This is important. Too many people assume that novel ideas come from abstract concepts. Yes they can, but they can equaly arise from playing with the medium.
Mining retro game mechanics was probably easier at the time VVVVVV was developed as the explosion of indy games has probably reused the best forgotten ones of the 80s/90s. It's getting close the time mechanics from 00s games can be reused though...
Return of the Obra Dinn was a 2018 mystery puzzle game, where you have to figure out how everyone died in an ill-fated voyage at sea. Amazing game.
I searched Reddit for "games like Obra Dinn", and this led me to Case of the Golden Idol, a 2022 game with similar mechanics. The developers were quite open about being inspired and influenced by Obra Dinn -- and they ended up creating something in the same genre, but very much their own creation, with their own flavor. And also very enjoyable.
Originality is nice, but I'm not at all convinced it's a prerequisite for quality.
That is, everything interesting appears from the relationships between subjects, not the subjects themselves (the edges, not the nodes, of the graph). You could change any one major component of the game, explore it sufficiently, and you will inevitably have something sufficiently original despite 90% of the original core being duplicated — the nature of exploring the relationships thoroughly — chasing quality — will inevitably lead to a cascading series of changes until you reach the new stable point
When I turned 30, I was like what the heck, I'll get a game boy color and play some games I played as a kid. That's since spiralled into gbc, gba (all models), psp, ds/3ds, ps1, ps2, xbox, 360 etc. Along with a now fairly sized collection of the requisite games.
I've been picking up all the games I missed on those platforms, because most people seem to have only played 2-6 games per platform when they were kids, same as me. I'm getting recommendations from friends of games I'd just never gotten into and coming out loving them and having many new perspectives on which game mechanics work and which don't. Especially given barely any modern games are coming out that are compelling enough for me; I barely ever gamed anymore before getting all this old stuff - new games just seem like the same old copy+paste for the most part.
Atm I'm playing through coded arms on psp, pikmin 2 on gc and timesplitters fp on xbox.
The gaming world has lost so much magic and fun stuff imo. From weird hardware like the motion sensor in kirby tilt n tumble, light sensor in boktai to game mechanics like the furious lassoing in pokemon ranger, or the unique gameplay of Archer Maclean's Mercury.
I haven't done a game jam in years but I'm so ready to smash it if I end up doing another one!
Not to say starting with a firm idea is bad... more like it may be hard to avoid playing around and improvising with the medium in any case.