A lot of good games are made under the shadow of capitalism and it's weird to think about sometimes.
Like the whole concept of coin-operated arcade games. The extra life and continue mechanics seen in console games came from a cash incentive to make the player lose.
Or the fact that RPGs almost always charge the player for items. I'm not saying that it doesn't make sense as a mechanic, but I always wondered why people weren't given more healing potions.
The way IP laws work, I'm really curious how games would change once those are gone.
One way I see games changing with the destruction of capitalism:
I think online multiplayer games would be a lot more bearable. There wouldn't be the stratification between people who could afford putting more time or resources into a game and those who can't. Microtransactions and addictive gameplay mechanics wouldn't exist.
Thanks for getting away from lathe socialism and back to materialism. The conditions that gave us so much computing power to the common person are so unprecedented that they are incredibly fragile. We're seeing the cracks start to form with the trade wars. The global north don't appreciate wwhat a massive cheap and skilled workforce in China is needed to mass produce these things let alone all the mining and energy use involved.
It's really hard to say what form post-capitialism will realistic take but in the timeframe that matters us to but it likely going to involve supply chain breakdowns and as you said changing priorities. Especially if any revolutionary movement embraces degrowth and opposes most resource extraction like I am hearing in some demsoc, trot and anarchist circles. There would be a window with existing hardware and maybe with what spare time and energy something interesting might happen. The vision is really the Ikea smart bulb being able to run Doom. Games will have to be simple with portable open source code that can be made fit in the most spartan of environments. Text games and MUDs may make a major comeback with alot of interesting examples in the games bundled with BSD systems.
Yes something like that is not unlikely for a while. People making new games would be targeting the widest possible install base or going niche since there would be less support from console makers or platforms generally speaking. Big titles and exclusives only really work when you can guarantee all of the infrastructure and supply chains to support it.
I think there would be, proportionally, a lot more homebrew and community stuff. Games like Omori or that one made by a hexbear user would still be possible, for example. Fewer big-investment, specialized system games, more smaller-scale labors or love.
And there will also be people who end up making the game for their own system only. Emulation will be more important then ever especially for salvaging the old games even though I have my doubts if that should be done either. Maybe there is alot from this neoliberal era we should bury and only let those trained in history and philosophy understand.
It seems a little grim but we're in a world where alot of young people are clocking up thousands of hours on leagues of legend and developing gambling habits or something adjacent to that. All between posting about how depressed/dissociated they are. A new youth culture is required that is actually rewarding. Literature, maths, geography, history, astronomy, wood shop, machine shop etc. as passions and not just school subjects. Games not as their own commodified spectacle but an extension of maths and culture that reinforces understanding of topics like risk and game theory that develop the majority of people as potential leaders in a socialist democracy.
This might sound boring. It seems boring to me if I try to imagine living in it. Some of us have to live with ADHD, but alot of us -to some extent- are brain damaged from stress, lack of sleep, advertising, dark design patterns, sugar, corn fructure syrup, saturated fats, trans-fats, omega-6 fats, PCBs and other contaminants. Our gift to future generations as socialists doesn't have to be fully automated luxury communism but patient and steadfast minds that find incredible joy in exploring subjects using nothing more then library books, microfilm and in some cases computers programs.