10 Things That'll Make The Next Generation of Games Worthwhile

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Free-to-play as a model has a very negative stigma at the moment, but it's not an inherently evil mode of monetizing games. The concept of letting players try games for free and invest if they like it is an inherently noble premise. What we're seeing though - and where the negativity comes from - is a corruption of this idea where publishers and developers consider the process an excuse to get as much money from customers for every feature of a game.

Through demos, expansion packs, and other age-old practices, we've seen how this method can work in a way that doesn't make the customer feel like they're in an ever-costing treadmill. The trick of the matter though is in providing real benefit for the investment, one that doesn't feel like a cheap pay-to-win situation or one where players feel the need to consistently invest to make the most of their first investment.

Expanding our minds about the free-to-play model (both as developers and consumers) could mean a future where the next generation of games offers an infinite number of new, free experiences with players investing heavily in those they genuinely enjoy. Customers win by getting a very tailored experience for their money, and developers who capitalize on providing that tailoring well could walk away with a lot more money than a simple $60 sale.

In a perfect world, every great idea would be recognized, funded, and promoted by the powers that have the ability to do so but the truth is that it's just not the way things go. There are countless stories of independent game developers starving for a chance, going unrecognized, and finding a place for their idea all on their own through self-publishing but that's only possible when those self-publishing options are available.

Apple's already shown us that great things can come out of a model that cuts out the necessity for a publisher, letting consumers decide what they want rather than having those publishers acting as an intermediary of quality control. Naturally, most self-publishing systems get inundated with a disappointing amount of shovelware, but sometimes it takes a shotgun spray to hit the bullseye.

As it stands right now, if you've got a brilliant idea that you feel needs to be played you'll have to convince a publisher to get your game to market or face a very uncertain future full of personal expense and a potential for no payoff. Upending this with a stable self-publishing platform will make it possible for great creators to get their stories across, regardless of status, and as consumers we all win.

This past generation has shown us not a plethora of new and unique gameplay experiences - a majority of the games released have fallen in the typical categories - but rather a plethora of new gaming interfaces. From motion-based controls like the Wii and the Kinect, to tablets and smartphones enforcing touch-screens, there have been a wealth of new ways to interact with out gaming systems, but not many games that truly capitalize on the opportunity.

The true successes of these platforms have been few and far between because developers are continually mired in old ways of thinking about games. Rather than designing entirely new concepts for these platforms, many of them have simply found ways for these new control types to mirror the old. Every time you've had to waggle a Wii remote to open a door or swipe through menu items with a Kinect, it's one more notch on the "missed potential" scoreboard.

With the Wii U already released and hoping to offer some new asymmetrical gameplay to players, along with other devices like the virtual reality system, Occulus Rift, the variety of unique interfaces is only going to increase. What we need to see if any of these implements of the future are going to be worthwhile for consumers is if they have gameplay experiences specifically catered to them or more of the same old stuff repurposed on new devices.

On the surface social media may just seem like a never-ending stream of likes, retweets, and inane chatter, but at its heart there's something very human driving it. The need to share with one another and express opinions about what we experience is all part of the human experience and systems that enable that are better for taking that into consideration.

Sony's already showed us part of their new online system that integrates your friends' purchase and play habits with their online marketplace to make more personalized recommendations based on titles that will be most socially relevant to you. We've also seen them tout the PlayStation 4's share button that allows players to transmit video of any game they're playing instantly to all friends who care to view it.

Beyond that though, we need to see a gaming system take into account your interests outside gaming, one that can make recommendations based on a much wider view of you as a person. Integrating your general online activity (and all that data we freely throw at Google and Facebook's servers) is a start, but a system that can analyze how those interests compare and contrast with your friends' and how they relate to your gaming experience could lead to a massively personalized and highly social experience.

Since Wii Sports opened the floodgates of casual gaming for the masses, we've seen a massive growth in the overall size and variety of the gaming public. With every major publisher pushing to make their platforms and games as casual-friendly as possible, they've done a great job of offering uncomplex games that are easy to pick up and play regardless of your particular skill level.

What these efforts have yet to do though is offer experiences on-par with the bulk of gaming's content in terms of depth in may regards. There is currently a disconnect between the goal to make a game as accessible as possible and one a more traditional gaming audience would enjoy. While there will always be resistance from either camps to bridge the gap between them, a future where games were not designed as hardcore or casual, rather simply accessible would make a great deal more of the content available on the next generation platforms worthwhile.

The ultimate goal here would be to have games as engaging and as complex as The Witcher or BioShock Infinite without the barriers to entry that scare off many newcomers. This requires a deconstruction of the concept that the desires of traditional and new players are immediately in opposition, which should be easy because it's not true; we're all here to enjoy good stories, face an appropriate challenge, and above all have fun.

