The indies used to look to the AAA for inspiration and something to aspire to, but the tables have turned in a way exemplifying the capitalism and diluting the art of the medium.
Once in a half decade we get a AAA game with a novel concept or a new IP (Overwatch, Fortnite maybe?), but even sequels are starting to just feel like polishing phases or DLCs on a tested IP and gameplay formula. DayZ/H1Z1 from the mod community spawning battle royale, DOTA Auto Chess custom map spawning DOTA Underlords, TFT, and Epic Games' Auto Chess (the newer big trend). DOTA2, LoL, and the entire MOBA craze was spawned because of the success of a custom WC3 map, and since then AAA have 100% adopted this as an R&D strategy. I feel like the game industry has made this really distasteful shift, of the big AAA companies just adding shoe-shine on existing projects - whether that's servicing a SaaS like League of Legends or World of WarCraft, or doing remake after remake of Age of Empires, Homeworld, StarCraft, Final Fantasy, etc, while leaving all the innovation and creativity to be explored at the expense of indies, mod creators or mapmakers.
