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Is Crowdsourcing the Next Big Thing In Game Design?

Posted by Soulskill on from the everyone-make-a-zombie dept.

An anonymous reader writes "We've all heard about user-generated content for games that have fixed toolsets — but this interesting piece on Develop has got me thinking about the idea of games production being opened to a community before development finishes. A new iPhone game (Aztec Odyssey) did that with its soundtrack; could someone do it with the game's art assets? Or level design? A great comment under the story says that LittleBigPlanet would have been more interesting if it was just shipped as a toolset with no pre-built levels. I'm inclined to agree!"

5 of 47 comments (clear)

  1. RPGMaker by Shikaku · · Score: 3, Informative

    Let's look at that as an example. What a great success that was. (This is sarcasm guys)

  2. Potentially by Sylos · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In certain circumstances, this could be an amazing and powerful tool for creating some truly genuine creativity. However, with all that power comes a metric ton of suck. This will take off like "player made" MMO's have taken off.

    --
    'Number-memorizing Chinese people.'-Anon
  3. I hope not by courseofhumanevents · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The problem with allowing the general public to make content for a game is that you get content the general public makes. If you really want to play in Penisworld, be my guest, but as for me, I prefer content with coherent design beyond the capabilities of Joe Nobody.

  4. LittleBigPlanet by somersault · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A great comment under the story says that LittleBigPlanet would have been more interesting if it was just shipped as a toolset with no pre-built levels. I'm inclined to agree!"

    And I'm inclined to disagree. I enjoyed going through the pre-made content, more than any platform game I've ever played.

    --
    which is totally what she said
  5. Inmates Running the Assylum by EXTomar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Its fine to take suggestions and inputs from the audience but asking the audience to create the game for you is insanity (pun!). You will always need the team or the leader or the person in control of "the vision" to make the tough calls when there is no right decision to be made. One of the weaknesses in "crowd sourcing" is that everyone is ready to offer their idea too few are around for the repercussions.