Video games and endless stories
In the cinematographic field, someone might think of Star Wars, now around since 1977: yet in forty years they have in theaters only nine films and only recently we have seen the proliferation of spin-offs, coincidentally just when George Lucas abdicated in favor of Disney. The disappearance of the original creator from the equation is a very important element, because once paternal love has fallen, economic exploitation takes over and spreads even to the detriment of quality, and without fear of the inevitable weariness of the public. With Lucas in charge, anything Star Wars related came out was an event to celebrate, while today the public is completely addicted to it. But we are digressing, after all the plot of Star Wars, the dear old Star Wars, is in its simplicity an excellent narrative plot, perfectly understandable even without reading the books, comics, and without chasing the characters between different platforms of different eras.
Want to enjoy the Skywalker epic? Go to Disney + and you have everything you need and in a bored afternoon you can get to the end of it. Net of remastered and remake, playing all the chapters of a videogame series is much more difficult and in some cases even much less fun, since the episodes of ten, twenty years ago are not like those of today, they don't just change the effects. special but also the gameplay solutions. Change the usability.
Resident Evil and the two-headed horror
In many cases, series that have become historical today were born to be games first, and stories later. Take Resident Evil: Capcom created the series by taking advantage of writers who came mainly from programming, rather than specific training for this task, not to mention that at the time video games did not even have the budget to develop a memorable story. Often the classic good face was put on a bad game, trying to contextualize and exploit these weaknesses, which is a bit what some independent developers present today. That's why, in Japan, it was decided that this first survival horror would wink at the horror films of the Z series: it was the maximum that could be aspired to, and it was still a considerable leap compared to what had been proposed up to that point. moment in this field.About twenty-six years separate us from the first Resident Evil, in this period of time we have witnessed quantum leaps in the quality of writing and in the composition of the images. Sometimes video games have offered stories even superior to those proposed in the cinema, yet the Capcom game is still stuck in characters and stories generated when the medium was still largely immature, dedicated to an audience that was still largely young. The latest Resident Evil Village, as much fun as it is, tries to rearrange old and new elements, mixing characters and elements of the past with vampires, werewolves and genetic mutations, in an experience that can leave both newcomers and old fans bewildered. date. And it's a great pity, a bunch of chains that turns a title that borders on excellence in every other aspect into a Barnum Circus.
Assassin's Creed: Desmond forever
Not far away Assassin's Creed is over, a series that has not yet had the courage to say goodbye to a storyline that has exhausted its arguments for several years. Desmond's parable is of interest only to those diehards who increasingly represent a minority, among the many who run every time to buy a new chapter. Not only is there nothing more to say, but those who had imagined this millennial battle between crusaders and assassins either are no longer part of the team, or have become one of the many cogwheels that deal with it from offices scattered throughout the world. Of course it would be foolish to ask Ubisoft to abandon the series to create another with another name, but perhaps the time has come for a reboot, or a new course that almost totally unties these fascinating time travels to the context that originally gave birth. to the series.Kingdom Hearts and respect for the fans
Perhaps the most striking case is however that of Kingdom Hearts, a series that carries on a lore that fewer and fewer people are able to follow , broken up into a dozen different titles for platforms that have no continuity. Twenty years of a confusing plot that still has the audacity not to close the narrative arcs opened in the beginning, almost coming to disrespect an audience that in twenty years has built a family, built a career or quit of video games: all without coming to the head of this story with Mickey and Donald, who locks up, reinvents himself, deceives and starts again as if he were to reveal who knows what secrets. Which is a shame, because it is impossible not to appreciate the productive effort of Kingdom Hearts 3: the craftsmanship that is hidden in many of its most successful features, the undeniable artistic quality that supports the experience in its entirety. Kingdom Hearts deserves much more, and its audience deserves it too.Hideo Kojima and the prison of creatives
The perversion of these mechanics reaches its peak when analyzing feedback from the users, divided between people who do not care in the least if a story changes hands fifty times, losing any form of coherence, and others who instead would like to imprison an author with his most famous title. Let's take Metal Gear Solid as an example, how can you hope for a new chapter without having Kojima on board? At the same time, how can you ask the Japanese director to work forever on a single universe, when his career has allowed him to achieve that absolute creative freedom that has given us a rare and precious gem like Death Stranding? Yet, there are those who would like Kojima, again, behind new adventures of Solid Snake.Everything must have a beginning and an end. Enough of the therapeutic fury that keeps series like zombies alive, in the growing disinterest of the youngest to whom we should sooner or later entrust the keys of the video game industry, and in the excitement of those who still cannot say goodbye to their sweet past.
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