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[Loxley]

people have been saying for at ten years that shooters are atired out genre and yet they keep coming back. they'll always be around, like any good gmae or genre.

I can't think of a time when shooters haven't sold well. Ever since developing an FPS in a 3D environment became possible they've been extremely popular.

Which is why I think people who expect shooters to die down in popularity are slightly delusional, shooters will likely always be tremendously popular and some of the industry's most profitable titles. As long as there are young males who are attracted to violence in their entertainment (which has been a staple of our sex since, I think, the beginning of time) shooters will always have a large audience.

I do agree that the market is over-saturated with bad shooters, but at least this year we've got Bioshock Infinite and Borderlands 2 coming our way.

 

[Mlatador]

They are actually too viable for my taste. What I've always liked about consoles more compared to pc-gaming - that's why I became a console-gamer - was the fact that they didn't have many shooters, but many other cool and fun genres.

That has completey changed, since too many PC gamers not only realized that consoles have become pretty powerful and that shooters do work on them, but also that console-gaming is much cheaper than having to upgrade your PC every now and then.

That led to them buying their favorite genre - shooters - like crazy on consoles, which therefore led to developers focusing on shooters like hell, makes tons of money and so on...

Back when console and pc-gaming were totally different, that were the best days of gaming in genereal IMHO, since pc-games didn't get dumped down and console-gaming had more variety.

Unfortunately that will never come back, since pc gamers on consoles are here to stay and thus shooters (which have a pretty bad influence on the whole industry - see RE6 Capcom statement).

 

[trinest]

Shooters will always be around, but I believe their rain as the it game to develop is slowly disapearing.

However nothing really has come around to replace it yet.

 

[LuchaShaq]

* Crysis 2
* Killzone 3
* Bulletstorm
* Resistance 3
* Rage
* Homefront
* Warhammer 40K: Space Marine
* FEAR 3
* Goldeneye 007: Reloaded
* Red Faction: Armageddon
* Hard Reset
* Brink

All amazing games, if you did not like them or buy them you missed out. People just don't want to spend money in this economy. Which I understand.

Honestly have to disagree 100% on Red Faction. As someone who absolutely LOVED guerrilla, Armageddon was basically the exact opposite of what I wanted in everyway. Sure the game wasn't broken but it was such a bummer.

As for rage, at least on 360 just moving made the textures switch/pop so much it literally made me nauseous. I consider it broken/unplayable on 360 at least at launch.

 

[Grayman]

They're still viable, but you are correct that like any genre before it, FPS are starting to ossify.

Sometimes, this process can occur rapidly, as in Guitar Rhythm Games. Sometimes, it can take several generations, as it did with JRPGs. But eventually, this process tends to occur:

1) A few kings-of-the-genre arise.
2) As time continues, these thrones become increasingly less assailable. The odds of a breakout hit in the genre go down and down.
3) Eventually the gap between the Kings-of-the-genre and everyone else becomes so wide that you have several major successes and then a swathe of underperforming titles.
4) Development in the genre begins to dwindle. Eventually, we're left with the Kings-of-the-genre along with a scaterring of niche titles.

I think we're rounding step 2 right now, and on our way to 3. That would occur within the next 3-4 years (we're talking very long timescales here, particularly for a genre as large as FPS; this whole process from step 1 to 4 may take 15 years).

Does this change with sub genres? DOOM, Quake 3, and Counter Strike have been on the untouchable genre king throne before COD.

 

[pieatorium]

They are actually too viable for my taste. What I've always liked about consoles more compared to pc-gaming - that's why I became a console-gamer - was the fact that they didn't have many shooters, but many other cool and fun genres.

That has completey changed, since too many PC gamers not only realized that consoles have become pretty powerful and that shooters do work on them, but also that console-gaming is much cheaper than having to upgrade your PC every now and then.

That led to them buying their favorite genre - shooters - like crazy on consoles, which therefore led to developers focusing on shooters like hell, makes tons of money and so on...

Back when console and pc-gaming were totally different, that were the best days of gaming in genereal IMHO, since pc-games didn't get dumped down and console-gaming had more variety.

Unfortunately that will never come back, since pc gamers on consoles are here to stay and thus shooters (which have a pretty bad influence on the whole industry - see RE6 Capcom statement).

The thing i find silly about your post is that there has always been huge variety in PC gaming and the way you talk makes me think that this anti shooter descision of yours must have occured at least last gen or the one before in which case I would say that there was probably even greater variety in PC games at least at the high profile end of the industry with RTS, TBS,Turn Based RPGs (and RPG's in general), Sims(sim city theme park railroad tycoon etc), Adventure and other genre's doing very well at their peak.

What genre's have died out since shooters hit it big? there might be retraction in what is selling at the top but this doesn't mean there is less variety in genres just that the games that everyone is trying to ride the coat tails of have changed.

 

[obonicus]

1) A few kings-of-the-genre arise.

