The future of gaming?

It is well recognized that a vast majority of the current generation considers themselves to be gamers, at least a little bit. I’d be willing to say that an even more vast majority of the population spends at least a decent amount of time, every day, playing games (video or otherwise). Yet it seems like the mainstream gaming community is focused mostly on the same “gamer” concepts. How quickly can you aim and shoot? How are your reflexes? When things get intense, can you still be accurate? These games have done very well in the market. League of Legends, Apex Legends, Super Smash Bros., Call of Duty, they all scratch the gamer itch, but don’t really appeal to a wide audience. No disrespect to those titles, I love them all, but I think there’s a way forward that will be more beneficial to the gaming community and to our society as a whole, a shift in focus that speaks to a broader audience for more than just high-intensity experiences. I'm sure you're expecting me to write about VR, AR, and the like, but let's address the source first. The games themselves.

My thoughts on this come from two places in particular. The first being a course on marketing that I took a few years ago. Mind you, I’m not the greatest marketer of all time, and I don’t pretend I know better than anyone. That being said, a certain concept caught my attention and has continued to do so since then: Your competition isn’t other people doing what you do, your competition is anyone who makes something that could take someone’s time and money instead of you. Let me explain. When I think of gaming and the concept of creating new gaming experiences, my “target audience” is more broad. This is where the second source of my view comes from. Less than a month ago I got married. Yes, it was the greatest day of my life, but since dating who is now my wife my gaming interests have changed. Gaming is what I do to have fun, I don’t watch much TV. She’s not as much of a gamer, but she does enjoy certain games. For a long time my hobby has been finding co-op games that she would like, that I would also enjoy. Is it possible? Of course! We’ve found a few indie games that we can sink hours into. But is it easy? No. Therein lies the issue.

Gamers, ponder this: Think of the people you like to spend time with. Are any of them non-gamers, or less gamers than you? What do you do together? Go see a movie? Get some dinner? Watch TV? Hit up a bar? All fun times. Now ask yourself this: Wouldn’t you rather be gaming with those people? Gamers know, there’s a connection formed when you join forces with someone to accomplish the common goals that gaming provides, but those friends don’t like the games you play. Or maybe, you don’t like their contributions to those games. 😂🤣The unfortunate truth about multiplayer games these days is that there is a decent amount of gatekeeping before the sense of accomplishment is allowed to kick in. Think of your favorite competitive game: how many games would your dad have to play before he felt like he was ok at it? Apex Legends, PUBG, Fortnite, or any other royale-type game. The first thing a new player will do is die and completely lose the game… yippee… League of Legends, DOTA, Pokémon Unite, or any other MOBA. The first thing a new player will do when entering a full multiplayer match is get flamed by teammates for not knowing the intricacies of the game… so fun… Among Us or other types of board/party games. The first thing a new player will do is hang out with their friends and have a chance… wait… that one sounds good? What’s the difference here?

It seems, to me, that game designers have begun focusing on something that makes games that require more and more time dedicated before one feels proficient. Don’t get me wrong, I love competition and I’m a huge proponent of “git gud” but not everyone is… and I still want to play with those people! So again, what’s the difference? I think it has to do, mostly, with the skill sets involved in being “good” at a specific game. A lot of multiplayer games these days, while having different rules and mechanics, have very similar core abilities needed to be “good” at them. This means that a “gamer” will pick up on a new game very quickly but a new player will probably need a bit more time to get used to it. That’s not inherently bad, but it does mean that there is an entire group of people who probably will never play those games.

The key skills that a gamer uses are essentially lesser versions of skills used when sword fighting: sharp reflexes, reading opponents, memorizing information about the game like maps or the way a character moves when using a certain ability. All of these skills are totally valid in their own way, but if they are necessary for competitive play then people who don't have those skills, or don't care to develop them, are effectively shunned from the community. Aren't there other skills that can be competitive? Look at a majority of board and card games. Look at social and party games. Sure, they're not as competitive, but what skills are necessary to feel proficient in THOSE? This is where the industry has a chance to turn the tides. What if those skills were more competitive? What if we could usher in an age where one's ability to play chess better could evenly counter someone's ability to get to a gun and click "shoot" faster? That's where we start bringing people together. To those competitive gamers: do you want to have better reflexes than everyone else, or do you want your reflexes to outmatch any skill in all competitions?

