Today's obsession with Remakes & prequels. Is it killing imagination?

[RetroZelda88]

I've tapped my sixth sense about today's pop culture especially the modern video game culture who likes remakes of old games, rehashed storylines, storylines in games that use prequels. The Star Wars Episode series does take place before the original Star Wars, but why not make a Star Wars movie, game that takes place after the First Star Wars in the late 70's. Correct me if I'm wrong about the dates, I'm not a Star Wars fan, but my point is that the movie & game industry lacks imagination in their content. It's either they prequel the storyline or rehash the same content from decades ago.

Please expand this and debate with me about this. I'm seeing this trend in video game & movie industries that developers, directors, and other involved like to redo the storyline or expand the character by bringing the audience to the character's early years. Is Remakes & Prequels killing imagination in game players & movie watchers.

[RetroZelda88]

I hate it when video game companies or movie director's prequel a series and somehow rewrite the history of the game or movie content. I'm not going to name any franchises or series, but it is evidence that the writer somehow wants to "patch up" the original story because it somehow made a "mistake" or the writer didn't intend it to be there in the first place. You know what I mean? Probably's its just me. Content creators somehow are prefectionists, they want to REWRITE the internal history of the content whether it is in modern video games (I could careless, it affects all modern gaming consoles & computer games). Somehow the story (content) is missing something or I think what's missing is CASH. Is the purpose of game prequels and movie prequels Goal is to Make cash? Maybe I'm wrong, Maybe the over-use of prequels in today's money saturated society is the answer to consumer's perception about imagination. "Let's just develop the character more by entering his/her childhood and how he/she develops relationship with the villian etc." - says the game writer or developer. With me. I'm done with prequels, I want innovation, new gameplay, and creative edge on my games thats my sequel to this rant.

[B_Rik_Schitthaus]

Its about risk taking. Its less risky to make a a game or film with an already established and popular brand. Even the smaller film and game companies who are the most likly to create new ideas cant afford to take risks they will go with whats popular. If they were to create a work of absolute genius and it dosn't sell well their history so they'll just milk the cash cows. So i dont think its a lack of imigaination i think its the threat of poor sales. which makes you think that its the majority of consumers who dont want innovation.


Somehow the story (content) is missing something or I think what's missing is CASH. Is the purpose of game prequels and movie prequels Goal is to Make cash? now here's an interesting point. I think its a good idea to use the star wars analagy. The original star wars film in 1977 i have no doubt that George Lucas created that film to tell a story. One of the reasons was that at that time there was no guarantee of it making any money. But with the new series of films does he still want to tell a story or does he want to set up his pension fund? and to be honest i dont know the answer.

Now if we relate that quote to games i'll take metal gear. I honestly beileve that hideo kojima wants to tell a story. The way he tells it is occasionally cheesy and clumsy but i think he has a geniune passion for story telling and he just happens to make money out of it. He struggled early on with some of his games they weren't exactly blockbusters (snatcher, policenauts)

[AtariDude]

As Shane has mentioned several times, it is all about the Benjamin's. Companies are very adverse to risk so they will stick to producing what is popular or what they feel will sell. As a result, there is a great deal of rehashing of the same themes in just about all popular forms of entertainment.

[RetroZelda88]

Since today's generation likes everything rehashed and leftovered from the 60s 70s 80s 90s they use content and culture from those decades and take our past away. Generation Gimmie is the "LEFTOVER" generation. All they think is money, money, money since their imagination and creativity are stale. Sorry, but thats how I feel about today's kids. They think Pacman World or Pacman Fever for gamecube is the original Pac Man. They don't have any sense of the past and let alone respect it.

[TripHamer]

If done right, I see no problem with remakes, prequels, sequels ect. But like I said, they need to be done right and stop doing them if you can't.

Just my $.02 worth.

[B_Rik_Schitthaus]

If done right, I see no problem with remakes, prequels, sequels ect. But like I said, they need to be done right and stop doing them if you can't.

Just my $.02 worth.

yep i agree with that, ie terminator 2 good terminator 3 bad

[AtariDude]

Terminator 2 was a great movie; Terminator 3 was just silly. They never explained how Skynet just suddenly developed. All the items that made Skynet possible was destroyed at the end of T2 so T3 makes no sense.

[TripHamer]

Terminator 2 was a great movie; Terminator 3 was just silly. They never explained how Skynet just suddenly developed. All the items that made Skynet possible was destroyed at the end of T2 so T3 makes no sense.

