Is 2015 onwards the new Golden Age of video games?

[deenman]

the only game i've played in that list is wow

damn you have missed out on so much,atleast try witcher 3 if you like rps's,nothing comes close

[Jester Joe]

There have been a lot of good games over the past five years but I wouldn't call it a golden age just yet.

• Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

• Yakuza 0

• Overwatch (before it stagnated)

• The Banner Saga 2

• World of Warcraft: Legion

• Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood

• Trails of Cold Steel 3

Compare that to 1995/96 - 2000/01

• Suikoden

• Super Mario RPG

• Super Mario 64

• Donkey Kong Country 3

• Sakura Taisen

• Star Fox 64

• Final Fantasy VII

• Bushido Blade

• Suikoden II

• Xenogears

• Final Fantasy VIII

• Starcraft

• Jade Cocoon

• Legend of Dragoon

• Final Fantasy IX

• Shenmue

• Final Fantasy X

Off of the top of my head. That's a ton of classics!

I mean, you really cut out a LOT from the newer era and then threw some cult classics on your list, like Legend of Dragoon.
Not to downplay cult classics, but there's a reason they're labeled as "cult" classics and not universally known.

1995/96 - 2000/01 was the golden age of high quality, high production value video games. You got the whole thing on the disc, no patches required, no DLC you needed to purchase for "the complete experience". Nowadays, you can hardly find AAA RPGs that are actually worth their salt.

Why does a game have to be AAA to be of value?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I mean, you really cut out a LOT from the newer era and then threw some cult classics on your list, like Legend of Dragoon.
Not to downplay cult classics, but there's a reason they're labeled as "cult" classics and not universally known.

Legend of Dragoon is considered a cult classic now, is it? Jade Cocoon perhaps, but definitely not Legend of Dragoon.

Furthermore, almost all of the games I listed were innovators, with their design choices have become standard practice today (Multiple dialogue options, QTEs, dialogue between party members during combat, superbosses, hero units, etc)


From my notes:


Suikoden (1995, December 15)

• + Cinematic, one on one duel battles. The camera angles and the dialogue in between turns really sells it.

• + Army battles: they showed the huge scope of the war and allowed the player to participate in it.

• + You can recruit NPCs who will fill up and add to a base. There is a sense of satisfaction in seeing your once empty base begin to become renovated and become lively with the people you've met across your journey.

Super Mario RPG (1996, March 9)

• + Timed hits spruces up the turn based combat and adds a dimension of skill, where you can even survive at 1 HP by blocking attacks!

• Sakura Taisen (1996, September 27)
  + Timed dialogue choices. The player has a short window of opportunity to choose a dialogue option. If the timer runs out, the player character remains silent, and the person they are conversing with will react as such. Sometimes, if you remain silent for long enough, they will think you're giving them the silent treatment and get mad at you. Sometimes remaining silent is the right answer. Depends on the character you are talking to and the situation. There are no binary "good" or "evil" choices like in Bioware games; just different dialogue options (and silence is a perfectly valid option).

• + These dialogue options can be spontaneous and affect gameplay a little bit. One timed dialogue that pops up during a battle forces you to recall the color a ribbon a girl was wearing earlier in the morning; failure to do so makes her demoralized and lowers her stats during the battle.

• + You can hold the cursor over a character's portrait to trigger internal monologues and responses from the characters.

Final Fantasy VII (1997, January 31)

• + Seeing the Weapon superbosses wander the overworld. There's something special seeing these alien looking machines of death that dwarf you, wandering about, and the approaching them for battle.

• + Your only consistent and reliable way to heal is to use Aerith. However, she dies during the story and is removed from your party, leaving you without a healer, and considerably amping up the difficulty of the game. It's more shocking as this difficulty spike coincides with the loss of a party member, upping the stakes. FFX does a similar thing where Yuna is removed from the party during a dire stretch of the story.

Xenogears (1998, February 11)

• + QTEs used for character attacks, breaks up the turn based gameplay.

Starcraft (1998, March 31)

• + Each race has their own distinct playstyle. Prior to Starcraft, your choice of faction boiled down to which aesthetic you preferred.

