Introduction
Video game publishers are always tracing the latest trends, hoping to hit it big. So, today let's ignore the ugliest, lamest trends and take a look back at what we wanna see, actually, return. Look, the 2000s had some bland shooters and washed-out color palettes, but on the flipside, there was a lot more that was awesome.
Here are the 2000s trends we think need to make a comeback in the gaming world. And before we sound like old men yelling at clouds here, we're mostly talking about trends from, you know, the major, big developers and publishers. These are the trends we'd like to see return in the mainstream. Not saying all these things are gone, but you know, it's really just points of discussion.
Physics-Based Gimmicks
So, with number ten, physics-based gimmicks. Look, the 2000s didn't give us flying cars, but it did give us enough computing power to simulate physics realistically in video games. For some of us, it was like the coolest thing ever. It's hard to imagine now, but "Half-Life 2" absolutely blew our minds. Watching a crate slowly tip over, realistically.
It running well and serving an actual gameplay purpose, it all seemed almost unbelievable. And looking back at the 2000s era of physics-based video games, we're wishing a little bit of that technological advancement actually stuck around, or at least, the feel, the excitement of it. You almost only see physics being played with in indie games like "Teardown." Big-budget developers mostly only use physics to show hair realistically swaying. We wanna throw crates and people around like ragdolls again. You know, we want that science to feel fun. 'Cause back in the day, even the mid-tier games were getting in on the physics-tech action, games like "Inversion," a forgotten Xbox-360-era shooter, had anti-gravity abilities that were realistically simulated with physics, giving you the power to make enemies float around in the sky as they bounce off of other objects.
Or, of course, like "Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy," dude. The physics were worked into the gameplay by giving you psychic powers. There's nothing better in games than just throwing ragdolls and stuff around. Of course, "Half-Life 2" is the best example of using physics in an incredibly fun and compelling gameplay way. But other games like "Red Faction: Guerilla" scratched an itch, no other major game release really tried to scratch, knocking over buildings realistically with your trusty sledgehammer. It was a delight. Planting explosives just to watch giant structures topple over from the legs down, like, just implode on itself.
It's just an experience more games desperately need. Why can't we blow up walls in "Call of Duty?" Why can't we throw buzzsaws like throwing stars? Every game in 2025 technically has physics, but again, we need to bring back that excitement, that experimentation, that flexing in games. Give us our physics gimmicks.
Wild and Creative Main Menus
Next, over at number nine. Do you remember, main menus got really weird, in the 2000s? All the interface stuff, really. Just look at the bizarre, box-shaped, 3D menu in "Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay." The way the menu twists and reforms itself, all sci-fi-like, while it's navigating the settings.
It's this flashy menu that exists for no actual reason at all, other than that it just, it looks cool. There's a similar vibe in the flashy main-menu screen of "Metroid Prime," where you'll zip through x-rays of pulsating Metroids. And games like "Assassin's Creed" tried especially hard with a main menu built to mirror, like, an in-game Animus, of course, the machine that you access, in-game.
It's a fun way to make the player feel like they're kind of part of the game. There are a lot of menus that are so weird it's tricky to tell what you're even doing. The main menu in "Brutal Legend" features a very real Jack Black checking out a bunch of albums and flipping through covers to explore settings or select your level.
It's one of the more ambitious main menus, definitely. It probably didn't help confuse, like, casual players, but we loved it. There was a lot of this weird, crazy stuff. It helped build up excitement for games and even in-game, like, some of the menus and, like, inventory screens and stuff like that, they just really pushed things to the limit.
Not always to great results, but at least they were trying. - Apparently, this wall records your achievements. I'm still trying to work out the specifics.
Mascots in Platformers
Next over at number eight. Stick with me here. We want more mascots. More little weird animals, more strange creatures in colorful, adventurous, platforming environments. And for a long time, the only characters keeping the 3D platformer alive were, of course, like, Mario and Sonic. But we need more on that today. These quirky, usually, somewhat family-friendly platformers used to be a pillar of video game releases and they were for a very long time. Mascots absolutely overwhelmed in the nineties era, but then the PS2-Xbox-era brought, like, this all new weird cast of characters.
