With discs becoming ever more obsolete as consoles (and the PC with steam and such) do you think more "Episodic" games could be on their way?


I was in a deep conversation with my brother about how "The Walking Dead" was a pretty big deal, and how the games actually turned up rather nicely. This led on to our conversation of even bigger and better Story-driven, Episode based, games. This is my example, and as I've been playing DCUO a lot lately, this is also the example I used with him;


Batman: The Animated Series style Episodic game:



Basically, what I'm saying, could more big episodic-like games be showing up with the next gen consoles? You could do a whole story on any superhero really (or anything), and as superheroes are pretty big (look at how well "The Avengers" or "The Dark Knight/Knight Rises" did) if a game with a good story, good game play, and a nice atmosphere were to show up, I think it could be fun and bring in a lot of money for some companies.

No, I don't like waiting to finish games I already bought.

If you ask me, "episodic" is little more than a marketing buzzword for "small budget game series." I'm sure it sounded like a good idea on paper; rather than produce and release one big game, devs could instead focus on making and releasing a series of smaller ones over time. It would mean shorter development cycles, a quicker return for profit, it can keep the fans happy and hungry for more, it doesn't necessarily cost anyone more than what they already spend, everyone wins. In practice, however...it hasn't really worked out that way. A lot of these so-called "episodic" games actually have development cycles that could very well qualify for full games. The Half-Life 2 episodes in particular show just what a huge joke the whole concept is.

Not to mention, I don't think your idea would work. Sure, people like Batman, but how many people do you think want to spend an episode or two just taking on basic criminal mooks? Or for that matter, playing the [censored] origin story that we all know and are rightfully sick of? No, people want to fight the Joker, Bane, Ra's al Ghul, and everyone else in the rogue's gallery. If you want an episodic series to work, you really need to work on hooking consumers in at the beginning, because if they're not impressed then, they're not going to come back for seconds. And that's the other problem with the model: funding. If the series isn't getting the sales it needs, it'll have to get cut short. End result: pissed off fans and a loss of credibility to entire gaming public. And even if you launch a successful series, expanding your audience is going to be even more difficult, as people who don't buy the older titles aren't going to be very inclined to check out the newer ones either, especially if you're hoping to tell a larger story over them.

The heart of Telltale's business is episodic content - it's been the case since 2004 when it was founded. It's coming more into the limelight now, because for the first time they've got a big pop culture brand to work with, whereas previously their games were based around either throwback (Sam & Max, Jurassic Park) or niche (Strong Bad, Monkey Island) IPs. But it's worked for them.

Would it work if more developers took up that model? Yes, to a point. Episodic games works for certain games, or certain genres, and it has limited appeal. One of the reasons it works in the adventure genre for Telltale is that it limits the scope, and therefore the complexity, of the adventure puzzles, making them simpler and more accessible. That broadens the base of users, but many adventure gamers look for more 'serious' content in full, feature-length games... And in this case, they need to go to other developers to get it. The same would be true if you adapted this for, say, RPG or FPS games. I imagine a game like Portal, for instance, would work well in episodic format, but full-length games like Borderlands would still be needed to sate the demands of serious players.

uh right. No.

i like to play a game at my pace. I hate waiting to watch a television series through, why would i want the same kind of inconvenience attributed towards video games.

I really don't see the point of the episodes. Just release it in one big chunk.