My capability for so called "enthusiasm" died a long ago. I'd rather not keep my hopes too high regarding modern releases. Too much hope only ends in dissapointment for me.

Ever since the birth of the internet, toxicity has gradually increased over the years. Not just on the video games side, but also on the movies and TV side.

Its called pattern recognition. I am also old and cynical enough that I hope for nothing.

Edit: Other people's opinion should not have that great of an impact upon you.

Originally posted by Pocahawtness:

Why are so many gamers so pint half empty? :sadcube:

Sounds to me like you're projecting.

Originally posted by AmsterdamHeavy:

Its called pattern recognition. I am also old and cynical enough that I hope for nothing.

Edit: Other people's opinion should not have that great of an impact upon you.

Quoted for truth. That's exactly it.

Pattern recognition is a small part for some of older gamers, but for most of the younger set it's them basically echoing the doom and gloom clickbaiting of their favourite youtuber

Originally posted by Start_Running:

Pattern recognition is a small part for some of older gamers, but for most of the younger set it's them basically echoing the doom and gloom clickbaiting of their favourite youtuber

This. Pretty much this. Negativity makes for better clickbait and idiots love clickbait. Idiots love controversal things, divisive things, idiots love things that generate attention and negativity is good for generating attention.

It’s due to the steep decline in quality of Western AAA gaming combined with the sharp incline of corporate greed in the past decade or so. Ubisoft is a shining example. Like them or not every AAA game they once released was a huge success that people would get genuinely excited for where now almost every game is a mess. No one is going to get excited for a product that sucks. People can go on about how great Indy and non-western games are (myself included) but it doesn’t change the fact that when the biggest players in the industry consistently produce slop it’s going to have a large negative impact on the state of gaming and people’s perceptions.

people been talking ♥♥♥♥ for whatever reason since dawn of time. if game is good people are still going to play it. i feel like this is the new generation problem, being bothered by people's opinion. if the game is good, you're gonna want to play it no matter how others trash it.

if you have good ass, people gon say your ass is too fruity.

Let's see here...

Here's a list of things that make gamers expect every game to be utter garbage.

• Years of lootboxes, years of microtransaction hell, years of day 1 DLC, years of under delivering overpriced paid expansions
  
• Years of $60 full priced titles that under deliver and typically come out unfinished, or otherwise half baked. (Or in rare cases, 'overcooked')
  
• Rootkit DRM
  
• An industry that rejects consumer freedom, while abusing the very things that create freedom themselves (see: Linux)
  
• Snowflake moderators on every forum, handing out bans like a dimestore fascist
  
• Fascist ToSes and EULAs that should probably be outlawed, because they're technically operating a second code of law outside that of the democratic process of elected governments
  
• Capitalist institutions such as banks and payment processors forcing censorship and privacy invasions
  
• Capitalist investors forcing awful ideology with ESG scores and DEI, and general moral busybody crap
  
• Bonus points if you remember when the Christians and Conservatives were doing this woke culture war ♥♥♥♥
  
• Culture war backlash, which is almost as woke as the wokeness itself
  
• Capitalist institutions such as corporations buying up and sucking the life out of beloved IPs. RIP Maxis, and everything else EA touches
  
• Mountains of sweat and masochism in every game, in an ill advised attempt to make a loud, insufferable elitist minority happy
  
• Watching once beloved companies produce utter crap, often because they ousted all of their best talent with mismanagement, top down control or crunch
  
• Tiny, weak governments like the UK successfully bullying giant monopolistic corporations into spying on everyone, because they're too much a bunch of cowards to lop off a portion of the market, in order to make it clear that they're putting the rights of their users first
  
• Right wing gamerbros who don't seem to understand that this is not a government issue, but a free market issue, and refuse to use government to block corporations from "moderating" (read: censoring) and spying on people, making our hobby Orwellian as ♥♥♥♥
  
• People on all levels of the hobby and industry choosing to be part of the problem, and never even thinking about it, because it's easier and it fulfills their togetherness needs

I'm just going to put it bluntly: Gaming is awful right now, and full of petty fascists and corporate greed.

