Where is the innovation?

I have been a hardcore gamer for almost two decades. I studied hard, went to college, bust my butt at work all week to do one thing, buy games. Video games are what I live for, but frankly I'm getting fed up....

Where is the innovation in the industry? This day in age video games pretty much are all the same freakin' thing. First person shooters.... ugh... don't get me wrong I loved them, I was aaddicted as much as anyone, but I started to get tired of it about 5 years ago... After 12 hour unreal tournament  lan parties they got old.

 Why is no one calling the industry on this? why are we all just eating up the same old crap over and over and over again. Think about the past few years and think about the big games. Doom 3,  FEAR, Resistance, Gears of War, GRAW, Halo, I can go on and on and on.

 The other day I was going over this rant with one of my students (I teach high school) and he actually said to me "you should try lost planet, thats a good game and it's not a FPS" I almost choked. IT"S THE SAME THING PEOPLE.

Think about those great games, those games that innovate. It was FPS about a decade ago, Wolfenstein, Doom, and Doom 2 ate up my childhood. What happens after that... we get carbon copy after carbon copy the only thing different is the price tag goes up.

The same thing happened with RTS after warcraft, we got the same stuff over and over and over again... red alert, command and conquer,  starcraft, warcraft 2, warcraft 3, lord of the rings... on and on and on... and to some extent it's still there with RTS. These games claim to "reinvent" with each new game. BULL, looks the same to me.

 Another thing that is happening that people havn't quite noticed yet, but those who own a wii or ds have noticed the trend, how many minigames can you spit at us?? Warioware ROCKED, incredible game, why geeze, have you looked at anything available for those systems lately, almost everything is minigame oriented.

Now I want you to think about those games that innovate (think sid meiers), pirates... one of my favorites, it fits no cookie cutter mold, civilization... once again, no mold.

Gamers really need to think to themselves are these gaming trends good. Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying that some of the games i mentioned weren't fantastic, they were... but we lost innovation... 

Yeah, I totally get what you mean.

It's like saying what would the movie industry be like if all that was exclusively released was Die Hard, Super Hero Movies, Generic Terminator Movies, Rockey Sequels featuring a lead characters over 60, and B movies with an A-list cast like Snakes on a Plane, disregarding beautiful fables like Magnolia, American Splendor and other films that don't centre around violence.

I think the fault lies with the medium concerning video games. The fact you are the the central figure in these stories mean they can be as contrived, cliched, or overused as they want to be as you take a unique role in the unfolding story.

I would be immensely impressed if we see a video game acclaimed in the vane of the likes of the Godfather, Fargo, or even the like of Charlie Chaplin in my life time. I think titles like Beyond Good & Evil are stepping stones to that forefront but are quashed by poor sales despite high acclaim by critiques.

I have been a hardcore gamer for almost two decades. I studied hard, went to college, bust my butt at work all week to do one thing, buy games. Video games are what I live for, but frankly I'm getting fed up....

 

Where is the innovation in the industry? This day in age video games pretty much are all the same freakin' thing. First person shooters.... ugh... don't get me wrong I loved them, I was aaddicted as much as anyone, but I started to get tired of it about 5 years ago... After 12 hour unreal tournament  lan parties they got old.

 Why is no one calling the industry on this? why are we all just eating up the same old crap over and over and over again. Think about the past few years and think about the big games. Doom 3,  FEAR, Resistance, Gears of War, GRAW, Halo, I can go on and on and on.

 The other day I was going over this rant with one of my students (I teach high school) and he actually said to me "you should try lost planet, thats a good game and it's not a FPS" I almost choked. IT"S THE SAME THING PEOPLE.

 

Think about those great games, those games that innovate. It was FPS about a decade ago, Wolfenstein, Doom, and Doom 2 ate up my childhood. What happens after that... we get carbon copy after carbon copy the only thing different is the price tag goes up.