Skynet was a computer program launched on the internet (in T3). Never a piece of hardware. Don't know how it surived by destroying all the computers it was running on. Unless there was some sort of a paradox when they change the future in T2.

[Shane R. Monroe]

I wasn't THRILLED with T3 ... But it was a servicable, DISPOSABLE (like most other films and media these days) entertainment that was probably as good as it COULD be without the support of a lot of the staff and cast from the others.

[RetroZelda88]

I agree. Even television is bring back some old tv shows from the 80s.

for example: "A Current Affair" on FOX is returning to TV.
I remember watching that when I was 8.

I just think today's culture is like stuff from the 80s or maybe it all hype for them. But for me, I was an 80s child and my perspective of the culture then is different from those who "relive" the hype. Might as well bring back Dynasty and Growing Pains on TV again.

[YoshiM]

Since today's generation likes everything rehashed and leftovered from the 60s 70s 80s 90s they use content and culture from those decades and take our past away. Generation Gimmie is the "LEFTOVER" generation. All they think is money, money, money since their imagination and creativity are stale. Sorry, but thats how I feel about today's kids. They think Pacman World or Pacman Fever for gamecube is the original Pac Man. They don't have any sense of the past and let alone respect it.

You have to realize that pretty much everything, in some way shape or form, is cyclical. In the 80's there was a 50's fad in some of the clothing (James Dean for example) but more noticably in music: Stray Cats were definitely dialing in the 50's/early 60's rock. Remakes of songs like "Don't Be Cruel" by Cheap Trick comes to mind as well. While the 80's did have its own definite flavor, we still saw some past trends come back. Today the 80's are coming back in some forms: musical influence (The Killers, The Darkness, No Doubt's recent sound for example) and clothes are the most noticeable.

You also have to remember kids (we're probably talking the pre-teen to teenager) probably doesn't give a rip about history, where the things they take for granted came from, etc. I'm sure there are things when we were kids we didn't know about that caused grown ups to slap their heads and go "WHY?! YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS!" I had that episode a few years back when I heard that a friend's daughter in kindergarten didn't know what an iron (as in for getting wrinkles out of your clothes) was. At first I was like "WHAT?!" but then I realised that she didn't grow up with one. Dryers for a long time in combination with dryer sheets and clothing technology have pretty much eliminated the need for irons. Made sense to me then why she didn't know what it was.

I know when I was a kid I didn't care about the history of stuff: I cared about the now. I didn't know who created Pong. I had no idea who Miyamoto was when I started playing The Legend of Zelda. I didn't know the Phil Collins' "Groovy Kind of Love" is actually a remake of an older song. It wasn't until later, when I was in my late teens/early adult, when I really started to look at recent history. The only history I knew was what was taught in school and personal history. I'm thinking it's the same phenomenon with kids today. They just weren't exposed to the "old school" along with not really caring (which is expected: they're kids).

I do agree that the recent resurgence is a big money-making ploy and we the late 20 and 30somethings are the target. But that's another topic.

[Shane R. Monroe]

Once again - I blame parents. My parents exposed me to the past. I learned of the origins of many things. I listened to Elvis - I knew full well that Don't Be Cruel was a remake.

My kid knows what 8-Track tapes are. My kid knows that The Incredible Hulk didn't start with that HORRIBLE Ang Lee movie. Yes, we even own an iron. :)

You simply cannot discard the wanton behavior by children by saying "Its ok - they are kids." I've been blaming everyone equally for years; the children AND parents of Generation Gimmie - right along with the mind-altering corporations shoveling crap to TV and radio.

I believe that parenting is the gap that we're seeing the problems with. Each generation has grown more and more lapsed with parenting; and that is what is causing an almost EXPONENTIAL explosion of IGNORANCE in our species. No lore, no nostalgia, no learning from the past - no experience. Soon, the kids will pop out of the womb, and we'll send them packing. Why bother raising them? We have MTV and Eminem to raise our children. We have Wal-mart selling thongs for five year olds. Why on EARTH do we need to parent? The Moral Majority is ensuring we don't need to parent; we have the government to regulate everything - good deal - no need to parent and carry ANY sort of responsibility.

[RetroZelda88]

Here's my problem with prequels, whether in video games, music, movies, books, etc. Why do entertainment industries modernize the look the the story of a franichise that takes place in the past. Ok if a developer did a prequel to Pacman, I think the graphics should stay the same to the older pacman or rudimentary to 2600 graphics to fit the storyline. Maybe I'm completely wrong, but for example, the Star Trek Series: Enterprise. That just vomited out of my mouth. Sorry.

