A Dearth of Demos
A few years ago I remember there was almost a good new game demo a month coming out on the Internet.   Today I find myself constantly disappointed by the lack of good demos online  Part of the reason may be the complete extinction of shareware and the huge size of those good demos that do come out (usually at least 100 megs), but it seems that developers are using the online demo  less and less of a marketing tool.    In fact, the prevailing view is that AVI files can take the place of a playable demo.  I still believe nothing replaces the experience of sitting down to play a game.  To this day I remember downloading the Dark Forces demo in 1993 before the game shipped; that demo single-handedly built up a huge amount of hype for the game.  When it hit store shelves players knew they wanted to buy the game.

Unfortunately, we now seldom see game demos come out ahead of the retail release, and if they do, the demo is usually some type of test version that isn't very representative of the final game.  Developers claim they don't have time to put out even a good one or two level demo of a game before release, but if they have a hot title in development, there's no more effective way to get gamers on your side.   Somehow the importance of a good pre-release demo has been lost in the push to get products out the door, and it's a trend that has hurt the industry.

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