What makes a game feel next-gen? The graphics, obviously. Also, playing a game that's definitely not possible on older hardware; the leap from Super Mario to Mario 64 was astounding, and I feel spoiled that games have advanced even beyond that. Personally, I wasn't stoked about a game having less loading screens when I first played GTA: San Andreas on the PS2. Previous games always had this jarring pause when you triggered a barrier leading to the next city, but in San Andreas, the only loading I had to sit through was booting up the game, and a short pause when I entered buildings (which, in my eyes, is perfectly fine, considering that being able to enter buildings were still fairly new in a GTA game).
Which is a shame that I couldn't quite appreciate great titles like the Assassin's Creed series. The games look gorgeous, the settings are what drew me into buying the dark horse that is 3, and no matter what era it is, the main character is always a bad-ass. But God forbid that I need to go to a different city or a new environment, I'm treated to one long ass loading screen. While I'm free to walk around, it's not exactly interesting to traverse into the white light, Poltergeist style. Maybe I'm nitpicking a minor thing compared to an otherwise great experience, but the constant loading is what killed it for me in this kind of game.
What would really wow me in a videogame would be a seamless ride. The most disappointing and what really destroys the mood are MMO's that don't have this. I'm always under the impression that MMO's are a seemingly never ending game with a ridiculously massive world to explore in. I can withstand the inevitable boot up (come on, I'm not asking for magic to happen), but when areas are sectioned off via doors with loading screens, it makes the game feel a lot smaller, like yeah...the game as a whole can span a continent, but it feels like...well, standard levels in any given game than a giant world that the genre gives the impression of.
Some games cleverly disguise their loading screens and are barely noticeable, like Resident Evil's infamous opening door. I mean, back then, it never dawned on me that this game had no loading until someone pointed it out to me that the doors themselves were loading screens. Freaking brilliant! Some games use cutscenes as a front to finish loading a level (which can get annoying once you want to skip it because you've seen it already), and back in the day of playing Test Drive and it's eternal loading screens, I could pass the time by playing Pong. Okay, bad example.
Dare I say I'd rather sit through a lengthy boot up than have it evenly spread out through the overall experience? I mean, I'm playing a videogame, it's not like I'm going anywhere. Videogames have such beautiful fictional worlds that gamers can't resist the urge to explore, because they don't really exist. Our form of entertainment is the imagination of the creator. Playing a videogame is a lot like reading a book for me: I can sit in one spot for hours just staring at something and still become entertained. Hell, imagine reading a book, and being forced to put it down and take a break after you finish a chapter, no matter how much you want to press on. It's no big deal, and sometimes we could use the break, but it does ruin the immersion.
It's more of an issue with open world games rather than a quick and painless action game or surviving a zombie takeover (honestly, in horror games, I could use the breather). In regular games, I see the pause as an opportunity to save my progress (yes, because I'm not the best gamer around, I'll admit) but with the types of games that have no rules or boundaries, I'd like them to find a creative way to make a loading screen with something else besides a static image that says Loading.