In a world driven by the Internet, global economics and the short attention spanned reader we’ve been bombarded with social networks and 140-character micro-blogging. We’re constantly finding ways to promote ourselves, promote our brands or tell people what we’re eating for dinner. Is this obsession with ourselves and our creativity bridging into video games?
It’s games 2.0 people!. A time when we’re inventing our own video game stages, characters and full blown casual games! Not only are people getting a chance to design their own games with Microsoft’s XNA, Adobe Flash or from small independent casual games, but we can design our own stages in games like LittleBigPlanet.
Microsoft wants to remind us that Boku is much like LittleBigPlanet in its user generated video game content. Seen in this video below:
It’s obvious their going down the same path as Sony has gone with creating your own stages with LittleBigPlanet and creating a new way of gaming: playing other people’s stuff. You can find some similarities with Guitar Hero: World Tour‘s ability to create your own songs and publish them for others to play.
Are we heading down a generation of games where some of the best stages are created by fellow dedicated gamers? Or, is this just a distraction and means for developers to have gamers invigorate and create more of a demand for the games they are making the money on?
(Thanks, Destructoid)
The game industry, like other entertainment avenues, is a risky business in which publishers have to pick titles they “predict” will do well in the market while passing on other “risky” propositions. While a the good ol’ shooter title will break sales records, the market cannot rely on one genre to carry the business especially considering many of these titles are forgotten within two months from launch. Publishers are going to be forced in expanding their reach to “family games” in order to finance new blockbuster titles.
The idea of designing a “family” game isn’t new to our industry, as a matter of fact, it’s one of the oldest cornerstones of video game entertainment. Pong, Centipede, Pac-Man, Space Invaders and many other classic titles were no doubt playable by the entire family, but things have changed. We’ve evolved from hit titles like Donkey Kong to hit titles like Halo. We migrated from 2D gaming to full 3D adventures and pixel graphics to pixel shaders, but where do we go next?
Imagine that, a well known game developer finally says what everyone has been thinking, “it’s the walking dead.” Will Wright, famous for TheSims, SimCity and upcoming Spore believes E3 is in a state now where we’ll never see the old E3 and we’ll never accept the slimmed down anorexic thing we’re getting now.
It seems Spore was the staging point for the SecuROM revolt and the massive amazon 1-star reviews and backlash have not gone on deaf ears. Electronic Arts has opted to leave SecuROM out of The Sims 3, an upcoming release for just that reason.
LBP is a great game for creating other games! Not sure of M$ Boku endeavors (will it see the light of day?) The PSN is very cohesive with user generated content (like mods / mutators for UTIII, custom music authoring on GH:WT) none of which are supported by the M$ Live service. I would doublt if M$ Live ever will. M$ Live is 6 years old now but the PSN is only 2 and has already exceeded M$ Live’s user base along with functionality at a FREE price. Truly Game 2.0 is on course at least in the Sony Home-landscape.
LBP is a great game for creating other games! Not sure of M$ Boku endeavors (will it see the light of day?) The PSN is very cohesive with user generated content (like mods / mutators for UTIII, custom music authoring on GH:WT) none of which are supported by the M$ Live service. I would doublt if M$ Live ever will. M$ Live is 6 years old now but the PSN is only 2 and has already exceeded M$ Live’s user base along with functionality at a FREE price. Truly Game 2.0 is on course at least in the Sony Home-landscape.