It's catchy, I like it. 

Anyways...

So, if you haven't heard the news lately, former 1UP.com dude James Mielke quit his former job and fufilled a lifelong dream of going to Japan and getting into game development. Specifically, he got a job at Q Entertainment. This guy here will fill you in on most of the details. And here's the confirmation itself. Warning: it's a wall of text (actually, more like one half of a wall of text) complaining about how expensive it is to move to Tokyo, how hard it is to open up a bank account there, how painful the bureaucracy is (if he's complaining about dealing with it, he should try working for it, like I am), blah blah blah, but the confirmation comes at the end. Or the beginning. The tags kinda give it away. 

Anyways... take a look at the comments on the latter link. One of the comments, from a user who has very good taste in television shows, said that one of the podcasts let word slip that James is working on a sequel/spiritual sequel to Rez. And that got me thinking. After about a week or so, I came to a conclusion that could be best summed up with a question.

Is this really necessary?

I guess my thought processs here is that the original Rez (and the Xbox Live Arcade version, too) was one of those once-in-a-lifetime things that you experience, like finding your dad's porn stash or buying your first car. The visuals grab you in the nuts and don't let go until you've fully experienced its blend of LSD-induced graphics, funky beats and classic Space Harrier-style gameplay, all wrapped up in controller-vibrating awesomeness. That sort of experience is pretty tough to duplicate. 

This isn't like a sports game, where you can get away with annual updates as long as you update the rosters and throw in a new feature or two, or like a racing game, where some refinement of the physics and new cars and tracks is enough to keep me happy. It's, shall we say, like doing a sequel for the sake of doing a sequel. 

I think a good example of this is Street Fighter IV. Sure, it plays exceptionally well, but when you get down to it, it's just Street Fighter II with a new coat of paint. That begs the question: was Street Fighter IV really necessary if it doesn't try anything groundbreaking for the fighting game genre? That's kinda what I'm worried about with Rez 2: Electric Boogaloo, that it won't be as revolutionary as the original and will just ride on the original's notoriety. I've also heard that this potential sequel/spiritual sequel will use the Xbox 360's Natal camera. I wonder how that will work. Will you tap on the enemies to lock-on? How will you activate the smart bombs? Will a new control scheme be enough, or will it end up being a gimmick?

This has been kinda bugging me for the past week, since it was announced. I know that James has been worried about the state of the Japanese video game industry, according to some of his previous blog posts. I think that sequelitis is probably one of the big problems over there as much as it is over here. It's just that instead of bald space marines, it's crossdressing effeminate fantasy wizards or some crap like that. It's not a phonemenon that's foreign to Japan- hell, isn't Koei on Dynasty Warriors 59? 

Am I saying that 2 Rez 2 Furious is going to be terrible? Hell no. I haven't gotten any official confirmation on it yet, so I'm keeping an open mind for the time being. It could turn out to be even better than the original. I just hope that this doesn't become the start of a trend of taking great ideas and running them into the ground like it's General Motors, video game style. 

I just hope this piece of rambling makes a little sense. Thoughts?

Oh, almost forgot... outro music. 

Have a nice weekend, guys!

(Also, thanks to Giant Bomb's Rez HD page for the images. The wiki is the greatest thing about this site, next to the community.)