GVMERS

After announcing its acquisition of the licensing rights for 20th Century Fox’s Aliens franchise, Sega teased two projects based on the property—a role-playing game and a first-person shooter. Within a few short years, Sega unceremoniously cancelled the RPG, which had been helmed by Fallout: New Vegas developer Obsidian Entertainment. Many would later contend the FPS from Borderlands studio Gearbox Software should’ve suffered a similar fate. Instead, it arguably endured far worse, and not at all for the better. Gearbox’s Aliens: Colonial Marines was intended as a showcase of what’s possible when a licensed brand and a skilled group of developers meet in perfect harmony. Fox and Sega additionally envisioned Colonial Marines as a stepping stone to narrow the divide between gaming and film. The shooter’s canonical narrative exemplified this intention tenfold. Gearbox’s efforts failed spectacularly, though, culminating in a mess of broken promises that long tarnished its reputation. According to a host of accusations leveled against Gearbox, mishandled resources, professional dishonesty, and a lack of passion beset the game’s lengthy and tumultuous development cycle. While studio representatives have denied these claims, the word of former staff members paints an entirely different picture, one that suggests Colonial Marines was never in a position to fulfill its promise of faithfully expanding upon the beloved sci-fi universe. This is the tragedy of Aliens: Colonial Marines.

In the decade following the turn of the century, first-person shooters had become a dime a dozen, especially those of the military variety. The likes of Battlefield and Call of Duty dominated with minimal competition, inspiring copy cats that rarely innovated the genre. Before long, the market grew oversaturated with experiences created by developers and publishers desperate to obtain a modicum of success achieved by EA’s and Activision’s flagship shooters. There did exist a fair few outliers, though, shooters whose creators, for the most part, chose to buck the trend instead of following the herd. Raven Software’s oft-forgotten 2010 title Singularity counted as one such project. As Raven’s final original game before its conversion into a Call of Duty support role, Singularity constituted the last bastion of originality during a transitory period for publisher Activision. All told, it did not seem an unworthy attempt, either. Despite a development cycle beset by mismanagement, Raven cobbled together a competent temporal shooter, one laden with inventive ideas that were hamstrung by formulaic game design choices. Dismal sales further handcuffed the franchise, since Singularity failed to gain traction in a marketplace flooded with other by-the-numbers shooters. Thus, Raven spent much of the decade following Singularity’s release beholden to someone else’s vision, its potential absorbed into the gears of Activision’s well-oiled Call of Duty machine. Yet, Singularity shouldn’t be remembered as a failure, per se; signs of triumph lingered within its faults, remnants of what could have been under different circumstances. This is the history of Singularity.

After shipping Mass Effect 3 in 2012, Mass Effect Co-Creator Casey Hudson and a small group of BioWare developers embarked on a new journey, laying the foundation for an original IP codenamed Project Dylan. The Hudson-led crew at BioWare’s Edmonton headquarters hoped to craft the video game equivalent of Bob Dylan, a title the industry would reference and revere for many years. Project Dylan, later dubbed Anthem, got off to a promising start, thanks to an ideation phase brimming with ambitious possibilities. The team’s high hopes and equally high morale eventually faded, though, replaced by stress and deep confusion about the end goal. Mismanagement and numerous staff departures left Anthem in limbo for years. While fans and media were being wowed at trade shows with impressive concept art and vertical slices of gameplay, BioWare developers were navigating a production cycle beset by indecision and an undefined vision. It didn’t help that similar games, such as Destiny and The Division, had already set the bar for what players expected from live-service experiences. Anthem failed to meet that bar. And while a series of post-launch updates improved surface-level issues, Anthem’s core gameplay loop and other fundamental systems demanded an overhaul—the likes of which BioWare had never previously produced. This is the tragedy of Anthem. As Raven’s final original game before its conversion into a Call of Duty support role, Singularity constituted the last bastion of originality during a transitory period for publisher Activision. All told, it did not seem an unworthy attempt, either. Despite a development cycle beset by mismanagement, Raven cobbled together a competent temporal shooter, one laden with inventive ideas that were hamstrung by formulaic game design choices. Dismal sales further handcuffed the franchise, since Singularity failed to gain traction in a marketplace flooded with other by-the-numbers shooters. Thus, Raven spent much of the decade

