Fans are continually looking for the latest and the greatest from their big budget games, causing the cost of development to increase to never before seen heights and even leading to the death of beloved studios.
Codemasters has unveiled a series of massive changes to the Career Mode in F1 24. Players will finally be able to play as a current superstar.
Bandai Namco have announced a console and PC game of the Tensura series - that of That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime ISEKAI Chronicles.
Wrath: Aeon of Ruin has come about via some old classical inspiration. If you liked Quake, DOOM, Hexen or the like, then you're going to love this as it blasts onto Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo Switch.
It's why we're seeing so many cross gen games.
I think we'll see more subscription model attempts, more DLC, more downloadable side-projects....
Games as we know them are dead.
Budgets for AAA games are too damn high. If you budget and market your game accordingly with realistic expectations, you'll be fine.
Look at Dark Souls, that game had a smaller budget and loot at how well it sold.
Publishers need to stop blowing their loads.
The 7th gen has seen the fall of many a studio some of which I grew up with and even more that are still around but haven't made a game in years. Its only going to get worse. Some companies didn't even survive the jump to the PS3/360 and I fear how many will fall when the PS4/One arrive. THQ was the canary in the coal mine. That wasn't some small developer with a handful of ips.
I believe many will fall like they did in '83. The problem is these games really don't cost as much as some are making them out to be. Some games like GTA ya, they do cost more just because of the vast size of them. But so many of these games do not cost as much as they try to claim. In the film industry they call it "Hollywood Accounting" where in reality it should not/really does not cost as much as they say it does.
I remember with Black Ops they said "Ooo look we got Gary Oldman, and Sam Worthington in it. As well as David Goyer writing the script. And funny enough the game would have sold as much with out those things. Too many game devs are worrying about how to make the game with absurd production value, instead of actual gameplay. They don't seem to understand that games can be done cheaper, and it's the publishers that keep trying to shove a broken business model at it thinking that we are the problem rather then themselves.
I think it will be a good thing, and indie studios will take over again. Video games will come back stronger then ever if there truly is another crash. Which in some ways I hope there is. Because the industry has lost a lot of it's creativity in the past generation. They worry too much about sales rather then..."Is it fun?"