alt Hacker NewsEuropean masterpieces, recentish:
- Talos Principle 2
- Expedition 33
- KCD2
- Anything by Arcane
- Anything by CDPR
- 007 Last light / Hitman
- Blue Prince
Most recently, I'm loving Order of the Sinking Star, and that's from a US team. There's hope!
Replies
> Order of the Sinking Star
I was going to mention this game as a counter point but then realised that if I am doing that it's kind of the exception that proves the rule.
I do wonder why this is, perhaps there's more money in the US to build bigger games with bigger teams and you just get the 'too many cooks in the kitchen' syndrome.
I must admit most AAA games from the US over the last decade have been underwhelming for me.
To add to this list, Remedy Entertainment. They don't miss.
- Alan Wake 1 & 2 - Control & Control Resonant (came out last month) - Quantum Break
They are a small studio but release fantastic works of art every time. If you haven't heard of them, you might've heard of Max Payne. It was developed by these guys.
Baldurs Gate 3 was made in Europe!
> Anything by CDPR
They're lucky they were able to No Man's Sky CP2077 alongside Edgerunners being well received.
The US gaming industry has serious Hollywood envy. There's a constant push to make games "cinematic" and put big name actors in leading roles. This not only bloats budgets but results in barely-interactive monstrosities where gameplay is just a bridge between long, non-interactive cutscenes.
It's ironic because Hollywood is not doing too well at the moment.
I think many of these games you've listed are a 7/10. A lot of games I am playing are either years old now or I am going back to older consoles (via emulation normally) and the classic games on them.
also people shouldn't sleep on Housemarque. Both Returnal and Saros were fantastic. Don't want to spoil Returnal but the narrative and symbolism that tie the game together if you go through everything after you've finished it and have a grasp of the story is incredible. And the gameplay is extremely fun.
You're forgetting a few major ones:
- Baldur's Gate 3 (German)
- Disco Elysium (Estonian)
- Divinity: Original Sin 1 and 2 (same studio as BG3)
BG3 is notable for its gigantic success. And Disco Elysium is one of the best written games ever made, and it showed that you can have a fantastic RPG with no combat system whatsoever, while still having meaningful progression.