Originality? WTF is that?

[Veylon]

Try a game like Dwarf Fortress or Minecraft. They offer the opportunity to play in a world that exists above and beyond your own private adventure. There is no huge plot beyond the one you bring to the table.

Really, the focus should be fun. If games were colors, the dominant ones right now are realism brown and exposition grey. The problem isn't that this video game or that one has a bad story, it's that the story is being pushed front and center as though it's the be-all and end-all of a good game.

Pick pretty much any old game from the NES or SNES era and gussy it up with prettier graphics and it would be hailed as original and/or innovative. But we're not likely to see a new-school game in the style of Dungeon Magic or Metal Storm or Power Blade or even Crystalis. Heck, let alone the dozens of Shoot-em-ups that have fallen by the wayside.

 

[Jabberwock xeno]

There is no "true" originality, unless you go back a few thousand years when everything was brand new in stories.

Today, orginallty, is taking old ideas, but using them in new ways.

 

[FalloutJack]

Well, I'm not one of the many throngs of people who BS about the originality of a game. In fact, I like that some games appear to indeed take something from other existing ideas.

For instance, my top pick for Survival Horror, the not-a-Resident-Evil-game thriller, Extermination. I've spoken about it before, but for those of you who haven't seen me talking about it before (or know nothing about the game), it seems to take some of its ideas from John Carpenter's: The Thing. But then, it took the idea farther and developed its own track. The game was received kinda' meh, but I liked it alot. Freaky shit.

In any case, talking of originality, I know it when I see it. I have some if people want it.

 

[AnAngryMoose]

Invader Zim game NAO PL0X!!
That is all.

I'd buy several copies of the collectors edition if that was released. Hell, just give me the damned TV show back!

 

[Staskala]

For video games in particular it is really not that hard to come up with "more original" plot elements (not completely original stories, obviously). Games usually tell stories while being completely black and white, i.e you are good, the rest are the evil bad guys, go and kill them. All is justified, you are the hero.
For games it would even be original to have a plot in which the bad guys have reasonable motives, or *shock* where they are just one side in a mutual war, with no side being better than the other. At best you get a little speech before the final boss fight that's supposed to justify the his evil deeds, but really doesn't.

Games really don't excell when it comes to innovative stories. Of course there are some, but you have to look really hard.
As for original gameplay, that's something we can't complain about, there's all kind of different stuff around.

 

[Thespian]

Originality doesn't have to be an entirely new thing. It can be taking one thing and expressing it in a different way. Look at what Cowboy Bebop did for Western Jazz, and it's widely credited as one of the best animes of it's time. It can be using an abstract artform, it can be using post-modernism, it can be avant garde, it can be an objet d'art, it can be reproducing an old classic with a different art style, it can be changing the setting of something, or it's genre, or tone. A good writer I once had the pleasure of meeting said that too much originality is a plague. You could make a novel based on Jupiter where all the characters are gas based life forms with an entirely new social structure, but that's asking a lot of your readers to buy into. Eventually it becomes more about the reader's attempt to comprehend something and less about the skill in which it is told. I believe this works for all mediums. A clever twist on something, or bringing together two contrasting cultures or genres can generally create originality.

As for games specifically, a lot of the best games of today are based on original ideas that now seem mundane as we are so used to them. I'm sure a lot of more successful games will be surprisingly original.

 

[s0m3th1ng]

I'm still waiting on a true post-apocalyptic survival game that's fun. Doesn't have to be zombies either. I'm talking finding shit to eat, places to sleep, weapons to defend yourself, and eventually starting civilization anew.

 

[badgersprite]

I think when people talk about originality, it's more a complaint about strict adherence to realism or other specific styles that seem to dominate the market today. It's not that things necessarily have to be original, it's just that so many games today can be summarised by any of the following:

Military Shooter
Space Marine
Standard Fantasy Setting
GTA Clone
God Of War Clone

etc etc etc. You all know what the usual games are. Adhering to this isn't bad, but they can afford to be shaken up a bit. Why can't I be a space marine in the standard fantasy setting with a FPS gun that shoots God Of War style chains at night elves?

 

[Daipire]

What do you WANT. What would originality LOOK LIKE?

That's kinda the point isn't it? If you know what originality would look like, it would no longer be original. It's about expecting the unexpected.

By that logic, the most original rpg wouldn't be an rpg...

