Some of them yes, like the big names. Real actors.

ACTUAL voice actors are often stamped on and pushed down by a cheap industry that tries to nickle and dime every little thing they can out of them. I've read a few interviews about actual people who make a living just doing voices, and some of the struggles they have to face. One is where a developer needs only one line done, so the bring the voice actor in for a test run. Get him to work a day recording lines, tell him they'll call him if they need him or will hire him. He doesn't get paid for doing voice work because it was just a test. Company goes on to make AAA block buster. Also it may have been a she, let me see if I can find the article.

Talk about sleazy eh?

Yeah, I don't look at a games decade to determine its merit or worth, and personally only a few handful of console/pc games from the 90's are 'big hits' to me, the rest are forgettable. Dare I say, Diablo being one of those series I've found chiefly in that 'overhyped trash' group. But I suppose subjective opinions will be subjective.

Surely that is illegal or something?

Another case of 'things were better in the old days'. No. Plenty of "creative and stunning games" have been released since the 1990s. As someone who grew up playing games on the Atari 2600 and Commodore 64 I would take today's games over those of yesterday any day of the week.

To my knowledge it's quite common. They bring in someone for a 'test' and they say they'll call if they need them, then if they say 'Hey wait, we still have that one guy/girls dialogue tests, lets use that', and it's perfectly legal. It's humanly a dike move, but legally fine.

Oh it might be no one has ever tried to change it. Voice actors are terribly under represented in games. The big names can call the shots (to an extent), but the actual ordinary actors that have to come in with 30+ voices to even consider being hired do not. It's not like they get payed enough to try and take them to court over this either, legal fees against a company that big are astounding. Way above a voice actors pay grade.

I thought the early 2000s were pretty good, but I was on a console then. The tech had reached the point where we could see some pretty lifelike graphics, and developers were still willing to take risks with unusual ideas.

You still see that on PC nowadays, it just tends to be limited to the smaller companies and indie devs.

Well someone pointed out how they don't think any one decade is the best, I agree with this. Though sometimes there is a marked decrease or increase in quantity/quality that can be measured and actually means something. Personally I don't see any one being the best. The exception to this is the 2000's PC gaming porting epidemic. Where it was just a series of awful games that were horribly unoptimized. If we were lucky to get a port at all. But that is an exception rather than a rule or pattern.

Edit.
On a semi related topic.I have never played X-Com, but playing Xenonauts just "felt" right. Like this was something that should have somehow been ingrained in my brain with machinery during birth or something. I'm just loving this kind of game, but having not played PC games until 2000 I had no idea this genre existed. It's some really great stuff. It got me interested in seeing if I can go back and see the X-Com games myself (play them). Also the new one coming out, and of course Xenonauts which introduced me to the genre.

I really hate it when someone says that the only reason that the golden age of gaming of the 90s is called that way is due to nostalgia.

I've played these so called golden age games in the past 5 years, since I had my first gaming computer in 2001 and I never played those games at the time, and yeah, I can see why they're called that way.

Fallout 1
Fallout 2
Arcanum
Baldur's Gate 1
Baldur's Gate 2
Diablo
Diablo 2 (2000)
Daggerfall
Half Life 1
System Shock 2
X-Com

All brilliant games, and I like them better than most newer games. Not all most newer games, but most. Personal opinion of course, but especially the ones related to computer role playing, they were much much better. Early 2000s was good too (Morrowind, Vampire Masquerade, Half Life 2 etc).

Here's a good candidate for showing that it's not merely higher fidelty graphics that dictates budget: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udEAEARD-Fo is essentially an indie game being made by a small group of experienced devs who left the big corporate side of the industry. It has visuals that easily competes with the top tier, but most of the game content just goes towards pure gameplay rather than trying to be a blockbuster "experience" (a buzzword the big PR people love to use in interviews and press releases these days).

Oh my god, I just peed a little. Not because I love the game, I have incontinence.

