In my opinion, one of the biggest issues that plague modern gaming is the gamers themselves who hold multi-billion dollar companies to such low standards and are willing to spend money on microtransactions on 70$ games If the modern gamer doesn't change, I don't believe modern gaming will change either

Overpromise, overcharge, out of touch. And people will keep buying.

Modern gaming is the greatest advertisement for pirating we could ever make

The biggest issue is the lack of accountability. When there's a backlash, a lot of people buy things _anyway,_ and it's probably because many players just aren't really in touch with the conversations, due to gaming being broadened to a socially acceptable and common hobby. It seems like a lot of gamers have already bailed out their support for poor business practices, but there's a lot of easy smucks leftover for gains.

Truly the most pressing issue in game right now is the lack of fishing minigames. We just need more of them, and everything will be fixed

90% of remakes nowadays are not even REMAKES, they're just RE-IMAGININGS of the originals that not a single person asked for

One massive problem for me is the ridiculous file sizes for some of these games, especially on PC. Like taking up 80-100 gb and having to wait hours to install, then wait a couple of minutes to an hour for an update/patch to play a game that might run like shit on your PC and/or not enjoy at all :\

My problem with remakes, is that a lot of the time when they do a remake or rerelease they tend to censor remove or flat out change content under the guise of fixing them for a modern audiance.

Main problem I have is the Nickle and diming in the gaming industry. I remember when Day 1 DLC and horse armor was a joke and people thought it was just a fad. But no now we have the stupid microtransactions that want more money. Like I love capitalism and what it offers, but if you give your consumers crap and stagnation, don't be surprised when your bankrupt down the road. Keep competition alive people, make them fight for our dollars.

More gamers have to be executives. In order to save the gaming industry. We should all strive to be like Satoru Iwata.

I went to school for game design and I can shed some light on the “we don’t say fun around here” in a game design setting we are taught the word “fun” is a meaningless, subjective term. We have about 9 or so different terms to quantify what “fun” is. As in does the player get engagement from narrative, interacting with other, getting a sense of fantasy, or getting a sense of competition and so on. It helps focus an idea. Because if you just say “it needs to be fun” well that doesn’t really explain anything

One silver lining is that while Triple A games have a lot of issues, AA and indie games, of which have been kind of immune to the problems outlined here, have been able to gain a massive foothold.

The problem i have with scarlet and violet is the potential it had to be one of the best pokemon games if it was finished

I do appreciate the optimism at the end of this video, and we should be supporting Indie's and developers that actually give a shit about their works/customers, but realistically speaking... nothing short of another Gaming Crash would fix most of these issues. God knows we are way overdue for another one.

Narrative driven games that embrace being games are some of the best narrative experiences I’ve ever had, see: Disco Elysium, Pathologic 2, MGS

I want shorter games with worse graphics, made by people who are paid more to work less, and I'm not kidding!

I miss those days of having a finished product on launch. In general(to me) it isn't just gamers that lowered their standards so far, buying virtually anything that comes along and is considered 'functional' enough. On journalists I lost any interest in their words long ago, but folks still follow things done from times too far past. I mean, our education system is primarily still from a century ago with an evergrowing price tag and lack of quality(bicker away as if there is only ONE reason at your own risk). Then we have video game movies that aren't quite movies and suffer on gameplay/interactive elements. The fact that game is still considered peak story telling in gaming hurts my soul the more I'm reminded of it. Lastly the accessibility conundrum, why some get away same game plus DLC(season pass please) but less stable despite YEARS ago already finished. Or remakes that lose the original, everything, in the game. Of course it isn't as simple as putting up the old copy and patch in new graphics and hardware to run on, but there is a blue print RIGHT THERE. No we don't want a sunroof into the basement, we just want you to follow what it shows here. At times, of course updating something that isn't intuitive or dated would be nice(Looking at you Valentia). The state of the industry I expect to worsen beyond every game requiring 24/7 connection and your SIN number/DOB/Bank and so on. I have no faith in the modern consumer with how other industries have failed miserably each year yet make more money

Awesome video! I agree with everything you said in this video, especially the part about how some of the gaming journalists are not doing a good job at reviewing video games. I always get so annoyed whenever some gaming journalists don't really review the gameplay or the stories in the games, but instead, just go off topic or state something in the review that happened decades ago.

One issue I have that I don't feel is talked about much is lack of variety. Most games just feel incredibly similar to each other at least to me. Plus games are incredibly long nowadays so I start to notice the inter-game repetitiveness even more.

