Is Replay Value Depleting?

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I have been playing games since the good old NES came out (never saw an Atari until it was considered retro) and the one thing that sticks in my mind is how much fun the games were. I can remember playing Mario for hours, never getting tired of it. I can also remember playing the original RBI Baseball and Mario 3 when it came out. These games had excellent replay. You could play them over and over without getting tired of them. The strange thing is, back then developers were not concerned about replay value, while today they can't help but hearing questions about how long the game will take to complete, how many levels there are, etc.

You would think that an increased interest in the replay value of games would make for some games that have replay surpassing anything that has been made in the past. For some reason, however, the replay value of games has gone down quite a bit. The focus on how long a game is and how many secrets it contains draws attention away from the fact that the game must be fun to play. No one will want to search for secrets or play through 100 levels if they are not having fun doing it.

The easiest answer for someone to say in response to what is going on is that the games are not as fun as they used to be, but is that really the case? I sure thought I was having fun when I first played Mario 64, but I got tired of it a couple months later. Does that mean I should have spent my money on 8 or so NES games instead? For some people maybe it does, but for me there is a different answer. Some people honestly think that older games are better, but I personally could not get two months of fun out of 8 NES games.

The main reason is that NES games are not quite as fun as Mario 64. The reason Mario 64 is only fun for a couple months is its length. It is too long to play in one sitting (and the difficulty isn't there, but that is a different story ^_^). All of the games I remember playing through many times involved fairly short games (Zelda 3 is an exception, but that game is a class all its own). When developers try and make games long, it is almost a sure bet that you will enjoy some parts but not like others. When developers made shorter games they were fun all the way through, because they were not thinking they needed to have a certain amount of levels. There are occasions when long games are fun all the way through and have great replay, and those are the games I believe have the most talented developers (Zelda 3 and Super Metroid come to mind).

So is there any hope at all? I personally think there may be just as many gems being released today as there was in the day of the NES. The main problem is that the majority of people only own one system (2 if you count the PC) and there are three major players (the Saturn had some gems too, just not as many). The market is not as lopsided as it was when the NES came out. Unfortunately, now to get all the best games it costs much more money. Unless you have that money the only solution is to look carefully and pick the system that you think will have the most gems and go with it. Maybe get the system that none of your friends have and trade systems every once in a while. Getting the full enjoyment of games nowadays is harder then it was, but not impossible.

Tony Piantanida
numberonepro@usa.net