For example. Why did the producers of that show use props that look like today's technology even though the story takes place before Captain Kirk's Time. Not to Segway to Star Trek, but thats the example. Enterprise on UPN looks like Voyager series, not the Original Series.

You know what I mean. Should Prequels look retro in style when done properly to fit a storyline that takes place before its original conception?

[Shane R. Monroe]

You mean ... why Star Wars Eps 1-3 all have TONS better technology than Eps 4-6?

[kinglumby]

I can see both sides of the argument but to be honest some things should be left alone for example:

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory - sure they've changed the name back to the original Roald Dahl title and yes Jonny Depp will be a good WW but c'mon the film is a classic and I believe should never be remade......BUT.....the kids of today don't seem to enjoy the original so maybe for them having a new edition is better than nothing at all??

And tell me why in the hell would you remake the Pink Panther Movies with no Peter Sellers? That is just insane!

[B_Rik_Schitthaus]

And tell me why in the hell would you remake the Pink Panther Movies with no Peter Sellers? That is just insane!

Yep, As much as i like steve martin (planes trains and automobiles is one of my favourite films) its going to be a shadow of the originals.

And i've just thought of a remake thats p*ssed me off the italian job, the new film was an insult. What made the original so good was its quintiesential englishness (it had noel coward in it for F*#k sake). And to link the new american version to the old english based version they got the guy out of lock stock and snatch well done :mad:

[AtariDude]

I am not looking forward to the new Willy Wonka movie. From the clips that I have seen, it looks to be a much more darker and perhaps sinister movie. I liked the original and I don't think you can really improve upon it without making too many changes.

And yes, the Enterprise series was just an attempt to make a quick buck and ultimately the series got cancelled. Too bad because I like Scott Bakula as an actor. Maybe if the trend of remakes continues, they might make a remake of Quantum Leap.

[RetroZelda88]

You mean ... why Star Wars Eps 1-3 all have TONS better technology than Eps 4-6?

Yes Shane. Thats my point. Probably, I'm wrong. The looks don't matter? Only the Content.

[Bubbledragon]

Remakes can be done, and done well. They aren't very often, but I'm not quick to damn anything without at least giving it it's day in court.

As a music example, take Richard Cheese (http://www.iloverichardcheese.com). This guy plays Vegas and a number of other locations, and doesn't have an original song to his name. What he does is remakes current and past mainstream songs and 'swankifies' them into Lounge.

And it works.

You may not want to go to the site/get his music if you're offended by bad language or loathe 'liberals', as he's a rather hardcore one. Politics and naughty words aside, his work is unreal. "Down with the Sickness" (Disturbed) was in the new Dawn of the Dead movie, for example.

A game example of this would be Jeff Minter of Llamatron fame. Llamatron and Tempest 2000 in particular are examples of remakes that don't embarass the original while adding enough to make it a new game.

Then again, for every one of these, you get a barrel of poor remakes, remixes and redesigns. But there's just enough out there to not immediately throw the idea out. :)

[Shane R. Monroe]

I will grant that its possible to produce a good remake. However, you'll notice ... almost EVERY successful one comes from a single dude or pair of dudes in their garage, banging on the code in their spare time - not a big publisher or house doing the remake. It takes soul and spirit (and an inherent desire NOT to mess up the original) to do a remake right - which is why we don't see many of them. :)

[RetroZelda88]

I will grant that its possible to produce a good remake. However, you'll notice ... almost EVERY successful one comes from a single dude or pair of dudes in their garage, banging on the code in their spare time - not a big publisher or house doing the remake. It takes soul and spirit (and an inherent desire NOT to mess up the original) to do a remake right - which is why we don't see many of them. :)

Hi Shane. You mentioned in your radio editorials about games today don't have souls anymore and you said that games today are just bulletpoints?

I forgot which MP3 you said that on. I think from the last one - Nostalgia
towards the end. or I think from the Xmas show - when you where talking about merging classic games with modern games.

I was wondering was "bulletpoints" meant. On paper as a business plan? or Jotted down notes in napkins by developers? Like it wasn't thought out?

[Shane R. Monroe]

Bulletpoints are those things on the back of the box, along with the screenshots, that people seem to soley base their opinions of the game on. Usually has nothing to do with actual GAME PLAY elements .. just crap about how great the game uses your video and sound and all the BS that seem to be MORE important than gameplay....


Unreal Physics Engine
Super high framerate
Multicolored Volumetric Fog
Realistic Lighting
Unlimited OnLine Play
6.1 Audio
Over 20 hours of game play
Two different endings
Starring Sean Connery