Honestly what I hate about modern gaming is how newer gamers seem to only care about graphics this really annoys me since it’s probably one of the least important things I also definitely agree with the “gaming is ashamed of itself” segment

Just so you know, Indies and Double As are a thing with Very, to Mostly, to Overwhelmingly positive reception by those who played them. Look 'em up and you won't be disappointed. You'll perhaps even change your mind.

One other practice you didn't mention is gamers willing to pay an extra 20 or 30 to get a game earlier than it's standard street date. Which that sets a horrifying precedent.

This sums up a lot of my problems with modern gaming and I appreciate how much you were able to put in (like with the Silvervale clip or the G4 clip) despite the video not overstaying its welcome. Also, the editing in this is spectacular, reminds me of some of my favorite videos from back when I was in high school.

As I see things, the industry isn't really dying as much as it is in a great evolution phase. The huge companies that have elevated franchises are becoming stale and too big for their britches - in part probably because AAA projects cost WAY too much to produce and so they need to result in playing things safe to ensure mass audience appeal and adopt business practices to keep their revenue guaranteed. For instance, Squeenix is still making traditional RPGs but they're always tiny side projects (Octopath, Bravely Default) even though there's a place for them in the industry just because they feel like a traditional RPG wouldn't do well against other AAA titles. When you pour ten times the budget into a game, you NEED it to have the largest appeal possible to break even, even if the best things are ones made for a specific vision. And I can understand the raising of price tags what with inflation being utterly ridiculous over the past three years. But that doesn't necessarily mean I like it, just that I understand it. The DLC model is also related to the whole "risk vs reward" assumption. In an old game you can only sell the product once so any bonus features you might want to put in would need to be in the base game or perhaps even do the thing like the "old style" of DLC where bonus features would be added in an updated re-release of a game. But with newer games it's not only that you "can" charge for bonus features. In a way it is a means of keeping the base price under control since the publisher is able to use DLC to solidify the overall profit. Honestly as long as the base game feels complete and the DLC is optional (like costume packs) and fairly minimal I don't really mind it. It only really becomes annoying when the DLC becomes particularly egregious in price, or if it's something like a common feature that gets removed from a franchise only to be added later as DLC. Which also is why they need to try and appease journalists - because it could be considered risky if the journalists don't give the game a favorable framing. A lot of the people in these companies are boomers who don't really understand that the audience doesn't really need to care about the legacy media and especially if the parent company is Japanese, they might not even have their ear to the ground on what the Western audience wants and simply take their contacts in the industry at their word. But the indie scene is booming, and has been for years. It's now at a point where there are a ton of passionate older developers who made BIG games in the past are recognizing that the indie model is the way to make the things they want to make. Like Eiyuden Chronicle is made by the Suikoden team, or Inti Creates making a lot of games based on the Mega Man Zero series, or ex-Rare developers making Yooka-Laylee, or the Wild Arms team making Armed Fantasia. And that's ONLY talking about people who are making spiritual successors who were directly involved in the original product, if you included indie developers who are filling in the holes in the industry who don't have a history with it, you get an utterly massive extra swath.

My biggest and real problem is the cost of cosmetics. There used to be tons of cosmetics unlockable in the base game of games and if games wanted to add more they’d sell skin packs with like six or seven skins for five bucks. Now it’s 20 dollars for one outfit. How much effort does it cost to make one outfit prolly two seconds.

Also, Games Journalist are the biggest crybabies I've ever met, second only to literally everyone who openly discussed politics.

It reaches the point where Resident Evil 5 is more fun to play and viewed as masterpiece compared to modern games like Forspoken and Gollum

My biggest problem is that they get pumped out in so little time. Video games are art and art needs time. If it's mass produced in a short time it becomes a product. Not every game should be like fifa with yearly releases, while also not being an agonizing wait like silk song. Don't rush your developers and the product will come out better.

I honestly don’t play most modern games anymore…I just go back to game from the past and emulate them/maybe find some physical copies if I can afford them. The most recent modern game I’ve played is Totk but that’s only after I looked the game over with my own eyes. The games of the past may be less graphically impressive but they have more style, gameplay, and soul, which is what makes a truly good game in my opinion. I’m in my 20s so I missed out on some classic games which is great for me because it means that I have a nearly endless amount of new experiences to explore from back when the AAA devs cared. I’m currently playing Chrono Trigger for the first time and am loving every second of it.😊

You know, triple A games might be on a bad trajectory, but indie games are currently on the up and up

I feel like this can be summed up as the issue being corporate greed

Remember when games used to actually be genuinely fun?

