Are Today's Games Too Complex?

After reading a majority of the posts on this topic I don't think most of you are grasping the scope of view Miyamoto is looking through. Remember that Miyamoto was making games since the very early 80's and I'm sure playing them before that. His first real game he made was Donkey Kong in 1981 (if memory serves correctly). Also keep in mind his experience is in the Japanese market where there are MANY more games and MANY more types of games. Anybody familiar with Japanese arcade games knows there are many amazing and simple puzzle and action games that never made it to the US which are surprisingly fun.

In response to many posts in this discussion: so games are getting less complex? So you're telling me that GTA:SA, HL2, Doom3, etc. are all less complex than Donkey Kong? Think of how that sounds and I'll let you answer that question yourself.

Miyamoto is making an observation that the landscape of gaming has changed drastically over the past 25 years. At 1980, nearly everybody could just pick up and play a game without much effort. It was about frantic and twitch gameplay. 25 years later it's dazzling 3d real-time environs with involved stories, characters, and scripts. There are titles that require a lot of time to get to the meat of the title. The focus 25 years ago used to be the gameplay (the actual game), the focus now is making them more visually realistic and parallel to real-life. Games used to be about escaping reality, now they are about simulating reality.

With the shift of focus in gaming the past 25 years, it has cultured a very faithful gaming community but it has also alienated that many more. For every person who plays games, there are several more who wish they could play games. Think of your parents, your grandparents, some of your friends, maybe your significant other, brother or sister. They might just fall into that category. Nintendo and Miyamoto recognize this trend of the past 25 years and see a great opportunity. Re-introduce gaming to those who want to get into gaming but are too intimidated by today's games and give today's gamers something new. Nintendo seems to feel gaming needs to be more accessible to everybody.

The DS was their first step with this new philosophy. Many hardcore gamers write it off as a gimmick, many others think it is a very refreshing strike at creativity. However the new and unique titles on the DS are definately catching the eye of the alienated gamer. I can not tell you how many people I know who don't play games see my DS and try it out and want to buy one right after playing one game.

Revolution will be the next step in the "N Philosophy." I don't believe the idea behind Revolution is to go back in time to where we were 25 years ago, but to take gaming in a new direction based on the technology of today with inspiration of yesterday. I am personally interested and intrigued to see what comes of this.

Honestly, each game that comes out today becomes less and less complex. This is why, in my opinion, PC gaming is slowly dying.

If you look at past games, you'll see how in depth they are. Compare Baldur's Gate II to Neverwinter Nights. Both great games, but there is no comparison in complexity. The Baldur's Gate series is the most in depth RPG in existance.

Role Playing Games are probably the best example of this. Look at the new RPGs coming out for PCs as well as consoles. They're all "dumbed-down". Not to bash consoles too much, but most games are dumbed-down for general consumption. They're easy to play, easy to get your mind around, and they're very linear. You don't do what you want to do, you do what the game tells you to do.

So to try to keep this short. No, games aren't becoming too complex. It's the opposite, and it's killing PC gaming for some of us.

Trying to teach your kid to play video games is impossible on a PS2 or XBox. My five year old (6 in August), loves to play video games and he can play games like Mario Kart, Smash Brothers, and Monkey Ball. Hell, he can play World of Warcraft because Blizzard made their game so easy to play, but if you actually found a PS2 or XBox game that wasn't rated above T-Teen, he'd look at the controller for 5 seconds and say "lets go play something else".

I don't game anymore because of just this. It's not that it's too complex, but rather too demanding of time. Games these days seldom allow you to play for 15-30 minutes, get some kicks and then walk away. I really only have the time to play one truely involved game a year (KOTOR, Elderscroll, etc usually). And this isn't even getting in to the fact that I'm just plain sick of the whorish games being churned out. One more mediocre half-assed FPS, Sports Game, RTS, MMORPG and I'll scream.