When Resident Evil 4 launched in 2005, it redefined both the third-person shooter and survival horror genres with inventive camerawork and visceral gameplay mechanics. For years after its advent, countless developers followed the game’s lead, emulating Shinji Mikami, who was the franchise’s co-creator, and his techniques for their own endeavors. However, barring the likes of Gears of War, hardly any of these titles managed to further innovate the genre. It would take another Mikami-directed adventure to reinvigorate third-person shooters with something completely fresh. The game in question is none other than the still highly-regarded Vanquish. In essence, Vanquish was a product of Mikami’s desire to reject the then standard characteristics of first and third-person shooters alike, especially those of the cover-based variety. As a result, speed-infused gameplay took precedence during Vanquish’s creation, as the team at PlatinumGames approached the project as though it were a melee-oriented action game—a genre in which everyone involved was much more familiar. This strategy yielded a genuinely unique experience that many believe remains unparalleled. It’s noteworthy that such esteem is held for a lesser-known, 7th console generation one-off with seemingly no hope for a sequel in sight. But perhaps the varying qualities that make Vanquish so distinctive constitute the reason for its continued relevance in the minds of all who have ventured through Mikami’s sci-fi world. This is the history of Vanquish. As Raven’s final original game before its conversion into a Call of Duty support role, Singularity constituted the last bastion of originality during a transitory period for publisher Activision. All told, it did not seem an unworthy attempt, either. Despite a development cycle beset by mismanagement, Raven cobbled together a competent temporal shooter, one laden with inventive ideas that were hamstrung by formulaic game design choices. Dismal sales furthe

As of the early 2010s first-person survival horror games were a rarity, a space most notably occupied by the likes of indie hit Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Triple-A games in the genre, the Resident Evils, Silent Hills, and Dead Spaces of the world, had yet to move beyond the tried-and-true third-person perspective. Change peeked over the horizon by the middle of the decade, though, with another indie success, Outlast, and Hideo Kojima’s P.T. demo laying the foundation for a new wave of survival horror. Little did anyone know, an Alien project based on Ridley Scott’s 1979 classic would also move the needle. The ambitions powering Creative Assembly’s vision for Alien: Isolation were grounded by far more than a shift in perspective. In using the original film as a stepping stone, Isolation tread ground that no other Alien-based video game had dared traverse. Previous interactive adventures through the sci-fi universe placed special emphasis on the action-oriented qualities of James Cameron’s 1986 sequel. Such titles supplied players with advanced firearms and assigned the arduous task of killing Xenomorphs—Alien: Isolation did neither. Creative Assembly instead encouraged players to avoid the creature, hide from and fear it, even distract it when necessary. But fully understanding the core of the experience they wanted to create proved a formidable undertaking for the team. Four years of production were devoted to the project. A new engine and major gameplay changes imposed several challenges on a studio that lacked a survival horror pedigree. To the delight of many an Alien fan, however, those obstacles culminated in a one of a kind exploration of the seminal franchise. This is the history of Alien: Isolation.

At the height of their popularity throughout the 2000s, military shooters typically emphasized the plight of enlisted soldiers. Most were shooting galleries, wherein players gunned down faceless foes with abandon across many historical or fictional battlefields. Little attention was paid to the human cost of war, including the destruction of civilian life and the emotional turmoil that comes with being on the receiving end of a foreign enemy’s hostility. There were occasional outliers like the controversial No Russian mission in 2009’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 . Yet, a mainstream first-person military shooter wouldn’t centralize the human cost of war on the civilian level until Kaos Studios and publisher THQ unleashed Homefront in the spring of 2011. Carefully nestled within the core of the original Homefront was a hard-hitting shooter that immersed players in action and occasionally elicited emotional investment. Arguably, for the first time, players felt unbridled hate for their virtual enemies on the battlefield, a field of war that to a lot of gamers, specifically those in the United States, looked a little too much like home. While Kaos succeeded on this front, and in spades some would argue, a sequel from Dambuster Studios failed to similarly hit the mark. In many respects, 2016’s Homefront: The Revolution neglected to adhere to the framework that outlined its predecessor’s various victories. As a result, this once promising series about a troubling, though implausible, near-future conflict fell flat before it could truly leave a lasting impact on the genre it was designed to reinvigorate. This is the Rise and Fall of Homefront.

