They only make 3 kinds of video games these days…

Vice Magazine has a turbo charged review of Project Gotham Racing 4 in it’s latest offline issue. I drive in London so race simulators are lethal stimuli for me and since the episode with the Flight Simulator in Blackpool when I was 12 I’ve stayed away from them.

What caught my eye was this:

‘They only make three kinds of video games these days. There’s that one where you’re Bruce Willis shooting aliens in space and saying “HOLY SHIT!” whenever something happens or explodes. Then there’s the type where you’re a wizard or a fairy and you run around talking to other wizards and fairies, trying to work out if they’re being controlled by a sexy woman who lives somewhere EasyJet flies to so you could meet her in real life for sex (unlikely). Then you’ve got games where you can be a car and drive around a series of increasingly complicated loops until you get one that’s so long and hard you can’t be bothered with it anymore.’ (Curry Gacklat)

If ‘Gaming is the New Hollywood‘ and next gen games let me create content (Spore, Sims, Second Life, Habbo…) then I’m looking forward to the totally interactive gross out comedy for the Wii coming to a disgusted family near you soon.

In terms of digital marketing Hollywood has relied on flash microsites to promote it’s wares with the majority of the ad spend offline, swallowed by cast lite junkets. The Games Industry should seek to innovate and take digital marketing, interactivity and what the brand can do for the consumer, to the next level. Gamers live online and whilst in-game advertising has garnered big dollars, it’s just a re-hash of what doesn’t work in the real world replicated in the virtual world. Fear and the quick fix, the desperate need to reach out to gamers has so far stifled innovation in this increasingly blockbuster budget market.

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