It's this reason why I'm a huge supporter of Nintendo and what they've been trying to do with the Gamecube and what they'll continue doing with Revolution. I want to sit down and play a type of game I've never played before for 30 minutes and get back up satisfied. Call me a fanboy but I really enjoy Miyamoto's strange approach to games. I love how it doesn't rely on looking around at whatever is popular and saying "Let's do that but bigger, prettier, and bloodier." There's nothing better for me than sitting down and saying "How did they think of that? And why is it so much damn fun?"

For every Katamari Damacy on other platforms there's 3 original concept games on nintendo platforms it seems. I'll skip the big libraries of the PS3 and XB360 for those 3-6 games.

I guess I just prefer to watch three films by Wes Anderson over twenty Fast and Furious/XXXInsert Action Flick Template Here] sequels.

My problem with games today isn't their complexity, it's their ease of completion due to the overabundance or "Quick Save" features. Quick Save is killing single player in modern games. They are nice if you have a short attention span and don't want to go through an area over again, but if that's the case maybe Solitaire is better for them. I'd like to see some tough games come about like Ghosts 'n' Goblins, and Super Ghouls 'n' Ghosts. Those were good, simple to understand, but highly difficult games. I still remember the futile feeling of accomplishment when I finally beat Super Ghouls 'n' Ghosts only to find out that I had to go through it again, but this time with the ring I aquired so that I could truly complete the game. Fucking insane. I eventually did it a year or so later, but as a gamer it was worth it.

As an example of my previous Quick Save comment before I end this, think back to the original Mega Man, and what it would be like if it had Quick Save built in (Those with emulators probably already know what this would be like). You reach the boss and hit a save button. Everytime you die you just hit another button and zap, you're right back at the entrence to try again. That's newer single player games in a nutshell, it saps the challenge from them. Sure, I don't have to use it, and I won't, but I sure as hell don't want other people having that convenience. Maybe it's part jealousy, but only a minor part.

I'm not against saving, or passwords, but real-time saving at any point in time is sacrilage.

So basicly the whole article is proving that the world needs another Duke Nukem game.

GEOOOOOOOORGE

The one franchise that has been dumbed down to feed the masses of "instant gratifcation" kiddies that have a brain freeze when a game requires more than 3 buttons that bothers me the most? Mechwarrior. I will never ever forgive mircosoft for what they have done to that franchise. The hardpoint system introduced in mechwarrior 4, while deviating from battletech rules, was IMHO brilliant. The rest of the game, and the Unrealmechtournamentassault series, makes me weep a little bit :(

I've had GTA:SA since Christmas. I've played about an hour of it. I just don't feel any motivation to learn another GTA city, plus I don't care for the setting. Nigga this, nigga that, fo shizzle, blah blah...it's too much. I didn't like Kingpin for a similar reason.

Well - games are more sophisticated than they were in earlier day, but imo much too easy. Look at Max Payne - what a game ! - but after 6- 10 hours anyone is through - casual and excessiv gamers alike. Also many many many game ideas are being reheated again and again, like beating on a dead horse. Novalogics Deltaforce Series, Diablo-Clones, 3rd Person Shooters..Sneak Games (Thief, Hitman, Splintercell etc.).

Just like the Hollywood Industry, the gaming industry is running out of new concepts, imaginative game storylining and open ways of solving problems. NOLF for example did a nice job, hitman too to offer the player several non-linear ways of solving a level/map.

Be creative ! Especially with computer games, no limits to ideas and comcepts is given, anything is doable.

Other than RTS games, the rest of the games should be simple. Especially FPS's. That's why I love Quake series.

BEJEWELLED (sp?) owned me.

Complexity isn't the issue. Thousands of Rogue/Nethack/Slash'em players can attest to that. It's the lack of new ideas. Rehashing the same ideas with each new generation of technology can only go on for so long. It's happening with movies as well. half of the films made in the last year were either sequels or remakes.

Gaming examples:
GTA:Elite in a car
Tomb Raider: Prince of Persia/Out of This World/Flashback
Any First Person Shooter: Any other FPS (Barring a few exceptions)
Diablo and any number of clones: Roguelikes

Having said all that, using a formula doesn't automatically mean that the game sucks, every one I just listed is a damn good game by most accounts. The problem is sifting through 400 "Blade of Firey Dark Torments: And Other Inconsequential Events, With Tatoos" To get to a single Half Life 2, Doom 3, or Far Cry. And then you can't even count on the same series holding up to the standard set by its prequels: Tomb Raider/Prince of Persia etc.

