Shorter compact games vs Longer games?

[Darkzone]

The determine the length of games is difficult. But it is like with sex, if it is to short then i don't know how it is, but if it is too long like 24 hours then it gets rather hard to keep a hard one and everything is just sore.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

It depends how much depth there is to the game's systems and mechanics. The more there is, the more content it can support, and the longer the game can be without it becoming a slogfest (think the usual AAA game). Pathfinder: Kingmaker can be as large as it is (to the point of having an infinite dungeon) because the it adapts the ruleset to videogame combat. To me, it doesn't really matter what the size of the game is, so long as the content amount and gameplay complexity are in balance.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Games cannot be too long. Otherwise you have to buy the remaster/remake while still being halfway through the original version.

 

[Ol' Willy]

Average length of my run in Underrail is ~110 hours, and I'm currently on my third one. Gonna have one or two more runs later.

So, 40 hour long games are considered long now, eh?

 

[Invictus]

It all depends what kind of content said game has; I replay Morrowind, Daggerfall and New Vegas every couple of years because I enjoy the experience of inhabiting those gameworlds so much its relaxing to “live” there for awhile so I don’t look at the game “duration” I just enjoy it.

In the case of games like Dark Souls its a relatively “short” game that makes the replayable with different builds and playthroughs, same applies to Dragons Dogma and Gothic for example

As you grow older it gets harder to commit to huge games like Witcher 3 but if they make the experience meaningful, enjoyable and with no retarded Ubisoft padding... all things considered I think Gothic might be the best happy medium between shorter 30 hour condensed experiences and 100+ behemoths; a good 50-60 hour experience for an open world kind of game is just about right for me

 

[Gastrick]

If you think a game is too long just don't play it anymore and it becomes a shorter game.

 

[GarrisonFjord]

So... Instead of a straight answer, a personal anecdote.

Without internet connection.
Never played pc games before.
A demo of HoMMII, from some magazine cd.
No manual, no other info.
And a pc I barely knew how to use.

The demo was a single map.
But all castles were available, with all structures & units.

It took me some time to figure out why nothing was happening,
after moving a hero and the green arrows turned to red.
Yes, there was a button for "end turn" or something.
And then the arrows turned green again. And so on.

So I learned to play this game without any info whatsoever.
Tried all starting locations on the one map & all castles.

By the time the full game was available I knew all about it.
That single map had filled an entire summer vacation.
Learned all kinds of gaming stuff from it.

This just happened due to resource imbalances:
The people making the game had access to info & technology,
that was simply not available in my environment, back then.
It isn't meant as a good or bad example. It was new to me.