Free Guy is the Metaverse
Kena: Bridge of Spirits promises magic, but can’t deliver much of it
After a little time with it, I’ve come to the conclusion that most of the negative takes on Kena come from the fact that, at its heart, it’s a cookie-cutter Unreal Engine game. If you start a new UR project, you’re treated to a setup wizard that lets you define the genre of game you want, and it gives you a project ready for assets. From what I’ve seen of Kena, I think the majority of effort went into assets and camera scripting over any real engine coding. For game reviewers, they can probably see that at play much like a web developer can instantly tell if the web page they loaded uses Twitter Bootstrap.
However, Kena is important for that reason. To understand why, you have to understand Free Guy.
Ryan Reynolds’ Free Guy could’ve been Fortnite: The Movie, but there’s more to it
When I watched Free Guy at a drive-in outside Portland, my only thought was “I’m watching the first Zoomer movie.” The parts that may feel strange or implausible to older generations are instructive of how Gen Z thinks differently about their digital lives. There is no Truman Show, because the digital world is no less meaningful them, including parasocial relationships with NPCs and reusing assets from other IP like Marvel and Star Wars. Of course the resolution would involve walking away from the money. To them, this isn’t about a business. The fate of the world is at stake here…or at least the metaverse, which matters more.
China bans kids from playing online video games during the week
It’s probably hard to take all that in without making a negative value judgment. My parents viewed my time on the internet as a waste up until the moment I made a successful career out of it in spite of their efforts. Hard to believe now, but up until 2010 most saw the internet as a fad. Judge it if you choose, but you’re fighting the future…possibly at the cost of your children’s ability to meet it.
Blizzard's claim that it owns Warcraft 3 mods isn't just the standard fine print
In 90s video games, it was common for the game you bought to get shipped with a map editor. Lots of innovation happened that way. Successful games in their own right started as mods. This was especially true of Blizzard games. Tower Defense and MOBA genres started there.
However, sour grapes about helping competitors led to a generation of games that discourage mod support and only promote first party content. It’s no wonder that Minecraft and Roblox are synonymous with the metaverse: they’re the only games in town for UGC. That tends to shape the thinking of business developers chasing the next unicorn: they think a business will own the metaverse.
Because businesses own content generation today doesn’t mean they always will…or always have. Look at how Twitch and YouTube have challenged entertainment. The future of the metaverse isn’t a Minecraft killer or NFTs; it’s the Unreal Engine and reused assets. Tools that are accessible enough to kids to make simple games with mechanisms to easily share with friends.
In short, the metaverse will look like map editors of the 90s with built-in features for virality.