So how do we get there? Well, I think it's a twofold process. First, and foremost, there needs to be a shift in the marketing strategy while building a game. I don't want to make a game that will be a better FPS than Counter Strike. I don't want to make a game that's a better fighter than Street Fighter. I want to make a game that convinces a group of friends that they can wait to see the next Marvel movie until it comes out on Disney+. Lofty dreams, I know, but the gaming industry wasn't built on following the status quo. The more the the content of game design becomes suited to attracting the casual gamer, the faster we transition into gaming being the most dominant entertainment medium out there. I hear you asking "But Zac, won't that alienate the current gaming community? Doesn't that just translate to making easier, less satisfying games?" No, fair reader, not at all. That's where the art of our industry kicks in. How do we scratch the competitive itch while not gatekeeping? This is the second part of the process: find ways that other skills can compete with the standard gamer skills.

We know that bringing people together as a team forms a wonderful bond and releases all those good stuffs in the brain, so let's call that a standard for the remainder of this article. Let's consider a real-world scenario, something basic: You and 4 friends are trying to clean the house as quickly as possible. We're all gamers, we're all problem solvers, what's the best solution? In the current meta of the gaming world, the answer is to divide the house into 5 sections and everyone does one. Let me ask you this: What if someone on your house cleaning team is really short, and can't reach the tops of the windows? What if someone has bad knees and a bad back and can't reach the ground to dust baseboards? What if someone is crazy ADD and doesn't recognize that the pile of magazines and mail on the desk doesn't count as "clean" because it's stacked neatly? What if someone is color blind and accidentally puts a red sock in the whites load?! Welcome to the chaos that is the current gaming world. A player has to be good at everything or else they hold back their team, but what if we could change the game to fit the skills that the players already have? What if, instead of dividing the house into 5 sections, we divide specific work to the people who are most proficient with it? The short person dusts baseboards, the ADD person sorts laundry, the person with bad joints does windows, the color blind person tidies up piles of junk. Now everyone has a sense of accomplishment, focusing on the skills at which they are proficient! Wouldn't it be nice if a player's real-world experience could be a part of their gaming experience?

The biggest example of this, that I can think of, is Asymmetrical Multiplayer games. The concept is simple: Everyone is playing the same game, but everyone is playing in a different way. Dead by Daylight is a good example of this. One player is trying to kill the rest, while the others all work together to escape. One is aggressive, the others are evasive. That being said, I'd like to address a genre that hasn't hit the mainstream as much just yet: Asymmetrical Co-op. A team game in which each player holds a unique role to the point that they appear to be playing different games. I insist you go find these games, but I really believe in the concept. The hardcore gamer can scratch the gamer itch, and the more casual gamer can enjoy solid gameplay without feeling useless. Clandestine is a good example. One player is a spy playing a stealth game, the other is a hacker playing a hacking game. They work together to accomplish a shared goal but effectively reach such a goal with completely different rules and skillsets. Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes is another fun one where only one character can interact with the bomb while everyone else has the clues about it. These kinds of games allow that sense of teamwork without requiring everyone to have the usual gamer skills imbedded in their fingers.

Let me give you another example. I am a bit of a thinker and strategist, myself. My best friend, who is a MEGA gamer, is much more into action games. When we play shooters and fighters, I either don't pose a huge challenge to him or I don't contribute to the team as much as I could. When we play management and base building games, he tends to get board. Then one day, the heavens parted and we found Automata Break, an Asymmetrical VR Co-op game. I play a tower defense game, he plays a shooter on that map. We work together, beating robots and stopping them from reaching our base. I got to be tactical and strategic, playing by the ruleset that makes me comfortable, and he got to be aggressive and fast, playing by the ruleset that makes him comfortable. Is it a perfect game? No, certainly not. Truth be told, I'm hoping to contact the owner of the studio and get involved somehow. I mention this because it's a proof of concept to the future that I envision.

This begs the question: can these games be competitive? Board games exist. People who don't have gamer reflexes compete all the time. Who's to say that a game like this couldn't be just as competitive as Overwatch? It's just a different kind of competition. It's a competition where each member of the team is expected to cover a different aspect of the shared goal, rather than one player being able to 1v5 (assuming that's even possible in said game). Game fans come in many shapes and sizes. Some like the competitive side and some like to watch it. I fully believe that games like this can build in the competitive edge that those players miss out on, simply because their skillset is different.

So let's answer the question of the future of gaming. What does it look like? Well, I see it going one of two ways. The first is the status quo. Small studios create charming games that families and friends can enjoy while larger studios cater to the more "hardcore" of gamers, creating games that gatekeep those who want to spend hours honing skills in a game and those that have other things to do. There will eternally be two sides of game culture: those who are gamers, and those who are not. The other way is the reimagining of the gaming industry as a true form of entertainment for the masses. Game designers realizing that if they create games that are as accessible to a wide audience as movies and TV are, that they can grow the gaming community into so much more than what it is. Video games create portals to new worlds, the ability for people to escape the real world for just a moment and feel greater than they are. I hope that I'm not the only one who sees this future and I hope that game designers start to, at least, explore what this kind of mindset can bring to gaming.