Why are video game companies ignoring older games? – Reader’s Feature

A reader is frustrated that as an older fan he’s increasingly being ignored by PlayStation and Xbox and pushed towards PC gaming.

Most of what’s going on with gaming right now seems to be because of profits going down (or rather not going up by as much as expected) and publishers panicking that they’re making the wrong sort of games. Suddenly single-player games are out of fashion again, as if all the people that bought the ones from last gen teleported off the planet and now nobody wants that type of game.

Obviously, that didn’t happen but I’m 38, which I don’t like to think is too old, and I don’t know any of my friends that enjoy live service games. I know one that plays Rainbow Six Siege a bit with his friends, and another that plays with his kid on Fortnite, but none of us want to be playing that kind of game in our time, when we get the TV to ourselves.

But apparently publishers don’t care what I want. They only want to make the type of games younger people player (I resent them for making me word it like that – I’m not that old!) because it’s more profitable. Which means that, basically, adults are generally too sensible to waste money on cosmetics and microtransactions.

The problem, as I understand it, is that games have got too expensive to make, although I see no evidence that anyone is trying to reduce this or do anything other than throw everything into live service games instead.

With all this in mind, I saw the report during the week about how console sales were flat, mobile is going down, and PC is the only thing increasing. This is no surprise to me. PlayStation and Xbox have both been acting like idiots the last 12 months (or more) and both have released hardly anything of interest.

If you don’t release, or at least promote, any eye-catching new games is it any wonder no one buys your consoles? No decent exclusives for the PlayStation or Xbox automatically makes the PC (or Switch 2 when it comes out) look like a better option. How they don’t realise this, especially Sony, I don’t know.

The other thing that’s driving people towards the PC is that, unlike the consoles, it isn’t subject to the shifting interests of Sony and Microsoft. It has almost every game in one place, it can play old ones without any hassle, and it has thousands of exclusive indie games across many genres that the consoles would never even touch.

As far as I’m concerned Xbox and PlayStation have hastened their own end by trying to prevent it. By not being a gullible teenager I feel like I’m no longer a customer they’re interested in and everything I want and appreciate is being ignored. But that’s their problem, there are clear alternatives to those two aging console brands and I’m just about done with them now.