Episodic and cliffhanger games - Good or bad, Fun or not?

[The Stinger]

Epesodic and cliffhanger games - Good or bad, fun or not?

Valve has been doing this for a few years now with Half Life 2 and releasing
each episode father apart from the last one. Other games, like "Runaway 2: The Dream of the Turtle", just end in a cliffhanger without a hint of when part 3 will be released. Or what about "Sin Emergence", which only released one episode, before it got set on hold. But not all episodic games have unclear release dates. Telltale's Sam and Max, for instance, releases an episode
every month. And Starcraft 2 has a set time frame for releasing each campaign.

Do you think this is beneficial for gaming in general, or is this just a way to rake in some dough? Are you bothered by it, enjoy it or don't mind the wait?

In my opinion, if it's a story driven game, they should either have set dates for their releases(and actually hold to it :eek:) or actually end the story with room for
a sequel. For games like Half Life 2 I've got a mixed feeling, on one hand it's a great story and they should make the best out of it and on the other it's annoying to have to wait this long to actually finish the story.
Even worse is if you have no clue when the sequel is going to be release or when the game just gets killed off, like Sin Emergence. Wouldn't it have been better to release a complete game?

[Monkey Butler]

The problem is that most devs don't understand the episodic model yet. When you've got a company like Valve basically making a mini (or not so mini with the trend towards shorter games these days) sequel with each episode, of course it's going to be impossible to release an episode every 3 months or whatever, and of course it's going to make the model look like pointless cash-gouging. If devs had enough lead-time, so that the first few episodes were already complete when the first was released or something, like a TV series, then it would be much easier for them to meet deadlines.
However, there's also the problem that devs are treating episodic games as being no different to regularly-released games. Episodic games shouldn't, IMO, just be seen as an opportunity to get half a game onto the market quickly to turn a buck before starting work on the second half for release "in a few months time". Games need to be specifically designed with story and content that make them not only work as a 3-4 hour game, but also makes gamers want to hang around for the next episode. Telltale is definitely doing it right, but other devs are still just treating episodic gaming as glorified expansion packs.

[motionblur]

It's okay in a set timeframe like Sam and Max does. Starcraft would be okay - there it's just my personal taste that I want to be able to play all three races from the beginning and rather not wait for each release. In those two cases it's like a TV series.

In any other case when there's no certain release date or even it's not even sure there will be another sequel at all - in that case cliffhanger endings plain suck.

Of course it depends on the kind of cliffhanger ending, too. Not every uncertain ending is there just to tie into a sequel.

[Mountain Man]

And Starcraft 2 has a set time frame for releasing each campaign.
It's Blizzard. Those "time frames" are no doubt extremely fluid.

In the case of the Valve, I agree that their original ideas for the episodic model are pretty much non-existent at this point, but it doesn't bother me because each "episode" has been well worth the wait, and they charge a fair price for the amount of content you get. I also like that we get more Half-Life gaming goodness on a more-or-less yearly basis instead of having to wait three-years or (more likely) longer between installments.

I guess what it comes down to is that I just take each game as it comes and don't worry too much about the next "episode".

That said, I wish Irrational Games would revive the Freedom Force franchise with an episodic model since the games themselves are already broken up into "issues" (following the comic book model that is their inspiration). I'd gladly pay $10 for a two-hour "issue" released every few months.

[Damien_Azreal]

Except that this time we are waiting two to three years for the next Half-Life installment. :p

[Mountain Man]

It's been a year since Episode 2 was released. I suspect we'll see Episode 3 released sometime in the next 6-months.

Or perhaps I'm just a hopelessly optimistic fanboy. :D

[avatar_58]

It's been a year since Episode 2 was released. I suspect we'll see Episode 3 released sometime in the next 6-months.

Or perhaps I'm just a hopelessly optimistic fanboy. :D

They already said news won't even happen yet, let alone a release. It's going to be another year or two before Ep3 is even mentioned again.

[Vroomfondel]

I thought it was good at first, but after what happened with Sin Emergence and the Half-life episodes taking so long I don't like it at all. It may work for adventure games, but nothing else in my opinion. And I don't think there's any excuse for cliffhangers in games.

