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It may sound like a reasonable and likely excuse to explain why gaming just isn't the same anymore, but I somehow fail to believe this is why gaming has taken a turn for the worse since the `Golden Age` when the Super Nintendo and SEGA Mega Drive ruled the world...
What I don't understand is how there can be a lack of innovation in gaming today when the likes of Nintendo are around bringing us the all-new and `different` titles like Pikmin and Doshin the Giant, along with Metroid Prime when that arrives over-here sometime in the Spring. During the last 12 months we've seen enough on the GameCube alone to know that `innocation ISN'T dead` and that bright and new ideas can still be found and introduced to gamers.
`Genre-Mixing` is something Nintendo seem to be doing to keep their brightest new games at the top with the likes of Super Mario SunShine and StarFox Adventures. Pikmin may seem like you're average `real-time-strategy` with an extra bit of colour and fun to it, but take a closer look and you'll come to discover the `adventure` inside - something you won't find in the latest Red Alert expansion pack!
And then there's Metroid Prime - the game hailed as `The GameCube's GoldenEye` for what it's done to console sales in America, and it looks just like another `first-person-shooter` to compete with the likes of TimeSplitters 2 and Halo. But you couldn't really be more wrong in believing that! The `Metorid` series has always been full of `adventure` since the very-first game back on the NES. With the usual ball-rolling, puzzle-solving, and exploration envloved here, you can easily see how this is just an adventure game like any-other, played in a first-person perspective.
And as long as companies like Nintendo -- aswell as SEGA (of course) -- are still around injecting us with the likes of Shenmue and the rest, we will never see a dull day in gaming when there is nowhere for developers to go; no games we haven't played, and no way we haven't played them in.
How can innovation be dead!??
With that case put to bed, I think it's safe to say that there must be something else out-there that's making gaming the way it is today; full of so-many dissapointments and good ideas gone bad... And it can't JUST be EA with their rediculours amount of annual releases that barely-ever top the charts for all the right reasons....
Obviously, Nintendo and SEGA aren't creating the problem. And companies like Capcom, for example, are also helping this supposed problem by coming up with the likes of Killer 7, Dead Phoenix, and Viewtiful Joe alone that can hardly be called `un-original` or `just-like something we've seen before`...!
But what about some of those other big-name companies, like Microsoft and SONY for example? Are they really providing us with anything new... at-all??
As you will probably be aware, despite their success in other areas outside of the console gaming world, both companies (unlike Nintendo) very-rarely support their own system with games of their own, and instead decide to find other people to do all the work for them, while they work on making money through advertising and the like, with all adds-up to big console sales, and a huge income.
It's companies like these that I think are harming gaming in a way for a lack of any real input from themselves. OK, so maybe the PS2 does play host to games like the entire Grand Theft Auto series, aswell as all of the Final Fantasy games created to-date. And maybe Microsoft have `struck gold` with Bungie who are working on a follow-up to the acclaimed FPS Halo, and they've also managed to make a few deals with SEGA on some old Dreamcast games too, along with the whole Rare purchase...
But by working your way to the top using money, they can't expect to gain the kind of reputations Nintendo and SEGA once had for carrying gaming almost all-the-way. It doesn't matter how many PS2's SONY manage to sell across the globe, they will never have what Shigeru Miyamoto, Yuji Naka, and Yu Suzuki have had and always will do - a great influence on the gaming world that doesn't envolve money!
I'm sure the `Gaming Gods` (probably the creators of Space Invaders and Pong...?) are looking-down from above somewhere with no respect for the men at the top of both SONY and Microsoft (yep, it's `anti-Bill Gates-time` again!) who are ruining gaming in the long-run.
If you think gaming's a bad thing now, try to think what it could be like in only another 30 years when the likes of Nintendo and SEGA have moved-on toa better place where all the money-grabbers are not allowed, and the Super Mario Bros. theme tune plays day-after-day, even if you can't quite see where that tune appears to be coming from....
In the year 2033, things could be a lot worse, thanks to the future Microsoft's and SONY's of this world - perhaps even Apple and SHARP will have entered the console wars by then, and won -- many times!! But there truly could be a lack of innovation then with the Grand Theft Auto series has spawned over 20 games already at a time where Mario and Sonic have finally been beaten and only existing in the memories of those who know what gaming is all about, people who are not just going to be brought into something just because others like it, no matter how much money is spent trying to convince them otherwise.
There is no lack of innovation! At least not now, anyway...
As long as there are people who really care about gaming, there will always be new ideas. Let us pray to Gods above that gaming does not become over-powered by money - like Football!
Is anyone still foolish enough to believe that a lack of new ideas is the problem?
