Oddworld Strangers Wrath and Psyconauts - When Good Games Go Wrong.
By Zanzabar
First let’s state that there is nothing actually ‘wrong’ with either of these games. Both were produced by companies with sound development teams and/or good track records in the gaming field. Both were well put together games in both content and presentation. They should have both been mega hits, instead they were also-rans. Why? To find the answer to that question you must look into what makes a game a ‘hit’ in the first place.
Strictly speaking there are only two practical ways a game can be considered a hit. A game can be a ‘commercial’ success if it brings in more than it cost to produce. If it paid back all the costs that went into producing the game and made just a meager profit then, technically, it can be judged as a hit. Ever wonder why all those games made from movies are still being produced even when they are, for the most part, the most plebeian of games? They make their money back! Most use well established gaming engines and play routines that most programmers can slap them together almost overnight. So little cost is put into the making of the game (for some the advertising of the game cost more than the actual programming), that even mediocre sales will produce a profit.
While neither OSW nor Psychonauts actually fall into the category of hastily slapped together games (actually both were well designed), the bottom line might be that they both at least ‘covered the spread’ as it were. That is, they might have made enough so that the publishers could continue to make more games.
But being able to simply make more games is not the goal of most publishers. They look for the mother lode; the Halo’s and Grand Thief Auto’s of the gaming world. This is the second way a game can be a hit: mass popular appeal.
Mass popular appeal means more than just kudos from the gaming world in the form of glowing reviews or even mass hysteria (i.e. Halo). It means high profile recognition for the developers of said games to the point where they can write their own ticket in terms of future game development and design. It is the golden ring on the gaming merry-go-round. It is what allows Bungie to break away from Microsoft, and RockStar to collectively thumb their noses at public opinion. It is what creates backers in the form of producers, with deep pockets, virtually throwing money at the superstar developers. It is, no less than, the ticket to freedom of gaming expression for developers. Both OSW and Psyconauts sprung from two teams of well respected and, frankly, well liked (being well liked is more important than many realize) developers.
Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath was developed by Lorne Lanning’s Oddworld Inhabitants and produced by EA. The game followed a disappointing debut of the earlier X-Box launch title game called Oddword. Determined to redeem themselves, Oddworld Inhabitants junked the old premise and developed an entirely new one for OSW. Featuring dual 3rd person and 1st person perspectives, and something called ‘live ammo’ (little critters that sever as ammunition) OSW was poised to carve out a niche for itself. It received glowing reviews and then…fell away into obscurity
Psychonauts also had an impressive pedigree behind it. Produced by Double Fine Productions and published by Majesco, it was the brain child of Tim Schafer, a well respected and liked developer. Tim Schafer’s quirky, almost irrelevant approach to gaming is legendary, with games such as the Grim Fandango, Full Throttle, and the Secret of Monkey Island; he had well established himself as the King of Quirk. After pouring more than a year into the development of Psychonauts, it was released with a hail of fanfare and received with glowing reviews…and sold well below expectations. Why does this happen? It drives developers crazy, and causes premature balding in producers.
It’s simple: every game has its weak points! Even the early Halos (memory storage) and GTA’s (god awful graphics) had parts of the game that were less than stellar.
With Oddworld Strangers Wraith, it was the slow to get to storyline and the new game mechanic created by its 1st person/3rd person switching. It was just too hard to ‘get into’ the on screen character. After awhile who cared why he was the way he was or who made him that way. Either because of bad timing, or an audience that wasn’t quite ready for the game’s quirkiness, OSW just didn’t take off.
With Psychonauts the weakness lay in the nature of the game itself: a platformer. Platforming games have a loyal if small fan base. For the average non platform player, they have been stung far too many times by poorly designed platformers. They would rather wait and buy it at a reduced price or used rather than plunk down 60 bucks on the chance that this one will keep them playing.
Predicting a sure fire hit in video gaming is like predicting the weather, no matter how good your tools are for forecasting a sunny day, you still better carry an umbrella just in case.
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