How Can The Game Industry Reinvent The Wheel?

[Kschreck]

The below opinions are the opinions of the author of this post and may not represent your own opinions.

Over the last few years many people have argued that game genres such as first person shooters are beginning to get bland are losing their appeal to the hardcore gaming market. Even high profile games like Crysis:

only collect the interest of a handful of hardcore gamers with others claiming that it's simply more of the same with prettier graphics. One could argue that Nintendo helped to reinvent gameplay controls with it's motion sensitive controller which allows for some advance features that even PC gamers don't get. By changing the controller and gameplay techniques the Wiimote has really gotten peoples attention. While the Wiimote works quite well with all genres it really doesn't do enough for hardcore marketed games such as FPS and other action type games.

The question is how can we breathe new life into first person shooters and other game genres that are losing their appeal. What do you the gamer want from these big multi million dollar companies? Do you want better graphics still? Better controls and gameplay mechanics (suggestions?) or how about a more immersive experience all around?

I can't speak for you guys. I can't tell you what you want but I sure can tell you what would get me heavily back into gaming. I am what I considered a "Lapsed Gamer" and by this I mean I only have a passing interest in games. My favorite game genres are FPS, Action, Adventure, Platform, RPG. I can play a round of UT2K4 with my brother for a couple hours and usually don't get bored. However usually I feel disconnected to games when I play them. Graphics to me are just important as gameplay. I personally usually only play a game for the storyline and to immerse myself into a creative world. I think the game genres I listed really help show this.

So when I look at a new game I always look at how the game is going to help better immerse me into it's world. Graphics are always a first step. Most of us can agree that games like Crysis looks quite good. Almost reaching a state of CG animation found in Pixar movies. Almost. However even with the advances in computer graphics I still find myself disconnected with the world I want to be apart of. Even with the fastest processors and the largest development teams games still don't really offer a truly immersive experience. To me Crysis doesn't really feel anymore immersive then the original Doom. Immersion to me means actually feeling like I am inside the game world and like I am the person trying to accomplish a set of goals.

Getting back on track, I can't tell you guys what you want your games to be like. You however can tell me. I have been playing games since the NES era and I have been keeping up with gaming, advances in technology and the industry on the whole for a very long time. So I am aware of what areas of gaming entertainment are lacking and needs worked on. But the question is how can you improve on the many game genres out there right now? How can you make things more interesting? Well I can share my opinions of what would do it for me.

I'm not going to get way into this as I have done so many times in the past but personall what I always wanted in gaming was Virtual Reality. Yes go ahead and laugh. The thoughts of the headache enducing Virtual Boy may feel your memory. It's uglyiness, bulkyness and low resolution 2 color graphics were definitely horrible. I never even own a Virtual Boy. Most of us gamers recall the era of cheap B+ scifi flicks with big bulky helmets that put you inside this virtual world. The entire concept fell apart at the seems in the 1990's but guess what? It's not the 1990's anymore...

Technology is forever changing, forever advancing to the point where later this year a company is going to be releasing a simply wireless headband that will allow you to play games like Unreal Tournament using nothing but your brain.

Look mom no hands.

VR technology while it has advanced slowly in the consumer space has made great strides behind close doors. An artistic look at what can be accomplished today would be this:

which shows a modern age VR system. You can watch the video of this here. So where does VR stand now? What has been accomplished and what still needs to be done? Well Visor displays are now capable of delivering an HD quality image inside that little visor and at a more consumer friendly cost. Visors are more sleek looking:

http://www.nextphasestrategy.com/iWear/photos.html

Thats what a current day visor looks like. Really it's not that bad. At least not like those huge 2 pound things shown 10 years back. The problem with visors of today are the fact that none of the affordable ones offer a full point of view. A full point of view visor will give you the complete illusion of actually being inside the game. That means that you don't see any black or anything besides the game itself. TDVision has a visor coming out that works with PC's and game consoles and delivers a 720p HD display. Internally it looks like you are looking at a 108 inch tv at 10 feet away. Theres plenty of room for improvement but still it's a good start. The visor will run for a little under $500. I have created some scenarios as to how VR would improve the games of today. You can check them out here:

