I'll keep this (relatively, for me) short.
My kids and I have been playing Mario Kart World on the Switch 2. It's really well done, free roam is fun (but limited), and the controls, smoothness, graphics, etc. are REALLY well done. It's lacking in many features (ghosts racing, competitive free roam trials, tracks, items, etc.) and I hope many of the gaps will be filled in over the coming years. It's feeling a bit played out already.
BUT... I've also recently introduced Double Dash (Gamecube) and Mario Kart Wii to the kids. They got a kick out of wii motion controls and double dash's gimmicks, but even with a retrotink, playing it on a big flatscreen TV is just not ideal.
So I sailed the high seas for some ROMs (to games I already own), installed the Dolphin emulator, and installed some 4K texture packs. My PC is ok... i7-4790 processor (10+ years old) and a 3080.
Double Dash, a game from 23 years ago now looks almost as good as Mario Kart World (you can easily find Youtube videos). It's staggeringly good. The controls and speed -- better than World, imho. The performance is fantastic.
If you took the base Double Dash or Wii game and compared to World, you would say we've come incredibly far. But, with a little upscaling, some new textures, etc., it's clear that we really haven't.
I get that Nintendo games are not known for pushing the envelope, but I think this is just one good example of how ... empty ... modern AAA gaming is.
Competency Crisis in Action. A generation or two of talented programmers and game designers have retired by now, and they took their expertise with them. The game dev mills aren't producing legitimate talent, and DEI is flooding every industry with unproductive retards. Anyone with real chops is swinging for the fences in indie development because success there sets you up for life. Outside of a few Asian and eastern European studios, AAA game dev is turbo cooked.
Yep that's what happens when you only hire people who are "qualified" but otherwise not passionate, intelligent, etc. It's just been a downward slide since the mid 2010's and getting worse each year. That's why the only great upcoming games are smaller and not by multinational corporations.
I wouldn't even say "it sets you up for life". I think the issue is entirely Occupational VS Aspirational. The OG game creators, and even to a good extent the next two generations, did not have money in the business. Even the burgeoning AAA industries were scrappy. Look at Pokemon Red's code: It's held together with duct tape and prayers. They had to make do. And had to work around a number of hard limitations.
Now, there's soft limitations. You can't have a woman be too attractive, or a man be too unattractive, or the harpies at IGN will throw a hissy fit. That's no longer a developmental limitation, it's a social one. And people follow that social limitation, not because they want to make a good product and they think it to be sound advice, but because they don't want to get fired. Because being a game dev in a bloated industry IS being set up for life. The indies fail, people are forced out, it's cutthroat for a few hundred to a few thousand sales. But get in the comfy EA-Sports or Blizzard houses, and unlike those indie devs, you ARE set for life... As long as you never cross the harpies, startle the tengu, or offend the shades.
And people know that. It's "a good job". And so they take no risks, because they want their guaranteed good paycheck. A-tier and above devs are occupational. They're just there for the reliable money. The indies are aspirational. They hope. They dream. VERY FEW are deluded enough to think they're the next Notch and going to be a billionaire. Most of them just want to make a game that they, themselves, would like to play.
And now they have the tech to do so! But the soft limitations still blockade them, too. A few break through, power through SBI and IGN's slander and libel and threats. But many are cowed, and choose not to make the game they want to make, BECAUSE there's so much money in the industry, occupational, dedicated to putting down innovation and ideas and creativity and making what the developer would want to develop.