To Reboot Or Not To Reboot

That is the question. Horribly misquoted Shakespeare catchphrases aside, reboots have been a spicy topic in the game industry in recent times. Almost all of the old games (ages range from 6-10 years) have decided to change the direction of the series and go with something new. Now, we can see that this has caused some controversy and the painfully obvious example has to be DmC Devil May Cry. I’m not going to divulge too much into the topic of the game’s quality because nobody has got time for that and it might take hours.

What I want to focus on are reboots in general. We see it everywhere these days. Movies, series and in some rare cases even books. Is it a bad thing? I don’t think so and here’s why. Reboots are good because it gives us something new. That’s the extent of it. We are being thrown with sequels left right and center for years now and some of them have admittedly started to stagnate. We get the same stuff over and over again with a new coat of paint and some random stuff thrown in and that can cause us to not enjoy the games anymore.

Reboots give us the chance to experience something new, but with the same characters and mythos that we have grown accustomed to as a series has grown. It’s a way for us to experience new things in terms of gameplay, but with styles and signature moves still present. I’m all for reboots. It’s something that I think we desperately need in the gaming industry. What would it be like if the same Tomb Raider game was released every second year with the same Lara Croft and the same platforming systems? We would grow tired of it. Now, they took the source material and made it into something that has almost nothing to do with the more “traditional” Tomb Raider elements, but still retains some of the franchise’s key features such as Lara Croft herself and some overall concepts.

It’s good and it works. I’ve expressed my love for DmC many times and wish that more people can just give it a shot before completely throwing it under the table because Dante looks like he belongs in an electronic “metal band”. There will always be people that disagree with stuff and with the topic of reboots it’s no different. Some want to stick purely with the traditional elements and they voice their concerns quite loudly. Some even go so far to take it to the government of the biggest country in the world (well done on that by the way). What these people fail to understand is that we need change. If there isn’t any change then everything will become the same and systematically wither and die.

This is just my personal take on it and I would love to hear some feedback from you lovely folks. Do you like reboots or do you think they can die in Davy Jones’ locker while on fire and melting? If so, then why.