Crimson Desert is the latest victim of the hype monster.
After over five years of known development, the action-adventure/action RPG finally released, but not before causing a stir among fans. Spending that much time in known development allows fans to build excitement for an upcoming.
With each passing trailer, fans got more and more excited for Crimson Desert. This built consistently until the expectations became borderline unrealistic as every detail received scrutiny.
The game finally released on March 19 and its initial launch became a release of pent up feelings on that game. What became worrisome was that it seemed like many had already made up their mind without playing a second.
Crimson Desert had so much hype around it that nothing short of perfection was good enough. That is a space where hype does more harm than good, and Crimson Desert is just the latest victim.
Critics and fans largely saw the game has passable though not perfect. This resulted in early aggregate scores of 77 (Metacritic) and 82 (Opencritic). These are far from terrible scores, but the chatter soon became that Crimson Desert was a failure with many celebrating that “demise.”
Hype and expectation serve a lot of good in the video game — and to a larger extent, entertainment — world. It’s what generates interest and drives sales of that particular media.
Those are both healthy parts of any development cycle, but the problem becomes when both hype and expectation get out of control. Once the beast is untamed, it can threaten to derail an otherwise good or great game.
As noted, aggregate scores of 77-82 are not bad, they’re just not masterpiece level scores. The tricky part is if the audience prepares for a masterpiece, anything less will feel like a letdown.
This all puts unfair pressure on a game to live up to unrealistic expectations, robbing fans of what would be generally considered a great or fun game. Fans are chasing a version of the game that never existed to begin with.
Of course, some games live up to the unrealistic hype and others find a way to skirt the unrealistic expectations. Tears of the Kingdom found a way around its unrealistic expectations and got a lot of praise in the process.
The interesting part about this phenomena is that no one is really at fault. We can’t reasonably ask developers and publishers not to make their game look good. We also can’t ask people to defer excitement on a game.
That said, there are some instances where both sides can do something. Developers can do their best to make a game that tries its best to live up to the hype and is not rushed out. This is constantly a problem among big game developers where a title is sent out unfinished.
Another solution could be to avoid overpromising and announcing games with a more reasonable timeline. I don’t think Crimson Desert would’ve hurt if it waited a year or two to officially announce.
On the other side, fans could do with scaling back their expectations, balancing their expectations, This doesn’t mean to get rid of them. Rather, it means to be more realistic with them.
I had a friend who said he was excited for Tears of the Kingdom but wanted to keep his expectations in check to avoid unrealistic excitement for the game. He was still excited but remained more in check.
The answer isn’t a simple one and there is no real conflict. Both sides could scale it all back a bit but neither is wrong in its approach to the hype dilemma.
That said, hype presence does negatively impact the initial thoughts of a game and Crimson Desert was the latest. As the week has worn on, the scores have gone up. Developer Pearl Abyss released an update that addressed many of the concerns, increasing the reviews.
Still, hype will continue to fester and, if not kept in check, can continue its trend of ruining otherwise good video games.
What about you? Does hype do more harm than good? How would you balance out this issue? Let us know in the comments below or head over to our Discord channel to join the conversation.
Featured Image: Pearl Abyss (via JV Mag)
Boss Rush Podcast – A Podcast about Video Games
The Boss Rush Podcast – A Podcast about Video Games – is the flagship show of the Boss Rush Network and Boss Rush Media. Each week, hosts Corey Dirrig and LeRon Dawkins are joined by friends, fellow creators, indie developers, and industry veterans to discuss the latest in the world of video games, including news, rumors, new releases, and what they’ve been playing. They also answer listener questions, debate important industry topics and Boss Rush Banter discussion points, and feature a rotating weekly segment. New episodes post every Monday.
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