The "General Games Chat" forum, which includes Retro Game Reviews, has been archived and is now read-only. You cannot post here or create a new thread or review on this forum.
In the late 70s, gamers were mainly early 20s, computer geeks, spending all their time in front of the green glowing screen of their monitor playing text-adventures on their computers.
In the late 80s, gamers were mainly teenage boys playing on either Sinclair products or the latest NES or Megadrive.
Now we're in the noughties, and it seems very hard to define what the 'average' gamer is. I think it's moved from teenage to older on the whole, maybe we're looking at the mid-20s band as the average age. 25 maybe?
Gamers seem to have more of that promised 'leisure time' that the advent of computers hailed (on the whole), but the overriding factor between all three of these stock takes is that the average gamer is still male.
Will this change, can we ever expect to see an even balance between male and female gamers? Will the agegroup change, maybe shifting further into the 30s because existing gamers now will still be gaming a decade on from now?
If so, will the types of game that we play shift to cater for this new average age range. Nintendo seem to have cottoned on to this shift with Conker's Bad Fur Day, and PC developers seem to have recognised this demographic shift in the gaming population by adding more adult themes to PC games. When Sony hit the market a while back, they were aiming for the 20+ gamer that was largely uncatered for in the mid-90s.
So 10 years down the line, I think there will be a few more Conkeresque titles on the shelves, a lot more nudity in games (the Japanese seem to have the edge over the rest of the world on this) and in general games will be a lot more 'complicated' i.e. you'll have to think a bit more to get the most out of them.
I'm looking forward to it.
In the late 80s, gamers were mainly teenage boys playing on either Sinclair products or the latest NES or Megadrive.
Now we're in the noughties, and it seems very hard to define what the 'average' gamer is. I think it's moved from teenage to older on the whole, maybe we're looking at the mid-20s band as the average age. 25 maybe?
Gamers seem to have more of that promised 'leisure time' that the advent of computers hailed (on the whole), but the overriding factor between all three of these stock takes is that the average gamer is still male.
Will this change, can we ever expect to see an even balance between male and female gamers? Will the agegroup change, maybe shifting further into the 30s because existing gamers now will still be gaming a decade on from now?
If so, will the types of game that we play shift to cater for this new average age range. Nintendo seem to have cottoned on to this shift with Conker's Bad Fur Day, and PC developers seem to have recognised this demographic shift in the gaming population by adding more adult themes to PC games. When Sony hit the market a while back, they were aiming for the 20+ gamer that was largely uncatered for in the mid-90s.
So 10 years down the line, I think there will be a few more Conkeresque titles on the shelves, a lot more nudity in games (the Japanese seem to have the edge over the rest of the world on this) and in general games will be a lot more 'complicated' i.e. you'll have to think a bit more to get the most out of them.
I'm looking forward to it.
Page:
I think that 70's gamers were also arcade Junkies who'd soon run out of 10p coins on Donkey Kong or Galaxians and resort to quickly switching the machine on and off at the mains while no one was looking, hoping to get a free credit as a result!
Basically, a gamer is a gamer. :-)
Its that good huh?
Personally I'd love to play it and I'm in my *cough*ties. And because of the lewd content, everyone from about 7 upwards would want to play it too.
It's definitely one of the N64 'Classic' titles, an A-list game if ever there was one, a little in the same way that MGS was A-list on the PSX, and MSR was A-list on the Dreamcast.
It's one of those games that's worth buying the console for, in other words.
It's definitely one of the N64 'Classic' titles, an A-list game if ever there was one, a little in the same way that MGS was A-list on the PSX, and MSR was A-list on the Dreamcast.
It's one of those games that's worth buying the console for, in other words.
I think Conker is intended for adults only!! Strangley enough my version doesnt have any certificate on the box at all, only a parental guidance saying that the game contains scenes of explicit violence - So really there is no reason why kids cant buy it.
Mind you I cant see many children forking out over £50 for it or many shop assistance selling it to under 15's!!
Mind you I cant see many children forking out over £50 for it or many shop assistance selling it to under 15's!!
Page: