Predict receptions of long gestating games.

With The Witness finally arriving at the end of the month, I started thinking about how it might be received. Then I started thinking about all the other long-in-development games that's finally or probably going to come out sometime in the relative near future. So I thought it might be fun to guess how these games will turn out.

• The Witness -Near universal critical acclaim. People are going to be talking about this game on the forums for a good while. Sales? Really hard to say for me. Puzzle game is a puzzle game and digital only is still hard to tell if something's sold well or not. Probably turn a profit but commercially not as lucrative as Braid.
• Persona 5 -Critically in the 4/5 or middle to high 8's. Good game but points off for being rather safe with it's formula and disappointing story. Fans will dig it nonetheless. Sells very well with PS3 version outselling PS4 version.
• Final Fantasy XV - Reviews very well. Sells very good, people still care about mainline FF.
• The Last Guardian - Reviews good, not amazing. Doesn't sell very well but still highest selling Team Ico game.
• No Man's Sky - Game is ok. Reviews and sells tepid. Overall disappointment.
• The Legend of Zelda - Near universal acclaim. Sells very well. NX port is no brainer. People well still complain the formula needs more shake up.
• Doom - Reviews ok, sales poor. Quickly forgotten.

Let me know what you guys predict and of course include games I didn't mention.

Doom: it will sell above-average but not amazing, and the reviews will me mediocre at best.

No Man's Sky - Sells well and is received positively, but dies out very quickly.

Kingdom Hearts 3 - Doesn't release in 2016. Sells mediocre at best, received positively by fans, mediocre reviews.

The Division - Sells well and reviews well, everyone has a good time with it for a hot minute, and then it's just... there.

I think No Man's Sky will disappoint given what I see people think of it. Just do not see what they are so hyped about at all.

I think Persona 5 is going to deliver more than you say. Faith in the developers and that the time they spent will be worthwhile.

As far as the the rest, I really have no idea. I hope FF 15 is great given how much I've liked what they've showed. Zelda could use tweaking and hopefully they do that because right now I have no expectations given how lackluster I have found the last couple Zelda games. I have no expectations for Doom or Last Guardian who has been so long coming that I just don't care about it as much as I loved other games by the developers.

Banner Saga 2: Greatest game of all time

Not to derail this thread immediately but what makes you think this will be the case? I mean it's certainly how Jonathan Blow talks about it but based on what we've seen as a game I don't see it. It looks like a very pretty game in which you interpret the solution to maze puzzles by observing the environment. That said I am one of the few people who thought Braid was merely good and not nearly as profound as it's thought to be.

@hayt: It's just a prediction really but Jonathon Blow seems like a really smart dude with a great passion and plenty of creative juice. The fact that we know so little about this game and how massive the game is suppose to be tells me they're will be a lot of surprises and a lot to discover. The fact that it's just coming out fairly quietly tells me that he's really confident in the game and wants it to speak for itself. But really, it's just a guess.

I'm going to guess aggregate scores:

• The Witness - 85% (Talos is sitting on about 88, I love Braid, but I have a hard time imagining The Witness topping Talos).
• Persona 5 -85%
• Final Fantasy XV - 81%
• The Last Guardian - 71%
• No Man's Sky - 68% (I think most reviewers will see this for what it really is: quantity over quality).
• The Legend of Zelda - 90% (Not necessarily because it's good, but because reviewers are scared to give a score below 9/10 :P)
• Doom - 80%

So, the Skyward Sword Effect then ?

I'll reserve judgement until the games are actually playable. Except No Man's Sky. I do know a little something about procedural generation, and I don't think it can possibly be as amazing as some people seem to think it will be. At least not the people who are like "I could spend the rest of my life exploring this game and never see it all!" While that might technically be true, the planets are going to start looking pretty samey pretty quickly.

I have high, very tentative hopes for some of these games, mostly Final Fantasy XV and The Last Guardian. The former has the stigma of having to follow up an incredibly disappointing trilogy of entries in a series that is typically near and dear to me. The latter has the stigma of following up one of my favorite games of all time and having been in development hell for nearly a decade now. I want them to be good so badly. Their console exclusivity is just about the only thing that's going to get me to shell out on a PS4 this gen too.

