While it would be great to see an uptick in quality branded games, there are definitely some barriers. For one, the skill set for making fun, simple, casual games isn't especially widespread -- it seems like it's easy to make an OK advergame, but very difficult to make a good one.

Some of the most innovative games over the past two years have been concepts so powerful there is no way they could have made it into a box. Innovation is a difficult thing to commit to when the life or death of a company hangs in the balance. With the rising costs in game production, the market is becoming less amenable to taking risks. Because of this, more and more of the innovation in the industry seems to be leaving the retail box.

Every once in a while, the specter of universal ratings for multiple content forms -- TV, video games, mobile content, and the like -- rears up in Washington and needs to be put down. Late last week, it appeared once again, with the Federal Communications Commission starting its inquiry after delivering a report to Congress about media blocking technologies.

Last week, my fellow columnist Shankar Gupta noted the loading time debacle with "Wipeout HD"'s in-game ads. The story is a frightening one for marketers unfamiliar with the gaming space. What was essentially a 10-second mistake resulted in the early termination of a campaign and loads of upset customers. Is the gaming space really so unpredictable and volatile?

In-game ads are a relatively new online ad option, and so the best practices are still being determined.

Electronic Arts is shaking things up and leading by example. The video game company seems to be evolving a new approach to game publishing, one that promises a cross-platform distribution model fortified against piracy.

"No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people," goes the famous quote by H.L. Mencken, which many marketers seem to take to heart. After all, if you want to maximize your reach, you ought to appeal to the lowest common denominator, right? Wrong, as Electronic Arts found out this week, as its "Sin to Win" promotion for the upcoming "Dante's Inferno" inspired an enormous amount of backlash.

I like Valve. The development company is one of the major reasons the PC market has remained a thriving platform for core gaming even in the face of dedicated gaming consoles. Valve offer indie developers and modders a platform for distribution through the Steam service. It also revitalize classic titles with similar distribution deals. So when managing director Gabe Newell talks about crowd-funding games, it might not just be a cursory side comment.

A recent release on the XBL Marketplace and Steam is making old gamers wax nostalgic -- the "Secret of Monkey Island, Special Edition." If you missed this title for whatever reason -- because you're too young to have played it, or you're a more recent arrival to the gaming culture -- it's well worth a download. As long as you don't mind a hard puzzle.

As video games continue to mature as a medium, one of the major narrative elements being included in AAA titles is the idea of your character's moral choices having an effect on the outcome of the game and the game world itself. Some of the top games of the last year have incorporated this element, including "nFamous" and "Fable 2." But there's a problem with this approach. In almost every game that features these kinds of moral decisions, the choices aren't just easy, they're totally transparent.