Game genres that are oversaturated and genres that are undersaturated in the modern era

[Xarpho's Return]

You also don't see console-specific versions of games, as games on multiple platforms tend to be just ports now. Back then you also had console-exclusive versions of Sims games such as Bustin' Out, and the console version of The Sims 2 had its own set of features and played in different ways compared to the PC version.

Those were almost exclusively licensed games to begin with and the handheld version was guaranteed to suck (this goes back to the NES/Game Boy days). But Bustin' Out and The Urbz didn't, they actually were BETTER than their console counterparts.

 

[Croaking Spider]

Monster hunting games. Monster Hunter isn't the only game in the genre, but it may as well be.

The only other game that comes to mind when I think MH-like that isn't obscure or dead is Dauntless, which just feels like a more "arcadey" MH. Being an Epic exclusive doesn't help the player numbers despite being F2P. Not a bad game overall, if you like MH, you'll probably enjoy Dauntless for a bit. To this day I wish MH would get an equivalent of Dauntless's rocket hammer. Think hammer with gunlance shelling and insect glaive vault.

Any "normal" sort of racing game whether it be arcade-style or simulation

I wish we would have gotten the arcade release of Star Wars Racer as a home title.

The major difference in the arcade version is how you control the vehicle. There's a throttle lever on both sides that you have to adjust to control your acceleration, braking, and turning. If you've ever operated a zero-degree turn lawn mower, it pretty much controls the exact same way. There's no silly powerup karting game gimmicks, just rotating the podracer to make your turns more efficient and to squeeze through tight areas. I think you could use dual thumbsticks to replicate the experience, but there's nothing like the original. I played the Gameboy Color version until the rumble motor in the cartridge went out.

That's right, a rumble pack in a GBC game, powered by a AAA battery.

 

[Ah ha']

I really liked those Yugioh rpgs where the card game was partially converted into something else entirely. I feel like if Konami wasnt so jewed right now they could take the risk of making some pretty cool rpgs with 2 decades of card lore and interesting ideas that are posed from the various scenes portrayed in the cards.

Though i bet they would just waste it all on pursuing waifuism with Sky Striker Raye (She is baye, but I dont wanna play a game as her).

 

[TheArtilleryman]

Oversaturated: Remakes.

Undersaturated: Enhanced ports.

Upscaled graphics =/= enhanced.

New features + QOL improvements = enhanced.

 

[Big Brown Schlub]

I really liked those Yugioh rpgs where the card game was partially converted into something else entirely. I feel like if Konami wasnt so jewed right now they could take the risk of making some pretty cool rpgs with 2 decades of card lore and interesting ideas that are posed from the various scenes portrayed in the cards.

Though i bet they would just waste it all on pursuing waifuism with Sky Striker Raye (She is baye, but I dont wanna play a game as her).

Yeah it's a real shame, they really threw shit at the wall during the 5th and 6th gen of consoles and gave us a bunch of games that weren't just duel sims like Capsule Monsters, Dungeon Dice Monsters, Duelists of the Roses (GOATed game) or Falsebound Kingdom, and even the duel sims like the WC series on Nintendo and Tag Force on the PSP were leaps and bounds above the shit we get today where it's all just duels against shitty AI or other people. If I wanted that I could just use one of the free duel sims like EdoPro.

 

[Shart Attack]

The only other game that comes to mind when I think MH-like that isn't obscure or dead is Dauntless, which just feels like a more "arcadey" MH. Being an Epic exclusive doesn't help the player numbers despite being F2P. Not a bad game overall, if you like MH, you'll probably enjoy Dauntless for a bit. To this day I wish MH would get an equivalent of Dauntless's rocket hammer. Think hammer with gunlance shelling and insect glaive vault.

That's a good way to describe it.

