On front mission evolved and culture clash

Square Enix has a problem or a least they think they do. Their front mission franchise just doesn't seem to be tacking off here in the west. Front mission is a long running games series in Japan, it's a turn based strategy game with mech's and it's pretty good. Their latest offering to the western market is however a 3rd person shooter and mediocre to boot. This game is not going to be the success they had hope and has even managed to anger western fans of the series, who basically see this as a dumbed down game for us dumb western gamers. Are they justified in their anger? Well yea probability they are but lets not get into that argument shall we. What I want to look at is how we got to this point and to do that we need to look back a few years at the first front mission game we got in the west, front mission 3.

Front mission 3 was released on the playstation in a limited run, that sold quite well by all account's and today the game is considered a rare and much sort after gem. Now here is where we get our first culture clash moment, while western gamers loved front mission 3 Japanese games we lukewarm towards the game. The reason? it was different form the games before. Japanese games put a lot of stock in franchises. what they are looking for in a sequel is basically conformity they want it to be the same as the last game. Now in the west innovation is what we are after we want new and we want exciting from our games, so this attitude can be a little hard to understand. It helps to think of games as comfort food most Japanese gamers seek games for the same reason we seek comfort food. Now imagine that you have a favourite brand of chocolate and they just changed the recipe. you wouldn't be too happy right? Yes it's still delicious chocolate but it's not familiar any more not able to comfort you the way that old taste did.

So next came front mission 4 and for this game they listened to the fans and gave them exactly what the wanted. The Japanese fans were happy, the game sold well and seeing as front mission 3 was a surprise success in western markets they thought they would have another crack at it. Things didn't go well. The game just didn't sell and the funny thing is Square Enix can't figure out why. The answer is quite simple though, it wasn't actually a good game. In fact is was mostly just bland. Just take a look at it.



That picture is pretty indicative of the whole game, grey mech's on tired bland backgrounds with even the menus coloured a depressing grey colour. It was a world of beige and grey and the game play was slow and plodding seeming to drag on for far too long. If clinical depression had a game this would be it. so while this game pushed the right button with Japanese gamers who just wanted a return to form, it's really no surprise that it didn't take off in the west where we prefer to play game that don't make us reach for a pack of razor blades.

Which leads us on to Front Mission 5 this game never got a western release, now Square Enix cite a few reasons for this and most of them seem quite plausible but the simple fact is mystified by the failure or front mission 4 they were unwilling to commit to a western release that might not get good sales. Now we can't really blame them for this making games is about making money after all. The thing is however front mission 5 would have sold quite well especially considering the popularity of the fan subbed version of the game. The Game was every thing the forth game wasn't. It had bright exciting graphics and a well paced game play style. It looked and played a lot like 3. This was the game that western gamers should have got.





Which of course leads us to our current situation. with the feeling that Square Enix is offering up a dumbed down game for us dumb western gamers . Now to be far this is definitely not what Square Enix is thinking their thoughts are more likely to be around the line's of - oh crap this franchise is bombing in the US quick how do we reboot it. Unfortunately their reboot is a bland game that is getting slammed in game reviews and will only appeal to fans of the franchise. Now that is not always a problem as most games like this have a fan base that a totally willing to buy it and will be quite happy with it, the problem in this case it that the western fan base they are trying to tap with this game desperately want a turn based strategy game. so it's not too hard to predict that this game won't sell too well. One can only hope that this does not affect future front mission games from being released in the west. although it most likely will.

Its always disappointing to hear that a games company won't release a game in a certain region due to a fear of poor sales.

I imagine its not just the fear of losing money but the media attention which probably would affect future purchases.

I have to agree, the screenshot for Front Mission 4 looks terrible. While I dislike games which use too much colour such as World of Warcraft, the plain grey looks terrible. It looks more like a throwback to an old 90's game.

From what RevRaptor has showed me of Front Mission 5 I have to admit I am very impressed and I'm also surprised I have not heard of it before. For as long as I can remember I have always been of fan of Mech based games such as Mechwarrior.

Its interesting to note the difference in taste between Western and Eastern gamers concerning turn based strategy games.

Unfortunately I do not have a PS2 however I found a Coop mod for Mechwarrior 4 recently which looked very appealing.

http://www.fileplanet.com/165727/160000 ... -Co-Op-Mod