For years, Konami’s Metal Gear Solid counted among the few gaming franchises that withstood the test of time across several console generations. Its 1998 debut introduced players to the wonders of stealth-action gameplay and subsequent entries elevated the genre further, laying the groundwork for the advent of Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell and the like. Unfortunately, turmoil within the company meant the Konami-published saga didn’t have the opportunity to conclude as strong as it started. And its last entry, the universally panned Metal Gear Survive, managed to leave somewhat of a blemish on Metal Gear’s otherwise immaculate legacy. Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain, the last mainline instalment, launched in 2015 with a less than satisfactory ending, effectively leaving a bad taste in the mouths of countless MGS faithful. As a spinoff adventure that took the series in a completely different direction, Metal Gear Survive hardly had a chance to succeed on even the basest level. The survival action title wasn’t what fans wanted, especially given the absence of series creator Hideo Kojima. Still, the experience offered a fair share of intrigue and fun; yet, by virtue of the alternate universe and zombie-centric premise, Survive struggled to retain the winning charms of its namesake. If anything, Survive’s drastic departure from its progenitors proved that slapping the title of a beloved brand on a new idea wasn’t enough to revive said brand. In this particular case, such a move may have led to the stealth property’s premature demise. This is the tragedy of Metal Gear Survive.

Fallout 4 hit stores in the fall of 2015, five years after the spinoff Fallout: New Vegas launched to widespread acclaim. In the years between the two releases, the video game landscape, specifically western role-playing titles, underwent a noticeable shift. The likes of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt raised the bar in many respects, especially with regards to content quality, storytelling, and presentation. While Fallout 4 couldn’t quite rise to the occasion, it still boasted the core tenets of the franchise’s modern adventures, offering a deep role-playing experience replete with choices, compelling characters, and a swath of customization options. To the dismay of fans, these pillars took a backseat in Bethesda Game Studios’ 2018 spinoff, Fallout 76. An online-only installment in a traditionally single-player series, Fallout 76 failed to garner the excitement afforded to its predecessors. However, despite the skepticism in the months leading up to release, Fallout faithful gave the new endeavor a chance. Few redeeming qualities accompanied the game’s arrival, though. In addition to a launch beset by game-affecting glitches and a dearth of engaging content, myriad other controversies cast dark clouds over what should’ve been a strong outing for Bethesda in late 2018. The controversy included poor quality collector items, overpriced rum, and a security breach, all of which contributed to a comedy of errors that many people will not soon forget. Bethesda slowly corrected course, deploying free updates that optimized performance and introduced meaningful content in the form of dedicated story quests and NPCs. But regardless of the steps taken, Fallout 76’s path to redemption proved long and arduous, as the lingering effects of countless missteps marred this particular venture through the wasteland. This is the tragedy of Fallout 76.

From Dead Rising’s zany antics to the bleakness of Telltale’s The Walking Dead, gaming had become oversaturated with all manner of zombie titles by the mid-2010s. As with anything, however, the market willingly made extra room for the right project at the right time. Such was the case in 2014 when Skybound Entertainment and Payday publisher Starbreeze partnered to create Overkill’s The Walking Dead—a first-person cooperative shooter with Payday-esque qualities set in the same universe as the acclaimed comic book series.

More often than not, western role-playing games emphasize two genres—fantasy and science fiction. Developer Obsidian Entertainment and publisher Sega dared to pursue a different path with their self-proclaimed espionage RPG Alpha Protocol. Yet, in its ambitious attempt to forge a new style of role-playing title, Obsidian faced myriad challenges that ultimately diminished the overall quality of the final product. In turn, Alpha Protocol garnered lukewarm reviews upon release and, consequently, failed to move the needle on the sales charts.

