Games development is young but is it starting to have generational genres like music?

If you look at music each generation seems to bring a new style or genre to the market.



Is this happening in games or does the technology still have to mature, further?



For instance is the development of AR/VR leading to the ultimate expression of game development, and only once the platforms and interfaces become transparent will game development reach maturity?

And are there new gener's arising with new generations of game developers?

What do you think is the next big game genre or revival of an old one?

 

Although it seems to be the game platforms that are more generational than the game genres.

PS I was born before this chart begins!

 

I think technology still has a long way to go, especially with cool stuff like hololens still in its infancy, but I think as for actual games, its too chaotic and too mixed to be generational, each title is so popular within its own right, like the highest grossing games are pretty different; Minecraft, Guitar Hero, Skylanders and Call of duty... they all raked in over $1B but are all of different genres.

You can create a unique game. You can't create a unique song and I think that is the sticking point.

 

Interesting question.

Not sure if the genres change with generations, but I'd definitely say the pacing does. One might go a step further and say that generations change the meaning/core of a genre (to an extent).

Taking RPG as an example, it would be possible to split it to a kind-of generations from pure text, vortex (I think it's called like that... the dungeon crawlers with line-based graphics... excuse my ignorance ), isometric (BaldursGate/Planescape style), 3d (either 3rd or 1st person).
Each of those "generations", while still being an RPG in it's core, played differently with emphasis on different parts - IMHO this does not only go with technology enhancements, but also general "playerbase" expectations (attention span, feedback loop frequency to name the most glaring diffs).

As for AR/VR, when/if it goes really off, I wouldn't even treat it as a generation change, but an era change - preVR, postVR style.

 

Adventure games are mostly gone. RTS games are mostly gone. Arcade racers are gone. Fighting games are very rare. God-sims games are gone. I remember during the 90s there was so many cool and unique games for the PC. Now we get only console ports. Back in the day you were ashamed of playing a console port. "PC Master Race" is a dying breed. Everywhere I see "Dirty Console Peasants" infecting my beloved PC with casual filth.

 

That's not what a generational genre is. A generational genre is one that spans generations, usually mutating or even being resurrected like punk rock. It does not mean a new genre. Also, throw out those stupid charts. Any new genre these days is going to be a sub-genre, and is easily catalogued as an existing genre. Do you see metroidvania or roguelite on there?

 

Can you link or state the source of those graphs? They look pretty cool.

 

I think so, absolutely. I also think that going forward, the idea of what games are and what games can be needs a swift kick in the ass.

 

Every RPG disagrees with you. Telltale game's entire catalogue disagrees with you. Indies disagree too

Do you even check steam? There's a new one every few weeks.

I guess rockstar and EA need to be told this important fact since it's completely slipped their attention.

Yeah better tell capcom and EA :/ Those guys are clueless and need to be told to stop.

From your attention, perhaps.

Look I get it, you're old. I'm old. But PLEASE play some more games before posting

 

I was in the elevator of a very expensive hotel recently and was surprised to hear them playing Nine Inch Nails. I don't know about whole genres but things like 8-bit or pixel-graphics have that same kind of generational "target market" feel to them.

When you're in Walgreens buying cranberry supplements and you realize they're playing Depeche Mode, you know you're old.

 

Obviously you didn't mention a SINGLE example. How convenient...

 

Hint: in Chrome you can click on an image and search for the image on google!

But Kotaku for the game related graphs via a google search!

 

Or he simply couldn't be bothered to feed the troll any more than absolutely necessary... go do a search of Steam. It has entirely too many games and I guarantee you that each of those categories is being covered. Whether the games are any good or not is another matter.

 

Nope! Dreamfall, Obduction, any telltale game, any wadjet eye game, the new King's Quest, Life is Strange. And a gazillion smaller indie ones, some are even great.

Starcraft II (the recent expansions), we had a new Homeworld game, Planetary Annihilation, Grey Goo, plus a ton of other smaller ones. Actually the only things missing are a new Command and Conquer and maybe a Dune.

I considered giving you that one, because I don't follow very closely and I'm bored to look up any decent ones. But turns out, just from the top of my head, I can think of quite a few: Mario Kart 8. Red:Out. TrackMania Turbo. Distance. GRIP. All of these are kinda awesome too.

Street Fighter is still around. Mortal Kombat is still around. Guilty Gear? We had a new Killer Instinct. New King of Fighters (although I've heard it sucks), new Tekken. BlazBlue. I mean, how many did we have in the old days really? What are you missing? Clay Fighter?

I just want to point out, that the genre was never really very prevalent. We had like... Populus, Black and White, Dungeon Keeper in a span of 15 years?

And while Godus really did try its best to kill the genre off, war for the overworld was half decent, Universim looks like it's going to be great ( https://theuniversim.com/ )

So, all in all... What are you talking about?

 

One thing I don't see in the chart is the recent resurgence in arcade games. A significant number of popular mobile titles should be properly classified as arcade.

While old genres don't die, there certainly seems to be generational trends on terms of popularity. Fighting games, adventure games and flight sims might not have gone away completely. But they certainly are less popular now then they once were.