Below:

That's probably a safe bet, maybe a little higher like 75%.

• Firewatch: 85~87, maybe going as high as 92. Looks, gameplay, and story all get glowing praise.

• Below: 74~76. People will like the minimalist aesthetic and the "punishing difficulty", but it will probably come away a little 'shallow' with little reason to return once you've beaten it (a dozen times).

• Cuphead: No idea. Everything I've heard indicates that it's essentially a "boss rush game" that is "brutally difficult" yet beautiful (and it is)

• Quantum Break: 83. Depending on how they handle the storytelling it could be lower, but I think it'll settle around there. Remedy has a good track record and Alan Wake was liked.

• Homefront: Again, no idea. Haven't seen a thing for that game. I don't think it'll set the charts on fire, so probably a fairly low to average score, mid to high 60's?

I'm probably forgetting a few and playing it safe with some of the guesses.

No Mans Sky: Universally praised and loved for a few weeks until the community gets split up into a massive chunk of players who get bored by the game and a few who insanely obsess over it mechanically.

The Witness: Decent, perhaps great, but people will compare it to Braid and be disappointed in terms of "gameplay gimmicks" and a story that this time will not have an easy explanation that is stated to be wrong by Blow but a super vague and obscure narrative that most players will barely even notice.

Doom: People will like it for being an Old-School-ish fast paced actiony shooter that rarely happens these day, and many will not care because it is an Old-School-ish fast paced actiony shooter that doesn't do particulary interesting things outside of that.

Firewatch: Critics will love it, the general crowd....no funking idea.

Persona 5: Probably very good, but not nearly as loved as Persona 4. Duh.

Far Cry Primal: Generally liked until the realization sets in that even with the huge tonal shift it's still very much a Far Cry Game.

Last Guardian: If it happens, inevitably both the best selling game of Team ICO and the greatest disappointment because it couldn't possibly match the expectations of such a long development cycle.

Dishonored 2 and Mass Effect will probably be delayed.

so much no man's sky hate.

Firewatch: ????

Persona 5: will suck/disappoint (ha ha!)

(these sort of things really bring out the cynic in people eh?)

All of them will get a greneral black-lash of some sort, and then the people that really like them will continue to play them for a while and/or declare them their GOTY.

The elephant in the room is Tom Clancy's The Division.

I think that will turn out to be a game I want to love, but I cannot stand. I think critics will be all over the place with The Division, some will give it 9s and some will give it 6s. I think gamers will be even more didvided. People who love to grief or get griefed will love it (ha ha ha, your 45 min of play was just ruined...wasn't that funny?); normal games who just want to play their game and get their Xp will be pissed (why am I playing a game where other people intruding into my experience can ruin it so completely and waste my time?)

If you thought people hated Destiny....lordy

@monkeyking1969: I imagine it will be even more polarizing than Destiny. Despite many of it's narrative and progression short comings the shooting part of Destiny was really good. From what I've seen of The Division it seems like my feelings toward the core gameplay could go either way.

People will moan about Half Life 3

I think No Man's Sky will sell well

WILD : Will sell and review poorly.

The Witness: Will get critically acclaimed and will be a lot of fun to play. The internet will bitch about a downloadable game costing $40 even thought there is supposedly 60-80 hours of content.

FFXV: Famitsu will declare it the best game ever made. It will sell like gangbusters in Japan. Reception in the West will be considerably more lukewarm. People who have grown up with Final Fantasy will hate it. New fans will probably love it. Squeenix will wring their hands and cry about how hard it is to "decide what Final Fantasy is supposed to be."

Doom: Lots of hype, sorta bad reception. It'll look real nice but I get the feeling the gameplay will feel considerably out of date.

No Man's Sky: It'll sell a ton of copies and get a lot of attention at launch. I think it'll be a decent game, but the level of pre-release hype will ultimately cause the Internet Consensus to view it as disappointing. Basically the new Spore.

