Why don't developers remake old Games as much?

[verdant monkai]

You may think I am speaking out of my arse because of all the "hd" remakes that are coming out at the moment. But at least the silent hill and metal gear ones don't have the first games! This just seems stupid and down right tight assed to me.
There are so many games myself and others would love to see remade. And made widely available to other people

Like the final fantasy games most were only available on ps 1, yes some have remakes on psp (I played some), not all of them though. And since they are only on psp they are not widely available. How much effort would it really be to put them up on the PSN network and XBLA for about £6/$9 each or something. They could do this with loads of old Games right?

Some games I understand it would be costly to remake, but I reckon their profits will outweigh their costs.

Also what Games would you guys like to see remade.
(apologies if the way my post is set out is not up to standard)

 

[SajuukKhar]

Because most devs are smart enough to know that remakes almost NEVER go over well.

even if they copied the original 100% there would be tons of fanboy backlash over "ruining" the "perfection" of the original.

Remakes in general are a bad idea, no matter how much you copy the original, tons of people will hate it.

 

[RJ 17]

I think the better question is why the fuck are movie makers so obsessed with remakes.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Nintendo and Activision do it all the time.

 

[Esotera]

Partly because older games have a load of ugly hacks (unmaintainable code) that keeps them running. Apparently the original Wing Commander crashes everytime you exit it with a memory error, and they had to edit the error message to say 'Thanks for playing Wing Commander'. Haven't played it myself but I know a lot of other games are at similar levels of complexity.

Another reason is time & resources. Is everyone really going to buy your PS1 game on the PS3? People who care about the game are likely to still have a working machine. You've also got to deal with quality assurance & porting it to a new platform, which is no mean task.

 

[DoPo]

Partly because older games have a load of ugly hacks (unmaintainable code) that keeps them running. Apparently the original Wing Commander crashes everytime you exit it with a memory error, and they had to edit the error message to say 'Thanks for playing Wing Commander'.

Oh, that's just brilliant! I love it. I'm so putting this in a future application I make. Catch a NullPointerException and just exit with a message that everything is fine or something.

Actually, I had that once, for an assignment. When I was finishing it, Eclipse complained that there was an exception I wasn't handling. So I just made it come up with "It's not a bug it's a feature" if it ever came up. I still don't know how or why it would happen.

But yes, the other problem is time and resources. As far as I know, it's not a quick job and just remaking everything you get your hand onto may not be profitable.

 

[Esotera]

Oh, that's just brilliant! I love it. I'm so putting this in a future application I make. Catch a NullPointerException and just exit with a message that everything is fine or something.

Actually, I had that once, for an assignment. When I was finishing it, Eclipse complained that there was an exception I wasn't handling. So I just made it come up with "It's not a bug it's a feature" if it ever came up. I still don't know how or why it would happen.

But yes, the other problem is time and resources. As far as I know, it's not a quick job and just remaking everything you get your hand onto may not be profitable.

It was a bit worse than that, something went wrong with their resource manager & they couldn't figure out what was wrong in time, so they had to use a Hex Editor. I think. Pretty sure that the majority of the bugs that I program end up being features too...

 

[RJ 17]

I think the better question is why the fuck are movie makers so obsessed with remakes.

Probably because it's a quick buck without much effort.

Exactly, and game developers know that their customers wouldn't stand for that.

 

[krazykidd]

Remaking a ps1 game with HD graphics take too much time effort and money . Now selling them over the psn or wii store makes MORE sense , and they already do this . The psp/DS remakes work because people don't expect top of the line graphics for these consoles , so it hurts their udget less. But even if , they won't sell THAT many copies to make it worth it in my opinion . I depends on the game .

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

Nintendo and Activision do it all the time.

I see what you did there...



Anyway...

I think one of the bigger reasons we don't see more video game remakes is because a lot of older games just wouldn't translate well to new audiences. A lot of the older game mechanics that made those games special back in the day might seem clunky and unbearable to a newer playerbase that's only familiar with more modern titles. So that puts the developer in a bit of a tight spot. Do they make the remake completely faithful to the original, making the fans of the original cry tears of joy? Or do they modernize the game to appeal to modern audiences, risking the alienation of the long-time fans? Either way they make someone unhappy, and either way that unhappy person is probably going to be very loud about their displeasure - likely starting flamewars with the segment of the playerbase that enjoyed the remake.

