every day it becomes more and more evident that video games are becoming increasingly harder to experience and enjoy without a massive, I'm talking MASSIVE, amount of money set aside in advance dedicated to consuming them, committing to a new console as planned obsolescence creeps in, they are becoming a luxury for the rich to make spectacle of, and technology that could easily be made accessible is instead limited to extremely expensive money sinks and prioritized to influencers/big-name people who make huge $$$ off having exclusive or near-exclusive access to them.
instead of being an experience, instead of pushing the limits on a form of media to create fantastic things, so much of it is a mindless churning for profit with stale writing, half-finished code, focused on having as many units sold in the first moments as is possible, then dumping it for the next 5-minute wonder.
another medium becoming less and less accessible to poorer people, people who cannot afford or just keep up with the various different subscriptions, add-ons, newest and sleekest consoles, computers, "dlc"s, additional endless microtransactions, pay-to-be-online, that are exhausting to parse and disheartening to experience.
i buy two video games a year, max. hard rule, now. didn't used to be, I didnt even used to have a rule like that. with the rising costs, I've found myself turning more often to my older consoles, which still work just fine, becoming purposely unaware of the industry trajectories and playing little part in the culture because it so obnoxiously pushes people out. my ps2 still works! my wii still works! my DS still works! and it makes me feel so stuck in time, trying to support small indie devs and then watching them not months later be absorbed by a bigger corporation that turns around and destroys any soul from them.
it's not even a hobby for me anymore, and I cant justify it. Even the ways I used to make money to support that hobby, by playing games competitively, is so cut off. my computer is outdated, I can't compete in tournaments for games that are popular now, I cant practice because I dont have access to the newest special gaming computer of the year, all i can do is sink back into the nostalgia i had for things as a kid and try to relive the magic that isnt there anymore because I'm 21, not 8, and even the things "marketed" towards me that I grew up surrounded by are exclusively marketed to the ones who make bank. It's just bleak.
theartofmadeline
germansingergirl
andulkaphoto
discoholicmusic
turnnoffyourmind
janainaart
areudirty
romaincrisis
