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Are These People Reshaping the Gaming Industry?
Mark Graham writes "An EU game development site has put up a list of the 25 people they think are 'reshaping the games business'. Although they admit the list is highly subjective, it's a debate-provoking piece, and some of the entries (Portal designer Kim Swift and Kongregate.com's founder) are spot on, going for the people that have introduced innovations rather than those that dominate column inches. Miyamoto is absent from the list, for example — although his boss Satoru Iwata is in there. Including Japansese designers like Hironobo Sakaguchi (ranked for his successful prolific outsourced development process) instead of Hideo Kojima is sure to anger a few fanboys. Or at least raise a few eyebrows." Anyone they left off that should obviously be on there?
The list is a fraud, without him. Old Man Murray and Sons was the funniest web site ever, and the games he's writing for now have a depth and clarity of writing that honestly eludes most title. Plus, he's pretty damned funny.
This is my sig.
Do you think that, just maybe, for Slashdot's ten year anniversary we might be able to fix that Atari joystick icon so the button is on the left-hand side like it's supposed to be?
That is all.
Kriston
As someone who has worked for almost 20 years making games I only have one reaction to that list,
LOL.
She's quite pretty in the face. Makes me want to cuddle her!
and why wasn't fatality on there hahahahah oh man, I keed I keed
wtf? clowns such as Avni Yerli and Mark Rein next to John Carmack and John Riccitiello? what a joke
To put Sakaguchi in there and not Miyamoto is pretty insane, especially given their "being the creator of FF is enough" quote. Miyamoto isn't out of the picture just yet, especially with Mario Galaxy just having been released. He is also one of the driving forces behind the innovation that Nintendo is working to saturate the market with.
Hopefully the Bioshock guy, Ken Levine is on there. I just read the article but forgot right away. Also they need a guy from Harmonix (Guitar Hero developer) if there isn't one.
Kojima, yeah he's not really big-time on the radar right now. MGS4 is highly anticipated but it's not a reason to slide into the top 25. If you take Kojima then you need to take Itagaki and probably a host of other "fan-fave" developers that push the boundaries in certain genres.
I like basketball!!1!
They just released IronClad's Sins of a Solar Empire. www.sinsofasolarempire.com If you don't know what this game is, I can't tell you without referencing 3 or 4 other games. It's more than a cross-over, and it's very well done. (As worthy to be on the list as Portal.)
However, if you look at Stardock as a publisher they deserve the spot even more. If you remember the big stink between StarForce and Stardock back when Galactic Civilizations was released. They continue their style of "don't screw the people who actually pay you."
Also, while there are only a few triple-A titles on Stardock Central, their scheme of 'digital download' + 'mail you a box for shipping costs' is much more palatable to me than Valve's Steam service where you are forced to make your own hardcopies from their backup files. It also get nicely out of the way once you've installed the game vs Valve's ubiquitous TSR style.
http://www.stardock.com/
(they mainly do desktop customization and other utilities, but they have an extensive selection of budget games and a few large titles.)
--Welcome to the Realm of the Hawke--
but it was all started as a college project... There's literally tons of experimental college projects going on right now anywhere in the country with just as much if not more innovation and creativity, but 99% of those will never see final production since game companies don't go in to colleges enough to recruit. They sit and wait for resumes and demoreels instead of being more proactive.
Unfortunately, it isn't for the better. Maybe if I stop playing games, get out of the house, exercise, eat properly.... Just one more quest. I swear, this one's the last one.
If at first you don't succeed, call it version 1.0.
Video Game Industry, or Gaming Industry. How about the people who run Wizards of the Coast. Or the original creators of Dungeons and Dragons.
How about the Monopoly guy? (j/k)
I know this isn't really the aim of the article.... but...
From a purely tech standpoint, the guys over at CCP (Eve Online) should be noted for the massive achievement of their database cluster. 45000 people playing in the same game universe, backed by Microsoft SQL Server (?!?!?), massive RAMSAN capacity, and all that custom Python code seems a very notable achievement. Yes I said Python! Stackless to be precise.
From where I stand, it's that kind of cluster which will run the MMO's of tomorrow.
Not everything is graphics and market share.
Another consultant who stuck it out.
"We are the Priests, of the Temples of Syrinx..."
Sakuraaaaaiiiiiii!
There are amazing things going on in game development.
However, this 'list' is nothing more than yet another tiresome example of fanboyism made by some little punks no better than some gradeschool kids arguing over which console is the best or which game is the best.
Hironobo Sakaguchi (ranked for his successful prolific outsourced development process)
So maybe that is why FFIV on the GBA was one of the buggiest console games I have ever played, and the buggiest Square game by far. It crashed on me at least once, battle timing was totally off(some characters would get two or more turns before another would even get one), and there were random pauses/slowdowns in battle. Come on, if you are going to outsource a port(a port! They weren't even creating original code) at least have the decency to do some testing before releasing it.....
Monstar L
You, sir, are a true Slashdotter
I hear she is in the "game" business ...