We've had multiple 'kings' arise for FPS, though. Doom was massive. Counterstrike (and thus HL) was massive. Halo was massive. CoD4 was massive. None of them have turned out to actually be unassailable, though.

Maybe you mean to extend your theory to subgenres, as it might be a better fit, but in all honesty, I don't think your theory has much merit. It fits guitar hero perfectly, but not much else. What you're describing might more accurately be viewed as franchise fatigue 'theory'. Which bears similarities to your theory but is much less general, and less useful for 'prediction'.

Edit: also, I'm not incredibly thrilled by 'franchise fatigue' as a theory either, I just think there's more evidence to back it up. It's more a series of observations.

 

[Grayman]

We've had multiple 'kings' arise for FPS, though. Doom was massive. Counterstrike (and thus HL) was massive. Halo was massive. CoD4 was massive. None of them have turned out to actually be unassailable, though.

Maybe you mean to extend your theory to subgenres, as it might be a better fit, but in all honesty, I don't think your theory has much merit. It fits guitar hero perfectly, but not much else. What you're describing might more accurately be viewed as franchise fatigue 'theory'. Which bears similarities to your theory but is much less general, and less useful for 'prediction'.

The theory works(ed) great with fighting games pre SF4 but yes it falls apart for FPS. I always thought FPS was a bad genre title, it is a viewpoint that different types of games use and shoot is the most common verb in games aside from jump.

 

[Jarmel]

Hahahaha I forgot that F3AR came out last year.

Anyway just like any genre, the games with the best production values and hype will sell.

 

[obonicus]

The theory works(ed) great with fighting games pre SF4 but yes it falls apart for FPS. I always thought FPS was a bad genre title, it is a viewpoint that different types of games use and shoot is the most common verb in games aside from jump.

Even for fighting games, I don't think it fits. Were SF and MK (which never stopped) unassailable, or were the competitors just technically flawed? And even then we had Namco's 3d fighting games come out while Capcom was 'out', and find quite a bit of success.

I mean, contrast that to guitar games, where GH vastly outsold RB even though RB was generally considered superior. And you can point to the same thing happening in FPS. But it's not a new phenomenon. NOLF games were terrific and no one really cared -- and yet the genre has trucked on another dozen years.

 

[Deleted member 81567]

I feel unpopular FPS games have to have some sort of appealing gimmick to sell a decent amount. Marketing also has to be smart.

 

[Chairman Yang]

I feel unpopular FPS games have to have some sort of appealing gimmick to sell a decent amount. Marketing also has to be smart.

I'm not sure gimmick shooters can even sell well anymore, and that sort of design has been tried a lot.

 

[Shtof]

All these games except a couple were moderate successes and most of them very good games, far better than MW3 and BF3. Just because they didn't make the profit the CoD series does doesn't mean they aren't viable.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Make more shooters, red ocean strategy will prevail. A market without competition, isn't! I believe in you shooter developers.

 

[Jinko]

I duno but I wish someone would throw them in a burning pit of fire.

I think they won't be going anywhere now though, they are the easiest to get into and coolest looking games to appeal to the casual crowd.

 

[Chairman Yang]

Two more corpses to add to the pile...Syndicate and Darkness 2 both failed to chart in an anemic month.

At this point, making a shooter is about as logical from a business perspective as making an MMO.

 

[Nirolak]

I'm going to agree on most of these titles except Crysis 2 and Hard Reset, since one shipped 3 million copies and beat expectations (I can dig up the link to that statement if people really want, but it'll take me a while of financial reports) while the other was an extremely low budget game.

But yes, I think the market is way oversaturated and we'll see more games in other genres due to it.

Like, I wouldn't be surprised if XCOM: Enemy Unknown outsells XCOM.

 

[Ace Harding]

I haven't played more than a few hours of a true shooter (e.g. not Mass Effect, Fallout, Deus Ex, etc) in over a year. The genre isn't dead, someone just needs to figure out something different with it. When the dozens of shooters on the market don't do anything better than (or as well as) Halo/COD/BF/Gears, then there's no reason for the masses to buy them.

At this point, making a shooter is about as logical from a business perspective as making an MMO.

I sort of agree, but at least a shooter doesn't HAVE to have a massive budget and the same level of ongoing costs as an MMO.

 

[Chairman Yang]

I'm going to agree on most of these titles except Crysis 2 and Hard Reset, since one shipped 3 million copies and beat expectations (I can dig up the link to that statement if people really want, but it'll take me a while of financial reports) while the other was an extremely low budget game.

I was under the impression that Crysis 2's sell-through figures (not shipped) were poor...could be totally wrong, though.

Hard Reset was indeed low budget. But you'd think that even then, it'd do well compared to other low-budget games.

 

[Pranay]

Seeing Resistance 3 sales make me sad........
and yes i agree with op.

FPS genre is getting stale.