Keepalive: Hunter the Reckoning: Wayward, Blood, 2009 -> 2010: WTF?

written by Blain Newport on Monday, July 27, 2009

I tried to play through Hunter the Reckoning: Wayward a long time ago. It was a pain. But I realized it might work for co-op Tuesday, so I gave it another shot. Turning the difficulty down to easy helped a lot. The later levels were still a pain, though. I think they screwed up and tuned the difficulty levels for the testers instead of normal humans.

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I still don't know how or if I'm going to record it, but in case my laziness means I never get around to it, I want you to know that Blood is a wonderful game. Running at 320x200 with a big black bar at the bottom of the screen because my monitor can only output 320x240, I love it as much as I ever did. The minimalist sound design is good and creepy. The deaths are gory and silly. The weapons aren't as beefy as some, but they have a feel that works. Plus the shell casings stay around, which makes the scenes of battles look pretty cool.

I've also been really impressed by the level design. The spooky mansion sections of the second episode are my favorites. There are ambushes and traps and mazes and secret passageways. Most shooters today just funnel you forward, which is fine, but I very much enjoyed hunting for keys and trying to remember where a particular locked door was when I found them.

I am a sick, sick man.

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What follows is a lot of uninformed speculation about the industry. Ignore it at no risk.

Ubisoft just pushed Splinter Cell: Conviction and Red Steel 2 into 2010. I remember thinking that Microsoft was talking too much about 2010 and not enough about 2009 in their press conference. Apparently that's because nothing's coming out this year.

I can understand shooters wanting to run in fear from Modern Warfare 2. But so many non-FPS games are delaying that it seems like the industry thinks it can delay its way out of the depression.

The following is not an exhaustive list. These are just some games I've been paying attention to.

Games Delayed Until 2010
Splinter Cell: Conviction
Red Steel 2 (I guess I will be looking for this one at PAX)
Bioshock 2
Bayonetta
Singularity
Heavy Rain (to avoid a "crowded" xmas season, hurr durr)
StarCraft 2 (but that's just how Blizzard works)
Mafia 2
Max Payne 3
Red Dead Redemption

Games Not Delayed Until 2010
Modern Warfare 2
Halo: ODST
Brütal Legend
God of War 3
Uncharted 2
Borderlands
Ratchet & Clank 6

Out of all the delayed games I think only Singularity, being an FPS and a new IP without an easily sold hook, needed the delay to avoid being crushed by Modern Warfare and Halo. Maybe Bayonetta and Red Steel 2 thought they were competing with God of War 3? I don't know.

But nothing's like Heavy Rain. And nothing's like BioShock (aesthetically, anyway). And the only western themed game that might be stealing market share from Red Dead Redemption released weeks ago.

Perhaps I don't know enough about the financial realities. Maybe trying to wait out the depression is a good strategy (even if everybody else is doing it). We've certainly hit diminishing returns with graphics this console generation, so it's not like these games will look horribly outdated when they release.

Anyway, if gamers are lucky, the extra time will be used to polish these games and make 2010 an outstanding year. We'll see. People got stressed about holiday 2008 having too many good games for the average gamer to play everything they wanted to. I think 2010 may also have that feeling but starting in March instead of October.