If you want better games, pony up the cash for the rare innovators out there. Play Nethack, whatever. Just support the quirky ones that are different. And don't bitch when they try really hard and fail spectacularly. (Black and White is a perfect example of this one.) Shit, at least they tried.

And ask, where's my flying car, they told me I'd have a flying car!

I definitely agree with the complexity argument. I used to be a pretty hardcore gamer, and played PC, Intellivision, NES, SNES, Genesis, and early Saturn games with a passion. I started to level off around N64 and PSX, and my interest has steadily declined.

The problem is definitely complexity, and initial learning curve. I find pretty few games these days that I can pick up and play without studying the manual and memorizing all the bizarre combinations of buttons necessary to "control" the character.

A great example of this is the Splinter Cell series. I downloaded the Chaos Theory demo, and gave it a whirl. Well, I never finished the first level, and in fact got sick of it around ten minutes in. There are simply too many controls, and too much up-front learning required before I can even determine whether or not the game is worth my time. It's ridiculous!

Now, Nintendo seems to have recognized this problem awhile ago, and introduced the context-sensitive "action" button to combat this sort of problem. And it does work pretty well. But Nintendo's most admirable gameplay trait is, as someone mentioned above, their insistence on not simplicity, but elegance. What's the minimum set of controls I need? This is reflected not only in their game design, but also their controller design -- the Gamecube controller is a masterwork because it forces games to distill their interactions down to "one analog stick, one big primary button, and a few ancillary buttons." You can't tell me that the PS2 and XBox controllers aren't frighteningly complex the first time you see them.

So, what've I been playing lately? Donkey Konga and DK Jungle Beat on Gamecube. Alien Hominid on PS2. And Darwinia on the PC.

I'm sure I'll love your game once I've spent five or six hours getting used to it, but you need to suck me in to make me want to spend that much time in the first place. Get your controls right, and I'll be willing to give your title a shot.

Here's to the old days, of the two-button NES controllers.

I wholeheartedly applaud nintendo for sticking with what they're doing in this aspect, as going against the mass fashion will undoubtabley cost them, at least in potential profits, but I can't say that I'm in total agreement with them. I wouldn't entirely agree that the issue could be purely boiled down to a complexity issue in such a black/white way. The thing is, imho, that the best games are always those that while initially accessible hold an underlying complexity or challenge that keep the game worth playing past it's initial freshness, right now I'm thinking of soul calibur as a good example: sure it's fun just to mess about with but once you're hooked you discover a new side to it, that's what has kept me playing it for so damn long (and I have a criminally low attention span).. nobody wants a game that's uber simple, where's the fun in that after 10mins? it all comes down to the learning curve, thats the difference between good and bad design, if a game has pushed you all it can after an hour of play then where's the incentive to continue? I think the major crime in games today is the constant copy-catting and games that hold their subject matter higher than the fun aspect. it seems more important that games now follow a trend of some sort rather than deliver decent gameplay. it seems like the freeform imagination of games is decaying further with every forward step we take in technology, when all designers had was a few pixels to push around then they had to be incredibly imaginative ,as did the players :). This is such a shame because anyone would think that the better tech we now have would allow designers to be increasingly crazy with what they can dream up (katamari is an overused example but a pretty perfect one). I can't help but feel this is the fault of publishers, just as hollywood stifles writers that think outside of the proverbial box it looks like the games industry is turning the same way. if nintendo are willing to take the gamble of putting out games that are a little more off-the-wall because they stand up on a gameplay/design/fun level ,wich they seem to be, then good for them.

the answer is no. GIVE ME MORE!

Today's games are getting less complex in my opinion. There are complex games out there - (if you are into space sims - check out X2 the threat, and the soon to be released X3)


San Andreas wasn't complex - it was just big - if you played vice city you were more than prepared for the 3 or 4 new features in SA.

