Developer Insists Dead Island Trailer Was Not Misleading

[Marshall Honorof]

Developer Insists Dead Island Trailer Was Not Misleading

Deep Silver believes other Dead Island assets conveyed the game's true nature adequately.

Remember the spinoff title [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZqrG1bdGtg], Riptide, its tone was much more "pulp adventure" than "dramatic survival." Deep Silver, however, maintains that calling this trailer misleading is "ridiculous," stating that there were more than enough other materials to get an idea of how the game would really play out.

"We did many gameplay trailers with in-game footage before the release, so labelling the CGI misleading would be ridiculous. We never pretended to be something different," explains Guido Eickmeyer, Deep Silver's creative director. Eickmeyer argues that, in addition to providing prospective players with a variety of pre-release material, Dead Island still provided an emotional experience. Playing cooperatively against zombie hordes with strangers or friends produced feelings of intensity and horror instead of sorrow.

Finally, Eickmeyer believes that the videogame industry should not feel so tethered to traditional narratives anyway. "Games live by user stories, not pre-defined narratives," he says. "For watching a scripted experience, I still prefer a good movie." An interesting viewpoint, although one has to wonder where a "cinematic trailer" falls on this continuum.

Source: VideoGamer.com [http://www.videogamer.com/xbox360/dead_island_riptide/news/riding_the_wave_of_success.html]

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[Harker067]

So essentially, this trailer wasn't misleading cause there was lots of other stuff showing how bad the actual game was in comparison? Not exactly a great defense.

I remember my time in dead island, realizing I hates all the playable characters by the time I got to the slums. Then stopping the game entirely while grinding through the jungle when I read up how the whole thing ends. Apparently riptide follows the same people too.... yeah really skipping that. I'd like to think you can make dead island as a coop focused loot game while still having an emotionally satisfying bit of narrative like the trailer had.

 

[Baldr]

There ere a ton of articles saying it was just an art piece not representational of the game at the time. Then again, a lot gamers are not like us escapists and only watch the videos, not bothering to read the articles.

 

[Deathfish15]

I have to agree with them. Any idiot that believes a CGI trailer represents actual gameplay is just that: an idiot. Honestly, I don't see anyone going up in arms against Blizzard, the masters of CGI trickery, who always has a CGI that shows off things that are impossible in their actual games.

Why don't we all just try and sue Blizzard because their Mists of Panderia CGI showed The Horde and The Alliance working together to fight a Panda; and that in PvP a Panda can take on other people else 1vs2; and that they can use environmental weapons; and that they can do acrobatic somersaults while kicking people in the face? After all...that's the "emotional tone" that was set in their trailer. It's only right to expect that everything in the trailer -not the gameplay videos- represents what's actually in the game.

 

[Trishbot]

Yeah, it WAS misleading. From heartbreaking family breakdown to "Who do you Voodoo, *****!" is quite the tonal shift. And, guess what, the TONE of something IS important and it WAS misleading.

That said, they aren't exactly alone. Remember Gary Jules' "Madworld" for Gears of War?

 

[Chester Rabbit]

I agree with him. I saw E3 footage before I ever came across that trailer and was amazed that most of the reason people were criticising the game was because they built their expectations off the cinematic trailer. I mean come on just from the E3 footage you could tell this game had the emotional depth of a cat and was a simple zombie-ocalypse run and gun hack and slash.

 

[Legion]

Yeah, it WAS misleading. From heartbreaking family breakdown to "Who do you Voodoo, *****!" is quite the tonal shift. And, guess what, the TONE of something IS important and it WAS misleading.

That said, they aren't exactly alone. Remember Gary Jules' "Madworld" for Gears of War?

If only Gears of War had taken that kind of atmosphere into the game... I still like the series, but damn it had so much more potential than being another cheesy-dialogue ridden shooter without any emotion. The books did a better job of it, but people shouldn't need to read them to get the same feeling.

 

[Harker067]

I have to agree with them. Any idiot that believes a CGI trailer represents actual gameplay is just that: an idiot. Honestly, I don't see anyone going up in arms against Blizzard, the masters of CGI trickery, who always has a CGI that shows off things that are impossible in their actual games.

Why don't we all just try and sue Blizzard because their Mists of Panderia CGI showed The Horde and The Alliance working together to fight a Panda; and that in PvP a Panda can take on other people else 1vs2; and that they can use environmental weapons; and that they can do acrobatic somersaults while kicking people in the face? After all...that's the "emotional tone" that was set in their trailer. It's only right to expect that everything in the trailer -not the gameplay videos- represents what's actually in the game.

There's a difference between not being actual gameplay and not trying to evoke the same themes/emotions as the game.

 

[Proverbial Jon]

It seems like there are increasingly more bizarre comments and ideas coming out of Deep Silver every day.

 

[zaziuma]

*reposted from facebook post*
I agree that user experience in a game is different than what you would see in a movie, though don't you think that as a media video games should try to follow what movies and books do? It's the only way too actually diversify yourself from the same old thing, and while new mechanics and "gimmicks" with the Wii is the way most developers think the future is, it's not really what most gamers want. Think if The Walking Dead (a good example of how to make a Zombie game) was motion control all the way, without the amazing story and diverse storytelling? It would be crap! That's why you should also focus on a good narrative; not just the user experience.

 

[DragonWright]

I thought it was a terrible trailer just for not revealing any information that everyone didn't already know, ie. there are zombies on a resort island, and for showing less gameplay than a Final Fantasy trailer.

I hadn't even considered how it didn't present the tone of the player's perspective.

 

[Skeleon]

This is still an issue? This long afterwards?

