The Next Innovation in Gaming

[pawsplay]

Electronic books will never replace real books until they can make ones that smell like paper and can be spread out on a table.

 

[Aeolius]

Electronic books will never replace real books until they can make ones that smell like paper and can be spread out on a table.

Well, here's half of your request:

 

[Mark]

I agree that there will be innovation that will come from smaller companies (eg Fantasy Grounds) and individual hobbyists who create labor of love projects (eg Iplay4e.com) but the point I was trying to make was that innovation will most likely be directed at D&D based on the the fact that D&D is the largest RPG in the category hands down. Largest as measured in terms of brand awareness, player base, revenue, longevity, etc. The second biggest player in the category is significantly smaller than D&D and they only get smaller the further down the chain you go. So it would make sense that the most likely game to get support from 3rd parties is going to be for D&D. This support could come in the form of a website like Asmor.com, a application like Fantasy Grounds, or content like Goodman Games. Point is the dollars and players are with D&D so that is most likely where the innovation will be directed.

The GSL excludes use of content for interactive products so the innovation of a unified system of content, content delivery, tools for prep, and tools for play (what I called D&Di 2.0) is most likely going to come from WotC. They have the most incentive to create such as system because they control the biggest game property and have the capital to invest in such as system.

I think you contradict yourself. When the system was open then it was a period where most oars were pulling in the same direction, within and outside of WotC. Most of what WotC has done is piggyback their more "unified system" on tech ideas that were innovated either outside the hobby or inside the hobby but outside of WotC, but while content was open and thus the best to use. That content door has been closed by WotC so those who are not part of WotC who are going to be developing in the future are either going to have to develop generically (this is for any RPG content, wink, wink) or going to have to seek non-WotC content.

Will cool stuff come from Paizo, IGR, White Wolf, Steve Jackson, Mongoose, etc? Absolutely! Will it be innovative? Yes. Will it change the industry and vault the company and it's game to a level even half the size of D&D? IMO unlikely.

For you, everything regarding change in the industry is still measured based on the bottomline of WotC and D&D. Don't get me wrong, people always liked the idea of making a little money with their hobby gaming and games development (even regarding RPGing in particular), but a lot more people do not work at WotC or for D&D than do, by a long, long stretch. Most of those people have no illusions regarding whether or not there will ever be 'D&D-sized money bags' in their future. The measure of innovation and whether it is good for the hobby has little to do with where it comes from and whether or not it vaults a company to D&D level. Let's face it, if it is a good idea, it will spread and be adopted by others (especially by WotC).


Heck just look at the list you created for the RPG innovation thread and how you try to include WotC as the innovator in your list when almost everything on there was innovated outside WotC and many outside the industry. Even the Open Game License is a co-opted idea, although it is probably the closest to a true RPG innovation on your list. But WotC walked away from that one some time ago. That's one of the problems with always measuring the worth of things based on a financial bottomline, you lose track of the things that have great value in other ways if they don't measure up to the money.

 

[bySwarm]

I agree with you that I think WotC shot themselves in the foot by moving to a new license that makes about anything but adventure and setting book publishing out of the question for other companies. I do not think they necessarily shot themselves in the foot financially, but I think they shot themselves in the foot at the cost of being a part of future innovations that come from outside their walls. I believe that if the Next Big Thing comes for Savage Worlds, Pathfinder or some other system that has more OGL-like licensing, it could be a pretty significant shift of gaming hobbyist area as lifetime gamers move from D&D to other products because of the gaming experience they offer.

 

[SSquirrel]

Yes, I guess I wasn't clear. I would advocate less AI than a CRPG and more free form "DM makes the rules play" The "rulesy" programed stuff would be for things like die rolls, line of sight, distance tracking, area effects etc.

Sitting around the room you all have a tablet in your lap which has your character sheet and powers and such. The DM has the battle area drawn up and your tokens are all showing locations and such, as well as condition trackers. Dice rollers on the tablets can handle the rolls or you can roll manually and the DM enters them. Or maybe someone has a camera setup similar to how some of those PS3 games work for SONY and it reads the results of your die rolls and auto enters them in the system. After he enters them the initiative order pops up, flashing your screen (or a small sound) when your turn comes up.

You can move your character where you want, then touch a target. Spells that are not in range will fade a bit or disappear from your screen, leaving potential actions, including the page 42 DMG free-form options. It would also show all targets who would be affected by AOE attacks, etc.