If there's one opportunity that was completely overlooked during this console generation it was the publishers' approach to digital distribution. The Xbox Live Arcade and PSN have proven that there is a market for small downloadable games for certain, but Steam has made a very strong case for how to do an all-digital marketplace right and the rest of the gaming industry would do well to learn a lesson from them.

The reasons to purchase a physical copy of a game continue to shrink as intenet bandwidth speeds and caps increase, almost to the point where the only real benefit to disc-based media is its property as a collectible. What's silliest about the resistance from publishers to release all of their games digitally in-step with their physical releases is that it ultimately benefits them the most, reducing used game sales and helping eliminate reasons for customers to pirate.

Getting this transition right is the hard part though, but the lessons have already been learned; flexible pricing, digital permanency, and less-restrictive DRM for digital copies will all help make this next generation a more enjoyable experience for consumers and a more profitable one for developers. It all comes down to whether publishers are willing to front the investment needed to make it all work though.

As with any new console generation, the processing power contained within the shells of our systems is going to increase on a massive level. With more powerful processors and more agile graphics cards, the limits of what's capable from these boxes are going to expand beyond our basic comprehension of what's possible. When faced with the opportunity, the best way to face it is not to question how this new technology can do what we're already doing better, but what can newness can be brought to the experience through this power.

It's one thing to improve overall graphical performance - improving the complexity of our experiences visually is a given - but seeing how we can use this technology to do things previously unfathomable will be what make the jump worthwhile. Developers have an opportunity with this next generation that they have never had before; having already unlocked the ability to produce near photorealistic graphics with the current generation, what is left to do with all that extra processing capability?

If developers can realize the potential of these machines to do more than render in higher fidelity, unlocking expanded capabilities for physics, more complex artificial intelligence, and a deeper level of systems complexity that harness this power, then we'll have something on our hands that far exceeds our expectations of what gaming can be.  

At the end of the day, regardless of whatever features each of the systems are touting, they're meaningless if there aren't quality games to enjoy on them. As we've started reaching the end of this generation, we've been inundated with a deluge of sequels and tired franchises that are starting to show their age.

As with every new generation before it, whatever comes next will be best served by an investment from publishers in new ideas that will continue to grow and shape the marketplace over the entirety of the console lifecycle. Trotting out Master Chief, Nathan Drake, and the rest of the familiar cast of characters won't do much for expanding the breadth of experiences available to us as a gaming public.

These old games weren't created in the same environment that newer ones can be, and so we won't see the sorts of games that capitalize on this new generation's best features unless that new IP investment is made. Activision and Bungie's Destiny may be the first forray into this (we've yet to actually see how it works after all), but we're going to need to see more of this type of new generation titles in order to prove the next generation is worth the money.

The assumption that games all need to be sold for $60 needs to get right out of here if the next generation is going to provide a wealth of new experiences for gamers and ultimately be worthwhile. The idea that a medium-scale platformer requires the same purchase price as the latest blockbuster is more than a little insane, and worse it's unsustainable.

A wider adoption of variable pricing in games allows publishers to invest in different projects that need different levels of funding and can attain different levels of success. Rather than automatically assuming all games deserve a $60 price tag and that any game that doesn't have this won't reach financial viability, a varied pricing model from top-down would allow developers to work on projects that don't all need to be massively bloated projects that cost millions and millions of dollars, and - more importantly - don't ask customers for an unfair price for what they get.

Expanding the pricing model from a set $60 to include projects that can operate at an MSRP of $40 or even $20 at launch will expand the number of titles players will be able to enjoy, allow more developers to work on projects they genuinely care about rather than shoehorning those ideas into games deemed worthy of $60. Most importantly though, this will allow publishers to take a wider range of bets on their projects and profit more fruitfully from the smaller ones.

Despite the general assumption that a more connected and accessible gaming community would improve the overall health of said communities, publishers are still mired in practices that continue to segregate players from one another. There's nothing more frustrating than being invested in a game to the point of buying a map pack only to find out that you won't be able to use them with your friends because they're not quite convinced its worth a purchase yet.

On top of that, the idea of forcing players to pay for the privilege of online multiplayer either through Xbox Live Gold or $10 activation codes further dice the overall community up into smaller and smaller chunks. If the next generation is going to be truly worthwhile, it's going to require a massive rethinking of how games handle the problem of access between players who have purchased different experiences.

The most obvious way to handle this would be to allow others (within limits) to join you regardless of their status as customers. This practice would simultaneously keep the community from fracturing due to purchase discrepancy, but also help encourage purchases from non-buyers who want the same experience as their friends having tried it themselves.