Remakes and rethinking: Tomb Raider, DMC: Devil May Cry, Ducktales Remastered

All ingenious has already come up with whether it is worth inventing a bicycle?

The same, but more expensive

All ingenious has already been invented. It is not for nothing that the main commandment of any designer is: "Steal, but do not get there". Invent something unambiguously new and unique, unprecedented-the destiny of the elect. And their ideas, if you dig deeper, are still built on the basis of existing ideas.

The gaming industry does not argue with the foundations of the universe, and remakes in it do not surprise anyone. It is difficult to say who was the first to step on this path, but now the bugs, the spaces, and the bear are doing this-any publisher, whose piggy bank has a couple of famous franchises who have faded ten years ago, seeks to sell them again.

► PC, as always, stands apart. There have always been a lot of reprints on this platform, but this year we were given at all Baldur’s Gate 2: Enhanced Edition , Having significantly improved this legendary game.

On the one hand, it's very good. No need to have retro consoles to play retro-games, just buy HD-transformation. In the case of Fumito Weda hits – ICO & Shadow of the Colossus, For example, everything is fine at all: two games on one disk, a high -quality improvement in the picture, and even 3D support. The costs are scanty, sales will surely cover them – everyone is happy, everyone is beneficial. Making console producers also encourage the release of HD-radiations, purposely cutting back compatibility with the games of the previous generation.

However, in 2013, there were few such remakes for large consoles ( Soulcalibur 2 HD ). The exception is only Wii U – there was a wonderful The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD. True, some publishers even in such an unpretentious business as the transfer of the game in HDs manage to step on the rake. Konami with her Silent Hill Collection HD managed to spoil her great heritage – the result turned out to be frankly worse than the original, the fans plugged them, and the newcomers did not understand him. As later it turned out, the reason for the technical problems of Silent Hill Collection HD was the lack of the source code of games – frank disorder for a large company.

A completely different thing is mobile platforms or, for example, Nintendo 3DS, where classic ECCO The Dolphin , Galaxy Force II And Sonic the Hedgehog , Adding them support 3D. Many old games are remade for relevant platforms and without any improvements, except for online support: this year a lot of classics were transferred both to Wii U (with SNES, for the most part) and “departing” PS3 and Xbox 360.

An alternative path is not just to stretch the textures to HD permissions, but to completely redraw the graphics, as, for example, in the hit of this summer Ducktales Remastered. So you can kill two birds with one stone at once-to please the generation that has grown at classical games, and at the same time introduce young people who are not pleased to be pleased with pixel art. Naturally, this development will be more expensive, but the costs usually pay off in full.

However, this type of reprint is also not always possible – for example, we are unlikely to soon see a remaster version Final Fantasy VII. Square Enix President stated that this will not happen until the company releases the game superior in quality. But even if it releases, it is scary to imagine what a budget (and time) will be required to create a worthy reprint.

The "Renaissance" is gaining momentum, the developers are increasingly looking back and come up with what has already been invented. Someone just sells old games again, someone is trying to rejuvenate them, while others just join. Remember the successful Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, which flirts with the golden era of militants on the holes of VHS cassettes, or look next year-in the already unconscious slasher Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z will be 2D mode.

► FROM CONTICTION HOTLINE MIAMI, which should be released in 2014. More and more independent developers go to pixel art-it’s nice for senior players, the youth shrugs depressedly.

But there is another trend that is directly opposite. While some publishers carefully transfer their hits of the past to new rails, trying not to lose anything, others burn bridges and rethink the classics. Capcom recently stood on this path – we are talking, of course, about the sensational DMC: Devil May Cry, British rethinking of the classical story about Dante demons hunter. Many did not like the idea sharply, but others were delighted with such a non -standard look at the beloved universe. One way or another, Ninja Theory made an excellent, beautiful and largely deep game, albeit not met the expectations of some fans.

Then it happened Tomb Raider – no less global rethinking of no less classic series. Lara Croft from an iron lady turned into a fragile, but brave girl with character and soul. Even Simcity restarted, what is it there!

Both DMC and Tomb Raider were highly appreciated by critics and many players, but nevertheless, the game suffered financial collapse. Will this be a lesson for publishers? It is unlikely. The following year is waiting for us, the smallest, restart Mirror’s Edge.

Next Generation

Everyone suddenly took and decided that the generation was replaced – the number of remakes and rethinking, dated 2013, this proves. Something similar happens in cinema (special emphasis, of course, on science fiction: “Robokop”, “Remember everything”, “Mad Max”), so there is no getting away from this. The gaming industry is no longer cooked in its own juice, and everything that is happening in the world affects it directly.

What will all be spilled into? In the current form, the HD-radiations will probably go into the background-after all, this phenomenon is rather a transient, such a product of time that is already starting to drive itself to a dead end. Like it or not, the space for experiments in this direction is limited to the heritage of the sixth generation of consoles (pay attention to how deftly in the current collections they bypass the game for the PS One), to which the seventh successfully added new https://lucky-carnival-casino.co.uk/ and popular bonuses, such as high resolution and the presence of trophies.

Now that the innovations of the past generation become familiar things in the current generation, they are already losing the status of a serious argument for re -purchase. Does anyone need a re-release of the trilogy Prince of Persia from Ubisoft in an even higher resolution on PS4 or Xbox One with updated set of trophies? Or the same Prince of Persia sample 2008? It is unlikely. And the PS4 with reverse compatibility through Gaikai has a chance to do this by default – especially considering that they take almost a year to accelerate to start their service. The Xbox One has a different situation: Microsoft can easily make reprints to some additional entertainment services that they are so rapidly promoting.

► Shenmue frame for Dreamcast. The game industry evolves quickly, but here, unlike cinema, literature and music, you can’t just evaluate the classics – you need old devices that are no longer released.

In other words, the HD-interpretations will most likely have to go into the weight category of full-fledged remakes, in which, together with high resolution, players will demonstrate qualitative changes that can attract them (additional content, new management, etc. The next generation remakes are represented by something like The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD , where the graphics were updated and the control changed, and new functions were added. True, they did it in some hurry, and therefore not in the most complete way, but the vector is given the right. True, no one will forbid publishers to send some old game to a digital store at a catchy price-only it is difficult to calculate this with a remake. And will the new generation of players will be able to come to terms with angular models and blurry?

Restarts will probably appear more and more often. Even if you look at the first projects of the generation, you can see the emerging trend of rejection of numbers – new Killzone I forgot about the four in the title, instead of it – the subtitle of the Shadow Fall, Infamous changed the main character and also rejected the coveted number 3, Killer Instinct And they will be presented at all almost as a new franchise. The audience is increasing every year, and the fact that for some is a significant and recognizable brand, others hardly say something at all.

The same with ideas – thousands turn their nose from the fact that the aristocrat Lara in the new Tomb Raider shreds the thugs, and Garrett in the updated Thief behaves like Adam Jensen from Human Revolution, But for beginners, this is perhaps the main reasons to play further.

Those ideas that once formed the face of a particular series go into the past, and this is a logical stage in the development of the industry. New developments should be replaced, and in large quantities they can be introduced only in the form of the so -called "restart". Why not abandon the old name in favor of something fundamentally new? There are many reasons: if the gameplay should often be radically updated, then the universe, characters and even plot lines are quite viable. And one cannot forget about the audience of old fans – they, whatever one may say, can add several zeros to the final figure of profit. Although with them, alas, are considered already last.