Dead End Ahead

[lightbringer]

It's been said before, and The Inquirer is saying it again (http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=27976).

I agree with Charlie and I would like to think we're smarter then the many developers in the early 80s. Could Nintendo be trying to stop us from not learning from the past (while keeping themselves afloat)?

I wanted to use this thread to serve two purposes. First I wanted to get the reactions from the people here (preferably from the people who have developed games for sometime and can spend their time designing and thinking rather then learning how to create them) and secondly I'd like to see a contest theme based around who can be the most original while at the same time being really fun. Even a greater emphasis on originality (over say graphics and audio) would be great.

I admit not everything I do is original, but I'm doing okay with the tools I currently know.

[AnotherJake]

(preferably from the people who have developed games for sometime and can spend their time designing and thinking rather then learning how to create them)
I'm not really sure what that has to do with having an informed opinion about the state of mediocrity in the video game industry, but I'll take a big chance here and assume you won't flame me just because I haven't developed a game yet. ;)

I hold a somewhat contrarian viewpoint to that of the article. I have recently come to the conclusion that there isn't actually anything wrong with gameplay that isn't innovative. Plain and simple. That's right, I think rehashing gameplay over and over again is just fine. I *like* standard FPS's. Seeing crates and barrels in a game doesn't piss me off! It doesn't bother me that they haven't come up with anything new besides a laser blaster, a rocket launcher, and a chainsaw. I *like* standard RTS's, and drivers, and fight games. What I don't like are games that are done POORLY. Those games are the ones that really make a statement for the company that developed them: "We're just trying to take your money. Thank you for buying our crap, sucker! Move along please..." I think that is what gets many players all riled up about the "mediocrity" in the game industry. It's a basic human knee-jerk reaction to any unsatisfying entertainment.

I think it often gets overblown though. IOW, "I just played a first person shooter and it sucked, so therefore first person shooters are boring now and shouldn't be developed anymore." That's easy to say, but there are other things to consider. It may be that the FPS is boring because you've grown tired of that style of gameplay yourself, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be made anymore, because there are new people born every day. That would be like saying, "I've played solitaire until my fingers bled. It's boring now and nobody else should ever want to play it, so I'm giving it the 3 stars that I alone think it deserves instead of the fair 10 that I would have given if I was a new player to the genre." Chess: Boring! Checkers: Boring! Poker: Boring! Football: Boring! Mortal Combat: Boring! Doom3: Boring, boring, BORING!!!

Okay, so you're bored with everything. So now you (the prototypical one-man game programming geek) go out and attempt to make your own games and "show 'em how it's done". You'll change the world and they'll all come flocking to your new, original gameplay. I used to think this too, but after playing countless video games in my time, I've recently realized that quality content is truly king. It's still a bit of a mystery to me as to why, when I read yet another rant about the video game industry I hear the age-old snipe, "all they have is flashy eye-candy". Well, geez, I'm really sorry he doesn't like flashy eye-candy. I do, and I buy a lot of games. Maybe the author is in the wrong business.

It seems like all game programming contests already focus on new original gameplay "while being fun at the same time". In my experience, it is very rare to see great original gameplay come out of one of those contests. And even if it is great gameplay, it's often not something that interests me enough to want to buy it. Sorry to sound like such a party pooper about it. Instead, what I would like to see is a contest that focuses on one genre and simply challenges developers to make quality content. I'd like to see great art and hear amazing music and sound effects. I'd love to see well done particle effects. Eye-candy and ear-candy. And smooth controls that give a game a "great feel". What ever happened to that? I can get the feel for pretty much anyone's game because I've played so many of them, but it's rare for me to find one that just really nails the sweet spot. I've given up trying to give amateur developers advice on controls because they just never seem to get it, and they cop this attitude like I don't know what I'm saying. It's their way or no way. I'll read a forum thread with like ten people saying the controls are too stiff or something and the developer does the same thing or modifies some other aspect to make it easier to play instead of just working on the controls like everyone requested. It's like amateur developers have some type of listening-to-their-customers disorder or something, like they know best. Whatever... :rolleyes: Just get the controls and the graphics and the sound right and I'll buy your game. I don't care if it's been done before. I still listen to rock and roll even though it's been done before too... As long as it's done well.

