Monday, March 06, 2006
Where Is Indie Innovation?
So Jeff Vogel, an indie game author and writer I admire and respect, says that indies will not be the source of innovation. "But truly innovative games? The sort you're only going to see a few more times in your lifetime? Those will come from Electronic Arts. Please feel free to kill yourself now."
I don't know why his "view from the bottom" column is quite so pessimistic. Maybe he's really trying to overcompensate for the almost frightening levels of enthusiasm and optimism from newbie / wannabie game developers that see indie gaming as a quick and easy "rags to riches" scheme. But his article looks to be geared more for the game players rather than game developers. Are game players really thinking indie games are some kind of new golden age? I think the trouble is more along the lines of them realizing they EXIST.
While I don't disagree on many of his points, I disagree with his tone. But he's been at the indie game development thing for longer than me. He started doing the indie game thing about the same time I started working on big-budget (for the time) retail games for consoles. My points of contention are more about semantics than anything else.
Indie Innovation is Alive and Well
First of all, here's more indie innovation than you can shake a stick at it. Yeah, a lot of it SUCKS. Creativity ain't always pretty. In fact, it's usually not. But there are some wild, hairy ideas in there that could find their way into an actual commercial release - indie or retail. So there. Neener.
There are many other innovative indie games out there that are just BIZARRE and refreshingly new. But you've never heard of them. I stumble across them from time to time, and become utterly amazed that I never heard of them and they have, in some cases, been out for years. They just languish in obscurity. For reasons I'll adress in a minute.
How Much Innovation Is Needed To Make a Game Innovative?
Second point of contention: The definition of innovation. I've heard it said that there are only three human stories, and that all stories are simply variations and combinations on those same three stories. Does that mean we should quit writing novels and short stories now, because it's all been done before? Is there no innovation left in fiction? Those are two very separate questions. The first answer is a vehement "no." The second --- I don't know. It really depends upon your definition of "innovation." There have been a lot of gimmicky things that have been tried - like telling stories in the second person, or telling a story backwards (as in the movie "Memento"). Is that the innovation the audience really craves?
Vogel complains that the innovation in the gametunnel.com indie innovation awards, stating that they are just "incremental innovation" and as such don't count, since that's the same kind of innovation you see in big-budget retail games. Apparently it HAS to be a blow-you-out-of-the-chair absolutely-never-seen-this-before type of game to count. The games he mentioned as being innovative from the mainstream are all things I *could* argue the same way against: The Sims was simply a variation on Little Computer People, Dogz, Catz, Tamagochis, and a couple of papers I read on "virtual theater" games back in 1995! Not to mention the "Sim" games Wil Wright himself had been doing for ages - you could trace the evolution in his own interviews on the game in the late '90s. Deer Hunter was simply a low-budget first-person shooter with a "hunting" theme (targets are rare and don't shoot back). Black & White was Populous combined with Dogz / Catz / Tamagochi.
I'm not really saying that these games don't deserve being labeled as innovative - they really are. But I do argue that Vogel sounds like he's applying a double-standard to indie versus commercial games. I mean, is Black & White THAT much more different from previous "god games" (and "pet games") than Facade is from text-adventure games? I really don't think so. The article sounds like a deliberate attack against indie games, and I really don't understand why.
He's Right, Though - Innovation Is Overrated
Now - on to what I agree with. Jeff is right on the money on many points, in spite of his overly sour tone. Truly radical gameplay ideas are extremely difficult to market. The whole "if you build it, they will come" thing works for cheesy baseball fantasy movies, but not in real life. The market, in spite of pleading for innovation, doesn't seek out innovative titles. Not usually. Nope, it goes for safe-and-familiar territory again and again. There's a reason those formula "summer movies" keep getting made and sell so many tickets over and over again. In fact, I think it goes further than that... the market actively avoids anything really new and different (read: "weird" and "scary").
What is interesting to point out is that two of the three games suggested by Jeff Vogel as being the most innovative games of the last few years were NOT enjoyed by gamers hungry for innovation. For the most part, the existing market hated Deer Hunter and The Sims. This is pretty telling. The success of these two titles was largely due to bringing in a brand new audience that had not been catered to by the videogames industry. And Black and White were initial critical successes, but ultimately proved dissapointing to gamers and critics alike as the promised innovations turned out to be not-so-much-fun gameplay. Sure, having your monster poop on villagers sounds like a fun game at first, but the shine goes off of that particular gimmick pretty fast.
