There's no denying the fact that the gaming industry has become bogged down by the same general stuff year after year. And understandably so, as creating new genres and/or game experiences is incredibly tough when action-heavy titles like Call of Duty rule the market. According to 2K global president Christoph Hartmann, the reason we aren't seeing as much innovation has a lot to do with the technical limitations of today's hardware.
Speaking to GI International, Hartmann explained his stance by saying that “recreating a Mission Impossible experience in gaming is easy; recreating emotions in Brokeback Mountain is going to be tough, or at least very sensitive in this country… it will be very hard to create very deep emotions like sadness or love, things that drive the movies."
The 2K boss went on to add that “until games are photorealistic, it’ll be very hard to open up to new genres. We can really only focus on action and shooter titles; those are suitable for consoles now. To dramatically change the industry to where we can insert a whole range of emotions, I feel it will only happen when we reach the point that games are photorealistic; then we will have reached an endpoint and that might be the final console.”
While yes, games like Heavy Rain still have a long way to go, that hasn't stopped developers from trying – and sometimes even succeeding – in generating deeper emotional responses from gamers. Heck, just look at how much of an impact Shadow of the Colossus made back when it launched on the PS2! So, while yes, Hartmann does have a point, I don't think photorealistic graphics are necessary to motivate game developers to think outside the box.
Agree? Sound off in the comments below.
