Decline Is The Age of Decline over?

[Shaewaroz]

Can we finally declare that The Age of Decline is over? Surely there has never been a better time to be a PC gamer. The RPG Codex List of Incline is getting longer and longer every year. Are there still forces that would like to push us back to the Dark Ages? Hell yea, but I think now we have at least established a firm foothold in the gaming market.

And if it's indeed over, when exactly did it (The Age of Decline) end? Should we set a calendar day to celebrate this victory? What were the key moments, the important people and essential games that helped push back the forces of Decline?

 

[A user named cat]

Decline, decline never changes.

 

[LESS T_T]

Capitalism will never fail us.

 

[tuluse]

It's not so much decline is gone as that incline has carved out a tiny niche, but it is a desperate fight to stay alive.

 

[pippin]

Popamole is still being made, but at least it keeps the undesirable away from the games that actually matter (to us)

 

[Konjad]

Yes. A new age has emerged. But the dark forces of Romances, Immersion and Awesome are waiting in the shadows to strike back. We shall remain vigilant as one day they they will try to restore the decay and corruption of the genre. We will be ready and we will hold the line. We'll never let the depravity take over everything. Not again. Not as long as we are alive.

Spoiler

 

[Night Goat]

Difficult to see. Always in motion is the future.

 

[taxalot]

With the Internet and good tools, all it is going to take for the incline to survive is mens of good faith.

I am optimistic.

 

[Ismaul]

mens of good faith.

 

[Kalasanty11]

It will never be over. Games became an entertainment for casuals, and what can change the nature of casual? Nothing, I believe. All we can hope for are some rare gems, that's it.

 

[Onholyservicebound]

No, decline is still all around us, the forces of incline are still the underdog, but at least they exist. It's like when Luke first found the force, there's a new hope to be sure, but the galactic empire still owns pr. much everything, just wait until the forces of decline strike back.

For me something unexpected has to happen. Like Fallout 4 being a good RPG, or being a shit skyrim with guns RPG and getting universally panned and fail because of it. If only it was as simple as Mass Effect 3 and we could just choose the red ending to make the decline and their drones go away in a shitty Deus ex machina.

 

[Perkel]

I'd say with Age of Decadence in 2017 it will be fully over. By 2017 when that Opum Magnus hits we will have Torment:ToN, Pillars of eternity 2, 3 and 4 and D:Second Sin.

 

[Onholyservicebound]

Pillars of eternity 2, 3 and 4

Not enough time for that many slam dunks, even on ie engine pace, they need lots of DLC after all.

 

[Melan]

Let's check.

18 "MICRO-ISSUES" REMAINING !!!

There are small pockets of good gaming here and there, but good studios are too small to work on anything but a small canvas. Commercial studios are dead in the soul. Limitations on the amount of crowdfunding and the kind of games which receive interest on KS/Indiegogo mean designers are mainly milking Nostalgia Bucks or the hipster crowd. This is enough to relive the past, but not enough to move forward.

Things have improved lately, but there is still a long way to go.

 

[Cosmo]

The main good thing happening now is middle-range companies like Obsidian and Larian creating their own ecosystem. Them not having to accept anything just tot survive is a necessary but not sufficient condition of a lasting Age of Incline.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Surely there has never been a better time to be a PC gamer.

 

[a Goat]

Over? It's just the beginning.

Abandon all hope.

 

[t]

Poll missing an option. Poll invalid.

 

[JesusGreen]

Decline has been happening for RPGs almost since the genre began just because people realised it's easier to write a CoD or fucking Mario clone and make 10x as much profit.

Now we've got Kickstarter, Indiegogo and other services where an idea can be funded based on what the fans think of it rather than what the lead developer/board of directors decide to tell them will lead to more money, so we've got a lot of pretty fucking sweet stuff coming out, and incline is here again, the problem is just like any good era whether it's for games, software, marketing ideas or whatever, comes to an end at some point, and I suspect in our case it's going to be because of the very things that have brought back the incline, aka the whole kickstarter idea forcing companies to basically con their fans by making 1000000% misleading adverts just to get their funding then releasing CoD: Pacman Ghosts or some shit.

We've all seen it happening with a lot of devs already, and it hasn't taken long, when Kickstarter first came out 90% of the ideas getting a large amount of funding were coming out and doing a good job, but it's already less than 1/3 to 1/2 that.

 

[made]

The decline begins

Each day begins the decline
a little earlier
At that time I did not know
what happens to me
But now that I'm here
I know where I belong
I belong to the decline
And the decline belongs to me
as daylight to the sun
We'll see where the
All the way down leads
But I'm pretty sure
that all of you fulfill soon

The decline begins

 

[Darth Roxor]

so bold and so foolish

 

[Nyast]

Considering that DA:I got rpg/game of the year on so many websites, I'd say the forces of decline are stronger than ever.

 

[Sykar]

Ah, we have optimists in our midst. Your foolish idealism will be crushed by the forces of reality very soon.

 

[Morkar Left]

The decline never sleeps, never dies. The decline is hold back but if it is enough to bring the rpg genre to new heights than were achieved before only time will tell.

I think we have a little renaissance going on with all the classical rpgs released. For the first time since years I have a backlog of new rpgs to play and more games on the horizon. Times are great and you should enjoy them as long as they last.

 

[Jarakka]

Ah, we have optimists in our midst. Your foolish idealism will be crushed by the forces of reality very soon.

Being an idealist on Codex is like playing a paladin in Ravenloft.

 

[Shaewaroz]

Surely there has never been a better time to be a PC gamer.

- Vast variety of PC games of different budgets are getting released all the time through multiple platforms.
- Games released on other platforms get (sometimes) high-quality ports to PC (which was extremely rare in the past)
- Almost all previous generation games are available for play (which hasn't always been the case)

Even if mainstream gaming nowadays is utter shit, I don't see how you could argue that there has been a better time to be a PC gamer.