The market demands "incremental innovation." While many critics call for absolutely revolutionary innovation, what most players choose is "Familiar but different."
A Window Of Innovation Tolerance
I have three "Dance Dance Revolution" games. Well, they are my wife's, but I bought them for her, and I play nearly as much as she does. The difference between the three? In all honesty, not much but the songs. There's some funky "challenge modes" and so forth in the different editions, but we don't play them unless we are forced to in order to unlock new songs. The differences in the selection of songs is enough to support us owning three different editions of what really amounts to the same game.
Would that be enough for us to own six different editions? Well, maybe, if they packed them with a bunch of songs (or remakes) that we already know and enjoy. If they are all nothing but Japanese pop music that we've never heard, then we'd be less inclined to bother. I mean, that stuff can be catchy, but we've got plenty of it on the three discs we already own. Would that be enough for TWELVE editions of DDR gracing our library? Probably not.
I think there's a window between two thresholds for people. On the one hand, there's a limited amount of similarity they'll tolerate between games. Too much, and they end up becoming "more of the same," and that gets boring. But beyond that, you are pushing the boundaries of their comfort zone. While there's not a hard-and-fast threshold of how "weird" and "different" a game they will tolerate, the further you go from their level of familiarity, the more you have to incentivise them to actually give it a try, and to stick with it until it becomes familiar.
And maybe that was what Jeff was trying to say. That incentivising takes MONEY - marketing money, promising the player, "Wow, this will TOTALLY be worth it to you if you give this a chance!"
Giving the People What They Want
In the end, it comes down to giving people what they want. And the market votes with their wallets. As a game PLAYER, think about your last ten game purchases. How did you make your purchase decisions? How many of the games you purchased were:
* Not a sequel of another game you enjoyed, AND
* Not based on a familiar license (Harry Potter, Star Wars, etc), AND
* Not very SIMILAR to other games you've played before (RTS, RPGs, FPS, Puzzle Game, etc)?
For myself, I can answer only one in the last eighteen months or so: Orbz (an indie game). Two if you include Guitar Hero, which has solid roots in conventional rhythm games but added enough of a solid twist to the mechanics and presentation that I'd be happy to call it "innovative." Though part of that might be because I haven't played some of the other guitar-type games that I understand are available in Japan. The other games I bought? Let's see. Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines (an RPG in a familiar license), Battlefield 2 (a sequel, and a team-based FPS game), D&D Online (A massively multiplayer RPG in a familiar license), Gran Turismo 4 (sequel), Age of Empires III (sequel, RTS category), DDR games (sequels, popular category), Ricochete: Lost Worlds (an AQUANOID-clone), Robotech: Battlecry (license - hey, it was cheap!), etc., etc.
But even though I bought my share of sequels, licensed games, and familiar genres, I still join the cry of wanting more innovation. But the truth is, while I want something different, I still don't want anything TOO different. Probably. I'm ready to be surprised. But when I play a new game, I really want something that is both familiar enough and new enough to make me feel like I did when I first discovered similar games in the past - to get that same thrill, to repeat the experience I first had years ago.
I am going to assume I'm not that atypical.
Labels: Indie Evangelism
- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 8:34 AM (Permalink)
Comments:
Links to this post:
<< Home
No, you are not atypical, not by a long-shot.
When we made Orbz, we attacked it as a labor of love. We thought it would be a cool idea, and just ran with it. We didn't really think much about finding an audience for the game, though we did deliberately try to make it a simple game to get to know.
If we had more people out there making games in that manner I think we'd be the better for it. However, the downside to attacking things in this way is that if you're expectations are to make good money, don't feel bad if it doesn't happen. Convincing people to buy ANY game is hard, and much harder when it is an out-of-the-ordinary game.
Personally, I'm just now researching for a game that harkens back to 80's, with the intent of making something that looks as good as present-day games, but plays simpler than the everything-including-the-kitchen-sink games that (for instance) Civilization and SimCity and Morrowind have become. I don't have time for these games, but I still want deeper gameplay than found in Bejewelled.
When we made Orbz, we attacked it as a labor of love. We thought it would be a cool idea, and just ran with it. We didn't really think much about finding an audience for the game, though we did deliberately try to make it a simple game to get to know.
