Predictions - Game Design Theory - page 153

games have just as many flaws as the new ones, and if you copy
them, you're just copying old flaws
Emulating the majors . Many indies are trying to create the next
World of Warcraft , the next Call of Duty , or the next Half-Life 2 .
Apparently, these indies thought that the issue was that the major
publishers weren't producing enough titles.
Making puzzle-platformers . I don't have the exact data, but given
the number of indies currently creating platformers, and specifi-
cally puzzle -platformers, the majority of indie games being pro-
duced must fall in these categories. Somehow—perhaps because
of the popularity of Super Mario Brothers— the idea that “in video
games, you jump around the screen� has been allowed to thrive.
Puzzle-platformers seem to be the go-to indie game at the mo-
ment.
The indies will be taking over the world of games, and they need
guidance—badly. Obviously, this topic is an attempt to do my part, but
where else might this guidance be found?
Merging Worlds
Changes in technology and the closer association of those who design
and play games—no matter the industry—have significant potential to
blur the lines between the worlds of video games, board games, and
sports. In fact, this melding of worlds is already taking place.
Board Games
There is surprisingly little overlap between the world of video gamers
and that of board gamers. As I've mentioned before in this topic, I spent
the first 25 years of my extremely hard-core video-gaming life playing
games and scouring the Internet for obscure games that I may have
missed. I always thought that board games meant just Monopoly , Sorry ,
Apples to Apples , and chess—I had no inkling of the fact that there was a
whole world of designer board games for me to discover.
Sometime in the late 2000s, though, that started to change. Settlers
of Catan bumper stickers started appearing. Forum threads talked about
Carcassonne and Dominion . Soon there were webcomics—a cultural
bastion of the video-game world—mentioning Pandemic and Battlestar
Galactica .
These days a serious surge of board-game designers and publishers
are porting their famous board games to the App Store on platforms
such as iOS. Hits such as Tigris & Euphrates , Samurai , Puerto Rico , and