>The golden age of gaming ended somewhere in 2005-ish, and now the vast majority of games are derivative and often worse than the originals in terms of gameplay.
Major studios produce derivative, uninspired, and stale sequels. Much like the movie and television industries. They're in it to make money. So their products will be interesting enough, and often show the desires of the creative employees. But their decisions are strongly driven by profit, and they have to regularly publish something even if their creatives have writer's block or a desire to totally pivot a project.
Real gems are produced by the middle-sized studios that grew from talented developers and great designers. I've only ever learned of them through word of mouth, and even then I only enjoy half the games I try.
>Path of Exile
Best example of freemium, IMO. Cosmetics are a big source of income, but the developers still put out new game mechanics every couple of months. Bug and quality-of-life patches are frequent. There is a category of real-money purchases that affect gameplay (storage tabs to help organize items you collect), but I don't mind it. Once bought, they're available to all your characters forever. Not having those tabs only became a problem after many (>100) hours in the game. So I saw it as upgrading from the trial version. I've spent less than $100 on it, but have played for almost a decade.
Major studios produce derivative, uninspired, and stale sequels. Much like the movie and television industries. They're in it to make money. So their products will be interesting enough, and often show the desires of the creative employees. But their decisions are strongly driven by profit, and they have to regularly publish something even if their creatives have writer's block or a desire to totally pivot a project.
Real gems are produced by the middle-sized studios that grew from talented developers and great designers. I've only ever learned of them through word of mouth, and even then I only enjoy half the games I try.
>Path of Exile
Best example of freemium, IMO. Cosmetics are a big source of income, but the developers still put out new game mechanics every couple of months. Bug and quality-of-life patches are frequent. There is a category of real-money purchases that affect gameplay (storage tabs to help organize items you collect), but I don't mind it. Once bought, they're available to all your characters forever. Not having those tabs only became a problem after many (>100) hours in the game. So I saw it as upgrading from the trial version. I've spent less than $100 on it, but have played for almost a decade.