I've talked repeatedly on these forums about my desire for less action games: less shooting and stabbing and killing, less space aliens and super spies. It's the reason I don't particularly like games like Gears of War or God of War.

Of all the people to share my sentiments, I didn't think the lead designer of Halo would be one of them. But apparently, he feels very much as I do. Here is a little blurb he gave to EGM:

"At some point in the next 20 years, people are going to get tired of fighting aliens, Nazis, zombies, and terrorists. It's a problem that is going to be difficult to solve not because game developers lack imagination or publishers are unwilling to take risks, but because there just aren't that many other settings you can use for a traditional [first-person shooter (FPS)]. You need guns...and lots of enemies to kill. So you can't do a good FPS about the mafia or a realistic crime thriller where each death is important and meaningful.... [This means] your options are limited to a couple historic wars, a present-day setting, and sci-fi."

He's specifically talking about the First Person Shooter genre, by the way, but his remarks could easily be applied everywhere. I've mentioned before that this is a very big issue for me, as I grow up and really don't have a lot of interest in games about super bad ass genetic soldiers that kill hundreds or thousands of people/humans/zombies/aliens. So, what do other people feel about this? 

Eh, sorta. Was really waxing the philosophic here.

My personal opinion has always been this -- as long as the pinnacle of gaming is Halo/GTA/Gears of War/God of War, where a single super spy/soldier/warrior kills dozens if not hundreds of people, as long as games are about shooting and stabbing and killing your way to ultimate victory, they will continue to be a market primarily for young males (say, 8-30). If we want to attract other people -- be they girls, women, the elderly, or my personal favorite, educated adults -- we have to do something different. I'm thinking less Banjo-Kazooie, and more The Sims, Brain Age and Wii Sports.

People seem to think that if Halo/God of War style games just get better and better graphics, with better gaming engines, suddenly adults will come to video gaming. This clearly isn't happening -- we've basically been stuck at the same market penetration of educated adults for 20 years. These games are not going to do it. By contrast, Tetris, The Sims, and the recent spat of Wii games have shown instant and immediate inroads to the adult market.

I'm not saying that the young-male demographic won't or shouldn't continue to see great games, I'm just saying that it's the only teat that video games have ever been nursed at, and it's getting tired and sore. We can't expect a multi billion dollar industry to survive, or grow, on that market alone.

It's a particularly quintessential failing of young males to think that everyone likes the same stuff they do, and if they could just make it cooler and more badass, then clearly everyone would obviously see how much fun it is. Many people don't want to kill stuff or shoot stuff, they want to solve puzzles and bake cookies. 

Meh not really, otherwise games like halo and the like might start to be seen as extremly nerdy (on the levels of Warhammer and the like). but hey as long as they continue to make quality games I won't care.

Well, I was looking for more of a discussion than an answer, but I do largely agree with your analysis.

Simply put -- whether you like Brain Age, Cooking Mama, The Sims and Wii Sports or not, most people should be happy, regardless of affilliation, that video games may be expanding into a full fledged entertainment market for all ages, genders, and lifestyles, and not simply a diversion for boys and young men. These games are the flagship titles in that push. Therefore, even if you don't play them yourself, I really believe you should appreciate their existance because of their significance to gaming as a whole.

Now, I do suspect that some people actually would prefer that all the games -- and all the billions of dollars producing them -- were spent entirely catering to their own interests, even if this means that gaming can never expand beyond the market it holds now. To those people I say: you're foolish, myopic and profoundly selfish. That's about as harsh a criticism as you will ever see me give here :p

there is nothing to discuss you want childish or family games i want stuff like Gow, its just how it is.

Lets hope they just ignore Blue3 and his opinion, because that is what it is, an Opinion.

Well you can't really get rid of that genre of game. There's still a bit of thrill (at least to some people) for such a type of game. I doubt anyone really gives a crap about much of the story elements involved in these games, not because there isn't much there to begin with, but because a lot of people are looking to play these games for one reason or another. There will always be people wanting that thrill of twitch gaming, just to see if they can bust out of some complex, guns blazing, or blast through a crowd of terrorists. It's not so much the game, but the actions of playing out a scene from an action movie that probably gets people. I've seen people who are, quite frankly, not FPS gamers play things like Nightfire/Goldeneye and still throw up a yell or get excited when they manage to take out two or three guys, or escape a certain-death situation and still get the kill.

Now, I've already stated elsewhere that, I feel that a lot of the FPS market (And in effect, the poorly-written RPGs, mini-games, and some sim games a la Tycoon...) are sheerly done out of lazyness. Noone wants to try to develop a game that might not be bought up and make them a profit. Only really big developers have the luxury of taking real chances on titles since they can afford for one or two scenarios not to pan out. And the thing is, the little guys looking up to the big guys, see them making big-budget shooters, or RPGs, or Mini-games, and producers say 'Come on, I need people looking to get in on a piece of that! I want a game like Halo!/Mario Party!/Final Fantasy!', and you end up getting a glut. The only problem is, people haven't often awarded those that step up to make a good game that tries to step away from the mainstream and still makes a good game.

We've already had our look at stagnation in the market, some of it happened last generation. And is still panning out this generation with gluts of mini-games on the Wii and FPS/TPS shooters on the 360, PS2 ports on the PSP, etc. This stirring needs to happen now, and the Wii's control system and 360/PS3's distribution networks should be used to break up that monotony of 'What you come to expect for X system'. The Wii's control setup should allow for developers to look at new games and new ways of playing, and 360/PS3 should be able to break out a lot more smaller, fun hits that you can get right from home if you so choose, and provide as much entertainment as bigger titles and allow for games that wouldn't make it out to systems normally.

So long as you don't cut these types of games out entirely, you should see some healthy dispersion of types of games to come out this generation. People who are only wanting to play one type of game, should probably broaden their horizon. You'd be surprised what you're missing and what you'd still have fun with. To get rid of these game entirely though, will only lead to another similar glut in another area. And perhaps producers/developers need to get on track in developing more unique ideas for the Wii and XBLA/PSN libraries, and prove they aren't just a lot of one-trick ponies.

 Bluewho?

 The person with a red car avatar and has one post before DonWii

The problem I see is that when you go outside the boundries and try something new like beyond good and evil and pyschonauts, both those games sold very poorly. However when you release a sequal your almost assured a profit from the get go. I think with the Wii that smaller publishers could flourish, in a good and big way. More original games, and maybe some new blood in the game system. I was thinking that with nothing but big game publishers taking over the market that it was getting stale.