Is innovation dead or alive? - The Bear and Badger

mk64

It's something which has been discussed before but I'm feeling like there are very few games coming out which aren't essentially takes on something already out there. No one seems to be breaking the mould, not even Nintendo.

Is anyone out there really innovating? If so who? Or which games?

Minnesänger

Yes.

Moot_Geeza

Games like Viewfinder and Inscryption spring to mind, but mostly it's fair to say that we're just getting the same things repackaged now. Which is absolutely fine with me tbf.

Moot_Geeza

Minnesänger wrote:

Yes.

It was just a Virtua Fighter copycat with boobs tho.

b0r1s

Baldur's Gate 3
GT7 + PSVR2
Death Stranding
Slay The Princess
Hardspace Shipbreaker
Valheim
Strange Horticulture

All recent(ish) games that have done something different.

It's all good, like TV there is just a lot of content, and a lot of it will be chasing the trend, doesn't stop some developers innovating.

LivDiv

The GDC Awards do an Innovation category, these are the last couple of years noms, winner in bold...

24th Annual GDC Awards
Zelda Tears of the Kingdom
COCOON
Hi-Fi Rush
The Making of Karateka

Honourable Mentions
Dave the Diver
Spiderman 2
Starfield
Viewfinder

23rd Annual GDC Awards
Immortality
Elden Ring
Neon White
Pentiment
Stray

There is definitely some easily recognisable innovation there, some others I would say are taking a bunch of stuff and combining them well but perhaps could be what is under the hood that is counted as innovative.
Some food for thought though, that is at least what counts as the best in innovation to industry leaders.

Another avenue of innovation that isn't always talked about but has come along dramatically the past couple of gens is accessibility. That is everything from colourblind mode to specialised controllers.

Moot_Geeza

Gonna resist getting on my soapbox about TotK again. It's the most and least innovative game Nintendoo have released for years.

Forgot about Immortality, huge yep.

LivDiv

Karateka, Llamasoft and Atari 50 are interesting.
They have taken making of documentaries and rom dumps and combined them in a way to make something so much better than the two in a way thats unique to gaming/interactive media. I guess Rare Replay did it first in a way but these have refined the formula and Id love to see more, Nintendo/Sega/Capcom/Square versions could be amazing.

edit: Also a way Nintendo could flog Mario Allstars AGAIN!

b0r1s

I’d forgot about Cocoon, great little game.

Spider-Man 2 and Starfield both seem like outliers in that list.

Moot_Geeza

LivDiv wrote:

Karateka, Llamasoft and Atari 50 are interesting. They have taken making of documentaries and rom dumps and combined them in a way to make something so much better than the two in a way thats unique to gaming/interactive media. I guess Rare Replay did it first in a way but these have refined the formula and Id love to see more, Nintendo/Sega/Capcom/Square versions could be amazing. edit: Also a way Nintendo could flog Mario Allstars AGAIN!

NES Remix was a good effort with that sort of thing too. SNES Remix pls.

LivDiv

Yup loved NES remix and would take a SNES one.

davyK

Compared to the pioneering days No. But that's why they were pioneering days.

Atari had a policy at one point that stated you couldn't repeat the "type" of game that had just been released for example.

But it's still alive as far as I'm concerned. New genres - not so much - but the evolution of them - very much so. Look at how far 2D platforming has come. Wonder is a wonder.

2D versus fighting and FPS are almost unrecognisable from the likes of Karate Champ and Doom.

EvilRedEye

I think what’s changed is that boxed product was once the only game in town and covered everything from uber-mainstream to super-quirky. Today, the biggest budget games have to have universal appeal to justify their budgets in the same way big animated movies do. And what once would have been a quirky full-priced game or, if you were lucky, a budget release is now more likely to be digital-only indie game sold at a fraction of the cost of an AAA game. On open platforms like PC and Playdate, you also have hyper-indie stuff available on itch.io or the Playdate Catalog that might be very weird, or short, or rough in production values.

I don’t think innovation has gone away, you just have to look outside of officially licensed boxed games for consoles for it now.

davyK

There's some types of game I'd like to see more of - the "thrust-em-up" a la Thrust, Gravity Wars and Solar Jet Man.

Always liked the control scheme in Joust as well. Nintendo made Balloon Fight but apart from Flappy Bird there hasn't been much else of late.

Moot_Geeza

davyK wrote:

There's some types of game I'd like to see more of - the "thrust-em-up" a la Thrust, Gravity Wars and Solar Jet Man.

Out next month:

LivDiv

davyK wrote:

There's some types of game I'd like to see more of - the "thrust-em-up" a la Thrust, Gravity Wars and Solar Jet Man. Always liked the control scheme in Joust as well. Nintendo made Balloon Fight but apart from Flappy Bird there hasn't been much else of late.

I suspect with things like that there are likely 1000s on Steam and the like, they just don't break through, nor have the production values. Its a hard sell of a game, unless its free.

Something like Flappy Bird comes along once in a while and goes viral but those types of things are impossible to predict.

Some of those simple mechanics end up making it into larger games. Astro's Playroom has a thrust-em-up section for example.

davyK

Nice.

LivDiv

We need a John Peel of Indie games.
I nominate Moot.

b0r1s

Isn’t that Cinty? I tend to trust a lot of his recs.

davyK

Steam is a great place to a look around. Loads of cheap interesting little games.

My favourite indie on XBL is Snake Party - it has a splendid 4 player versus mode. But it never made it off that platform which is a bit of a shame.

The dev of that game has an interesting new game on Steam that has you playing multiple Wario Ware style micro games at the same time. Forget its name now.

edit: remember - it's Super Multitasking

Moot_Geeza

LivDiv wrote:

We need a John Peel of Indie games. I nominate Moot.

I'm the Neil Fox of Nindies.

LivDiv

That just reminded me of (although totally unrelated) this game that I saw yesterday. Its a unique spin on things.

Its a 3D and 2D platformer at the same time, the player holds a GameBoy like handheld in front of them and the player moves in 3D space and 2D on the GB screen at the same time. Seems like certain sections will require movement and challenges in one or other on the spaces.

LivDiv

Screenbound, better explained here...

Moot_Geeza

Nice. The Pixel Ripped VR games do something similar-ish. I only played the first one but in one of the stages you had to play a knock-off GameBoy in class without getting spotted by the teacher.

davyK

LivDiv

Oh god, that looks panic inducing lol.

Reminds me of an episode of GamesMaster I watched the other day where a youth had to play 3 games of Bubble Bobble at once across 3 Playstations like what them chess eggheads do.

He did well but didnt win the Golden Joystick.

davyK

I emailed the dev (YYR games) asking if Snake Party was going to Steam and he gifted me Multitasking on Steam which was rather nice of him. So I push it whenever I can. It works great with a 360 pad.

I write reviews for a couple of sites and I should really post one of this as it's a nice idea that has been well implemented.

davyK

Screenbound looks very nice indeed.

davyK

Moot_Geeza wrote:

There's some types of game I'd like to see more of - the "thrust-em-up" a la Thrust, Gravity Wars and Solar Jet Man.

Out next month:

Will check that out. I tried the Gravitar update on Steam but got a refund because the keyboard controls were not user definable which broke it for me.

I fancy one that really focusses on tight navigation over firing. I have asteroids for shooty gravity play which is still unsurpassed in my view. Lots of nice navigating action in this game though so I should like it.

Moot_Geeza

I spotted Sub-Terrania on your shelf the other day. Another good'un.

mk64

that's epic (Screenbound and the multi game thing)

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