Is this a cheap investment? No, but it is a possible future and seems pretty cool to me.

 

[Dragon Snack]

I think it's going the other way. Not electronic aids or expensive gadgets, but something simple and cheap - therefor easily/cheaply adaptable...

Look at the gaming innovations of the past. They didn't ask for a big up front investment (although you may get there eventually). CCGs? A couple of bucks for a pack. The OGL? Put your stuff up on a website.

A few years ago a 3PP was making waves about a game marketed through dollar stores. While I'm not sure that drastic an approach is needed (there is such a thing as making your product too cheap and judging from the recent posts I've seen from this publisher they have tabled the idea as well), I found the idea intriguing. Lower the cost of entry into gaming and attract more people who are curious about it. The Savage Worlds Explorer's Edition does this somewhat (it outsold D&D at my store until I put D&D on sale), but I think it needs higher production values and more of a push into big box stores.

It frustrates the LGS owner in me, but drawing more people into the gaming community should be a priority. Moreso than pricing them out of gaming at least...

 

[nedjer]

I think it's going the other way. Not electronic aids or expensive gadgets, but something simple and cheap - therefor easily/cheaply adaptable...

Look at the gaming innovations of the past. They didn't ask for a big up front investment (although you may get there eventually). CCGs? A couple of bucks for a pack. The OGL? Put your stuff up on a website.

A few years ago a 3PP was making waves about a game marketed through dollar stores. While I'm not sure that drastic an approach is needed (there is such a thing as making your product too cheap and judging from the recent posts I've seen from this publisher they have tabled the idea as well), I found the idea intriguing. Lower the cost of entry into gaming and attract more people who are curious about it. The Savage Worlds Explorer's Edition does this somewhat (it outsold D&D at my store until I put D&D on sale), but I think it needs higher production values and more of a push into big box stores.

It frustrates the LGS owner in me, but drawing more people into the gaming community should be a priority. Moreso than pricing them out of gaming at least...

As the publisher of a full free fantasy system its refreshing to hear a store owner take the view that lowering the entry cost for tabletop RPGs could be of benefit all round.

To me it would make sense for a store to go to local schools and libraries, or people leaving a game store without buying an RPG, and give them a 'try before you buy with a downloadable free game' leaflet. I base that on the 'goodwill' and increased number of players which might result.

When I happened to speak to a store owner about this he practically reached for a shotgun and ran me out of two. So maybe that'd be an innovation too far

 

[Scott_Rouse]

I think you contradict yourself. When the system was open then it was a period where most oars were pulling in the same direction, within and outside of WotC. Most of what WotC has done is piggyback their more "unified system" on tech ideas that were innovated either outside the hobby or inside the hobby but outside of WotC, but while content was open and thus the best to use. That content door has been closed by WotC so those who are not part of WotC who are going to be developing in the future are either going to have to develop generically (this is for any RPG content, wink, wink) or going to have to seek non-WotC content.

Mark, I don't feel like I am contradicting myself and at the end of the day it's my opinion, and nobody else has to agree with it.

The OP asked:

So my question is simple. What if any will be the next innovation or revolution in our beloved hobby?

I take the OPs question as game changing, growing the category, vaulting a company into a higher level of operation type of innovation. Magic: the Gathering is listed. This lucky break of the right game at the right time put WotC on the map and gave them the capital to eventually buy TSR. If it weren't for M:TG WotC would likely have failed as a business in the mid 90's. With that in mind, I am coming at this from the big innovation = big cost. I am thinking capital investment of tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. There are a handful of companies that can handle the type of investment I am talking about. WotC, White Wolf/CCP, Fantasy Flight, ProFantasy, Mongoose, GamesWorkshop, maybe Paizo. IMO the most likely place this will happen is WoTC because they have a) the capital, b) the biggest property (at this time), c) the audience. The company that will make the biggest bet is likely the one that expects to have the best chance of winning.

My second most likely is White Wolf/CCP. Eve Online makes a lot of money, they have good properties, smart people work there with experience in technology, and they have infrastructure (servers etc).

I don't think the potential reward in the TableTop RPG industry is worth the time and investment of most companies outside the industry, the ROI for larger scale development is not there. But there will still be innovative ideas developed. For example, some grad students at MIT are doing some neat applications for RPG play with Microsoft Surface. I don't see Microsoft suddenly making a RPG product for Surface but maybe the ideas from MIT trigger someone else to develop a similar application on their own as a hobby or pet project.

