Beyond Good & Evil 2 'More Accessible' Than Original, Says Ubisoft

This may not be as bad as all that. While the gameplay was simplistic and easy to understand, the world and the storyline were not.

Seriously, at the start of the game they dumped you right into the middle of a conflict, and after that smeared thick layers of exposition. While the game itself was accessible, the world was not.

Zelda always had a pretty good balance here; you start off in a neutral little town and get introduced to characters, mechanics and items gradually, before finally embarking on a dungeon. While I'm not saying "BG&E SHOULD BE MORE LEIK ZELDAR", easing the player in is incredibly important, especially when it comes to some as detailed as BG&E.

Let me explain why this is a poor move for Ubisoft, from a very business-oriented POV.

Any company that hopes to survive will recognize that innovation is important. Not every game need be innovative - in fact, most probably should NOT - but you do need to innovate here and there, or risk boring your consumers or losing out in new opportunities. And innovation is risky, so when you have an opportunity to innovate with less risk, you should take it.

I would argue that BG&E2 is an opportunity for Ubisoft to innovate with less risk. The fan base is hardcore and dedicated, with tons of nostalgia. That affords you a few important characteristics:

1) Graphics do not need to be amazing. People loved BG&E mainly for the story, and such a fan base will not demand "next gen" graphics. You don't need to spend a huge budget trying to make it the next Assassin's Creed or GTA. This saves you tons of money on production.
2) Since the fan base is very hardcore, they will be interested in and willing to learn new game play mechanics. So you can try something innovative and see if it sticks. I'm sure Ancel wouldn't mind trying something really new.
3) Unless you totally screw up and betray the fan base (like they may be doing now), the fan base will support the game. If it is innovative and has the same magic as the first, many will probably buy the game even if it isn't perfect. Even if the graphics are last-gen. Even if the difficulty curve is broken.

Ubisoft should see this as an opportunity to make a game that innovates for the hardcore community, without a AAA budget. They certainly need to address the "casual" market, but is this really the franchise to do it with? How many non-hardcore gamers even know what BG&E is? Ubisoft is wasting a great opportunity here, trying to leverage a fan base from a completely different market.

Talk about a company with it's head up it's ass. They clearly have no idea why it failed. It wasn't that difficult. They risk "fixing" the wrong problem!

This game would and should have sold buckets and all Ubisoft really needed to do was produce some bit white sheets of paper with "BG&E: IF YOU LIKE ZELDA YOU'LL LIKE THIS" on it.

Instead they reduced the price so fast it seemed like a budget title and got no shelf space or any publicity in any (UK) store I visited. I only even heard about the game because people on the Shack talked about it. It deserved to do better.

I don't think they have any idea why the first tanked and some marketing fool figured it was because it was too hard (which it wasn't). I think the problem was nobody knew about it and if they did the premise didn't appeal to them. It seems like when people actually got a chance to play it, they loved it. Perhaps they need to give this some decent marketing this time. Am I wrong? Probably.

Ha ha. I was watching XPlay and Adam Sessler was reporting about the game being more accessible and at the end of the segment he muttered "Please don't screw this up" under his breath. I guess we're not the only people concerned about the possible new direction that BG&E might take.

I think what a lot of people are missing here is that they found the game to be too difficult for your casual gamer which none of us here are. I think a lot of people here lose touch with how bad many of your average gamers are at games. If this is what it takes for a sequel then so be it. If it is a good game then great we win, if it sucks then just ignore it and pretend it enver happened because it is not like you were going to get another one anyway.

I'd suggest that the game didn't sell for reasons like:

- Generic/easily forgettable name that doesn't tell you what the game is about.
- Doesn't provide a clear fantasy to players that can be explained in a single sentence.
- Female protagonist - sadly, they seem to consistently sell worse than male protagonists. Not sure why as most gamers don't care (and there are plenty of female gamers out there).
- Setting/mechanics that aren't traditional and require explaination.

In short, it was a great niche game. Very well done, but not mass market at all at a concept level.

Unfortunately, I don't know if a sequel can be made that addresses this issues without making a different game entirely.

they're on the verge of just calling casual gamers retarded people... I can't wait for the first press release that does.

oh fuck that, the original was incredibly accessible. it had button mash combat, simple puzzles and an story that crossed all over the place - you could pick fantasy, sci/fi, rpg - it had elements of everything.

when i read accessible i hear, its going to get console'd from the start, probably heavy focus on wii 'gamers' and in the end be a POS watered down game. i know this makes me sound like the typical reactionary internet commentator but wtf man. we go on and on about how great a game is, then they say, 'oh look those guys loved our game we should make another!' only a day later the come back with 'uh the audience that liked/bought our game last time, yea we dont care about them anymore. lets go make something generic that has mass appeal.' yeesh i hope im wrong but yea this just went from a sure buy to a guess i have to wait and see what they do scenario. awesome!

