Will rising development costs hinder innovation?
There's an interesting piece over at CVG worth bringing on the PS3 Fanboy front. An analyst actually stopped making console guesstimations and thought about the developers end of the equation for a bit. The man, Ed Barton from Screen Digest, called the "risk reduction strategy" of focusing on franchise sequels and multi-platform titles will choke the innovation out of the gaming industry.
But it's not just developers to blame -- consumers widely ignore the innovative titles that are specific to one platform (see Ico) but will eat up a franchise title with minor improvements over the last iteration (see Devil May Cry, EA Sports games, etc).
In a contrasting view, those games that are now franchises did indeed start out innovative -- there was nothing like DMC before it, but now it's a cash cow. Sort of. It's breaking into the franchise market by creating an innovative title that's key, right? That's my aside, but let's continue on Ed Barton's rant.
Barton talks about the PS3 briefly, calling it the one system that will take the longest to exploit the potential of because of the multi-platform attitude of developers. Since each system this generation is so different, he says, the one that stands apart (my words) will take the longest mature. Good stuff. What do you guys think? Will original titles fade out completely, or is making an original title the only way to break into making successful sequels and a franchise out of what was once innovative?
