Video Games Trends

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Game Girl Advance has an insightful post about 5 trends in the world of video games that I fully agree with:

  1. Sex and games are coming into their own. (...) If the critically and financially successful God of War is a sign of anything, sex will soon become an effective part of storytelling in mainstream games.
  2. Wireless Online Gaming: (...) Online portable gaming has paved the way for MMORPGs and even more impressive strategy games. Furthermore, the DS's touch-screen capabilities make impressive ports of games such as Civilization, StarCraft, and Diablo possible.
  3. Nintendo has basically said that they know they can't compete with Sony or Microsoft in terms of straightforward gaming. Instead, they want to co-exist. Rather than creating a competing third console with pumped graphics and a two-stick joypad, Nintendo is made a console that will complement a console set-up. [So does Philips with its <a href ambx project - nicolas]. Nintendo's business strategy acknowledges a very new trend in gaming - companies don't always have to outright compete (...) "the system wars," as if one company must plant a flag in the gaming public and declare victory. Nintendo's new strategy suggests a different outlook in which different systems deliver fundamentally different experiences and therefore all warrant a unique purchase.
  4. Console Indie Development
  5. Gamers Fight Back against Critics

What I find really interesting is the console indie development thing (Xbox 360, Nintendo Revolution) and the Nintendo strategy that we will follow closely.

To some extent, we are still waiting for the next thing: at some point, video games will jump from the set-top-box (PC, console) to the real world, embedded in various objects. The mobile phone is already something but the existing game are translated from old consoles and they still do not take that much advantage of the phone capabilities such as voice or location-awareness. Alternate reality games is another step towards this direction and I am pretty sure that the so-called "Internet of Things" will allow game designers to create great challenges or pertinent features (like playing the same game on a cell phone, an interactive tv or a computer for instance). I am also looking forward to see how the toy industry will meet the video game companies...