[OneSadCookie]

I think that calling it stagnation is a little unfair. Yes, the vast majority of games are repeats of older gameplay; yes, games are expensive; yes, the cost of failed innovation is too high for most companies to try it.

That doesn't mean that there are no original games though, or that there is no evolution within the genres. Try playing Warcraft III followed by Starcraft, for instance.

The movie industry is in much the same position -- making films is big-budget stuff, you can't afford to have one flop, so you play it safe and don't do anything really innovative. I don't see anyone predicting that Hollywood is going under!

[lightbringer]

I don't think comparing the Movie and the Video Game industry can be concluded as being similar enough in the innovation regard without taking a big leap. In other words I don't think you could say a genre like FPSs can be compared to a genre like Action movies (FPSs don't have the noviety and aren't as varied as action movies, it's not even close, in my opinion).

So maybe the sky isn't falling, maybe you don't follow in some of my views, but I still want to bring up a very valuable point we should all be aware of.


Sure the Mac platform isn't full of big game developers that keep us with the latest headline games, instead it's more about the smaller developers, the guys making Lugaru and Chopper. Of course we don't have the big pockets and time to create the massive games as those other guys, but in the tradeoff we get something else, agility. We don't have huge commitments that could be a flop and destroy us, instead we can switch on a dime and let our imagination take us anywhere. If anyone is going to be looking over someone else's shoulder wondering what's next, it should be the big guys looking at us.

[Najdorf]

Bah. We could make a "game design" contest, where you dont have to submit a game, just a design paper, and vote the coolest idea.

Unfortunately I dont follow the mainstream industry to tell if there's really so much repetition or also innovation. I would like statistics with the best selling games of the 5 last years to see how many I've actually seen... about 10% I guess.

Well here are last year's:

1 - Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - PS2 - Take II Interactive

I played the original one for PC, I have to admit it's an incredibly good implementation of an incredibly cool concept.

2 - Halo 2* - XBX - Microsoft

Never seen it. I think it's a FPS.

3 - Madden NFL 2005* - PS2 - Electronic Arts

Never seen it. C'mon football is the most boring game evar. And videogame football must be like death or worst

4 - ESPN NFL 2K5 - PS2 - Take II Interactive

Never seen it. Hockey prolly

5 - Need For Speed: Underground 2 - PS2 - Electronic Arts

Racing, never seen anyone of the series actually. But racing is kind of boring.

6 - Pokemon Fire Red W/ Adapter - GBA - Nintendo of America

Bah.

7 - NBA Live 2005 - PS2 - Electronic Arts

Never seen anyone of the series. Some basketball games were actually good. I remember NBA jam was lots of fun about in 1996

8 - Spider-Man: The Movie 2 - PS2 - Activision

Damn I'd like to see the movie, I missed it

9 - Halo - XBX - Microsoft

Never seen it

10 - ESPN NFL 2K5 - XBX - Take II Interactive

Never seen it

But... I never thought of the mainstream industry as a competitor. I think we are in two different markets. People that buy John Madden dont usually buy shareware

[Dan Potter]

The thing that gets me is that it seems like all the games coming out today are just an earlier game, redone. Which is cool if it's got improved content (like Jake said), but all too often it just seems like I'm playing the same game over and over again. Which is ok, too, except that there's now a serious fixation on movie-like plotlines and other things that really only work the first time through. And even that would be ok, except that they seem to expect me to keep spending money on it :)

Tell me again why I would want to buy FF8, FF9, FF10, FF12, etc... when I have FF7? :) I mean at least FF7 moved to 3D vs the earlier ones, but from there on out it's basically the same story lines, revamped character designs, more polygons, etc... I just get bored with it.

