Eh, gaming journalism just wants clicks to get ad-revenue. They would write an article about anything. Gabe waking up in the morning is news worthy to them.
I’m looking forward to the ward between factions posting the two quotes in comments sections every time a game gets delayed for the next several decades
I actually have that in my library because I bought the Index but haven’t played it yet because I wanted to play the first 2 games first. I didn’t play the first game for very long tho because I got stuck at some point early into the game and haven’t felt like continuing yet. You can also really feel the age of that game, controls and that kinda stuff. Not sure if I should just punch through that game or just say fuck it and play Alyx.
Well you’re in luck because there are VR mods available free for the older Half Life games. Just get the Orange Box or something with all the half life backlog and VR mod them for free.
If by “first game” you mean HL1, you could try playing “Black Mesa” which is a fan remake of the game, in the same engine that powers HL2. It’s not a 1:1 recreation, but it’s close enough (and I feel it improves on some things).
HL2 is also 3 seperate games (HL2, HL2 Episode 1, HL2 Episode 2), so make sure you have all of those in your library.
At the very least, I’d suggest playing HL2/EP1/EP2 before Alyx, since those would provide the expected background for Alyx, despite it technically being a prequel-ish thing.
Half life 1 just got a new big update that makes it much better to play this day and age and fixed a bunch of bugs. Either way you could skip 1. As a kid I never played 1 and went straight into 2, then 2 episodes 1 and 2 with the orange box. I still haven’t finished 1 but with this new update I think I’ll go back to it some point soon now.
Am not sure there’s a way for them to release HL3 and don’t disappoint huge number of people. Not because they suck at making games but because expectations have grown so so so much they are downright unachievable now.
My highest play time game is probably minecraft, and my recent go-to is slay the spire.
Sequels are seen as safer profits (there is an existing market) so they get more investment and more investment tends to make better games.
This doesn’t mean its what people want, it just means that name recognition means its cheaper to market a hit game with previous versions acting as a marketing boost. Its a feedback loop.
It is always amusing to see the head of optional entertainment industries make statements like they are making a declaration on par with climate change, a economic depression, etc. As if they expect massive press coverage and endless crying by their would be customers.
When in reality the actual reaction by most is along the lines of “oh no, anyway” and move on to the next bit of optional entertainment media while they and their company are forgotten to the trash pile of failed companies.
What gamers want is innovation and overall fun gameplay, sequel or not. I’ve heard rather little coming from AAA studios of interest to me as of late 'cause they’ve all gone to creating endless battle royales, action RPGs or looter-shooters that all play near identically, all with the same military or techno jungle aesthetic that just doesn’t appeal to me. It’s all gunning for their game to get big on that e-sport sponsorship money or find some way to load their games with micro transaction pay to win gambling BS. For the most part, small and indie studios are doing as well as the AAA big boys because they are able to put more creativity into their games on smaller budgets. When a big AAA game such as BG3 does succeed, it’s because they put as much or more effort and care into innovative and entertaining gameplay as they do into fancy ray tracing graphics and cash grab mechanics. Games like BG3 are as praised as they are because they are complete games that work like they should out of the box, no day 1 patch/DLC or extra money required for the full intended experience. We get the quality we expect for our $60-$70. Whether that’s a brand new IP or a sequel doesn’t matter much.
My only quibble with this is that I’m not sure I’d classify larian as a AAA studio. Not when you’re comparing to Activision or Bethesda or something. The game is absolutely amazing, I’ve put over 700 hours in and am still playing it. I can’t think of any of the big AAA studios releasing a game that comes close anytime in the last decade.
Meh, at least as far as the games industry goes, we’ve been here before. Really the past few years have been incredible for games, now it’s time to settle into another stretch of mediocrity as companies learn the same lessons over again. Super sucks for the devs, though, seems they always get the shortest end of the stick.
Ah yes the anime treatment. Only release reboots, sequels, prequels, and poor spinoffs. For every One Punch Man, Mob Psycho 100, Chainsaw Man, or Megalobox, there are way more re-do’s or milking such as Yet Another Gundam Series, a new Bleach something or another, InuYasha retread, Trigun reboot, Hunter x Hunter reboot, FMA Brotherhood, Fruits Basket, Fate/Stay universe, Evangelion remake, everything DragonBall…I could go on. It’s rather depressing.
Games are just following the curves established by other artistic mediums over the decades when laziness and greed wins, as it always does. Even The Last of Us wasn’t safe.
For every reboot sequel and prequel there are 10 new series. There are around 40 different new anime this season. (Without counting Chinese, musics, poor quality and children’s show). Take a look at myanimelist seasonal anime.
(Anime in Japan come out in season : winter, spring, summer, fall. So they start and finish roughly at the same time).
.
And most or your example are pretty bad,
bleach just got an end that everyone liked
hunter hunter was paused because the author is sick, it never stopped and it’s not a reboot
FMA brotherhood was great because it fixed the issue with FMA : the end of the anime was made before the manga. And it’s 2009 come on you can’t use that to say that nowadays there’s only reboots
yeah they are milking the fate franchise and evangelion, and their community is all for it
A quick 5 minute search shows me that this is true. Lots of articles and lists out there. And the only games I could see that weren’t sequels or remakes, are Starfield and Harry Potter.
This isn’t a new development either. Pong had a sequel.
Elden Ring. Cyberpunk. Outer Wilds. HiFi Rush. Stray. Midnight Suns (licensed like Potter but original).
Not saying a lot. But far from none. And alongside Starfield and Horizon Forbidden West (second game in an original series) it’s hardly no original titles.
Ironic for a company that published indie hits like Terraria and fresh mainstream games like A Tale of 2 Sons.
This does not reflect the whole gaming market but rather the failure of publishers to innovate well and make new things people like. Big publishers are risk averse and it's a common path them as they get bigger, and care more about shareholder value or venture capital. They won't take risks, and can't accept failures so they retrench. It's not a recipe for success as that end of the games market is already dominated by big publishers churning out annual versions of their mass market games.
A publisher like 505 r ally only has two possible futures on this road - go bankrupt as they can't compete or get bought out by a big fish who want their IP.
It doesn't say much abou the games market as it's actually very large, vibrant and varied. A publisher like 505 is not on the vanguard of the games market and like most people I had to look them up to even see which games they had published. This is just yet another company being mismanaged into oblivion and well beyond its hey day.
Yet it still managed to be fresh and, in my opinion, make the next big leap in what rpgs are capable of. Sequels aren’t really the problem, and I don’t mind them really—in a vacuum. The bigger problem is what ‘sequels’ are in corporate speak; making minimal effort and doing the same things over and over again, trying to profit off of name recognition alone. They don’t see a franchise and think “Great, a chance to dive into this world and see all it has to offer and what makes it tick,” they see it as a chance to make maximum $$$ while not feeling like they need to do much.
Right, but from the perspective of a gaming company CEO, it being a sequel is everything. You have to remember, these people are incredibly uninformed and shortsighted. Think of the dumbest person you’ve interacted with ever, and that’s about as intelligent as the smartest CEO. They see that Baldur’s Gate 3 sold well, and all they learn from that is that sequels are a profitable endeavor. They couldn’t care less about any of the context that makes it a good game.
pcgamer.com
Gorące