"Psychonauts," of course, spawned out of this environment of experimentation, along with other incredible games, like "Sly Cooper," "Ratchet and Clank," and "Jak and Daxter." These games were everywhere. When you think about the 2000s, sometimes you really think about these guys. And what makes all these games special is that they ditched the collect-a-thon focus of earlier Nintendo 64 efforts and went their own unique routes.
I mean, "Sly Cooper" mixed stealth with good, smooth, platforming. "Ratchet and Clank" defined itself with cool, creative guns and shooting mechanics. Just stuff that made the jumping and running a little bit more interesting. This is one trend we might see a comeback with. You know, of course, the success of "Astro Bot" took the publisher Sony, seemingly, by surprise. But if you'll humor me for a second, what I really want to see return is the weirder mascot platformer games. Look, even if some of them were bad, it was just cool to have them because they were trying different things.
They were throwing different things at the wall to see what sticks. I'm talking, like, the mid-level stranger ones, "Tak and the Power of Juju," "Ty the Tasmanian Tiger," "Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy." There were a lot of these forgettable ones, but, like, I still just appreciate them. It's definitely nostalgia. Yeah, sure, but it just felt so different then.
GTA-Style Open World Games
Next at number seven, the 2000s were a paradise of GTA-style games. We call them GTA clones. You know, these big, open-world, crime-focused games. We had the "True Crime" series. We had "Saints Row." We had "Mafia," sort of. Hell, we had "The Getaway." And crime game aside, so many games were inspired by that open world thing. So many games were trying to shoehorn in, stealing cars, exploring an open world. It was crazy.
All these games were like, yes, kind of, ripoffs of GTA in the loosest sense. You play as a criminal in an open-world city. But they all took drastically different approaches to the material. "Saints Row" started out as a very straightforward riff on GTA before going in weirder, sillier directions. "Mafia" told a grounded, focused, cinematic story. "The Getaway" also was very focused on the actual story, the immersion, British crime culture, if you like those types of movies. Look, all these are just series that we love. It's nice to see GTA done from a different perspective and it was especially nice having more "Grand Theft Auto" to play because we also got three full GTA games in a single console generation.
The PS2 gave us "Grand Theft Auto 3," "Vice City," and "San Andreas," all before we moved on to the PS3. It's only going to take longer and longer for more GTA games to come out. Look, we'll have "GTA 6," but then we'll probably be waiting two decades for more over-the-top heists in a fake American city. If that means we need more developers to rip them off again, then so be it. I'll take 'em.
Hardcore Military Shooters
Next over at number six. Military shooters weren't just big business here, they were practically the only business in town, it felt like for a while. Games were becoming realistic and that meant taking out the health bar, removing health pickups, and making death happen suddenly. Some multiplayer games still keep this challenge, you know, this tradition going, but we don't see it much in mainstream, AAA, single-player games or shooters anymore. Games like "Rainbow Six" and "Ghost Recon" made you practically die in a single hit.
The stakes were super high in things like "Full Spectrum Warrior." Look, we're not talking about "Call of Duty" time-to-kill numbers. We're talking about like a single bullet, usually. In the original "Rainbow Six" and "Ghost Recon," your operators would die permanently after going down, making each run through a mission way more tense. And our favorite of these types of games has to be "SWAT 4." "SWAT 4" is one of the most unpredictable of the one-shot-one-kill shooters because you don't win without arresting at least some of the criminals in each mission. Staying alive is important, but earning a passing grade is even more important. These weird little shooters were almost educational. They taught us a tiny bit about real-world tactics.
"Call of Duty" teaches us that rolling around on the floor like a maniac is a viable gunfight tactic. We love them both, but slow-paced, simulation-style shooters still have their place. And while, yes, things like "Arma," they're still kicking around. That's a game that's pretty tough for casual players to get into. We just want the simulation, without having to practically enlist ourselves to understand how everything works.
