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I know people often like going “off on one” in big long posts about innovation here, but the human experience aspect of it just struck me. If you think about it, the guys who we call the great innovators were brought up in a very different era, one without modern computer games and hence had to base their influences on real life events. Miyamoto’s has cited his childhood games running and exploring in the forests around his house as one of the main factors behind Mario but would that be different if he had been brought up in an era of 8/16/32 bit home, recreational computing?
Someone starting out designing games now is likely to be well versed in computer gaming. Does this mean he will be a more or less inclined to try out new things? People like Miyamoto or Suzuki were putting new things in their games as nothing had really gone before them. As the boundaries of their consoles were pushed further and further they simply filled up this new ground. It wasn’t really innovation in the terms of groundbreaking ideas (though I’ll admit both are exceptional character and level designers); it was working with what was available to you. Mario 64 is often cited as an “innovative” game – how? The answer will almost always be that it was the first genuine 3D game, but it also appeared on the first console that could manage to host a 3D world. If Joe Bloggs had been leading a project on a console that could create such a world in 1990 would he now be the Grandfather of Gaming as a series of technological factors fell into place to put him in that position? Sure, the levels may not be so slick and the character not quite so iconic, but they are issues of spit and polish, not breaking new ground. The guy who makes the first football game will break new ground by default, but he isn’t really a true innovator, that would be the people who developed the hardware to facilitate this “first” in software.
At the point we’re at now there the main limitation is imagination rather than technology (okay, so money and getting a publishing deal is in there somewhere too, but that’s a whole other discussion). Sure, games will get prettier and levels will get bigger etc but developers can pretty much create the real world and then tweak it to be in-line with whatever game they wish to design. So now people have to be ground breaking as individuals, rather than being the pioneers of new technology, will they? Will the fact they’ve got patterns laid out before them have an effect? Does it make a difference that Miyamoto had to base his ideas on real world situations as video games weren't the common pass time then? As Mr. New Developer has played Mario 64 will that influence him to copy or surmount?
Someone starting out designing games now is likely to be well versed in computer gaming. Does this mean he will be a more or less inclined to try out new things? People like Miyamoto or Suzuki were putting new things in their games as nothing had really gone before them. As the boundaries of their consoles were pushed further and further they simply filled up this new ground. It wasn’t really innovation in the terms of groundbreaking ideas (though I’ll admit both are exceptional character and level designers); it was working with what was available to you. Mario 64 is often cited as an “innovative” game – how? The answer will almost always be that it was the first genuine 3D game, but it also appeared on the first console that could manage to host a 3D world. If Joe Bloggs had been leading a project on a console that could create such a world in 1990 would he now be the Grandfather of Gaming as a series of technological factors fell into place to put him in that position? Sure, the levels may not be so slick and the character not quite so iconic, but they are issues of spit and polish, not breaking new ground. The guy who makes the first football game will break new ground by default, but he isn’t really a true innovator, that would be the people who developed the hardware to facilitate this “first” in software.
At the point we’re at now there the main limitation is imagination rather than technology (okay, so money and getting a publishing deal is in there somewhere too, but that’s a whole other discussion). Sure, games will get prettier and levels will get bigger etc but developers can pretty much create the real world and then tweak it to be in-line with whatever game they wish to design. So now people have to be ground breaking as individuals, rather than being the pioneers of new technology, will they? Will the fact they’ve got patterns laid out before them have an effect? Does it make a difference that Miyamoto had to base his ideas on real world situations as video games weren't the common pass time then? As Mr. New Developer has played Mario 64 will that influence him to copy or surmount?
NIce post, i found it funny that you managed to put joe bloggs name in there. Nice one.
I know people often like going “off on one” in big long posts about innovation here, but the human experience aspect of it just struck me. If you think about it, the guys who we call the great innovators were brought up in a very different era, one without modern computer games and hence had to base their influences on real life events. Miyamoto’s has cited his childhood games running and exploring in the forests around his house as one of the main factors behind Mario but would that be different if he had been brought up in an era of 8/16/32 bit home, recreational computing?
Someone starting out designing games now is likely to be well versed in computer gaming. Does this mean he will be a more or less inclined to try out new things? People like Miyamoto or Suzuki were putting new things in their games as nothing had really gone before them. As the boundaries of their consoles were pushed further and further they simply filled up this new ground. It wasn’t really innovation in the terms of groundbreaking ideas (though I’ll admit both are exceptional character and level designers); it was working with what was available to you. Mario 64 is often cited as an “innovative” game – how? The answer will almost always be that it was the first genuine 3D game, but it also appeared on the first console that could manage to host a 3D world. If Joe Bloggs had been leading a project on a console that could create such a world in 1990 would he now be the Grandfather of Gaming as a series of technological factors fell into place to put him in that position? Sure, the levels may not be so slick and the character not quite so iconic, but they are issues of spit and polish, not breaking new ground. The guy who makes the first football game will break new ground by default, but he isn’t really a true innovator, that would be the people who developed the hardware to facilitate this “first” in software.
At the point we’re at now there the main limitation is imagination rather than technology (okay, so money and getting a publishing deal is in there somewhere too, but that’s a whole other discussion). Sure, games will get prettier and levels will get bigger etc but developers can pretty much create the real world and then tweak it to be in-line with whatever game they wish to design. So now people have to be ground breaking as individuals, rather than being the pioneers of new technology, will they? Will the fact they’ve got patterns laid out before them have an effect? Does it make a difference that Miyamoto had to base his ideas on real world situations as video games weren't the common pass time then? As Mr. New Developer has played Mario 64 will that influence him to copy or surmount?
Someone starting out designing games now is likely to be well versed in computer gaming. Does this mean he will be a more or less inclined to try out new things? People like Miyamoto or Suzuki were putting new things in their games as nothing had really gone before them. As the boundaries of their consoles were pushed further and further they simply filled up this new ground. It wasn’t really innovation in the terms of groundbreaking ideas (though I’ll admit both are exceptional character and level designers); it was working with what was available to you. Mario 64 is often cited as an “innovative” game – how? The answer will almost always be that it was the first genuine 3D game, but it also appeared on the first console that could manage to host a 3D world. If Joe Bloggs had been leading a project on a console that could create such a world in 1990 would he now be the Grandfather of Gaming as a series of technological factors fell into place to put him in that position? Sure, the levels may not be so slick and the character not quite so iconic, but they are issues of spit and polish, not breaking new ground. The guy who makes the first football game will break new ground by default, but he isn’t really a true innovator, that would be the people who developed the hardware to facilitate this “first” in software.
At the point we’re at now there the main limitation is imagination rather than technology (okay, so money and getting a publishing deal is in there somewhere too, but that’s a whole other discussion). Sure, games will get prettier and levels will get bigger etc but developers can pretty much create the real world and then tweak it to be in-line with whatever game they wish to design. So now people have to be ground breaking as individuals, rather than being the pioneers of new technology, will they? Will the fact they’ve got patterns laid out before them have an effect? Does it make a difference that Miyamoto had to base his ideas on real world situations as video games weren't the common pass time then? As Mr. New Developer has played Mario 64 will that influence him to copy or surmount?