I love video games. I love old video games. I love new video games. I love my Call of Duties, my Marios and my Uncharteds. They're all great modern games, and dismissing any of them as being "crap" is incredibly ignorant and just wrong. However, I have to admit that my most memorable gaming experiences happened in my 7-11 years more so than 12-16 years.

Is it a problem with me, as I become more and more familiar with games to have them be less interesting to me? Probably.

Is it a problem with modern game makers in general that they simply don't have the imagination of older game devs? Maybe.

My theory is this: Discovery = x = Uncanny = Fear.
Fear = Engagement.

As games have aged, they have become more safe. I mean yes, games deliver incredibly deep narrative experiences (Red Dead Redemption) or have dark, interesting morals that make us question ourselves and gaming as a whole (Spec Ops: The Line) but I haven't had a game that's truly captured my imagination as a whole in a long time. Even as much as I looooooooooooove Red Dead, I can say in honesty that I remember Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door more. And it's because Game Devs have forgotten the power of discovery, the power of the uncanny, and the power of the fear.

Think about it: In a game like Call of Duty, you may not know every plot twist and turn but you know basically what's going to happen: You're going to be dropped in a war zone and have to shoot all the foreigners.

In Earthbound you start in a regular village, with regular music and regular people. Then you find the meteor. A bug comes out. Alright, strange, but acceptable. Then the bug becomes your friend and is the strongest member on your party; you begin to like this bug. The bug dies as you squash it. Once again, a little sad, but acceptable. 20 hours in you find yourself fighting a horrific demon with what I THINK is supposed to be music. I'm crying now. I want to go home, but I don't. I want to see what happens to this strange beast, if I can overcome it. I'm scared though.
Discovery = Giygas (or even the Happy Happy clan) = Uncanny = Fear.

In Minecraft; an unstructured game with cubey graphics and low-fi sound effects, made me wee myself a bit. A lot. Discovery = Creepers = Uncanny = Fear. See?

This is why Silent Hill 2 is great despite it's terrible camera and combat. This why Amnesia: The Dark Descent can be considered fantastic but at it's core is only a average puzzle game. This is why we still remember the scary village bit of Paper Mario: TTYD.

This is why we remember that freakin' moon from Majora's Mask, man ;_;

And while Silent Hill 2 and Amnesia can be placed squarely in the "horror" category, that just reinforces my point. Devs no longer embrace fear and discovery unless it's an inherent part of the Genre. Would you call Paper Mario horror, or Earthbound? Or hell, remember getting to world 1-4 in Super Mario Bros. for the first time? Remember how scary that was? Is THAT a horror game?

Revisiting any of these titles today may not be as effective: The technology has aged, the concepts reused in newer games, and we just aren't as easily scared as older people. But I believe, with current technology, we can make better games than ever. We can draw interest from even the most hater-y of video game haters. We can make better gaming experiences. We just need to relearn the power of being scared.


Thank you for reading,
Porky's out.

Just incase you didn't read this the last 800000 times:
Discovery = x = Uncanny = Fear.
Fear = Engagement.