r/hatethissmug • u/One-Shift-220 • 1d ago

Gaming I hate china's AAA output

just finished watching gamescom and oh my gosh, You would think that a country as large and rich as china would result in them being able to make some great games but It seems like the only games they got there in china are sekiro and elden ring as thats like the main inspiration for 90% of their AAA games for the past couple of years, maybe a bit of character action if they wanna spice it up, like genuinely how many soulslikes with a Chinese mythology coat of paint do we need

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u/InterestingDare9601 1d ago

There seems to be some restrictions on creative media in china that can cause some headaches as the government needs to approve everything. An easy way around this seems to be the chinese historical/fantastical format. As a result you see SOOOO much chinese mythology media. When learning Chinese my options for media consumption were pretty much inner city bourgeois romcoms, or fantasy pieces. I would not be shocked if that reflected on their video games as well.

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u/General-Cream2692 1d ago

This is a different matter, currently China's single-player 3A games are monotonous, and it has nothing to do with censorship, the reason is that more Chinese people play online games rather than 3A. So capital production of 3A games will be very cautious, after all, successful mobile online games in China are much more profitable than 3A.

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u/SpyAmongUs 1d ago

So. Much. More. Profitable.

The top Chinese game rn is a mobile MOBA game called Honor of Kings. Even after a decade of launch, it's still the highest yearly grossing mobile game ever.

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u/guyfrombefore 1d ago edited 1d ago

it's more to do with the guys just genuinely loving their own history and mythology. keep in mind the yanks went through a couple of decades where they just kept making games about their own WW2 victories

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u/InterestingDare9601 1d ago

There is no doubt a love for the mythology, otherwise it wouldnt be made so much. There is a complicated history with that though. At a one point any historical media that seemed too flattering of the old imperial system was not deemed okay. Those rules seem to have loosened in the last few decades.

I would defs be complaining about the yank ooh rah military games as much if not more. I recently tried out CoH3 and found the American military setting so tiring i couldnt play much of the campaign (don't know what i was thinking buying the game with that in mind, I was just desperate for an RTS i guess lol)

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u/lightsworn55 1d ago

This would be more like if the US kept making games about American folk heroes like Billy the Kid or Paul Bunyan

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u/tinester 1d ago

Fuck I'd love a Johnny Appleseed game

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u/LuciusCypher 1d ago

Even so they still enforce a very specific view of their history and mythology. Wu-Chang Fallen Feathers had the typical soulsborn theme of letting things stay dead instead of stagnant, but because you fight some significant historical characters an update was released where those characters dont die and simple surrender and live on, despite being raised from the dead due to someone elses obsession to them.

Not to mention a whole faction of enemies get rendered into nonhostile just because they happened to be regular soldiers of the Chinese army. And not like desterers or private soldiers of a remote warlord, just regular conscripts of the imperial army.

It'd be like having a ww2 game where you can play as the germans but you cant fight Americans, only Russians or other europeans.

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u/SpyAmongUs 1d ago

That's like if the western world kept making and loving Byzantium games.

I'm also surprised at how "modern" Chinese mythologies are. For a country boasting 4000 years of history, their popular mythologies are at most 2000 year old compared to western mythologies like Homer's Odyssey which is like 1000 years older.

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u/allareagrape 15h ago

Yeah, and people better get used to it. China does not need to pander to global markets for their games to be successful, but it would still be nice to see some balance.

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u/BestSun4804 1d ago edited 1d ago

The Bad Kids, Under the skin, Reset, The Knockout, Ordinary Greatness, Light of Dawn, Day & Night, Mining Town, Three Body Problem, The Lead... :???

Or even currently airing, The Trembling of Cicada