It’s not even “content at it’s zenith” - AAA games nowadays are pushed out both expensive and broken, plus they come with the risk of some form of enshittification being sneaked in later (be it promised content that we’re told “couldn’t make it into the launch” being sold later as overpriced DLCs or even monetisation).
I would say that the zenith of most AAA games (in the sense of peak enjoyment) is at least a year after release once most bugs have been fixed and the threat of enshittification has passed, sometimes never (for those games that did got enshittified).
IMHO, the best value, not just in terms of fun-per-$ but also in avoidance of unpleasant feelings (such as feeling that you’ve been swindled by a game maker or are being taken advantage of) is in buying games which are at least 2 years old, or in the case of some publishers like Nintendo, it’s never.
AldinTheMage@ttrpg.network 2 days ago
Definitely recommend playing or replaying old games. I’ve recently put hours into replaying Morrowind and Jedi Academy.
The main game I’ve been playing lately is Mount & Blade Warband from 2010. Got it for a couple $ and have been loving it. I missed it when it came out and recently a friend had been talking a lot about how much fun it used to be.
I have played a few newer AAA games that I uninstalled after a few hours. Sure there’s some great new games, especially from small publishers or indie devs, but there’s a lot more slop like you said.