Syndicate Remake Revealed as a Shooter - UPDATED

[B33J33]

I'm still hopefull. letting go of the isometric viewy-game kinda sucks (loved it back in the day), but Starbreeze (Chronicles of Ridick) could aim for a cross-over between ye olde Syndicate and HR which could be an awesome gift to humanity imho

 

[Quiotu]

Tell you what, I'll give your desires thought if you can name me more than three modern squad-based, tactical RTS games for consoles that actually sold well and got critical acclaim. I'll even give you the first two for free: Halo Wars and Dragon Age.

I cared about this point until you said "Consoles".
And right there the point became clear. More on this later.

If you nix "real time" from strategy and tactics, you can easily make these sorts of games on consoles. Hell, the original XCOM games used Time-Units and turns, but I suppose the assumption now is that your stereotypical fratwad Xbox 360 gamer wouldn't play it...

Really, play the first two games again and tell me they work well anymore. I'm even a fan of the series, and I can admit that they did NOT age well. Putting HD textures on them and calling it a next gen title won't help that.

Deus Ex proved that you can take an older design and bring it up to modern standards without sacrificing the entire genre. Before you say "Well, Deus Ex 1 was also a shooter.." you will find that it doesn't play AT ALL like most shooters; today or then.

I get what you want... but you don't reboot a franchise by putting a new coat of paint on a 16 year old game and slapping it on Steam, bypassing consoles completely.

This is part of where the ire comes from.
They dredge up old PC-games/IP and then they truncheon them over the head with the Console-marketing-stick until they no longer contain anything but REFERENCES to the elements that made them successful in the first place. The results in the franchise ceasing to retain its mechanical identity and thus it gets turned into generic mediocre garbage.

What this tells me: The IP is just there to sucker players of the older Syndicate games into buying their new shooter. Exactly like XCOM.

It slays me that we live in an age where BOTH MODERN CONSOLES (no, not the Wii. That's last-gen tech.) have access to USB Mouse and Keyboard, yet nobody is even trying to develop strategy games for them.
(And this is the same market demographic who paid 100 bucks for Steel Battalion's controller?)

And it's all because of an "image problem" that many perpetuate but few are willing to defy or change.

"Nobody will buy tactics games on console because the developer assumes that their audience assumes that they will suck. Their audience assumes they will suck because nobody develops them."

It's a Mobius Loop of assumptions. I'd wager that if consoles started making small unit tactics games the genre could grow, and we'd have more solutions for the controller problem.


Until then, we're stuck in this console-only shit-cycle where older properties keep getting rebooted and "reinvented" for the maximum exploitation of nostalgia at the minimum of design effort.
Distinction has become the new "niche", and in today's gaming industry, "niche" is something that the Publishers want to destroy entirely.

Once again, I'm not exactly against the idea of making a true sequel to the Syndicate games... I just understand that it's never going to happen, and I'm not going to pointlessly ***** about it. Whether you like it or not, games that are PC-only are a dying breed. MMOs and a few exceptions notwithstanding, PC games simply do not sell like they did 10 or 15 years ago.

The choices are either to spend more money to make a modern Syndicate game, but cater it to consoles because that's who's buying games right now. Or spend less money, make a PC game that borrows engines and programming, and make what people would probably conceive as a half-assed attempt and even MORE of a cash-in. It's lose-lose for the devs, so you may as well go all in.

And it's easy understanding why it's being done. It's way easier to bring back a dead but established IP and reboot it than think of something new. Happens in the movie industry all the time... and sadly, it works. Those complaining aren't wrong, but there's no reason to boycott something that might actually turn out to be good. You can dislike the change, but don't drop all faith until you see what comes out in the end.

First impressions can be awfully wrong at times. I didn't like how the new SSX looked at first either, but once more information came out, most of us realized they were doing it right. EA can make something good with an established IP.

Calm. The fuck. Down. I want way more information than this before I pick a side.

 

[ZombieGenesis]

I get the feeling gaming is moving towards some kind of first person shooter singularity.

Has nobody noticed that these games are essentially identical to a coconut shy? Just costing millions to produce.

 

[Iron Criterion]

What's next? Crusader: No Remorse remade as an FPS?

Civilisation VI: The FPS years? Mind you since that series is gradually dumbing down it wouldn't be all that surprising.

 

[Waaghpowa]

It was simplified none the less, going from an FPS rpg to an FPS with RPG elements. Best example is the whole weapon proficiency, or the lack there of. That and basically forcing you to just take on the bosses in a closed off room where you can't do much other than shoot them in the face.

Boss fights: Yeah, those were straight up ass. Hell, I would have even been fine with forcing to fight them, if the story expanded upon who they are, why they do what they do, and why you'd have to kill them in the first place. If it did that, I'd be just fine with being forced to kill them. But it didn't, which is a great shame.

As for the weapon proficiency: Well Jenson's an ex-SWAT commander, so him being proficient in all kinds of weapons makes sense story-wise.