If we had more people out there making games in that manner I think we'd be the better for it. However, the downside to attacking things in this way is that if you're expectations are to make good money, don't feel bad if it doesn't happen. Convincing people to buy ANY game is hard, and much harder when it is an out-of-the-ordinary game.
Personally, I'm just now researching for a game that harkens back to 80's, with the intent of making something that looks as good as present-day games, but plays simpler than the everything-including-the-kitchen-sink games that (for instance) Civilization and SimCity and Morrowind have become. I don't have time for these games, but I still want deeper gameplay than found in Bejewelled.
Orbz is my poster-child for what an indie game could / should be. It's unique (as far as I know), technically solid, pretty without being cumbersome, and just plain FUN. I hope it did well by you guys.
Where did the term "kitchen sink design" originate, anyway? I use it now, but I doubt I coined it. I know I was GUILTY of it back in the day... I was one of those crappy designers who thought more always equalled better.
I look forward to seeing where you go with your research & eventual development, Dave!
Where did the term "kitchen sink design" originate, anyway? I use it now, but I doubt I coined it. I know I was GUILTY of it back in the day... I was one of those crappy designers who thought more always equalled better.
I look forward to seeing where you go with your research & eventual development, Dave!
I agree with Dave, you're definitely not atypical. My game purchases for the last 18 months have primarily been sequels. Manhunt is the only purchase that doesn't fall into that category but it's far from what I would deem innovative (or fun...).
It's my belief that the problem with the whole 'innovative games' catch phrase is, as you've pointed out, that the word innovative often means very different things to different people yet we all assume everyone knows the context in which it's being used.
I'd say you've summed up the pitfalls of innovative game design quite well. Too much and you start to get into niche markets, too little and the game is compared with every other game in its genre.
As indies, we may be walking a finer line than we've fully realized.
It's my belief that the problem with the whole 'innovative games' catch phrase is, as you've pointed out, that the word innovative often means very different things to different people yet we all assume everyone knows the context in which it's being used.
I'd say you've summed up the pitfalls of innovative game design quite well. Too much and you start to get into niche markets, too little and the game is compared with every other game in its genre.
As indies, we may be walking a finer line than we've fully realized.
Brent Fox says: If your game is truly groundbreaking, the first thing a traditional publisher will say is "That's a game?"
Of course, they'll probably say that if your game sucks, too. :)
Anonymous says: If Sony doesn't reject your concept, you haven't innovated at all.
Howard Aiken says: Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you'll have to cram it down their throats.
Of course, they'll probably say that if your game sucks, too. :)
Anonymous says: If Sony doesn't reject your concept, you haven't innovated at all.
Howard Aiken says: Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you'll have to cram it down their throats.
That article is completely ass-backwards whne it says that corporations innovate because they aren't on the brink of starving. Think about it - a person can go get another job, or just turn on a dime, ont having that big corporate inertia. A corporation on the other hand will actually DIE if it doesn't make enough money. As an entity, the corporation is fighting for its life in an enormously dangerous environment. Who's more likely to take risks? Besides, an individual might have more motives than maximizing profit. A corporation will have very little if anything else.
You hardly see any innovation from the big companies. Not from typical indies either... it comes from freeware authors! Kids who are just making games in their spare time while they go to school. See, an indie, like a corporation, does rely on the game to make him money. A kid making freeware for fun is just having fun. Jeff is right - not fearing starvation is the key. The thing he's wrong about is whether corporations have to fear it, and they do far more than any individual.
Not that freeware from kids is generally GOOD. But its extremely innovative. Just like LD48 - you're not gonna make money, so you try something new. Those games also are highly innovative. You'd be wasting your weekend if you just churned out a clone.
You hardly see any innovation from the big companies. Not from typical indies either... it comes from freeware authors! Kids who are just making games in their spare time while they go to school. See, an indie, like a corporation, does rely on the game to make him money. A kid making freeware for fun is just having fun. Jeff is right - not fearing starvation is the key. The thing he's wrong about is whether corporations have to fear it, and they do far more than any individual.
Not that freeware from kids is generally GOOD. But its extremely innovative. Just like LD48 - you're not gonna make money, so you try something new. Those games also are highly innovative. You'd be wasting your weekend if you just churned out a clone.