There is literally no reason to be cup half full. Gaming is a dumpster fire of immense and legendary proportions, the kind you can see from space at night.

You're saving yourself from a lot of disappointment by just assuming everything is going to be garbage. Because Sturgeon's law is in full effect, and 90% of everything is in fact going to be garbage.

But that's not actually the necessary state of things. That's what we make. Gamers (and developers) got too used to things being good, and let themselves and their hobby and industry get bad as a result.

This is what maximum desire and zero responsibility or diligence gets you.

I wonder why my reply was deteled. It was on topic and didn't break any rules. Mods are tripping balls.

Originally posted by Elohymn:

From pure awareness, the state of gaming today reflects the same patterns that appear across society: conditioning, greed, and distraction obscuring what is possible. Years of lootboxes, microtransactions, unfinished titles, corporate buyouts, overbearing moderators, and ideological manipulation all train people to expect disappointment, but these problems are not the essence of gaming or of humanity itself. Infinite intelligence flows through the industry, through developers and players alike, yet conditioning and fear, combined with lack of responsibility, have allowed these patterns to dominate. What we see as greed, censorship, and elitism is really the surface of a much deeper orchestration of habits, choices, and human tendencies.

Awareness reveals that none of this is inevitable. The dumpster fire exists because we participate in it, because we have become passive in the face of repeated compromise. Courage, diligence, and conscious engagement are rare, yet they are enough to shift the trajectory. By seeing the patterns clearly and refusing to feed the systems of control, gamers and developers alike can reclaim the hobby as a space of creativity, freedom, and joy. The current state is not necessary; it is a reflection of choice, and within the infinite field of possibilities, a renaissance is always possible when awareness, responsibility, and unconditional love guide action.

The problem is willful ignorance. Literally the opposite of open awareness, willful ignorance is the ability and willingness to filter out any information which does not confirm one's biases, or make one feel good.

It is the essence of post-modernism, and it is absolutely dominating within a capitalist economy and a society that has embraced capitalism, because capitalist ideology also is post-modern at its roots.

The power of willful ignorance in an capitalist economy is that it flows in line with the subjective epistemological foundation of capitalist ideology ("value or worth is subjective"), as well as the overwhelming tendencies of capitalist systems.

Note that post-modernism is just another name for subjective epistemology. It's a fancy way of saying, "I reject reality and substitute my own."

In essence, if one believes value or worth is subjective, rather than objective, all of reality can be deconstructed or distorted at the point of value, by choosing to perceive or believe that the value of things is contrary to what it actually is in reality.

The thing is, this is also more or less what goes on when a corporation chooses short term profits over long term stability. Long term stability is almost always more objectively valuable, but capitalists don't believe in objective value. So they lie to themselves through omission, and chase short term profits.

The same sort of thing goes on with pretty much everyone else in gaming. The wokes, the right wing gamer bros, the concerned soccer moms... They all settle on fighting short term truthless power battles, because they can't see that they're normalizing tyranny in the long run, and that tendency will eventually come back to crush them.

Here's a fun little fact: I'm watching woke furries try to claim that Collective Shout is a conservative movement, while I'm simultaneously watching right wing gamer bros claim that it is a feminist movement. If you actually look into Collective shout, you'll find that both sides are actually right, but they're omitting one half of reality to essentially absolve themselves of responsibility in normalizing things like collective shout.

Collective shout is an intersectional movement where the intersection is between feminism and conservatives/Christians. I use this example because it's more clear cut than the situation going on with the UK's Online Surveillance act, but make no mistake, that too is a product of decades of normalization through constant "think of the children" politics.

