Alright, American Thanksgiving is over and the Christmas season has begun. I actually had this thought back in the summer but wanted to wait until the start of the holidays to make it.
It's a simple question. When you think about it, there are countless classic Christmas forms of entertainment/media. Classic movies, classic songs/albums, classic books. Home consoles have been a major part of our lives for close to 40 years now, and there hasn't been a Christmas centered game that we all revisit each year like our favorite movies. Why has no one seriously capitalized on this? Movies/songs make an insane amount of royalties each year, in some cases it has set singers up for life with a single song. A classic Christmas game could do the same for a developer, with sales every year and being re-released every generation on new consoles. From a purely business perspective, it seems like a no brainer, especially considering there is no competition and the first game to obtain classic status would be guaranteed remain that way as it would forever be "the first".
Now, as for the game itself, I think about 3rd/4th Gen titles as an example. You could create a game that could be challenging enough on the first play through that your average player would get a few hours of enjoyment out of it. But the game itself could be completed in an hour or so with proficiency. This would be the same length as a classic Christmas movie. It could be something that players came back to every year, that the family could gather around the TV and enjoy together. Kids growing up playing this game could introduce it to their children, the way many of our parents enjoyed rewatching Christmas classics with us, as it brought them back to remembering how much they loved these movies as children.
A quick search on the eshop shows no real Christmas game, except for some puzzle games and gimmicky stupidity like Cthulhu Christmas or Santa with a gun. The closest thing to a Christmas game for me is Christmas NiGHTS, which is just the first level of NiGHTS Into Dreams reskined as a Christmas level. That's less than 10 minutes of playtime total.
So how come we haven't seen a Christmas game yet? It's been decades, games aren't going to go away, they are a form of entertainment that has become apart of our lives. It seems like it's such an obvious thing that should have happened a long time ago yet it is still a glaring omission in gaming.
It's a simple question. When you think about it, there are countless classic Christmas forms of entertainment/media. Classic movies, classic songs/albums, classic books. Home consoles have been a major part of our lives for close to 40 years now, and there hasn't been a Christmas centered game that we all revisit each year like our favorite movies. Why has no one seriously capitalized on this? Movies/songs make an insane amount of royalties each year, in some cases it has set singers up for life with a single song. A classic Christmas game could do the same for a developer, with sales every year and being re-released every generation on new consoles. From a purely business perspective, it seems like a no brainer, especially considering there is no competition and the first game to obtain classic status would be guaranteed remain that way as it would forever be "the first".
Now, as for the game itself, I think about 3rd/4th Gen titles as an example. You could create a game that could be challenging enough on the first play through that your average player would get a few hours of enjoyment out of it. But the game itself could be completed in an hour or so with proficiency. This would be the same length as a classic Christmas movie. It could be something that players came back to every year, that the family could gather around the TV and enjoy together. Kids growing up playing this game could introduce it to their children, the way many of our parents enjoyed rewatching Christmas classics with us, as it brought them back to remembering how much they loved these movies as children.
A quick search on the eshop shows no real Christmas game, except for some puzzle games and gimmicky stupidity like Cthulhu Christmas or Santa with a gun. The closest thing to a Christmas game for me is Christmas NiGHTS, which is just the first level of NiGHTS Into Dreams reskined as a Christmas level. That's less than 10 minutes of playtime total.
So how come we haven't seen a Christmas game yet? It's been decades, games aren't going to go away, they are a form of entertainment that has become apart of our lives. It seems like it's such an obvious thing that should have happened a long time ago yet it is still a glaring omission in gaming.
