[Frequent Pilgrim]

I basicly agree with everything being said in this thread. There are 3 probems with the game industry that need to be fixed before true progress can begin.

1. Instead of a messianic game, there needs to be a messianic game director. Not a developer, but a director. I'm relating to movies again, but work with me here because I'm going to avoid "narrative" comparisons. The industry needs a director who is fully responsible for a game. A director good enough for game titles like " SUDA51 presents: Killer 7". The game industry doesn't have many people worthy of becoming an industry leader in the same way that Alfred Hitchcock redefined the personality that could be put into a film by any one man. I could probably rattle off 20 directors right now without trying, but doing the same for game developers, I can't make it to 6. Miyamoto, Kojima, Suda51, David Jaffe, Sid Meyer, and I'm stumped now. So the question is, who has the ability to become the first game director who has a following based solely on his name alone (and not the name of his series, like Metal Gear) and has enough clout to be able to make whatever game he wants without interference from the publisher? Miyamoto is past his prime and Kojima doesn't seem interested in moving games beyond his high-water mark of MGS1. I might say Suda51 if most of his games weren't described as "intentionally un-fun". So we're waiting for someone new to come along who can basicly tell any publisher "I'm going to make whatever I want to make, and you can't touch it, and it's going to be a masterpiece, and my name on it alone will make it a million seller, so do whatever I say or Ill just find a new publisher."

2. A performance hall. No art-form can exist without a community. Musicians became good musicians because they went to a concert and heart a band that inspired them and they talked about that band with thier friends and eventually their conversations led to these friends making their own band. The same goes for people walking out of a theater talking about a movie. If it moved them enough and inspired them enough, those people will go out and buy a camcorder and start making movies. I can't exactly walk into my next door neighbors house as he's playing half-life in his underwear and say "hey man, what do you think about this narrative? How would you do it if you were making a game?" The big problem here is that, as we all know in America, arcades are dead. I'm not sure that the arcade in it's most recent incarnation would really be what we need anyway. They tend to express a more childish viewpoint of games than even the console market does, the most successful arcade game right now involves stomping on arrows while techno synth-pop plays loudly and red and blue lights flash in your face.

Honestly I don't know what I'm looking for here. I dont know how you could express games in a community setting that has a fundementally different outlook than a bunch of guys trying to get headshots at a LAN party. Maybe 3 hour multiplayer co-op sessions of games for a flat rate? The problem with that is currently all multi-player games have are focused on extreme competion, like counterstrike and streetfighter, or on creating new ways to interact with people, like World of Warcraft where the point of the game is meeting people before actually playing the game. The focus of multiplayer gaming it seems has never been to create an entirely new kind of experience or message, which is something I thing really needs to be done. I might make a thread about this later because I don't want to start up a whole new conversation when theres already so much to discuss in this thread. Can this tie into creating a community or performance hall environment? I don't know.

3. The final problem is the complexity of tools. I personally have a great interest in creating a game, but unlike a book where I can just start writing, for a game I need to use programs that I don't own or know how to get, nor do I have any information on how to use them anyway. Then to make anything I'm going to be spending months working before I see any sort of playable form of my game. At least with music, when you begin to play, you can immediatley see the progress you've made and can start to emulate professional work. Even then, because of the technology demand, my game is going to look pretty underwhelming in terms of both scope and graphics compared to any major release. Once again, I don't know how to fix this problem, I'm just recognizing that it exists.

So thats my feeling on what needs to happen before really creative artistic work can begin. This post ended up being a lot longer than I anticipated it being. I'm sure it's filled with gramatical errors that I don't have time to search for right now. Theres probably even more important things I could discuss given some more time to think about it.

edit: evnvnv pretty much said what I was trying to say about new multiplayer experiences except better.