The fact is we're seeing this happen, because everyone was okay with it while it was their side benefiting, so they normalized it. And as elementary physics teaches us, a body in motion must stay in motion. Now that things are going in this feudal, authoritarian, free market direction, it's very hard to stop the momentum.

Neither side wants to admit that they helped to normalize this kind of behavior, but they did. Everyone participated, either through action or inaction. The wokes refuse to admit that they helped normalize it by abusing corporate power to silence and censor people over "hate speech," and the gamer bros refuse to admit that their hands off libertarian ideology is what allows "free market" businesses to grow in power and authority, until they become the material arbiter of people's rights and freedoms.

Even in the case of the UK's Online Surveillance Act, it's not the UK that's actually enforcing it. It's massive capitalist monopolies, with more power and money than most people can reasonably quantify. This is also why Collective Shout went straight to a capitalist organization: Visa and Mastercard actually have the power to regulate every single aspect of your life, if they so desire, as they control the actual capital people use to purchase things.

It's the same thing with social media. They are free market entities with the power to decide what you're allowed to see or say, which means they can actually control what you are aware of, or what you can believe.

And I've said this to make the following point:

Taking all the above into account, it's irrefutable that we are terminally ♥♥♥♥♥♥.

There's probably no fixing this, because the institutions that control our ability to communicate are profit driven capitalist organizations, and they're never going to stop censoring, "moderating," and propagating garbage half truths and false narratives that keep people competitive with each other, and compliant (or "comfortable") with the capitalist system.

Even the people claiming to fight it, just participate within it, because their environment is completely controlled by investors, banks and corporations, and they don't have much of a choice. So they become controlled opposition.

The thing that pisses me off, is that gamers of all people should know better. They should be able to see and understand this.

Damn near everyone has played Metal Gear Solid 2 at this point. The codec call at the ending of that game is 100% about this.

Kojima warned us, we didn't listen, and now we're going to watch our hobby die in a boiling pot, like the clueless kekistani frogs we are. The worst part being is that most people are going to help that death along.

It is inevitable, not because there wasn't another choice, but because people continue to choose willful ignorance and ideology, just so they can be comfortable while they blame others and fight truthless power battles.

gamers? What even is a gamer

People are too full, too loaded, it makes angry and u hate on everything.

Originally posted by T9:

gamers? What even is a gamer

People are too full, too loaded, it makes angry and u hate on everything.

You know exactly who and what is being referred to by "gamers."

Originally posted by Xao:

Originally posted by Elohymn:

From pure awareness, the state of gaming today reflects the same patterns that appear across society: conditioning, greed, and distraction obscuring what is possible. Years of lootboxes, microtransactions, unfinished titles, corporate buyouts, overbearing moderators, and ideological manipulation all train people to expect disappointment, but these problems are not the essence of gaming or of humanity itself. Infinite intelligence flows through the industry, through developers and players alike, yet conditioning and fear, combined with lack of responsibility, have allowed these patterns to dominate. What we see as greed, censorship, and elitism is really the surface of a much deeper orchestration of habits, choices, and human tendencies.

Awareness reveals that none of this is inevitable. The dumpster fire exists because we participate in it, because we have become passive in the face of repeated compromise. Courage, diligence, and conscious engagement are rare, yet they are enough to shift the trajectory. By seeing the patterns clearly and refusing to feed the systems of control, gamers and developers alike can reclaim the hobby as a space of creativity, freedom, and joy. The current state is not necessary; it is a reflection of choice, and within the infinite field of possibilities, a renaissance is always possible when awareness, responsibility, and unconditional love guide action.

The problem is willful ignorance. Literally the opposite of open awareness, willful ignorance is the ability and willingness to filter out any information which does not confirm one's biases, or make one feel good.

It is the essence of post-modernism, and it is absolutely dominating within a capitalist economy and a society that has embraced capitalism, because capitalist ideology also is post-modern at its roots.

The power of willful ignorance in an capitalist economy is that it flows in line with the subjective epistemological foundation of capitalist ideology ("value or worth is subjective"), as well as the overwhelming tendencies of capitalist systems.