In 1979, George Miller’s Mad Max introduced movie-going audiences to a post-apocalyptic anti-hero, the titular Mad Max, who went on to inspire generations of other morally ambiguous pop culture figures across multiple mediums of entertainment. Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome hit theaters in 1985, marking the third entry in the wildly successful series. It unwittingly denoted the start of a decades-long drought, too, which wouldn’t end until Mad Max: Fury Road and Avalanche Studios’ Mad Max released in May and September of 2015, respectively.

Widely considered the grandfather of first-person shooters, Wolfenstein and its lengthy history know both the thrill of victory and the agony of failure. The franchise’s 2009 entry, the Raven Software-developed Wolfenstein, marked a particularly low point for the series, leaving many to ponder whether protagonist B.J. Blazkowicz’ Nazi-killing days had finally come to an end. MachineGames, however, a Swedish studio founded by former Starbreeze developers, proved approximately five years later that B.J. still had plenty of fight left in him. The team successfully pitched a new direction for the IP to series creator id Software and publisher Bethesda Softworks, proposing an alternate history, post-World War 2 narrative wherein the Nazis claimed victory. MachineGames’ ensuing partnership with the companies culminated in 2014’s Wolfenstein: The New Order, 2017’s Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus, and The Old Blood expansion in between. These adventures cast a darker, more serious tone over the franchise that ultimately led to B.J.’s transition into a family man. And killing Nazis, inherently, became integral to the proverbial family business.

During the 80s and 90s, most video game genres tended to stay squarely in their lanes. First person shooters like Doom focused exclusively on gunning down monsters. Role-playing games like Ultima epitomized inventories and statistics. And stealth games like Thief prioritized sneaking through the shadows above all else. Every now and then, an experience like System Shock or Strife would come along, and challenge the medium’s self-imposed rigidness by melding multiple genres together. Yet many would argue that it was only after the release of Deus Ex that the idea of a genre-bending game became truly popular. The brainchild of Warren Spector, Deus Ex allowed players to make their way through a cyberpunk rendition of the year 2052 using a wide variety of different mechanics and playstyles, allowing for an uncountable number of solutions to its life-like quagmires. The experience that it provided was as stupendous in its execution as it was difficult to quantify – so much so, that it would single-handedly usher in the term “Immersive Sim” to describe all prior and future games that would be included in its lineage.

Microsoft changed console gaming by launching the original Xbox with a built-in Ethernet jack in November 2001, a move Sony wouldn’t follow until the PlayStation 2 Slim received an embedded Ethernet port in 2004. The American-based console manufacturer also shifted the state of things with the introduction of Xbox Live and Halo: Combat Evolved’s robust online offering. But Sony took its share of unique multiplayer-related strides upon investing heavily in Zipper Interactive and the genre-defining SOCOM franchise. Thus, though it lagged behind in terms of network services, the PlayStation brand doubled down on innovating in the software department. Nowhere was this more apparent than in 2010’s MAG. The Zipper-developed Massive Action Game once held the Guinness World Record for most players online in a console FPS, courtesy of its ability to simultaneously host a then-unprecedented 256 users. Above all else, MAG emphasized teamwork, which Zipper underscored with an inventive command structure that brought a sense of order to the expansive online conflicts. The intricate leveling system additionally proved impressive for the time, as did the relatively minimal server hiccups.

Today, countless of the industry’s most seminal video games were produced by dozens, often hundreds of developers. These teams are typically replete with animators, artists, designers, programmers, and other integral members, all working in tandem to guarantee a product reaches the market as planned. 60 developers were responsible for Batman: Arkham Asylum. Roughly 450 Ubisoft personnel took part in Assassin’s Creed II’s production. And a whopping 2,000 people contributed to Red Dead Redemption 2. Sometimes, though, making a splash in the gaming industry doesn’t necessitate an extensive amount of manpower, considering a group of only eight made Portal. A Cinderella story of sorts, Portal is the brainchild of seven students who happened to produce a demo quirky and ambitious enough to pique Valve’s interest. The central conceit behind the series involves navigating obstacles with the skillful positioning of portals. Yet, so much more depth pervades every facet of these games, from the intricate physics that power the myriad puzzles to the compelling antagonist whose antics quickly became iconic. As the story goes, such incredible feats of game design may not have come to fruition had the original game’s small development team been given access to an abundance of resources.

