Flash can do at least 2 things better than HTML: 1) create interactive experiences, and 2) create moving pictures (tweens, animations, video).
That's great. Now let me point out that Flash's two great powers are more than not antagonists, and their clash distorts and cripples many a swf.
The example of 1st-person shooters is misleading here, because the experience of ACTING and the experience of SPECTATING are fused in the intensity of 3D immersion into life-and-death scenarios.
Off this peak, spectating and acting are often at cross-purposes. It can be hard to "do" while you "watch," and to "watch" while you "do." Watching a movie while you play racquetball is a bad idea.
Of course, we multi-task all the time, and I believe there are literally infinite ways to fashion experiences that mix the two so that they complement each other…but I don't believe that designers blind to this elemental conflict will be the ones who create these new experiences.
[...] incredibly powerful–experiences that aren’t easily incorporated into interaction. (See this post for [...]
Posted by Building Pet 1: The Need for Patterns on May 7th, 2007.