• + Ingame storytelling. In prior RTS games, most of the lore and story was in the manual that came in the box, and even then it was pretty sparse. Warcraft II had a narrator who gave some details in between missions, but again it was pretty sparse. Starcraft had characters who talked during the actual mission, as well as in between missions.

Saura Taisen 2: Thou Shalt not Die (1998, April 4)

• + The protagonist can hold a conversation with multiple characters at once, which also spawns new responses and affects their relationships.

Final Fantasy VIII (1999, February 11)

• + The player can obtain the summon, Odin, who has a chance of appearing at the start of a battle and one shotting all of the mobs by bisecting them with a single stroke of his sword. During a climatic boss battle with one of the villains, if the player has Odin, Odin will appear at the beginning of the fight and do his usual attack... except the villain parries the attack and bisects Odin instead. A huge "OH SNAP!" moment, and very effective at establishing the villain's powerlevel.

Legend of Dragoon (1999, December 2)

• + Additions, aka QTEs used for character attacks, breaks up the turn based gameplay.

• - Long QTE chains for basic character attacks, becomes tedious. Basic QTE chains (1 to 3 button presses) should've been used for the most basic and most used attacks, long chains for special abilities/ultimates. Goes hand in hand with combat animations taking far too long.

Shenmue (1999, December 29)

• + If you walk up to a desk or a closet, the camera moves to where Ryo's head is (the character model also fades out) and you look at the thin from Ryo's perspective, controlling his hand. You can open a drawer and pick up items and inspect them, pick up hangers holding up clothes or scrolls to look behind them. You literally push the button on the vending machine for the coke you want. You don't press a button to open up a map; you walk up to a map in the world and the camera moves to the map, and you can pan the camera around the map. Imagine if you could look behind a painting to find a secret vault, or looked between two books on a booksheld to findd a hidden lever that opens a passage. Imagine if the player was tasked to retrieve the head of a monster, the head isn't relegated to an inventory menu. The player walks to the corpse of the monster and cuts it's head off. When the player interacts with the head, the protagonist takes the bag off of his shoulder, the camera moves to the player's head and looks in to the bag, which is the player's inventory.

• + No minimaps or quest markers; you have to learn where to go by talking to NPCs.

Final Fantasy IX (2000, July 7)

• + Fixed camera used for blocking and dramatic compositions

• + Great magic VFX

• + Each character feels unique, as they have exclusive access to game mechanics. Vivi is the only one who can cast black magic, for example.

Sakura Taisen 3: Is Paris Burning? (2001, March 22)

• + The player can angle the anlog stick to determine the intensity of their dialogue option. In instance, the player can angle their response to be loud enough to be overheard outside the room, or only heard by the character they are speaking to. Characters might get mad if you start yelling in their face, or if you are speaking too low; depends on the situation and character you are talking to.

Final Fantasy X (2001, July 19)

• + Mi'ihen Highroad doesn't feel like an empty corridor, but... a road! There are traveling merchants, historians, military volunteers, priests, etc traveling on the road who you can interact with and see throughout your journey. The roads are at most three screens long, and the fixed camera angle makes the journey visually appealing to look at with the vistas and such.

• + Cinematic presentation of certain fights, feels like you're playing an action movie/anime.

• + In addition to dialogue between party members during combat, the combat dialogue may also vary depending on the location and at which point of the story.

[Tech614]

• Trails of Cold Steel 3

No offense but didn't you literally say in the trails thread you haven't played this yet and are waiting on a PC version? Are you actually listing games in good faith or just using your own franchise bias? Because it feels like #2 and it go's back to what Jester Joe replied to you as well.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Why does a game have to be AAA to be of value?

That is not what I said. I enjoy many low to mid budget RPGs, such as The Banner Saga, Trails of Cold Steel, Tokyo Xanadu, and so on. I'm just lamenting the days when we consistently got amazing RPGs from the biggest and best like Squaresoft.

