I wouldn't call a game that came out in 2023 "old".
this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2025
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Just 1 year can make certain genres ancient. Mostly multiplayer only titles, but also meme games.
I think most big budget multiplayer games last 2-5 years, but there are some (among us, fall guys, lethal company, etc) that pass pretty quickly, and some that are just bad enough that they are basically outdated already when they come out.
For publisher bottom lines, it absolutely would be!
Basically anything not purchased this fiscal quarter may as well be non-existent to them - hence the push towards reoccurring monetisation.
Meanwhile I’m currently (slowly) playing through a massive backlog of games from the 2010s, so I’m good!
The game I most recently bought is Trackmania United Forever, still $15 on sale even though it came out in 2008. I suppose my purchase of that is less though than of what they get from a user playing their new subscription based (!) racing game for a year.
I'm building an arcade stand I can put in front of my TV so I can play emulated games with my kids. I could not care less about most of the new games coming out these days.
GPU prices priced me out of the top of the PC gaming market, got new hobbies now.
Love to see metrics im apart of. I only play TF2, Minecraft and emulate PS2 games nowadays.
A lot of my friends weren't into the shift from Fallout 3's third person open world to the original game's isometric perspective; Understandable, but that's what I grew up on. I enjoy revisiting 1 & 2 every other year or so. Also, Sid Meiers Pirates hadn't adapted well to modern systems, but has a clean gameplay loop that I enjoy revisiting.
Their metric for "older" is two years or more.
I wouldn't be surprised if book readers spend 92% of their time on older books. Or if music listeners spend 92% of their time on older pieces.
Especially if "older" means two years or older.
According to the article, they mean 6 years old or older.
No, they said 67% at 6y or older, but 92% at more than 2 years old
Oh, okay. Seems odd to call a 2 year old game an "older" game.
Well, at 2 years it is probably older than at least one other game.
There is something satisfying about going back and cranking Far Cry 2 or some other older game to max settings / 4k with an extremely modest GPU.
- 7.1% of the total hours spent were on Counter-Strike: Global Offensive / Counter-Strike 2
- 6.4% were in League of Legends
- 6.2% were in Roblox
- 5.8% were in Dota 2
- 5.4% were in Fortnite
Proud to say I don't play any of those. Screw live service games, there are plenty of other gems out there to keep me entertained.
Valve have worked so hard to disgust me away from dota 2, they're so real for this ❤️
I'd say don't yuck someone's yum but I tried league of legends years ago and it's why I avoid any game that makes me interact with strangers.
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What counts as an "older game?" Surely not... thinks about the games I played last week ...Tie Fighter or Dune 2?
Actual answer:
The data shows that from January 2024 to December 2024, 67% of player hours on PC were spent on a game that was six or more years old. A further 25% of player hours were spent on games that were two to five years old, and the remaining 8% of time was spent on games that are less than two years old.
Sample:
The results are extrapolated from a yearly in-depth survey of 73,000 players, alongside data from over 10,000 games
More than 5 years old includes all the major live service titles at this point, back in the day people would be hopping to whatever new COD/Battlefield just came out, which would lock that metric to 2-3 years max. Since Moore's law is long dead at this point the technology just doesn't improve much year over year, and it's hard to sell a new minor iteration on a game without flashy visual upgrades, the old model just doesn't really make sense anymore.
Yes, that is the main point the article makes
I've been playing Unreal Gold from 1998. I never finished it.
Baldur’s Gate 2 forever. 🖤
Dark Alliance for me lately
Been playing that one on PS5 lately. I feel bad for neglecting BG3, but it’s such an investment, and I know I’ll get distracted.
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We never should have kept going after Tribes 2
Did you not enjoy Tribes Ascend?
Are there any active tribes games? I miss that vibe so much.
Tribes 3 has active servers but they aren’t well populated.
Because the devs already abandoned the game before even coming out of early access.
Noted thanks
OHHHH MY GOD YOU JUST HIT ME RIGHT IN THE GIZZARD WITH THE NOSTALGIA
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