Graphics Do Not Gameplay Make?

Thanks to Boomtown.net for their article discussing the importance of higher-quality graphics in making good games. While the article comes to fairly mundane conclusions: ("..it's not just the graphics that are important... if there isn't good game design present, there isn't a good game"), it makes some good points about better graphical technology affecting gameplay ("With Alone in the Dark, 3D was used for an entirely different purpose. A fully polygon rendered environment allowed the developers to move the point of view around, to view the same scene from many different angles, resulting in some memorably shocking moments.") There's also links back to the first article in this series, discussing how bad level design affects gameplay.

Comments

Re:Where is the inspiration?

[May Kasahara]

It seems like a lot of the "crazy game ideas" (like, oh... dating sims) are largely staying in Japan these days, and the few that come over here (like Ka [aka Mister Mosquito], Gitaroo Man, the Jet Set Radio series, etc.) linger in obscurity. I wonder how Wario Ware is doing in US sales...?

Of course, there are a few publishers in the US willing to do offbeat games, but for some reason, Japan seems to have more of them. Games are too expensive to make these days, so not too many publishers will take risks.