Movie Tie-In Games
Next, over at number five, movie tie-in games, man. At one point, they were like an obligation. We'd get a bunch of new movie tie-ins, every year, usually, related to more of the big tentpole releases. And usually, the games were really, really bad. But they're still a lot better than some free-to-play mobile game slop that we're getting now. Modern movie tie-in games on iOS or Android can barely qualify as games sometimes.
We want bad graphics, simple gameplay with some gimmicks, and voice actors pretending to be Hollywood stars. Is that so much to ask? Things got so crazy, to a point. Like, we got a movie tie-in game on Steven Spielberg's "Minority Report." Are you kidding me? Look, a lot of these games were bad, yes, but we'd like to see more big publishers using their powers to release these silly, short games that aren't skinning us alive with microtransactions or anything nefarious.
With the advent of Xbox Game Pass and other subscription services and stuff, you'd think more mid-tier games like this would be an easy win for everyone involved. The realities of game development have only gotten worse over the years. Games now take exponentially longer to make and costs have skyrocketed. But we suggest one simple mantra: keep it simple, stupid. We don't need a Marvel's "Spider-Man 2" every year. We do want more cheesy Captain America games. Look, the tie-in games don't even need to really adapt the movies. We just want more nice little games.
Handheld Games
And speaking of nice little games, one trend we'd like to see return next, at number four, is handheld games. Handheld systems have both died out and made, sort of, a comeback, thanks to the Nintendo Switch. Even the Steam Deck and stuff. Nintendo were once the standard bearers of small handheld experiences for a small screen. And now, they merged businesses with the Nintendo Switch. It's both a console and a handheld and it was such a smash hit that imitators weren't far behind. Like I said, tablets, PC handhelds, all those things. And a lot of them thrive on indie games. Indie games on Steam, Epic, and GOG have completely taken over the low or mid-budget video game space.
But we'd love to also see more big publishers release smaller games, support smaller games. Capcom used to release entire series of creative games on handheld devices. The "Ace Attorney" series, the "Megaman Battle Network" series. This is, like, some of our favorites. Konami crushed it with six more mini "Metroidvanias," in the style of "Castlevania: Symphony of the Night," giving us just a steady drip of new awesome games with modest budgets to play, on the go, or on the couch, or on the boat, wherever.
We're living in an era where big developers could make smart profits on simpler games, but it seems like they're just not tapping into that market anymore. The Nintendo Switch isn't the only game in town anymore, though. PC is big. And Konami could make a killing by making small games for the small screen again. But every big publisher only believes in exponential growth, it seems. Go big, go bust, or go home. Smaller games give developers room for more experimentation. Of course, that's why the indie scene popped off. But with the big guys getting into it, it could lead to something cool. And that extra freedom gave developers a chance to develop something else.
Brand New IPs
Brand new IPs. So with number three, video games thrive on sequels. Sequels give developers a chance to refine ideas and polish gameplay mechanics without reinventing the wheel. But when the wheel is worn out, maybe it's time to try something new. Ubisoft just won't quit with "Assassin's Creed" and "Far Cry," when I'll admit, like, they figured it out with "Assassin's Creed 2" and they figured it out with "Far Cry 3." While games like "Halo" and "Gears of War" were kind of kept on life support with sequels that are often all right. But you know, they either don't feel quite the same or they just don't hit as hard.
And look, we love all these games, all these franchises, we talk about 'em all the time, but we love new stuff, too. Video games were a rising industry in the 2000s and no ideas were too weird. All the games we just listed were all first created between, like, the year 2000 and the year 2010. Microsoft, Sony, and Sega would regularly trot out totally new intellectual property or IPs and really push 'em. EA tried to make the hyper-violent "Dead Space" series into a multimedia property, which is yet another game series that got its start, yes, in the early 2000s.
