Jaicee said:
I'm not a man, bruh. In my response to Mnementh, I addressed the good point you make about the risks involved in marketing more casual and just plain clever and quirky games in the console business today like Arms and Splatoon and gimmicks like Labo that are fair enough. No need to get all hysterical on me. I'm not an unreasonable person and you should know that by now. But on Returnal though, we're going to disagree. 1) The genre is an established niche in the indie market. It is not so much within the cultural mainstream of gaming. I mean I don't run across all kinds of roguelikes on store shelves, I don't know about you. I typically have to download them. 2) New IPs are rule in the indie market. They are definitely the exception in the AAA landscape, NOT the rule, and that's even more true for games that sell large numbers of copies and manage to turn a profit. 3) It's uncommon enough that there are like five times as many games released in a given year that use male-only lead characters. Pointing to a handful of exceptions that didn't sell half as well doesn't exactly make much of a case. Seriously, Horizon Zero Dawn and the 2013 Tomb Raider remake are the best-selling female-led games of all time and they've sold like 11 or 12 million copies. This is the basis your argument here stands on. You don't have one, in other words. 4) To counter my point, you highlight a smaller, indie game of different thematic material, a game that hasn't been released yet, and a movie I've never heard of before. *shrugs* I think you're just going out of your way to be disagreeable rather than even trying to make an honest argument because you don't have one. There's no one video that can explain Returnal's entire story because it's a little bit subjective, but here is what most of the internet (including me) feels is the single best Returnal story explainer out there. 5) $70 is the price tag that was charged, and it was a stupid decision to make, particularly given all the other risks the game already takes. It was also just the wrong decision. Okay, it's past midnight here and I didn't get three hours of sleep last night. I'm headed to bed. |
I don't think my response was hysterical.
As for Returnal...
1. Yes, and there are plenty of niche games. Like I brought up, Octopath Traveler. Not a whole lot of classic JRPGs like that, even among indie games.
2. Yes, but still there are plenty of new IPS, and a fair number of them are successful. It is more risky than using an established franchise, but it's simply not something that's so rare that doing it should elicit gasps of awe.
3. No... because your argument was about risk. Just because male games tend to sell better does not mean that any time you make a game with a female character you are taking a risk. It simply means you are not using the most common path to success, and there are reasons for doing so beyond simply taking a risk. We'll stick with Octopath Traveler. For every old school sprite based JRPG there are at least 5 shooting games that will sell more copies. Does that mean any this was a brave risk that demonstrates how much Nintendo values developer freedom?
4.
I just gave a few recent examples. I'm sorry, I didn't know I was supposed to list every one. But... Groundhog Day, Edge of Tomorrow, Source Code, The Endless,
, Majora's Mask,
, Christmas Everyday, Happy Death Day,
, Xena Warrior Princess,
, Buffy the Vampire.
Time loops are not a new idea in fiction. Kind of based off Nietzche's idea of eternal recurrence. Those are the pieces of media I've seen that invoke the idea of time loops in a pretty direct way. There are others that sort of do but not as directly (Naruto, Harry Potter, South Park, and Mass Effect or Dr. Strange for instance). I'm sure there are many other examples I didn't name (I'd be shocked if there isn't a Star Trek or Simposon's episode of that). https://www.imdb.com/list/ls069145438/ I'm sure it might add some other quirk (not watching the video cause I may buy it), but the timeloop aspect is the main one they've advertised to potential buyers, so (unless there is something so divisive in the story that it would turn people off when word of mouth spread) that's the part that would be relevant to how risky the game is.
More importantly though, even if all of these examples of time loops in media didn't exist, so what? Why would this make it risky as a narrative element? Are there people that are just would hate the concept and would not buy the game because it has time loops (even though as demonstrated it's actually pretty popular in narrative ways). The fact that others have not done this exact story in this exact way doesn't mean it's exceptionally risky. More broadly, doing things that are not the norm is not inherently brave or risky.
As for your assessment of my personality and motivation, you can keep those to yourself. If the argument is flawed, explained why it's flawed. I am addressing your arguments and not making any statements about you, and expect the same in return.
5. I guess charging full price for games is brave and risky now...
Really the argument boils down to the fact that this is a new IP and a style of game that is popular in indie gaming but hasn't been tested in the AAA space. And sure that's a lot riskier than GTA VI will be, but to me it's not so exceptionally rare that it is noteworthy or it says something significant about a publisher willing to publish it.
Which leads me again to the point that you're claiming I don't have. My point is that you have given no intelligible way to identify what counts as risky. Without that, you cannot support your claim that Sony is particularly noteworthy in their commitment to risk, bravery, and freedom, and no real discussion can be had.
So, can you explain how we tell when a game is brave and free? If so, how did you determine that Sony produces more of these types of games than other developers?
