How Do Games Grow Up?

Gamasutra is running a piece by game designer Brice Morrison questioning the lack of games for grown-ups — or, more accurately, the lack of an intellectual progression in games like that which exists for books, movies, and other creative works. "While my interests in other media grew substantially more adult — from Nickelodeon to CNN, from Dr. Seuss to George Orwell — games did not seem to have a more intelligent counterpart for me to move on to. As I entered college, I became less interested in mindless entertainment and more interested in encountering new ideas. I didn't want to kill time; I wanted to take advantage of it. I wanted to challenge myself with profound concepts, to learn of new paradigms, processes, and possibilities. ... So what exactly are the barriers of entry for great thinkers (or groups of thinkers) to leave their mark on games? What must happen for games — or interactive entertainment, if you will, to mature as a medium?"

Re:My advice - don't look for satisfaction in game

[ciderVisor]

Being good at Guitar Hero won't give you much benefit when you actually try to play a real guitar. In fact, the immediate good results you get from GH could actually discourage you from going through the basics of learning how to play the real thing properly.

The reason is technical

[HertzaHaeon]

I think the reason is partly technical. Games are by definition interactive. Interactivity requires logical rules that can be expressed in programming. But there aren't any good programming solutions for social or intellectual interaction. Gaming AI is still in its infancy, even if people are working to change that. Right now it's much easier to model objects colliding than people being social or intelligent.

Games' focus on guns, cars and jumping can surely be attributed to a range of reasons, including tradition and male domination, but I think it's primarily because there's no way of realizing anything else in code yet. We're still waiting for an AI revolution that can match the graphical revolution we've seen in the last decade.

Re:Adult vs not-for-kids

[aadvancedGIR]

That kind of thing exists to a certain extend, for example in The Witcher (the non-humans are persecuted by the humans and have opted for guerilla warfare, while guarding crates of weapons, you are faced with a small group of them who pretend your boss is OK with them (but he didn't mention any expeted visit when describing the job), would you let them take a few crates or kill them?) or Fable II (OK, the second example has a too obvious good/evil dichotomy, but it's fun to play according to the moral values you chosed for yourself).

Re:breaking up the narritive

[Ifandbut]

Deus Ex. Might not be as recent as you want but it certainly had a great mix of narrative and gameplay.

Something more recent but not as good, Assassin's Creed and the Halo Saga.

Re:breaking up the narritive

[Fallingcow]

Another nod to Deus Ex here. My favorite games provide "literary" qualities alongside good gameplay, and Deus Ex is a perfect example of that, exploring political and individual philosophy in surprisingly great depth.

Bits of Chesterton's The Man who was Thursday are scattered around the game. Moral choices are made. Free will and the nature of humanity is examined. The final decision in the game is essentially picking which of Aristotle's "good" governments you'd prefer (democratic city-states (Tong), aristocracy (Illuminati), or Philosopher-King (merge with AI)). Very deep, especially for a game that's primarily an FPS.