OT: People only complain about unoriginality when the game does the 'unoriginal
feature badly.

The bullet-time in Red Dead worked well (dead eye or something), sure there were people complaining, but not as many as could have.
Because zey did ze bullet-time vell.

 

[gl1koz3]

For each his own, but less absolutely apparent copycats could do fine too.

And the copycats should be the sequels, so that you don't fck with fans of original. Want a completely new game? Start from scratch. Give new incentive to care about, not change established things. Devs often getting it wrong these days.

 

[Sacman]

The thing about originality is that it has to be good too...

 

[Kurokami]

I had a bad case of the facepalm when I was talking about originality to one of my friends once.

He casually tells me "I don't get why they don't just make a new genre, it can't be that hard".
Then I ask him what new genres he had in mind and I just got a long silence followed by "surely they can think of something".

It's difficult to be original these days, especially when you're talking about gameplay. And the bigger game developers aren't going to risk making their game batshit crazy just for the sake of being different.

The combination of elements isn't too hard to achieve, I'm sure. As for story they often times go for the contra-standard shit to try and achieve originallity, or simply back shit up with nice reasoning. Personally I loved the approach DA:O took with Mages/Templars, I found it quite interesting cause for me it was original (feel free to correct me, it was new to me but I'm sure its been done before).

 

[Sacman]

What do you WANT. What would originality LOOK LIKE?

That's kinda the point isn't it? If you know what originality would look like, it would no longer be original. It's about expecting the unexpected.

By that logic, the most original rpg wouldn't be an rpg...

and at this time I would point at Deus Ex... it's an RPG that walks like an FPS, OMG...

 

[Daipire]

What do you WANT. What would originality LOOK LIKE?

That's kinda the point isn't it? If you know what originality would look like, it would no longer be original. It's about expecting the unexpected.

By that logic, the most original rpg wouldn't be an rpg...

and at this time I would point at Deus Ex... it's an RPG that walks like an FPS, OMG...

I hated Deus Ex....
Am I a bad person?

 

[Sacman]

What do you WANT. What would originality LOOK LIKE?

That's kinda the point isn't it? If you know what originality would look like, it would no longer be original. It's about expecting the unexpected.

By that logic, the most original rpg wouldn't be an rpg...

and at this time I would point at Deus Ex... it's an RPG that walks like an FPS, OMG...

I hated Deus Ex....
Am I a bad person?

In my eyes, yes... I'm not sorry...
Then how about we use Fallout 3 as an example even though I didn't like Fallout 3...

 

[Lono Shrugged]

There are only seven stories in the world. Can't be original all the time. I want a Video Game version of Hyperion by Dan Simmons. Any other examples I can think of have been done. They just need to be done better. I would love a game where you explore alien planets in total freeform

that seven stories thing isn't true. Especially in games where the story is not only told through words and actions but the way the actions are performed and other parts of gameplay. Even then, the point of alot of games is just "survive". that isn't included.

I would argue that the seven stories concept/rule applies even to games. Obviously you need a narrative but even if you don't have one you can apply one. Tetris is a never ending struggle against the forces that dispense the blocks like a benign god raining slow death. (Overcoming the Monster) Any of these examples can apply to any game. And that I think is a great thing to say about the relevence of video games. Minecraft could be half these stories depending on how you play it.

1. 'Tragedy'. Hero with a fatal flaw meets tragic end. Macbeth or
Madame Bovary.
2. 'Comedy'. Not necessary laugh-out-loud, but always with a happy ending, typically of romantic fulfilment, as in Jane Austen.
3. 'Overcoming the Monster'. As in Frankenstein or 'Jaws'. Its psychological appeal is obvious and eternal.
4. 'Voyage and Return'. as diverse as Alice
in Wonderland and H G Wells' The Time Machine and Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner follow the same archetypal structure of personal development through leaving, then returning home.
5. 'Quest'. Whether the quest is for a holy grail, a whale, or a kidnapped child it is the plot that links a lot of the most popular fiction. The quest plot links Lords of the Rings with Moby Dick and a thousand others in between.
6. 'Rags to Riches'. The riches in question can be literal or metaphoric. See Cinderella, David Copperfield, Pygmalion.
7. 'Rebirth'. The 'rebirth' plot - where a central character suddenly finds a new reason for living - can be seen in A Christmas Carol, It's a Wonderful Life, Crime and Punishment and Peer Gynt.

(Taken from Penguin.com)