Vanquish: a chance for Sega to redeem itself

Written by Erik Kubik Sunday, 27 February 2011 06:00

Vanquish is a fun game. It is a sci-fi action adventure with quirky characters that takes one part Devil May Cry and one part Bayonetta and adds a cigarette-smoking protagonist. Throw in some guns, a few robots, and six hours of game play and you’ve got Sega's solution to gaming.

Vanquish is a good game, but it is not worth $50, nor is it worth 1000 points on Goozex. The game doesn’t have a lot of replay value. Short of upping the difficulty to challenge oneself there is not much to do beyond one play through. Although a co-op mode would have added wonders to the game. Anyways, Vanquish is a fun, short six to eight hour romp in a sci-fi world with lots of button mashing. But a $30 or less price tag would have been ideal. There is not much to the overall story except for the over-the-top gun play. There are very easy boss battles that make the game enjoyable most of the way through.

With all that said, Vanquish is the kind of game that Sega needs more of. Just like Bayonetta, these are the games where Sega could really succeed. Here is a great idea: release games like Vanquish or Bayonetta with separate online/offline co-op modes, keep the story around 5 to 7 hours and keep the price tag at $30. Sure, Sega might lose money during the initial sales but when people hear about the amount of bang for your buck I expect the games to fly off the shelves.

Releasing DLC with new levels and game play modes could keep games like these profitable.

So here you are Sega, this could be your future. Stop with the $50-$60 releases and focus on value. There’s a chance here to be very successful outside of Sonic.