Apparently this post over on EN World represented the height of swinery.  I'm not entirely sure why, perhaps the claim that indie rpgs were responsible for a lot of advances in the industry?  As far as I can tell, indie games have done almost nothing to actually advance the industry, simply because their market share is so small.  But that doesn't mean they haven't been responsible for some fantastic innovations.
 
Or have they?
 
This got me wondering... what have been the big innovations in gaming over, say, the past 10 years?  I mean in terms of games themselves, such as style, writing, mechanics and so forth, rather than business models (thus excluding probably the biggest "innovation" in the hobby, the advent of the OGL).  I want this to be completely distinct from popularity and influence, because obviously a game can be highly innovative but for business reasons not necessarily a big seller.
 
So what are they?

Can't help you there, TF. I'm the dense sort and wouldn't know innovation if it sat on my forehead. All I know is I ain't got any.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceCan't help you there, TF. I'm the dense sort and wouldn't know innovation if it sat on my forehead.

If innovation sat on my head, I'll recognize her instantly

(Slight derail. Is innovation even welcome in gaming?)

Regards,
David R

Quote from: David RIf innovation sat on my head, I'll recognize her instantly

(Slight derail. Is innovation even welcome in gaming?)

Regards,
David R

If I *did* recognize her, I'd deny it - my wife would kill me...

-clash

John Kim has written both on live journal and at his darkshire site about innovation and design trends over the years...but I'm in a rush so I can't provide links.

A lot of "innovations" are either reintroducing things that fell out of fashion a long time ago, or writing down things that it seems a lot of people took for granted but never codified. Some others are simply disseminating concepts that were invented earlier but never got a lot of attention. So in discussions of this sort you run into arguments over originality and credit. I think it's more useful to be aware of the issue than to let it sidetrack discussion. E.g., okay Apple copied a lot of ideas for the Mac interface from Xerox Parc, and maybe those ideas would have made their way into personal computers anyway, but the Mac still marks the breakout of GUIs and mice into the broad consumer PC market.

Heh. I still think of dice pools as innovative, but the idea is probably 20 years old...this decade? Drawing a blank, but indeed it's not something I really look for.

TheShadow

People seem, in the past few years, to have become more aware of the idea of look at system as forming and influencing the act of players telling the story instead of (or as well as) looking at it as forming and influencing the outcomes in the context of the fictional world and its rules.  It's a different viewpoint that lets people tackle some old problems quite easily, while creating a whole mess of new problems that never occurred in the previous type of system.

There's a lot more awareness of reward systems, and particularly experimentation with rewards given by one player to another player.  That one hasn't shaken out yet, because there's just so damn much ground, but it's found its way into some interesting games (with Primetime Adventures being, perhaps, the most well-known in this regard).

Well, I think bennies and num nums are fairly new.  If you don't consider them to be a strictly metagame version of hero points.

A few concepts in the GURPS 4e character creation strike me as fairly innovative.  The Cosmic enhancement in particular, a stackable trump card mechanism is such a no brainer in hind sight I'm amazed I've never seen it before.  Another one that wowed me is the disassemblable attributes.  Very neat.

Super focused games like DitV are also pretty new, even Pendragon didn't automatically make you a christian knight with divine favour and infallibility.

Setting wise, we've seen a number of games that went to entirely new places, like Low Life for Savage Worlds and the Snakes on a Plane RPG.

first, let´s get a little Schumpeter.
Then add some needed clarification:

1) basic innovation
2) procedural innovation
3) pseudo-innovation

Afterwards, let talks ensue.

Speaking of pseudo-innovation, I'm working on lots of shitty, single-premise games that I'm totally gonna release in *.pdf as "ashcan" special editions!



I think Burning Empires' scene management mechanics are really innovative. I'm trying to get a game together to see how they'll actually work in play. I'm hoping that the mechanics will support a more diffuse kind of play, with PCs able to maintain independent goals within a larger formalised framework than the traditional adventuring party. I don't know if they will though, until I get the game going.