All IMO :)

[Dark Helmet]

I think it's the content of the game that makes it really good. Gameplay, graphics, music, sound, all that helps, but there's still that region of the quality of the actual ideas that they put in there. For instance, Ev nova, is the same gameplay as the last two, with medium revamping to graphics and sound, and yet it is far superior to it's predecessors. Perhaps that's why the old MUDs are still fairly popular today, and not just with the fan boys, in this world of a million polygons. And it's not just the gameplay being popular (as most of them are fairly similar in that rescpect). If the mainstream dies, I think there will be a new riseup of the indie developers to the stores.

[Chris Ball]

What bothers me is the lack of strategy, story and puzzle solving in FPS and games in general. It seems like they are all designed with care not to challenge the intelligence of anyone.
The missions and 'puzzles' in Diablo, for instance, are completed by following written instructions. I've worked for many folks who seem to feel that the customer is as dumb as a stump. I wish there were more really difficult puzzles and subtle strategies out there. Voilent, ham-fisted methods can always be provided as an alternate path.

[Jones]

What bothers me is the lack of strategy, story and puzzle solving in FPS and games in general. It seems like they are all designed with care not to challenge the intelligence of anyone.
The missions and 'puzzles' in Diablo, for instance, are completed by following written instructions. I've worked for many folks who seem to feel that the customer is as dumb as a stump. I wish there were more really difficult puzzles and subtle strategies out there. Voilent, ham-fisted methods can always be provided as an alternate path.

I get that feeling too sometimes. I remember Kotor II had less "Smarts challenges" that Kotor I, and 1 was lacking them too. But then in II they would treat you like dumb-smurf then out of the blue there was the one level on Nar-Shadaa with the really hard door puzzle. Maybe it wasn't so hard, perhaps I am just dumb-smurf. :p

EDIT: Also, unrelated: LightBringer, I've just noticed the link to your game "drawing grounds" is broken, and It looks pretty cool. Thanks.

[igame3d]

If you are playing games on only one kind of system, one kind of compute or one brand of console, then you are not getting a full picture of what is happening in the games industry.

Innovation happens in little steps, single items out of a huge library of similarity.
Innovation is a huge risk, the G4 Cube as one example, the fruit flavored iMacs as another (although the iMac was really the mac classic done better), and the new iMac is the 25th (or 20th, or 15th..losing track of the years) Anniversary Mac done affordably.

What can you innovate in a driving game, a space shooter, or an FPS that won't have gamers screaming? Well you mix them up and get Halo 2, yeehaa!

What caused the last game crash was not lack of innovative titles, because there was tons of innovative titles going on in the computer gaming arena, which drove sales away from the stagnated consoles, also the internet was being born and people were simply spending their time doing something else besides blowing dust out of cheesy cartridges.

I think its best to ignore people who get paid to whine and cry about various sorts of media because they are self absorbed asses that aren't even pretty to look at. Have you read any movie reviews lately...they haven't changed in twenty years, ie, its all bitching and moaning by people with no talent to make movies themselves and most likely no friends so they spend all their time getting paid to sit in movie theatre alone and then let the world know just what a miserable loser they are by writing up a terrible review for a movie that was written for a very specific target audience that they aren't included in. Same with games and the games industry.

The question to ask authors like the one above is ..wait maybe not a question but a threat "If you can't do better then shut your mouth or I'll shove one my wii controllers down your throat and the other up your rectum"

Anyone play X-men III: the Official Game? Innovative gameplay, how many games do you get to teleport and hang from all manner of objects, then teleport all over the battle zone beating the life out of your opponents, or zoom around on an character generated ice slide? Innovative gameplay in a movie title, thats unique!

[Najdorf]

Thread got back from the dead... most AAA games suck? No better news for the indies.

[gatti]

To be quite honest... When an individual feels that games do not give them the entertainment/challenge anymore, perhaps it's a mental awareness that they should seek different things to invest their time into. Read a good mystery book. Pick-up comic books again. There are plenty with mature and complex storylines these days as these markets have expanded.

Also, I'm not sure it helps by saying that the video game industry is going stagnint and will crash soon. Sure, many games are sequel after sequel, however, so is the film industry. There are many developers that have the creativity and (when necessary) money to take risks. The Nintendo Wii is a good example of this. I think it will reiterate that ultra-realistic graphics and a team of 250 people don't make a game great. The forgotten word of "game-play mechanic" will reign supreme and help companies protect themselves from a possible industry crash if that's what happens.

