Assassin's Creed: Syndicate. Black Ops 3. Halo 5. Rise of the Tomb Raider. Just Cause 3. Rainbow Six Siege. Star Wars Battlefront.
Those are most of the big action games that are due for release between now and Christmas.
I've enjoyed instalments of all of them, to greater or lesser degrees. So why am I feeling such ennui at the thought of returning to any one of those franchises?
I'll tell you why: because I'm not seeing anything new, and it's getting right on my moobs.
Those are most of the big action games that are due for release between now and Christmas.
I've enjoyed instalments of all of them, to greater or lesser degrees. So why am I feeling such ennui at the thought of returning to any one of those franchises?
I'll tell you why: because I'm not seeing anything new, and it's getting right on my moobs.
FAMILIAR FACES
Syndicate looks pretty much like last year's Unity, albeit set in London, and with fewer bugs.
Unity had the benefit of returning the AC series to another sprawling city following the refreshing sea breezes of Black Flag. Black Ops 3 is another Call of Duty romp set in some potential future.
Rise of the Tomb Raider looks, sadly, like more of the same - more Tomb Raider, more Uncharted, more Far Cry. Halo 5 seems to be banking a little bit too much on its audience's commitment to the ongoing saga of Master Chief. Just Cause 3 at least arrives five years after its predecessor, but gives us yet more explosions on yet another tropical island.
Battlefront once again places us in a bunch of Star Wars battles that it feels like we've all fought before - with no campaign mode. And Siege is another online-only effort, with familiar gritty action-stealth mechanics in lots of dark corridors.
I totally get why this is happening. Halo 5 has cost something like $100 million to make, and if you're going to invest that sort of money in something, you'd better be sure that it's going to sell. And it will, of course. Halo always does. The brand is familiar and safe.
But there's a cumulative effect here, with so many overly familiar games hitting around the same time. I just feel fatigued; like any one of those games is going to test nothing but my muscle memory. It is, finally, on the cusp of being boring.
Syndicate looks pretty much like last year's Unity, albeit set in London, and with fewer bugs.
Unity had the benefit of returning the AC series to another sprawling city following the refreshing sea breezes of Black Flag. Black Ops 3 is another Call of Duty romp set in some potential future.
Rise of the Tomb Raider looks, sadly, like more of the same - more Tomb Raider, more Uncharted, more Far Cry. Halo 5 seems to be banking a little bit too much on its audience's commitment to the ongoing saga of Master Chief. Just Cause 3 at least arrives five years after its predecessor, but gives us yet more explosions on yet another tropical island.
Battlefront once again places us in a bunch of Star Wars battles that it feels like we've all fought before - with no campaign mode. And Siege is another online-only effort, with familiar gritty action-stealth mechanics in lots of dark corridors.
I totally get why this is happening. Halo 5 has cost something like $100 million to make, and if you're going to invest that sort of money in something, you'd better be sure that it's going to sell. And it will, of course. Halo always does. The brand is familiar and safe.
But there's a cumulative effect here, with so many overly familiar games hitting around the same time. I just feel fatigued; like any one of those games is going to test nothing but my muscle memory. It is, finally, on the cusp of being boring.
S'WEARY
Because here's a thing. Metal Gear Solid V was great... but even then I reached a point where I grew weary of it.
Kojima's opus pushed things into wholly peculiar and original areas, but even then... there was enough of an outside influence at play that boredom set in. Enough of the game felt similar enough to other games that it felt like I was replaying things I'd already played a dozen times before. Alright, then there'd be some weird cutscene, or quirky moment, or a talking gnu in a gas mask or something, that would jolt me out of my detachment, but still... it's becoming an issue.
The UbiSoft map model has become the norm, and it's becoming as overused as side-scrolling platformers were back in the 90s. It's the default model for too many games. Alright, it isn't what we're going to be seeing in Black Ops 3, but that suffers from the Call of Duty series' adherence to its own rigid formula - and no amount of zombie or parkour modes is going to change that.