 

[revjay]

It's funny because actually playing the game both solo and in groups the only "feeling" I got was that I shouldn't use weapons since they'll break after four hits and that jump kicking zombies to death was the only viable option. Then once I had an abundance of stuff to make bullets with I just shot the bastards. So the tense feelings I got was, jump, find a work bench and "shit this broke again", much like that trailer. mmmhmmmmm. If the ripoff.. errr spinoff is more of the same I'll just go ahead and pass.

 

[Thyunda]

Did Deep Silver just get access to the internet or something? Throughout Dead Island's hype, release and criticism there was not a peep from them. Now they can't shut up.

Also. Yeah. The trailer was very misleading. The trailer implies a survival game with a sorrowful tone. What I played was the Sam B Sledgehammer Quartet.

 

[Assassin Xaero]

A lot of trailers are misleading, just look at Dragon Age: Origins. Trailer was amazing, game was bland and boring as hell. The trailer made it look like there was actually going to be combat in the game.

 

[Zombie_Moogle]

"Yeah that TOTALY happend in the game, we just didn't show it." ~_~

Teeechnically, the dead bodies of that couple are in the hotel

doesn't really change anything though

 

[Mumorpuger]

The teaser trailer for Dead Island would have been more suited (actually, virtually perfect) as a teaser for TTG's Walking Dead. I just finished it last night, and I shed a few tears.

 

[squid5580]

This is still an issue? This long afterwards?

They tried the same crap again with Riptide. I am guessing they are trying to do some damage control since we won't be falling for the same thing twice.

 

[Deathfish15]

I have to agree with them. Any idiot that believes a CGI trailer represents actual gameplay is just that: an idiot. Honestly, I don't see anyone going up in arms against Blizzard, the masters of CGI trickery, who always has a CGI that shows off things that are impossible in their actual games.

Why don't we all just try and sue Blizzard because their Mists of Panderia CGI showed The Horde and The Alliance working together to fight a Panda; and that in PvP a Panda can take on other people else 1vs2; and that they can use environmental weapons; and that they can do acrobatic somersaults while kicking people in the face? After all...that's the "emotional tone" that was set in their trailer. It's only right to expect that everything in the trailer -not the gameplay videos- represents what's actually in the game.

There's a difference between not being actual gameplay and not trying to evoke the same themes/emotions as the game.

And yet there's no difference between the Mists of Pandaria trailer to it's game and the Dead Island trailer and it's game. Same theme/emotion screw up. See, if you'd have seen the trailer knowing nothing of the game, you'd think that first this human and this green orc are at battles, but then set aside their differences to fight against a Panda. Only after that the Panda shows them this peaceful land and everything is surreal. This isn't the case at all, and there's more separation in MoP than there was for WotLK, in which both factions at least shared the same city.


I'm sorry if some of you didn't catch some emotional themes in Dead Island, but that's your fault/lose, not the developers. The game had some very deeply emotional areas like when the mechanic shop girl had to kill her own father who turned zombie. There was also a part about a woman's husband who was in a bathroom dying and was bitten. You could save her as well as kill him. Just because the game had lots of action within it, doesn't mean it was in any way "gimped" in emotional story.

 

[Therumancer]

In general I'm getting sick of this. The bottom line is that the gaming industry needs to understand that gamers are getting tired of being lied to. The justifications don't matter, everyone on both sides knows exactly what's up. You show a trailer that is nothing at all like the game being made, and people are going to get upset with you. Other information being potentially availible is irrelevent.

It's sort of like when a game makes promises on a pre-order box or whatever, that happen to be untrue, a point made on a website or buried in a forum mentioned by a developer, that doesn't cover you for not lying, it just makes you an even bigger scumbag because you should have known better.

To me the excuses about marketing and game developers not talking to each other, and so on, don't matter. All that matters is the results. It's the job of the industry to keep this stuff in line, noone else's. The guys making the game and taking the money are responsible for the information circulated about it, period.

For years the industry has gotten away with taking turds, glossing them up with slick marketing and movies, and people are catching on the industry is taking flak for it. The industry doesn't need to cry, or try and justify themselves, it needs to change otherwise people are just going to get angrier.

One thing I will say for "Dead Island" though is that it WAS a decent game, if not the game a lot of people thought it was going to be. As a result Deep Silver has gotten some crap, but not as much as they would have if the game was genuinely awful, it would not have succeeded well enough to get a sequel.

Also I'll be honest, if your complaining about reaction to your marketing as opposed to what you delivered, be glad your not EA/Bioware. They went through a LOT of effort to lie to people about the ending of Mass Effect 3 and what it was going to entail. They not only failed to deliver on their promises, but released a "behind the scenes app" in which they more or less say that they never had any intention of keeping those promises. Pretty much going "hahaha, we punked you...". The reaction was titanic, and the rage is still ongoing.... In short, shut up and change, and be glad you aren't these guys. Any other company would have been destroyed, and truthfully, I have a feeling the real reckoning over this might still be to arrive, a lot is going to revolve around what happens when EA/Bioware releases their next big franchise game and how much damage they repair to the "Dragon Age" and "Mass Effect" names. From what I've seen so far, and the attitudes projected... it's probably going to be pretty epic. Given that they didn't change the endings and seem to be following their recent design paradigm, your probably going to see a once lionized company die, in comparison to "Deep Silver" which comparitively speaking got a slap on the wrist.

Deep Silver, and other companies, need to learn when to zip it, and realize that trying to "explain themselves" when everyone knows the score, just makes things worse. Sell "Riptide", let actions redeem you, don't try and claim you didn't pull a scummy move with the first game, we all saw it, and you can't rewrite history.