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Comment by the__alchemist

5 hours ago

*US game studios. Continental Europe has been continuing to put out masterpieces. (Many countries: Poland, Croatia, Czechia, France, etc)

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the__alchemist

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flumpcakes  5 hours ago

Why do you think that is? What would you consider a European masterpiece? And what would you consider something that falls short from outside Europe?

  • the__alchemist  4 hours ago

    European masterpieces, recentish:

      - Talos Principle 2
  - Expedition 33
  - KCD2
  - Anything by Arcane
  - Anything by CDPR
  - 007 Last light / Hitman
  - Blue Prince

    This is subject to taste, but the games I've been personally enjoying the most are almost all European. US games are comparatively mediocre. I don't have an explanation; only this observation. I was startled when noticing it.

    Most recently, I'm loving Order of the Sinking Star, and that's from a US team. There's hope!

    • tsimionescu  3 hours ago

      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.

      1 reply →

    • mrcsharp  1 hour ago

      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.

    • flumpcakes  4 hours ago

      > 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.

      1 reply →

    • ZekeSulastin  2 hours ago

      > Anything by CDPR

      They're lucky they were able to No Man's Sky CP2077 alongside Edgerunners being well received.

    • Barrin92  17 minutes ago

      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.

    • AlexandrB  4 hours ago

      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.

      4 replies →

    • IslandRebel  1 hour ago

      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.

  • rossvor  4 hours ago

    If we are sticking to the CRPG theme. Then the Witcher 3 and Divinity: OG 2, BG3 and Disco Elysium would be the obvious choices. If you told me in beginning of 2010s all of the future hits in this genre will come out outside of US and Bioware/Obsidian will fade away, I would be quite surprised (but maybe shouldn't have, considering their owners and financial situations)

  • charm137  4 hours ago

    As many have mentioned, BG3, CDPR's Witcher and Cyberpunk 2077 franchise, Remedy's Control / Alan Wake franchise (both original IPs) to name just a few. DICE (within EA) comes from Sweden and it's responsible for EA's core Frostbite engine alongside its Battlefield franchise.

    I cannot point to the reasons as to why. Many of these teams are global teams - so a lot of the same problems apply: marketing costs/timelines, release-time crunch etc. The one difference I can point to is that perhaps executive payouts are not overly dependent on total shareholder returns.

  • mcmcmc  5 hours ago

    The Kingdom Come: Deliverance games from Warhorse Studios and the Witcher franchise from CD Projekt Red (both Polish) are excellent and have won a ton of awards

    Lots of non EU games fall short, including several mentioned in this thread, e.g. Anthem

    • antiframe  4 hours ago

      > The Kingdom Come: Deliverance games from Warhorse Studios and the Witcher franchise from CD Projekt Red (both Polish)

      Warhorse Studios is Czech; Slavs are not all alike.

      1 reply →

  • santoshalper  5 hours ago

    CDPR is probably the flagship studio in Europe. Interestingly, they are probably the modern studio that most resembles Bioware in the 2000's.

    • AdrianB1  2 hours ago

      Unfortunately CDPR is showing some signs of Bioware-ing. As much as I liked Cyberpunk 2077, it was visibly "less than" Witcher 3 in too many ways. This is a sign of decline.

    • Hamuko  2 hours ago

      Not really sure if they're comparable to a Bioware since CD Projekt Red the studio is basically the one and the same as CD Projekt the publisher. They also own GOG.com. They're probably more comparable to a Valve, with game development, game publishing and game distribution under a single roof.

      1 reply →

    • izacus  4 hours ago

      Warhorse studios as well. Rebel Wolves. Machine Games. IO interactive.

      The list is rather long.