Yearly instalments: What about the games?

Just as a little introduction, this is an issue which I am in two minds about. There could be much debate about this subject to which no end will ever be reached. What I aim to do is provide a picture of the gaming community's attitude towards yearly instalments as well as give you my analysis of why we have yearly instalments in the first place and how it affects my ability to enjoy a game.

Call of duty, FIFA, Madden, WWE, Football Manager, Tiger Woods, Assassin's Creed and a few others. What do these games all have in common? They come out every single year.

Let us consider games on the opposite end of the scale: Elder scrolls series, Final Fantasy series, Metal gear solid series and Starcraft just to name a few. While these games take a considerable amount of time to make, they are considered to be of great quality (by most people). Perhaps the long development time is part of the reason why these games are held in such high regard. Sure, people may have their individual quirks and problems with the games, but it can't be disputed that they are all excellent games. If a game takes a long time to make, surely that means that it is going to be a better game? After all, no job is worth doing unless you do it right.

Now, can you think of any bad games that have been in development for a considerably long time? Duke nukem forever? That's about it, really. The point I am trying to make is that with long development cycles, good quality games emerge. Now, can that be inverted? I.e. do short development cycles mean bad games? Not exactly. Or at least, not always. Here's my take on it...

If I am at work and my manager gives me 3 hours to do something, then he expects it to be done in around about those 3 hours, right? So if I come back after 20 minutes and say "that's it. Job done" then he'll suspect something is up, won't he? Say he comes along and I have somehow pulled a rabbit out the hat and have done a 3 hour job in 20 minutes. What then? Say it is done exactly to the standard he was expecting and is done just as well as the other workers who are finishing their work on the 3 hour mark. Do I deserve a pat on the back? Hell yeah, I do. Do you see where I am going with this?

If a company is able to put out a game and have confidence that people will buy it, they will do so. The game may or may not be of the same quality as a competitor's games: that is a different argument altogether. The point is that this game may take half the amount of time to make and will probably still sell just as well, if not better than the other game that takes 2 or 3 years to make. The question is not in fact "which game is better?". The question is "which game is perceived to be better?". Of course, you're all thinking that the 2-3 year game is most definitely better. That's only natural. But is that really fair? To say that "you've only taken 1 year to make this game, obviously your game is inferior".

Now, lets consider if the same one-year game was released a year later with a gap between instalments. It's exactly the same game, but as far as you, the gamer, is concerned it took 2 years to make. You got bored of the previous game and have waited 2 years for this one. You find that instead of hating on the game for taking 1 year to complete (because, remember, you don't know it only took 1 year to make), you are actually enjoying it a lot more because it hasn't got tedious because it isn't coming out every single year.

I think we've reached the crux of the problem with yearly instalments, here. Large corporations want to make a quick buck, but what they don't realise is that they are running a good video games series into the ground by releasing them every year. Call of duty is one that has been talked about a lot. I feel that after buying these games year after year, they have to do something fresh, something that will blow the whole lid off the franchise. It is because I love the series so much that I buy it every year, but my enjoyment of it has been dying a little. And no, there aren't any alternatives. If I think FPS, I think call of duty. It is the only online FPS which I enjoy (because of its fast pace and mad fun) and it is getting killed by it's own development cycle.

Now, these games are obviously not aimed at hardcore gamers, which I am (and probably you are too, if you're reading this). They expect the typical player to buy this one game and play it every now and again throughout the year. But if you're like me, you want a game you can get into and these games do offer that... at a price. If you do really get into these games, you'll find new enjoyment in them, but it starts to get boring. You stop feeling challenged. You realise that there are very few people like you who play this game as much as you do. Now, that wouldn't be a problem if the game came out every second year. It'd give you a chance to go play something else for a change of pace and forget what this game is like. Then when you come back, it'll feel all fresh.

So, no. I am not going to hate on yearly instalments because I can see the game developer's side of things, but at the same time, they have to do something to keep us coming back, because at this rate, well, we all saw what happened to guitar hero. It is a war of short term cash vs longevity for them and I think the former is going to win this fight, I'm afraid.

Anyway, I've barely scratched the surface, so let me know what you think in the comments section below and whether you agree/disagree, I hope you at least saw things from a new perspective by reading this blog.