For you, everything regarding change in the industry is still measured based on the bottomline of WotC and D&D. Don't get me wrong, people always liked the idea of making a little money with their hobby gaming and games development (even regarding RPGing in particular), but a lot more people do not work at WotC or for D&D than do, by a long, long stretch. Most of those people have no illusions regarding whether or not there will ever be 'D&D-sized money bags' in their future. The measure of innovation and whether it is good for the hobby has little to do with where it comes from and whether or not it vaults a company to D&D level. Let's face it, if it is a good idea, it will spread and be adopted by others (especially by WotC).

Again, I was answering what I thought to be the OPs question of innovation that would drive commercial success. Yes, good ideas are plentiful and some of the best ideas are definitely going to come from the smaller companies and relative unknowns but I have the somewhat pessimistic viewpoint that most good ideas never amount to large scale commercial success for the creators. Rarely do good ideas get funding and become the "game changers". Going back to M:TG, Richard Garfield's trading card game may never have taken off if it weren't for Peter Adkinson's company funding development and production.

Heck just look at the list you created for the RPG innovation thread and how you try to include WotC as the innovator in your list when almost everything on there was innovated outside WotC and many outside the industry. Even the Open Game License is a co-opted idea, although it is probably the closest to a true RPG innovation on your list. But WotC walked away from that one some time ago. That's one of the problems with always measuring the worth of things based on a financial bottomline, you lose track of the things that have great value in other ways if they don't measure up to the money.

Of the list below, only one is thing is directly attributed to WoTC and the OGL was not a 100% new and unique concept. Innovation does not always equal invention. The open source movement was not created by Ryan Dancey, but as with many innovations, it is often less about original creation and more about how others ideas are applied in new ways. Gygax was just riffing off war games and Zeppelin was just playing the blues with amplification and reverb, doesn't mean it wasn't innovative.

D&D 3e and the OGL
PDF format and distribution via RPGNow/Drivethru RPG
Print on Demand
Pre-painted plastic miniatures
e-Character Creators (e-tools, PC Gen, D&Di etc)
Internet game tables (Fantasy Grounds, Game Table Online)
Online rules databases (d20srd.org, D&Di Compendium)
RPG based web communities (ENWorld etc)
Web based RPG resource services (Obsidian Portal, D&D Insider)

If I was able to really predict innovation, I wouldn't be here telling the world about what i thought the next big thing would be. It's, just my one man's opinion on what I interpret to be the question the OP posted.

 

[SSquirrel]

I think it's going the other way. Not electronic aids or expensive gadgets, but something simple and cheap - therefor easily/cheaply adaptable...

Look at the gaming innovations of the past. They didn't ask for a big up front investment (although you may get there eventually). CCGs? A couple of bucks for a pack. The OGL? Put your stuff up on a website.

I'm thinking less a matter of needing to buy these and instead the benefits of having them enhance what you already have. I know several friends who have iPhones (and a few who even produce their own apps) and they would likely make use of some of the D&D apps if they were gamers.

When the Walkman first came out it was very expensive, but it was a great way to be able to take your cassettes w/you and listen to music everywhere. Eventually they became really cheap, having reached the level of "commodity". As the tech behind these items increases, you will be able to push the cost of items that perform this function (and well) lower and lower.

It may be a few years in coming, but I can definitely see a RPG group of the near future sitting around doing things like that.

 

[Dragon Snack]

As the publisher of a full free fantasy system its refreshing to hear a store owner take the view that lowering the entry cost for tabletop RPGs could be of benefit all round.

Well, note that I did say there is such a thing as "too cheap".

The real key is to have other products available as a revenue producer, so that you aren't just giving away the store.

I probably also have a differing viewpoint than other store owners from trying to build a local gaming community from scratch. RPGs, miniature games, and board games have been slow sellers because there just weren't that many people playing them.

Magic took off because of 2 previous card shops in the area - people knew the game and it was easy to pick up a $4 booster.

Savage Worlds "took off" (using the term loosely) because it had a much lower buy in than D&D - people knew D&D but were more willing to take a chance on Savage Worlds to test the RPG waters.

A lower price point makes adaptation easier. Even WotC priced the original 3E books at $20.