As PlayStation and Xbox compete to see who can upset gamers the most, a reader becomes exasperated with the current state of the video games business.
It has been a long time since I last wrote into GC, mainly due to being a busy dad of two, etc. But I have been keeping a eye on the industry and I do not feel it is being hyperbolic to say the industry is in a f’ing mess. With the likes of Ubisoft and EA potentially being in financial trouble, and the mass layoffs in the industry. Strangely, following the billions spent on studio acquisitions.
Some of the decisions coming out of the industry are insane, Sony decide to plough money into live service games, despite literally no-one being interested in them. Microsoft going multiformat, then not going multiformat. Buying Activision, to then have them seemingly slowly kill Call Of Duty; they have already killed Halo, stopped producing their own games (largely), etc., etc. I read a comment that made me laugh at how absurdly correct it was: Sony and Microsoft are having a competition on bad news, and they’re both winning.
Then we have the ultimate own goal for Sony, announcing they will no longer be producing physical discs for games after next year. Now, I am not naive and most of my own games are digital these days, but I no longer buy new games. I tend wait months, if not years, for games I like to drop low enough for me to consider it.
An all-digital future is 100% going to happen, it makes sense for the lack of shipping and use of plastics, etc. but anyone who has used Sony’s stores will be fully aware of how inflated their games are after monopolising the digital sales.
And this is where the problem lies, Steam has been around for a long time and seem to have a much better user experience, including timed refunds, etc. But Sony has proved already that they’re more than happy to fleece their customer base.
Expert, exclusive gaming analysis
Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning.
All of this seems to come hot on the heels of the news that Sony have deleted hundreds of previously paid for movies due to licensing issues.
For me at least, there have always been three main reasons for owning a console over a PC: price, plug and play, and physical media. From what I gather, the rumours are the PlayStation 6 will likely cost upwards of £1,000. With the price and lack of physical media, I honestly cannot see any reason to now choose to buy a PlayStation 6.
Rant over, there are some positives in the industry. The indie side of gaming is incredible and improving year after year, the triple-A market seems to ne struggling massively but this has returned games for the double-A market.
There are a handful of studios still smashing it out of the park and they seem to be the studios actually run by gamers or at least people with a huge interest in games. Seeing Capcom return to form has been a particular highlight for me. I love Resident Evil and having Resi 4 and 9 has been amazing.
It seems to me that the big corporations in the West are now run exclusively by money men, and as they do in every single industry they leech onto, they are actively killing the companies whilst syphoning off every single penny possible.
By reader Dr Gonzo
The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.
You can submit your own 500 to 600-word reader feature at any time, which if used will be published in the next appropriate weekend slot.
Just contact us at gamecentral@metro.co.uk or use our Submit Stuff page and you won’t need to send an email.