When Pitch Black released in the year 2000, moviegoers were treated to a flawed, yet entertaining slice of science fiction. Its plot – which saw a crew of interstellar travelers band together to survive a hostile planet – was formulaic, but its setting and cast captured the imagination. And no other character on its cast did so better than Richard B. Riddick. An enigmatic antihero portrayed by Vin Diesel, Riddick’s mixture of smarts and physical abilities proved decently popular, and all but guaranteed that audiences would be seeing him once more on the silver screen. Few could have predicted that on the eve of his next cinematic appearance, a little-known Swedish game developer called Starbreeze would release a expertly-crafted video game starring the anti-hero – and that it would prove more popular than the movie it released alongside. This game was Escape from Butcher Bay, a stealth-centric action title that followed Riddick’s numerous attempts to escape from a maximum security prison using whatever means necessary.

A passion project that snowballed into an industry-wide phenomenon, No Man’s Sky’s very premise as a space-exploration game vowed to deliver so much more than the moon. Developer Hello Games established the parameters for an interactive universe replete with star systems, unique lifeforms, and 18 quintillion planets, all made possible through the power of procedural generation. Optimists bought into the fanfare; skeptics thought it too good to be true. Ultimately, Hello Games would have the final say.

Radical Entertainment and publisher Activision Blizzard believed they had an instant success on their hands. Both parties needed it to succeed at least, especially given the risk involved in developing a new intellectual property—not to mention its arrival at the tail end of America’s Great Recession. In an effort to mitigate said risk, Prototype’s protagonist Alex Mercer and the conspiratorial world of intrigue in which he operated were designed with sequels in mind. And one sequel it did indeed receive in the form of Prototype 2, which launched in April of 2012. Interestingly, a fleeting comic book series published by DC’s WildStorm imprint spawned from Radical’s brainchild, too.

A number of Criterion Games’ early projects put players in the driver’s seat of racing titles, high-octane adventures that helped the Guildford, UK-based studio slowly build a reputation for itself. However, it was 2001’s Burnout that launched the development group into true stardom. Burnout most notably served as a response to the simulation racers that dominated the genre at the time, such as Polyphony Digital’s Gran Turismo series on PlayStation. Instead of simulating refined driving experiences, Criterion focused on delivering an action-based thrill ride from start to finish, complete with the seminal Crash Mode that boasted over-the-top crashing sequences. The studio later decided to inject a similar level of extravagant action into the then PC-oriented first-person shooter genre, introducing console players on PS2 and the original Xbox to Hollywood-style shootouts in the often overlooked yet transformative Black.

When first-person shooters were introduced in the early 90s, most of the studios making them were content with keeping their protagonists silent. They believed that doing so would allow players to step into their shoes with far greater ease, and that the worlds their shooters explored already had plenty to say in their place. Any additional dialogue would be novel – yet wholly unnecessary.

Founded in 1999 by former Rare developers who served as creative forces on GoldenEye 007 and Perfect Dark, developer Free Radical Design built what many consider among the most inventive first-person shooters of the 2000s. The TimeSplitters series especially set the world on fire with exciting time travel elements. Free Radical’s subsequent project, Second Sight, brought its own unique brand of thrilling gameplay to the table as well, courtesy of various psychic mechanics. The Nottingham-based group tried pushing the envelope further when designing Haze, a PlayStation 3 exclusive primarily remembered for playing a role in the studio’s collapse.

To achieve its ambitions, 3D Realms set about developing a new game engine to run Prey and future endeavors. These goals, and countless others, strained the workload, resulting in a series of unmet expectations. For years, the genre evolved without its influence; the likes of Battlefield and Call of Duty rose to the top, establishing a new norm while Prey endured development hell. But Prey, when it finally emerged from the depths, offered an experience unlike any other. While there’s little to suggest it marked the seminal release 3D Realms had dreamt of, Prey’s 2006 adventure merited applause for at least attempting to reinvent the wheel.