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Originally Posted by remixor
I'm sorry, but I have to side completely with Trep here. The graphic adventure genre, in its youngest years, was responsible for some big innovations but since then it really has hardly changed at all, much less innovated. Can you give some solid reasoning and evidence as to why you think the adventure genre is the most diverse and experimental of genres? That seems quite far-fetched to me.
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Perhaps our definitions of diversity are different - or what we would base diversity on - but I personally base it on variation in gameplay and approach:
. Emphasis on story, puzzles, or a balance of both.
. Emphasis on experience or interaction or both.
. Environments: 2D handdrawn, 2D rendered, 3D, photographic.
. Use of cinematics or no cinematics.
. Characters: hand animated, 3d animated, photographic.
. Story: comedy, serious, horror, supernatural, historical, pun, scifi, realism, suspense, mystery, investigation. Populated worlds, sparse worlds.
. Interface: typing, keyboard-direct control, mouse-direct control, point-and-click. Large verb menus, small verb menus, context sensitive actions. First person, second person, third person, no person.
. Puzzle types: Dialogue, conversation, Object with object, Object with environment, Mechanical, Word puzzles, cryptograms, anagrams, Classics (jumping peg, chess, checkers, etc), Strategic, Translation, Riddles, Decoding, decyphering, decrypting, Physics, Mixing, chemistry, Tape splicing, Numerical, Using traits/skills of other characters, Jigsaw, torn paper, Musical, sound, Bribery, Mathematical, Timing, action, twitch, Mazes, Sliding, internet-interaction, right-place-at-right-time. Abstract, realism, lateral-thinking.
. Adventure games have experimented with: action elements, RPG elements, strategy elements, exploration, confined puzzles, linearity, different types of non-linearity, realtime worlds, single-room worlds, all manner of interfaces, graphics/no-graphics, all graphical and graphics styles, etc etc etc etc.
. The adventure genre has seen a wide range of sub-genres (and has even lead to the creation of entirely new genres): interactive-fiction, graphical, action-adventure, rpg-adventure, survival, point-and-click, direct-control, the whole range of 1st- 2nd- and 3rd-person, and even no-person, artificial intelligence, multiplayer etc.
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I could keep going, but that's a fair example of what I consider diversity within the adventure genre.
I haven't sat down and made similar lists for the more mainstream genres - platformers, shootemups, FPS, rpg, sports, etc - but I don't think you're going to find anywhere near the same variation you see in adventure games. To me, the adventure genre is so wide ranging that I even wonder if it's not several real genres lumped under one title.
I don't know. How is your thinking different?