Modern AAA games are mostly a mess... AA and lower though, a lot of great stuff. Specially indies. Deep Rock Galactic, Spark the Electric Jester 3, Curse Crackers, Sea of Stars, Hollow Knight, Risk of Rain 2, Pizza Tower, Valheim, etc. Not to mention there will always be good games as long as FromSoft is around.

I was literally thinking of Godhand when you were talking about how useless game journalists are because of how a bunch of game journalists (at Kotaku I think) gave it a low score because none of the ones there cared to learn the systems and get good at it before giving it a score. Then you went on to immediately start talking about it in the next section.

Considering what we used to have back in the 90s and 2000s, you can see the decline from a mile away.

Was out of town when this vid released, absolute SOLID content right here. Great summary of the MAJOR issues with the industry and I hope this reaches some higher ups who can make change. While I pray, I’ll be supporting my indie devs as always 👍

This video pretty much sums up the issues I have with modern gaming. Welp time to go into the indie game rabbit hole.

If I worked for a company and somebody said ''We don't use the word fun'' I'd change their job from game development to beating a No death run of Rayman 1, hopefully they'd learn the meaning of fun on the way.

22:17 “plenty” that is an understatement There are so many indie games released in the present it’s amazing

the ridiculous cost of the games themselves, regardless of the quality of the game released, and the insane push for micro transactions is what i personally think will kill a lot of new games. i bought myself a switch to play pokemon scarlet and splatoon 3, and while i haven't personally ran into issues with scarlet's performance i was absolutely blown away by the fact that the dlc was $35. it's ridiculous to me that dlc that cost nearly (or more than) half of what i paid for the base game is considered normal, no matter how big the dlc content is. it makes more sense for free games to have expensive dlc or micro transactions because, well, they have to make money somehow. but the insane cost of it all just puts me off from buying anything or even playing the game. overwatch 2 is a great example of this. overpromising and corporate greed are at the heart of a lot of the issues in current gaming imo.

I’d argue there’s also problems with some KZfaq reviewers. Not in the sense that they insert real-world issues into their videos, but more so that they either suck at the game or are being disingenuous with their reviews. I’ve seen several games put on blast simply because they are a franchise or genre the KZfaqr isn’t a fan of or because they just want to maximize hate clicks. Good video though.

No, day one patches are NOT a good thing the same way microtransactions to skip grindy parts of a game aren't. Said microtransactions give companies incentives to actively make their games less fun and in a similar way, day one patches have lead to companies all but skipping QA in gamedev. I mean, we're literally at the point where we all but expect games to be outright broken at release. It's become a pleasant surprise for a game to actually work at launch. Because companies can rely on us knowing a broken game can be fixed they'd much rather release a game too early, knowing it won't affect their profits much

You forgot to mention the fact that multiplayer costs money on console but is completely free on PC. Which is why I joined the masterrace.

10:33 KLONOA SPOTTED, holy shit. It's official, you know of him. Please talk about him and his series more. Bandai Namco neglects him so much... ;_; Okay, with that out of the way, my biggest issue with modern gaming, specifically in the AAA scene, is everything looks so samey and kind of all blends together.

The first two points are indicitive of higher-ups not just wanting money, they want ALL of the money.

My main problem is when something is advertised, but barely delivered. I'm speaking, of course, of netherrelm studios. They put invasion mode into MK1, which if you play of ps5 or x box series x it probably is fun, but for the Nintendo switch version, they only included the tutorial level with, as of time of typing, no known timeframe for when the mode's other maps will be playable. Add on the fact that they are going to rotate what maps are available in seasons, and that just adds a bigger blow to the nut punch. To be fair to them this was agnaliged and they say they're working on it.

Personally I dont mind day 1 patches for big game beta testing with a smaller sample, especially on big games is gonna leave some inevitable bugs. However I think it get used as a crutch a bit too much, I bet cd projekt thought they could fix their game in a patch or two once it released. EDIT : BRUH the instruction manuals were so sick and I'm sad I saw them slowly disappear

Like when Kotaku transitioned into a rant about the orange man while reviewing the PS5

1 of the worst problems is fanbois thinking that if they root for one company and attack the competing company, the company they're rooting for will reward them. If a competing company fails the only reward you'll get is sky-high prices.

Omg...i was not expecting to see geddan. This made me feel so much more old than my childhood consoles being called retro

Never bought a game on release. Of course, I have no interest in social media and interaction with other players, so this outlook only really works for people like me, but it never lets me down.

