News - Review 2017

When Justice League (DC) released the media tried to speak ill of it. Little did they know, the worse was yet to come!

Hello everyone and welcome to my year review of 2017,

Being this a movie/game blog I've focus on these themes and not the all evolving, ever changing, personal, political, economical, cultural environment we all live in. Having cleared that up, if I had to muster the entire year of games and films in one word it would be... disappointment!

Let's begin.

Games

The year started pretty well. We had a great franchise summit to an all time peak in Destiny (Bungie) captivating fans and gamers alike into a fun full filled experiment! The community was happy, the gamers where happy and - so we though - Bungie and Activision were also happy.

Destiny - Age of Triumph is still considered  by many the epitome of online game experience

Enter Destiny 2 and the problems begin! The game was pretty much the same as ever, no real new classes or enemies, same raids and strikes, only big difference as the now 4x4 PvP fireteams, when in D1 it was up to six. But we were in for a much bigger problem! The whole reward/progression system, not to mention player costumization, was complete and utter trash. That and half of the new content closed behind micro-transactions led to most of the almost 5 million player to leave Destiny 2 and make their voice heard throwout the community and social media that the game had let them down.

And speaking of micro transactions...

Battlefront 2 (Electroni Arts) hit a wall of backlash after announcing that the game was going to have a pay-to-win micro-transactions mechanic. Meaning that the player no longer had to resort to it's own skills but to his wallet to further his chances of winning in the game. The same game that had the Star Wars seal right on the title. Making this a blunder not only for the game but also the franchise (and worse was yet to come with the film).

EA learned the hard way that gamers are not cashing machines!

These late year examples send a clear message not to trust the game developers, since it was clear, they cared more about money then they do about their games or the gaming community.

But...

With downfall of the online games some single player made a big leap. The greatest examples being Horizon Zero Dawn (Guerrilla Games) and NieR: Automata (Platinum Games). Both games got excellent reviews and were well received by the gaming community, opening thus a new spot for storytelling driven games once again.

Bungie failed the story, the system, the game but mostly they failed their own community. Will fans forgive them in 2018?

That and the fact that underdogs like Tom Clancy's The Division (Ubisoft) and Warframe (Digital Extremes) made huge commitments on their online games, shined some light onto the possible future relation between games and gamers.

Movies

Although the movie industry in 2017 didn't fail some sure wins (and one surprise) the truth was, for the most part, the movies were ok and did what was expected. Only standout  exception  was Thor: Ragnarok  (Marvel) that took and existing recipe and spiced it up with a good dose of sense of humor.

The only movie that surprised audiences, fans and still made  you laugh for it!

For the most part, films didn't thrilled us or makes us wonder about future endeavors.

To make it worse, one of the most awaited (now hated) movies of the year was a kick-in-the-balls to the fans. I'm talking about Star Wars - The Last Jedi (Walt Disney Pictures). This blunder of a movie made audiences do mad that even the fan community raged against it. And, for a end of the year review I think the disappointment was general.

In conclusion

The year was not a total blunder. Until summer, things were looking on the up and up, but once the new games released mid-September and the industries were trying to push their Holiday products, it all went belly up really fast!

This year was annus horribilis (latin meaning terrible year) for the Star Wars franchise. 

Destiny died, Star Ward died, DC continued and Marvel prevailed. Here's hoping they've all learned something for the new year!