Last week we looked at five reasons why you should love the modern generation of gaming - how about why you shouldn't? Gamers have certainly been vocal about their disdain for certain games and companies as of late, with the backlash BioWare received for the ending of Mass Effect 3 and the response to Capcom's on-disc DLC scandal for Street Fighter X Tekken two prime examples of this. Have companies driven the gaming industry to the ground - or are we, as gamers and loyal fans, simply overreacting? Here's the five worst things that this generation has spawned:
Motion controls
To some, the inclusion of motion controls may seem a tad harsh, but when was the last time you seriously enjoyed a game on the Wii more than you did on a console using a traditional controller? Hailed as the next big thing in gaming preceding the Wii's launch in 2006, motion controls seemingly never caught the break they were itching for. That's not to say that the technology wasn't there - Microsoft's Kinect has been subject to various third-party development projects, such as 3D video capture (see video above).
While Microsoft advertises many new Xbox-branded games as "better with Kinect", truth is, most features such as voice and gesture recognition are being unnecessarily slapped on, with gamers much preferring to use a standard controller. Developers have not yet taken full advantage of the technology motion sensing has to offer - instead providing us with disappointing titles such as Steel Battalion: Heavy Armour and the embarrassment that was Kinect Star Wars (need I say why?).
Downloadable content
Equally one of the best and worst new features this generation has spawned, downloadable content is always a contentious topic. However, it is often used as a tool to rob gamers of content that should've been included at launch. Between "pre-order bonuses" and on-disc DLC, it's easy to see why so many were ruffled by the revelation that Capcom had included downloadable characters on the (Street Fighter X Tekken) disc that could only be unlocked for a price - why should we be made to pay for something that's already on our discs that we've paid for?
DLC has led to a level of greed previously unseen in the gaming industry - unless you're willing to fork out extra money for pre-order bonuses and added content, you're not going to receive the full package.
Less diversity
Guns, guns and more guns. With the runaway success of titles such as Halo and Call of Duty, it seems as if developers see violence as the ultimate catalyst for sales. Nearly every AAA game being developed these days features some form of weaponry and violence - it's no secret that some of the most popular games of the last year (such as Skyrim, Max Payne 3 and Borderlands 2) all possess this common theme.
This dependence on violence has ultimately led to less diversity within recent games, with developers and publishers preferring to play it safe rather than take a gamble on something that may be "too different".
Online passes
Essentially a publisher's way of trying to prevent used game sales, online passes are yet another annoyance that has come to prevalence in recent times. It's just another means for companies to make even more money off gamers - a questionable one, at that. Take those who own an Xbox Live subscription - to get online, you pay your ISP, you then pay Microsoft to use their service, and in the case of some used games, you then pay the publisher to access the online functionality within the game.
It's all a bit much and is nothing less than milking us consumers for all we're worth - once you own the disc, you should own its contained content, regardless of when you purchased it.
Broken games
With the advent of the Internet comes developer laziness. Developers are now able to patch their games at will, updating their games with added content and patches to fix bugs all in real-time. Sure, that sounds like a good thing on paper, but it's lead to all kinds of buggy releases within the last few years. Take anything by Bethesda (Fallout 3 is an excellent example), with their releases often subject to a multitude of random environmental and NPC bugs. That's not to say that Fallout 3 wasn't a great game - it certainly was no Superman 64.
Whilst even the most revered games aren't shy of their glitches (Red Dead Redemption), it certainly wouldn't hurt for developers to ensure no game-breaking or bizarre bugs are shipped with their games, no matter how much content they're offering.
By Jake Galouzis