I personally believe the average gamer person does not care about many of those issues. Those who do not play games as their main recreational activity, or only play so frequently. They don't care if the price is going up a bit because they buy a new game once every blue moon and it's not much of an issue. They don't care about DLCs including important gameplay features because they just want to play something fun and cool. Broken on release is an issue to someone hyped for the game en masse, fair, but most other issues are more negligible for the (I assume) vast masses that don't spend so much time on games as dedicated gamers do.

12:42 “The Last of Us series has the greatest stories in gaming” - people who clearly never played Outer Wilds

Video hits the nail on the head. Repeatedly. Also, true man of culture for those Formidable section breaks 👍

I want to see a video game with meta commentary about bad game journalists

"Even if we lose a life, we always have continues." -MangaKamen 2023

The most fun ive had currently was playing persona for the first time and playing ai somnuim,although there are good new released games (ex.TOTK starfield etc.) I find myself playing older games like 999 zero escape.or i just like story type games alot, idk

honestly, my goty is absolutely Armored Core VI. Not just because it's hella fun (to the point where I think it killed my actually good laptop), but because it's a finished and complete game, and a fucking good one at that. I'm not usually the biggest fan of Fromsoft games, they just don't really click with me, but ACVI is one of the best new games I've played in a long time

At this point the only game journalist I listen to is Mark Brown from GMTK. Not just because he actually knows what he's talking about, but also because he (as well as quite a few other KZfaqrs out there) actually has a personality.

The problem is that the in the overwhelming silent majority casual gamers don't give a fk. They will buy anything and fall for even the slightest marking trick.

It's honestly extremely sad that the majority of the games I loved were released in such sorry states like with FNAF SB and OW2. And it really ticks me off that game devs saying to not have high expectations for other games when Baldurs Gate released. Like what happened to the time when a great game released and game devs wanted to create a game better than that.

I refuse to buy any game with always-online DRM, even for single-player mode. It means I'm missing out on plenty of otherwise fun-looking racing games like The Crew: Motorfest, but I refuse to support any game I can't play completely offline. I know the excuse with modern racing games is that it's to prevent cheaters modifying their profiles offline to make themselves overpowered in competitive play, but the simple solution would be to have separate profiles with online-only saves for competitive online play and offline saving for single player mode or casual online mode (and you'd be able to download your progress from your competitive online account into your single player account but not vice versa).

My favourite game journalism case is ultrakill. Either the journalist can’t complete the first layer and it hurts their pride, or just don’t understand the mechanics, then they have a mental breakdown about it.

I played the original re4. The re4 remake has dlc that would be in the original game. The initial game had alternate unlockable costumes. Separate ways was also something to unlock. I’ll just wait until the complete edition come out.

I have an issue with mk1 and sf6. The game was announced and weeks later the full dlc wave of characters was found out before the title is released and when it released sf6 had it's first dlc character released a month and half later and mk1 has dlc characters that are in the main story that was cut to be sold later in up coming kp1 two months after release.

11:37 the thing about videogames is they have a powerful means of getting across ideas in a way that no other medium can. Like, with films you have visuals and a sound track, there's something that the films visual adds that you cant get with just the sound track. There's something that gameplay adds that you cant get with a film. And yet, people with this mentality want to just make a movie but for some reason as a videogame, so they add in button prompts and dont do much else.

This guy knows what he's talking about, he's a gamer

I have a rule to help with older gaming: If it's not from a franchise that's still going, they're abandoneware.

bullseye level points aside, the fact that I saw both smg4 and press start to laugh in a different creator's video obliterated my mind

Let's not forget the "1.99 €" DLC infinite syndrome - everything from an alternate outfit to an additional equipment is contained within a marginally expensive DLC that adds up to a significant expense. Or the plots that get tossed around different platforms and you might not get to play the rest of the series because of that (World Meteor Actor, here I come).

It’s funny how game companies do everything they can to convince you to buy legal copies of old games whether through remakes of games or legal action and yet most of the time all it does is convince people that emulating or pirating are just better options all around

Hey just thought I’d deliver the bad news. Since the PlayStation came out in 1995, it has passed retro and had now fallen into the category of vintage. We still got about 70 years before it becomes an antique though. I can feel my age slowly weighing me down.

Biggest problem today is games are coming out super unfinished and companies think they can finish making the game thru patches after we buy it, Its sick cuz i see it with almost every game now

Low standards is the biggest one. If you make people not care about the quality of why l what they're putting out then why should i as a consumer. A lot of people are feeling this way too.

