Time for me to reveal a
big secret about myself: I like video games.
I’m one of those people
who believe that video games can be art, and by extension make for a unique
medium bursting with potential. I’m not
the only one who feels the same way -- but on the flip side, the fact that I
hold games in such high esteem just makes all the problems and failures sting
that much more.
I know it’s a little
early to start with the doom-and-gloom toward the new consoles on the block,
but cripes a la mode, neither Sony nor Microsoft have come even close to
justifying an upgrade, what with titles like Ryse and Knack. To be fair, the Wii U also had and still has
problems, but right now I’m convinced that the console that’s actually
interested in delivering good games will do so long before its rivals.
(Side note: have you
played The Wonderful 101 yet? You should.
Because it’s dope.)
YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAtotallynotbiased!
Console woes aside --
but only to an extent -- it seems like there are diminishing returns on the
amount of money put into a game and the actual quality of it. Halo:
Reach may have made something like $220 million dollars in one day to
justify its likely sky-high budget, but a rock had more personality than the
entire cast put together. The same
applies even more so to Halo 4, no
doubt; Microsoft
said that it is (or was, at the time) its most
expensive game, but it tossed out all attempts at quality for so-so
gameplay (with a multiplayer suite that, IIRC, wasn't well-received by all the fans), Master Chief glorification, and visuals at once pointlessly elaborate
and depressingly bland.
It’s a symbol of the
triple-A games regime: sure, they might -- emphasis on might these days -- make their money back, but they’re pumping so
much money into it that all the talent and creativity gets shoved off the edge
of a cliff. It’s a real problem…but it
seems like no matter where I look, money issues are a problem for almost every
medium. Video games and movies are the
chief examples, but I suspect there are others.
I suspect there are problems running through every corner of the
entertainment industry -- the industry responsible for giving us much-needed
stories -- and things have just as much potential to get worse as they do to
get better.
So pardon my
apocalyptic pondering, but I’m curious to see what you guys think about the
subject. Based on your experiences (with
any given medium/your medium of choice), do
you think that big budgets are doing more harm to media and storytelling than
good? Feel free to weigh in on that
subject at your leisure. I’ll reserve my
thoughts for now, but I will say this much: I’m glad that indie games are
finding a place in the gaming world, but I can only imagine how much good they
could do if they had the resources of a bigger production. If Atlus and the Persona Team had the big
bucks of the Call of Duty team, I’d
like to think they could make a game of reality-shattering quality…and ensure
that thousands of gamers perpetually stay at full mast. That
said, you don’t need a million dollars to come up with a good story. It helps realize it when/if it’s time to go
audiovisual, but what’s important is the vision and the will to realize
it. Everything else is just gravy.
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Aw, snap! Kamen
Rider W reference! Now, count up
your --
Ahem. Anyway, I’ll leave the rest up to you. Got an opinion? Feel free to weigh in. Just watch those wallets along the way, all
right? Ready, set, comment!