Most Innovative Mechanics (Round Three)

[SkyPikachu]

Welcome to This Old Neon’s fourth official “BEST GAME EVER!!!” Project.

Round Three of the “Most Innovative Mechanics” side-event includes the next batch of games in addition to the Round Two winners. There are 4 polls of 6-7 games each. If a game you nominated doesn’t appear in these polls, it probably seeded high enough to get a bye into a later round.

VOTE HERE

• You can vote for 1-2 games per poll, or skip a poll entirely.
• The top 2 games from each poll will advance to the finals!
• You can’t change your votes once they’ve been submitted, so click carefully. Voting closes on Saturday at midnight AST.

Don’t forget to vote in the main event and find your way to the other user-submitted categories at thisoldneon.com/bge !

[SkyPikachu]

This has been my favorite side poll (enjoying it more than the early main rounds too)

Poll 1 of 4
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons (2013, Multiplatform)
Doom (1993, PC)
Fez (2012, Multiplatform)
Guitar Hero (2005, PS2)
Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes (2015, Multiplatform)
LittleBigPlanet (2008, PS3)
Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord (1981, PC)

Brothers gets a vote by itself one of the top 5 games in this poll so far.

Poll 2 of 4
Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (2010, DS)
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (2000, N64)
Papers, Please (2013, Multiplatform)
Pikmin (2001, GCN)
Rogue (1980, PC)
SimCity (1989, PC)

Another easy single pick Ghost tricks mechanics are amazing. What part of pikmin is the innovative mechanic? I generally dislike the game but curious if it's the timer or some other mechanic.

Poll 3 of 4
Herzog Zwei (1989, Genesis)
Katamari Damacy (2004, PS2)
Pac-Man (1980, Arcade)
Portal (2006, Multiplatform)
Splatoon (2015, Wii U)
Tetris (1989, GB)

Portals just incredible the whole concept it amazing and it's close to a perfect game as well (not that that matters here)
Tetris imo is a perfect game. The whole concept is amazing people still love playing tetris to this day as the mechanic is so simple but so innovative. It only works with 4 blocks and it's addictive. This is going to sound weird but I feel the series is highly underrated

Poll 4 of 4
Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty (1992, PC)
Gradius (1985, Arcade)
Sid Meier's Civilization (1991, PC)
Street Fighter II: The World Warrior (1991, Multiplatform)
Super Mario 64 (1996, N64)
Wii Sports (2006, Wii)
Wolfenstein 3D (1992, PC)

Mind blowing at the time. Kids these days won't understand how insane this tech seemed in 2006.

[Kong Wen]

Poll 2 of 4
Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (2010, DS)
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (2000, N64)
Papers, Please (2013, Multiplatform)
Pikmin (2001, GCN)
Rogue (1980, PC)
SimCity (1989, PC)

Another easy single pick Ghost tricks mechanics are amazing. What part of pikmin is the innovative mechanic? I generally dislike the game but curious if it's the timer or some other mechanic.

For Pikmin, it's probably the idea of collecting and using your little buddies as "powers" in a time-based strategy game. It's pretty creative design. Like Fez, though, I consider it to be far more innovative on the design side than the mechanical side. Definitely still fits the category, but that's how I sort out conflicts for tight races in my brain.

Pikmin is going to (and should) get absolutely obliterated by Rogue and SimCity here.

In Poll 3:

Tetris is the obvious winner. For my second vote, I can't decide between Herzog, which invented a hugely popular genre, and Portal, which revitalized a stale old genre with some great new mechanics. Both are legitimate angles for approaching a vote here. Going in hard for Rogue and then not doing the same for Herzog feels hypocritical, but at the same time I don't think genre influence is the be all and end all of mechanical innovation.

Holding off for now.

[Kong Wen]

I need help from someone in Poll 1.

What makes me vote for Doom here when I could vote for Wolfenstein in the other bracket?

[Pluvius]

The fact that Wolfenstein isn't in Poll 1?

Also, the fact that Doom is more innovative than Wolfenstein.

Rob

[Kong Wen]

The fact that Wolfenstein isn't in Poll 1?

Also, the fact that Doom is more innovative than Wolfenstein.

If you explain the reasons why Doom is more innovative than Wolfenstein 3D, then I'll perhaps have more of a reason to vote for it.

If I have a tough decision to make in Poll 1 and I can make myself feel better by supporting Wolfenstein 3D, that makes my Poll 1 decision easier. But if someone with better context than me wants to make a good case for Doom, that could make my decision easier in the other direction.

[VictorViper]

A vote for Doom is a vote for monster closets and level design, with the (substantial) improvements to FPS gameplay in general as a secondary consideration. A vote for Wolfy is a simple vote for the "granddaddy of first person shooters", and a worthy vote it is. Both worthy votes.

My 2¢.

[Pluvius]

As I said before, it was the first game to have decent online multiplayer, and it also made modding a thing that PC gamers came to expect support for. Wolfenstein wasn't even the first FPS, just the first popular one.

Rob

[Kong Wen]

As I said before, it was the first game to have decent online multiplayer, and it also made modding a thing that PC gamers came to expect support for. Wolfenstein wasn't even the first FPS, just the first popular one.

Yeah, I'm not even really voting for Wolfenstein because it was an early FPS. More that it used ray-casting and 2D sprites to make a serviceably compelling lo-fi 3D environment.

I guess I don't give Doom enough credit in the online realm because I grew up playing MUDs, which were surprisingly functional online games supporting hundreds of simultaneous players (with the obvious text-only limitations).

Still, this is enough to sway me to give Doom equal billing with Wolfenstein for now.

A vote for Doom is a vote for monster closets and level design, with the (substantial) improvements to FPS gameplay in general as a secondary consideration. A vote for Wolfy is a simple vote for the "granddaddy of first person shooters", and a worthy vote it is. Both worthy votes.

As we get deeper into the category and the polls get harder, I find myself trying to differentiate innovative mechanics from innovative design. These are all pretty good though. At least, enough of them are pretty good that we don't have enough votes to vote for all of the good ones.

[VictorViper]

Yeah, the level design in this case is only something I'm mentioning because it was such a step up (yuk). I consider monster closets a mechanic in their own right though. Unbelievably, I forgot to mention deathmatches. Wow!