| Hiku said: [1] So I guess you're saying that generally, the more risks you take, the less likely it is to be as much of a commercial success as if you played it safe with entries in familiar franchises and formulas? And do you want the big companies to essentially make more AAA 'inde games' (creative, original, etc) with high budgets? [2] It makes sense that familiarity tends to be the safest bests most of the time. But aside from looking at how much they sell compared to other games, repeating new entries in a franchise is also very important to get more eyes on the franchise and have it grow to where it could have been a long time ago. Final Fantasy VII, Persona 5, Nier: Automata, Yakuza 0, Dragon Quest 11, Monster Hunter World, etc. There are a lot of these games where one particular entry in the series does a much better job at attracting a wider audience than usual for whatever reason. [3] I'd like to think that game developers tend to compromise between cash-cow safe bets, and projects that are expected to make less money. I remember Shuhei Yoshida said something about how they never expected The Last Guardian to sell a lot, but they made it because they knew the fans wanted it. I imagine those kind of passion projects are easier to pitch to the CEO's, or justify to investors when you have some safe bet games alongside them. |
First of all, I'd just like to say thank you for this especially pertinent and genuinely thoughtful reply. I was wondering if this thread was ever going to become the substantive and enjoyable conversation that I was hoping for instead of the idiotic and thoroughly exasperating brand-based slug fest it was for most of the first six pages. Thanks for helping shifting the direction! Seriously.
Okay, that said, let me divide my response into three parts corresponding to the number you've seen me add above.
[1] That's definitely something I'd like to see more of, yes, because while it's really nice just to have so many new developers out there offering such a wide array of really unique experiences, what I think would have a more meaningful impact on gaming culture writ large would be for some of their indie spirit, if you will, to make its way into the mainstream where it'd be more visible. And also just for smaller developers in particular to be able to access the resources they need to optimally realize their visions. I'd like to see, in short, mainstream gaming become more like it used to be and less stale, ossified, and mono-cultural than it has become.
[2] I don't see any intrinsic merit to franchise-building, personally. Franchises are the rule among major companies and practically don't exist among smaller developers. Their main function, one can only conclude from this simple reality, is to transform an innovator into an entrenched power that doesn't innovate anymore and in fact actively stifles other people from doing so by rendering them comparatively invisible with their massive production and marketing budgets.
That's not to say I'm against like sequels, remakes, this sort of thing per se, I just feel that they should earn the right to exist and should be rewarded only when they do. Some really do, IMO. You listed six games, for example, of which I've only personally played the first three before, so I can't really comment on the others. However, I will say that my current approach to established gaming franchises is well-exemplified in the case of Nier: Automata. I bought the game because it looked and sounded interesting to me in the coverage. I think it's one of the best games ever made. It's the only installment of the Drakengard series I own. I have no problem or difficultly ignoring every other installment because none of them sound especially compelling to me. I approach franchises and sequels the same way I do new IPs, in other words. I do so on a case-by-case basis. I get a little info on them and then go with my gut rather than feeling like "I have one, so now I gotta catch 'em all!" Not a collector these days. But lots of people think differently about it. I used to think differently about it too. I just got tired of playing highly similar games.
[3] Unfortunately, you're probably right about that. Such is the nature of a profit-driven system that revolves around supply and demand. And I've observed that we are, in fact, seeing more first-party support for newer and smaller developers these days across the board too, and find that refreshing and encouraging!
