Alright this might come off as somewhat of a rant, because it is.
The further the gaming industry progresses toward realism the longer it takes to develop a game. It takes more time to develop high poly objects, animate them, and get textures to look exactly realistic. Likewise, games are still games, and even realism requires a great deal of planning to develop levels that interact like a game, not just a simulated virtual space representation or recreation of an existing environment.
The problem I'm having lately is as games become more realistic, and the time to create said realistic games, the shorter the game becomes. However, the price of the game still remains the same, and sometimes increases!
This is actually why I stopped buying many next-generation gaming titles, specifically for Xbox 360 and PS3. However I don't speak negatively toward the gameplay, asthetic, style, or graphic quality of said games, but I believe that if the game doesn't have a certain amount of content to play, then the game simply isn't worth my money.
Let's put it this way. I bought Vanquish recently and before I begin bashing it, let me start by saying dear god yes, the gameplay is amazing. Emphasis on forward momentum was a winner in my book and the immersion of the game was ideal. However my gripe was this game costed me 60$ and I was barely able to get 10 hours of gameplay out of it before I had already completed the campaign on normal mode.
This is where the cost of games gets me. A lot of my friends laugh at me for not keeping up with next-generation titles but to me I simply don't see it worth the money. Typically I'll buy the game used after several months and play it later when it is worth my money. Example, I loved the concept of Bayonetta but I couldn't see paying 50$ for it. Eventually I found it for 12$ used. Definitely worth the money.
The breakdown if of next gen games giving about 10 hours of gameplay at the average going price equates to about 5-8$/hour of gameplay. If you look at it like this, games can get exceptionally pricy.
This is another reason why I continue to emphesize my gaming experience within online games. 12$/month and I'm almost guaranteed I'll get more hours of gameplay than I could ever attain. A good example, I played Final Fantasy 11 for nearly a decade. (10 years of gameplay x 12 months of subscriptions, 12 months x 13$ = $1560). So yes, I payed a good deal of money, but when you look at the amount of time I played the game, I had over 900 days playtime. When you get down to the math, I saved a lot of money if I were to buy consule games that equated to the same amount of time I played. That's 21600 hours of gameplay, at the going rate of 5-8$/hour of next-gen games that would equate to about $136,000 worth of games to equate to the same amount of gameplay.
Although, Final Fantasy 11 is a slow gameplay style, you can argue playing next-gen games yields a more rewarding experience, it's a matter of preference at that point.
My ending conclusion is simple, the value of games is getting to the point where gameplay (In a factor of how much content you get out of it) is being driven lower as the graphics are driven higher. If you're looking to get the best gaming experience out of your money, I would recommend picking up less graphic intensive games that focus more on gameplay and story. Games such as Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Legend of Zelda (Just about any of them), or Street Fighter. There are many kinds of games with lots of content in almost any genre of game, so there's a lot to choose from.
Overall, stop wasting your money on overpriced games that lack content. Get the best of your money. And to game designers, learn to build games in a more modular fashion to cut back on the time needed to complete games, but also, emphasize more on gameplay than graphical quality. Maybe it's just me, but I would much rather sit back and play Castlevania: Symphony of the Night than play Heavenly Sword.
