The sad truth is that capturing lightning in a bottle is exceedingly rare, let alone twice or more. Cyan made at least 2 massive hits, which is 2 more than almost all game studios manage. Even their contemporaries Id Software didn't make that many more hits (Quake 3 was their last outright hit, releasing only 2 years after Riven).
There are almost no Bethesdas/Blizzards/etc that continue releasing hits for decades at a time.
Fair point, and I sort of understand the nostalgia that's involved. A large part of my disappointment probably comes from the fact that the endless remakes never quite live up to the hype.
I was a big Diablo 2 fiend, it was one of my formative online games. So a few years ago there are rumblings about D2 Remastered, and I'm obviously pumped. Come launch day, Blizzard has my money and I'm deep into the thing I used to love, but it's just... meh. There was a time and place that made the original D2 fantastic, but it turns out that's not here and now. I feel the same thing for Myst/Riven, they were SO GOOD but who actually gives a shit about doing the same thing again with better graphics?
I can't write off the fact that those dudes made a few great games, and that's a crazy accomplishment. I think Myst is the first "real" PC game my family ever bought, and I still remember my mom staying up late at night to click around the world and figure out what the hell was happening. She wrote notes on those yellow legal pads, reminding her of lore and other important shit. But the lightning in a bottle thing works both ways, and that lightning is basically static electricity in todays world :P To borrow your example, id software didn't release the same version of DOOM 30 years later, we got DOOM Eternal. It's not a reskin of their (by today's standards) shitty game, it's a whole new experience that's a damned (hah) blast to play. That's not what's happening with Myst/Riven, unfortunately, but I'd love to see that level of innovation come out of the studio that was once great.
They did make new games tho, most recently Obduction and Firmament (the latter released in 2023). I think their style of games just fell off the zeitgeist.
Anyway I do empathise - my favorite games are fallout and fallout 2 and I was looking forward to Bethesda’s sequels but I never manage to stick to any of them for more than a couple hours, it just doesn’t feel like fallout to me - and I think a big part of it is because I’m not longer 14 years old playing a new game (with very little other commitments on my time and attention).
I know they made newer games, I played Obduction in person in their offices before it was released :)
But you're on the same page as me, there was a time and place for these FANTASTIC games, but that's in the past. And it feels kind of silly to watch them push the same games onto new platforms in a futile attempt to stay relevant (and cash the nostalgia checks, even when players end up NOT feeling the same things as the OG release).
Part of why I didn't like D2 again is exactly what you said, I'm not a teenager with endless time to spend online gaming. But another huge part is that I've been there and done that, and a nicer, newer version of that fun just doesn't hold a candle to the fun I had years ago when it was fresh. I'm saying the same holds true for Myst/Riven, release it on my smart fridge for all I care, it's not the same :D
The original D2 is still one of my favourite things for LAN play (especially with the Ancestral Recall - Skills Enhanced mod), I think the friends plus pizza plus beer combination helps bring the nostalgia back more than a graphical overhaul would.
Yeah I agree we actually agree! Another complicating factor is that there’s a significant subjective component to it - I have an acquaintance that works at Cyan (after growing up with Myst and Riven) and is extremely happy working on their newer games.
Ultimately they’re getting money from players (not investors), so the test of “is there a reason to remake the old games” is ultimately if people are buying them (and I wonder how many of them haven’t played the originals? Considering they came out almost 30 years ago).
I had the same experience with the Fallouts. These were the last PC games I played obsessively. (In my late teens I decided I wanted to be an artist, while gaming was moving in the opposite direction with always more guns and 3D and less story and less art. So for a long time I never played another game after Fallout 2.)
In 2016 I was very impressed by the advances in VR, and so I spent thousands on a gaming PC and HTC Vive and the VR edition of Fallout 4. But one hour into the game it was clear that the magic just wasn’t there. I had this expensive setup to put me directly inside the world I enjoyed as a teen, but it was totally “uncanny valley.” The overwrought game design had lost the mystery, and the 3D VR rendering just made everything look cheap and fake. Engaging the player’s imagination is a delicate balance.
It's not just you. Bethesda's Fallouts are like cargo cult versions of the classics. Oblivion set in a retrofuturistic postapocalyptic world just isn't the same thing.
There are almost no Bethesdas/Blizzards/etc that continue releasing hits for decades at a time.