...Oh, well YOU would! :P
It may sound like a reasonable and likely excuse to explain why gaming just isn't the same anymore, but I somehow fail to believe this is why gaming has taken a turn for the worse since the `Golden Age` when the Super Nintendo and SEGA Mega Drive ruled the world...
What I don't understand is how there can be a lack of innovation in gaming today when the likes of Nintendo are around bringing us the all-new and `different` titles like Pikmin and Doshin the Giant, along with Metroid Prime when that arrives over-here sometime in the Spring. During the last 12 months we've seen enough on the GameCube alone to know that `innocation ISN'T dead` and that bright and new ideas can still be found and introduced to gamers.
`Genre-Mixing` is something Nintendo seem to be doing to keep their brightest new games at the top with the likes of Super Mario SunShine and StarFox Adventures. Pikmin may seem like you're average `real-time-strategy` with an extra bit of colour and fun to it, but take a closer look and you'll come to discover the `adventure` inside - something you won't find in the latest Red Alert expansion pack!
And then there's Metroid Prime - the game hailed as `The GameCube's GoldenEye` for what it's done to console sales in America, and it looks just like another `first-person-shooter` to compete with the likes of TimeSplitters 2 and Halo. But you couldn't really be more wrong in believing that! The `Metorid` series has always been full of `adventure` since the very-first game back on the NES. With the usual ball-rolling, puzzle-solving, and exploration envloved here, you can easily see how this is just an adventure game like any-other, played in a first-person perspective.
And as long as companies like Nintendo -- aswell as SEGA (of course) -- are still around injecting us with the likes of Shenmue and the rest, we will never see a dull day in gaming when there is nowhere for developers to go; no games we haven't played, and no way we haven't played them in.
How can innovation be dead!??
With that case put to bed, I think it's safe to say that there must be something else out-there that's making gaming the way it is today; full of so-many dissapointments and good ideas gone bad... And it can't JUST be EA with their rediculours amount of annual releases that barely-ever top the charts for all the right reasons....
Obviously, Nintendo and SEGA aren't creating the problem. And companies like Capcom, for example, are also helping this supposed problem by coming up with the likes of Killer 7, Dead Phoenix, and Viewtiful Joe alone that can hardly be called `un-original` or `just-like something we've seen before`...!
But what about some of those other big-name companies, like Microsoft and SONY for example? Are they really providing us with anything new... at-all??
As you will probably be aware, despite their success in other areas outside of the console gaming world, both companies (unlike Nintendo) very-rarely support their own system with games of their own, and instead decide to find other people to do all the work for them, while they work on making money through advertising and the like, with all adds-up to big console sales, and a huge income.
It's companies like these that I think are harming gaming in a way for a lack of any real input from themselves. OK, so maybe the PS2 does play host to games like the entire Grand Theft Auto series, aswell as all of the Final Fantasy games created to-date. And maybe Microsoft have `struck gold` with Bungie who are working on a follow-up to the acclaimed FPS Halo, and they've also managed to make a few deals with SEGA on some old Dreamcast games too, along with the whole Rare purchase...
But by working your way to the top using money, they can't expect to gain the kind of reputations Nintendo and SEGA once had for carrying gaming almost all-the-way. It doesn't matter how many PS2's SONY manage to sell across the globe, they will never have what Shigeru Miyamoto, Yuji Naka, and Yu Suzuki have had and always will do - a great influence on the gaming world that doesn't envolve money!
I'm sure the `Gaming Gods` (probably the creators of Space Invaders and Pong...?) are looking-down from above somewhere with no respect for the men at the top of both SONY and Microsoft (yep, it's `anti-Bill Gates-time` again!) who are ruining gaming in the long-run.
If you think gaming's a bad thing now, try to think what it could be like in only another 30 years when the likes of Nintendo and SEGA have moved-on toa better place where all the money-grabbers are not allowed, and the Super Mario Bros. theme tune plays day-after-day, even if you can't quite see where that tune appears to be coming from....
In the year 2033, things could be a lot worse, thanks to the future Microsoft's and SONY's of this world - perhaps even Apple and SHARP will have entered the console wars by then, and won -- many times!! But there truly could be a lack of innovation then with the Grand Theft Auto series has spawned over 20 games already at a time where Mario and Sonic have finally been beaten and only existing in the memories of those who know what gaming is all about, people who are not just going to be brought into something just because others like it, no matter how much money is spent trying to convince them otherwise.
There is no lack of innovation! At least not now, anyway...
As long as there are people who really care about gaming, there will always be new ideas. Let us pray to Gods above that gaming does not become over-powered by money - like Football!
Is anyone still foolish enough to believe that a lack of new ideas is the problem?
...Oh, well YOU would! :P