"More accessible" can mean a lot of things, some good and some bad. I'm willing to give it a shot.

Michel Ancel is still at the reins, which I'd say is the most important thing about this sequel. I'd have much less confidence in this if they'd farmed it out to another team. For all we know, he may be driving the more accessible train, which I'd have more faith in than publisher-mandated directions.

With only one tease of a teaser in existence, it's way too early to pick up the torches and pitchforks.

Let's hope they're as smart as we are - and are just throwing the words around to pique interest in gamers who didn't get on board last time around - but know the game was quite accessible and a satisfying challenge.

You wouldn't want to alienate the very core group of gamers who were so engaged by your first project that their active fandom enabled the second by taking a dump on the franchise for the American Idol crowd.

BG&E2 = Rayman Raving Rabbids!

i hope this is just the marketing department just saying things that will get a broad range of people interested in the game, and not an attempt to fix a perceived problem in the first game.

How can the difficulty be a reason why it failed commercially... I don't understand the logic... Those who didn't play it can't say they did find it too difficult since they didn't play it....

That and the game was super easy..

Not the best of news..

I appreciate Beyond Good and Evil for the beautiful world, the comedy and the art style, but I still enjoy a challenge.

Making everything quicker and easier does not make for a happier playerbase or more sales. I would expect it to achieve a dissatisfied playerbase after week 1 sales followed by a rapid decline as 'boring, too easy' word of mouth spreads.

I'm not sure they are reffering to the difficulty of the actual gameplay. It's more like sometimes it could be a little confusing for the casual gamer.
Gears of war and Half Life are very simple .. linear shooters .. very accessible even if they are not so easy at the higher difficulties. GTA is also very accesible. Lot of things to do but it is always showed very clearly where you should go on the map.
Oblivion .. easy enough but you have to think more and experiment a little to find your way through the game. Same could be said about eg. Bioshock. Casual gamers hate this. They want the game to hold their hands all way through.

What I am trying to say is that they can make the game both more accessible and more difficult than the first one. I don' tneed it more accessible but I don't see it as a problem. I am looking forward to hopefully a great game

I haven't played the original yet myself, but for all the love and nostalgia around these parts I'm thinking about grabbing it on Steam.

(except that I've just checked in the middle of writing this and it's not available to UK residents... great)

But from reading the comments here, do they perhaps mean then that they will be sexing the game up to bring it more in-line with recent trends... as opposed to dumbing it down in terms of mechanics and difficulty so much? As in if they made Jade less of an admirable Alyx-type character and more the kind of character 14 year-old boys could spend half the time admiring the jiggling ass of? etc. etc.

Original game was difficult? I found the story and characters fun and all but seriously, the gameplay was way too fucking easy. The incredibly stupid AI didn't help.

... more accessible and make sure that it�s ...

is that happening for anyone else?

Eidos did this with Invisible war, they wanted a more accessible console friendly version of deus ex (dumbed down for ritalin popping xbox retards) because it did not sell all that well. Even though it was well received by critics and hardcore gamers.
Now this was at a time where the "casual" gamer did not exist, what this potentially means for the sequel
is frightening.
Another example might be Sands of time and its sequel Warrior Within.

What is really irritating is that the original game was not difficult or inaccessible at all with the sole exception of the last bossfight.
And that one was only hard because you had to memorize certain patterns, which admittedly was beyond annoying.

So I guess they are going to rename it? A sequel to a game from 2003 doesn't scream "accessible" to me, doesn't matter what they do to it or how they market it. Make it for the fans of the original who have been waiting years for this to happen. :(

I think that Ubisoft is looking for something to blame the poor sales of the first one on, and "not accessible enough" is all they could come up with. Really, it was perfectly accessible, there is no really good reason why it didn't sell that well. I think it just came down to the fact that lady reporter with a pig for a best friend wasn't really a role that a lot of gamers could get into, and it wasn't released in such a way that it played to it's strengths. I'm just glad they aren't trying to change to court the hardcore gamer, if the trailer is any indication.

Watch, it's gonna be all combat.

Ugh... as others said, what? The original was not exactly a hard game. Lots of gameplay elements: stealth, action, adventure, racing, but all of them were more or less easy.

This scares me. What are they going to do, add combat? That was the worst part of the original. The reason it didnt sell well was because they were idiots and didnt do enough advertising.

Wow, I never bothered finishing the first one because I thought it was too easy.

How can you make a mainstream, console platformer more mainstream and accessible? Oh wait, maybe a COVER SYSTEM!? :p

This sort of talk is frightening to me. At the rate its going major game releases will be designed for the barely functional and no one else. I've played a couple of games in my time, faggot, where's the stuff that's new and fresh and interesting and challenging to me?

More accessible? The original was an amazing game, no doubt, but it was also not difficult in any sense of the phrase.

I was excited about this game...until now. I hope they reconsider.

I need to play the original game still.

Figures.

Fuck.