That's the entire tech industry. I got in at the tail end of it being full of nerds who were interested in computers. Then jocks and the like found out it pays really well and now it isn't fun anymore.

Yoko Taro talking about weird shows a healthy deal of self awareness... +1 respect in my book

I know im late to the party but... I just started playing Death Stranding. Lets just say its more than just a walking simulator...

There's definitely weird people making games on itch and sometimes in the depths of Steam.

By its very definition weird isn't going to sell to mass market. That being said I do agree that we need more weird AAA or AA games.

I love it when I'm playing a game and I can feel the genuine love put into it. Old Nintendo games for example. now most games feel so bland and corporate

Makes sense. AAA games are finance projects more than creative projects. Yeah there’s a lot of art and writing and stuff, but it’s all calibrated to make the most money and anything that threatens it is jettisoned. This makes them formulaic to a fault.

Indie games are passion projects, so you see a lot of weird stuff out there. Most of them are utter failures, financially, but the ones that survive are truly something special.

The weird people are still there, but development teams are much larger now, so their input is not as prominent. Plus the budgets are so large that a flop can heavily damage a company or even ruin it, so they're very risk-averse. We need more AA or A games instead of relying so much on heavy-hitters.

Dragon Age 1-3 all had their drawbacks but could always fall back on how beloved the lore was and how it was present. Dragon Age Veilguard has much of the lore the original creator laid out but presents the revelations in its game poorly and retcons lore from previous games in sterile ways. The original creator left after 3 and over the decade has dropped tidbits about the changing culture of the studio he left

~~Creativity~~ Production

The indie scene is so much fun.

After Spec Ops The line, everything went to shit, the bar was too high

Part of the issue is that AAA still hasn't learned how to manage and produce passion projects, which most great games are. They keep wanting to use what's working elsewhere with no regard for what makes sense in their own game.

That's why bg3 felt so special. For us by us at that scale

"Do you think video games are silly little things?"

No worries. There is plenty of weird to find with indie games.

There are plenty of weird people making weird games if you know where to look. itch io and DLSite, for instance.

Meanwhile, Death Stranding 2 is just days from launch.

Called HR.

Nepotism is ruining entertainment.

Next you'll tell me mainstream is not niche

Fewer weird people.

The thing I miss most about handhelds is all the mid-budget experimental spinoffs made for them. That was where weird truly flourished, and I'm sad that there's not really a place for that in today's market. Hideo Kojima's Boktai trilogy is one of my favorite games of all time, and there will never ever ever be another game remotely as weird as that.