What makes a good “remake” is when the game is true to the original and only adds to the experience. This would require that the narrative, core gameplay design and even pacing remain intact. The best example I can think of is Resident Evil on the Nintendo Gamecube. While the graphical fidelity was the main draw for a lot of players, the game felt very familiar, even to a fault. Retained was the nerve inducing camera angles, the tank controls and the difficult weapon play. What we gained was a new level of visual depth by using darkness and lighting. At its heart, Resident Evil encourages the player to think a few steps ahead, not be wasteful and reserve their equipment for larger challenges. The remake further reinforces this with the introduction of Crimson Head zombies. Without the use of hard to find, finite materials to set them on fire, a downed zombie will return to “life” with greater speed, strength, and the ability to break through doors and your sense of safety. You are punished and dissuaded to engage with the low level monsters that further enhance the intended experience. But they also added the saving grace of defensive weapons to recover from errors, thus balancing out the experience.
What the fidelity does bring is a much more immersive and thoughtful experience, particularly when it comes to sound. Every footstep tells you the age of the building. The thunder outsides gives a reminder that your predicament indoors isn’t much improved outdoors. Walking through shadows in the hallways with long camera shot gives a sense of dread, sometimes having the player mistake themselves for the monsters. While the series took a different design approach here after with Resident Evil 4, the experience was unmatched on the system. A remake should follow this blueprint, improvements on fidelity and additional systems that empower the original design philosophy.
A fitting remaster worth looking into is Final Fantasy VIII. What was once only relegated to the Playstation and PC has been touched up and given quality of life features for the modern age that don’t get in the way of its narrative. When square was attempting another leap in fidelity from Final Fantasy VII’s polygonal character design to VIII’s mix of pixel and polygon, some of the work got in its own way. What we readily accepted as a product of its own time then, would not fly by today’s standards. So what the Remaster provides is a much smoother, cleaner look. There are some technical limitations that have to do with framerates, but for a turn based RPG it hardly makes a difference.
Square provides the ever sought after “Quality of Life” improvements that are fitting for a modern audience and cut down on a bit of the grind that games 20 years ago were known and sometimes praised for. You now have the option to play the game at 3x regular speed that can help you push ahead in levels and magic mining much quicker than before. The random enemy encounters can now be toggled on or off, which may feel a bit redundant if you can blow past them quickly. I will say though, the leveling and character customization system doesn’t follow the conventional rules, so in a way not having these encounters could prove more useful for different play styles. In other words, having a team of characters at level 99 isn’t always beneficial. Another great aspect of this remaster is it’s wide release. You can find it on all modern consoles and PC, so there’s plenty of options and the pricing was just right.
Final Fantasy VII Remake is another story (literally). When the announcement came a decade or so ago showing off the power of the Ps3 and a graphical fidelity that seemed to rival Advent Children, I was sold. Unfortunately, what we got much later felt like a bill of goods. Essentially, a rewrite of the story (or alternate universe, same difference) that undercuts the pacing of the original, stretches out the first act to a dubious degree and builds upon character relationships in very shallow ways. What was the first 7 hours of gameplay in the original is not a padded out 30 hr game where the main character’s lack of … character is on full display. What most unfortunate is that the combat is sealed behind these walls of content that hardly add to the story. I could go on.
Sticking to the scope of remakes, this game commits the cardinal sin, it changes the narrative. I won’t go too heavy into spoilers, but essentially the game is not a remake in the colloquial sense, but the game, narrative and all, remade. What was considered as a seminal work in the field has now abandoned its pacing and depth for flash and scale. The greatest shame is how fun the combat really is!
To end on a much more cheerful note, let’s look at the curious case of Link’s Awakening for the Nintendo Switch. This might be the most faithful reproduction of a gameboy game to date. The combat, puzzles, dungeons and even scale are all accurately portrayed but in the cutest way possible. The graphical fidelity has somehow found a middle ground between the shortened and exaggerated sprite work with a smooth 3D toy box look. It’s a sign that Nintendo hasn’t yet lost its charm and reverie for its past achievements. So is this really a remake? Yes, as in they remade the game from the ground up? Is it a remaster? Well … yes because the games are identical and the only meaningful changes were made graphically and in regards to sound.
My hope would be that this is less of an uncommon event in the game space. While increased resolutions are nice, a faithful to gameplay and unique approach to improvements on the art styles of games limited by their hardware is what I think we should all hope for.
Are there any games I missed that are better examples? Let me know below!
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