Where to next? (copied off a forum.)

Original

I know this thread could be taken badly, I just can't think of another way of saying it. I think that most of you regulars have seen me around enough to know this is consistent for me and not just a troll thread.

We and by that, I mean various forum users that have said things I identify with, have realised that there are two different types of players.

There are those of us that used to boot up Commodores, XTs, ATs, 286s and so forth when they were new and not just a novelty. There was a time when things were difficult and you had to learn a fair bit about computers just to install a game, there was no "Next. Next. Next. Continue. Finish." Had to create the directory, copy the files, sometimes read another file, move them into sub directories, had to run filters like C:\game\ dir *.exe /p just to find the "start" point. Even then we saw TV and realised the graphics were terrible.

However, the market was very different. They were games made by nerds and geeks for nerds and geeks. I have done tertiary IT, however, I am nothing compared to some of the dinosaurs that I have met. Those that come from the generation that started the games. When I find a part like a graphics card that is broken, I just pull it out and put a new one in. They had to be qualified and still have the skills to indentify exactly which capacitor or resistor was malfunctioning and then replace it. They can write drivers, they know how the machine code works. Can make operating systems that are minute and run just off RAM if they want. (To me that is really impressive.)

I grew up in a world of clever games. Blockout, Tetris and even Asteroids falls into that. That is how they had to be sold. Games with absolutely no graphics, just text based.
I even remember calling modem to modem, dialing into the local University, trying to work out what went wrong on a coaxial network and most importantly there was no walkthroughs and we had to figure out what was going on in a game. It wasn't just handed to us.

During the past fifteen years to decade things started to change, it became easier and cheaper to use a computer. People damaged systems, trust was broken, virtual areas were closed off, pr0n ran rife, it became easier to log online, surfing and the dot-com bubble grew then burst. Yet, I could still find IRC rooms with interesting conversations, I came in near the end of it but Anarchy had a good little community where you could really discuss things at length with people. Deep conversations. Those people are dwindling and I come across them less and less. More and more I see people using descriptions for their names, eg "Dochealz," "Killer666sneak" (think I made those up. Don't know anyone by those names) and so forth. "Lol" cropped up at some point, snuck in but it actually meant that person was "laughing out loud," before that, you didn't even need to say that. "Ha ha," "that was funny," or how they would have their own witty come back would be enough to know they got the joke and a good laugh out of it.
Walls of text like this were common back then. Most of us could do this thing called, touch typing and have the ability to read what someone else was saying, think up the response and send it while they were typing out the next part.

Then Waste of Web came along. (please don't turn this into an anti-WoW or pro-WoW flame thread) It is just a point at which MMOs became easy for anyone to play. Now the masses were no longer just going to bars, having barbecues and such, now they could use graphical computers, log on easily and play an online game. Obviously, it was a roaring success.
Yet, there were all those single player experiences. All those solo gaming that they did first, where they had their own little world that worked at their pace, was linear and didn't rely on others to get things started. Then in WoW, they didn't have to congregate and start talking with people. They didn't need a personality to break the ice and make friends that would risk their character out in the wilds of the unknown. Just signed up.
Fast food, fast gaming, double clicks instead of command lines, copy and pasting, self explanatory games and systems, little that needed memorising, working out or reading help files for hints.

I am finally feeling this big social pressure of the masses. The "lol"s and the inane chatter and the lack of substance. This demand for immediate self gratification has become so over whelming that I can't even grab a few old friends and head off to do something because now it is in my face with the push over game mechanics. This thing seems to have pervaded everywhere. The IT people have become victims of their own success.

Now, consider this; I wrote this all out here I must feel my back is to the wall.

Where have all the old generation players gone?

Did they all grow up, have children and left? What happened to them? Where have all the people that liked challenging and clever games gone? Where did the the people that had the time to just talk and didn't get bored after five minutes, "gtg" head off to?

I don't know or see where the next refuge is.

Edit: I started playing EVE for almost a year now.