I think of how video game walkthroughs have gone this way. It used to be you'd find exhaustive 300k text explanations of everything in a game. Now there is a "let's play" video that goes on for 40 hours, you have to find the right video to watch, then seek to the right place in that video, it's exhausting.
The one case I found the video was better was in a certain level where the way forward was to make a jump that didn't look possible and the video made it obvious.
Honestly though, video walkthroughs are an improvement (navigation aside). It's hard to describe a situation entirely via text, and having that plus a short video showing the exact situation (e.g., finding a collectible in a weird location, strategy for defeating a boss, etc.) makes things so much clearer.
I've had instances where a walkthrough with pictures still wasn't enough and had to find a video showing me something and it only became clear after that.
I recall as a kid that the Zelda OOT water temple was nearly impossible to navigate with a gamefaqs guide. Video back then would have been so much easier.
I wonder if you could start writing guides on Substack to monetize them.. I think the real problem here is that writing a 300k textbook on GameFAQs gets you a chance at winning some swag, but 40 hours of YouTube videos can actually pay out in the form of money
Then again, even though World of Warcraft sites pay guide authors, the guides are super formulaic and low quality... even though I despise video content, I end up getting most of my detailed info that way
My son made it all the way through one of the older games doing all the fighting with one Pokémon, developing others just to host skills like cut. I have been disappointed with recent fire Emblem titles because level trumps the weapons triangle.
I was thinking about information extracting the GameFAQs for certain Hyperdimension Neptunia games to make a knowledge graph so I could figure out the dependency graph of what dungeons I would have to go to to get the items to craft the items that I need to craft an item I want. But then again, I’m a weeaboo.
The one case I found the video was better was in a certain level where the way forward was to make a jump that didn't look possible and the video made it obvious.