I can agree with the whole swat thing, but I can't help but feel that it still lacked complexity. JC was a trained agent, yet you could still specialize in certain weapons. Would it have been so hard to give Adam the proficiency of using every weapon but with some sort of perk you could spec into?

I guess the general consensus is your average gamer is just too stupid and impatient to handle squad based games these days?

Or at least console gamer's, since Deus Ex, although rather good, was fairly simple compared to the original. (Please see ZP episode regarding Deus ex HR)

Speaking of the subject of Deus Ex Human Revolution... don't you think This new Syndicate game is trying at match the art style? It seriously seemed to smack of a similar tone in the screens >.>

Now that you mention it, yes. Though I doubt it was to capitalize on DX:HR's success as it's likely that this game has been in development for a while.

 

[fozzy360]

Seeing as how the original Syndicate games were before my time as a gamer, I'll take a wait and see approach. What gives me a good amount of faith in the project is the fact that Starbreeze is developing, which is very welcome news.

That said, I find it quite humorous how people are collectively losing their shit over this. We have seven screenshots and a press release to tell us what this game is all about, and that's it. Yet, we have declarations and affirmations that Syndicate will be shit, a hollow shell of should have been, the death of the gaming industry. A press release and seven screenshots is enough to confirm that? I can understand the hate on something like Modern Warfare because we've already had two installments and now several videos to show us how little the game has changed between these installments. This, on the other hand, has so little information out, we can barely make a judgment on the art style, let alone gameplay.

This game might be shit (doubt it) or this game might be great. Impossible to tell until we get some real info later down the line.

 

[Cranky_Gamer]

I was really hoping for another (real) Syndicate game, but alas. On the upside, there's a possibility they'll re-release the original Syndicate and Syndicate Wars. If they do, I would love to see them on GoG but expect they'll use Origin.

 

[Cranky_Gamer]

I think your missing the point. Let's say for the sake of argument the game turns out to be amazing, loved by critics and FPS fans alike. GOTY material, an instant classic, a genre defining masterpiece that becomes the next benchmark that all future FPS games will be judged by. None of this will make it a true Syndicate game, as Syndicate is an RTS not a FPS.

 

[Cranky_Gamer]

Seeing as how the original Syndicate games were before my time as a gamer, I'll take a wait and see approach. What gives me a good amount of faith in the project is the fact that Starbreeze is developing, which is very welcome news.

That said, I find it quite humorous how people are collectively losing their shit over this. We have seven screenshots and a press release to tell us what this game is all about, and that's it. Yet, we have declarations and affirmations that Syndicate will be shit, a hollow shell of should have been, the death of the gaming industry. A press release and seven screenshots is enough to confirm that? I can understand the hate on something like Modern Warfare because we've already had two installments and now several videos to show us how little the game has changed between these installments. This, on the other hand, has so little information out, we can barely make a judgment on the art style, let alone gameplay.

This game might be shit (doubt it) or this game might be great. Impossible to tell until we get some real info later down the line.

I think your missing the point. Let's say for the sake of argument the game turns out to be amazing, loved by critics and FPS fans alike. GOTY material, an instant classic, a genre defining masterpiece that becomes the next benchmark that all future FPS games will be judged by. None of this will make it a true Syndicate game, as Syndicate is an RTS not a FPS.

 

[Joe Deadman]

Heh... in the far flung future there will only be... LENS FLARE!
Guess the protagonist also replaced his eyes with cameras or something.

This seems like a silly direction to take Syndicate in, especially since they seem dead set on giving this agent a name, backstory etc. That seems really out of sync with the whole numbered faceless agents who are effectively remote controlled drones.

 

[b3nn3tt]

I'd never thought of it like that actually. That's a very good point. In which case, I've got to fall back on the brand recognition argument, because I can't see any other reason why they'd call it Syndicate.

And which leaves the brand recognition as a version of emotional blackmail ("It could be as good as you remember it being" - which, of course, it will never be).

That's why emotions run high from the "NO SYNDICATE" side.

The "THIS SYNDICATE" side tend to be people who never experienced the recognition, and so are fighting to have it themselves.

It's a very dirty game being played. Faction stirring just for hype. But then this is from the people who have boobies everywhere else. Not the most subtle of companies.

Well, that seems like a very underhanded tactic. But then, I suppose that that's what the developers decided would be most likely to make the most money, so from that perspective it makes sense. Does show quite a lack of respect for their potential fanbase though. Although again, if money is their primary objective then they probably don't mind that too much.

 

[Antari]

Another frankenstien ressurection set loose to destroy the world ... wonderful. Yet another reason to not use Origin ... or any service EA comes up with. Or any game they sell either.

 

[WaywardHaymaker]

Hey guys, I recently became privy to the information that... wow, the two games I thought to make this joke out of kind of already did it. King's Quest: Mask of Eternity WAS a mediocre action game, and Zork was in Black Ops.