[Tech614]

That is not what I said. I enjoy many low to mid budget RPGs, such as The Banner Saga, Trails of Cold Steel, Tokyo Xanadu, and so on. I'm just lamenting the days when we consistently got amazing RPGs from the biggest and best like Squaresoft.

"Sqauresoft" was simply the western publishing name of Square, not the name of the developer. It's like saying you miss the days of getting the best RPGs from EA, when you're talking about Bioware games like ME2 or DAO.

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Also to get away from subjective individual opinions Opencritic is a good resource for this, since it's only existed since like 2013-2014ish. Still opinion based but a collection of many different opinions(far more then metacritic which gatekeep with weighting and not even listing reviews of most sites they don't think are "real journalists".

https://www.opencritic.com/browse/all

Anyone trying to argue the production has been bad for this period is so off base with the rest of society. It's one thing to have opinions that go against the grain, it's another thing to act like it's normal. Like I think BoTW is a meh Zelda game but I'm not gonna sit here and pretend that is a popular opinion because it's not- my opinion on it is far different then the gaming community as a whole.

[Shelly]

The golden age honestly changes depending on your age and when you had the time and income to afford the games and play them.

So for me the golden age was pretty much 1995 to 2005. I had access to all the old games from Nintendo, Genesis, SNES, plus Playstation, Dreamcast, PS2. Combined with working regular hours, living at home, so low expenses and a good amount of free time.

Though I'd also say that gaming kinda ended around 2006 when I started playing WoW regularly. That the game changes roughly every 2 years and includes social pressure to keep gaming, plus the general cost of a gaming PC either in addition to or instead of a console and nice TV really shut down a lot of my gaming for years.

That said I've got a kiddo now and I'm really thinking of getting a Switch. It'll be nice to get back on the couch, have access to the suite of family friendly Nintendo offerings and two player co-op.

Oh and since it always much be said when the game comes up, Legend of Dragoon is a terrible game. The story is formulaic and you can complete the whole thing half asleep. One of these days I should see how much it'll sell for and get rid of my copy.

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"Sqauresoft" was simply the western publishing name of Square, not the name of the developer. It's like saying you miss the days of getting the best RPGs from EA, when you're talking about Bioware games like ME2 or DAO.

SquareEnix became a publisher that leased out their own IPs.

Back when they were Squaresoft EA was their publishing partner in the US.

[Tech614]

SquareEnix became a publisher that leased out their own IPs.

Back when they were Squaresoft EA was their publishing partner in the US.

They where never "Squaresoft". They where Square. Squaresoft was again, the western publishing name. You seem to be confusing publishing with distribution, which EA distributed their games in the west and Square distributed EA games in Japan. Mutual partnership, not a publishing deal.

SquareEnix was the merger of Square and Enix not "Squaresoft" and Enix. Don't try to correct someone without at least taking 5 seconds to google.

[Cæli]

not even close, but the most notable thing about those years is that
1.there's far less risks, new franchises, most of the games are a follow up, a remake, increasingly harder for smaller studio to grow
2.most of the games looks the same with ultra bright shaders and plastic textures, many indie games tries to mimic the retro look but with little tech limitations (which opens the road for lazy artists and have many games looking the same again)

[Shelly]

They where never "Squaresoft". They where Square. Squaresoft was again, the western publishing name. You seem to be confusing publishing with distribution, which EA distributed their games in the west and Square distributed EA games in Japan. Mutual partnership, not a publishing deal.

SquareEnix was the merger of Square and Enix not "Squaresoft" and Enix. Don't try to correct someone without at least taking 5 seconds to google.

Squaresoft and Square are interchangeable. If that's not the other case feel free to link it, you do have to actually show your work rather than just claim you're the superior pedant. :-)

[Tech614]

Squaresoft and Square are interchangeable.

If you think the actual company name is interchangeable with a western publishing name only used for 8 years well, lol. Hell, Squaresoft also published shit that wasn't even made by Square, it's like claiming Atlus USA is Atlus.

[Shelly]

If you think the actual company name is interchangeable with a western publishing name only used for 8 years well, lol.

