[dkislyuk]

I think commodification is directly tied to a perceived drop in quality. For example, if the barriers to making a video game keep going down, there will be far more attempts, and per Sturgeon's law, the majority will be of low quality. And we have a recency bias where we over-index on the last few releases that we've seen, and we only remember the good stuff from a generation or two ago. But for every multitude of low-effort, AI-generated video games out there, we still get gems like Factorio and Valheim.

[johnnyanmac]

Surgeon's paw was true in the 90's and is true in the '20s. There's not much point in comparing the crap to the crap. The only big difference is that it is easier to see the bottom of the barrel in your most popular storefronts with a click l(even on "curated" ones these days woth PSN and the eShop) instead of going out of your way to find some shareware from a Geocity that barely functioned.

Thing is those high profile disasters are still supposedly the "cream of the crop". That's why they get compared to the cream of before.

Popular examples are easier to exemplify as well instead of taking the time to explain what Blinx the Cat or Midnight Club are (examples of good but not genre-defining entries)