http://theboard.zogdog.com/index.php?automodule=blog&blogid=4&showentry=2726

You can also check out my small VR site here:

http://www.freewebs.com/dailyimmersion/index.htm

When I play a first person shooter, race down a track in a fast card, run around with a sword and shield in a fantasy world I want to feel like I am actually doing what I am playing and the only technology that has come close to providing me this feeling is virtual reality. VR has always been at the forefront of jokes. Seems like no one will even give the concept a try. I actually seen people think that you have to run around your house to play VR. They don't grasp the understanding that VR is just a way to view the game. Of course you can use headtracking which would allow you to move your head to move your head in the game world. VR right now is fairly pricey but only because there are only a couple companies developing the tech. Sony or any of the other big companies could probably make a kick but VR system with full point of view for $200 if they wanted to.

It seems like game developers keep pushing graphics to make it feel more real but yet no one will try and actually create a system that really puts you inside these games. VR tech no longer gives you headaches or eye strains anymore and the technology no longer weighs 2 pounds. Most of them are just a little heavier then regular glasses. VR isn't perfect yet but the concept certainly does sound intriguing. It's only a shame that most people will never give VR a try and that 20 years from now we will still be playing the same games with the same controls and tv.

Virtual Reality also can help enable something called Augmented Reality which is a system that places game assets into the real world and have them fully interactive:

Thats a Half-Life 2 combine soldier placed into the real world. These images are not AR but give you an idea of what the technology can do. It is worth noting that the technology is still in early stages and more or less on the backburner of game design since not many systems use this stuff. However the Gizmondo handheld and PS3 both have some AR applications. I think VR has the potential to revolutionize all game genres. Even the simple ones but it also allows the user to feel like he or she truly is inside the game or movie that the developer has created and I think that the technology is close to being ready but that it will never take off because of peoples unwillingness to actually give it a try.

If you have any questions on anything above then feel free to ask. Most importantly, I am curious as to what you guys want in the form of gaming advancements?

 

[Qonfused]

Video games have reached the point that movies have. Most games are rehashes, or just plain bad. A great game will come out that's awesome every four months, but it's really just more of the same. VR is where games MUST go in order to survive.

 

[Asknoone]

VR is where games MUST go in order to survive.

I don't think so...there's alot of progress to be made and ideas to be explored yet. Sure, we've got rehashes, but just like movies so long as they stay fun it won't have to go anywhere. I'm sure that's an area that will be explored in the future, but we've still got a long road ahead of us. I mean, that's all Crysis is: more of the same, but it looks better. I still firmly believe that nobody has really looked at what Valve have done and taken it to the next level. Until a developer cottons on that an FPS is more than about shooting people, we'll continue to see the bland rehashes.
A developer of Crysis at GDC was talking about gameplay in his videos when really, all he was describing was combat. Combats a factor of gameplay, not gameplay itself. It's a huge flaw, and one many developers make the mistake of following. Bungie is the best example of this. Remember, there's alot of unique ideas out there waiting to be exploited; the problem is who's going to do it? Very, very few. Why? Because the majority of consumers flock to the tested and the proven concepts (Fifa, for instance - all EA actually is tweak the creases in the shirts and change a number on the end). Developers who pursue new ideas often end up without reward, and for a low level and starting developer this is not only costly, but potentially fatal.

 

[Ren.182]

VR is some way away yet. And even when it comes it'll be a while before it developers get settled in with it and the great games start comming. Though, when it does come it would be awesome if they mapped out a huge open area, and theres just loads of people running around with some goggles on running around a virtual map with 100's of other players. BF6?

In the near future... Larger scale would be good, for online play. More players on one server. Though hardware and bandwidth limitations are whats slowing devs down here. Can't really go any bigger, else it'd just lag.

Also, some gameplay please! And variation within a game. I loved HL2 because each chapter was different. More of that please.

 

[Asknoone]

Yeah, exactly, shake your game up abit. Nobody wants to trek through the same gameplay. It's why it's so easy to get bored of Halo. There's nothing different at all; you're just doing the same thing over, and over.

