Most Innovative Games?

[DaHeckIzDat]

One of the biggest gripes people have about video games today is that they're all clones of each other. What are some of the most innovative games you can think of, ones that do something that is entirely their own thing?

- Katamari Damacy. Do I even need to say why?

- the Persona games. Combining a real life sim with a JRPG dungeon crawler, and having the two mix together better than they have any right to, is one of the best examples of innovation I can think of.

- Minecraft. It's old news by now, but back when it first came out there were no other games like this on the market that offered the same kind of freedom of both exploration and creativity.

- PUBG. Maybe it's not the first game to have a battle royale mode, but it's the one that put that mode on the map. Also, I'm too lazy to look up who actually did it first. But the concept is so simple (100 person deathmatch with no respawns in a large scale arena) that I'm surprised it took this long to catch on.

- The Batman: Arkham games. This ones a little iffy, since stealth and brawling games aren't exactly rare. I'd say, though, that they're innovative because it found the perfect balance of the two to create something we've never seen before: an indisputably awesome Batman game!

[Luigi & Peach]

Both Toejam & Earl and Ecco the Dolphin for the Genesis come to mind for their uniqueness. There was an SNES game that centered around evolution which was really original too.

[Stalvern]

The early/mid-'80s were one of the most creatively fertile times for games, before genre categories became more strictly defined and enforced by the market that the NES created. I have a special fondness for the machine that the Critic himself grew up using, Atari's 8-bit line (the 1200XL model, in his case). Here are some of its most impressively imaginative games, all native to the system (despite a multitude of ports):



1982 - Necromancer

A beautifully strange game about raising an army of trees to vanquish an evil necromancer. Despite its rudimentary graphics, it has an oddly spooky atmosphere that complements the bizarre gameplay perfectly.



1983 - Alley Cat

A set of crazy little arcade-style minigames about being an alley cat. Fun and full of character.



1983 - Murder on the Zinderneuf

A surprisingly deep game of interrogation and investigation, set on a Zeppelin (not that you can tell from the frankly horrible graphics). Inspired by Clue but closer to L.A. Noire (!) in execution.



1984 - Seven Cities of Gold

A game of exploration in the New World, unusually sophisticated for something on such a primitive system and handling its subject matter with nuance. Hardcore Gaming 101 has an excellent page on it.



1985 - Koronis Rift

Lucasfilm released a trilogy of heightmap-based 3D games in 1985, and while all of them are technical marvels for the time, this one has innovative gameplay to match its graphics. An antecedent to Pokémon in some key ways, although I doubt that Satoshi Tajiri even knew about it.

[mbd36]

There were some innovative arcade games in the early 80s. You have to wonder what the heck they were smoking when they came up with some of these.

Pac-Man
Q*bert
Joust
Marble Madness
Qix
Snacks'n Jaxson

[C64_Critic]

Interesting topic! In the 80's, at the height of the arcade craze, there were a ton of weird/odd/unique games, so I'll limit a quick 5 to those I enjoyed at home. I have to give a shout out to these games for originality/innovation:
1) Tetris - It spawned a ton of rip-offs, and when it was original was released it was unlike any other game that came before it. Also, it was the first video game ever exported from the Soviet Union to the United States apparently.

2) Space Taxi - A game where you fly a taxi cab to various locations and pick up a fare, delivering them to their chosen destination for an ever-decreasing tip. I can't think of another game like it, aside from the obvious Crazy Taxi which mimics the idea of picking up fares and losing tip $$ depending on how much time you take to deliver them and how rough the trip was but of course takes place on Earth.

3) Zork - The first of many text-based adventure games by Infocom, it basically launched the entire genre of such games that has since fallen almost completely by the wayside. Yes, "Adventureland" came first, but was a one-off, whereas Zork was the cornerstone of an entire company that lasted a decade.

4) Wizardry - The first true "Dungeons and Dragons"-like game I ever played. Very rudimentary by today's standards, but at the time it was a fascinating glimpse into what home computers might be able to do with regards to replacing a Dungeon Master where our D&D campaigns were concerned.

5) Samba de Amigo - A game so original it had it's own controllers! I can't remember another experience looking and feeling so ridiculous, standing in front of the TV on a plastic mat and shaking those electronic maracas in sync with the music and loving every second of it.

[mbd36]

Interesting topic! In the 80's, at the height of the arcade craze, there were a ton of weird/odd/unique games, so I'll limit a quick 5 to those I enjoyed at home. I have to give a shout out to these games for originality/innovation:

1) Tetris - It spawned a ton of rip-offs, and when it was original was released it was unlike any other game that came before it. Also, it was the first video game ever exported from the Soviet Union to the United States apparently.

Good call. It was based on puzzles that existed long before, but the implementation was original. Hard to believe that nobody thought to do any piece dropping puzzle games before Tetris, but it was the first.

[CharlieR]

As far as new games, I played a demo for a game last night on switch that was pretty different: Yoku's Island Express. It's a very imaginative game which is part platformer and part pinball. The way you traverse through levels is by hitting pinball flippers.

[Stalvern]

As far as new games, I played a demo for a game last night on switch that was pretty different: Yoku's Island Express. It's a very imaginative game which is part platformer and part pinball. The way you traverse through levels is by hitting pinball flippers.

Isn't that basically Sonic Spinball?

[rahimtx]

Super Mario Brothers- The game that put platformers on the map.

Legend of Zelda- I believe this was the first battery saved game.

Double Dragon- Grandfather of Beat 'em ups.

[CharlieR]

As far as new games, I played a demo for a game last night on switch that was pretty different: Yoku's Island Express. It's a very imaginative game which is part platformer and part pinball. The way you traverse through levels is by hitting pinball flippers.

Isn't that basically Sonic Spinball?

A little bit yes. I think it's more fleshed out and more like a platformer that has pinball flippers.