Everyone recognizes that games like 'Katamari Damacy,' that contain tremendously innovative gameplay mechanics, ought to interest publishers. But all that publishers seem to be looking for is the next sports game or the next first-person shooter. They're all afraid that they're not going to recoup their investment if they back something that's on the fringe.

• What's the best way to train future game designers? "Since almost everyone with success in the industry was self-taught or, at best, mentored unofficially, there's no track record of how any given game design program has paid off," notes Noah Falstein, a freelance game designer and producer since 1980.
• How can we make games more emotional than movies? "What's preventing game designers from doing this," asks Nicole Lazzaro, president of XeoDesign.
• How can we make our games have real social/political applications while still being "good" games? "The existing 'serious games' are all too often failures as games," comments Dallas Dickinson, a producer for Sony Online Entertainment. "Is it due to some deep disconnect players have between playing games and learning about real problems?"
• When will game developers realize that business concerns are just as important as any other decisions in creating games? "How long will we allow people with business savvy but little or no real interest in games as a creative medium to dominate the economics of games?" asks Brian Green, a game developer and founder of Near Death Studios.