- God Eater: Arguably Monster Hunter's strongest competitor, probably dead. GE3 probably didn't sell well enough for Bamco's liking, and the core staff left Shift to form their own studio. Their new studio is supposedly working on what may be a new monster hunting game, but there's been almost no news about it for five years now. This one hurts the most, because I goddamn love God Eater.
- Toukiden: Obscure and dead.
- Soul Sacrifice: Obscure and dead.
- Freedom Wars: Coming to Steam next year, but it looks like a lazy port of the Vita original. I don't think there's any way in hell it generates enough hype or revenue to justify a modern sequel.
- Wild Hearts: Came and went like a fart, despite a fair amount of hype leading up to the release.
- Dauntless: Still alive somehow.

Monster Hunter is becoming more like God Eater with each passing game, with a greater focus on player mobility and silly storylines, and now the ability to switch weapons mid-hunt. The way they're going, they may add something like the Dauntless rocket hammer or God Eater boost hammer to the next game.

 

[Croaking Spider]

- God Eater: Arguably Monster Hunter's strongest competitor, probably dead

I feel slightly ashamed for not mentioning God Eater. My first exposure to God Eater was seeing Soma in Project X Zone (fucking gem) and occasionally seeing people's homemade cosplay props back when it was still new enough to be relevant. You can only see so many badass giant weapons without thinking "this is fucking cool, what actually IS this?".

Some friends and I tried playing GE3 together, but we ended up soured on the experience after having multiple hunts get stuck in an infinite ending loop. As a solo experience though, great games. The bullet customization is one of the neatest systems I've seen. Being able to change how many projectiles came out and change the trajectory behavior made for some really interesting setups. My personal favorites were a healing shot I made where the bullets pretty much stop as soon as they're fired and curve back into the player, and a shot that would fire a projectile that travelled a certain distance and break apart into a spinning circle of bullets that were perfect for part breaks. Honestly kind of a shame that the series isn't more mainstream.

- Wild Hearts: Came and went like a fart,

Outside of my friend group, I really didn't keep up with this one. The PC I had at the time was an absolute toaster and didn't have an ice cube's chance in hell to actually run it smoothly. From what I saw of my friends streaming it, I thought the traversal and building up a world were neat ideas. Maybe I should go back and give it a shot myself now that I have a non-shit PC.

 

[Joe Dough 68]

MMO Shooters, while only being a small footnote on the bigger genre itself, never really had their chance to shine, imo. And with BattleRoyales effectively occupying the niche nowadays the chances of that happening are practically next to zero, which is rather sad. PlanetSide 2 to my knowledge is the last of it's kind now, and it's a miracle that it's still alive and receiving updates.

 

[Evil Peter Griffin]

I miss Aerna FPS. I really want a new Unreal Tournament.

 

[Anus Lemonade]

Oversaturated: Cartoon/cozy games. Stardew valley cursed us all. Minecraft ruined us. I hate them.
Also, I love Dark Souls, but it's time to stop with the store brand clones.

Undersaturated: They don't make games for us anymore fellow Chuds. Every now and then we get a bone thrown to us in the form of DOOM or Ready or Not . Space Marine 2 looks awesome. But are we ever going to get a Ghost Recon again? Maybe a Diablo that isn't trannygoyslop? Or perhaps a hyper violent Ninja Gaiden (feat. tig ol' bitties)?

Sorry for the blackpilling, but we can't escape from cartoons, homosexuals, tutorials, bad writing, or just painful mediocrity.

 

[Cactus Concerto]

Oversaturated: Cartoon/cozy games. Stardew valley cursed us all. Minecraft ruined us. I hate them.
Also, I love Dark Souls, but it's time to stop with the store brand clones.

Undersaturated: They don't make games for us anymore fellow Chuds. Every now and then we get a bone thrown to us in the form of DOOM or Ready or Not . Space Marine 2 looks awesome. But are we ever going to get a Ghost Recon again? Maybe a Diablo that isn't trannygoyslop? Or perhaps a hyper violent Ninja Gaiden (feat. tig ol' bitties)?