I love how modern gaming has changed rapidly because of 2 technical advances, then collapsed like dominos we got massive graphical upgrades with 3D gaming and that led to day 1 broken messes which could be fixed because of the advance of internet which allowed for instant and free patching...which led to rushed/lazy development cycles for a game then these longer/lazier development cycles that led to massive losses needed to be subverted with price hikes and microtransactions and general predatory behavior...which pissed off customers journalists started seeing the discontent nature around gaming and stoked/subverted the flame for their own financial and ideological backed power moves this led to these rushed/lazy devs to develop a sort of Stockholm syndrome and now, they view the idea that players...playing a game leads to them getting more flack so they force games to be like movies to constrain gamers ability to find bugs, allow themselves to justify a higher price/microtransactions because "you are going to be playing this for 40 hours!" and allows them to placate/cooperate with journalists and their ideological conditioning for protection from criticism or targeting games that force them to look at how bloated their carcass has become all this led to the business side getting spooked because these compounding problems hit new products the hardest because you can handle a flop with an established IP, but a new IP has no exploitable or "safe" audience that will always buy a product even if everyone from the business side, the developers, and the customers knows it is going to flop so it is just better to remake established IPs and have cash cow revenue at the end of the year

Corruption ruined gameing.

this is why i only play indie games💀

2 things are prioritized over gameplay. Politics, and spectacle. They'll make """realistic""" graphics, several stupifd game-padding sidequests, and the ability to fuck any dog in the game before they make the actualy gameplay worth your time. Because people have been conditioned to look for the most """"content""" for their buck.

I miss when you could unlock characters in games. Now they're micro transactions

I was fine with remaking games that could benefit from such treatment. But now we're remaking gems like RE4 or Dead Space that really didn't need remakes. Can't wait for RE5 Remake and Capcom to mess up the canon more. I prefer good remasters now, especially for games that have been not available for years now due to stuff like licensing hell. It'd be nice to play an official rerelease for Aliens Vs Predator 2 2001 and The Punisher 2005. If Turok 3 can finally be remastered, so can those two one day. The current state of AAA gaming has pretty much killed my interest in most new games. I've got a few indie and AA games coming I hope will be good, but I have not guarantee they'll be great either.

Though I love remakes, but I much prefer to just have the option to play the original games on modern consoles or platforms.

That last line actually made me shed a tear🫡

Another point about journalists: the whole ‘hot take’ or using games as a way to talk about world issues? Guess what? YOU CAN JUST GO TO A KZfaqR FOR THAT TOO AND IT WILL BE INFINITELY BETTER THAN WHATEVER THEY SAY. There are a lot of talented creators that do a fantastic job at game analysis, and it can either stop there or go on to use the game as a way to talk about current day issues; which isn’t an inherently bad thing. The difference between the creator and the journalist is that most of the time, the creator’s video is a lot more thought out, comes from a genuine place, and oftentimes will go the extra mile to analyze the history behind their subjects. Not every KZfaqr is going to be great, but I’ve been able to find so many great analyses on YT of games that ultimately leave me with a greater appreciation for both creators and the developers behind games. Most journalists on the other hand just want a place to vent their frustrations. I’m not opposed to that, but maybe don’t do that for every article you write…

Sudden hiatuses, unnecessary censorship, out of touch,overpromising, and don't forget poor localisation and lazy UI designs and details.

I play Xbox 360 these days, and it’s been so fun to dive back into the catalog of games I missed. Not as many micro transactions, good games, and a reason to keep existing. Going on PS4 it feels vastly inferior. Don’t even get me started on Gran Turismo 7. I stopped playing my Switch from how bad Joy Con are.

Games need to at least function. Even if games aren’t all that interesting, functioning is a big important part of an enjoyable or at least average experience. I definitely hate it nowadays, that bigger titles can’t even do that. I do have to wonder if video game journalism helped ruin video games.

As a sf6 fan, it's not even a costume for a character, it only effects the avatar So it's not a big deal

“The KZfaqr more often than not has better comedy, a better personality, and you won’t have to worry about them having a mental breakdown about how awful our world is during a PS5 review.” Yeah but, unfortunately, some KZfaqrs have gone the way of complaining how awful our world is and have essentially pushed people away from their channels because of that. Cough *Angry Joe*

Honestly one of my issues with gaming is how many mediocre and outright bad games are liked and get a good score. Still kinda stunned that Totk got almost perfect ratings despite being the disappointing and boring game I’ve played this year.

