We never really know what the future of video games holds. Unlike other artistic mediums, our biggest advancements have always been technological. The best game in any given year would have likely been impossible to make a decade before. While we're seeing new filming techniques developed in movies and new forms of recording in music, it's only gaming that consistently improves and, as such, never really knows where it's heading. There are some drawbacks in our obsession with technological advancements (we become embarrassed of our history, mired in remakes, and too easily dazzled by shiny pretty objects that we too rarely reflect on anything else), but it also makes gaming one of the most unpredictable and exciting mediums out there. Playing The Quarry, I feel the evidence of that.
The Quarry is a decent game, and like all of Supermassive's other offerings, it will be fondly remembered by horror fans but won't tear up any trees across gaming as a whole. It won't be in the mix for anything major at The Game Awards, and when we look back on 2022 in the future, it will be drowned out by the likes of Elden Ring,God of War Ragnarok, and even Horizon Forbidden West. It's just a good game that's kinda good, and that's all it needs to be. But if you described all of the games that have launched this year to someone 20 years ago, The Quarry would feel like the future.
The Quarry is an interactive movie where you and your friends control each character, all of whom are played by major stars, and every decision you make influences the outcome of the game. Every character can die, and all can be saved – it entirely comes down to you. This sort of interactive storytelling is exactly what we thought gaming would turn into, but gaming has pushed on elsewhere. The likes of The Last of Us Part 2, for example, have much stronger, more affecting stories than The Quarry, even though player agency barely matters at all. It's just a story that happens to us, and on the face of it, that doesn't take advantage of what a video game can be. Yet we all agree it's a 'better' video game than The Quarry.
This is not to put down The Quarry. It's great at what it does and we need games willing to explore different avenues of the medium. But we thought that sort of thing would be the future, when it turns out to be just another game. Gaming has evolved in so many ways over the years, but it's strangely endearing that the games we consider the pinnacle are the ones that move us the most. As gaming has advanced, it has also grown in depth. We might not have as many rich stories in gaming if it had not first become capable of replicating film, but it will be fascinating to see where gaming goes from here.
While The Quarry is not the peak of gaming, it's still a pretty great experience, and we have several more Dark Pictures games to follow it – the upcoming one also stars arguably the game's biggest get yet in Oscar-nominee Jessie Buckley. This specific style of game is constantly evolving, and FMV titles are seeing something of a revival through the works of Jack Attridge and Sam Barlow. Beyond that, is gaming going to continue to refine its storytelling? Will that come alongside, or as part of new developments?
3D was a passing fad in filmmaking, but perhaps gaming could get greater use out of it. It probably won't be NFT bullshit on the Polium One, but who knows what the future of gaming could be? We all thought it would be games like The Quarry, and what's perhaps most exciting is that games that seem impossible to conceive of today might be your run of the mill double-A title in 15 years time.
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