Original games

[madbringer]

As I was sitting on the crapper today, I was struck by a thought; when was the last time a game was truly original? The setting, gameplay, concept. It all seems derivative, if not outright a remake. What is your last original game?

[Acrux]

What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun.
- Ecclesiastes 1:9

The most recent original game I can think of is Vessels

[Fargus]

I was also sitting on a crapper today and i remembered the plot of a game called Evil Islands. Where due to the curse (or blessing in this case) main character transforms from a ****** into a white male with blond hair and forgets about his niggering days. That was truly original plot twist for an rpg and i never thought about it before... but here you go.

I don't remember what was my last original game to be honest, they stopped feeling original somewhere in the late 2000s. Can probably give a small list of old games i consider original for one reason or another but i'm ******* lazy.

[madbringer]

I don't remember what was my last original game to be honest, they stopped feeling original somewhere in the late 2000s. Can probably give a small list of old games i consider original for one reason or another but i'm ******* lazy.

Go for it. For my part, the last truly original game I played was Deus Ex. It was derivative in gameplay, but the plot felt very fresh. Conspiracy theories coming true, sticking to historical facts, in a fictional setting. That sold me.

[rusty_shackleford]

Survival-crafting is probably the most 'original' recent genre. Though they have their roots in a much older and barely known indie game: Stranded 2.
https://www.unrealsoftware.de/game_stranded2.php

I think, but have no way to know for sure, the 'building' in these games was heavily inspired by Fallout 4 of all titles. If anyone can find me similar 'snapping' settlement building prior to Fallout 4, I'd be interested.

[Fargus]

Go for it. For my part, the last truly original game I played was Deus Ex. It was derivative in gameplay, but the plot felt very fresh. Conspiracy theories coming true, sticking to historical facts, in a fictional setting. That sold me.

Ok.

I agree about Deus Ex so i start with it. Deus Ex to this day still feels original to me, highly replayable, in fact gameplay gives me the kind of experience and enjoyment like no other games of this type. As well as amazing atmosphere, especially in urbanistic areas like in New York. So it's still unmatched. Not to mention this game drops some truth bombs even to this day.

Silent Storm when i played it back in the days had 3d destruction unlike anything i've seen before, when you could level an entire building or shoot your enemies through the floor with an lmg. Of course Jagged Alliance 2 did the similar thing earlier but with 2d graphics and less detailed.

Rune (2000) melee dismemberment mechanics. Cut off goblin's arm and beat him to death with it. I doubt it was the first game that did this kind a thing, but the first one in my memory that did it so well. And the story and setting were good too. First ever scandinavian mythology game ive played.

Morrowind's setting felt unique and original. And still is. Whether you like the game or not it is hard to deny how charming and alien the Vvardenfell is.

Arx Fatalis. The spell system. Or the fact that you can just sit back and fry some fish or bake bread in 'real time', years before survival craze in games. And it was very atmospheric and immersive.

The game called Diggles: Myth of Fenris. Was probably the first colony sim i remember, but back then i dont think colony sim was much of a thing. Every dwarf felt alive, they visually aged and died and they had something akin to genetic memory when part of their skills passed to their offspring. It was all around unique game at the time. But one thing that blew my mind was liquid physics. If you find some body of water and dig through the bottom of it the water would just flush down the hole. Something i saw decade later in Terraria, but less impressive because its just a pixel platformer. Overall 2000s german gamedev brought a lot of gems like Gothic games, Spellforce, The Guild, Spellforce and some others.

Max Payne for bullet time mechanics.

Stalker SoC was unique because of setting, atmosphere and the plot.

Stronghold. Best siege mechanics in my memory. And the devs from Firefly still struggle to make anything even remotely as good to this day.

Mount and Blade for blending action rpg, simulation and strategic elements. And sieges of course. It's one thing to experience a siege in something like stronghold and another where you have to fight alongside your troops and issue orders. And lets not forget horse combat.

