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One of those four damn well better be Gunstar Heroes.

An innovative game is much more intensive in design, to a lesser degree art, and to an even smaller degree technology (though technology can drive huge interest also, and does). While design and to an extent technology can be free, art talent is a hard thing to come by. You have to be born with it (if you are lucky enough), work at developing the talent, or hire employees to do the art.

An idea I've been thinking about is the thought of an innovative open sourced game. Providing the source for the game on the media and the company/project website, but purchasing the art. While you still could comply with an open source model, true developmental freedom is still held back by buying the art itself to see your work on the game. This can be overcome by creating a game around the rendering engine and frame itself. Something along the lines of Ikaruga (FreeKaruga), if a community desires to do so.

An open sourced gaming model would greatly help budding game designers to get their vision to the public, but what are the problems with this business model? The obvious ones are money lost on engine licensing, and users playing the free game instead of purchasing the company's game, but are there more that aren't so apparent?