[igame3d]

What bothers me is the lack of strategy, story and puzzle solving in FPS and games in general.
Ya want some puzzles? Try Tomb Raider: Legend!

[Zekaric]

To be quite honest... When an individual feels that games do not give them the entertainment/challenge anymore, perhaps it's a mental awareness that they should seek different things to invest their time into. Read a good mystery book. Pick-up comic books again. There are plenty with mature and complex storylines these days as these markets have expanded.But I'm too old to play with LEGO!

[Baldock]

But I'm too old to play with LEGO!

I recently discovered with my 4 year old son I'm not to old to play with lego. Thanks to a nature of hoarding as much as I can I've still got a rather impressive lego collection from my youth which my son can now play with. In a few years I'll also dig out my box of technic lego as well for him. Hours of fun :D

[igame3d]

While we are veering wildly off course into LegoLand check out the sexy technology coming this fall from Lego Mindstorms (http://mindstorms.lego.com/)
You are not a good parent unless you teach your child to build his own killer robot to take care of those school yard bullies.

[MilesBaskett]

Unfortunately, I am going to blame every indie game designer/publisher for todays sad state of video games. Competition is what drives the game industry(and all others) forward. The last game with cool play mechanics(that I had never seen before) was Katamari Damacy on the PS2. But part of the games unique-ness and playability came from the fact that it used a controller and not a keyboard(because it used the dual analog control sticks). I think at the end of the day, the use of a keyboard and mouse is detracting from alot of the possible games that can be made PC wise. I find that good game controls are the major detractor of PC gaming as a whole(sans FPS's, as the mouse keyboard set-up is only good for them really).

Also, being an indie game designer doesn't mean that you should skimp on graphics.Why should I buy a shareware game for 10-30$ when I can buy very well made games for 20$ or less(on PCs or consoles).

"I think it will reiterate that ultra-realistic graphics and a team of 250 people don't make a game great."

No it doesn't make a game great, but for example, Nintendo has a vast amout of excellent artists.They can spend the time to make great game mechanics.....but they back that up with beautifully made game art(models,textures,design). Indie game houses fail over and over from this one oversite. They skimp on good artists(note, im saying artists, not graphics). An indie game house has yet to make a game on par with any of the Zelda/Link games on nintendo.......heck, nintendo did Pikamen(?.....the little alien dudes), that was similar to a "lemmings" game style, but the game art is what set it apart.


Indie game houses need better artists! Game "box art" or previews for the game are the major things selling that game(as it makes the buyer/player give it a look in the first place) well before playing a demo enters thier mind.

sorry for ranting.

[Nick]

I disagree. The indie companies are where you'll find the potential. They're the ones who have to figure something cool out to make it into the big leagues. Companies like EA with their teams of 250 and talented artists do almost nothing besides release copies of popular sports franchises with virtually no enhancement to gameplay. Even the art hasn't increased on the games. It seems most AAA companies are happy being really creative to create a big smash hit... and then milking it with seventeen sequels just to get all the profits out of it they can.

Finally, art doesn't make video games. You can have absolutely horrific graphics and still have a very fun, enjoyable game if you are willing to let it be good. That's one of my complaints with the PS3. They're trying to sell it for the graphics. Graphics are always nice, but the gameplay is where it's at.

[MilesBaskett]

Gameplay can(and should) sell a game, but someone will never know until they try the game.Even if its a game such as pong, the play area could have nice modeled arena or whatever.....something to at least catch the eye of a potential player. Even simple games can look good.

[Nick]

Even simple games can look good.
But should they have to?

The problem is the mindset of the consumers. They want graphical increases to keep going, but honestly they can't increase at the rate that most consumers want them to. Let's get back to gameplay and stop worrying about who can put the largest number of maps on various objects (bump maps, normal maps, shadow maps, specular maps, etc) with such-and-such graphical feature. I don't care if my virtual basketball player sweats as I play if the controls are too convoluted to play for more than five minutes.