Seriously though, that looks amazing.

The voice actors and engine costs are peanuts compared to the salary they pay to 100+ people who work on the game for 2-3 years. AAA games require fancy graphics, and lots and lots of artists work on those games to create the 3D models, textures, animations and build the detailed game world.

Not long ago it was announced that over 700 people are working on Epic Mickey 2, which is a huge number! Just imagine all those paychecks! While games in the 90s often had a team of only 15 people or so, and in the 80s it was usually just 1-3 people.

Diablo 2. Duke Nukem.


Ahhhhhh....



"Stay a while and listen"

The 90s were great for PC gaming. I'm especially fond of 1994, lots of great games that year, like UFO: Enemy Unknown, Little Big Adventure, System Shock and others.

The System Shock series is still my favorite gaming series of all time, and both those games are from the 90s. And then there's the first Thief, which still is the best sneaking game ever made (together with Thief II which was released early 2000).

Excellent PC games from the 90s

I can't help but to feel that the year 2000 was the last great year for exclusive PC gaming. After that PC gaming somewhat changed after most games becoming multiplatform games with the arrival of the Xbox and gaming in general going mainstream. Good games are still made, of course, but most seem to lack that extra oomf gameplay and immersion, and instead focus on the cinematic experience.

Don't forget the astronomical marketing and advertising budget.

Just ask around your friends. How many actually enjoy point-n-click and that kind of graphics with so much readings and immersion on player's part? I mean immersion as in dipping in without the need of simulation aids, immersion as in getting in to the mood without the need of technology.

People are already used to getting handed with fun for what they paid instead of looking for fun in what they paid. They jump titles, never stick on to one for more than a month. With that kind of gaming climate, you cannot survive without something that could actually keep them in awe for more than 6 months, and that takes millions dollars of cost.

Just think about it. How much do you think you can pay the bill if you're working for a company? When you may have better alternatives selling real estates and rolling about in stock market. People simply move to better alternatives when it's more appealing, and working on a video game with solid content doesn't pay off, cause nobody cares.

There are still plenty of great PC exclusives coming out each year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_64DAOrSMM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f98OJpkcxYs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UV5cwtGE-Zw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ucLyqEboGM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njgHMxzwDLU


That's not to say there aren't innovations or great games still going on.

Look at Prey, Portal, STALKER for the shooter genre.

The X series is still going strong in the space sim area.

Iji and Hero Core have that wonderful old school arcade action to them whilst making an actual good story out of it.(These two are indie games though)

Thats the only game in your list i've played! Now that brings back childhood memories. I remember some kind of disease that made their heads swell up... or something similar to that. Or a treatment?

Greed and Dying inspiration mostly.

Falcon 4.0 came out. There's been no reason to make flight sims since.

Seriously though the 90's had major leaps in engine tech and experimentation, there was variety in genres, drm was limited to a cd key if there was drm. It was less about "franchises" "ip's" and "fans" and more about just making good games for your customers.

Then xbox happened...

And so the decade of dudebro began.

re: high production costs

Most of the money isn't in voice & mocap actors. Like SFX in movies, high-end graphics & sound can start to really pack on the $$$$.


Everyone who [censored]es and moans that doesn't support every DX11 bell and whistle, at 2560x16whatever, in 3D; and complains that anything even a step below looks "horrible" or "dated".... yeah, that's why budgets are sky high. (and why they spend so much effort on "oooh, looks pretty!" instead of on, say, gameplay and story)

The 90's weren't that great, there aren't many games I go back too from 1996-8.

90's PC games... hell--console games as well--are so much more dynamic.

I'll see your graphics and raise you depth.

Yeah, late 90s early 00s is more accurate.

Just look at BF1942 compared to BF3 - how many more things could you do in that game 10 years ago? We've lost features as gaming has moved on.

Earlier than that, the PS2 and Xbox started it.