Toxic Indie Gaming

I am not a huge fan of Indie games. Let's get that out of the way first. However, I'm not against playing some of them. My favorite game of this current generation is Life is Strange, which was made by then small company Dontnod despite getting backing from Square Enix. The thing is, it has to depend on the title in question. A lot of them don't impress me. The ones that do are either because I'm curious about it. A premise might be enticing. Or it stands out in a way that it's not some generic NES type game.

My feelings of Indies in the paragraph would get both praise and criticism. And this is one of the bad things about this particular community. There's this snobbish elitism that comes from these fans. I love the 90s as much as the next guy, but if I wanted 90s type games, I'm going to play my Sega Genesis. Or my Super NES, PlayStation, N64. Play some old DOS games. Indie games most of the time are not that unique. The other side aren't the brightest themselves with bashing these games. Some of the AAA games don't exactly wow me like they did back in the 2000s.

What it comes down to is the overvaluing of these titles. As I said, most of them are not unique. The difficulty is very ridiculous at points. I don't want to see games holding people's hands, but we don't need to go back to 1987 with sloppy design and poor mechanics. An example is Epic Dumpster Bear. The title alone got me interested. It's a cute concept, but an atrocious difficulty and physics that don't work in your favor bog it down despite graphics that aren't 8-bit and not being a pure side-scrolling game. Yooka-Laylee tried too hard to be Banjo-Tooie and was only okay. The sequel was a bit better and offered more to the throwback experience.

Of course, there's the horrors of developers not wanting to deal with fans. Indie or AAA, they do want to make gamers happy. With the Internet, that's easier said than done. One little gripe can lead to a viral outbreak of harassment. It's why specific people bite their tongue 99 percent of the time. The instant one does flip out on a "fan", it's a meltdown that has consequences for the worker.

There's great Indie games. You have to sift through a lot to find the ones that will pique your interest. However, the fans need to be better. No excuse to gloat about generic NES type games and bash anything AAA. It's a reason why there is toxicity in it, though it's not the only kind of toxicity in gaming.

Game Addictions

A while ago, the World Health Organization declared gaming addiction as a disease. I would say it's somewhat true. I look at a few parts of the world where it's a lot more prevalent, but it is a worldwide thing. The worst of it comes from the Asian region. Numerous stories over the years of people dying from playing so long in gaming cafes has become a very common thing. I can't imagine someone doing something like that all the time. I wouldn't mind doing an all nighter once in a blue moon, but there are other things I like to do.

It can also bring out the worst in some people. The consumption of gaming can derail a lot of things in a person's life that they are alone with no one to support them. They don't respond to family or shun them away. Their friends stop caring. Maybe some outbursts that make them look like vicious fans. Comes off very deranged if you want my take. Depends on the person. Some can function even as huge fans, but it all comes down to the length of consumption. 

This is something gamers have to accept. Even if it may not seem that way in a specific country, other places will have that problem a lot more. I think there needs to be more awareness about this. To curb the addictions and to reach a healthy level of gaming.