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Should We Support Abuse Of A Setting?
AngelHedgie
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
A recent article on Ars Technica posits an interesting question: should we support the abuse of an existing setting, even if the result is good? The reviews of Shadowrun have been good, when one looks at it as a standalone game. But when you compare it to the setting that spawned it, one cannot help but feel disappointed. Personally, my feelings are summed up by this post on the AT thread:
But even so, should we support the game even though it mangles the setting? Or should we send a message that this won't stand?
Shadowrun wasn't just a title of a series, it was a word assosiated with a concept that was central with the IP. So I will pose just two questions to you.
Based on the Shadowrun FPS, answer the following:
What is a Shadowrun?
What is a Shadowrunner?
If you cannot answer either question, based on the FPS, then you might start to get the idea of why people say that the game is nowhere near the IP.
But even so, should we support the game even though it mangles the setting? Or should we send a message that this won't stand?
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What message were you thinking of sending, by the way? Boycotting? If you don't buy the new Shadowrun, MS will just interpret it as a lack of enthusiasm for the franchise, and you'll get no more Shadowrun. It's the same story with many franchises - they'll start out great, but one bad game/movie/book can deal a huge blow to the machine, and most just don't recover. Unfortunately this is just an intrinsic part of commercial storytelling.
A 66 at metacritic and a 65/60 at gamerankings is not exactly glowing praise.
Is this where I start in with the George Lucas prequel trilogy stuff?
On the other hand - along that lack of enthusiasm for the franchise line - if everyone boycotted that maybe we wouldn't have gotten KOTOR or Jedi Outcast.
I understand that a successful boycott means there is a chance that they will never make another game in that series and I'm o.k. with that. I very ok with it when the only reason they use the title is because they are trying to cash in on a successful series.
How is the series ending any worse that watching them continue to butcher a once great title?
Regardless, the Shadowrun FPS is actually pretty fun (what with the teleporting elves and trolls with hang-gliders and stuff.) It seems stupid to "punish" the developers for making a fun game just because you don't agree with the setting.
But the FPS plays way before the "real" Shadowrun anyway if I remember correctly. I'm not a Shadowrun crack but their "story" turned me off right from the start. I see it as wasted potential. Some people mentioned the flaw there, too. There are enough possibilities in the "real" SR setting to justifiy groups of people shooting each other to pieces which would have been more appropriate.
And Disney World is nowhere in sight.
Is this abuse? Nah, I wouldn't call it abuse. Abuse is more what Sega has done to Sonic. I honestly don't know how I feel about this specific instance, because I try not to be elitist about things. For instance, I played the shit out of WC-WC3:TFT, and was a bit miffed when they decided to take the franchise in the direction of an MMO. Now that I'm pretty deeply entrenched in WoW, I understand that it wasn't exactly an illogical step for the series.
As that applies to Shadowrun, it's not exactly an illogical step, it's just undesirable and entirely unjustified. They should have fucking remade Tribes and left it at that.
Yes, the brand names are theirs to abuse. That doesn't mean it's not abuse.
It's also bad business sense. Non-fans are just as likely (or not) to buy the game based on its merits regardless of the license. Fans are only going to be alienated. There's an unfounded paranoia of original IPs in the video game industry right now that leads to very poor business decisions (such as this one). Luckily liquor and car companies (for the most part) don't hire the kind of business school C-students who end up as pointy haired bosses at publishers and seem to have no reason to exist except to make life miserable for developers and fans.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
65/60 is a wonderful review.
But yeah...
It wasn't really meant as a sequel, it's just a game that assumes prior knowledge about the enviroment and uses it to its advantage rather than having to write a rationale on just what the hell is happening.
Feral does raise a point though.
A name brings pre-requisites, and they must be met. Otherwise this is what happens i suppose.
Basically, IPs are by and large handled by the business office not the dev team. I.E. you've got a team of fps devs who have never worked on a RPG before, and they get handed and IP and told "make it". They all look at each other and say "oh shit". No matter what they do their gonna get fan backlash, they can either make a shitty RPG, think the first VampMasq game and start shuddering, or they can try and incorporate what they think an RPG is (the reason they'd make a shitty one in the first place) into their regular retinue of FPS and actually make a game that is, in and of itself, worth playing.
From what I've heard of Shadowrun, it is leaps and bounds ahead of so many games made based on set IPs. I DON'T want to kill a dev team who is finally showing some balls, brains, and creativity and actually making something work instead of trying to lemming out some shit for fan consumption.
I was a part of the forum discussions on the Firefly MMO message board, and as many of you have, have seen Bethesda's Fallout boards. Honestly, these guys did the right thing, the IP is being served much better by having a solid FPS in it's name than a shitty RPG.
Actually, yeah, it was. Maybe not immutable, per se, but the storyline had continuity and a set of fundamental rules. For instance: no teleportation. Teleportation fundamentally isn't Shadowrun. It would be like Star Wars with a light-side Jedi assassin who sneaks around and force-chokes people for Yoda. At that point, it's not Star Wars anymore.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I'm pretty sure the fundamental trait of Star Wars is "contains lightsabers... maybe even space monks," just like the fundamental trait of Shadowrun is "cyberpunk/urban fantasy," not "does not contain teleportation." If in the next edition of the rules, they said "oh yeah, and here's a spell that mages can use to teleport" the entire setting would not collapse in a firey wreckage. Life would somehow go on.
