John Davison over at GamePro has posted quite a enlightening article about whether or not games in this generation are getting too big and too hard?

Basically whether games should start becoming easier and shorter.

And no this isn’t the rambling of some bean counter over at the development companies trying to push for shorted and simpler games, this is a seasoned journalist debating a point which is backed up by irrefutable facts.

The majority of major games we play in this generation incorporate telemetry systems which automatically phone home and tell the developers how we are doing, how far we have gotten and how we are the playing the game.

So how long do you think we generally play a game for? Not the Call of Duty, Bungie or Battlefield style games but more the Assassin’s Creed, Dragon Age or God of War style games?

Would you be surprised at 4 or 5 hours? I know I wouldn’t. I finally completed Wolverine: X-Men Origins last week and I have to say that while the beginning of the game was awesome I felt like I was pulling teeth towards the middle of it and was whining like a little girl towards the end of it.

The best single player (gaming) experiences of my life have taken between 4-6 hours. Anymore than that and I can’t finish it in a reasonable amount of time and they end up rotting away on my shelves for eternity.

Some other information they received from this data is that we don’t like hard games… we like to be challenged to a point. I would say if it takes more than 5 minutes to solve a problem the vast majority of us will quit and either look up a cheat sheet or move onto something else.

I am once again horrifically guilty of this and generally enjoy playing single player games on a reasonably easy level so that I can feel good about my gaming ability. I mean isn’t that what gaming is all about in the end? Escapism?

The big worry obviously is that the developers take this to heart and start producing more G.I. Joe’s and Rogue Warrior instead of good quality episodic games.

We still expect value, I just don’t feel that size is everything.

Head on over to GamePro to read John’s original piece.

Source: GamePro

*Header image taken from this awesome list of graphics related to movies and games (DesignYourWay)