Over the last several months I have started to ponder about where we are at in the video game industry. I then started to consider a theory that I will share with you. The theory is simple, the video game industry is too meta. Obviously I will elaborate.

In any industry and in particular in the video game industry what defines what is the next big revolutionary thing is almost never dependant on what a developer thinks, says, or does. If that was the case Peter Molyneux and David Cage would be credited for changing the industry a long time ago. No, the industry is changed by the consumer perception. We are the ones that determine what ideas are actually meaningful.

Consider now the last several years we have seen in game development. Motion control came into the picture. It was going to "change" the way we perceive video games. PR teams were overjoyed with the perspective. They essentially were telling us, what was supposed to be the next big thing in gaming. Motion control however didn't accomplish that. I don't think it is of any fault of it's own. At the end of the day it simply isn't something that the consumers felt would replace their current experience. At it's best, something like motion control served as a good one two punch, being able to exist with our other gaming experiences. At it's worst it was something untouched that collected dust. Sadly developers and companies seemed hell event on pushing the worst aspect of it.

Which made me consider why that is. I think it is simply because we have hit a wall. Years and years ago developers and companies could always look forward to the next consoles, new batch of hardware to try out some of their ideas. They weren't focused on trying to understand the industry or where it is at. It was all about making the best quality games, the best quality services and trying to get them to as many people as possible. But once the game industry started to rise and console hardware started to get exceptionally close to the PC level those in the industry started to crave more.

Which is basically where I think everything went wrong. I won't call it impossible, but in most cases anyone who sets to try to do create something that is going to redefine the way consumers look at anything is almost doomed to not do that at all. In some cases it may fail completely for usually it ends up as a mediocre idea that may of had potential if it wasn't hyped up to be the next gift to gaming. It almost makes me wish that there was still some mystery between developers/companies and their consumers. It just feels to me that the awareness of the state of the industry has gave way for several "big picture" ideas that based on consumer perception are anything but.

So I pose the question to you the Giant Bomb faithful. Do you agree with me? Do you feel that some of these companies and developers are too aware of the industry thus overextending themselves trying to make the next big thing?