Okay, so maybe the blog title is a bit misleading here, but we're in an era in gaming where we can flood our gaming devices with new software or DLC with little or no interaction, and very often while keeping a decent budget. Indie games appear in bundles constantly with great help from Steam sales, Humble Bundle, Indie Royale bundles, and even bundle sales from Amazon and its kind. XBLA, PlayStation Plus, and Nintendo's eShop, especially now that it's cross-platform, enable impulse buys with as much efficiency as the various PC markets. In short, content delivery has changed drastically in the last decade.
The game purchasing flowchart used to be something like the following: work hard to earn money or save your allowance; read reviews constantly for days on end; bite the bullet and download a demo or go rent the game; find a way to the store; buy game; enjoy. "Back in the day", owning physical copies of games was akin to bibliophiles owning personal libraries, and was honestly a bit of a gamer dick measuring contest. Completionists loved owning every edition of every game, and having them on display was a mark of not only personal satisfaction, but esteem.
Consider digital distribution - the new means of content delivery. Games are easier to get to consumers in many ways: publishing is less arduous, as independent developers now have much more leeway in both PC and console land these days; they're less expensive to manufacture and ship; they can be patched much more efficiently and seamlessly than older methods; the list goes on and on. Established brands and publishers have also switched to this new method for the same reasons, often producing games of similar caliber while lowering costs for the consumer.
By mixing ease of publishing with lower creation and manufacturing costs, far more games are entering the market. Consumers, rather than dealing exclusively with tangible items and the dilemma of which game has more value over another, now have the power to much more easily impulse buy (I'll take that whole bundle, plus throw another $10 for all of the soundtracks, why the hell now!) and load up their personal libraries. The problem a lot of gamers face, then, is "which game do I play next?"
When I was younger, getting a new game was both a rare event and a carefully planned purchase. Following the flowchart of old, the "enjoy" part was a climax many weeks in the making, and the ridiculous excitement that surrounded a game once I finally had it made playing it a thoroughly amazing event. Flash forward to the "modern" age and we're dealing with gamers and being flooded with interesting games, often resulting in a deluge of new things to play. The problem many of us face at that point is overstimulation - owning far too many things that we might not really want, but they were either extremely inexpensive (Steam sales, bundles, the like), or just owning entirely too many awesome games to consume while dealing with the rest of life's responsibilities.
Now comes my own dilemma: what do I want to play? For me, it's actually pretty difficult to get into a new game unless I have a HUGE,exciting amount of energy going into the purchase. Part of the reason I don't get super pumped about games anymore is that maybe it's too easy for me to get my grubby paws on them these days. I still strongly prefer getting physical copies of things (that $30 3DS bundle credit from when I bought both Shin Megami Tensei IV and Fire Emblem Awakening is still sitting pretty on my account), and so long as I have the option, I'm still going to buy that way, likely because I enjoy admiring a physical library. While I might be tangentially interested in something because it continues a beloved series (most recently it was The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds) and end up buying it, I haven't really felt the necessary push to get into it. Instead of starting that or another new purchase, Bravely Default, instead I found myself with my second run in Pokémon X, and I'm not sure I'll stop to take a break for the others. In console land, Tales of Symphonia Chronicles will arrive tomorrow (after a strangely sour experience with Amazon.com customer service), which I've already blocked off the weekend for a binge on the first of the two games in the package, but handheld and console games are separate beasts in my mind. Long story short, a lot of new things are coming out and I’m finding it hard to play them instead of going back to my typical mainstays.
For the rest of you likely more normal people, what issues do you face with the immediate availability of damn near any game you could possibly want to play?