Anyway, I stopped playing nintendo after N64. Though I miss Zelda and Metroid, I don't at all miss Mario - or the slew of childish chuckeechesses games featured on gamecube.

Don't know if it's the complexity, for me it's when game starts feeling like a job that I get disinterested. Any game that requires "babysitting" for instance - I'll use Half-Life 2 as an example; Alyx was nice eye candy, but I got pretty tired of hearing her say "protect me, Gordon." And after all that protecting did we get a stip tease? Nope, we just cock-blocked by the G-Man. Other scenarios, like excessive box moving = major suck. Nothing's going on, you're just moving boxes around to get past a puzzle the dev's think you'll find entertaining in order to complete the game. Moving boxes around is menial work, not entertainment.

A game should be a careful balance of fun and challenge, have a good storyline to hold interest, and ultimatly serve as a distraction from the normal day to day BS.

Of course games are too complex, for monkies!!

With the absolutely huge variety of games and sales at an all time high I don't see what the problem is. There are both massively complex and simple party games out there to play for all consoles and PC, there isn't any kind of change necessary imo. Not everyone wants to play just Donkey Kong and Mario Kart and I think sales prove that, but kudos to Nintendo for trying to attract a new audience I guess.

Games today too complex? Hasn't anyone ever play Falcon 4.0 (400+ page manual), Daggerfall, Homeworld, Die by the Sword, Trespasser, Civilization 2, the vastly complex racing sims by Papyrus (Grand Prix Legends), Independence War, Ultima VII (almost completely interactive environment), etc...?

Games are complex in the sense that they are hard to play for a beginner but are relatively simple in terms of substance.

Simple games are available for free , people play tons of simple flash games everyday. Consumers just aren't willing to pay for stuff they can get easily and legally for free - which is why only huge collections of simple games (or extremely good simple games) seem to sell, such as fusion frenzy or mario party.

And I must add that the reason why I have less of an interest in gaming nowadays is because they've become less complex, at least PC gaming that is...

I've long said that games should allow complex actions from simple controls. Make it easy and intuitive to pick up a game and get into it, but provide a lot of depth to what can be done without requiring people to learn 50 buttons or insane combinations of buttons.

In other words, in my book, Quake is fucking great (an incredible amount of depth to what you can do from basically up/down/left/right/shoot), and every fighter since Street Fighter 2 is fucking shit (about 20 different moves but you have to learn some spastic, unintuitive input system to reliably pull any of them off).

Note: IN MY BOOK. I know some people like fighting games and that's cool, they just don't work for me and this is why.

I am also sick of cutscenes and overwrought stories. Sometimes I get really into a game and they're fine in stuff like GTA:SA (especially since you can skip them) and in moderation between levels like in Splinter Cell. But so far, having owned it for 6 months and loaded it once, I cannot be bothered playing MGS3 because I don't want to sit through the 30 minute cut-scene at the beginning (before the 5 seconds of gameplay drops out to another 10 minutes of people talking... argh), although it's partly also because I can't stand the fixed camera angles where you can't see shit now that I'm so used to SC.

To me, they are talking about a game like Unreal Championship 2. It's all a matter of controls. To frag someone; I pick up some Adrenaline, activate an Adrenaline boost by hitting a combo of a couple buttons and a trigger, click the right thumbstick to track them with my camera (which is not the same as my crosshairs) switch to first person mode, switch to the lowest level weapon, charge it up and shoot them to "freeze" them, switch to third person mode, run up to them with both triggers pressed to keep safe with my shields, activate a 6 or 7 button combo finishing move (different for each character) and hope that all goes smooth. Each character has different properties and skills. Each weapon has 2 OR 3 firing modes. That takes alot of practice! Sure Doom 3is as simple as can be... but to design a really fast multiplayer game with attributes of a shooter, platformer and fighter... who can master a game like that if they work full time? It doesn't help me that the levels are easy to get around in.

Lack of great singleplayer campaigns is what bugs me the most about today's games. We get these dinky 18 hour games and then you're supposed to fill up on multiplayer. Well, I'm not really into playing paintball on my computer.

