The Pro’s and Con’s of Re-Releasing a 100+ Hour Role Playing Game
In recent years we have been lucky enough to see a host of incredible role playing games that take quite a few afternoons to complete. These include popular titles such as Persona 5, Dragon Quest XI, and Final Fantasy XV; all are part of very prestigious gaming series and earners of high praise from the critics that have reviewed them. Now, if you were to go out and purchase any of these titles you would quickly notice that you have many options that you may be confused about. For example, you could buy Persona 5, or an updated version of the game called Persona 5 Royal. Looking into a forum or review section will let you see one big divide in the worth of each game, whether it is worth it to buy the version with the extra content or save the money and get the older version of the game. In this article I want to contrast the features of each version and talk about how each of these long games presents their extra content.
Persona 5 vs. Persona 5 Royal
Speaking of Persona 5, that is a great place to start seeing as it’s where most of the controversy lies. Persona 5 is a game where you play through a calendar school year and what Persona 5 Royal offers is a big handful of quality of life changes and an extra semester onto the game. The Persona series has many dedicated fans that have probably already played the game, so asking them to play the game again just to reach new content has rubbed some of the fan-base as “asking too much”. This is pretty understandable seeing as it is 100 hours of your life, and 60 USD, again. While fans that are used to this method from previous Persona games would easily fork over the money and gladly play it again, the rest of the fans can’t see why they can’t just purchase an update to the game that they already own. In my own opinion I can see where a tradition of re-releasing can be easily overcome, the last time that ATLUS released a Persona game was on the PlayStation 2 so there was not the option of updating via the internet. However, given the jump in technology since then, I would love to see the series take on an approach that follows in the footsteps of most modern games. Of course we are not developers and don’t know how easy it actually is to just “patch the game” rather than fully re-release it. Personally, I love the game and will gladly replay the title to experience the new features and content, but I know that possibly a better solution would be to add the extended story as a standalone game like they had done with Persona 3’s “The Answer”. I believe that the company is providing die hard fans with what they want, a complete package with enough new content to warrant an interesting new play through under a metered eye that can pin point those differences. But for everyone else, asking someone that may be new to role playing games, or someone that maybe wanted a little bit more Persona story to play the entire game again and purchase it again while it is for the most part exactly the same would be very frustrating as a player.
Final Fantasy XV: Royal Edition
Final Fantasy XV: Royal Edition has a sort of opposite effect on me than Persona 5 Royal did. When the Royal Edition came out it was the same Final Fantasy with the season pass and some extra weapon packs. The DLC introduced is pivotal to each section of the game and lets each character gain specific aesthetic gear and costumes while showing the player another side of particular story events. So, like most game of the year editions, Final Fantasy XV: Royal Edition was a good deal on the game and expansion packs. This is fine, I’m glad that this game was packaged in a way that let new players enter into all that Final Fantasy XV had to offer at a fair price. What I am proposing is that perhaps this game would have benefited from having a re-release that cleverly inserted the story content into the game in their respective parts (keeping Comrades as a standalone though). I would happily pay again to receive a version of Final Fantasy XV that saw these disjointed chapters sewn into the base version of the game. And note, that this is just subject to my own opinion because I know that a lot of players might be a little thankful that they can play them in the beginning and then have those costumes throughout their play through, or happy that they can hold off on this content until reaching the end and then dive into the side content. I also know that I could stitch them together myself (which I actually have the intention of doing later this year) and just go back and forth between the main game and the expansion whenever it is chronologically appropriate. However, a re-release of Final Fantasy XV that stood as a “definitive version” of the games story would be something that I would be really interested in owning.
Dragon Quest XI S Killing Dragon Quest XI
Dragon Quest XI S is the updated version of Dragon Quest XI which is the updated version of Dragon Quest XI on the 3DS. However you would not know that as someone looking to buy a copy today. When Dragon Quest XI S launched at a full 60 USD, the previous version of the game was taken off the store. Speaking as a fan of both versions, Dragon Quest XI S is the way to play the game and we are better off without the older version. However, I was a little disappointed that owners of the older version were not offered any sort of deal on the newer version. The update is nice, it offers a lot of changes to the game that have changed the way that I’ve played, but it is not on the same level of additional content as Persona 5 or even Final Fantasy XV. When I purchased the S version of Dragon Quest XI I immediately felt a wave of buyers remorse because really the changes implemented were not worth 60 USD to me. However, even with the price tag I’m glad that I got to replay a game that I love with little enhances like being able to have your party members follow you around outside of combat, being able to craft outside of camps, and filling in story gaps that previously were left to my own imagination.
Skyrim: Modded Edition
For my last example I want to pull an old and good one out. Skyrim has re-released a lot of times on many different systems but Special Edition was a notable launch. I think that it was handled mostly well and didn’t ask its players for too much. So, the game was essentially the Legendary Edition of Skyrim, but with the added fun of dedicated modding. Now I could go into Skyrim modding but that is another article entirely, the point however, is that you could now mod Skyrim without the risk of destroying the game files load order and even on console now. Everything is fine, except for the mod store which is a big taboo in the modding community, I could go into why on that as well but that is also another article. Skyrim: Special Edition was given out for free to anyone that owned Skyrim and it’s DLC on PC (mostly because PC players had no need for this upgrade) and Special Edition was the version of the game sold as an upgrade to current generation hardware. This is what I consider to be a good re-release, providing a modding service to everyone that has been niche to PC for a long time while also allowing a better looking version of the game. Skyrim is also has the advantage of being in the realm of a sandbox in the way that any added content can be accessed at any time without requiring you to replay large chunks of the game, so somebody just looking to revisit Skyrim to play DLC or a modded campaign could easily sidestep the base content and play what they wanted. This is not me saying that Persona, Dragon Quest, and Final Fantasy should be in sandbox format; I just believe that Skyrim got lucky based on it being an adaptable game that re-releases as an easy sale to its fan base.
The Full Cost
The answer to the controversy based around the business practices of large game developers remains completely up to your own value of a game. Square Enix, ATLUS, and Bethesda are going to keep trying their luck getting you to buy the same game again because they know you want more of the world they’ve built; and as huge companies, they know what a fan is willing to pay to live in that world again. The fact at the end of the day is that if you are a big fan of a game and it releases again only better, you are most likely going to buy into it. Whether its to support a group that made something that you love, or as an excuse to replay a great game, that’s the hook. In conclusion, I only want game marketing for any company to respect their fans that want to buy their product again and see more of the work that’s been added or improved. Making a game that’s affordable and accessible is hard, but hopefully as the industry continues to grow we see improvements in how new content is presented and sold to us that changes along with the technology and times.