The thing I hate the most happened with Tony Hawk on PS4 where the game wouldn't install the whole thing offline with the physical disc, you had to download the rest of the game, second is the "games don't have to be fun" that bothers me to reasons of what can be fun, music, gameplay, glitches, narratives, third obviously microtransactions :3

“Ignore the journalists” Something that the Quatering, yellow flash, and a lot of anti woke “gaming” yourubers BADLY need to hear lmao

Man, “Yu-Gi-Oh: Duelist of The Roses” Came With That Awesome Background Music!!!

1:42 Yep. Young MJ won't find any discouragement from me. All he had to do was finish his move, and he could get on the stage with that. 👍

I honestly have 3 games on my potato lap top , WC 3 , CS 1.6 , AND C&C Generals And I still enjoy them alot , i will start playing modern games when i get a good pc , but i dont think ill enjoy them anymore since ive got better things to do on the future , but it doesnt seems like im missing out alot

Also speaking of Ideologies, when we talk of diversity, it isnt even the ethnic or sexual diversity that I take issue with at all, it is the bad dialouge and writing that grinds my gears. Idc if a character is black, white, gay, or straight, or trans, just improve the writing and dialouge. I want more diverse characters but with good characters

Im just glad the baytlepass scene is finally dyong down.

For me gaming is a new thing. I’ll be honest… I only know Nintendo and what I see. I love Sword polish and what I favor to return with its Legendary raid multiplayer adventure with Tundea and Isle de Armor Story. Wow omg SV is good but in the bad way. I didn’t have any issues but heard it for other. If I play a game and it is buggy that it’s a bump I don’t mind it, but if I play a game it turn unplayable or tri-hard to finish. Did we all forget 06? NGL, I didn’t get Octo Expansion because it’s 50 bucks… Yeah I’m not getting until it’s like 20. Skip on getting the return to Inkoplisis because it’s just a new area hub with no nostalgia but will later for the new story. The only game I felt nice that I played was Bayo 3. I felt great experience. It was entertaining to watch, had great gameplay, and no DLC. But if I can show my inner creator. I have been tempted by other to emulate games but refusing. I am thankful that I can replay Bayonetta 1 and 2 on switch later for what 40. I am guilty of feeding the Pokémon machine but it something that just close. I actually going into the Journalism to fix this or try, or if you want to something right you gotta it yourself be the change you want to be now. The only thing I can say is power to the player, company have more interest in there wallets. So thank for inspiring me MangaKamen.

90s was the golden age, 2000s and early 2010s was the Renaissance, and late 2010s to now is the dark age.

You know the "Finish it Later" used to neat before billion dollar corps got their hands on the idea. It used to be called Alphas and Betas. Minecraft started that way. To the point where when I 1st played it, in like 2010, I was convinced it was horrible and would go nowhere. Baldur's Gate 3 another good one. Wouldn't be nearly as good, if that hadn't released builds and taken feedback. Used to be you could buy and unfinished game at 5-10 bucks and see where it went. (You can still kinda do that now, but more than likely, you could of given that money to the local homeless dood on your local street corner. And it would be been a far better use of it.) Now you pay AT LEAST $70, to get a glorified demo, a few months before launch, they call a beta (So they can blame any bugs or bad gameplay on: "It's not released.") Made by a large team of people(sometimes in the 1000's) that can barely make a function game, let alone fun. That's before the microtransactions. That you get beaten over the head with at every possible moment.

You would THINK, with the shift toward "digital only" sales that games would actually get CHEEPER, since they don't have to worry about all costs involved with physical sales. But no, Raise the price, pay more for less, YOU WILL OWN NOTHING AND BE HAPPY! Overpriced Microtranscation, Scummy In Game Stores, NFTS, Unfinished Releases, Live Services without "live service", Obsessive amounts of DLC, Overpriced DLC, Crunch culture burning out Devs, Companies Chasing Trends, so on and so forth. All of this and more is why "Modern Gaming" SUCKS. "voting with your wallet" sounds all and good, till you hear EAs next shitty sports game somehow sells MORE copies each year and makes BILLIONS on its microtransactions. It really doesn't matter, the House always Wins. Like you said though, thats what the Indie game scene and AA games are for. AAA is just NOT WORTH the Price anymore. Hell on average id say more games these days are probably worth 30 bucks, 40 at a premium. Anything above that and your getting ripped off and anything below that is a steal.