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Once again, we find ourselves quickly approaching the final days of the year. And, like most years, December is a month rather barren of big game releases, it being both the holiday season and the time when Game of the Year awards are distributed. I guess that means it’s time to stop talking about video games, right? WRONG. You didn’t think I was going to stop talking, did you? Instead of assessing what’s current, we look towards the future. Towards the time when the next big games come out. To 2013 (assuming Quetzalcoatl doesn’t leap from the depths of an ancient volanco and ravage the world beforehand). It’s time to review the announcements of 2012, to anticipate what we’ll want to purchase, to preview the months ahead when new titles are placed on the shelves. We already know about many of the games that will ship in 2013, mostly due to zealous marketing. As I pored over the lists, sampled the demos, devoured developer commentary, and watched previews, I formed a hypothesis about the upcoming year.
2013 is going to be dark. The games of next year will disturb, unsettle, and upset. Get ready people: it’s going to be rough. Let’s check out why.
To start with, 2013 will have its share of dark, gritty, realistic reboots. Badass half-demon Dante returns in January with DmC, a Westernized reimagining of Capcom mainstay, Devil May Cry. Though this installment continues to provide the signature campiness and over-the-top action for which the series is famous (as shown in the demo, already reviewed by N3D), the world of DmC is more hopeless and dangerous than ever before. Even the pizza-eating, trash-talking Dante sports a new look, one far less polished than his original. The game’s thematic elements have shifted as well. Once Dante fought waves of nameless demons, but now he fights the demonic influence that perverts and controls the world, even as he comes to terms with his own demonic heritage. His battles are both deeper within his character and more applicable to our own twisted world. Another formerly ridiculous franchise, Tomb Raider, is receiving a similar transition into terrifying realism. Where the leading lady was once a gun-slinging adventuress with miniature clothing, the rebooted Lara Croft seems like she has far more character, but will be put through far more trauma. No one would’ve guessed that sexual violence and Tomb Raider would occupy the same conversation, but the harsher world of Crystal Dynamics’ reboot brought those very topics together after trailers previewed one such harrowing scene for Lara. Whether or not you think that sexual violence should be an element ofTomb Raider or any game, there can be no doubt: Lara’s world is getting darker, and our play experience will reflect it.
The sequels of the thirteenth year of the millennia also appear to be downright freaky. Some of the most terrifying franchises are making a reappearance in the upcoming year, and some that were not particularly scary are becoming so. Dead Space 3 will return players to the violent and disgusting world of the Necromorphs, pitting hero Issac Clarke and (for the first time) his allies against the writhing biological horrors that have made the game so iconic. Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs, sequel to possibly the most petrifying game of all time (look up YouTube reactions… seriously) Amensia: The Dark Descent, will be arriving on PC next year to scare the knickers off of anyone foolish enough to play it in the dark… or light… or whenever. FUCK THE GAME IS SCARY…. Okay. Ahem. Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm, follow-up to 2010′s real-time strategy hit Starcraft 2: Wings of Liberty, leaves behind the mercenary Terran Jim Raynor for the vicious, vengeful Sarah Kerrigan, a deadly psychic assassin who controls the vile Zerg Swarm. Next up on the list is the highly anticipated Irrational Games project, Bioshock Infinite. The original Bioshock was already pretty dark, set, as it was, in a damned utopia, collapsing under the sea along with the sanity of its denizens. The morbid Little Sisters probing the dead for Adam while their frightening Big Daddies watched over them, ready to pounce on any unsuspecting yet bloodthirsty Splicers (or you). Bioshock Infinite appears to have similar elements: psychotic residents of an impossible city along with creaking steampunk-y death machines. Not a pretty picture. But the theme of this new Bioshock is a drastic departure from the original, for instead of an underwater “utopia”, we have a struggling, xenophobic, isolationist caricature of America, a commentary of current or upcoming doom if ever there was one. Trailers and videos show the shining statues and waving flags of a lost paradise splattered with the blood of a warring populace. It’s freaky, and it’s about us. GRIM SHIT RIGHT THERE.
In fact, this blog post was inspired by the trailer for what is now thought to be another upcoming sequel. Last week, at the Spike VGAs, an extraordinarily intense trailer for a game called The Phantom Pain was shown. At first glance, the trailer tells the tale of a disabled veteran who wakens from a coma to find that the military is butchering everyone in the hospital. Not a pretty picture. Seriously, the trailer seems like it could cause some intense post-traumatic stress. It’s punctuated by stark text and strange sci-fi elements, which only add to the unsettling nature of the trailer. Shit’s bleak. Bleak as all hell. But it turns out that the whole game might be a red herring for an unexpected sequel: Metal Gear Solid 5. If that is the case, then hot DAMN is MGS going in an austere direction. Admittedly, I’ve only played the first two, so maybe I’m missing something, but the militaristic tone of the series didn’t seem that upsetting before. Woof.
Finally, we have 2013′s new IPs, most of which either have dark content or grim themes. Star Wars 1313, for example, leaves the simple good vs. evil tale of Jedi/Sith and/or Rebellion/Empire for the seedy underbelly of Coruscant, where the bounty hunters and smugglers and assorted criminals do their dirty work. The developers claim the game will showcase a more mature side of the classic franchise, a side that will undoubtedly contain sinister motives and objectives. Remember Me, an upcoming Capcom adventure game, is set in a dreadful future, where memories can be rewritten for dire purposes and social media has become the method by which humanity is manipulated. Ubisoft’s highly-anticipated Watch Dogs shows the power of the technology of the “near-future,” technology which is used to perpetrate espionage, create chaos, and orchestrate complex assassinations. And, to top it all off, there’s what may be the most foreboding game of the lot: The Last of Us. The Last of Us is a post-apocalpytic narrative, where an older man and a young woman travel through the ruins of civilization, trying desperately to survive. Early footage of the game shows the brutality of a potential future, where bullets must be saved for the gravest of emergencies and other humans are the greatest dangers to your food, shelter, and life. Naughty Dog’s third-person adventure/horror looks to be a heavy-hitter, pulling no punches when you must choose how best to survive. Many new and different franchises will make their debut in 2013, but the overarching theme is a morbid fascination with darkness.
So, sure, there will be light, happy, and joyful games in 2013, but they will be the exceptions rather than the norms. Your year can only get so bleak when a studio Ghibli game is published, and I’m sure some Lego or Nintendo game will be chock full of optimism and family fun. But I can’t shake the feeling that we are in for a disturbing year of games. Which isn’t to say the year will be a bad one. Quite the contrary: I think these dark and twisted themes will yield some particularly fun and interesting games. Either way, prepare yourselves: your video game experience is about to get real weird.
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