Do we really want games to surprise us? (Gaming)

by Korny , Dalton, Ga. US. Earth, Sol System, Wednesday, August 09, 2017, 11:47 (2673 days ago)
edited by Korny, Wednesday, August 09, 2017, 12:00

So nothing about Destiny 2 has really gotten me pumped. New Subclasses? Eh. New worlds to explore? Expected. Large-scale Cabal assault? We've been calling it since Year 2. Other than a few elements that it's borrowing from Horizon Zero Dawn (and a few other games), nothing is a surprise.
And yet, preorder sales are through the roof. People who whined and moaned about the first game have been saying good things about what they see, and from the looks of it, we're going to coast off another three years of much of the same repetitive grind that we have been for the past three years. And for the most part, we are all okay with that. We know that not enough will change to make it a brand new experience. We know that people will continue to have the same complaints that they had before, as Bungie has clearly played it safe (remove Specials, remove self-rez, remove random stats, remove variety)... Players say that they want drastic changes, that they want things to be fresh, but they clearly don't, given the preorders and buzz...

And this week, an experiment has come along to challenge that complacency. It throws standard conventions out the window, and gives us something different for a change... And the reactions have been very mixed, which has gotten me thinking.

The experiment is Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, which launched Yesterday on PS4 and PC. Described as an "indie AAA" title, it was developed (and self-published) by Ninja Theory, the guys behind Enslaved, Heavenly Sword, and the Devil May Cry reboot. Hellblade is an incredibly interesting game for a great number of reasons; everything from how you feel while playing to how you should listen to it has had articles and entire threads written about it, but I'll get to that in a minute. First, an idea of what the game is even like (with a word from one of the team members):

And a more thematic trailer (showing the game running at 60FPS):

Now let's talk about the things that it does different.

The one you've likely heard about (if nothing else), is that the game has a mandatory permadeath feature if you die too much. Except it doesn't. But it does. What's going on? It ties into what the game even IS. The game has you playing a character, Senua, who suffers from psychosis. And not just in a Dead Space "you hallucinate sometimes" way, either. The game does everything that it can to put you into Senua's shoes. When you load up the game, it recommends that you play the game with headphones (3D Audio is not only supported, but recommended), and then you're thrown into the world with no tutorials, no explanation of what's what. There are voices that constantly plague you. They help you... Sometimes. Other times, they'll mock you, they'll disturb you, and worse, they might even flat-out lie to you. When you die, the game will inform you of the permadeath that will happen if you fail too much. And you'll have that looming over you for the rest of the game. Every hit that an enemy lands is that much more terrifying. Every death a gamble... Some folks immediately jumped on Ninja Theory to denounce the feature (including prominent moron TotalBiscuit, who ended up sheepishly deleting his tweet once it was pointed out to him how much of an idiot he is, because he hadn't even played a single minute of the game).
So that really caught my attention. It's something that you never see in games these days: true punishment. And some people rage about it, while others praise it (and in the end, it may just be intended to make you uneasy rather than actually going through with its threat, which fits thematically, since you're not supposed to be sure about anything that you see or hear in the game, and it's clearly working, since people don't even know how to trigger it)...

In fact, each of the things that Hellblade does differently, such as no tutorials, no HUD, no hand-holding of any sort, and the looming threat of actual consequence... it's all being criticized by a large portion of the gaming community. And the funny thing is that reviewers themselves, who did play the game from beginning to end, love it. It currently holds an 81 on Metacritic. And something that was funny to me is how not all reviewers loved the same things.

For example, while one of the lowest-scoring reviewers (METRO) said:

A technical masterpiece with some of the best swordfighting combat in years, but the storytelling and puzzle elements come across as muddled and awkwardly mismatched.

another of the lower-scoring reviewers (Vandal) said:

Although gameplay-wise is far from Ninja Theory’s best works, the universe and the story are outstanding.

They pretty much praised and criticized the exact opposite of what the other said. And these are the people who gave some of the lowest scores.

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Another thing that Ninja Theory did differently is the self-publishing that I talked about earlier. People like to hiss and spit at Activision, and at Bungie's partnership with Activision, and many wonder what it would have been like without that union.
Ninja Theory has done just that. They funded the game themselves, using their own resources and a tiny team, and it's blown my mind. The entire game was developed by a team of thirteen people. The main character, Senua, is played by Ninja Theory's video editor, who helped put out nearly 30 fantastic Dev diaries. The studio used this freedom to put out an experience quite unlike any other, that's being praised by reviewers, and is being sold for $30, half the price of a standard game release. The game includes both a 4K mode, and a 60Hz mode for 60Fps. It has a Photo Mode. It's everything that people say they want!

And yet, people are complaining... So do we want games to surprise us? Do we want developers to break away from their publishers and deliver truly unique experiences? Hellblade is the manifestation of that question, and the sales and player response will be the answer.