Note that post-modernism is just another name for subjective epistemology. It's a fancy way of saying, "I reject reality and substitute my own."

In essence, if one believes value or worth is subjective, rather than objective, all of reality can be deconstructed or distorted at the point of value, by choosing to perceive or believe that the value of things is contrary to what it actually is in reality.

The thing is, this is also more or less what goes on when a corporation chooses short term profits over long term stability. Long term stability is almost always more objectively valuable, but capitalists don't believe in objective value. So they lie to themselves through omission, and chase short term profits.

The same sort of thing goes on with pretty much everyone else in gaming. The wokes, the right wing gamer bros, the concerned soccer moms... They all settle on fighting short term truthless power battles, because they can't see that they're normalizing tyranny in the long run, and that tendency will eventually come back to crush them.

Here's a fun little fact: I'm watching woke furries try to claim that Collective Shout is a conservative movement, while I'm simultaneously watching right wing gamer bros claim that it is a feminist movement. If you actually look into Collective shout, you'll find that both sides are actually right, but they're omitting one half of reality to essentially absolve themselves of responsibility in normalizing things like collective shout.

Collective shout is an intersectional movement where the intersection is between feminism and conservatives/Christians. I use this example because it's more clear cut than the situation going on with the UK's Online Surveillance act, but make no mistake, that too is a product of decades of normalization through constant "think of the children" politics.

The fact is we're seeing this happen, because everyone was okay with it while it was their side benefiting, so they normalized it. And as elementary physics teaches us, a body in motion must stay in motion. Now that things are going in this feudal, authoritarian, free market direction, it's very hard to stop the momentum.

Neither side wants to admit that they helped to normalize this kind of behavior, but they did. Everyone participated, either through action or inaction. The wokes refuse to admit that they helped normalize it by abusing corporate power to silence and censor people over "hate speech," and the gamer bros refuse to admit that their hands off libertarian ideology is what allows "free market" businesses to grow in power and authority, until they become the material arbiter of people's rights and freedoms.

Even in the case of the UK's Online Surveillance Act, it's not the UK that's actually enforcing it. It's massive capitalist monopolies, with more power and money than most people can reasonably quantify. This is also why Collective Shout went straight to a capitalist organization: Visa and Mastercard actually have the power to regulate every single aspect of your life, if they so desire, as they control the actual capital people use to purchase things.

It's the same thing with social media. They are free market entities with the power to decide what you're allowed to see or say, which means they can actually control what you are aware of, or what you can believe.

And I've said this to make the following point:

Taking all the above into account, it's irrefutable that we are terminally ♥♥♥♥♥♥.

There's probably no fixing this, because the institutions that control our ability to communicate are profit driven capitalist organizations, and they're never going to stop censoring, "moderating," and propagating garbage half truths and false narratives that keep people competitive with each other, and compliant (or "comfortable") with the capitalist system.

Even the people claiming to fight it, just participate within it, because their environment is completely controlled by investors, banks and corporations, and they don't have much of a choice. So they become controlled opposition.

The thing that pisses me off, is that gamers of all people should know better. They should be able to see and understand this.

Damn near everyone has played Metal Gear Solid 2 at this point. The codec call at the ending of that game is 100% about this.

Kojima warned us, we didn't listen, and now we're going to watch our hobby die in a boiling pot, like the clueless kekistani frogs we are. The worst part being is that most people are going to help that death along.

It is inevitable, not because there wasn't another choice, but because people continue to choose willful ignorance and ideology, just so they can be comfortable while they blame others and fight truthless power battles.

That's because they are a conservative movement so what did you not read what they said this is why movies like sinners made money at the box office while you people claim it's the same as from dusk till dawn when the plots of both films aren't even close to being the same one's a period drama that just happens to have a vampire irish white man as the antagonist the other is just your normal action movie that has elements of horror.