Sorry for the blackpilling, but we can't escape from cartoons, homosexuals, tutorials, bad writing, or just painful mediocrity.

As a lover of specifically Stardew Valley, cartoons, and girly slop, it is not just the chuds that suffer from this fate.

Oversaturated: Cartoon/cozy games made by the alphabet mafia that have more agenda than charm (and always more visually pleasing than stimulating as an interactive medium should be). Games that are just glorified films (aka the end point of journalism glorifying walking simulators and visual novels being the easiest game type to push out for creative hacks who cannot compete in their wanted field, like writing or directing) because reading is hard but everything on Netflix is shit. Girly games made by teams that apparently don't like playing games, never grew up with games in any capacity, or believe a good game is clicking a button and getting everything you want right there and then. Female-orientated games getting pushed out as microtransaction filled bullshit on mobile.

Undersaturated: Some hecking GOOD GIRL GAMES (especially on PC).

Puzzle games, time management, object finders, strategy games, story games, light adventure games, simulation-type games, dress-up games, single player games that do not involve anything online, even fucking visual novels/dating games: every single aspect of female-orientated gaming is now catered to gender specials, furries, and degenerates. If you find something that isn't driven by The Narrative, it's on mobile, free, and fucks you in the ass for a chance to tap around the screen for two minutes unhindered. Or it's geared towards the lowest common denominator. The yellow adventure line is hilarious but at least that's better than click button, watch number go up, energy's run out, repeat tomorrow.

There's also the issue of a lot of the games having dev teams that don't know what the fuck they're doing, or shifting towards mobile because that's where the money is, or the creative side of shit letting everyone down.

Looking at the type of shit that was available for free on the internet and what is being handed out now at full price (often overpriced) is fucking painful.

I also miss getting to watch guys play games geared towards their sensibilities and go apeshit over it, even if I personally might not play it. I'm reminded of Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance and how much I enjoyed watching people enjoy that game.

 

[Safir]

Also, I love Dark Souls, but it's time to stop with the store brand clones.

I'm currently playing (well, gave up for November) a store-brand Dark Souls / metroidvania and it's nothing like either.
- No optional bosses and a strict order of progression.
- Double jump after the tutorial, every jump is high enough to have to use it.
- No NPCs.
- Boring notes scattered everywhere instead of "environmental storytelling".
- No background grinding, no gradual improvement of any sort. Really need an upgrade? Move between these two screens for six hours.
- No weapons or armor, you have 2-3 shooty attacks and 2-3 melee attacks.
- No builds.
- No interesting paths and shortcuts.
- Abilities might as well be keys. Two types of "doors": ones that wall off the next area and ones that hold a shitty item or attack upgrade points (upgrade costs are rising geometrically, very early game shit can theoreticaly be farmed but doesn't need to be, there's enough points in the open, midgame and later no single find is meaningful).
- No penalty for dying (literally no penalty, progress is saved).

"Metroidvania" in 20xx is just "bad platformer", and souls-like is "bad spoopy fantasy and you wake up when you die". And there aren't actually too many of them, it only seems that way because they're winnable and short, a fan is always looking for new ones, whereas if you're into multiplayer shooters or 4x, you find a good one, then sit with it for a long time.

There's a steam reviewer named "Metroidvania Review", most games on his list aren't proper metroidvanias. Very few people have the spatial imagination to make a metroidvania.

---
thread tax: ActRaiser-likes. A Valley Without Wind (procedurally generated nonsense, got me addicted for a while though), SolSeraph (bad), nothing else.

(Also, "wake up when you die" is boring. I don't want to wake up when I die, I want to reload. I want games with almost no instadeath that reward getting to the checkpoint (a new one, or "back home") in one piece.)

 

[Calandrino]

undersaturated: maze games, block-breaking paddle games, light gun games, pinball

oversaturated: 3D games, games with scrolling backgrounds, games that require an analog stick or mouse

 

[Shart Attack]

thread tax: ActRaiser-likes. A Valley Without Wind (procedurally generated nonsense, got me addicted for a while though), SolSeraph (bad), nothing else.

Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin scratches the same itch as ActRaiser for me. The game studio even cites ActRaiser as one of their inspirations. That's the only other one I can name.

"Metroidvania" in 20xx is just "bad platformer", and souls-like is "bad spoopy fantasy and you wake up when you die". And there aren't actually too many of them, it only seems that way because they're winnable and short, a fan is always looking for new ones, whereas if you're into multiplayer shooters or 4x, you find a good one, then sit with it for a long time.

If you really think there aren't too many souls-like games on the market, I want some of whatever you're smoking.

 

[skykiii]

undersaturated: maze games, block-breaking paddle games, light gun games, pinball

Is there really not enough Pinball though? There's Pinball FX (several versions which have their own unique tables), Pinball Arcade, Pinball M which is horror-themed, and I always run across a ton of shovelware pinball games on the eShop.

Just the 30+ tables available for Pinball Arcade and the 50+ available between the two versions I have of Pinball FX are enough to keep me ball'd up for a long time. My only regret is that there's no modern port of Devil's Crush--not a remaster or spiritual successor, just a straight-up port/emulation is all I ask.

 

[Calandrino]

Is there really not enough Pinball though? There's Pinball FX (several versions which have their own unique tables), Pinball Arcade, Pinball M which is horror-themed, and I always run across a ton of shovelware pinball games on the eShop.

Just the 30+ tables available for Pinball Arcade and the 50+ available between the two versions I have of Pinball FX are enough to keep me ball'd up for a long time. My only regret is that there's no modern port of Devil's Crush--not a remaster or spiritual successor, just a straight-up port/emulation is all I ask.

If you count up every DLC table in Pinball FX etc I suppose it's a lot. Though a lot of modern tables don't seem to have made it into video game form -- I'd grab that Godzilla table that I keep seeing irl. Demon's Tilt/Xenotilt are the only reps out there for video gamey pinball/Crush-likes. Yoku's Island Express, maybe, but I never tried it. Would be interested in a modern port of Devil's Crush, Alien Crush, Pinball of the Dead, that Metroid one I never got around to, etc etc, or anything else new like that. The impossible irl tables in Pinball FX have a little of that feel but still lean to the sim side.

I only found out about Pinball M recently. Much disappointment that the Texas Chainsaw table is based on the Netcucks reboot. They need some better licenses or something. At least for the Chucky one they apparently got the rights to enough stuff to theme it right.

I never bit on any of those shovelware-looking ones but I assumed they're exactly what they look like.

 

[Soy Fed]

MMO Shooters, while only being a small footnote on the bigger genre itself, never really had their chance to shine, imo. And with BattleRoyales effectively occupying the niche nowadays the chances of that happening are practically next to zero, which is rather sad. PlanetSide 2 to my knowledge is the last of it's kind now, and it's a miracle that it's still alive and receiving updates.

The Division has a great NYC Christmas environment, although with so few players left it's only an MO.

 

[skykiii]

even fucking visual novels/dating games:

This reminded me of a video I saw recently:

One thing Punchy mentions at some point is that westerners tend to use the terms "visual novel" and "dating sim" interchangeably but apparently they're actually really different games. Relevant to this thread he also mentions that real "Dating Sims" don't actually exist nowadays because the final Tokimeki Memorial game was such a bomb (pun intended).

 

[bile demon]

UNDER-represented

 

[pot of sneed]

You know what I miss? A good old dinosaur game, but not those park simulators like Jurassic World Evolution. I miss the old platformer style games, specifically the PS1 version of Lost World: Jurassic Park. Playing as a velociraptor, mauling the shit out of humans and fucking up bigger dinosaurs than you was so cool. You just don't see games like that anymore, and oh, those carefully timed jumps so you didn't fall to your death. Damn I miss that game, but no, there are endless park simulators.