 | When was the last time Konami-internal made a good game? |
Don't really have much of an opener other than to state that, if you've never played P.T. on PSN, you have until April 29th to do so. Apparently, Konami's removing the game after announcing the cancellation of Silent Hills. I'm sure EmP is incredibly depressed that he's never going to play as Norman Reedus.
Joking aside, these recent events surrounding Konami, what with their falling out with Kojima Productions and the Silent Hills' cancellation, has got me thinking: when was the last time Konami themselves made a good game? I'm thinking of all the recent titles they've published over the last, maybe, ten years, and they've all been outsourced games. I mean, even Sega, with their recent troubles, still crank out games using in-house teams. I'm honestly at a loss.
-Current Games-
Midway Arcade Origins: After playing some Iron Fisticle for my review, I plopped in my MAO disc into the 360 to play some Smash TV for comparisons sake. Man, that game is brutal. Afterwards, I played a few other titles, like Robotron 2084, Spy Hunter, Super Sprint, and Super Off Road, and it really felt like I got whacked over the head. These games are really a good indication of what a lot of 80s arcade titles were like, cranking up the difficulty so you can insert more coins. I had a semblance of fun with Super Sprint, but Super Off Road was testing my patience with all its obstacles. Spy Hunter is pretty ridiculous, too; it's extremely easy to blow up in this game.
3D Fantasy Zone II: Played a tiiiinnnnny bit of this, but I was still impressed by what M2 did by remodeling the Master System exclusive into an arcade-style release. I highly doubt I'll review this. Not that I find it difficult to do, since there's a lot of material to work with, but I just don't feel like doing another Fantasy Zone review after my odd hardships with the other review.
Pivvot: I thought this looked like an interesting title, so I bought it off Steam. Basically, it's an "auto-scroller" where a ball travels through a long tunnel from point A to point B. The catch is that the ball is hooked to a bigger ball that you control, where you can freely rotate it around the traveling ball, and you need to dodge every upcoming hazard and obstacle that's functioning around the tunnel. I thought this would be a neat, mindless game to play as a way to relax. Not even close. Pivvot is huge on memorization and twitch reflexes, and if you've played something like, say, Bit.Trip Runner, you know the deal. It's definitely an interesting approach to the "genre", but it's one that filled me with anxiety and fatigued. Not the right game for the mood I was looking for. xD
Soundodger+: So after my experience with Pivvot, I immediately purchased the next game on my list, Soundodger+. It's a "bullet-hell" game where you have to dodge an onslaught of spikes, orbs, and square-seeking formations in a circular arena, all of which is coming at you to the literal beat of songs. And yes, you can use your own music if you want. At first, I thought this was just a generic idea after five or so of the game's actual stages, but playing a few more I've noticed some interesting twists with how the formations confront you. Probably will play more to see where they go with this.
-Movies!-
Not a whole lot this time. Spent the last few weeks with my remaining cash making repairs to my car.
Faster: I was expecting some kind of heavy action movie, since it involved a driver who was really good with cars. Instead, I get a weird revenge movie that tried really hard to play up its "whodunit" mystery. The problem is, you pretty much piece the whole thing together within the first 5/10 minutes of the film, so you just sit there and watch in confusion as they play this aspect up all the way to the finale. The side-story with the hitman hired to take out the driver was really odd and unnecessary, too. It really makes me wonder if the director or writers made an action movie before, and the answer was: no.
Now, if you look at the back of the box for this movie, there's two scenes that don't actually show up in the movie! They were cut out, but the scenes are included as bonus features. After viewing them, especially within the context of the plot, they're embarrassingly awful scenes. Thank you to whoever made the decision to cut them.
Haywire: Because shut up! If I want to have fantasies of a strong, hot, confident woman slamming my body painfully to the ground, I'll have them, damn it! Erm.... If you see the box cover for this movie, you'll see an image of Gina Carano holding and shooting two guns. This is the most misleading thing ever, as she only holds three guns throughout the movie, spanning a total of less than three minutes combined. The movie functions more like a thriller than anything else, and as a whole, it's actually not a good one. Odd, considering that seems to be the director's, Steven Soderbergh, forte. You get these strange, long periods of traveling that don't build tension or drama, they're just... things that happen. Not surprisingly, the moments where Gina beats people up are the best parts of the film. Spoilers: my favorite is when she beats the ever-loving out of Michael Fassbender.
