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Guns, Guns, Guns! The video-game industry seems to be one of weapon-worship. I decided to look at the last few games I’ve bought recently and noticed that they all involved shooting something. Over the last few months I have purchased Halo: Reach, Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Ultimate Edition, Metroid: Other M, and Red Faction: Guerrilla. Perhaps I should be wondering why all of my new games have subtitles rather than why they have guns…

To be fair to Metroid, it is considered an action-adventure game, but that doesn’t exclude it from the list of violence! First/Third Person Shooters seem to dominate the industry. Just by looking at the NPD sales of 2010 so far we can see the popularity of the genre. On average, over a quarter of all games sold (in the top 20) were first or third-person shooters. This does not include the multitude of other shooters released that failed to make the top 20 sellers of the month. Initially, you may not see “a quarter of all games sold” to be all that much, but when you look at how many genres the industry has at its disposal, it’s really quite staggering.

Now, is this a bad thing? Well, initially it might not seem so. The people want to shoot stuff, so developers make games that let them do so. Two of the most anticipated games of the year, Call of Duty: Black Ops and Medal of Honor will be released within the next 2 months. Both games already have a huge amount of attention surrounding them. Are there any issues here? Well, yes and no. During the N64/Playstation era, 3D platformers ruled the roost. They were a dime-a-dozen, just like many of today’s FPS’. In fact, there were so many 3D platformers being made, 2D sidescrollers fell to the wayside. History seems to be repeating itself, with a different genre playing the king of the generation.

What this means is that those that enjoy FPS’ will have plenty to choose from, while those that wish to explore other genres may have to settle for a game with less competition in its respective genre. Is it simply a matter of consumers voting with their wallet? Would these games never see the light of day if people weren’t lining up to pay for them? The fact is that people are paying for them and they are saying it’s what they want.



Imagine though, a year where no games released fell under the First/Third Person Shooter genre. What would people buy if they were not given the option to shoot? How would developers innovate? Many games of different genres, often employ a shooting mechanic in some portion of their game. Platformer Donkey Kong Country Returns, for example, allows Diddy to shoot his Peanut Gun at enemies. Even the upcoming music game, Child of Eden, fits the bill. If such a thing were to happen, would millions of people simply stop gaming? Or would they explore other genres?

Now don’t mistake this as a call for the death of a genre. Hardly. People love these games because they are fun, plain and simple. Hell, I’ve probably missed out on several great games because I went with the shooter instead. The “Halo’s” of the world don’t need to go anywhere, but don’t let the “LittleBigPlanet’s” lose out because of it. Print this post