And it's not even the gameplay that's becoming an issue. It's the settings of all these games. Call of Duty: high-tech warfare. Snow mission, city mission, countryside mission, oil rig mission.
Or it's the number of jungles we've now walked round, or the deserts we've found ourselves lost in. Or the identikit, close-cropped, male action heroes we always seem to be. Put Nathan Drake next to the bloke in Just Cause or Mad Max. They're virtually interchangeable.
So we get more plastic-y, wobble headed, CGI avatars, in more ill-directed cutscenes, talking about things that move us only towards the 'Skip Cutscene' button.
Because here's a thing. Metal Gear Solid V was great... but even then I reached a point where I grew weary of it.
Kojima's opus pushed things into wholly peculiar and original areas, but even then... there was enough of an outside influence at play that boredom set in. Enough of the game felt similar enough to other games that it felt like I was replaying things I'd already played a dozen times before. Alright, then there'd be some weird cutscene, or quirky moment, or a talking gnu in a gas mask or something, that would jolt me out of my detachment, but still... it's becoming an issue.
The UbiSoft map model has become the norm, and it's becoming as overused as side-scrolling platformers were back in the 90s. It's the default model for too many games. Alright, it isn't what we're going to be seeing in Black Ops 3, but that suffers from the Call of Duty series' adherence to its own rigid formula - and no amount of zombie or parkour modes is going to change that.
And it's not even the gameplay that's becoming an issue. It's the settings of all these games. Call of Duty: high-tech warfare. Snow mission, city mission, countryside mission, oil rig mission.
Or it's the number of jungles we've now walked round, or the deserts we've found ourselves lost in. Or the identikit, close-cropped, male action heroes we always seem to be. Put Nathan Drake next to the bloke in Just Cause or Mad Max. They're virtually interchangeable.
So we get more plastic-y, wobble headed, CGI avatars, in more ill-directed cutscenes, talking about things that move us only towards the 'Skip Cutscene' button.
THE ISOLATION GAME
All of the games I've mentioned are going to sell well. Or well enough, that they'll convince publishers that these are the sorts of games people want.
The relative disappointment of Sega's mega-budget Alien: Isolation - which, by Sega's own admission, flopped despite being a known brand - has the industry running scared. Isolation offered new ideas, but somehow didn't connect with a big enough audience.
I mean, I didn't much like it - the difficulty level was ramped up so high that it became a chore for me. But given the success of Bloodborne and Dark Souls II, that seems to be something people want these days. Which merely adds to the mystery of why the game wasn't a huge hit.
And the conclusion for many seems to be: too original.
But I honestly think that, at some point, it's going to backfire for the industry, if it continues along this path. It won't be sudden, but there could be a gradual slide, as people start to look around for something new.
Look at movies - the first signs of super-hero fatigue are beginning to set in. Avengers: Age of Ultron didn't do as well as its predecessor, and Ant-Man was only a modest hit (but managed to turn a profit due to its relatively low budget). People like the familiar, but they also yearn for the new.
What worked once won't always work if you just keep repeating without refreshing.
All of the games I've mentioned are going to sell well. Or well enough, that they'll convince publishers that these are the sorts of games people want.
The relative disappointment of Sega's mega-budget Alien: Isolation - which, by Sega's own admission, flopped despite being a known brand - has the industry running scared. Isolation offered new ideas, but somehow didn't connect with a big enough audience.
I mean, I didn't much like it - the difficulty level was ramped up so high that it became a chore for me. But given the success of Bloodborne and Dark Souls II, that seems to be something people want these days. Which merely adds to the mystery of why the game wasn't a huge hit.
And the conclusion for many seems to be: too original.
But I honestly think that, at some point, it's going to backfire for the industry, if it continues along this path. It won't be sudden, but there could be a gradual slide, as people start to look around for something new.
Look at movies - the first signs of super-hero fatigue are beginning to set in. Avengers: Age of Ultron didn't do as well as its predecessor, and Ant-Man was only a modest hit (but managed to turn a profit due to its relatively low budget). People like the familiar, but they also yearn for the new.
What worked once won't always work if you just keep repeating without refreshing.
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