Remakes, remasters and reprints are a mistake - column

Remakes

Due to the current occasion, since Diablo 2: Resurrected was announced, we have taken the article from the archive.

Original: If you read the interview from colleague Matthias Dammes with the makers of Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, fails on how important it is for the developers to constantly emphasize that the new game would capture the spirit of the original and that you don't want to make too big changes.

Last but not least, this fact drew me into the brought to thought over the last few days, and with a view to the countless remasters, remakes and other new editions that have appeared in recent years, I have realized that I generally have a problem with the concept of these rebirths of titles that are sometimes decades old >

Table of contents

1 Brilliance through problems 2 As then, only different 3 The Lord of the Rings - now with 30 more pages! 4 Part of the problem Not because of the often scolded lack of creativity that many players accuse developers and publishers of in the face of this flood of new editions. No, that doesn't affect me, I recently processed my opinion on the subject of creativity in video games in a column and in this case see it, at least from this perspective, only as a secondary aspect.

Recommended editorial content At this point you will find external content from [PLATTFORM]. To protect your personal data, external integrations are only displayed if you confirm this by clicking on "Load all external content": Load all external content I consent to external content being displayed. This means that personal data is transmitted to third party platforms. Read more about our privacy policy . External content More on this in our data protection declaration. What bothers me is the principle of tinkering with ready-made games. When it comes to the subject of creativity, I find it much worse how the vision of the former makers is sometimes trampled underfoot.

Brilliance through problems

Remakes, remasters and new editions are one Error - Column (2) Source: Bioware Every game development is a product of its time, shaped by what was en vogue at the time and what was technically possible. If you look at it ten, twenty, thirty years later, I understand the idea that you want to lend a hand here to make the old ham "better", "more modern".

The fact that most New editions only arise anyway because money can be made with comparatively little development effort and an established brand, I deliberately exclude this here, that's not my point.

But why are some games great? Especially BECAUSE they were created under conditions that made it necessary to think outside the box in order to circumvent the numerous, primarily technical, restrictions that stood in the way of a developer. The iconic fog of a Silent Hill would not have existed if the PS1 had not had to struggle with the representation of objects in the distance.

Remakes, remasters and new editions are a mistake - Column (6) Source: Mobygames Silent Hill, a good example. Let's take a look at the remakes of Silent Hill 2 and 3 that came out for the PS3. What was done The graphics were far too sharp, the fog far too thinned out, apparently because the makers did not understand the value of these restrictions and simply delivered what was now much easier technically possible for them.

As back then , just different

This is an extreme case, but I find this "We can do better" idea generally disrespectful to the team that developed the original game behind a new edition. Often enough, yes mostly, it is not the men and women of yore who are also responsible for the remake or remaster. There is adjustment, screwing around, changing, often enough simply because you think that is required of you.

Remakes, remasters and new editions are a mistake - Column (5) Source: Lucasfilm The other case is the same as with the Mass Effect: Legendary Edition (buy now 69.99 € / 53.99 €), where a large part of the previous developers are still sitting. But here, too, I wonder if you really have to praise the developers for tinkering with their own baby. And the changes are by no means as subtle as claimed: Part 1 should feel more playfully like Part 3, the controls have been changed, the lighting mood in some scenes is completely different and, and, and.

In other media forms would that lead to criticism, or would that regularly lead to criticism. The best example here is of course Star Wars, where George Lucas almost compulsively constantly "improved" the look and individual aspects of the original trilogy before selling the brand to Disney. Han shot first, "Noooooo!" celebrating Gungans and Hayden Christensen as a power spirit are now memes and show impressively why you should just leave some things as they are.

The Lord of the Rings - now with 30 pages more!

Again referring to revisions by people who weren't even involved in the original project: Let's transfer that to books and imagine that the novel by a celebrated author was reprinted years later and the responsible rewriter deleted adjectives , Add sentences, rearrange chapters and intervene in any other way so that, in his opinion, the work feels "rounder". Hardly anyone would find it that great, would they?

Remakes, remasters and reprints are a mistake - Column (3) Source: PC Games In this context: Yes, the discussion about adapting children's books in particular these days Of course, I am aware of unacceptable terms and I believe that, apart from particularly blatant cases, it is better to work with critical, classifying footnotes. But this discussion is again a different one, and the case that the N-word in a video game is thrown at your feet without context, for example, should be rather rare.

So I'm generally against it, old man To make games accessible to a new generation? No of course not. I am aware that there is still a great deal of interest among younger players in older titles that do not run on modern PCs or that require the possession of an ancient console. Games are welcome to come back, but then not for an end in itself, to give them an apparently modern look anyway. Emulated ports or ports adapted accordingly to new hardware can of course not exactly implement the spirit of the original, but are at least close and do not put an unsolicited "now obsolete!" Stamp on the originals.

Part des Problem

Remakes, remasters and new editions are a mistake - Column (4) Source: Medienagentur plassma Of course, I am also not polished before having fun with a remake or remaster of the type that I criticize at this point , The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening for Switch, for example, I think it's great! But the fact that I enjoy this and other games doesn't speak against the problem itself, and the new Link's Awakening is a good example of the dangers that arise from the wave of new editions: The new edition should de facto make the Game Boy classic have been replaced. It is an impressive contemporary testimony to how you can create something great under the most adverse circumstances on a device that was already obsolete when it was released in 1992. As nice as the remake is, the achievement of being something special in the context of its development will never be associated with it.

That brings us to the core of the problem, the way I see it: games are At least from the point of view of those who want to earn money with it, primarily goods, the discussion about the question of whether they are to be considered as art or not (are they) can still rage. Where other forms of media proceed much more cautiously, when classics are revived and criticism quickly becomes loud when the work is poor or too offensive, video gamers too often get caught up in the fact that there are generally too many new editions. That's true, but not because of that a problem, but because of the implications this circumstance entails.

Recommended editorial content At this point you will find external content from [PLATFORM]. To protect your personal data, external integrations are only displayed if you confirm this by clicking on "Load all external content": Load all external content I consent to external content being displayed to me. This means that personal data is transmitted to third-party platforms. Read more about our privacy policy . External content More on this in our data protection declaration. Do I encourage the laziness of the studios through this perspective, which would then have to put even less effort into new editions than some of them already do? Yes, somehow. That is why it is probably best to find a balance between the modern approach and the original, like the remastered versions of the Monkey Island Point & Click Adventures do. If you want, you will find a significantly revised, modern version, but because you can switch to the original game at any time, it never runs the risk of getting under the remake wheels with regard to its meaning.

This is not for every game just feasible. But I think you owe at least the attempt to give the game due respect due to the potential success of the new edition as a developer.

How do you see that? Tell me in the comments!

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