The only video game remake I've personally seen that didn't appear to encounter this problem was the Resident Evil remake on GameCube. I really haven't seen too much negativity toward this game, other than from people who dislike the series as a whole to begin with.

 

[burningdragoon]

There is a reason why Silent Hill 1 and Metal Gear Solid weren't on their respective HD collections. I'll give you a hint why: it's not because the developers are stupid.

It's really easy to think you know what's better than the people actually in the industry, and most of the time you don't. That's okay though, it's kinda something that people just do.

 

[Ranthus]

A lot of people complain about remakes, you know. It's a sign of unoriginality to many people.

And yeah, while I WOULD like to see Metal Gear, Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, and Metal Gear Solid remade, we can all acknowledge that today, they really just wouldn't be able to hold up. We've played MGS through and through, and Metal Gear was riddled with flaws (yes, I DO mean Metal Gear on the MSX2). Metal Gear 2 could work, though.

But I do admit they totally need to bring Majora's Mask to the 3DS. I can't imagine it would take them much effort, either, considering they already brought over OoT. It would print monies!

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

I think we should be thankful for this. I don't know why anyone would desire remakes of classic titles. In general, the remakes are worse than the originals and its also wasting time remaking stuff when you could be coming up with something new.

 

[accipitre]

We get remakes all the time. Like Syndicate, and the X-Com shooter. There's a reason we don't hear a lot about them.

 

[tippy2k2]

Why go through the effort of completely re-building an old game when you can create a new game? Just because the foundation of the old game is there doesn't mean it's going to be a lot cheaper to make it.

Not only that, but you also limit your audience. I've been gaming since I got my NES as a child and I've yet to buy any HD re-release. Why? It's very rare that I replay games and if I wanted to play the game, I'd have played it by now. If I was never interested in the first place, why would a shiny coat of paint convince me otherwise? Along with that, gaming moves quickly. A huge innovative hit from only a few years ago feels outdated VERY quickly. Now granted, you could argue that these are not for me, the life long gamer, but for the new people. Well, that brings me to my last point.

These old consoles are not hard to come by and they are not expensive. Seriously, for the price of a new $60 game, I could buy a PS1 and Final Fantasy VII (PS1, $24 on Amazon used and FFVII $21 used). Unless it's a super rare game (or a game that was never released in the states), you can get all of these games at pretty cheap prices. Not to mention that they are re-released a lot on the PlayStation Store and 360 Marketplace.

 

[Phlakes]

Haven't you heard? Remakes are just cash grabs orchestrated by the suits at the heads of corporations.

 

[TheGreatAndPowerfulZOG]

Nintendo does this very regularly. XBLA and PSN both have quite a few old games, too. I think it's really taken off with the explosion of digital distribution, and I believe it's only a matter of time before virtually all old games are in downloadable form.

 

[distortedreality]

I'd rather see devs make new IP's than remaking older games. I like the occasional remake, but I'd hate for it to get to a point where the major releases of the year are remakes. That would suck.

 

[Moonmover]

It is only occasionally profitable. Most people who want to play some classic game will probably already have by now. Plus, some people will not buy remakes as a matter of principle.

Plus, video games are largely defined by the power of the technology they run on. Movies hit their technological peak a while ago and have been sitting on it ever since. A movie from the 80's isn't outdated - it's just not new. A video game from the 80's almost never has the depth or the polish of a good modern game, and teh kiddiez who grew up in the days of save files and three-dimensional enviorments would not be satisfied with it.

Finally, the arty-type game designers (and, despite the whining we do on this forum, there are a lot of them) would rather make a name for themselves doing something fresh and original.

 

[370999]

I think the better question is why the fuck are movie makers so obsessed with remakes.

They think it's less risky financially then a unknown property. I know you already answered, but I think it's best to see games more like TV series then films. And to the best of my knowledge, TV series get remade much less regularly. Because why bother with re-runs?

This goes for games, people usually have a copy of the original thus decreasing the amount of people who would probably buy it. Yes I know how much FF 7 would sell like hot cakes but not all games are like that. Besides isn't their also the belief that gaming is done as a thing for young people who wouldn't be invested in the classics due to not playing them?