We're more likely to get remakes or reimaginings of old IPs, now, as companies become more and more risk-averse. And look, we'll always see some new IPs. As long as creative people are alive and making things, we will get new ideas. But what once was standard has now become more of a rare thing. There are over 20 "Call of Duty" games now. The series has been going on for so long, they've long since eaten their own tail and produced both remakes and reimaginings of previous games with the "Modern Warfare" stuff. We're not asking you to stop making "Call of Duty." Do what you want. But we'd just love to see what a tiny portion of that budget could do with one of the many talented development teams at the helm. I'd bet we get something interesting, at least.
Real-Time Strategy Games
Now down to number two, speaking of interesting things, real-time strategy games are, kind of, done, when it comes to the big, competitive, multiplayer scene. "StarCraft" isn't the massive force it once was, and people are more likely gonna think of "Warcraft" as an MMO than a game about commanding little warriors to attack little buildings. RTS games were once a dominant force in video games. "Command and Conquer," all that stuff. There's a reason why Blizzard is part of Activision Blizzard. Now, it seems unlikely this company will ever really release an RTS like they used to.
Some of our favorite games of the 2000s were RTSs. Starting the decade off strong was "Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2," of course, a masterpiece, with blisteringly-fast gameplay and goofy actors doing their best. It's an incredible game. And this kind of anything-goes energy is what we'd love to see in more modern video games and modern RTSs. And getting multiple, playable, single-player campaigns, on release, that's a bonus entry right there.
And one of our other favorites is "World in Conflict," a low-key release from 2007 that takes the same premise and does something completely different. Both games are about the Soviet invasion of the United States, but the detached nature of warfare gives us chills in "World in Conflict," especially, while using the full might of your army to just wipe out entire towns and armies with a barrage of ordinance. The camera controls are the standout here, putting you in direct control of the camera, so you can view your battlefield however you want, the best possible way. They just, they don't really make 'em like this anymore. That's why we're bringing it up because, like, there aren't a lot of games like this.
Over-the-Top BFGs
Now number one, "DOOM" popularized BFGs, way back in 1993. You know what a BFG is? It's like a giant gun that wipes out everything. A good BFG is basically a win button you can press constantly. And while the BFG is still in video games, you know it's in "DOOM Eternal," at the cost of super-rare pickups, making it feel more like a power-up than a weapon.
Look, we're all about the big silly guns of the 2000s. The 2009 "Wolfenstein" game, developed by Raven Software, is a game where half of your arsenal is BFGs. The best is the final weapon, this crazy launcher that reverses gravity and melts the skin off of bad guys. Then games like "Unreal Tournament 2004" had the Redeemer, this shoulder-mounted nuclear warhead that made explosions big enough to wipe out whole teams. Let me remind you, this is a multiplayer shooter, where things like competitive balance didn't really matter as much. Bigger and bigger explosions are what we wanted.
And the Redeemer is one of the best BFG-likes in the business. "Quake 4" had its own ultimate weapon, the Dark Matter Gun. Remember that? This was like a giant black hole that devastates all the Strogg in the room. And it's just one of thousands of these super weapons you find in video games, at this time. BFGs were everywhere because they were trendy, but they were visually flashy. This is the era where games got a whole lot easier in general, so giving a player a weapon that can easily wipe out everything in a single shot—why not? Go crazy. Have fun, have two or three of these things. There are guns that shoot killer sharks, guns that shoot energy portals, nuclear warheads, guns that summoned laser beams from the sky.
Conclusion
Video games might still have big guns, but they're rarely as broken and crazy and fun and over the top as the 2000's-era BFGs. Give us more of these, please.So, this covers some of our favorite trends of the 2000s. Video games from every era have some great stuff, but the goofy 2000s still holds a real special place in our heart. So, let us know your favorite or least favorite trends from video games past. We're still trying to decide if Map Packs were better than Season Passes, but either—I'm joking. But, as always, thanks for reading and we'll see you guys next time on gamix.
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