I’ve come to terms with the fact that video games are swarming with unnecessary remakes. I can enjoy them in the moment, but when studios are being bought up or shut down everywhere, I wish devs were more free to create their own history rather than recreate someone else’s. I’m used to it, I can accept it, and they’re interesting curiosity to experience. ButAssassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag is taking it too far.
I’ve heard the excuses for why remakes are so important to the ecosystem. I’m not sure I believe it. We’re told they’re a way to test the waters ahead of classic series being brought back - but six years afterCrash Bandicoot’sreturn was a smash hit, the studio got shoved into the Call of Duty content mill while he’s‘starring’ in a lightweight MOBA that ignores all of his qualities and turns him into a money-making mascot.
Related:Accents Are The Best Thing Final Fantasy 16 Took From Game Of Thrones
Either that, or remakes are supposed to modernise greats to ensure audiences don’t forget them. But didThe Last of Usneed this treatment only nine years after launch, or was italways a vanity project? Couldn’tgaming history be more secured by playingone of the many, many, manyResident Evil 4versions on modern consoles rather than rebuilding it? And more broadly, shouldn’t more games from the past be readily available as they were? For the record, I think RE4 makes strong changes for the player experience, but are we really preserving history when the result is to forget about the originals entirely?
This comes to a head with Black Flag. It’s my personal favourite of theAssassin’s Creedseries, so I’m not against the game in principle. But I don’t believe it’s a legendary great to be preserved, and it’s already readily accessible on modern consoles anyway. There’s also no need to test the waters for Assassin’s Creed with a pirate ship throwback - this was a divisive entry in the series and AC is still going strong, with Mirage out in October and several projects slated for years to come.
On Friday, it emerged that Ubisoft might be planning a remake of Black Flag, dressing the game up with new software a la The Last of Us Part 1. If any of this is true, it clashes heavily with the plan forSkull & Bones. Ubisoft isn’t showing a lot of faith in Skull & Bones as it is with numerous delays, development reportedly restarting, and little in the way of marketing despite a closed beta launching next month. A Black Flag remake smells like planning for its long-gestating pirate game to fail. Leaving aside how you feel about remakes, this feels like a quick palette cleanser for a game it expects to leave a bad taste.
Ubisoft Singapore, the team behind Skull & Bones, is allegedly involved in the remake due to its ocean rendering technology, but to take the one good thing from Skull & Bones and use it for a quick paint job rather than anything fresh or interesting is very disappointing.
This is not to say Assassin’s Creed can never do the pirate thing again. Skull & Bones doesn’t have exclusivity on the genre, especially as it started as a Black Flag spin-off and has been beaten to the punch bySea of Thievesanyway. But if this leak is true, it’s bad timing ahead of Skull & Bones’ inability to stick to a launch date, and shows a startling lack of creativity.
A little while ago,there was (very disingenuous) talk of a Black Flag sequel, which turned out to be a web comic. But doing one for real is what the game deserves - I don’t think any of us have even moderate hopes for Skull & Bones at this stage, so if we want Ubisoft to take us to the waves again, Black Flag 2 is our best bet.
I’d love to return to the world of Black Flag, and it’s this feeling that stops me from writing off Skull & Bones completely. But a remake doesn’t hold much appeal when it’s the same game as befits but the ocean is more oceany. Unfortunately, we live in a world of remakes, and it feels like modern gaming ideas are a sinking ship.
