I would laugh if it wasn’t true. But also, people underestimate how realistic light and shadows can really sell a scene. It just shouldn’t require the electricity of a refrigerator to do it.
It’s really tough to pin it down to just one thing… to me, it’s a perfect storm. This is anecdotal, of course. But companies made several bad decisions in a row. They seemed to think growth during COVID was normal and would continue annually. Some companies bought a bunch of other companies thinking this would be a new big push in gaming. Embracer group comes to mind.
Other companies decided to divert their very talented developers away from the types of games they were so good at developing, and towards what the business wanted to chase as far as revenue opportunities. Gatcha riddled live service games. Ubisoft, WB, Sony, EA, Microsoft, practically everyone chased this trend. Some put everything into it. Others dipped their toes. Some pulled back before it cost them hundreds of millions. Some spent hundreds of millions and got nothing to show for it. Some companies lost a lot of talent when the really good developers left to go work on stuff they care about. Others had no choice but to cut the business down to the bone because of all the money and time they wasted chasing a trend.
The government also started raising interest rates, which makes it more expensive to borrow money. So a lot of companies aren’t willing to spend the kinda money they used to, not without a guaranteed return. So now you will see more consolidation and less risk in the types of games being made by AAA studios.
So yea. I think there’s several factors, all could have been planned for with actual solid management, but that’s not the kind of management running these companies right now.
Well you do have to give it to him, three graphics options (low/med/high) is more than the two graphic options (low/high) that came in the previous game.