Games have matured, but mature games are are too hard to learn.

Games have matured, but mature games are are too hard to learn.

People keep on saying games need to mature and “grow up” I think this is wrong. It is the mature games that need to be simplified without loosing depth and complexity, so the mainstream can play them.

There is plenty of fundamentally deep games like:

Deus ex 1, Eve Online, Planetscape Torment, The witcher ½, fallout ½/new vegas

Games like those are very mature but also got a level of difficulty/complexity that makes most mainstream gamers unable to play them or appreciate them. And then it is:

Dwarf Fortress

That game is so deep and complex that one can say rather securely, that even in its unfinished form it is probably one the deepest things that humans have created. In general most books and films cannot in their limited forms convey the depth, complexities and feelings that game can give.

But of course the problem is that so very few people bother spending the several hours it takes to understand the basics of Dwarf Fortress. Or even bother spending the time it is needed to play or understand the depth of the story, setting and universe of less mature games.

Part of the problem with getting the mainstream to play mature games, is that the methods to make the mature games simple enough is yet to be truly explored. Minecraft shows that you can bring some of the sandbox elements over from dwarf fortress, over to a game that is playable by the mainstream. But the problem is that Minecraft is a rare example. Most games that try to be “mature” does it by being more like movies than games, heavy Rain does this with its very linear game style. Making movie games is not progress, it is pretty much making movies with some quick time events in them.

There needs to be more exploration of a shovel is a shovel type of game design, by that I mean use of rules in games that people is already used to, people think a shovel digs, so that is what it should do. No need to make it only dig when it rains on a certain time of day etc.

Nintendo and apple really shows how to bring complex things to the masses. There is a need in games to develop better user interfaces so people can play complex and deep games without having to spend half a day learning the rules. As this stops most of the gamers who want mature games from playing mature games.

Again Minecraft shows you can give massive non linearity to gamers while still making the game playable by the mainstream. This shows that in the future someone might bring the depth of Dwarf Fortress to the masses.

In short there is games that are mature, but the amount of people who can play them is too small for games to appear mature as a whole. There needs to be more use of smart user interfaces and smart “a shovel is a shovel” game design for games to appear mature to the mainstream.

Ps: I am to tired to fix all the grammatical errors and the confusing way the blog is written. sorry for that.