In August 2006, I had just moved to LA and didn't have internet yet, so was computing in the Interactive Media Lab, while a professor was lecturing on game design. The professor was covering the usual front matter, when I was taken aback by something I overheard. The professor said something like: We do not encourage first-person shooters, because first-person shooters are a solved problem. I shook my head. A solved problem? I thought to myself, "What about Portal?" It wasn't my class, so I didn't want to interrupt, and besides, like many hyped game ideas, (such as morphing in Black & White or Fable) it might just have been hype.
Then about a month ago I played Portal. It was the most fun I've had with a videogame all year, and it was innovative. I don't like FPSes, swiveling the camera makes me nauseous and shooting people in a pseudo-realistic manner disgusts me (sorry, Chronicles of Riddick, you're good but I can't stomach shivving random people up close and personal).
I don't even call Portal a first-person shooter; I call it a first-person puzzler. But regardless of semantics, it's a first-person shooter engine and user interface, and bundled with 4 first-person shooters. When I showed the game to RJ, he told me of where the concept and team came from: Narbacular Drop, a senior student game at DigiPen, which was already recognized for its innovation back in 2006. I hadn't known about it, and I guess the professor that thought first-person shooters were solved hadn't known either. Compared to the polish of Portal, Nabacular Drop is a mere rough sketch with a number of frustrating elements in the simulation and user interface. Having played Portal, I didn't stick with it beyond a few of the puzzles after repeating due to ambiguous user interface and unsteady difficulty ramping in the level design. But I'm glad that those students didn't think that first-person shooters were a solved problem! The Nabacular team was hired by Valve to make Portal. And despite my physical nausea in first-person shooters, Portal was one of my pinnacles of joy this year.
Anyway, aside from trying to go beyond blanket statements, I saw this article on physics as gameplay, which explores what was going through my head after playing Portal. What other space or physics can an FPS toy with? I was impressed at how this article went under the hood and discussed not only the dreamy what-if's favored by designers, but also the hardware constraints and costs for physics. It keeps the possibilities grounded in the realm of the practical.
Although separate from the simulation, also of interest for its rigor and rich examples is this article about design lessons from input device hardware. For a short article, John Harris' historical breadth is oustanding. I do wish a little more were said about the Wii motion wand, since titles like Smooth Moves and Rayman Raving Rabbids have made novel use thereof. For example, in Bunnies don't like gifts, you pound your arms rapidly, isomorphic to the result of a Track & Field sprint, but the controller itself generates a physiological response... a heightened heart rate from the mild cardiovascular exertion. I'd really be interested in hearing more examples of novel input devices and their design implications.