I'm beginning to believe that creating a truly new game experience is vitally important for small developers. As the larger studios spend more money pushing existing genres, we'll fall further behind in our ability to compete against them directly. I'd like to propose the following (tongue-in-cheek) list of things I've noticed about good, innovative titles:
1. They're based on a ridiculous or boring concept. Innovative titles are often sound dry on paper (especially to those who are hardcore gamers):
- You roll a ball around a house and pick up objects left lying around. Almost like vacuuming!
- You sit at a terminal and key in passwords to break into other computers. Like sysadmin work, only you don't get paid!
- You manage the lives of a suburban family, making sure they sleep, eat, and poop at the right times. Almost like... well... what you do every day anyway.
(Yet I enjoyed Katamari, Uplink, and The Sims.)
2. They're lovingly reared. Take Katamari Damacy, where half the fun is...in the King of All Cosmos's purple tights. If it were simply a game where you rolled a ball around, collecting everything from thumbtacks to small children to Mount Fuji, it'd still be enjoyable. But the music, the lights, and the animation bring this up to a point where it's been called happiness in a box.
3. Imitators copy by-feature and get it wrong. We have Cargo Cult Game Development going on here. Developers sometimes mimic individual elements of an innovative game (in order to bring about good gameplay) the same way that cargo cults made radios out of coconuts (to bring about American planes laiden with consumer goods). Take, for example, the way that Playboy: The Mansion (link goes to IGN, but is possibly not safe for work) mimicks Simlish by repeating the nonsense phrase, "vajawaja" over and over.
This all is not really meant to be a litmus. Like art, I "know an innovative title when I see it"! I certainly think people have expected independents to create more games that delight for their newness. But most indie games I've played are firmly part of an existing genre with -- if we're lucky -- one or two minor new elements.
Will it really cost us that much more to make our next game be about listening to dasies complain about their hatred of roses, rather than one where I swap pairs of tiles around to match their colors? I don't think so; but I have this sneaking suspicion that we'll eat better next month if we do. And I'm trying to put my money where my mouth is. Our next first-person shooter will include bits about planting seeds on hostile planets and making sure they grow up; and our next prototype for PDA title has focused on an optimizing algorithm for...creating the perfect pot of green tea. I haven't thought of anything more seemingly boring than making tea. (Perhaps a drying paint simulator?)
Of course, I may be wrong about this direction. If, by next year, I'm lying in a gutter with a sign that reads, "will code for food," please take heart and drop a quarter into the cup.
1. They're based on a ridiculous or boring concept. Innovative titles are often sound dry on paper (especially to those who are hardcore gamers):
- You roll a ball around a house and pick up objects left lying around. Almost like vacuuming!
- You sit at a terminal and key in passwords to break into other computers. Like sysadmin work, only you don't get paid!
- You manage the lives of a suburban family, making sure they sleep, eat, and poop at the right times. Almost like... well... what you do every day anyway.
(Yet I enjoyed Katamari, Uplink, and The Sims.)
2. They're lovingly reared. Take Katamari Damacy, where half the fun is...in the King of All Cosmos's purple tights. If it were simply a game where you rolled a ball around, collecting everything from thumbtacks to small children to Mount Fuji, it'd still be enjoyable. But the music, the lights, and the animation bring this up to a point where it's been called happiness in a box.
3. Imitators copy by-feature and get it wrong. We have Cargo Cult Game Development going on here. Developers sometimes mimic individual elements of an innovative game (in order to bring about good gameplay) the same way that cargo cults made radios out of coconuts (to bring about American planes laiden with consumer goods). Take, for example, the way that Playboy: The Mansion (link goes to IGN, but is possibly not safe for work) mimicks Simlish by repeating the nonsense phrase, "vajawaja" over and over.
This all is not really meant to be a litmus. Like art, I "know an innovative title when I see it"! I certainly think people have expected independents to create more games that delight for their newness. But most indie games I've played are firmly part of an existing genre with -- if we're lucky -- one or two minor new elements.
Will it really cost us that much more to make our next game be about listening to dasies complain about their hatred of roses, rather than one where I swap pairs of tiles around to match their colors? I don't think so; but I have this sneaking suspicion that we'll eat better next month if we do. And I'm trying to put my money where my mouth is. Our next first-person shooter will include bits about planting seeds on hostile planets and making sure they grow up; and our next prototype for PDA title has focused on an optimizing algorithm for...creating the perfect pot of green tea. I haven't thought of anything more seemingly boring than making tea. (Perhaps a drying paint simulator?)
