How do you determine which games to buy?
How do you determine which games to buy?
A while ago, I wrote about how I have not played most of the games in my Steam inventory. In theory, I should have plenty to kill time with when I need entertainment. The truth is, there are only certain genre of games I play. Even then, I have my own preferences in style and game play.
The hardest puzzle, like we face on the Steem blockchain, is content discovery. Not all publishers have massive budget to promote their games. Sometimes, they rely on more grass-root movement through their fan base. Sometimes, they may rely on built-in discovery mechanisms. Or, you know, pay some professional critics to write critiques.
Today's front page on Metacritic
As a fun tangent, how many similar approaches do you think this blockchain has had?
For me, in more recent years, I have become the type of old grouch that only purchase things based on familiarity. That is, I go for known publishers and game developers. Take The Outer World, for example, I would go for it because it's from people who made my favorite Fallout series.
On the basis of that familiarity, I am also the type of guy who would buy remastered versions of games. I'm sure there are enough of us who feel that way to have a substantial market. And yes, you bet I will get the remastered version of Final Fantasy 7, despite how overrated it might be. When the remastered version of Resident Evil 2 came out, I went back, got it, and played it. Never mind the fact that it scared the crap out of me back in the old days. The new graphics made it worse, in a good way.
Anyhow, that's how I go about looking for new games to play these days. Some gamers may choose the most popular games out there. Some might take their favorite streamers' recommendations. Some might even follow voluntary "curators" such as those on Valve's Steam.
Let's be honest, though, I don't follow serious curators on Steam. Not when I follow Critiquing Doge and No, I am Your Father.
That's literally all they say
What tools and criteria do you guys use to determine which games to buy? Budget will not be part of the consideration here.
Most opinions are welcome.
- Critics' recommendations
- Streamers/YouTube personalities
- Brand/Publisher reputation
- Remastered versions of previous games
- Self-discovery
- Randomly landed on games
- Other (please specify)
Answer the question at dpoll.xyz.
Voted for
Another way I find games I might be interested in is just to scroll through Steam's endless recommendations on the store home page. I usually add games that look good to my wishlist, and then spend way too much money on them during the big Steam sales. I've found some great games that way, though!
Voted for
Watch gameplay on youtube, then if i like it buy it.
But i don't game anymore nowadays.
I often it find that if I watch through the game play, I wind up not buying the game. Instead, I would become well-versed in the game's lore.
Voted for
I do not buy games. Only play them if they are free.
Do you wait for the freebies from Humble Bundles, etc.?
No, I do not really play games at all. Just a bit of action on some steem games, @enforcer48.
I don't have a Steam account but I play the Xbox 360 and some older consoles from time to time and mainly stick to the games I already have. I do download a new one from time to time and its usually one that catches my eye do to be advertised on said console.
P.S. you should consider using the BATTLE tag on your gaming content so you can collect some added rewards (BATTLE) for your efforts.
Yeah, I pretty much stick to what I have as well.
I keep forgetting to use the #battle tag. lol I will have to train myself into doing it.
Voted for
It's a little tricky with "Remastered versions of previous titles".
In general, I don't do that, I don't know why, really. For example, the FF7. I bought, played, and still own the very first version that was released for PCs, I even had to upgrade my PC back then because it ran so F* slow that when some in-game movie was played, like the (sic!) opening "train" movie, or when some richer animation (the summons, etc) was played, the game looked like a slideshow and music played several looped notes for a few second, then next several notes looped for a few seconds and so on. Nevermind. What I wanted to say, I played "the original", and it was great. Then I replayed the original on a more-modern computer, and it was ... uh ridiculously quality in many aspects. And paradoxically, most of the bad reception I got was not from the fact that the game, I dont know, "changed" it self, or not that it was really bad, etc, it was that the game did not make the same fun as when I played as a kid. Time did its "damage" and my expectation rose over those years, but also memories play role: the same scenes/plot/mechanics are now nothing new to me, and what was great now is just plain. When I look now at remastered-FF7 versions, heh, I still remember the original and how cool/great it was, and I completely don't remember the "let's replay it on modern machine" failure. I somewhat don't want to end up with similar feeling. I'm not afraid of being disappointed, etc, but it's just waste of time/money.
So what's tricky here? It sometimes happen that I find and play and like some game, only to later discover that this game was remastered version of some older original. I then simply can't hold back and must play the original. Now, that's a case! It's reverse "Remastered versions of previous titles". Like "Original versions of previous remastered titles". It happened a few times already, and I was really very positively surprised how well originals turned out compared to remastered ones.
Similar thing applies to "prequels/sequels". Let's say I got into FooBar-5, I often will also play in foobar-4, 3, 2, 1, and rarely -6. As a notable example, after playing FF7 and FF8 on PC, I think I played every single previous 'chapters' on SNES/etc, while I don't think I ever even saw FFXII or FFXIII.
Now writing this I feel like some retro-maniac, but looking at when I meticulously searched shops and the internet for all those old ones, while ignoring the new ones, I think the most important cause was ... the price. When I had tons of free time, I had no funds to be buying recently-published non-pirated games often. I could afford it once a year, maybe. In comparison, the same budgets allowed to buy/find/obtain 10-20 older games/roms/etc. Now situations's changed. I got some funds, I have no time to play ;)
That’s also assuming the remastered version is the exact same as the original, but with only graphics update.
For example, Resident Evil 2 remastered has some major differences compared to the original. Some of them being the camera angle and free range aim.
Yeah, that's right. Sometimes "remastered" is just about graphics and sound, and sometimes controls are diferent (which can make huge difference in gameplay quality) and sometimes it's like a total overhaul, with some features added/removed resulting in almost a new game, just looking similar. In the latter case, I wouldn't really consider it 'remastered', but rather, a new release, or huge service-pack/patch-pack, say i.e. FF7.02 :)
Voted for
Other: I like video game series (for example Grand Theft Auto, Heroes of Might and Magic), so I look for the sequels. Sometimes I also buy expansion packs. For example Heroes of Might and Magic III Essential.
HoMM3 was definitely a classic in the series.
Voted for
Like a good content (as you mentioned as well), selection of anything, not only games, cannot be determined only on a single criteria. For me, all of the options you have given are applicable, I have left those which could be of the last resort, though.
Some games definitely fall into the "I don't want to talk about how I found it" category.
Voted for
Voted for
Voted for