Unfortunately trying to change consumers is about as useful as yelling at a brick wall...

[Skorche]

I don't care if my virtual basketball player sweats as I play...

Speaking of which, has anyone seen any of the "next gen" sports games? Man! Those are gross! Not only do they sweat, but they do so to unatural looking levels.

That's another thing that I don't like about some of the new "graphical features" you are starting to see in a lot of games. Maybe this has to do with what Nic was saying about progress not keeping up with people's expectations, but special effects in newer games are almost always overdone. Bloom is a good example. You could have a nice subtle bloom effect that gives that nice warm look, or you could give the image a ton of bloom to make sure that the player notices it even if it's to a distracting amount. HDR lighting is also a good example, a lot of games that I've seen that use it seem to abuse it. You could use the extra precision to produce more natural light by extending the dynamic range (like photographers do), or you could keep the output range the same and clip the dynamic range and a liberal amount of bloom. (Like in HL2, why does the stupid flashlight cause oversaturation when the sun doesn't. Hmmm...)

[igame3d]

New techniques and technologies get over used, until an artistic and reasonable middle ground is reached. Photoshop's lens flare for instance, Kai Power Tools effects as another instance. It goes in phases of overuse and levels out to more subtle and aesthetic use.

From this thread I can tell people around here are living a sheltered life, complaining about specific instances of gross indulgence in certain games
without giving any credit to some of the wonderful things that are going on.

Everyone who has access to a Blockbuster needs to get themselves a GamePass and rent everything on the shelves before making closed minded responses ($16 a month gets you unlimited rentals). There is a ton of good work out there and you will not see any of it if you don't put the effort toward trying to find it.

Anyone played Farcry Evolution? Yeah its a standard FPS, but the world is so populated with realistic scenery that its somewhat mind blowing as a game designer only using a Mac to even imagine how to implement it. It has game play mechanics never before available.

Anyone played Resident Evil 4? Within 15 minutes you forget about the fantastic graphics entirely and concentrate on avoiding getting killed at all cost, in under an hour you are afraid of opening the next door. Evoking irrational paranoia isn't revolutionary, but it sure is an amazing success for the game designers, who deserve every single award they've won for the game.

Games are like women (or men for the one woman in our audience), it does not matter if 99% of them are fugly beasts, its only the one in a million that stop your breath that ever matter at all. Another analogy would be digging for gold, 99.9999% of the mountain is granite, but its the nugget of shiny stuff that you are after. Seek the shiny and you will find it, sniff for crap and you will find crap.

Perhaps its not games that are stagnating, but that people with too much time to complain and not enough time actively bringing games into new frontiers that are the problem.

[MilesBaskett]

" I don't care if my virtual basketball player sweats as I play if the controls are too convoluted to play for more than five minutes."

I don't mean a game needs to look good in that way(high end graphics).....if your, or anyones game has lets say 500 poly character models, then they should be the best darn 500 poly characters you can make. I'm talking about the ingame art(models,textures, color, ect).

Here is an example picture(done by a guy named "Bobo the Seal").
http://www.bobotheseal.com/personal_work/textures/RTS-unit-example.jpg

Now, this is a very low spec model....but, it does look as good as it could be. That is what I was trying to get at. Simple, but perfect(much like what you want the gameplay to be). That is one of the resons nintendo's games do so well. Play a Zelda game lately, look at those graphics, or a game like Pikamin. They have not gone overboard(no sweat or crap like that) but give solid game environments to augment the gameplay. Ingame art helps set the mood for every game. Would the old black and white pong be a better game compared to .....mario tennis? No, people only played it because thats all thier was.

What I am trying to say is:
Indie games fail, because a good 60-70% of them look like a third grader did the art(models,ect). That turns alot of people off initially, while they are still deciding if downloading some game is worth it.The best gameplay in the world can't help that. Just my opinion though, if i'm wrong then indie game houses will somehow get a larger market share and maybe help us get better games.....I just don't see that happening with game models that look worse than a PS1 game model would.