Speaking from a casual observation, it seems like HD remastered titles are steadily becoming more of a commonplace trend in the wake of the new current-gen consoles–Microsoft’s Xbox One and Sony’s PlayStation 4.
While the notion of an HD remastered–or indeed an HD re-released / remade–title isn’t entirely new, it just feels like we may be seeing a lot more of such in the future.
From HD remakes such as Homeworld 2 , Pokémon HeartGold / SoulSilver (bit of a stretch, but I think it counts) and Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary , to HD re-releases such as Final Fantasy X | X-2 HD Remaster and Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMix , to HD remasters such as Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition , possible Killzone titles , The Last of Us and others, I’m starting to think that remastered games from here on in are starting a trend of becoming stand-ins to keep us occupied while developers and publishers work on bigger titles.
I say that primarily because of the introduction of the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4, as both offer significantly superior hardware compared to their predecessors.
I mean, that’s the purpose of Halo: The Master Chief Collection for example–to release remastered versions of the four games from the main Halo series on the Xbox One while work on Halo 5: Guardians can proceed without it being awaited for impatiently.
As we’ve seen with Tomb Raider and now Grand Theft Auto V and others, more critically acclaimed titles of the previous generation could have themselves a remastered version specifically tailored for the new consoles, like Metro Redux .
Of course, the likely probability of HD remastered titles becoming more of a trend is so that players can have better performing and/or looking last-gen games on their fancy, new current-gen consoles, but I thought it was nonetheless a curious observation for the steadily increasing popularity of HD remastered titles.
Personally, I’ve not got a problem with that–like I said, it’s just a casual observation–but what does that mean for us in the future? Will HD remastered titles become even more common place in the next few years? Quite possibly, I think–at least until the current-gen consoles have gone through their teething phase.
It’ll probably be a few years before the remastering of last-gen games to current-gen consoles becomes less of a thing, when (hopefully) more killer console games will have released for the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4.