I have excellent Karma and I am not afraid to Troll it.
The visionary who brought us Bioshock and System Shock 2 among others. The very fact he isn't mentioned seriously undermines the legitimacy of this list in my view.
Bioshock was and continues to be huge for gamers and its effects on the industry are still being felt and will be from years to come.
Kim Swift - A gimmicky little game that really only shows just how dead the pc gaming market is outside of MMORPGs. An irrelevant nobody.
Sakaguchi - Sold out to Microsoft in an effort to have his revenge against his old company Square. Two very expensive flops is all he has to show for his effort. Next.
Carmack - A relic of the pc fps glory days. The only thing notable he has done in the past few years is publicly cry about not being able to handle modern console graphics hardware. Go play with your rockets John, the industry left you behind years ago.
Chudley - She handled Bizarre selling out to Activision. Uh ok...
Burgess-Quémard - She works at Ubisoft. Uh ok...
Riccitiello - EA is fading as the dominant US game company after having grown as large as possible. I guess Riccitiello should be on the list, but not in a good way...
Dan Connors - Why is he on the list? Because one or more Sam and Max fans made the list.
Ray Muzyka - Small development house becomes mid-size dev house, sells out to big publisher. What a new development for the games biz!
Robert Kotick - Activision makes games and lots of money doing so. Robert works there. Ok.
Torsten Reil - A middleware developer. Various games use his company's middleware. Ok.
Bonus points! What console are the guys who made this silly list fans of?
Coral cache: http://www.developmag.com.nyud.net/interviews/123/Game-Changers (it works!)
Anyway, she looks a little like Drew Barrymore: http://www.gamesetwatch.com/kimswift.jpg
Certainly changing the face of game reviews, I'd say.
Everyone on /. knows this list is simply going to be John D. Carmack 25 times in a row.
sheesh.
I wanted to mod you +1 informative, but they wouldn't give me mod points.
I doubt you look that good!
More bragging: she's also petite, hot, and a Stanford graduate. I highly recommend that the single and non-African American portion of Slashdot date black women. Statistics from dating sites indicate that lots of people eliminate them from their preferences. Well, there's lots of smart and hot black women out there.
That, and take up some form of couples dancing. And hygiene. Confidence. Yada yada...
Ever notice how its getting increasingly harder to get a console game where you can do multiplayer on the same box? My bet is its driven by the profits from the on-line fees earned by forcing you to play on-line for multiplayer. Noticed how thinings are becomming more MMO oriented? Thank the income streams generated by WOW for that.
What about non-game studio execs? I'd rather see a list of game reviewers and how they shape the future. ZeroPunctuation, Penny Arcade, PvP, etc. You know, the real gamers with a voice the is heard by millions of gamers. And of course they are not tied to a magazine where all editorials are subject to review based on the ammount of paid advertising...
Dominant Meme
Stardock is one of the greatest independent studios out there. Their products are A+ quality and they continue to support them for years. The interaction with their customers is admirable in this day and age of being flat out ignored and abused by most (here's looking at you EA). They also have an amazingly common sense approach to DRM on their software. Namely, you'll never find any DRM crap on any of their software, exactly as we the paying customers like it.
If ever there was a studio that your average slashdot gamer could get behind, it's these guys.
Galactic Civ 2 (http://www.galciv2.com/) is their flagship 4x empire building sandbox game and is at quite a bit better then it's nearest competitor Civilization 4 imho.
I hadn't realized that Sins of the Solar Empire was released yet. It's a very busy time of year and I've had my head in the sand since early January concerning gaming news. Thanks for the tip though, I'll certainly be picking this one up in the very near future.
i think natural selection ( a hl1 mod) was ahead of its time when i played it 5 years ago.
it an FPS with RTS and RPG thrown in, unfortunatly there were problems when it came down to players but the game itself was pretty good.
whats the state of the game now?
are there any similar games ( actual games not just mods)?
is looking at the games a bit late? doesn't real innovation come from mods?
IranAir Flight 655 never forget!
I vote for Bill Roper. He is not important since he left Blizzard though.
Bioshock is a great game, but there's nothing really that new in there gameplay wise, the setting's pretty original but that's about it.
