The Video Game Critic

What happened to original video games? I guess the video games of the present can be divided into three categories:

1) succesfull and good, but unoriginal blockbusters (e.a. C&C3, Halo 3, Nights 2)
2) re-releases and compilation of mainly 8- & 16-bit games
3) horribly movie licenses which are releases multiplatform (Shrek 3, Spiderman 3, Transformers, TNMT and so on...)

Anyone agree?

For the most part, yes, that is accuarate.

I often wonder if Nintendo could really help itself by putting all existing franchises in a ten year hiatus, but that is easy for me to say. At least they are attemting to branch out a litle bit with Brain Age, Wii Sports and such, but I am surprised at how few blue ocean games we have seen for Wii so far. I hope they drop a few bombs (but not bombs!) at E-3, and get Wii Music out soon. At the same time I am a hypocrite because I can't wait to buy Mario Galaxy and the DS Zelda.  But i have never bought a movie licesnsed game sinse Goldeneye, so hurrah for me.

Overall, in some ways the game market is fragmenting, but as long as companies keep making such big games in the $50 - $60 range, things won't change much. If these services like Live Arcade, and the PS one, and WiiWare amount to something, we could have a viable alternative there, so things could get real exciting. At least the internet is allowing people a direct pipeline from builders to gamers, so there is hope.

Otherwise, the market decides, and that durn market don't seem to ask fo' much, less it be familiar and ussually violent. Oh, and it always needs purtier graphics, cause we ain't subsidising super computers for nothin'.

How about all those great looking games that they like to show us teasers for a year or two ahead of its release?

Seriously, the overall production and consumer waiting time for some of these games are getting to be so unbelievably cumbersome. It's terrible.

I think Wii Music (man oh man am I looking forward to that one) and Wii Health are going to do the Blue Ocean thing pretty well.

I think you'll see a good chunk of these titles on Wii, but companies will nonetheless be cautious: you are talking about totally new ideas here, and they must be carefully cultivated. Nintendo's campaign for BrainAge DS was well planned and executed (it was mainly a viral campaign: They gave away large quantities of the game in order to get word of mouth and press coverage) and you can expect more of the same. The less conventional the game, the more calculating one must be.

-Rob

You have to understand, in the early days of videogames, Gaming was NEW and companies were more willing to try NEW ideas. Also, games were often one-person programs and the people were allowed to create very weird and unique games. And of course, as with the invention of literature, there were so many things that had not been tried yet! I myself saw the first 3-D games, the first driving, fighting and shooting games. That is why I call it the best period, to never be repeated. It was EXCITING!

Now there just aren't that many new ideas. Almost everything is going to be a LITTLE like something. I think POLARIUM on DS is kinda unique, but it is a puzzle game with squares, obviously inspired by TETRIS.

And of course if you want to see new ideas, you will find more in PC shareware/freeware games than on mega-million dollar console games. Producers are more cautious. Perhaps, Like DOOM, some new idea will appear on PC or Xboxlive and start something.....

For now the most unique games are in Handheld land. Especially with GBA, I see a lot of strange stuff, because it's so much cheaper to produce. PS2 titles may be a source for this soon.

But as I said, the days of dozens of new ideas are gone....
my next car will be a Delorean. Complete with time machine.

Originality is one reason I like to stick with the older games.