OK, so you don't have anything to actually back up your statement. Got it. Thanks.

[Tech614]

OK, so you don't have anything to actually back up your statement.

Nothing, except reality.

Go ask anyone in Japan what "Squaresoft" is, you might need to search down a non Japanese tourist before you find someone who knows wtf you're talking about.

Final Fantasy games where made by Square, not "Squaresoft".

[kuhntasmash]

- Witcher 3 - definitely a master piece
- Bloodbourne -
- Dark Souls 3 - I will stick with my guns on this and continue to say, Fromsoftware surprisingly makes the worst "soul-like" games in the genre.
- Overwatch - lol
- WoW: Legion - I'll agree with this one.
- WoW: Classic - a remake of a post 2015 game
- Doom - music was the best part, so can't really put this on best games.
- Borderlands 3 - 2 was far better.
- Resident Evil 2 - remake
- Resident Evil 3 - remake
- Spyro: Reignited - remake
- Assassin's Creed: Origins and Odyssey - bioware presents assassins creed, but lesser
- Crash Bandicoot N.Sane Trilogy - remake
- Fortnite - brah... no

[aceperson]

to me, a golden age is when good games aren't getting increasingly rare. if i were to compare this to the history of comics, we're in the bronze age. governments are starting to look at the industry and realizing something needs to be done. either companies like EA need to voluntarily stop milking as much money as they can regardless of means or governments will force the industry into the silver age.

[Misuteri]

From an RPG standpoint of both quality and quantity the PS One/PS2 era work of Square, Enix, Konami, Working Designs and Sega may never be topped.

Side scrolling platformers will never be outshine the 16 bit era in innovation, character design and quantity.

For shooters there really hasn’t been a golden age since the 80’s arcade scene. It’s a much maligned and hardcore category that produces a few sterling examples per generation, this one’s being Cuphead.

The one thing that 2010 onward that will never go away is that games are no longer bought and the transaction/game is done. There are so few major titles without day one DLC, add ons, cosmetics etc that this era will forever have a blotch against it. I’m to the point now where I wish major titles were subscriptions instead of micro transactions.

Does anyone think that mobile gaming, as a whole, is better on phones flooded with F2P/P2W $99.99 IAP’s than the Game Boy Advance or DS eras? Sure it’s nice to get a solid A title for $4.99 but they’re so few and far between. It’s a shame too since Xbox and PS2 titles can be played on them.

I just got around to getting the SNES Classic and I was hugely disappointed the games were not remixed and remastered for HD. Frankly that’s one trend I’m all for. I have no issue buying collections of old games again, F-Zero sill can’t be topped in my book.

[Guildenstern]

I cant agree. There are some gems like Skyrim, Witcher, and Kingdom come deliverance, but most of it is just mass market EA lootbox type of trash

[dope_danny]

In general no i just think, all the more after looking through the releases for a goty for each decade list, that it seems that way because by and large the amount of sheer trash games, mobile scams and anti consumer bullshit releases in 2012 to a degree and especially in 2013 were so abominably bad that a return to normalcy in the industry at large meant we finally saw a return to games being made to entertain rather than "how can we legally sell this hustle and get away with it?".

Seriously go look at 2010-2013 and watch the staggering decline in quality and shrinking number of critical and commercial darlings with an equal and opposite rise in notable events like "Sega announces plans to leave mainstream gaming to get into mobile social gambling apps". It was a fucking dark ass time i'm glad is over.

[Dezerte]

I suppose it depends upon what kind of game or genre you like. For me I think 2005 (+/- a few years) was the closest to a "golden age" I've experienced, but I think gaming has been kind of samey overall over the years. I dislike the normalization of microtransactions, exclusive content and similar practices - but during the same time period of these things we also saw indie-developers become big and make a "comeback".

[Kokolums]

The video games I loved the most were social games. If it was a solo player game, we'd trade controllers back and forth to make them social, or play side and side and race on PC. But they were my favorite games because I played them with great friends. It wasn't really about the games at all. We could drop the controllers, go outside, and have a water gun fight or go swimming and have as much fun.