 

[Qonfused]

I don't think so...there's alot of progress to be made and ideas to be explored yet. Sure, we've got rehashes, but just like movies so long as they stay fun it won't have to go anywhere. I'm sure that's an area that will be explored in the future, but we've still got a long road ahead of us. I mean, that's all Crysis is: more of the same, but it looks better. I still firmly believe that nobody has really looked at what Valve have done and taken it to the next level. Until a developer cottons on that an FPS is more than about shooting people, we'll continue to see the bland rehashes.
A developer of Crysis at GDC was talking about gameplay in his videos when really, all he was describing was combat. Combats a factor of gameplay, not gameplay itself. It's a huge flaw, and one many developers make the mistake of following. Bungie is the best example of this. Remember, there's alot of unique ideas out there waiting to be exploited; the problem is who's going to do it? Very, very few. Why? Because the majority of consumers flock to the tested and the proven concepts (Fifa, for instance - all EA actually is tweak the creases in the shirts and change a number on the end). Developers who pursue new ideas often end up without reward, and for a low level and starting to developer this is not only costly, but potentially fatal.

I understand.

When I said VR is the way to go to survive, I meant in the long run. If you look at it, we're close to photo-realistic textures in this generation. Sure you can clearly tell when you view a character model, but some of the environments truly trick me some times. Some shots of a tactical shooter (forgot name) with some Marines outside of a small shed tricked me; I looked and looked, almost studying this screen shot looking for flaws. We are very close.

What then?

Currently the trend is better and better graphics with little innovations. When we reach photorealism, hopefully developers will begin to focus on game play. But honestly, most ideas have been used up (like in the movies). Sure, you can have a renegade cop on a shooting spree to save his family; oops. You could have a secret spy -- nevermind. Hmm. Of course there are new ideas on the current genres out there that would freshen up the air. Take Company of Heroes for example. If you look at the basics (WWII RTS) it sounds like all other games. But they pulled it off. I still don't know what is different than all the other WWII RTS games, but CoH is, by far, more fun than all.

But what then?

No new graphic updates, and most game play ideas gone.

At this point gaming will slow down considerably.

In the long run, video games will have to turn into something that will rock the gaming world; Virtual Reality would do that.

 

[Ren.182]

Once we reach the peak of graphics developers will have to get their artistic head on! They'd have to produce some beautiful breathtaking environments. Or simply use a different graphical style, like how cel-shading came into the scene a few years back with Jet Set Radio (Jet Grind Radio).

Also, once we reach photo-realism, the only way they could go with graphics is with scale. Higher res textures, better shadows, larger view distances and so on.

MMO's will also become bigger I reckon, but they'll need to have some changes. They are all pretty much the same, just set in different locations. They'll need something new soon, people will get bored of it eventually. I can't think of a single real life friend who plays WoW any more. They've all got bored of it.

 

[CyberPitz]

Mmmmm Jet Set Radio...
OH!

Personally, games can do so much better than what they are doing now. It's all because they want to make the most money with the cheapest costs. It's all about money, and as long as it's like that, the great games are going to remain few. Look at, my opinion, Natural-Selection. This started out as a mod taking donations, that's it. It's is one of the best games I've seen in terms of originality and polish. When it comes out for source, it will be a mod that I would buy, mainly because they have created a product that is, without a doubt, retail standards. Another example, another mod, Dystopia. Looking at the game, and how well it was created, for free mind you, goes to show what an amazing job people can do when money isn't what they are mainly striving for.

I think VR is the way to go, but not yet. We still have to get the few good games out some more.

 

[PvtRyan]

It's not the developers that are striving for money, you don't become a game designer to make money. It's publishers that push developers to release unpolished games. And you can't really blame them, seeing how much a modern game costs to make (tens of millions) and how many they must sell. And that's probably something that has to change, developing games needs to become cheaper.

 

[Iced_Eagle]

VR isn't mainstream yet. It's going to be babysteps until we get there.

Right now we're entering the stage with the Wii and the Novint Falcon. Two really cool technologies (if you don't know what the falcon is, google it! I messed around with it at GDC and it's amazing)

Also, there was VR tried before by Nintendo... Virtual Boy! Man that thing was pretty sweet.

Anyways, in the long term I agree we'll end up in VR... Short-term we'll have to find new gameplay innovations and continue to improve our current technology.