Factor 5 on Wii

[Dodece]

I find it strange how fast the Sony boosters turned on Factor 5. The reality is your looking at a small development house. That had some successes on the last Nintendo console. They were very competent with their coding for the most part, and they filled a niche genre. I guarantee that your beloved Sony aggressively courted them. Sony needed some exclusive parties to back their new console.

That said Lair should serve as a stark reminder that not every exclusive game Sony is going to have on their console is going to be a killer game. Some are going to be good, and some are going to be mediocre. This is to be expected especially with small development houses. They lack the resources that larger multi platform studios have. They cannot simply pick up a phone and hire ten new guys. They have what they have, and in this case they were too ambitious. Perhaps even Sony was too ambitious.

What intrigues me is why so many thought so highly of Factor 5. The first two games in the Rogue Squadron series were space shooters. The scope was small on such titles. The games were fun and well executed, but the fact of the matter was the environments were simple. You take a mostly empty box and drop a few three dimensional objects within it. A truly simple formula to master. Even the engine was arcade in nature rather then simulation.

Factor 5 did a wonderful job with those two games. I loved them they were a lot of fun. However I realized they were mechanically simple games. They were neither terribly complex, or terribly ground breaking. So why did anyone think that Factor 5 could do a fantastic job with a graphical power house game on the most complex system early in its development cycle.

I think Factor 5 could do a great job on any console. They just need to be more aware of their strengths, and how best to use those. I would love to see a space shooter series from them on the Wii. I would be insanely happy if they put together a series for the 360 as well. Anyone who played the first two Rogue Squadrons has a serious lust to be able to dogfight with a dozen other people either co-op or head to head. Thats simply a genre being overlooked.