[avatar_58]

I thought it was good at first, but after what happened with Sin Emergence and the Half-life episodes taking so long I don't like it at all. It may work for adventure games, but nothing else in my opinion. And I don't think there's any excuse for cliffhangers in games.

Why's that? All it proves is Telltale stuck to a schedule while Valve mis-used the term episodic. Sin was doomed from the start and it doesn't surprise me it failed.

Theres no reason why one couldn't spend a few years creating a versitile FPS engine and then release regular 'episodes' of content.

[Vroomfondel]

Why's that? All it proves is Telltale stuck to a schedule while Valve mis-used the term episodic. Sin was doomed from the start and it doesn't surprise me it failed.

Theres no reason why one couldn't spend a few years creating a versitile FPS engine and then release regular 'episodes' of content.

Yeah, but no one is doing it right (except telltale of course). I think cliffhangers are fine for stuff like series where you can look forward to what will happen next week. In games where you have to wait over a year to know what happens next, that kind of anticipation doesn't work for me.

[avatar_58]

Yeah, but no one is doing it right (except telltale of course). I think cliffhangers are fine for stuff like series where you can look forward to what will happen next week. In games where you have to wait over a year to know what happens next, that kind of anticipation doesn't work for me.

Why do you assume it has to end on a cliffhanger? Again - that's Valve's hangup not the concept in general. Theres no reason why episodes can't be seperate stories or quests that are self contained. Look at Strongbad. Theres nothing at all to tie them together, and I'm sure Wallace and Gromitt will probably be the same.

Think about an RPG series that has 30 quests every month and allows you to import your character with all his goodies intact. Sort of like Quest for Glory only much quicker.

As far as I'm concerned the concept of episodic is a success, it just needs more devs onboard to sell it.

[Vroomfondel]

Sorry, I was actually talking about cliffhangers in general, rather than in episodic games. Just ignore me :o

[Mountain Man]

Theres no reason why one couldn't spend a few years creating a versitile FPS engine and then release regular 'episodes' of content.
I'd add "provided the developer doesn't have Valve's obsession for quality".

[ZuljinRaynor]

Episodic is cool when you know it is episodic and not "short game with long development cycle."

[Phait]

Bad if there's a risk that they won't continue them, like XIII.

[vcatkiller]

When done in a game that's obviously setting up a sequel, it's preferrable if the game ties up a number of loose ends and leaves only a few to pull the player back for a sequel. There's nothing worse than getting to the end of a game and having zero closure.

In an episodic game where you know absolutely there will be another episode coming within a month, then more loose ends are allowable. Unless it's the last game of the season.

Otherwise, I'm not very fond of cliff hangers. I remember getting to the end of both Soul Reaver 1 & 2 and going "wtf where's the rest of the fking game?" Particularly 2 - wtf was with that ending?

[Damien_Azreal]

Bad if there's a risk that they won't continue them, like XIII.

Well XIII wasn't an episodic game. It was a full sized game, that they planned for a full-fledged sequel for. Bad average sales and reviews killed that.

An episodic game that died while it had just set foot in the water was SiN: Episodes.... dead after only Episode 1, Emergence was released. :(

[Phait]

Read thread ttitle, "and cliffhanger games". In a sense it was episodic considering the source material, they only used a portion while there were several volumes of the comic.

[Reaper]

Yeah, I wish they'd make a sequel to XIII.

[The Stinger]

I'm just annoyed with Runaway 2, the game ends in a cliffhanger.
It was released in France and Germany in 2006 and in a lot of other countries in
2007 and to this day the release date has been TBA.
Has anyone seen copies of Runaway 2 recently? Now imagine Runaway coming out in 2009.
Either they are going to re-release Runaway 2, or the more obvious choice, bundle it with
Runaway 3. So basically new people would pay less for the whole story.

[Reaper]

WTH is runaway?

[The Stinger]

Runaway is a 2d point and click adventure game, with the first game released in 2003.