After 2000s everything went stale and in current year originality is something that is actively being discouraged.

[madbringer]

Go for it. For my part, the last truly original game I played was Deus Ex. It was derivative in gameplay, but the plot felt very fresh. Conspiracy theories coming true, sticking to historical facts, in a fictional setting. That sold me.

Rune (2000) dismemberment mechanics. Cut off goblin's arm and beat him to death with it. I doubt it was the first game that did this kind a thing, but the first one in my memory that did it so well. And the story and setting were good too. First ever scandinavian mythology game ive played.

Oh man, 1 billion % agree. The dismemberment mechanics alone were very novel, but the setting and the fact it was a melee game, not a shooter, were dope
And done so well! I spent many hours as a teen playing Rune multiplayer in net cafes, it was something else.

[Fargus]

Go for it. For my part, the last truly original game I played was Deus Ex. It was derivative in gameplay, but the plot felt very fresh. Conspiracy theories coming true, sticking to historical facts, in a fictional setting. That sold me.

Rune (2000) dismemberment mechanics. Cut off goblin's arm and beat him to death with it. I doubt it was the first game that did this kind a thing, but the first one in my memory that did it so well. And the story and setting were good too. First ever scandinavian mythology game ive played.

Oh man, 1 billion % agree. The dismemberment mechanics alone were very novel, but the setting and the fact it was a melee game, not a shooter, were dope
And done so well! I spent many hours as a teen playing Rune multiplayer in net cafes, it was something else.

I did t a little clarification that it was melee dismemberment. Because if we take the gore and dismemberment in FPS games into account there are two other very impressive games in that regard. Soldier of Fortune 1 and 2.

I also played multiplayer a lot. I remember some old server called Sons of Northern Darkness where people used to just **** around and server messages even had offensive jokes.

[madbringer]

Survival-crafting is probably the most 'original' recent genre. Though they have their roots in a much older and barely known indie game: Stranded 2.
https://www.unrealsoftware.de/game_stranded2.php

I think, but have no way to know for sure, the 'building' in these games was heavily inspired by Fallout 4 of all titles. If anyone can find me similar 'snapping' settlement building prior to Fallout 4, I'd be interested.

I think one could argue the snapping and crafting mechanics can be backtraced to Dungeon Keeper, no? Maybe I'm reaching a bit but the idea is there.

[Klerik]

[General Reign]

That game Death Stranding was original and everyone just dismissed it. Sure, Kojima is super autistic, needs to die so someone else can run his studio. and the story was goofy ****, but it was fun.

That game Undertale was kinda original but it turned everyone into pedophile furry weirdos so I feel gay even mentioning it.

Project Zomboid is fairly original I just wish they made a game for the sandbox to serve a purpose.

Vagrant Story was original and they never made one like it again.

Most of the games in the sim genre on DOS were original.

ORIGINAL.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

The old trite answer of "risk".

There are lots of original indie games, but those indies don't have high production values so they don't appeal to everyone.

The higher production value games require hiring teams of people to produce. Even if your company is not "public" and you don't have shareholders or suits to be beholden to, as a leader you asked people to commit their limited spare time to work for you in the hopes that they would be able to support their families. You might have once had a motivation to make an original game, but now you also have the motivation to keep your promises and try to keep your people employed, which means you want your game to be successful enough to allow you to keep paying wages and keep people employed while making more games. And as an artist, you probably want to make art that people like. It's no good to spend a lot of time making a game that will just sit on your hard drive only occasionally be played by you.

D&D and videogames have been around for fifty years. There has been an enormous amount of trial and error that has been documented. People have generally figured out what most people like and how to be deliever on that (ie, RPGs where a party of heroes go on an adventure and get into encounters and fight people. Shooters where you shoot people. 1vs1 fighting games with ridiculous combo memorization for the elite. Etc). Yeah you can try to go off the beaten track, but given the two aforementioned motivations of wanting your game to be liked (before yourself and to employ other people), most devs are going to stick to the script of what is known to work.