Trying not to sound like a broken record I think makes me sound like a broken record, I think.
I think, therefore I game?
Putting philosophy only slightly to the side as we focus on a sampler platter of news items to confront today, I’m not quite sure how much Gamescom contributed to my current levels of exhaustion, but this week has felt like a mighty one. I reported recently on just the tip of the iceberg in terms of gaming news from the show, including Borderlands, Indiana Jones, Wukong, and Masters of Albion in some detail, and there’s yet more I will likely discuss in the following week relating to the show with the ridiculous breadth of content that the gaming world was a party to in the past week or so. The news marches on of course, even outside of Gamescom, as there is always something popping off in our little gaming world.
Or not, as the problems seems to be
Sony’s new team based hero shooter Concord is getting dragged through the mud for low player count following launch, with reports saying under a thousand concurrent users were enjoying the new FPS during launch, not numbers I’m sure Sony is thrilled about. On the one hand, the game did just launch, and sometimes you need to let players really dig into the experience for update improvements and word of mouth to roll out. On the other hand, hype for this kind of game really should start building early on in betas and the like, much like Valve’s shooter Deadlock, which albeit is a slightly different beast in terms of design, but to my point, a badly kept secret until very recently, where people were just dying to talk about the title, inspite of the company trying to keep it low key to the point of seemingly ignoring it’s existence entirely.
A visual representation of Valve’s marketing strategy with Deadlock
I’m always torn in moments like these, as I don’t want to see a developer fail with what could be considered a less than stellar product, especially with layoffs continuing to be a problem left and right for the industry, but on the other hand, how many team based FPS games (and the like) in general can even coexist on the market before the entire field feels flooded with choices? At some point, you will reach a saturation point, and with gamers sinking countless hours into a title and unlocking both skins and racking up stats in more prominent shooters or a title they have at least put a bunch of time into with a friend group that is already all about it, the prospect of just up and moving to another game is a hard sell.
Sometimes, even acclaimed titles are sales flops
There are a lot of realities to this business that I don’t necessarily have all of the info at the ready on to make a totally sound judgement call as well, so it’s hard to say whether something like Concord needed to launch with gangbuster numbers in order to justify it’s existence immediately or whether or not people are overreacting and the game just needs to play the long game to be deemed a moderate success. I guess in a fast moving market, if a title at launch is already struggling to maintain excitement levels and is already falling off fairly quickly in terms of player base, at least on Steam, it’s hard not to assume the worst for the longevity of the title.
Just one of many examples that spring to familiar mind
Publishers may have lofty expectations for developers in terms of recouping losses and making a general profit, if the recent news involving the cancellation of the development of Crash 5 is any reminder. The title was planned on being a crossover with the Spyro series, as a proper 3d platformer where you could play as either titular hero, but Activision scrapped the idea due to low sales numbers from Crash 4. A damn shame as I think many can agree, as that kind of collab sounds very much like a chocolate and peanut butter scenario most people would have jumped at. 
Activision: The consumate cockblocker strikes again
In slightly less depressing news, the King of Fighters series celebrates it’s 30th anniversary today, with KoF 94′ having launched on this very day in a much different era, helping to usher in a glorious ongoing rivalry with Capcom for dominance in the 2d fighting space for years to come. SNK promised a slew of announcements in celebration of the event, and has continued to remind people of the awesomeness that is KoF with Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui appearing as guest fighters in SF 6, as well as a rerelease of Snk vs Capcom: SVC Chaos, and an upcoming title Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves launching mid 2025. Trailer below.
Not all is bad in the world of gaming, and at the very least, we all have the fortunate problem of being haunted by choices, which comes as much of a relief as it carries a horrifying reality to it. Even in moments when I’m totally zonked out due to tiredness on top of not even having had much time to play much in the past couple of days, I remind myself that this is all suppose to be in the name of fun, and return down back to Earth before I let myself get overwhelmed with choices. We may live in anguish in the face of freedom, but we remain capable of finding comfort in our random moments of zen amidst the chaos.
~Pashford
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