While the film wasn't great to begin with, it was still watchable throughout. That is, until the final 15 minutes. I don't know what happened, but it felt like the movie took a huge dip in quality during that time span. The part that ultimately took me out of it was the fight scene at the beach. Within the context of the movie, it felt really, really, really goofy. And when the ending credits suddenly popped up, I was like, "Oh, come on."
MacGruber: I originally wanted to watch this a few years back, but due to bad word of mouth, I stayed away. I finally watched it recently, and it actually wasn't that bad of a comedy. It wasn't an amazing one, but I was laughing more than I originally thought I would.
That's it! Go away!
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joseph_valencia - April 27, 2015 (10:59 PM) From what I've heard, Konami's gaming business has whittled down to: soccer games, dance games, and Metal Gear. It's really sad to see them shitting the bed like this. I wouldn't call myself a huge fan of Kojima, but he worked for that company for decades and his games made a lot of money for them. It's unbelievable how they're treating him and his team. It's like the people in charge just don't give a shit. It doesn't help that their PR department has been giving blunt, terse responses to inquiries about the situation. This is making me worried for the Japanese game industry. |
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honestgamer - April 28, 2015 (12:12 AM) Yeah, AAA development in Japan is basically down to Nintendo at this point. Sony develops most of its stuff in Europe and North America. Capcom is barely relevant. Square Enix barely puts out anything for consoles, aside from the upcoming Final Fantasy XV. There's stuff from smaller studios that qualifies as mid-tier, but it's clear Japan has almost entirely moved away from AAA. I mentioned Nintendo, but a lot of its stuff--though I love it--is not a lot of people's idea of AAA. And frankly, even elsewhere in the world, it seems like a lot of those projects are being left to EA, Activision, Take 2, and Ubisoft, while most other studios are folding or doing third-party work for companies like Microsoft and Sony. Mobile is where all the money is, and until the honeymoon ends (which it could soon, judging by how many people are getting sick of free-to-play), the spiral is probably going to continue. I just hope our favorite companies stick with it and come out the other side. |
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dementedhut - April 28, 2015 (11:33 AM) It kinda reminds me of what happened during the 90s, when the medium was making a shift towards 3D gaming design and different console structure, and some companies that were excelling during the NES/SNES/Genesis-era just couldn't make the proper leap forward, and sunk because of it. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Konami's future seems more bleak than Sega at this point. Stop making pachinko games! |
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honestgamer - April 28, 2015 (11:56 AM) Konami is doing fine, and its games have been quite profitable. They just aren't earning it the easy money that pachinko is, so the company seems to have decided that video games aren't really its thing anymore... with the possible exception of Metal Gear. This is what happens when companies in Japan are owned by shareholders. The shareholders in Japan seem to be unusually bad at looking at games as a global business, and the decisions they pressure executives to make ruin companies. Recall recently that one shareholder complained in a Nintendo meeting that the company was spending so much time talking about boring things like video games. That actually happened. We're lucky that more companies haven't folded to that pressure, the way Konami seems to be doing. |
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joseph_valencia - April 28, 2015 (12:33 PM) I recall reading an article where Kojima said that the Japanese entertainment industry is very Japan-centric, which explains why a lot of Japanese game companies are failing to globalize. |
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dementedhut - April 28, 2015 (12:39 PM) Oh, I'm sure Konami is getting by just fine with dance and pachinko games, because Japan, but in terms of what Konami used to be, with their quality IP lineup, I see a blank future. It's depressing. |
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JANUS2 - April 28, 2015 (03:53 PM) I feel like it's bad worldwide at the moment. I look down the list of confirmed upcoming PS4 releases and there's just nothing. Maybe a couple of genuine AAA games, like Phantom Pain in Autumn or whenever it's supposed to arrive. |
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