\'s go down, and the who\'s got the prettier graphic\'ed penis syndrom drops, the content will follow, but for a new piece of hardware, pushing the limits is a major factor.

I agree completely. The industry can't survive these high budget flops. Development costs for these games are through the roof by comparison to the last generation, and where is the massive audience to compensate? They don't exist. The gaming population hasn't suddenly tripled to make it worthwhile. I don't see how this (sinking 25-40 mil or possibly even more into a single game) can in the long run be good for any gaming company. Even if they do cover their cost the profits from it would be minimal compared to if it had the same performance on a 10-15 million budget. Putting such excessive amounts of cash into a game doesn't make it sell enough to justify it.

As for content wise, I agree there too. More money doesn't equate a better gaming experience, just a prettier one with a orchestral score and real actors. And the trend of pretty 6-8 hour games is also disturbing. But not surprising given the cost.

Though I would disagree with one thing. I think it should go gameplay first, story to motive the gameplay second, and then graphics sound ect. The heart of videogames is the game part of it, rather than story.

As a whole I don't see how this gen can be good for 3rd parties. If it takes such inordinate amounts of money to make a game on an HD machine, but the consumer base has only increased marginally, and if 3rd parties don't fair well on the wii (which is far more reasonable as far as cost of development goes) then 90% of third parties will struggle, or possibly fall so hard they get bought out up by the 10% that profit from a few big name games. Either way I think the technology has expanded faster than the market, and it's the games and the companies that will suffer.

Nintendo predicted this problem during the PS2/Gamecube/Xbox days.

Back when all games could render where red squares and blue squiggles art was an extremely limiting factor. So we started building bigger, faster, better machines so we could support more colors and higher resolutions.

Eventually we went to 3D and pre-rendered movies. Suddenly art budgets became more expensive than game design. That's when trouble began. Instead of making several games that look "good enough" to get the gameplay across, companies are obsessed with having the best graphics. We're reaching the asymptote where doubling the art budget does not double the presentation. Where adding nosehair textures does not improve immersion enough to justify its costs.

Last gen, a lot of middle-level developers like Tatio and Hudson couldn't deal with art costs (even though they still have great game ideas) and have been bought out. So now we're left with the big boys, who are vastly less likely to spend money on new game ideas, but will burn cash on super-mega high res graphics.

Nintendo asked developers last gen and basically got "yes, graphics are good enough now." So Nintendo decided to not pump up the graphics too much and instead tried to think up new ways of gameplay. Hence the Wiimote.

It's the Hollywood spirit rearing its ugly head and infecting the game industry. Many dev's reason that huge budget = good game.
False, as is the case with movies and other media.
The most enjoyable movies are the small underdogs that lounge out at you from nowhere without million dollar promo and endless trailer and commercial attention a full year ahead of release.

This is another problem they should address; why release specified information on games a full two-three years before its slated for release?! They start building up hype years in advance, only to show a half-hearted product in the end.
This endless hyping is turning people AWAY from the industry, as all it ever does is let them down.
Announcing a game is well and good, while telling the world how marvelous it is before its even in a pre alpha-phase is stupid imo...

I think one of the best exampls of this is the Halo 3 monster---hyped for god can only guess amount and in the end unless you want multiplayer your going to be let down by the meager single player campain--but man check out the bloom lighting and the motion blur

"Epic Gaming" -- is it ruining video gaming? 

 For me? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

 Yes.

I'm much more extreme in my views than you, Kn.

I hate story driven gaming, and I hope it goes away. I think it's certainly less important now than it was 5 years ago, and I believe, as Raph Koster does, that single player games are doomed:

http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/02/10/are-single-player-games-doomed/

Although I would add that I think casual-style single player games will remain relevant (games such as Tetris, Brain Age, or simple Solitaire), I otherwise think single player games are an anachronism that only existed because multiplayer games were technologically difficult to implement in a convenient manner. 

Yes, I agree. However, I think these $30 million games do have a place in the video game industry. Developers with grand ideas of visual and audible experiences should not be denied the possibility to realize their visions. And on the economic side, there certainly is an audience for a limited number of such games. The problem is that publishers are convinced that all "great" games *need* to have presentations that are state of the art audio-visually. Developers get tons of cash and personnel, but only two years (or less) to complete the game, often resulting in a buggy rush job, lacking in gameplay and coherency. In truth, there should only be one or two such games released per year, and not from the same publisher. Unless there is a change within the next few years, the industry will suffer for this in the long term. However, I think Nintendo might pay the price early on, if developers only use the Wii for budget titles and continue to develop their big games for the more ‘capable’ consoles. Ironic, considering Nintendo is one of the few publishers not affected by this mentality. Oh well, they seem to be doing well enough for themselves for now.

And about story; while story is an invaluable part of any modern game (even games like Mario), a game should not be based on a story so much as a premise of what that game will be about. Story in a game should first and foremost be a motive for new gameplay. That doesn’t mean you can’t have a great story, but the two of them should be linked whenever possible.

Bodhesatva: Well, I'm afraid story driven gaming isn't going anywhere soon - even our friend Mr. Koster agrees on that. By the way, his article is interesting, but a bit sensationalistic. He's basically just saying that all games will eventually have some kind of community aspect that allows for interaction between players - a lesser fact these days. I doubt there will ever be a time when every game requires multiple players to function properly, however. Like it or not, there is a market for interactive movies/books, and it's not going to go away any sooner than people will start acting like in those 60's future movies.

The only thing ruining gaming are the people buying poorly designed/shallow games.

Stop buying crap and developers will stop making it.