Well, the reaction to this piece of news is predictable...
Certainly, people have a right to be disappointed, but I also think they may be overreacting in this case. When I first heard about this remake, I couldn't help but be skeptical as to how they could include most of the original game's content using modern production values. I feared a stripping down of the game to make it affordable to produce, something I would regard as worse than getting no remake at all. Now there is at least a possibility that the game we will see will be true to the original in terms of content.
I know people are terrified that Square-Enix is just going to fleece everyone to death using an episodic format, but I honestly don't see that many episodes needed to tell the full story. What I envision is a three-episode arc, the first part taking place entirely in Midgar and ending right at the part where the party escapes from the city. There would be no overworld map in this installment. The second installment will greatly expand the scope of the world as it did in the original game, and will probably end around the time when Sepheroth kills you-know-who. (A good time for a cliffhanger.) The third installment will be the end-game content and the battles against the Weapon enemies, as well as a true ending to the story that the original version didn't really give us. If Square-Enix does this right, I think a ballpark figure of $40 per episode would not be out of the question. If the world is fleshed out considerably with extra content not seen in the original, then maybe even $50 per episode would be acceptable. More likely, I think the first episode will be the smallest and the cheapest, with episodes 2 and 3 costing around the price of a typical AAA title per installment.
We need to understand that it's not 1997 anymore. To get the same kind of experience we got then, using the latest production values, for only $50 just isn't realistic. We would never get a remake under those conditions. The number of copies it would have to sell just to break even would be staggering. All things considered, an episodic release is probably the best possible course for Square-Enix to follow. In a strange way, it is actually quite encouraging. If the game isn't any good, Square-Enix stands to lose big money on the later installments, so they must have a lot of confidence in the product going forward to take that kind of risk. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt for now.
Konami is rewriting the book on burning bridges. I've never heard of a company so ruthlessly alienating an entire market segment just because they want to move in a new direction. I would go so far to say that the decision-makers at Konami really don't understand what this is doing to the company's reputation, and are not conscious of doing anything improper, because there is no logic in this behavior. If Konami had any thoughts of re-engaging with western markets at a later time, they can pretty much forget it now. That's how much damage they have done to their brand outside of Japan.
I'll admit, after seeing this trailer, I feel a lot better about Batman v Superman. I was pretty skeptical before this.
However, the March release date still concerns me. If the producers are so confident in the film, why not release it in the summer along with all the other big-budget films?
An incredibly long tail? More like Peter Moore has an incredibly long nose.
Hopefully GameStop's sales projections are accurate, because nothing else will persuade EA to produce a Battlefront that has $60-worth of content out of the box.
EA is gambling that all the money this game will generate between launch and 2016 will be enough to make it a profitable venture. Because it seems the long-term appeal will go into the toilet once the buzz for Force Awakens has taken its course.
Actually, I suspect a great many people would rather spend $60 on seeing The Force Awakens several times than dropping it on a shallow Star Wars game.
Let's face it, this new Battlefront is just one more cash-grab title to take advantage of a movie tie-in, and will be quickly forgotten. We've been seeing this kind of thing for decades in the gaming business. Of course, the people that this game is marketed towards aren't old enough to know that. Isn't it funny how that works?
The overall theme of the show (and presumably the books) seems to be loss and decay. I don't expect that to change. In fact, I see things getting a whole lot darker for everyone except Bran. Bran himself is safe, but he is cursed into witnessing the deaths of everyone he cares about, as well as the destruction of the land. He will try and salvage things with his new powers, but he will fail. Game of Thrones is a tragedy. What we will see in the end is Bran relating the tale of the destruction of Westeros by the whitewalkers and the dragons, and the lives of those people who were most intimately involved in the events leading up to the fall. Bran the narrator will explain how things might have turned out better had the people involved made wiser choices. Mark my words: Westeros is doomed. And seeing over the course of five seasons just how things began to fall apart makes me believe Westeros deserves to be destroyed. I wouldn't be surprised if the author himself felt the same way about his world. In any case, I am as interested as anyone in seeing how those who are still alive try and stave off the inevitable.
Tomb Raider fans have nothing to worry about. Remember that the first reboot took awhile to gain sales traction, and it became a very successful title. (Square-Enix initially thought the game was a failure, and they got egg on their face.) You'll see the sales figures climb fast when it's no longer an X-Box exclusive. And lets face it, Fallout 4 is the most likely reason sales figures have been tepid. Whose idea was it to try and compete with that release?
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