In Defense of Scalebound


Scalebound is not getting the reception it deserves, but it's mostly Platinum Games and Microsoft's own fault.

The game is obviously not just another action-game from PG, but that is what people want, and expect. Because we have this dissonance between expectation and reality, there is mass confusion, denial, and ultimately pessimism and negativity.

We don't even know what kind of game this is. If it's not another action-game, what is it? We don't know. PG and MS have not communicated this to us; this is their fault. They expected us to look at a trailer, then some gameplay that reminded us of a MMORPG (2015), then a co-op boss-battle (2016), and piece it all together; we still don't get it. PG and MS need to communicate what kind of game this is, whether it's a hybrid of multiple genres, what the game-flow is like, what kind of games it's similar to, etc.

It doesn't make sense to be down on Scalebound yet. You haven't even played it yet. Even if you have played the demo at E3 or whatever, you are not getting the full experience, and I think this game will be a fuller experience than any of PG's games in the past. I expect towns and shops to buy stuff, but this is all conjecture. We don't know anything.

It's great to keep things secret, but in the case of Scalebound, Platinum Games and Microsoft Studios need to communicate to us what the fundamental structure of the game is first, because this game seems very hybridized and experimental; Kamiya needs to tell us how to perceive the game, and how it will play out - the game-flow.

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