Another annoying thing is the graphics whoring, it's causing the whole industry to stagnate. I feel cheated everytime I upgrade my computer to play the newest shiny game. It's still the same fucking game I played on my P90.

I wish graphics would just hold up a minute and let gameplay catch up to it, that's how we got those great games from the late 90's.

Anyone who thinks San Andreas has a steep learning curve should stick to playing that Kirby Air Ride game where you only have to use one button.

needs more shooters (or shmup's or whatever you want to call them).

need more games that require SKILL and induce raw controller chucking frustration.
too bad the US can't seem to do those correctly!

need less emphasis on 3d tech/features, need more art direction, design and illustration!

oh and gameplay. gameplay so solid and challenging that it could be done with point's lines and planes and still be fun...

needs more games that you can pick up for 20 minutes and enjoy 100% in that time.

I've fallen out of gaming because the vast majority of games are stupidly easy any more. Old games required skill to beat, whereas most new ones only require the person to be breathing for 8-15 hours.

Different games for different dorks!!! It's all about preference (genres, etc) and an issue of time and how much you want to dedicate to gaming.

Whatever. Something "controversial" to write about so that your site gets more hits. More hits=more Ad gusto. ::shrug::

It would be nice to have some games to play with my wife. With most games she gets frusatrated before she gets good enough to enjoy them. She didn't grow up playing them like I did.

yeah. well even a game like Full Spectrum Warrior or Fable definitely brings up the argument of control nightmares.

I guess I wish more people would gun after the clunky ass endless barrage of 3-d, 3rd person clunky shooter/platfomer droves. EA is a good example of a publisher that does this shit.

Even rpg's are watered down and derivitave all the time. The only RPG's i even care about coming up in the next god knows when are Elder Scrolls IV and FFXII.

I think that the arguement that Miyamoto is making isn't characterized best with the word "simple". None of his games were just "simple", they were "elegant". That means that the mechanics of his games were simple, but the game design had a lot of depth. The masses are not going to like a game as complicated in its mechanics as Dungeons and Dragons. But they will like a game whose mechanics are simple, but itself is complicated, such as Myst. So I don't thing anyone should hop on this bandwagon thinking that games should be "dumbed down". They just need to have complicated mechanics removed to make the games easier to pick up and less frustrating to play.

If more want "easy" or "turn right only" games then why do the "overly complex" ones sell so well ? Maybe there's nothing wrong with different markets?

Why in the Hell shouldn't there be a divergence from those who want to press jump/jump in a platform and those who want to spend hours on a mmorpg every night

The market will dictate what will/won't be made etc as where there is a profit to be made so be it

It's fine for Nintendo to stick to that then and let the MS and Sony's of the world make the complex ones -

Personally I have no desire to go back to the Mario days and want complex games

Are games too simple or too complex? I think both. I think MP is the intervening factor.
Take BF2. For example: how hard is it to fly a chopper in that game? Not hard.
How hard is it to fly a chopper against an organized defense?
Pretty hard. So hard, in fact, that I don't have the time to practice getting it right.
I'd love nothing better than to zip around rocketing people all night. Please hold still and don't fire back, kthx.

The only thing left in gaming that gets me off is multiplayer. I got bored to death of Doom 3 within hours. HL2 kept my interest for about two weeks.

Something like Quake 2 Rocket Arena though, I could play for the rest of my life.

I'm enjoying the BF2 demo (choppers rule). But in the end, all these games are just too similar.

Slash'em Burn'em Shoot'em....it's getting VERY old.

as long as I have a gun and something to shoot. I'm a happy camper (but not a camper like in CS).

I trend toward MP games that you can jump in & out of due to a lack of free time. SP games are pretty tough for me to stay engaged in due to my schedule. I love most of Nintendo's games for the same reason. I've been working through Super Mario 3 on the GBA for close to a year (maybe playing 20 minutes a month!)

I think there's enough room for both types (simple vs. complex) However one of the reasons gamers are seen as GEEKS is that many games way too complex for other folks' "primitive" brains.

Yeah lets go back to when you could only run to the right in games.