Today, we were treated to a bunch of hands-on previews for Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2, and as part of them, Ninja Theory studio head Dom Matthews told IGN that the team has found an audience that enjoys shorter games.
Matthews says that he’s “really pleased” to see so many people liking shorter and very focused experiences in general, as the idea behind Hellblade 2 is for the “game length to be appropriate for the story that we want to tell”. For the record, the length of this sequel is said to be around eight hours, which is very similar to the original.
Read the full article on purexbox.com
A good 100 hour game will never feel too long.
A bad 2 hour game will never feel short enough.
That is a fantastic point.
Exactly this. I want to be actively engaged. That’s the opposite of padding a game with bs.
I think that’s a valid point. I spent almost 100 hours in Zelda Tears of the Kingdom, and didn’t feel it was long.
These days, I enjoy shorter games a lot more, but I used to love longer games in my youth and wanted never-ending games. Just different stages of life, I guess.
I’m kinda in the same boat. Although I do still get the occasional game where I never want it to end.
It may be the fact that I have a kid now, but I do feel games have gotten too big, most of the time for the sake of “we have to make it bigger!”
This has led to broken games, boring content, and 200 hour long grinds.
You aren’t wrong for the most part. 90% of the “AAA” studios just push out bigger and bigger games way sooner than they should. It’s the inevitable consequence of the pursuit for ever growing profits.
I enjoy good games. If a long game is good throughout with satisfying progression of game mechanics and story to chew on, then that’s most ideal and desired. Eg Witcher 3, Final Fantasy 12, Mass Effect, Deus Ex and so on.
I dont mind either way, so long as the story and/or game play is good. I cant stand a long game that is long only because of pointless fetch quests or meaningless side missions.
I won’t say no to game that offers 100h+ of story driven progress including side quests.