Behind the Curtain: Innovation
I'd like to talk about Innovation for a little bit.
There's an argument which runs along the lines of, "gamers don't get innovation because gamers don't want innovation." There's a certain logic there – if we, as consumers, are not willing to spend money buying games with innovative features or content, then why should developers and publishers spend money to make them?
Eating the same food again and again, refusing to change your diet would be monumentally unhealthy for you. Why then, do so many of us do almost exactly that when it comes to our gaming habits?
In my opinion, there's been plenty of innovation in gaming in past years. Half life 2 introduced a character I'm sure many of you grew attached to almost as much as I did; LamarrMiss Alyx Vance. For the first time ever, we had an NPC did more than just get in your way, die easily and spout the same catchphrase over and over. While Alyx really shines in Episode One, the introduction of her character in the original game stands out for me.
My point? Where is the innovation in MMOs just now? World of Warcraft, for all that it's a continent-striding behemoth, hasn't really innovated much of anything. What Blizzard did with WoW was to take the best features from any number of existing MMOs and polish them to a mirror shine. Innovators? No. Pioneers? No. Extremely talented, very clever and ridiculously successful because of it? Yes.
A little over a year ago, in his keynote speech at the Develop Conference, Richard Garriott said that, in his opinion, "MMO game design has not changed in over then years." He accused the genre of becoming stagnant. I agreed with him then, and I tend to agree with him still. Much was made of Tabula Rasa, when it was released, and how innovative it was supposed to be, which was something I didn't really agree with.
But is it a bad thing, to not innovate? Of course not – the example of WoW shows that innovation isn't required to make a great game, or to be successful. That's the problem. Making a great game is hard enough, without having to worry about pushing back the boundaries of your chosen genre as well. Look around the shops of your local game store, and you'll see shelves groaning under the weight of sequels. While none of those games are likely to be braving new frontiers in gaming history, that doesn't necessarily stop them from being really good games.
It's easy to get stuck in a rut playing MMOs. You invest so much time in one game, with a handful of avatars, that it can be hard to see past one particular style of play. Change can be scary and unsettling, and more often that not, we simply don't have the time to adjust. With the current hectic pace of life, those of us still lucky enough to hold a full-time job probably only have a handful of hours each week to relax in front of the computer. If you are in the kind of situation, it's easy to excuse sticking with the same game for a long period of time, avoiding new games or innovative mechanics not because you're not interested, but because you simply don't have the time to make the most of them.
So, innovation may be a good thing to see in games, but it's far from necessary for commercial or critical success. Plenty of gamers would welcome a truly innovative MMO, while equally as many couldn't be less interested in stepping away from whatever game it is they play. A good portion of those gamers willing to welcome innovative game simply lack the free time it would take to get their heads around them.
Lets have some opinions, shall we? How much importance do you give innovation? Are you even bothered if a game is innovating or not?
