I celebrated my birthday yesterday by not working - which I liked not doing so much that I'm continuing not doing it today - and by spending the evening with two of my three brothers, one of my one sisters, and six of my nine nephews and nieces (I hope I've counted correctly). There was pizza and presents, and a good time was had by all.

It wasn't just my b'day party, though, not really. My brothers and I are all born within one week of each other - two of them on the same day, the third a day later, and then me - but none of us are the same age. In fact, we're pretty widely distributed, from the late 20s to the 40s. I'm the second youngest, though at 33...'young' may be stretching the truth a bit.

Quite scary, really: thirty-three. Still so much to achieve, and only about, ooh, another seventy or eighty years to do it in? When I cross the century mark, I'll let the young'uns take a shot at it.

Heck, the way things are going, I'll probably be working on The Longest Journey: The Final, Final Chapter...Honestly! when I'm in my nineties. Unless this industry starts taking chances on new properties again, five years from now there will only be sequels or license-based games around.

Not that there's anything wrong with sequels or licenses - as long as the games are good, I'm happy to play Grand Theft Auto 5 on the PlayStation 3, or the next NBA Street. But for this industry to grow and thrive, and not stagnate, there must be invention; we have to surprise the players, offer them something new - be it new gameplay, new settings, new worlds, new characters, or something so original and different that it defines a whole new genre, a completely new way to play games.

It'll happen. But it won't happen as often as it used to. Games cost too much, take too long, for publishers - and developers - to risk taking too many chances. Instead, we're seeing a gradual and slow evolution, in terms of technology, game design, and content, resulting in progressively more accomplished games. But the generational shifts take years, not months, and this evolution will continue as games become more and more complex and expensive.

Fact is, games are the most complex beasts around, even more so than some big Hollywood movies, and while five years ago, it was possible to develop a triple-A title for a million dollars, today that number is much, much higher. Even a low-budget game will have a team of fifteen to twenty people working two to three years, and a typical medium-sized console title will employ thirty or forty people full-time. At least.

I'm not saying this is a bad thing, however. Games are becoming more involving and accomplished; growing up, morphing into an entertainment medium that will soon be considered the equal of TV and films. The stories we can tell, the emotions we can engender, the sense of immersion and participation that no other medium can produce - all of these benefit from the technological and aesthetic evolution of games. It's an exciting time to be working in the industry, despite the publishers' unwillingness to take chances with new developers and new games.

For me personally, as a storyteller, I see great things ahead for what I like to call 'storyplaying'; for players to get immersed with and participating in a plot where their choices - the interaction with the medium and the characters - define the outcome of any given situation, while being guided through a scripted and mostly linear storyline.

Pipedream? Not at all. Stay tuned.  ¶ 15:00