Original idea? More like aboriginal hernia <-- oi! no more of this shit

[Erkki]

Damn it. Just as I thought I finally had a somewhat original idea for a simple game that is relatively easy to program, it turns out it has been done in at least three games already.

The idea was radial breakout. Your paddle would be moving around in a circle or ellipse and the blocks would be in the middle.

Any games I've tried to make before have always been too complex to actually be completed and for a while I've been trying to think of a small game that would be easy to do by myself and would be fun to make.

I might still make this, though. Maybe I can do it better than the previous ones

[Roderick]

Original idea? More like aboriginal hernia

Haha! =D

[Marek]

Originality is so overrated and misunderstood.

Just make the game. Don't try to plan everything ahead. It sounds like it could be fun.

[Roderick]

Agreed. It's very crippling and not constructive at all to be making something and hear people say constantly: hey, this reminds me of this and that movie/game/concept. The only thing that matters in this argument is if you're authentic: were you consciously inspired by the other ideas? If not, then it's still your genuine idea. If you are, then it's still a valid concept if it's not a basic copy, but either a remake or something that you're using in a different way, or part of the whole.

Example: Psychonauts is built from the ground up from ideas and concepts that already 'exist', and cliches. It's even easy to see what comes from where. Do we not regard that game as highly creative? It doesn't matter where ideas come from or if they are already made; what matters is how you use it, the execution, your own vision and integrity.

There.

[oerhört]

Agree about the general point, yet highly disagree about Psychonauts.

In my view, Pyschonauts' one big problem was just that: the blatant copying of old platforming ideas, coupled with the mediocrity (and lacking understanding) of the actual platforming design.

Schafer & Co should either have made it more of a pure adventure, or hired someone who knew what makes platformers tick. In my view, the excessive figment collecting was largely lacking in finesse, and several of the levels lacked the needed creative spark and fun factor.

Admittedly, the style, the voices and the creative concepts for the levels were all excellent, but that was clearly not enough in itself when the game was striving with getting the platforming bits right.

[brkl]

It's the only platformer I've enjoyed.

[oerhört]

Well, if so I'd like to know: How many and which other platformers have you tried? Maybe you just need to try some really good ones, or maybe platformers just aren't your thing. If the latter is true, then I imagine what you're trying to say is that Pyschonauts is the first platformer you've played which was sufficiently "non-platformey" to be interesting to you.

Either way, the fact is that much playtime in Psychonauts goes into the platforming aspects of the experience, and as such, those needed to be excellent in order for the game to be excellent. Since many of them weren't, I feel the game as a whole was less than it could have been.

[Roderick]

The platforming techniques were exactly half of my point.

On this subject; whether you like it or not, you have to admit that the game was constantly trying to reimagine itself, having different takes on the gameplay for every level. New techniques and ideas were unloaded before the game ever ran the risk of becoming boring. I, too, see nothing really wrong with the platforming, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I consider myself an enthusiast of the genre.

However, the other half of my point concerned the style of the game. Here too, Double Fine used many influences within levels, like Black Velvetopia incorporating the pokerdogs painting, Mexican wrestling and an 80s artstyle. None of these were invented by DF, and their heritage is easily seen, but in this new mix it becomes highly refreshing and something 'original'.

[oerhört]

I do of course agree with you. But whereas the "borrowing" of ideas worked wonderfully wrt. the art style and concepts, the same cannot be said about all the different levels. The goggalor level, for instance, or the Napoleon level, both are severely lacking as platforming playgrounds, and even when it's more or less competent it's hardly in the same league as games such as Super Mario Sunshine or, for that matter, Prince of Persia.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy Psychonauts, I just feel it's not quite comfortable as a platformer.

[vimes]

But Psychonauts doesn't try to be a platformer like Super Mario Sunshine ... the only link Schafer drew to an existing game is Zelda.

Staying on Psychonauts, I would say that the way it used several elements of gameplay, culture and art is an innovation in itself. And that would lead me to say that innovation can take a lot of different forms... which might make the whole concept of innovation to be misunderstood, as Marek said.

Apart from that, I'm not quite sure I understood the rest of Marek's post : : 'Just make the game. Don't try to plan everything ahead.' Is that supposed to be about games in general or just Erkki's project ?

[Marek]

Both.

I just wrote a paragraph trying to explain myself but failed. Maybe a picture will help.

So the white area is all the stuff that's already been done, right. And the black area is the Big Unknown. The red X is your starting position.

Many designers think you have to plant a big red X firmly in the dark regions of the never-been-done-before. They go like 'ok fuck yes let's do something super innovative' and want to sort of parachute themselves somewhere into that big dark space, but then they frequently end up getting lost and making something super derivative after all.

A much more sensible journey is to start with stuff you know and then gradually explore outwards. You have a better sense of where to go because you know what was made before and why it was made that way.

Originality and innovation are often thought of as these Big Things, but really they are a bunch of little things combined, and they are rarely a complete departure from conventions, they just sort of start there and explore a little bit further.

OK I have no idea what I'm talking about. Time to go to bed.

[Oath]

OK I have no idea what I'm talking about. Time to go to bed.

No, no, this actually sums up most of the thread nicely.

[Erkki]

I agree.

[Nachimir]

Originality and innovation are often thought of as these Big Things, but really they are a bunch of little things combined, and they are rarely a complete departure from conventions, they just sort of start there and explore a little bit further.

OK I have no idea what I'm talking about. Time to go to bed.

Actually that makes a good deal of sense (Argh, there was a really concise definition on the Loewy Foundation website, but they redesigned and nuked the content. Glad I blogged a copy):

Loewy summarized his design philosophy with the acronym, MAYA - Most Advanced Yet Acceptable. It served as a guiding principle for Loewy and those in his employ reminding them not to push a design, however excellent, beyond the threshold of acceptability to consumers and manufacturers.

He was a fucking good designer.

Anything too far out on the fringe may be exciting, but also utterly foreign. Anything too far within the mainstream may be assured an audience of some kind, but ultimately be quite boring.

Really good things that come before their time simply bomb because culture isn't prepared for them. The unknown is also full of absolute crap, which all people in creative professions are in the business of wading through to find something good. Zeitgeists are the sweet spot between bleeding edge and traditional.

Hence, more artistic games like Katamari Damacy not doing so well in the US because they're too far outside of typical gamer culture. As an AI programmer named Adam Russel put it recently: "Technological change is very quick, but cultural change is glacial". I forget who said this, I think it was in a recent issue of Develop: "[right now] games are brilliant if you want to be a moron with a gun".

The market is currently a huge constraint in terms of making the medium more mature, though Sony and Nintendo are doing good work on that.