The future of gaming – what do Hideo Kojima, Doug Liman and Kiki Wolfkill think? Our Tribeca Games Festival round-up
Metal Gear producer Kojima talks about VR and the difficulties of telling deeply meaningful stories through interactive media, at an event featuring film and gaming luminaries including Brett Leonard, Sam Lake and Neil Burger
What will games look like in the future? According to a series of panels at the inaugural edition of the Tribeca Games Festival, a forward-looking adjunct to the Tribeca Film Festival, games will become more interactive and immersive and have more realistic characters, broader storylines, and a deeper sense of place and location.
“All media is a continuum to this point,” said Brett Leonard, director of the prophetic 1992 virtual reality film The Lawnmower Man, at a games panel to discuss the film’s legacy to the gaming and entertainment VR industry.
The event, which also featured a keynote speech by legendary Japanese games developer and film buff Hideo Kojima, took place last month in downtown New York.
The past few years have seen more crossovers between the video game and film industries: game titles have been adapted for the big screen (Assassin’s Creed and Warcraft) and vice versa (The Amazing Spider-Man and The Lego Movie), while more and more actors are lending their voices to characters in popular game franchises. Meanwhile, with VR technology becoming more advanced, the format is being seen as one that will enable a comfortable collision between these two mediums.
Developers at the festival expressed a desire for their games to evolve past puzzle solving and action engagement to tell film-like stories. They want their games to have more meaning and deeper characters and perhaps, in the case of Firewatch designer Sean Vanaman, even social commentary.