But really, we should stop taking old IPs and making them shitty CoD clones that will, at best, fade into obscurity without making enough money to warrant licensing the IP in the first place, because the only people the IP means something to don't want to play the shitty BETRAAAAYAL.

 

[duchaked]

well umm the screen shots look pretty cool? tho I did get a hint of HR

 

[The Random One]

its disapionting they aren't making a syndicate game. Why call it syndicate? just make it a new IP. First X-com now this

At least this Syndicate is in the right timeframe, and has a bit of the things of the original, like supa-powaful corporations. Though based on the screenshots, not much else.

The only thing the new X-Com has in common with the old is, 'aliens exist'.

ATTENTION ALL UNITS, ATTENTION ALL UNITS, WE HAVE A TYPE FROMDU, WEAPONS FREE, WEAPONS FREE

 

[GrizzlerBorno]

I perfectly understand people being upset about this one because of the genre change.... but the majority of escapists here are console gamers. Why don't you guys understand that Consoles WON'T have over-the-top squad based strategy games. It's just NOT going to happen. Just get the fuck over it.

Alternatively if this was a PC exclusive: (which no big developer will make nowaydays anyway) A)it would undersell like dogshit. B)The majority of people here will whine about not being able to play it! It's a lose-lose situation.

Hence it's either THIS Syndicate or NO Syndicate. Choose.

Bet you're getting sick of people quoting you to say 'NO Syndicate' eh?

I may not have thought that one through. Problem is, I thought people were really looking forward to a new syndicate. Evidently not.

 

[dyre]

I perfectly understand people being upset about this one because of the genre change.... but the majority of escapists here are console gamers. Why don't you guys understand that Consoles WON'T have over-the-top squad based strategy games. It's just NOT going to happen. Just get the fuck over it.

Alternatively if this was a PC exclusive: (which no big developer will make nowaydays anyway) A)it would undersell like dogshit. B)The majority of people here will whine about not being able to play it! It's a lose-lose situation.

Hence it's either THIS Syndicate or NO Syndicate. Choose.

Bet you're getting sick of people quoting you to say 'NO Syndicate' eh?

I may not have thought that one through. Problem is, I thought people were really looking forward to a new syndicate. Evidently not.

I'd love a sequel to Baldur's Gate 2, but if EA forced Bioware to make an FPS out of it...

Just because people want a new Syndicate doesn't mean they'll take any shit EA throws at them under the name "Syndicate."

 

[Ayay]

Reinvention..visceral FPS experience.So this game will have nothing to do with the original and will be the same as the last few years FPS then.Oh and i am going to eat my happy sack with salt on if the Character you play is not a Emo ridden sod that goes on the whole game how evil the big corporations are while wading in bodies he just slice shot or burned.

 

[GrizzlerBorno]

I perfectly understand people being upset about this one because of the genre change.... but the majority of escapists here are console gamers. Why don't you guys understand that Consoles WON'T have over-the-top squad based strategy games. It's just NOT going to happen. Just get the fuck over it.

Alternatively if this was a PC exclusive: (which no big developer will make nowaydays anyway) A)it would undersell like dogshit. B)The majority of people here will whine about not being able to play it! It's a lose-lose situation.

Hence it's either THIS Syndicate or NO Syndicate. Choose.

Bet you're getting sick of people quoting you to say 'NO Syndicate' eh?

I may not have thought that one through. Problem is, I thought people were really looking forward to a new syndicate. Evidently not.

I'd love a sequel to Baldur's Gate 2, but if EA forced Bioware to make an FPS out of it...

Just because people want a new Syndicate doesn't mean they'll take any shit EA throws at them under the name "Syndicate."

Well that was my point. A new syndicate can never be the new Syndicate they want.

 

[dyre]

I perfectly understand people being upset about this one because of the genre change.... but the majority of escapists here are console gamers. Why don't you guys understand that Consoles WON'T have over-the-top squad based strategy games. It's just NOT going to happen. Just get the fuck over it.

Alternatively if this was a PC exclusive: (which no big developer will make nowaydays anyway) A)it would undersell like dogshit. B)The majority of people here will whine about not being able to play it! It's a lose-lose situation.

Hence it's either THIS Syndicate or NO Syndicate. Choose.

Bet you're getting sick of people quoting you to say 'NO Syndicate' eh?

I may not have thought that one through. Problem is, I thought people were really looking forward to a new syndicate. Evidently not.

I'd love a sequel to Baldur's Gate 2, but if EA forced Bioware to make an FPS out of it...

Just because people want a new Syndicate doesn't mean they'll take any shit EA throws at them under the name "Syndicate."

Well that was my point. A new syndicate can never be the new Syndicate they want.

Well, it could be. The new Deus Ex was absolutely the Deus Ex I wanted. They just need to find good developers who loved the old Syndicate, and give them some freedom to do what they want. Though, it probably wouldn't be very profitable. I'm surprised Square Enix took the risk with Deus Ex...