Further back, I think Mage: the Ascension's minimal-limits magic system was really innovative. Until then, most folks were basically doing some sort of spell-based system involving resource management. I think it was pretty cool to get away from that into a toolkit approach and I think it worked out pretty well in play and has been somewhat influential (it seems to be a small influence on the Riddle of Steel and Iron Heroes systems, amongst others).

Also, D&D and the OGL was pretty innovative. No one's really mentioned that.

The only real MECHANICAL innovation ever made to the RPG was Amber's truly diceless strategic-competitive play, and that was a one-shot (no other game has really followed in its footsteps; a few of them pretended to but always fucked it up by trying to get some kind of a replacement for the roll of dice, whether it was some gimmick or some kind of beancounting).

Every other RPG ever has, when it comes down to it, just been variations on D&D.


The place where REAL innovations have happened are in presentation; things like layout, formatting, and in metaconcepts like single-mechanic resolution systems.

Most of the shit the forge has claimed to come up with have been either mental masturbation, pointing out the obvious that people have been doing since gaming began and claiming its "innovative" because you gave it a fucking label, or gimmicky nonsense (jenga or tiddlywinks as a game mechanic, anyone?).

RPGPundit

Here's one innovation that I was actually thinking of putting into an RPG before I got totally sidetracked: a diceless system that isn't just a variation on a dick-size competition (compare, biggest wins) and isn't just running a piggy-bank for magical powers (Nobilis).

I mean, chess isn't diceless and we don't think that motherfucker's a "rules-light" game with no real tactical heft.

Quote from: PseudoephedrineAlso, D&D and the OGL was pretty innovative. No one's really mentioned that.

Except for me.  In the original post.  Where I specifically excluded the OGL as it is more of a business model than a game mechanic.:rolleyes:

Quote from: Tyberious FunkExcept for me.  In the original post.  Where I specifically excluded the OGL as it is more of a business model than a game mechanic.:rolleyes:

Whoops, wasn't paying attention.

Quote from: RPGPunditEvery other RPG ever has, when it comes down to it, just been variations on D&D.

Really? There are 412 different English-language first editions (not including D&D and Chainmail) going by John Kim's list) just up till 1994... The first 100 rpgs published were,

