I am a long-time lover of the Stealth Genre of games. From Deus Ex to Metal Gear to Splinter Cell- you give me the opportunity to proceed through an area in a manner so quiet that I am a veritable ghost, and I'm probably going to grind my way through that room, reload after reload, until I master it's every slight shadow, alternative path and split-second opportunity. Perhaps that stems from my inherent invisible nature as the kind of person you forget about the moment after you've met them, but anonymity and plausible non-existence are my utmost forte. Which is why it can be so gruelling being a fan of a genre of games so poorly served over the past few years that I'm starting to wonder if my genre is one of those 'dead genres' that just doesn't sell games anymore!
Started, quite literally, due to a lack of processing power which resulted in a full action game being impossible to make- stealth created a whole new philosophy to the way we play games. Suddenly the idea of going through rooms of enemies without leaving corpses opened up the possibility to question why people needed to die at all, which would pave the way to complex scenario writing where maybe the opponents are always the defacto villains of the story. Deus Ex itself being a great example of a franchise were sometimes the choice to play stealthily and non-lethally can prevent genuinely unnecessary loss of life that can positively come into play later down the line- all possible because of the concept of alternative gameplay paths.
And to be fair, that might be what makes stealth games such a tough proposition compared to your normal run and gun affair. They need to ideally cater for both games, the violent and the quiet. Sure, there are a few pure stealth games on the market such as the Styx games- but they come across as niche even admits stealth enjoyers like myself. Splinter Cell and Metal Gear need to be half competent shooters on their own to facilitate the consequences of failing at stealth, which is what leads to situations such as 'Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain' just being one of the best third person action games to this day, for the sheer malleability of it's many tools and systems creating near limitless gameplay potential- even for what is ostensibly a 'stealth focused' franchise.
But Metal Gear has rusted to a standstill, unfortunately. Splinter Cell has splintered. Siphon Filter needs a replacement. Deus Ex renounced itself and became secular. And Sly Cooper is trapped in an alternate universe or something. (That last one isn't even a joke. I'm pretty sure the last game ended with Sly being shoved off this entire realm.) Every single significant Stealth genre game is currently dormant and all we have to scratch this itch are the works of one particular studio who include stealth not because of any internal passion for the genre, but simply because it's one of those core pillars that someone long ago instilled in their franchises back when the studio had a soul. Yes, for the fiftieth time in the past hour, I'm ragging on Ubisoft.
Assassin's Creed bitterly tries to shirk it's Stealth Gameplay in favour of hit-and-miss combat that is becoming more and more generic as the RPG sub-series progresses. What began as an Arkham light affair of style, flow and speed has become plodding, slow and tedious. Chipping away massive health bars on big enemies with simple attack cycles that are 12 feet tall for some reason because some one on their team played Dark Souls once and now that has to be all their games. Mirage tried to bring back stealth to the franchise and it was an admirable attempt, but it still felt slightly clunky. As though someone was trying to stuff stealth into an engine it clearly wasn't made for. And otherwise Ubisoft are working on the Ghost Recon games which treat Stealth about as basically as they did fifteen years ago. Do not expect any innovation out of that franchise.
In fact, to this day I think the most innovative and creative stealth game on the market is still Phantom Pain, and that was nine years ago! That was a game which featured complex enemy AI packages that reacted to how badly the player had screwed up their infiltration, oodles of reactivity objects and dynamic interactions that still surprise me to this day, (such as the ability to hide bodies on cots to make passerbys think they're sleeping.) and so many tools and gadgets to work with that sometimes it feels as though you are a god of manipulation terrorising these Russian outposts for your own sick amusement. And you know what? I kind of am! MGS V was the kind of game malleable enough that you could play it a hundred different ways practically forever. But it's not enough.
We need a new prince to worship! A new cadre of Stealth that manages to at least approach what MGS V was doing, let alone surpass it. To this day one of those nagging elements of that game which bothers me is the apparent truth that dogs, with smell based gameplay, were conceived of but ultimately scrapped- surely someone out there has taken that as a challenge to see what new elements to the stealth genre they can bring? I've dreamed about what a successor might look like, how it would feel, the ways it would innovate. Perhaps improving on the companion system to give you a plethora of team interactions mid mission, maybe shoring up melee combat to create more dynamic gameplay moments in those times where you're caught off guard up close- or just giving us actual proper bosses to play around with like previous Metal Gear games. MGS V gives us like... one at the very end.
Who has the nads to try at that? At the time being only the Arkane Immersive Sims seem deeply invested in stealth gameplay but I wouldn't call them especially ambitious in their iterations. Deathloop kind of revealed the fact that the team are basically remixing the same stealth tools and abilities they came up with back in Dishonoured again and again, and though they're still fun- there's no scratching at the cutting edge happening to set my stealthy heart aflame. Maybe their upcoming Blade game will have something special, or Kojima's rumoured new stealth action series will be the successor? All I want is for someone to try. And heck, maybe that's a signal for the fact that it's time for me to start learning how to use an engine and give it a crack myself. (It's better than not doing it, right?)
No comments:
Post a Comment