I interviewed as many of the video game fanatics I knew about what they wanted the next big video game innovation to be and I was surprised to find out that just about everyone said that they just wanted improvements to the games we already have.  But this makes a lot of sense because if everyone could think of new innovating video games, everyone would be releasing hit titles.

It makes sense that out of the people I interviewed improvements to the games they played was the most common answer.  They are the people most likely to know what improvements to games are needed because they spend every available waking hour playing them.  The most popular changes people wanted were more balanced multiplayer experiences and more games that support player-made content.

There are already many ways for players to create and share their own content.  Just last year Microsoft released XNA so that people could share their indie games with the Xbox Live community.  Some companies like Valve release software developer kits for their games allowing people to create their own custom modifications, maps, or even entire games.  Harmonics, the creators of Rock Band, have just launched the Rock Band Network that lets musicians work their own music into the game and even gives them a chance to share what they’ve got with the world.

Multiplayer gaming is not an easy feature to include in a game.  Not every developer chooses to include it in their games and few perfect it.  With online gaming communities growing larger and larger there have been increasing demands for multiplayer experiences to be fairer but it is not easy to make sure that a game can have an even and fun multiplayer.  Every game is built differently and plays differently so there is no one sure fire way to create a perfect multiplayer.  The best way to create a good multiplayer is to develop your game specifically for that purpose instead of making it just another bullet point on the back of the game box.  Centering the focus of your game on the multiplayer experience is something expertly demonstrated by Team Fortress 2.

Team Fortress 2 was developed with the intention of creating a well balanced multiplayer experience that is fun for everyone and so far it has been one of the most successful games to hit the industry.  The game maker uses a class based system so that the developers can focus their attention on each individual character keeping them all in tune with each other making sure that no one was over or under powered.  The classes were all balanced so well that upon the game’s release new weapons and items were added so that players could customize their characters to their own personal playing style.  Along with online gaming having players connected to the Internet also allows developers to update their games weeks, months, or years after the game is released to the public because with thousands of players someone is bound to find a bug that needs fixing.  I think video gamers have a bright future to look forward to whether it is filled with new and exciting innovations or just improvements on old ones.