Once again, some cinematics that do nothing to get me excited about a game I am already looking forward to. Native scouts, chopping trees, and an out take from John Adams.
Another Substanceless Trailer – Colonization
August 18th, 2008 by Troy Goodfellow · 9 Comments · Firaxis
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It must be hard to make both an entertaining and enlightening trailer for a turn-based strategy game. Concentrate on gameplay and scare off the novices. Focus on cinematic cutscenes and mislead the newcomers. Ehhh…it only means we need a variety of sources to make a purchase decision.
It doesn’t have to show gameplay – though that would be nice. But you get no idea what this game is about beyond what you already get from the name.
But you know me. I hate these things.
I think there’s a missed opportunity to really show more about the flow of the game. All of the gameplay “phases” are shown, but there’s no sense of continuity to make the clips feel like anything more than a random collection of vignettes. Not that it really matters–I’m looking forward to the game despite the awkward trailer.
Here’s a question to the Flash of Steel peanut gallery, has there ever been a trailer that really worked? For myself probably the closest was the one for Call of Duty 4, it got me pumped for the game and since it was a FPS seeing the environments was good enough since all FPSs play the same.
But overall I can’t really think of any trailer that actually provided substance. Then again, I guess as long as you have eyes on the brand does it matter?
In-engine trailers are better than cinematic ones, most of the time, which gives a strong advantage, in my opinion, to those games which have some action.
The Rome: Total War trailers were excellent for that reason. Compare any of the Rome trailers, even the first one, to the Empire: Total War one, and there’s really no contest as to which makes you more excited about the game.
The Spore trailer is quite good, as well. It’s funny, cute, and, once again, in engine.
It’s more accurate to call this a teaser rather than a trailer, if you want to borrow from cinema promo terminology.
Most, though, are still better than this stinker: http://www.videosift.com/video/Conflict-Denied-Ops-But-Allowed-Boobies
This is why I never watch trailers, they rarely represent the game itself.
But on the plus side we now are certain that the game’s not about colonizing Mars!
@ JonathanStrange
Lol!
I guess you won’t like the new Dawn of War trailer then (on my blog if you are interested) On that note, I haven’t really seen you talk about Dawn of War, do you avoid it because it is a twitch fest or some other reason.