I mean, what's new about it? The plasmids are fun, but no better than previous games that have allowed spell casting, like the Elder Scrolls series (where you can actually make your own). The tonics are interesting, but compared to the delicate balances and quirks of S.T.A,L.K.E.R.'s artefacts which have down sides and need to be balanced between tasks, rather than just having different slots for different types and the decision pretty much made for you. The combat wasn't particularly interesting, it's more in the old school with large amounts of health on both sides, close range and no cover, pretty much just aiming practice really, the AI is pretty dumb too. Combat these days tends to be moving towards the more tactical, cover driven battles of F.E.A.R. Gears of War, S.T.A,L.K.E.R. or Call of Duty which I find more exciting and mentally involved, Bioshock reminds me of Quake (not bad, just pretty retro). Hacking royally blows of course, some dumb pipes game which is smashing fun for the first 10 times, but as I'm as compulsive hacker who cannot stop, it gets irritating. If you want fun hacking, check out the latest Ratchet and Clank game, shorting circuits with a rolling ball. U-Invent and Power to the People are the stupidest excuses for customisation I've ever seen, either make regular items out of crap you can pick up or add two improvements to the weapons that you have to carry. That's right, in the days where every game seems to let the players pick which weapons to carry, 2 guns in halo, 2 rifles and 1 pistol in GoW, 3 guns in fear, space/weight based in Deus Ex, stalker or Elder scrolls. Bioshock you have 1 of each weapon and an independent max ammo for each. People say it has roleplaying elements but it has no inventory! The only thing you can change is your plasmids, but they all just use the same EVE source so you only end up using 2 or 3 of them or so anyway since they never run out of ammo, I just used telekinesis for everything because flying corpses make new corpses.
The story also, I did like it because it was easy enough to follow and since I'm often too lazy to pay attention it helped me, but it was obvious that it was the sort of story that was going to have a "twist" and there was only really one possible since near the beginning, it didn't really take me by surprise. Oh and what's the whole thing about morality in it? You kill the girl and take all the adam or you save the girl, get half the adam then get most of the rest in a teddy bear along with some unique plasmids and some ammo. Basically the only difference is whether you think it is funny to kill the girl or not, there's no complex moral reasoning in it, just H or L. I really liked the backstory though, the whole story of Ryan founding a colony away from the government in the name of freedom then ending up oppressing them even worse. It appeals to me as an authoritarian in that if a democratic government doesn't have the power to control the people, then other people will instead.
Anyway, despite me discussing its failings, I did really like the game, I liked the atmosphere, I liked the world they created, I liked the graphics and I particularly thought that the research camera was a very great addition. I have just played many cutting edge, genre redefining games in my time and I really don't see Bioshock's place in there.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
To be fair, though, a game doesn't have to be "revolutionary" to shape the game industry. It just has to be well-received enough that it gets other developers and publishers thinking. Halo wasn't revolutionary in terms of game design, but it certainly helped shape the game industry tremendously by giving the Xbox a foothold.
I like basketball!!1!
How could they overlook the original designer of SimCity, The Sims and soon to be Spore?
hahahahahaha
these fucking idiots
you cannot have a list like this and not include Fumito Ueda (TeamICO)
he has literally pioneered the use of emotions, other than fear and anger, as the driving force to get you to play the game. not to mention being a graphic and level design genius
this list is full of idiots maintaining the status quo
"omg guy who invented final fantasy! omg guy from EA!"
jesus christ
The people who make the gaming industry evolve are the ones who do something new, don't get me wrong, not original, new. Might sound obvious, it even might be a truism, but we must keep this in mind, for so few make anything new, from home-brew abstract puzzle hobbyist creators to big game studio designers.
Little is truly new, people like to explore the already explored.
You just got troll'd!
The article says it was published just two days ago... But the article on Graham Hopper (second from the bottom) talks about the creation of Pirates of the Caribbean games as some distant pie-in-the-sky opportunity he is investigating... when there have already been at least 19 games on various platforms off of that franchise (as a quick searching of gamerankings.com reveals). It's particularly curious to me because I worked on one of those games... but that paragraph sounds like it was written before Dead Man's Chest. Dan.
While his games have never been huge hits or ground breaking, they almost always offer something unique and entertaining. His best known works are probably Killer7 and, much more recently, No More Heroes. He's trying new things and ideas, and perhaps he shouldn't make it to the top 25, but I think he should get at least honorable mention.
If anyone's not tried No More Heroes and enjoys over-the-top fighting games, I highly recommend it. The overworld (think GTA) really needs a lot of work, but the actual fighting more than makes up for it. Pretty crazy plotline and characters, too. (Each of the ten bosses you fight would be a major villain in their own right for any other game.)
Honestly, give credit where credit is due. Everyone knows that Kim Swift did jack diddly on the project and was lucky that Valve hired the entire Narbacular Drop team. Last year at GDC when asked what she did on the project, she stuttered and said something about coding a state machine and creating textures.
"The way Swift managed Portal into become a smart melding of both an excellent gameplay mechanic and great writing..." Give me a break.
"Shaping gaming industry" here is sometime but not necessarily related to "creating great games". Otherwise the project involving Tim Cain and other great developers would have been a nice addition to the list.
Amerzone, Syberia, Syberia II, Paradise... the guy is an artistic genius. These aren't games, they're slices of (very interesting) worlds.
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
Katamari Damacy anyone?
Don't forget Jack Thompson!
Kim is the voice of the team (moderately attractive females tend to increase male gamers' interest) but Jeep deserves most of the credit.
I mean, I hate them as much as the next guy, but Xbox and Bungie (Jason Jones) pretty much mainstreamed the console market.
(And now I'll go back to worshiping Sid Meyers.)
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