Once upon a time, when I was a little brown haired scamp back in the early 90’s my uncle gave me a gift. This gift would unintentionally affect me in ways nobody could have imagined. It was a Sega Megadrive, it introduced me to games, it started my my love affair with the medium.
With the Megadrive I got two games, Terminator and Sonic The Hedgehog.
Each of these games I remember fondly from Terminators opening scene where you have to arm a bomb in the future and escape within a time limit, to the music of Green Hill Zone from Sonic The Hedgehog which I still think is one of the finest pieces of music to ever appear in a game. They are games I will always cherish.
These games have one main thing in common they are both platformers. Different kinds of platformers but they both follow the main traits of the genre. Jumping, Collecting, Avoid/Destroying enemies, and getting from Point A to Point B. Its possibly the most pure example of video gaming that we have come to know. When you think of the glory days of video gaming The 8-bit and 16-bit era Platformers were pretty much the big thing! Ever since Super Mario Bros on the NES they were the big thing. Games like Mega Man, Duck Tales, Ninja Gaiden helped define a generation of games in the 8 bit era and then likewise in the 16-bit era we have Super Mario World, Sonic the Hedgehog, Rocket Knight Adventures and Donkey Kong Country to name a few. These are only some of the more well known examples of the Genre but the amount of high quality games in the genre really is something to admire.
As time went on we got a little older and gaming got a little more advanced. 3D was the new thing and the platformers really took advantage of it!
Mario 64, Crash Bandicoot, Banjo Kazooie are all some of the greatest games not just of the genre but of the the Era as a whole. Plus many forgotten titles such as Gex and Klonoa stand out as favourite for myself. This era was also a time when gaming moved from being more of Kids thing to being a universal entertainment source for young and old alike, games like Tomb Raider and Resident evil helped open up a new market for adults to get into video gaming and it didn’t take long for publishers to realise this.
Come the PS2 days platformers were becoming a lot less frequent and their quality was dropping significantly. Sure games like Jak and Daxter and Ratchet and Clank kept the genre alive and well but they were nowhere near the popularity they were once at. Even Mario had a much loved but questionable outing with Mario Sunshine. It seemed at the time the best place for a platforming fix was on the Portable consoles which had many releases of classic platformers and some exciting new ones too.
This brings us to 2012 and the current generation of gaming. A time where Call of Duty rules the charts and Ezio stabs a dude in neck nearly every Christmas.
A time where the traditional platformer is seemingly long forgotten by most. Sure Nintendo still churns out amazing Mario games and Sonic is still doing the rounds in games that range from good to mediocre but most of the genres icons are dead and gone or the just being re-released as HD remakes. This is pretty much entirely because of the way the gaming market has changed over the years. Unless your platforming game has Mario or Sonic in it, chances are its not going to sell all that well… and you will lose money… and you may go out of business. Scary times. Nobody wants to take the risk on a game that could possibly end their careers.
For example lets take a look at two recent enough platformers Rayman Origins and De Blob 2. Rayman Origins being the best game I played in all of 2011 and De Blob being a unique and engaging game, something new yet completely familiar.
Both these games sold terribly. They ain’t underrated, they both received very high critical acclaim its just… nobody wanted them.
This is especially surprising seeing as Rayman was a pretty big name back in the late 90’s, De Blob was always going to be a risky title but Rayman failing really opened my eyes. Thankfully the game has been ported to pretty much every platform available at the moment with the 3DS version due out very soon. So it will be a long term seller and eventually make a decent profit. A sequel to Origins has also been leaked so thankfully the series will live on! De Blob on the other hand… unfortunately it will be unlikely we will see another game in that series given the amount of money its publisher THQ has lost in the past year or so.
In a nutshell no big publisher wants to risk making these kinds of games anymore as they are just too risky, its not their fault. Gaming is a business after all, and a business has to make money and no matter what we are told by the industry games are made first and foremost with the intention of making money not making us happy…
…Unless you live in Japan in which case if you wrote a cool idea to a developer I’m sure they would personally make your game.
I guess the best way to put this into perspective with the games I own from this generation.
Now remember platformers are my favourite Genre so naturally they would be the games I crave most.
Out of the 250 or so games I own from this generation (360,PS3,Wii,DS,3DS,PSP,3DS,Vita) about 20 of them are platformers, and not all of them are very good either. Most of the good ones are remakes. (My favourite being the Klonoa remake for Wii)
Thankfully though while this generation is slowly killing the big budget platformer. The indie platformers are rising to become to the true heroes of the scene. Ever since we were introduced to downloadable games from the likes of XBLA and Steam we have been getting a nonstop stream of amazing platformers. Super Meat Boy, Braid and Limbo have been amazing examples of how you can push the genre to new bounds while staying true to what made the classics so great. Classics have returned in new adventures through this medium, we have seen Mega Man 9 and 10 as well as a new Rocket Knight game. I find its mostly the new kids on the block that shine most though as they really push the genre to placed I always hoped it would go. Introducing new mind bending puzzles, clever level designs, music, graphics… everything a great game needs.
So while the big boys in the industry may have forgotten their roots and gaming is more about XP and head shots than collection a few *insert coin,ring,gem,trinket here* to get yourself an extra life. Its the people that love games and love to make games that will never forget why gaming is what is it is today and that is why when it comes to downloadable and indie games, platformers are the new king, and as long as they are king of something I’m happy.
*Side Note*
Its also worth noting the upcoming documentary film “Indie Game the Movie” focuses on the development of Braid, Super Meat Boy, and Fez. It digs deep into the reason these developers make the games they do and how strong their passion for them is. It has won numerous awards and is a must see for any gaming fan.
