I think part of the problem is that people don't know how to deliberately focus on gameplay. Back when the graphics could NOT be achievable due to the hardware being unable to provide performance, you HAD to focus on gameplay because the area of graphic representation was so limited. This forced people to think about how to expand the game in non-graphical ways, producing better gameplay and more structure and more original ways to do things.
Then the hardware got better and better meaning nobody has to care about whether the hardware can do the graphics, so then there's this explosion of graphics which chases after the limits of the hardware and absolutely no restraint or discipline or deliberate focus on expanding the gameplay. If you could take a game on a current level of hardware, and strap some serious restraints onto the graphics so that you are forced to overcome limitations creatively, there would be better games. So it seems as though great games are born from overcoming limitations in creative ways and channeling creative energies into other aspects of the game besides appearances, rather than just having an ever increasing ceiling of what the hardware can do. In a way all this `hardware freedom` is leaving people flailing all over the play on auto-pilot rather than ask themselves why they are doing what they're doing. In a way, as the hardware performance increases it's almost as if the `challenge` which promotes genuine creativity is totally lost.
Graphics are not bad or wrong. It's more a matter of how you use them and for what. If you use them to entertain the ego and focus on appearances then it's going to be empty and shallow. If you use them as a tool to represent a deeper core of experiences and fun then it stops being an end unto itself. You certainly don't need millions of texture-mapped-lit polygons in order to provide gameplay, but if gameplay was BEHIND those polygons, informing their use, then that certainly would be a nice mix. Maybe what we're really missing in these empty copy-cat games is a sense of deeper meaning. The more you focus on appearances the more unconscious you become and you then lost the ability to see the bigger purpose or meaning behind it. The more we have to focus on the stupid specific x number of polygons per second ratings or how many sound effects play simultaneously or how many colors or what framerate, which is all shallow bull, the less we can appreciate that there's anything to it other than just a fake emptiness. What these games are missing is depth.
Consider the early use of real-time graphics to create visual presentations (the demo scene). It was hardly creative to display a rotating cube or show that you can put 10,000 particles on the screen. But when it started to to be *used* to tell a story or to be part of something bigger than itself, then it started to become an art form, was more interesting, conveyed more meaning and was more enjoyable. It's the same with games. If you only focus on the technical visual appearance and not what it means then all you're doing is playing with eye candy.
Then the hardware got better and better meaning nobody has to care about whether the hardware can do the graphics, so then there's this explosion of graphics which chases after the limits of the hardware and absolutely no restraint or discipline or deliberate focus on expanding the gameplay. If you could take a game on a current level of hardware, and strap some serious restraints onto the graphics so that you are forced to overcome limitations creatively, there would be better games. So it seems as though great games are born from overcoming limitations in creative ways and channeling creative energies into other aspects of the game besides appearances, rather than just having an ever increasing ceiling of what the hardware can do. In a way all this `hardware freedom` is leaving people flailing all over the play on auto-pilot rather than ask themselves why they are doing what they're doing. In a way, as the hardware performance increases it's almost as if the `challenge` which promotes genuine creativity is totally lost.
Graphics are not bad or wrong. It's more a matter of how you use them and for what. If you use them to entertain the ego and focus on appearances then it's going to be empty and shallow. If you use them as a tool to represent a deeper core of experiences and fun then it stops being an end unto itself. You certainly don't need millions of texture-mapped-lit polygons in order to provide gameplay, but if gameplay was BEHIND those polygons, informing their use, then that certainly would be a nice mix. Maybe what we're really missing in these empty copy-cat games is a sense of deeper meaning. The more you focus on appearances the more unconscious you become and you then lost the ability to see the bigger purpose or meaning behind it. The more we have to focus on the stupid specific x number of polygons per second ratings or how many sound effects play simultaneously or how many colors or what framerate, which is all shallow bull, the less we can appreciate that there's anything to it other than just a fake emptiness. What these games are missing is depth.
Consider the early use of real-time graphics to create visual presentations (the demo scene). It was hardly creative to display a rotating cube or show that you can put 10,000 particles on the screen. But when it started to to be *used* to tell a story or to be part of something bigger than itself, then it started to become an art form, was more interesting, conveyed more meaning and was more enjoyable. It's the same with games. If you only focus on the technical visual appearance and not what it means then all you're doing is playing with eye candy.