The evolution of gaming

Evolution and you. 

Shock horror, a new Call of Duty’s out soon. There’s also another Pokémon game out and FIFA is getting a ‘13’ version. I’ve heard so many people criticise these games for staying ‘too close to the formula’ and not innovating enough, which I can sort of empathise with. There’s not a whole lot else you can do with Football now to make it completely new (the sport’s probably as old as time itself) and CoD will never change things up. Pokémon will always be a game about imprisoning various animals and forcing them to fight for your own entertainment.

But what happens when games do change it up? Apparently, the apocalypse. For instance, Halo 4 was shown for the first time ever at E3 recently, and many people complained that it was ‘changed things up a little bit too much’ and that they ‘should have just made a better looking version of Halo 3’ but if they were to actually do that, they’d be burnt at the stake for a lack of innovation. To some extent, I can agree with what Reggie the CEO of Nintendo America (or something, idk) said about the fact that you’ll never be able to make all gamers happy. It’s almost entirely true – make a new CoD game that’s set in the Modern Times, and it’s unoriginal. Make it in the Future, it’s too original and ‘not CoD’.

It’s the eternal problem when it comes to gaming – how much do you change? You can never release less than a previous game because it leads to a lack of features, so you can’t go back to the ‘good old days’ without backlash, but you can’t advance without it either. Some additions in the past to various games have been sheer stupidity to say the least (Dead Man’s Hand on MW3, anyone?) but at the end of it all, there’s bound to be the odd hiccup before you stumble upon the perfect formula. Sadly, very few games have beta tests so it takes years to get things sorted through subsequent broken releases and community backlash on what should be changed.

But there’s that ugly monster rearing its head once again. Community feedback. What is actually broken, and what’s nothing more than a minor inconvenience to the individual. For instance, a player might think that certain ability is overpowered because they’re ineffective at countering it in game, however it might work well in the big scheme of things. Unfortunately, it’s also apparent that community feedback isn’t the most helpful. “ARMUR LOCK SUX U SUK BUNGIE I WIL NEVER PLEY HALOAGAIN” isn’t something that can be directly used by developers to improve their game. “Armour lock lasts for too long, it should be reduced by 15 seconds” is an example of productive criticism and helps developers out greatly, as they can see what they need to do to improve their game to cater to the fans.

That said, you don’t always need to religiously listen to the fans – sometimes going and doing something a bit more different despite the fans demanding that you cease and desist can greatly improve the game for everyone. After all, the developers made the game – they know how it works and they probably see a lot more than the fans do, and as a result could lead to the game evolving further.

Because I’ve seen a lot of people complain that their favourite games are evolving into something different, let me ask you this – You complain that CoD: Black Ops 2 is different to post-CoD4 games by adding in a point-based loadout and other nice things but what would have happened had CoD4 not introduced classes and perks? These sorts of people just negate their own arguments. If you don’t like the way a game is going, play something else. Don’t want to? Play the ‘perfect’ version of the game, the one you expect every subsequent release to be.

Meanwhile, the rest of us normal people will sit back, relax, play some games and watch how the whole thing evolves into the gaming industry of the future.

It’s not the strongest, nor the quickest species that survives – it’s the one that’s most adaptable to change.