Very true. I just seem to see games from a 180 degree view than most developers sometimes. I'm far more in favor of AI and scripted action make up the bulk of interactions in games instead of other live players. Other players are very unreliable for doing taks that make the games flow, unless there are very clear way to reward flow and disincentive screwing around.

That how I see The Division going, there will be too many armed groups on the map and too little dis-incentive to just fuck with people. It is fine to have scare resouces that another group might take, but I can GUARANTEE most players will settle for just making sure nobody gets anything. Illogical thuggery to make people who want to play the game annoyed could be rewards enough for so many players, so they will settle for that.

You would think it would be Game Design 101 to subtly make the rules of game stress rewarding cooperation and make griefing boring/ineffective, but you see a total lack of awareness in so many games that I think such ideas go over many developers heads.

I'd add Cyberpunk 2077. We are rapidly approaching 4 years since the original announcement (with presumably SOME time spent working on it before that to get the original creator on board and selling it) with no idea when it will be out. Given the source material and the quality of their past work, I think it will be gloriously praised by a segment of the population and have sharp edges that others will dislike. As an example, people have already complained about the fact there will be unsubtitled dialogue in foreign languages that will require cyberwear to translate, but if you, the player, know the language you can just respond (of course this being the internet the "right" selections will likely come out regardless). Design decisions like that can be super awesome to some and annoying to others.

Wasn't there supposed to be a (relativitely) fast-tracked sequel to Duke Nukem Forever? 9.5/10 that one.

• The Witness - I'll just not say anything because I am not up on what it is....
• Persona 5 - The fan base of the game is there, and it is growing a fan base around here at GB...Jeff influence?
• Final Fantasy XV - I think that game will have a lot of mixed reviews even from the big outlet, respected critics. The gamer reviews will be all over the place too.
• The Last Guardian - I think it will be 'just okay', not bad at all...just a bit boring without the 'snap' of Ico or Shadow
• No Man's Sky - Oh, I think many well respected critics will love it. It just not a game for everyone, but I think its one of those rare games that just clicks perfectly with some players.
• The Legend of Zelda - I think the issues of 'where are these games innovating' and 'this is so by the book' will crop up again. It will get very good scores, even great scores, but iof you read the reviews the scores won't match the nagging misgivings that Zelda is stagnant. (Which is again going to be a case of some people who love that saying, "This is great, you people are crazy not to see how great this is!"
• Doom - Universally, panned. I think this game will get a lot of 6s. A six isn't bad, but for a Doom game...someone at the developer will flip-out on Twitter.

@ripelivejam: If I had to guess how No Man's Sky is going to do based on my experience with Elite Dangerous, then yeah, I think @frybird hit on on the head. A split in the community between those who see the procedural generation as "shallow" and "everything's the same" and those fans who find it "infinite" and "limitless". I think the difference will be in how complete an experience NMS delivers on launch day versus E:D essentially taking the entire fan base along for the protracted development ride (Frontier Developments have a 10 year plan).

Regarding FFXV, it's hard to know, but based on Episode Duscae I think that it's going to get either lukewarm 60-75 western reviews if people think the combat is superficial and the open world is huge and empty. OR it's going to get all right ~80 reviews from critics who appreciate the Action RPG combat and open world and have little attachment to the Final Fantasy brand or legacy. It all depends on how they execute the finished game. Final Fantasy Type-0 didn't review well, after all. If XV is just a next-gen version of that... Anyway, I'm still betting Squeenix miss the holiday 2016 window.

I'm feeling the same as others about Zelda, it'll review and sell well enough regardless of how good it is.

As for Doom, I have a feeling it'll be like Rage; much hyped, but quickly forgotten.

The Last Guardian feels like it's destined to be an internet cult hit. Not a mass market success, but they'll likely do well enough to make their next game.

XCOM2 - Critics: who cares; community: who cares

I will play this game to death and beyond. One of the best games ever.

@zevvion said:

No, seriously. It looks so fucking outstanding. I've actually planned around how disruptive this game is going to be.