A different flavor of game
Developing video games was not always as much about risk aversion as it is these days. Who could blame the few billion dollar corporations in the game industry for always playing it safe when it comes to investing up to fifty million dollars on a modern full retail game? No matter how much time and money a developer may spend on focus testing and streamlining game features for a broader audience, they will always lose some of the small yet dedicated group of so-called “hardcore” gamers. Though not entirely wrong, I feel labeling a collective group as hardcore simply because of differing tastes gives those not familiar with more obscure and/or foreign games a misleading and sometimes negative idea about what this group of people is really interested in.
All it takes to be a hardcore gamer is dedication, but you can be dedicated to any game or kind of games you like. Millions of people buy the latest iterations of games like Halo or Call of Duty each year and a good chunk of that audience spends what many would feel is an unhealthy amount of time shooting fellow fools online. These people are certainly dedicated, but I would doubt the games they spend so much of their lives on are of any value to them other than to kill time in the many moments of their lives in which they have nothing better to do. Essentially, what I feel these gamers lack in order to ascend to any higher level of gamer than just “hobbyist” is passion. When you become passionate for something, it defines you. I don’t know of any easy terms that properly describe what I consider to be a passionate gamer, but what sets this group apart from the rest in the gaming community is the unwavering passion to discover and explore the many diverse ranges of emotions and experiences that the interactive story telling tools exclusive to the medium provide.
That was my long winded way of saying the kind of gamer I consider myself to be cannot subsist only on games with high production values provided by development studios of up to three hundred employees funded by crazy rich companies because by nature these games rarely offer the new or unique experiences I desire. The independent game development scene is what I find myself turning to whenever I feel the need for something new. Websites like http://www.tigsource.com or real life events like the Independent Games Festival and Penny Arcade Expo celebrate the exploration of new ideas in gaming by shining the spotlight on independent game developers.
I’m doing a pretty terrible job here of trying to get around to what this blog is actually supposed to be about. This is also admittedly kind of a last minute thing, so I should just get on with it already. The place that consistently produces the most interesting independently developed games is the ill-defined region I will refer to as Eastern Europe. It is a misleading label since what are often thought of as eastern European games can come from anywhere from Norway to Bulgaria to Latvia or to some of the western areas of Russia (not a very European place at all!). One of the largest contributing factors to the development of games in these regions is the fact that computer (PC) gaming dominates the market in all these areas since game console manufacturers take too long or often never even release their consoles in those regions. To have a good gaming PC in the nebulous Eastern European region pretty much guarantees you are serious about your hobby and game developers in the area make games for their serious PC gaming audience. While here in North America game development has shifted its focus to mass market console gaming, PC games still thrive over there. An extra ten or so years of focus on PC gaming development in those regions has resulted in many good examples of unique games with unique atmospheres.
I suppose examples of such games and analyses of their many diverse elements will be for a future blog post.
Yo, StacE! You’ve got some pretty neat stuff here! I like how you talk about the passionate gamers. The two games that have ever actually made me want to cry are Final Fantasy VIII and Metal Gear Solid. These games have truly left their mark of excellence in my lifetime. I was easily absorbed by the storyline, characters, music, and graphics of FFVIII, and I was in utter dread when the game was over. I was about 8 or 9 at the time, and I still think about that game a lot. The music on its own is a masterpiece. The same goes for Metal Gear Solid, ESPECIALLY when Meryl gets all shot up by Sniper Wolf. I had grown so attached to Meryl…
Anyway, I understand where you are coming from about passionate gamers. I admit that I play Halo 3 and used to be obsessed with it, but no games have really affected me as much as the ones I described above. They really had an impact on me.
Reading about the differences between “Western” games and “Eastern European” games lays an interesting foundation for psychological/cultural research related to gaming… oh to produce more studies that are game-related…
The point you make about consoles not often reaching some countries is interesting and something I honestly didn’t know or even think to realize before.
What I wonder is this: What else contributes to the different style of games and the different mindset people have in the “Eastern European” block. I could potentially write a thesis on this and, further, somehow convince my department that it is relevant to my specific degree course >_>.
I have asked the former editor in chief of Computer Gaming World magazine for at least the text of a sort one of his freelancers wrote after visiting the developers of STALKER. I never read the feature since CGW died before I knew to subscribe, if he can get it for me and the feature is as good as most everything else in CGW, then I will hopefully be able to write something good from it.
Its funny how awkward comments can be when they are written via cell phone. Especially when the cell phone likes to predict random words occasionally and I don’t catch them.