Thing is that you get marginal evolution when you have big budgets and venture capitalists beating down your door to return profits.  So, the issue then ends up being that the process venture capitalists use to decide what to invest, is proven track record.  And my take, from a gaming standpoint, is anything that is proven, very likely ends up dull and fails to surprise.

I think of games like Dead Space and Mirror's Edge as being heralded as innovative.  They are both in the FPS genre, and really not really new and innovative.  They are refinements on an established genre, rather than something new.

where did you read that El Shaddia took 75 mill to make? thats fuckin retarded thats like FFXlll levels.

Decline is already happening in japan and only grew this generation due to wii and ds. Also most growth comes from more markets opening like the middle east. 

But this video tell wonderfully 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5foJ-cwj4Mk

Someone apparently mistranslated an article:

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=131192

But still, say that $20-$50 million ends up being the costs for an AAA title, and if you have EA saying they will spend $100 million to market Battlefield 3 alone, that is nuts.  Will go $20-$50 million (or even higher):

http://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/4518/how-much-does-it-cost-to-produce-a-major-video-game

They would have to sell millions and millions of copies to be able to break even.

I have been having concerns about this since around '05/06 and my fears have come reality almost 100% of the time.

Have to wonder where things would be without Nintendo.  As of now, the top buzz generator as far as new IP goes?  I believe it is Angry Birds.  That is a sign of the times.

Indie games on the PC are still around. Frozen Synapse is the most recent "holy shit this is awesomely new" type of game. Problem is that they don't advertise, and it's not on something that fits in your pocket that requires less than 3 neurons to set up and get going. Shame really.

Edit: The problem is that all the money is with the least common denominator, and just like everything else the least common denominator in gaming are the idiots.

Since when has Dead Space ever been a FPS?

EDIT: And I'd also like to add that the notion that something has to be a new genre to be innovative is absurd.

Well, I see they will either act like a sheep and get married to a brand, or get bored of a genre and move on.  Neither one is healthy unless the industry tries to go blue ocean.

Given how many millions shit like CoD is selling, I'm gonna go with option 1.