(1971) Chainmail -
(1973) Dungeons and Dragons -
(1975) Tunnels and Trolls -
(1975) En Garde -
(1975) Empire of the Petal Throne -
(1975) Boot Hill -
(1975) The Complete Warlock -
(1976) Uuhraah! -
(1976) Bunnies and Burrows -
(1976) Starfaring -
(1976) Metamorphosis Alpha: Fantastic Role-Playing Game -
(1976) Monsters! Monsters! -
(1976) Knights of the Round Table -
(1977) Bifrost -     Volume 1: Faerie ed (1977) L.W.Felstead Ltd
(1977) Chivalry and Sorcery - 1st ed
(1977) Traveller -     1st ed by Marc Miller (1977) GDW
(1977) The Fantasy Trip -     Melee ed by Steve Jackson, Howard Thomson (1977) Metagaming
(1977) Superhero 2044 -     1st ed by Donald Saxman (1977) Gamescience
(1977) Flash Gordon and the Warriors of Mongo -     1st ed by Lin Carter, Scott Bizar (1977) FGU
(1977) Dungeons and Dragons -     Basic Set 1st ed ed by J. Eric Holmes (1977)
(1977) Space Quest -     1st ed by Paul Hume, George Nyhen (1977) Tyr Gamemakers Ltd
(1977) Star Patrol -     Space Patrol ed by Michael Scott Kurtick, Rockland Russo (1977) Gamescience
(1978) Adventures in Fantasy -     1st ed by Dave Arneson, Richard Snider (1978) Excalibre Games Inc.
(1978) Dungeons and Dragons,  Advanced -     1st ed by Gary Gygax (1978) TSR
(1978) Starships and Spacemen -     1st ed by Leonard H. Kanterman (1978) FGU
(1978) The Complete Warlock -     1st ed by Robert Cowan, Dave Clark, Kenneth M. Dahl, Nick Smith (1978) Balboa, Inc.
(1978) Simian Combat -     1st ed by Marshall Rose, Norman Knight (1978) Avant-Garde Simulations Perspetives
(1978) The Infinity System -     1st ed by Derrick Charbonnet, Terry Podgorski (1978) Threshold Games
(1978) John Carter, Warlord of Mars -     1st ed by M. S. Matheny (1978) Heritage Models
(1978) Legacy -     1st ed by David A. Feldt (1978) Legacy Press
(1978) High Fantasy -     1st ed by Jeffrey C. Dillow (1978) Fantasy Productions Inc.
(1978) Age of Chivalry -     1st ed by Marshall Rose (1978) Avant-Garde Simulations Perspectives
(1978) Gamma World -     1st ed by James M. Ward, Gary Jaquet (1978) TSR
(1978) Once Upon a Time in the West -     1st ed by Beck, Spencer (1978) Tabletop Games
(1978) What Price Glory?! -     1st ed by John Dankert, Jim Lauffenburger (1978) self-published
(1978) RuneQuest -     1st ed by Steve Perrin, Ray Turney, Steve Henderson, Warren James, Greg Stafford (1978) Chaosium
(1978) Star Trek: Adventure Gaming in the Final Frontier -     1st ed by Michael Scott (1978) Heritage Models
(1978) Realm of Yolmi -     1st ed by Ken Black, Marshall Rose (1978) Avant-Garde Simulations Perspectives
(1979) Buccaneer -     1st ed by Carl Smith (1979) Adversary Games
(1979) Heroes -     1st ed by Dave Millard (1979) Tabletop Games
(1979) Mortal Combat -     1st ed by David John Morris, Steve Foster, Andrew Murdin (1979) Waynflett House Ltd (UK)
(1979) Commando -     1st ed by Eric Goldberg, Greg Costikyan, John Butterfield (1979) SPI
(1979) Ysgarth -     1st ed by David Nalle (1979) Ragnarok Press
(1979) Villians and Vigilantes -     1st ed by Jeff Dee, Jack Herman (1979) FGU
(1979) Crimson Cutlass -     1st ed by George Rahm, Joseph Hilmer (1979) Better Games
(1979) Gangster! -     1st ed by Nick Marinacci, Pete Petrone (1979) FGU
(1980) Knights and Magic -     1st ed by Arnold Hendrick (1980) Heritage Models
(1980) The Archaereon Game System -     Mage ed by Wilf K. Backhaus (1980) Archaereon Games Ltd.
(1980) Supergame -     1st ed by Jay Hartlove, Aimee Karklyn (1980) DAG Productions
(1980) Skull and Crossbones -     1st ed by Gerald D. Seypura, Anthony LeBoutillier (1980) FGU
(1980) Laserburn -     1st ed by Bryan Ansell, Richard Halliwell, Tony Ackland (1980) Tabletop Games
(1980) Land of the Rising Sun -     1st ed by Lee Gold (1980) FGU
(1980) Star Patrol -     1st ed (1980)
(1980) Rolemaster -     1st ed by S. Coleman Charlton, Peter C. Fenlon, Kurt H. Fischer, Terry K. Amthor (1980) Iron Crown Enterprises
(1980) Bushido -     1st ed by Paul Hume, Bob Charrette (1980) Tyr / Phoenix Games
