I think in general it is very hard to compare the market, budget and the way of working / thinking
of 90's - 2010 and most recent modern games.
A lot of things that were considered completely normal back then,
are pretty much a no go today. And thats going to lead to different outcomes and projects.
Not better or worse projects but just how different budgets were back then and how nobody gave a sh*t
about working hours and so on. You could do some pretty expensive but experimental stuff back then
because the market was pretty clueless about success. And because clueless companies wanted to jump on that videogame market train, it was actually not that hard to get a very decent budget for very weird games.
(weird by todays standards)
Nowadays its pretty clear what each genre should offer and how polished some
AAA first party game should be and the budget of these games is ridiculous high.
Which then leads to less expensive experimental games because
its already established which content is going to make money.
No company on this planet is going to give you 60 mil USD for some experiment nowadays.
There is a german game example, the two RPG games Gothic 1 and Gothic 2.
These games were released in 2001 and 2002
and even today they still get voted into the top 10 all time RPG favorite games in Germany,
Poland, Czech Republic, Russia ... Gothic 2 even got a brand new fan mod in 2021.
And do you know how they made these games back then? It was made by actual computer nerds,
not like modern trendy nerds, no, actual 90's nerds who worked night and day on these projects.
Not because someone forced them, but because they wanted to do it.
They released Gothic 1 and then they made the way way bigger Gothic 2 in only 9 months
and a full add on in 6 months. And do you know how they were able to put all of this work in such short time frame? Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch.
They basically lived in their 'offices'. They worked extra hours every single day.
Thats what was going on in developer offices back then. By free will or forced by the publisher.
And you can bet that something like this was going on in the development team of Shenmue too,
especially if you keep in mind how expensive that whole thing was.
This was not some kind of work at a desk with fresh flowers and sunshine in your face.
Again, its not about supporting this or that, but i'm pretty sure that this way of thinking
on how to make games back then and how they handle this stuff today,
totally leads to different projects.
The times of actual computer nerds working their asses of for actual unique and fresh games is over.
There is no need for them because their work established todays gaming standards.
People working in the top studios today are simply doing their job.
Todays big video game market with its top developers and publishers has nothing to do
with the market of 2001.
So if you think that publisher X should just get the same team as 20 years ago
and just re create this same unique thing again but more modern or unique but fresh ...
chances are extremely high that its not going to work.
These special type of games back then worked, because they were products of their time.
Think about what type of games are considered normal by todays standards,
GTA 5, RDR 2, Skyrim, Elden Ring, ...
you are never ever going to impress todays audience with a Shenmue game or some german RPG.
Imagine how high the budget and quality / detail level has to be to keep up with todays standards,
especially the AAA market.
Its not going to work on the same level as in 2001.