It's not like developers were beating down the doors of the license holders to make a game out of it. Who cares whether or not it's true to what the fans think the setting should be? The whole "this isn't appropriate for this license" reeks of NMA stupidity. They bought the license, if the overwhelming outrage of the fans is so great, I'm sure they wouldn't mind each pitching in a buck or two to buy it off of them and make them change the name instead of sitting at their desks and emitting a high pitched whine.
You, sir, have made my day, may I kiss you now?
anyway I think fans that try to boycott something based on it straying from the original IP but still being great on its own are just like small children throwing a tantrum at the grocery store because their parents won't buy them candy.
One of the top 5 best-selling RPGs of all times.
At one time it was only outsold by D&D.
It's not like this game counts for anything anyway. They're not changing the Shadowrun franchise to match it. It's a cash-in, at best.
So Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is fundamentally a Star Wars movie.
And yet until now only 1 computer game was ever made using it as a base. Seeing the nerd angst targeted at the new one, I'm beginning to think that was a wise choice.
There was a Genesis game, a SNES game, and a Sega CD game. All stuck closely with the pre-established rules of the setting and hey, what do you know, they were well-liked.
So because this game which is the equivalent of slapping the Star Wars logo on UT2k4 and calling it a Star Wars game is getting shat on by people who are familiar with the license, it proves that if a Shadowrun game that vaguely resembled Shadowrun were made, just as many nerds would have bitched just as much about it? Slick logic there.
That's because FASA was a bunch of tools with zero business sense.
and what they said: the SNES game is pretty legendary.
I preferred the Sega one myself. More Roleplay-y and the lack of those goddamn assassins.
Actually I had alot of faith in nerds not bitching about this stuff ever since I saw SW: Battlefront, which is the Star Wars logo slapped on Battlefield 1942. Part of what pisses me off is half the people getting up in arms haven't played and by their own admission won't, which to me says that they have soo much riding on what they want a game to be, they probably would have shat on anything that came out that didn't exactly match what they were expecting.
Furu:
All 3 of those games were from when I was 8 or younger, pardon if I missed 2.
[edit] Echo:
I can agree it was probably a bad decision on FASA's part... in fact FASA is rather well known for their business idiocy...
Shadowrun, however it plays (which from what I've heard it's a pretty big mixed big), does not use more than two or three of the most generic aspects of the setting. It would be considered a cheap Shadowrun knock-off if it didn't have the Shadowrun name slapped onto it.
Actually no, SW: Battlefront takes place in the Star Wars universe, not during WWII on Earth. So it's not Battlefield 1942 with a Star Wars logo slapped on it. But hey, don't mind me, I know it's important for you to be able to talk down about someone to feel whole and it's not like the nerds aren't used to it m i rite?
Your post before this one, good rebuttle. This one (and VCs)... wtf? I say the words "nerd angst" and suddenly I'm some prick talking down to nerds. I am a nerd! Where are you reading my "calling other people nerds in an insulting manner". People are getting pissed that a fricking game dares to use the name of their precious PnP RPG and it doesn't strike you as the least bit silly? Come on people, it's a game! Why can't you all be this pissed somewhere it matters?
The game has been deemed good, maybe not great, maybe not what you expected, and if it's not for you great. But it is their license to do with what they want, and since they have said publicly that their thinking about doing an RPG if this game works out for them I would have thought you'd all be supporting it even if just to show the developers you appreciate the title.
Go ahead, try to kill the damn franchise and punish people for making good games for a change, but don't expect me to pat you on the back.
Actually it was the part where you talked down at people for taking issue with the fact that this game has absolutely nothing at all to do with the I.P. used, whatsoever, and wrote them off as nerds angsting. Like, how dare anyone admit to having liked Shadowrun? That's almost as bad as admitting to liking Batman! In fact, why don't we make a Batman FPS with guns and translocators where you play as Batman and kill people with guns? IT WOULD BE AWESOME AND THINK OF HOW MANY PEOPLE YOU COULD TALK DOWN AT FOR BEING UPSET BY SAID ABUSE OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY!
That's the part that amuses me most, personally.
As much as I love the Shadowrun franchise, and am sad that we'll likely never see any of the various forms the perfect Shadowrun game would take, I like this new one.
In fact, I won't hesitate to say it's a lot more fun to play than the SNES/Genesis SR games from back in the day.
I'm enjoying the new Shadowrun game, though it could have used another few months in the oven, to get down a ladder-climbing animation if nothing else. It's a competent online shooter with an interesting setting and some distinct mechanics.
PokeCode: 3952 3495 1748
It's like the very definition of nerd angst, VC. Personally I was crazy angry for months after they changed the look of the Gold Dragon from the snakey Chinese dragon to the regular dragon in the Monster Manual, kowtowing to western audiences and Dragonlance fans. I mean way to fuck it up and sacrifice your integrity, TSR.
Do you get what I'm saying?
Of all first-person shooters out right now, Shadowrun is by far the most fun. So I'm supporting it right now.
I do understand the heartache over what a game called "Shadowrun" could have been, but this isn't that game - it's the lovechild of Counterstrike and WoW Battlegrounds more than anything. By supporting it, I'm hoping that other developers will move even further in that direction - the idea of FPS games featuring distinct races and classes fills me with glee.
PokeCode: 3952 3495 1748