(1980) Basic Role-Playing -     1st ed by Greg Stafford, Lynn Willis (1980) Chaosium
(1980) Castle Perilous -     1st ed by James T. Sheldon (1980) West Wind Simulations
(1980) Acquitane -     1st ed by Carl Smith (1980) Adversary Games
(1980) Beasts, Men, & Gods -     1st ed by Bill Underwood (1980) Imagination Unlimited Imagination Unlimited The Game Masters
(1980) The Atlantean Trilogy: The Arcanum, The Lexicon, The Bestiary -     1st ed by Stephan Michael Sechi, Vernie Taylor (1980) Bard Games
(1980) The Morrow Project -     1st ed by Kevin Dockery, Robert Sadler, Richard Tucholka (1980) Timeline, Inc.
(1980) Melanda: Land of Mystery -     1st ed by Lee McCormick, John Corradin (1980) Wilmark Dynasty
(1980) Dragonquest -     1st ed by Eric Goldberg, David James Ritchie, Edward J. Woods (1980) SPI
(1980) Dallas -     1st ed by James F. Dunnigan (1980) SPI
(1980) The Hammer of Thor: The Game of Norse Mythology -     1st ed by Joe Angiolillo (1980) Gameshop
(1980) KABAL -     1st ed by Ernest T. Hams (1980) Kabal Gaming Systems
(1980) Space Opera -     1st ed by Ed Simbalist, A. Mark Ratner, Phil McGregor (1980) FGU
(1980) Odysseus -     1st ed by Marshall Rose (1980) FGU
(1980) Top Secret -     1st ed by Merle M. Rasmussen (1980) TSR
(1981) Fringeworthy -     1st ed by Richard Tucholka (1981) Tri-Tac Games
(1981) Wizard's Realm -     1st ed by Niels Erickson, C. Polite, W.G. Murphy (1981) Mystic Swamp
(1981) Star Rovers -     1st ed by Stocken, Hoffman, Hoffman, Hargrave, Huey, Lortz (1981) Archive Miniatures and Game Systems
(1981) Champions -     1st ed by George MacDonald, Steve Peterson (1981) Hero Games
(1981) Aftermath -     1st ed by Bob Charrette, Paul Hume (1981) FGU
(1981) Crimefighters -     1st ed by David "Zeb" Cook (1981) TSR
(1981) Spawn of Fashan -     1st ed by Kirby Lee Davis (1981) Games of Fashan
(1981) The Official Superhero Adventure Game -     1st ed by Brian Phillips (1981) self-published
(1981) Weapons and Warriors -     1st ed by Robert Alan Beatty (1981) self-published
(1981) Arduin Adventure -     1st ed by David A. Hargrave (1981) Grimoire Games
(1981) Wild West -     1st ed by Anthony P. LeBoutillier, Gerald D. Seypura (1981) FGU
(1981) Stormbringer -     1st ed by Ken St. Andre, Steve Perrin (1981) Chaosium
(1981) The Mechanoid Invasion -     1st ed by Kevin Siembieda (1981) Palladium Books
(1981) Spacefarers: Rules for Science Fiction Skirmish Adventures -     1st ed by Bryan Ansell, Richard Halliwell, Tony Ackland, Richard Priestly (1981) Games Workshop
(1981) Call of Cthulhu -     1st ed by Sandy Petersen (1981) Chaosium
(1981) Heroes of Olympus -     1st ed by B. Dennis Sustare (1981) Task Force Games
(1981) Merc -     1st ed by Paul D. Baader, Walter Mark, Lawrence Sangee (1981) FGU
(1981) Universe -     1st ed by John H. Butterfield (1981) SPI
(1982) Taste My Steel -     1st ed by Don Johnson (1982) Phantasy Network
(1982) Second Dawn -     1st ed by Art Wiederhold, George J. Herget (1982) Arrose Enterprises
(1982) Simulacron I -     1st ed by Mark Manning (1982) Simulacron I
(1982) Gangbusters -     1st ed by Mark Acres, Rick Krebs, Tom Moldvay (1982) TSR
(1982) Starleader: Assault -     1st ed by Howard Thompson (1982) Metagaming
(1982) Cassiopean Empire -     1st ed by Raymond Norton (1982) Norton Games
(1982) M.I.S.S.I.O.N. -     1st ed by Ernest T. Hams (1982) Kabal Gaming Systems
(1982) Dawn Patrol -     1st ed by Mike Carr et al. (1982) TSR
(1982) Swordbearer -     1st ed by Arnold Hendrick, Dennis Sustare (1982) Heritage Models
(1982) Supervillians -     1st ed by Rick Register, R. Vance Buck, Allen D. Eldridge (1982) Task Force Games
(1982) Man, Myth, and Magic -     1st ed by Herbie Brennan (1982) Yaquinto
(1982) Phase VII -     1st ed by Dennis Drew II (1982) Cheshire Games
(1982) FTL:2448 -     1st ed by Richard Tucholka (1982) Tri-Tac Games


Are you sure all of them were just variations on D&D? Surely some of them had some innovation in there...