Of course, I may be wrong about this direction. If, by next year, I'm lying in a gutter with a sign that reads, "will code for food," please take heart and drop a quarter into the cup.
"Daisies." It's "daisies." You'd think that being a programmer would make me more meticulous, but, alas, no.
"Cargo Cult Game Design." I love it! Where'd you pick that one up?
And we have, "Kitchen Sink Game Design." Dang, someone needs to compile these terms into some kind of lexicon. Though I guess we need more than two terms. :)
So often it is too easy for us to slide into the easy rut of sticking our own game designs into a category and borrowing all or most of the conventions of that category. It's like doing a paint-by-numbers picture, but we're feeling all creative because we're changing the colors. But it's the same dang picture.
I often use the examples of The Sims and Pac-Man (though I should add Katamari) of how really good games can be based on ideas that sound REALLY stupid. I guess we need more DUMB IDEAS in order to innovate. If I hear one more "game idea" from a new, wannabe game developer that starts with the idea that you are playing a soldier in the future, I'm probably gonna rip my own ears off.
Oh, wait. I'm working on a game now where you play a soldier in the future. OW! OW!
I am officially a Part of the Problem, I guess.
And we have, "Kitchen Sink Game Design." Dang, someone needs to compile these terms into some kind of lexicon. Though I guess we need more than two terms. :)
So often it is too easy for us to slide into the easy rut of sticking our own game designs into a category and borrowing all or most of the conventions of that category. It's like doing a paint-by-numbers picture, but we're feeling all creative because we're changing the colors. But it's the same dang picture.
I often use the examples of The Sims and Pac-Man (though I should add Katamari) of how really good games can be based on ideas that sound REALLY stupid. I guess we need more DUMB IDEAS in order to innovate. If I hear one more "game idea" from a new, wannabe game developer that starts with the idea that you are playing a soldier in the future, I'm probably gonna rip my own ears off.
Oh, wait. I'm working on a game now where you play a soldier in the future. OW! OW!
I am officially a Part of the Problem, I guess.
I am trying to compile a list of 1,000 game ideas. If I have 20 ideas, maybe I'll have one good idea, but it isn't likely. With 1,000 ideas, I have a better chance of getting a winner.
A lot of the hundreds I have are dumb. If we need more of them, I think I'm covered. B-)
A lot of the hundreds I have are dumb. If we need more of them, I think I'm covered. B-)
Jay- Thanks for posting this. I'm a little late to the party because I have been thinking about how to reply to Vogels's article in my blog. My repsonse was shaping up to be much less political than yours, i.e. something like jjust because Jeff can't do it, the rest of the Indie community can't either. Now that you have posted such a thoughtful response, I don't have to think about it any more.
-Jeff Tunnell, Make It Big In Games.
BTW, somehow I had missed getting your blog in my blogroll. Should be fixed now.
-Jeff Tunnell, Make It Big In Games.
BTW, somehow I had missed getting your blog in my blogroll. Should be fixed now.
Glad you liked it, Jeff, and thanks for the compliment.
I have read both of Jeff Vogel's articles in this column, but I think this one has created the most controversy. It seems he's really taking a negative attitude about indie game development, which seems odd because he is one of the more successful indie developers who hasn't gone the "casual" route. And while I agree it's REALLY hard (and expensive) to market anything truly innovative and different, he's dead wrong saying indies don't innovate. Yeah, if you only look on RealArcade and BigFish for the indie games, you are going to form an opinion that indie games are all alike.
But Jeff Vogel should know as well as anyone that there's way more than that in the indie world.
Post a Comment
I have read both of Jeff Vogel's articles in this column, but I think this one has created the most controversy. It seems he's really taking a negative attitude about indie game development, which seems odd because he is one of the more successful indie developers who hasn't gone the "casual" route. And while I agree it's REALLY hard (and expensive) to market anything truly innovative and different, he's dead wrong saying indies don't innovate. Yeah, if you only look on RealArcade and BigFish for the indie games, you are going to form an opinion that indie games are all alike.
But Jeff Vogel should know as well as anyone that there's way more than that in the indie world.
Links to this post:
<< Home
