Great video games repeat themselves

Millions of gamers love the Naughty Dog company. Works like

Uncharted

and, above all,

The Last of Us

are among the best in history, thanks to the value of mixing entertainment with demanding and uncomfortable plots. But, at the same time, there are hordes of users who criticize the company. Most of them precisely because of their daring, with risky narratives or transgender or LGTBIQ+ characters. Although lately he has also been accused of just the opposite: extreme conservatism, at least economically.

More information

'Final Fantasy VII Rebirth': the art of making a sequel to a 'remake' (which was actually a 'reboot')

Every time a new console has appeared on the market, Naughty Dog has tweaked

ad hoc

and relocated its flagship title to stores: so much so that there are now more remasters (three) than original games (two). First,

The Last of Us

showed the world what video games were capable of

.

But then he summarized great paradoxes that plague the sector: originality or more of the same; prioritize talent or technology; the thirst for money or art. From

Final Fantasy VII

to

Resident Evil,

sequels, remakes or restorations dominate releases and sales. To the joy of fans or nostalgists. Others, however, fear that creative risk is losing the game, at least in blockbusters. Meanwhile, the independent sector brims with innovation, but also precariousness. Artwork, games, products? Here, too,

The Last of Us

suggests the way: the best debates seem complex.

Image from 'Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth'.

“There are many repetitions, too many. It is evident that it has an economic interest,” begins Sofía Francisco, author of several books on the sector (the latest,

The Berserk Phenomenon

, in Héroes de Papel). Almost all the great titles of the last decades have already returned, more or less in makeup:

Silent Hill, Prince of Persia

,

Metal Gear Solid, Dead Space, Zelda, Mass Effect

or

Crash Bandycoot.

“The number of users, their average playing time and their spending have all decreased since 2021. At the same time, the most popular works, which can remain popular for a decade, unlike a book or a movie, have become larger. and faces. All of this has made it difficult for many titles and developers to increase their audience,” says Matthew Ball, a renowned analyst in this industry.

In reality, continuing or retelling the past is as old as culture itself, from

Hallelujah

to Shakespeare, from

A Star is Born

to

The Price of Power.

Almost all of Hollywood's biggest global blockbusters come from well-known franchises. And television is heading toward the era of “safe ideas,” according to an article published in

Vulture

last year. The video game may be just another example. “There are formulas that tend to be repeated, especially in large productions: mechanics that seem to be copied from one game to another, sagas that are exploited for decades. It is a way of reducing risk that, on the other hand, is not exclusive to this industry,” argues Luis Oliván, head of the Spanish company Fictiorama, creator of original works such as

The Fabolous Fear Machine

or

Do Not Feed The Monkeys,

as well as of the sequel to the latter. However, the trend does contain different elements in the video game, even unique ones.

A moment from the video game 'Do Not Feed the Monkeys', by the Spanish studio Fictiorama.

“The new versions here serve to preserve the original work,” highlights Francisco. Because an old song or film is almost always still available just like its

recent

remakes

. Recovering an adventure conceived for a console that has already disappeared, on the other hand, presents a path of obstacles. However, at the same time, in video games the new tends to bury the old more than in other areas. “Sometimes, Nintendo leaves the

remake

alone and removes the original from its digital store,” Francisco exemplifies. A phenomenon that

Wired

magazine also lamented

in June of last year: who is going to travel to an archaic universe when they can visit the brand new photorealistic version of it?

That report added a reflection: “We do not believe that literature will be perfected over time like science. Nor have advances in visual effects improved the films. Artistic quality does not have to be linked to technology. Still, in video games we tend to associate new with better.” Sometimes the equation is real: the second installments of

Red Dead Redemption

,

Alan Wake

or The Last of Us

itself

came many years after the original, with scripts as solid or more, and ideas as daring as a musical in the middle of a scary nightmare.

An image of 'Alan Wake 2', by Remedy.

In general, it may be that the playability and graphics, more connected to technical advances, do appreciate the passage of time. The second installment of

Horizon

offered a larger world, more alive and absorbing than its predecessor. And the threat that plagued

A Plague Tale: Innocence

becomes more oppressive in its sequel,

Requiem.