 

The same thing happened with RTS after warcraft, we got the same stuff over and over and over again... red alert, command and conquer,  starcraft, warcraft 2, warcraft 3, lord of the rings... on and on and on... and to some extent it's still there with RTS. These games claim to "reinvent" with each new game. BULL, looks the same to me.

 Another thing that is happening that people havn't quite noticed yet, but those who own a wii or ds have noticed the trend, how many minigames can you spit at us?? Warioware ROCKED, incredible game, why geeze, have you looked at anything available for those systems lately, almost everything is minigame oriented.

 

Now I want you to think about those games that innovate (think sid meiers), pirates... one of my favorites, it fits no cookie cutter mold, civilization... once again, no mold.

 

Gamers really need to think to themselves are these gaming trends good. Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying that some of the games i mentioned weren't fantastic, they were... but we lost innovation... 

mfp16

Why should devs make inovative games when sequels sell wayyyyy... more copies??? Your not saying anything that hasn't been said before....topics like these are interesting but lack any substance anymore.

I agree with your innovation poitn, but who doesn't want to see a continuation, an update, or a reinvention of their favourite innovative title in the form of a sequel.evil_tormentor

Don't get me wrong, I do. Sequels here and there are fine, I like em as much as you do, but when the entire industry starts making the same game with new packaging thats where I have a problem. 

I don't know. I've been a gamer for over 25 years so I've pretty much seen it all since the Atari 2600 days. Honestly I'm not really bothered at all by gaming and how it's progressed up until now. In fact I'm probably enjoying now more then I have before. It's always easy to be innovative when a genre first starts out. I buy alot of games and I enjoy them all.

I don't see how you can say that Lost planet is the same thing as an FPS game except in the most basic sense that you shoot people. I still see a pretty good degree of innovative stuff being done in games these days though due to more powerful hardware that can implement ideas that weren't particularily possible on previous hardware. Games such as Dead Rising.

Part of the problem is that as games become more technologically advanced, they cost more and more money to produce. Therefore in order to get funding the need to prove that the game is going to sell. Unfortunately in most cases this means that will just copy something that has already been proven to be successful and change it.

I think there is still hope though, just look at Spore for example.

I dunno, maybe your just getting too old for games? ;p 

I understand your opinion but can't agree.

Games today are maybe less mind-blowing differently in concept then they where years ago but I still feel a lot of innovation in the industry. 

Just because there are many games in witch the general game mechanics are the same it doesn't mean that they don't really are creative and original.

Supreme commander gave me a new look on the battlefield and controlling or moving units became far more tactical than in any other RTS games.

Gears of War Gave me in my opinion a complete new experience of combat. In a way  I had never seen before in any other game.

The Total War series gave us all a new way to play strategy games.

Most people don't think that does games are truly innovative. They only see a some gamer shooting stuff ore moving units around on the map. The real innovation now a days is not always that obvious but it sure is there!

True complete innovation in video games is also still present in the industry. Sing Star, Darwinia, Guitar hero, Wii sports, Pikmin, Elite beat agents, Nintendogs, Silent hunter, Defcon,... all games that are completely innovative and are generally asumed fun to play.

There are also lots of games that come out sooner or later and show allot of innovation: Spore, Bioshock, EndWar (although there isn't that much known about this game) and Drawn to Life are just a few of them

You maybe think that I might be pleased to easily with what the developers try to sell me but all I can say is that I'm a happy gamer. I don't feel like a I'm playing the same game over and over again and I'm still amazed by what shows up on my monitor more than often.

True complete innovation in video games is also still present in the industry. Sing Star, Darwinia, Guitar hero, Wii sports, Pikmin, Elite beat agents, Nintendogs, Silent hunter, Defcon,... all games that are completely innovative and are generally asumed fun to play.

XeONE

There certainely are some games that are completely innovative. Obviously not every single game that comes out is a copy cat, just the majority. Frankly I'm glad that you mentioned defcon, because it makes my point, that game was fantastic and innovative but I'm betting we are two of the 100 people who have ever heard of it.

