this post was submitted on 28 Dec 2025
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Gaming

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Welcome to the FPS vibe shift: At the end of 2025, it's clear that casual shooters are back in a big way. (www.pcgamer.com)
submitted 2 days ago by alyaza@beehaw.org to c/gaming@beehaw.org
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The FPS is once again in transition. It's a change that's been percolating for a while, but 2025 was the year a number of developing trends in PC gaming's favorite genre finally boiled over.

The time of extreme skill ceilings and the pursuit of metallic ranks defining every new multiplayer FPS is behind us. The escalation of gaudy, overpriced cosmetics created a distaste so palpable that Call of Duty had to desperately change its game plan. The two biggest shooters this year cost money, and there were no major free-to-play releases. The theme of this new era, as I see it developing so far, is remembering that shooters can be both casual and thrilling. High fun, low emotional investment.

An old guard of life-consuming live-service games remains a vibrant and popular part of this genre, but they're once again sharing the space with—and even adopting the attributes of—a more casual breed. Games that don't mind if you only play them once in a while. Games that let you make your own fun, encourage cooperation, or earn our respect by not bombarding us with ads.

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[–] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 1 points 12 hours ago

I guess for me I'd feel like I've read about all these cool events in HD2, and they're gone and done and I can't replay them, because they were live events only.

Compare that to something like Mabinogi (which is still an MMO, but doesn't follow the same live-service philosophy), where you can start as a first-time player today, and still play through every campaign/ storyline since its ~2003 release (and there are a LOT of them).