The fashion of remakes and remastered is certainly not a matter of today. Since the dawn of time, attempts have been made to revive a certain type of production; whether to give it more prominence and luster or for purely commercial purposes, even in the past we found disparate revised and corrected versions or total remakes of successful works. Just think of Super Mario All Stars which carried the classic chapters of the series Bros. 8 to 16 bits. There was the Ninja Gaiden Trilogy which did exactly the same. How to forget then Final Fantasy Origins which even harnessed the hardware power of the former PlayStation to re-propose and enhance the experience of the first two chapters of the respective series created by Hironobu Sakaguchi.
The examples could be very many, but to give you an idea I think they will be enough. Clearly, several remakes were also released at the time, therefore, however, it is also true that in these last two generations of total remakes, lazy remastered or mere porting, an infinite number of them have been made and sometimes you feel a little the feeling of having enough. Often there is a tendency to blame their realization for a lack of ideas or to fill holes between one thick exit and another, or for targeted reasons of convenience. Well, this theory is not always so unfounded.
When you don’t need it
We are the first to break a lance in favor of remakes and remastered as it is a way to relive experiences of a distant past, both in a totally modern key, thanks to a total rewriting of the formula and game mechanics, and faithful the most possible to the original, but taking advantage of a reinterpretation of the play system to modernize it and make it suitable for more current standards. Excellent examples could indeed be Resident Evil 2 (total rewrite) e Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy (original loyalty modernized).
In both cases, the nostalgic appeal of faithful experience and that in a modern key are more than willingly accepted. Leaving aside those who do not appreciate renovations aimed at giving a new identity to the work, it must be said that reinterpretation is not necessarily evil, also because the original is always there and nobody touches it. Rather, they should be seen as ways to relive the experience from another perspective (if well done). Apart from digression, we get to the point, that is when we do not feel the need for certain commercial operations.
We could start the examples with the last one Resident Evil 3, which is not a bad game at all as you can also read in the our review, however, is an occasion partially missed, especially because after the 2 it was reasonable to expect something more from Capcom. If you live a consumer well and above all deceive him making him hope who knows what with this last remake, he will inevitably turn his back on you, dear Capcom. And it is done because although the last job is absolutely not to be thrown away, it is not what you got used to with it Resident Evil 2 which remains, albeit different from the original, an excellent work of reinterpretation and remake. It is a bit like if Nintendo took two steps back with the sequel to Breath of the Wild, it would not be accepted even if it were an 8 or more game.
This happens when you want to overdo it and beat iron until hot. Resident Evil 3 in fact, it gives the impression of having been hastily created to ride the crest of the wave and delight the hunger for remakes that there was by the user towards this chapter, taking advantage of the success of its predecessor. The result was what it was; it hurts because there was plenty of time to do better. No one had aimed the gun at the heads of the Japanese company executives for a remake of Resident Evil 3 necessarily a year later. If they had invested more time, the work would certainly have been more meticulous, thus being able to guarantee the production quality of the prequel.
Sometimes it really seems that publishers want to take advantage of the wave of nostalgia by investing the minimum while demanding the maximum. Another example would be the remake of MediEvil that, like Crash is Spyro, proposes the experience faithful to the original, but it does so without modernizing some mechanical daughters of its time, which is now quite frustrating. Here too we speak not of a bad game, on the other hand it is still MediEvil, and a good job has also been done from a purely technical point of view (the artistic side has lost a bit of Burton’s color). However, this is a makeover that undoubtedly deserved more care and was not necessary; not so, at least.
How not to mention the remastered of Final Fantasy VIII. Square Enix, not content with reviving the seventh famous chapter in a modern way, decides to demand even more and to strip the fans to the core. This is how the announcement of Final Fantasy VIII Remastered. Why do as col VII is IX (available as emulated porting of the originals) when with theVIII can you take advantage of the unconditional love of the fans and offer them a lazy remastered? Mind you, the game still remains valid, because it is always basic Final Fantasy VIIIhowever, remastering itself is indeed at an all-time low. Remastered, and then there isn’t even the option to play it in full HD. But come on, at least we can look the protagonists in the eye.
Let’s not talk then about the tide of porting that Nintendo is carrying by Wii U to Switch. The problem is not even the ports themselves; the will of the great N to give more prominence to productions than on is clear and evident Wii U by force of things they have sold very little, the problem is mostly the price. It is unacceptable to re-propose a Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze at full price (€ 60.00) when it adds nothing but an easy mode, after which it is the exact same game Wii U. Steps for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe or for Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition which at least have important additions and improvements, but above all they contain all the DLC released until before their release. However, it is not totally justifiable, but definitely more understandable. Nintendo it already has a policy of its own regarding prices, but however criticizable it remains their philosophy and it is up to us to accept it or not. Full-price porting instead is unjustifiable, considering that certain collections and remakes are even at a lower price.
Sometimes it seems that publishers don’t really want to commit and squeeze as much of their IP as possible with the least effort and maximizing earnings. Pulling the rope of nostalgia too much is not always a good thing, because after a while it can break (but you remember the first years of PlayStation 4? Everything, remastered). On the other hand, fans are not always satisfied with all the remakes or remastered that are proposed to them. Mind you – and we want to reiterate it -, we are certainly not against these operations, but in recent years the proposals have been really too many; most of the time forgettable or in any case disappointing (to a small extent or less) and a more targeted and higher quality distribution would be preferable.
Ben are being remakes and remastered, but exasperation is never a good thing. We certainly cannot dislike operations like that of Shadow of the Colossus, Yakuza Kiwami 1 & 2, of the same Resident Evil 2, typical repropositions Persona 5 Royal (which is much more than just a port) or remastered like Assassin’s Creed III or the last one dedicated to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. A little less work like Devil May Cry HD Collection (re-proposed even twice, without the slightest effort to improve it in this gen), Resident Evil 3, MediEvil, Resident Evil HD or Final Fantasy VIII. And then let’s face it, we all dream of a remake of the two Dino Crisis you hate Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, but if the result in the end were more subdued than what one might expect, would it not be better to do it directly rather than receive a job that leaves nothing but bitter taste in the mouth? Would we really need it?
If you want a great remake we suggest the one of Shadow of the Colossus for PlayStation 4 that you can buy on Amazon.