Pikman, innovative and cool... being copied by overlord, it's the carbon copy cycle starting, and it probably won't continue because pikman doesn't pull the numbers like some of the heavy hitters.

Nintendogs, interesting but pretty shallow. Now I'd like you to count the number of versions and copies out there already, you need more than both hands and feet. Plus, that was a copy of a tamagchi from the 90s repacked as a video game.

Guitar Hero, and you have no idea how much of an addict I am at this game, but i'll bash it anyway. It's a rthymn game like the drum game for ps2 (don't remember the name) and donkey konga with a different controller. 

Frankly I'm glad that you mentioned defcon, because it makes my point, that game was fantastic and innovative but I'm betting we are two of the 100 people who have ever heard of it.mfp16

Make that three. I thought DEFCON was great a first, but it doesn't have much replay value. 

Guitar Hero, and you have no idea how much of an addict I am at this game, but i'll bash it anyway. It's a rthymn game like the drum game for ps2 (don't remember the name) and donkey konga with a different controller. 

mfp16

I'm sorry but that really doesn't make much sense. I mean they are two very different instruments but you're going to say that it's not innovative simply because it's a music rhythm game.

After a certain period of time, anything can become mediocre. Once a new idea comes up, it is repeated several times and then it becomes unoriginal.

Think about movies. I can't think of a single good movie that has been original for a while. Why? Probly because much of what you can do with movies has already been done. The Matrix was a great innovator in 2000, but stuff like that now is plain.

Another reason why is fanbase. Why innovate when you KNOW that there is a large amount of people that want to see a sequel or something. For example, no matter how many Dynasty Warriors Koei makes they still sell. Yet there has been little innovation (although they could toss Gitaroo-Man 2 out there). 

 The last reason is money. Spending the time and money needed to come up with original ideas constantly is very risky - especially since producing high quality games these days is very expensive. The profit risk is too great. 

 I agree with what you are saying, but you have to look at it from various perspectives.

There is innovation you just aren't looking hard enough. If you want innovative games to flourish more then you should hunt them down and buy them.capthavic

*disclaimer* IMO you're absolutely right, sorry but I don't feel sorry for anybody that says gaming now lacks innovation, compared to what era? I would make the case that the current gen is looking to be the most innovative since the golden era of gaming or at least my golden era PS1/N64

Guitar Hero, and you have no idea how much of an addict I am at this game, but i'll bash it anyway. It's a rthymn game like the drum game for ps2 (don't remember the name) and donkey konga with a different controller.

mfp16

It was after reading this particular paragraph, and going back and reading "... looks the same to me" that I realize that some part of you doesn't get the meaning of the word "genre" in terms of the video game industry. If you go into a shooter game, your going to shoot things. If you go into an RTS, your going to be controlling armies/soldiers/squads. If your expecting something completely different, your in for a big surprise.

I do decry the fact that the are a lot of carbon-copy games out there, and no risk is taken with making new headway into unknown territory for the respective genres, but I do respect that these games are going to be in a particular genre, and I have to expect certain aspects of the genre to show.

Oh, and great job on mentioning Civilization, which hasn't had any major innovation in its gameplay in the last 2 iterations imo.

Exponential growth of gaming userbase has caused proven formulas to be repeatedly accepted as "fresh" by a large group of new gamers that are constantly entering the marketplace. What we really need is for gaming to hit a no-growth period where the current userbase can become "educated" and tired of existing genres and demand something fresh and innovative. The majority needs to want something new, not just those of us that have been at this for 20+ years.

So, what is innovation, exactly?

I agree with you about innovation. But there's one game I wish they hadn't changed, Ghost Recon.  It seems they took a great game, and dumbed it down!  I wish they had left the concept the same, and just made the graphics better.  I play GRAW alot and like it, but miss the planning an switching different personnel.