video game previews – Page 2

As I fill out a bracket that will no doubt be null and void shortly after the round of 64, I kick back and smile at the upcoming joy that is the greatest playoff system in all of sports, the NCAA March Madness tournament.

It’s a tale of underdogs and goliaths. It’s one of men who aim to be heroes coming from all corners of the lands to do battle. From the heated debates regarding those involved, all the way to the moment one school, and one team, stand upon a pile of worthy, yet vanquished, foes to achieve the title of champion, there is no event in sports so epic and engrossing.

In fact, it would really make a great video game wouldn’t it?

This time every year, for the last few years, I have to remind myself there are no new college basketball games. The reasons why are nothing quite so epic as the famous tournament, but are as tragic as any great tale nonetheless.

Simply put college basketball games, unlike the NCAA Football games, didn’t sell well at all. Reports even put “NCAA Basketball 10,” the last entry in the field, selling just over 200,000 units total, which for a company like EA (the last developer to make an NCAA basketball game) was not cutting it. Combined with the always tricky NCAA licensing battles stemming from creating the likeness of college players in a game (and the historic so-so quality of the games themselves), from a business standpoint, the answer couldn’t have been more clear.

College basketball games had to go.

And you know what? It’s a damn shame.

While the games were never quite at the same level as their college football or professional basketball counterparts, EA’s series (and 2K’s before that for that matter) was improving leaps and bounds, and that strive to improve it each year washed away that “we’re the only game in town so deal with it” feel you sometimes get with their sports titles.

As for the sales, as atrocious as they were in terms of that type of game, as we near the opening rounds of the great tournament, I can’t help but feel like the biggest issue was the game’s typical release date around November, and not closer to the madness that is March for college basketball fans. Why you wouldn’t try to capitalize off of the frenzy surrounding that event remains beyond me.

Instead another NCAA tournament approaches and once again fans are left without a virtual option to forge their own tournament memories, unless they want to pay some absurd prices for one of the old entries. Even then, the online servers are long dead.

You can do a lot of things in video games and get away with it, but at the end of the day you’ve got to sell. College basketball didn’t, and now they’re gone. Unlike that plucky “Cinderella” team that comes just short of the big game though, there is no next year for college basketball video games. Instead there is just time for even the most feverishly adherent of fans to vaguely remember that once, there was a contender.

While the original “Payday: The Heist” was a fun game, you wouldn’t be blamed for just remembering it as a particularly well made “Left 4 Dead” mod, even if it wasn’t.

The 4 player FPS co-op style was a big cause of this, but it was more the fact that each level played out like the “heist gone wrong” part of the story, and required you to shoot your way through waves of enemies to escape with the loot. It was more smash and grab than the perfect crime.

The details on the sequel (known only as “Payday 2”) are starting to emerge, and it’s obvious that the change of ownership (Starbreeze acquired “PayDay” developer Overkill) isn’t the only thing new in the series as there is a change in philosophy as well. This is evident through the early information, which points to a smarter game, and one not shoehonrned completely into the action genre.

Among the ideas contributing to this are new character classes like the “ghost” class, and varied approach and execution options which will allow for a level to theoretically be completed with minimal violence, assuming you are able to craft and execute the perfect plan for a job. Standing in your way is the usual security and alarm systems, made all the more cumbersome by the introduction of random elements which will change the location of guards, traps, and even the loot on multiple playthroughs.

It’s an exciting step in the right direction, and should still result in an entertaining game, but it’s still not the heist game I’ve been dreaming of.

No, the ideal heist game doesn’t skip to the shootout like so many others, but rather looks to the unappreciated strategy element. The perfect heist game would be 80% planning and strategy, and the rest left to execution, with action only as a last resort. This doesn’t mean that it has to abandon the FPS genre, but rather take the influence away from “Left 4 Dead” and closer to the original “Rainbow Six” games, which required precise planning and loadout selections, as well as effective on the job group management, to even have a chance of surviving a mission, much less flawlessly executing it.

There are other ways to go of course. A “Syndicate” style pure strategy game, an isometric original “Fallout” or “Baulder’s Gate” RPG sort, an “XCOM: Enemy Unknown” simplified grid based game, or even a “Dishonored” or “Deus Ex” think on your feet multiple approach for each problem type would be great.

Honestly though I’d just like to see more attempts at the genre until someone gets it right. Heist games are among the rarest in video games, and ones that approach it with anything more than a shoot first mentality are even more-so. A real shame too considering the inherit potential in the genre.

Not all hope is lost though, as the “Payday” series can still continually evolve, and “Grand Theft Auto V” promises more heist missions than ever. Plus let’s not forget that another “can’t miss” genre, the western, took almost 30 years to do right.

And That Was Well Worth It…

Tag: video game previews (Page 2 of 2)

Why no College Basketball Video Games for March is Simply Madness

The New “Payday” Looks Great…But Not Quite Ready to Steal the Show

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