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An example I used with computer networking students about "what business you're really in" is the failure of the great railroad companies (Santa Fe, Union Pacific, NY Central, etc.). The great railroad companies dominated late 19th century business; past the middle of the 20th, most were bankrupt. This happened because they thought they were in the railroad business, when they were actually in the *transportation* business.
When the transportation business changed (trucks and good roads, airplanes) and railroads became much less important, they lost out. My point to networkers is that they're in the communication business, not the networking business.
How does this apply to games? Some video game companies apparently think they're in the technology business, when they're actually in the entertainment business (even the ones making "serious" games will prosper if those games are also entertaining, as for example "America's Army").
I think this can be applied to the Sony vs. Nintendo console competition. Sony thinks technology, Nintendo thinks entertainment (also applies in handhelds, it appears). (And this should have been obvious to Sony, because the *really* good technology, PCs, doesn't make it as a major game platform compared with the whimpy consoles.)
As another example, many people called "Crysis" a technology demo, but a poor game. The management of the company decried piracy for a failure to sell the game in expected numbers, but the real reason might be that it wasn't much of a game.
To move down one level of complexity, some video game companies think they're in the story-telling business, or even more specifically in the movie-making business, when they're really in the video game business.
Video games are not like movies, and stories are not the most important component of most video games. (See http://www.costik.com/gamnstry.html) At one time in the video game industry, film-maker wannabes published "games" that were more cinematics and cut-scenes than games, and that turned out to be a failure.
So we see proposals to treat video games, and video game production, the same way films are treated. I think this is a mistake. Every industry finds its own way of doing things. Trying to pretend you're something else is very likely to end badly.
This is the difference between saying "we should do such-and-such because that's how the film industry does it", and "the film industry has a different way of doing such-and-such, and we can adapt it this way because it makes sense." If it makes good sense, do it. If it just happens to be how some model does it, forget it.
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Crysis was incredibly deep, had far more room for player self-expression in gameplay than most shooters on either PC or console, had some of the most impressive open-ended level design I've seen in shooters, had a subtle but effective mechanic in the multi-purpose nanosuit, and of course was an impressive visual achievement to boot.
I suspect people who dismiss it as merely a tech demo are either parroting other kneejerk reactions, making assumptions on its gameplay simply because it IS such a graphical showcase, or played the game but never bothered to invest themselves in its mechanics and design mentality.
It asks more of the player than a typical corridor shooter does, but the reward is an incredibly rich experience.
It's certainly not particularly accessible, either from a technical or gameplay standpoint, and it's fair enough if you want to criticize it for not being mass market enough, but simply dismissing it as a game without any actual supporting points seems pretty silly to me.
To first follow a design trend someone should know and understand why there's a trend on it, not blind-follow it. Games are made from details, having or not a nanosuit/open-ended system/whatever isn't the question, HOW every piece of the design is implemented and how smooth it works and flows in the gameplay is what makes a good game.
The first 3 or 4 levels of Crysis are not that bad, but the aliens are very dumb, the AI really feels cheating (choppers anyone?) and the mechanics are more about trying to be "realist" than to work well together. Bugs all over, things that start levitating, dead bodies becoming scarecrows and objetives that don't state to "complete" when you do the thing, making you restart all level again...
Even I think Crysis was not a good game, I personally enjoyed it. I am a seasoned player, creative and with game design and mechanics notions, so I can see what the game offers and give myself some joy, playing it a funny way, using the game to make my game. Ultimatelly people talk about it, but do players know how to enjoy a game?! Will we let our kind of business die as the railroads did?
As Lewis suggests, perhaps the solution to this is one that will be unique to the games industry (as the root of the issue seems to be from fitting a movie plot around a game structure). In non-linear titles, perhaps plot should be largely minimal. The only thing I can say for sure with this issue is that non-linear games with a linear story (meaning several plot points must be hit in a certain order, requiring all players to converge on the same points, regardless of their different playstyles/choices) tend to have their choices turned into shallow and arbitrary ones.
I didn't mean to go on that long. So yeah, great article, got me thinking. Thanks.
Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony know they are in the Enternainment Business. Sony even so much, that they forgot to tell their kids 'PS3 is a video game console, not just a BlueRay-Player, a Home-Entertainment-System, etc...)
Video games compete with the most valuable human ressource: their finite time.
You want their money and you need their attention. Video games compete with all recreational activities people can think of; from 'going to see a movie', to watching DVDs at home, or going to a concert, riding a bike, going to a restaurant, hiking, etc etc...all is competition.
I am sure many of the game makers know this very well.
(about Crysis) Why Crisis became such a Technology-Showcase? Rather ask Microsoft, Intel, NVidia etc... they all had their 'helping hand' in this. You don't get 'that' amount of help (beyond the usual) without somebody telling someone else something.
However, I am getting a lot frustrated with the fishing genre. They almost get it right, and then "Flop". It's like they only wanna go so far then stop. I don't get it, we got all these fancy games but they can can make a really decent fishing game that appeals to many people on many levels.
I always like to remind myself of the quote Clint said a programmer made during dev of Far Cry 2. "Dude, it's code... we can do anything." Exactly. Anything is fair game as developers are still experimenting, trying to find what works and what doesn't.
Games must be viewed as technology and entertainment at the same time. An art house film or a hardcore game will not make the same ammount of money as a movie or game that a person could understand if they are only ten years old, like Transformers or Pokemon(no offense).
Software and games get better as successive versions, not sequels are released. New versions or remakes of movies are almost always awful; Planet of the Apes, the Rocky Horror Picture Show, I kid you not.