Creative and narrative talent, however, is not judged only in pixels or possibilities with the controller in your hands. The

Fifa

or

Call of Duty

sagas

have dominated the market based on small annual tweaks. Which can also condition the external audience's view of the video game. And there are remasters that simply leave everything intact, except for the aesthetics. The so-called “Complete Edition” of

The Witcher 3

was nothing more than an “update,” as

the Financial Times wrote

.

And Francisco highlights that

GTA: Trilogy

accumulated more bugs than new features.

Still, Matthew Gallant, director of the remaster of

The Last of Us Part 2,

stated that he did not understand some of the “consternation” about the project. An analysis by the specialized media

IGN

offers some answer: “Finally, it is money for new graphics. It's hard not to imagine how interesting these games would have been if new, modern ideas had been properly applied." Or if, instead of focusing on them, developers allocated time and resources to generate unpublished intellectual properties. Although the ideal reflection does not include the most earthly of keys: money. “Criticizing this conservatism is easy from a distance but, from a purely commercial point of view, it makes perfect sense, especially when we talk about products that can cost hundreds of millions of euros and that, to be profitable, have to sell.” many units,” says Oliván.

An image of 'Horizon. Forbidden West', by Guerrilla Games.

“Since the PlayStation 2, in the first decade of this century, each generation of consoles had less revenue, while graphical and world improvements became less and less revolutionary. If you add the explosion of independent and mobile games, the main studios turned towards

remakes, reboots

and sequels to reduce the risk of a failed launch," contextualizes Logan Brown, professor at Indiana University, in the USA, and author of an investigation into the matter. The thousands of recent layoffs at some of the sector's main developers darken the economic outlook. And the sources consulted draw similarities with cinema: skyrocketing budgets, also in advertising, and growing competition (audiovisual platforms, social networks, independent video games) have pushed the industry to “corner” itself, according to Brown: “As “They cannot compete in innovation, they do it in labels with recognizable names.”

“Between the nineties and the two thousand, the largest film studios also invested heavily in

indie-

style productions , dramas or medium-budget romantic comedies, but now they focus on blockbusters. “It's close to what happens in video games,” adds Ball. And he maintains that, with so many similarities, many “also expect a similar outcome: that the public begins to ask for different experiences.”

Image from 'Chants of Sennaar', by Julien Moya and Thomas Panuel.

The truth is that there already are. Already in 2016, creator Fumito Ueda encouraged his colleagues to find their own path, instead of being inspired “by cinema or other media.” “You won't have fun with video games if you work in a big studio,” said Dave Oshry, head of

Dusk,

these days . And authors like Karla Zimonja, Lucas Pope and Sam Barlow have been exploring the limits for years with works like

Gone Home, Return of Obra Dinn

or

Her Story.

Ball adds recent titles such as

Cocoon, Dave the Diver

or

Chants of Sennaar

and Francisco mentions

Balatro.

All, yes, independent productions. With more risks, but less funds, more instability. “The two main challenges of

indie

games

are access to financing and visibility: more and more quality works are published, but that makes it more difficult to stand out. Precisely creative risk can become a key element,” defends Oliván. Although Brown also highlights that the fight to be seen is pushing some independent companies to revise their formulas towards easier and more in-demand recipes.

There, large and small industries come into contact. And, at the same time, the sources highlight

successful and careful

remakes , such as

Resident Evil II

,

Yakuza Kiwami

or the peculiar

The Making of Karateka.

“I question the idea that

remakes

and

reboots

imply less creativity. Even just porting a video game to another medium requires an enormous number of creative decisions that the public and the press may never see,” Brown emphasizes.

The recent

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

may be the best example: it recovers an old game, but modifies its plot, its gameplay and several internal dynamics. Thus, among so many labels, they have not managed to hit any: neither

remake

nor

reboot

nor remastering nor sequel. Or maybe all of this at the same time. In its own way, it is also a novelty.

Image from 'Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth'.

Subscribe to continue reading

Read without limits

Keep reading

I am already a subscriber

_