This happened days ago, and I don’t know how I missed it. It’s the Open Screen Project, which boils down to Adobe making a big move with Flash.
What did they do, and what does it mean?
Here’s a few ways to think about this:
Rob Fahey has an editorial up on Eurogamer called “Genetically Modified Gaming” which makes the case that Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is lifting the key elements of an MMO, and is in fact the most important MMO release of the year.
This definitely echoes things I have said in the past about the ways in which online gaming is taking over single-player gaming. After all, the CoD series has always been about strong single-player narrative despite its multiplayer component. With the latest installment, there’s lots of MMOish things like persistent character advancement snuck in there.
On the other hand, I think it is worth asking if this is really what we want:
Player retention and the science of addiction is being expanded upon in innovative, groundbreaking ways
Put that baldly, it’s rather disturbing. I don’t want my games to be about the science of addiction! There are a lot of other qualities brought to the table by virtual worlds, and to my mind, it’s these other qualities that are better.
Mostly a joke, not an art game. 🙂 Astonishing how difficult it is this way, though!
Maybe someday the Polliwog will grow up to be a frog prince, but for now it’s still mostly a jam. This version is, I think, less of a trainwreck than the last one. 🙂 The piano’s gone, but it’s all still at 200bpm!
