We are living in a computer gaming golden age

[Toonces]

I've been thinking about this recently and I have come to the conclusion that there has simply never been a better time to be a computer gamer than right now.

Certainly gaming was great back in the day, and there was innovation and so much new to see and do that maybe hadn't been done before.  But as I look at my game collection right now, I realize that I will probably never get to play all of the awesome games that deserve to be played.  I just don't have the time.  Some of these games are so good, and have so many hours of potential gaming in them, that there is no way to see and appreciate everything.

Some examples:

- The Total War series:  I have all of the Total War games.  Sadly I have been unable to keep up with all of the DLC.  But that's ok because the primary reason is that I simply haven't been able to play all of them.  Even until recently I was still mucking around in M2TW- my favorite- leaving Empire, Napoleon, Shogun 2, and Rome 2 to explore.  I did boot up Shogun 2 the other day and I am just blown away by the whole experience.  The added depth...the graphics...the atmosphere...coming off M2TW it is just remarkable. 

- Crusader Kings 2:  Unbelievably replayable.  With all of the hundreds of years in which to start, combined with the astounding number of rulers you can play as, this game could take a lifetime to fully explore all by itself.

- Scourge of War series:  As a Civil War gamer, this is about the ultimate experience.  Real time, selectable levels of command, courier system, with a sandbox mode allowing one to replay this one infinitely. 

- Elite: Dangerous:  A galaxy worth of space to explore, with players worldwide.  A living, breathing economy influenced by players.  An epic space odyssey MMO experience.  I can see this sucking up hundreds to thousands of gaming hours.

- Role Playing Games: Between the new RPGs coming out every other day, how can one keep up with them unless it's at the expense of every other type of gaming?  I've got a hundred hours sunk into Morrowind and I'm not even 1/3 through!  And then there's still the Dragon Age series, the Witcher series, the Fallout series...and so on.  And that's single player...the MMO world opens up a whole new experience and time sink.

- Flight sims:  Perhaps the weak sister of the bunch, I would argue that flight sims have become technically better but have perhaps regressed somewhat backwards in gameplay.  I'm looking at you, DCS and Battle of Stalingrad!  Wings over Flanders Field is a notable exception.  On the civilian front, though, companies like PMDG and others continue to crank out aircraft that are almost good enough (or actually are good enough) to train for their real-world counterpart.  They certainly look amazing, and the detail is outstanding.  And, the hardware exists to pimp out a home cockpit as real as you can afford.

This is just scratching the surface.  I'm sitting here looking at icons for CMANO, F1: 2013, Steel Armor Blaze of War, the list goes on.  Too many games.  Too many good games.  It is getting to the point where marginal games are just getting sent to the unplay-pile.  I have too many awesome games to waste time on something that isn't awesome.  And even of the awesome games, I simply can't focus on all of them enough to be proficient in everything.  Some games are just falling to the wayside due to the impossible task of maintaining all that muscle memory. 

I find, lately, that I have about a half dozen "go-to" games and they're simply great enough that I don't need to move around too much.  An occasional one-off play of some other game is fine, but with 6 games only I can eat up all of my gaming time if I want and have a completely fulfilling experience.

It is just a magical time to be gaming.  I never thought I'd run out of time before I ran out of good games to play.

[jomni]

And hardware requirements has stagnated a bit. No need to be always using the latest and greatest.

[undercovergeek]

Haven't bought a new one since elite, and when I'm not in an elite place, Rome II does the job nicely and for real time sponges I have ckII and euIV

Gamings all good at the mo

[bbmike]

Maybe, but I think if it were a true Golden Age I would be playing Imperialism III, Soldiers at War II, turn-based Star Fleet Battles, Call to Power III, a good graphical/statistical football game...
Of course, Spock may have been right when he said "After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true." :)

[undercovergeek]

Maybe, but I think if it were a true Golden Age I would be playing Imperialism III, Soldiers at War II, turn-based Star Fleet Battles, Call to Power III, a good graphical/statistical football game...
Of course, Spock may have been right when he said "After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true." :)

When you say football........

[MetalDog]

You know...the REAL football.

[Gusington]

Group hug and big shiny watches for everyone!

[MengJiao]

It is just a magical time to be gaming.  I never thought I'd run out of time before I ran out of good games to play.

  True.  Lots of good games, but I'm steadily cutting back on the time I spend at the computer playing games.  About 6 years ago I was probably averaging 3 hours a week-day night and 6 hours on the week-ends.  That's far too much.  So now I've cut back to about 1-2 hours a day and at the moment that's just WitPAE PBEM and some flight sims.  Board games take some idle time too.

  Certain kinds of games (Massive Multiplayer stuff and most online stuff and RPGs) just absorb too much time for me these days.  But I agree, these days there is the best range of gaming possibilities I've ever seen.

[undercovergeek]

You know...the REAL football.

Ah in which case I recommend football manager  :P

[Sir Slash]

Going back to the Dark Age of Mattel Intellivision and the 3DO, I totally agree this is the best time to be a gamer to date. So many games today that I simply would've begged for in the past, I just skip-over now because of the wealth of good games. The spec requirements slowing down, Steam making it so easy to buy and update games, and the dedicated modders that have perfected so many games, the sales, the free demos, the list goes on. Still I see problems with the whole corporate attitude of deciding FOR US what we really like to play and the non-violence crusaders deciding FOR US what we should be playing continuing and maybe getting worse. But for now the will of the gamers prevail and that's a good thing.

[Greybriar]

I have to agree. This could be called a "Computer Gaming Golden Age" with the lack of hardware incompatibilities that existed back when DOS was king. But I don't believe the games today are superior to the classics like Master of Magic, Master of Orion I or II, Darklands, etc. The games today generally have better graphics and user interfaces due to technological advances. The availability of gaming services that simplify obtaining and keeping games up-to-date, as touched upon by Sir Slash, are certainly big pluses for gamers today....unless they don't have access to the internet.

[LongBlade]

This is a good time to be a gamer, period.

People are not just gaming on their PCs. There are games on every handheld device out there.

Boardgames and minis games are more diverse, of higher quality, and more widespread than ever before.

[Rayfer]

Toonces....I couldn't agree more.  I finally got over the nostalgia of GOG games realizing what we have today is far superior. Those old games were great in their day but just don't do it for me anymore. Just my opinion, I know others disagree.

[Queeg]

And hardware requirements has stagnated a bit. No need to be always using the latest and greatest.

This is a big factor.  I spend far more of my limited time playing games than worrying about hardware. 

[Gusington]

I learned to discount nostalgia the hard way, after purchasing some 'redone' titles and then sitting there, angry at myself, and then realizing 'I can't play this ancient title when I have all these new ones to dive into.'