What would it take to make a NEW Wipeout ? -Estimate from those who know.

[mannjon]

Let me explain some of the reasons why the USA might be part of the problem. And before I get too many evil looks, for those who don't know, I am an American and I take no shame in being honest about what I've seen and heard here. First and foremost games aren't what they used to be, I think there is no argument there. I would even say they are worse in general despite better graphics which half of the gamers around here (in the US) find the most important aspect anyways. Many of the gamers here also are PC gamers who don't even have access to a wo title except the original and xl or emulated versions of anything before HD or Fury: that is problem number one. Wipeout is gorgeous, but Horizon Zero Dawn it is not. That, and it isn't on Steam which is HUGE here.

Modern games are watered down instant gratification machines that excel when the entry difficulty is easy enough that you get a silver trophy just for buying the damn thing. People don't want to get good. They want to just be good from the start without working for it. Wipeout has always had an extremely high entry skill level which is unattractive to the casual gamers that buy things like Mario Kart instead (no hate btw, I own it on the Wii, Wii U, and now the Switch). People like the fact that it takes very little skill to win. If you are no good at MK, just use the op super weapon only "awarded" to those in last place to jump ahead of your friend who has skillfully mastered each turn. Little to no skill is involved. Some of this is a generational thing. Plain and simple, we (as in the older pilots who played the original PS1 games when they first came out), didn't have all the bells and whistles and the game industry was still in infancy. We played what we had and there were fewer choices. You played a game because you liked it. There were no trophies. Games were just harder by comparison and partly because there was less motivating people to play games to completion without trophies to extend a game beyond the normal story. I almost hate to play in a US lobby because I'm afraid people will rage quit on me, or drop out of a lobby. There are very few elite pilots in the US compared to Europe, so being massacred on your first race is enough for a lot of more casual pilots in the US to just give up without ever giving it a chance. They have no motive to actually get good enough to compete. So they go back to their COD's or Battlefields and camp in sniper spots (no offense to you fans out there of either of those games, you aren't who I'm talking about otherwise you wouldn't be reading this post or thread).

The FPS games have absolutely dominated the market on a global scale. This automatically places a title like Wipeout in the niche category and it receives little to no hype at all which drives games (with out hype no one would have bought No Man's Sky here, a game that I love and knew well enough beforehand what I was getting). The major retail stores here don't even stock it. I preordered mine from Gamestop. There were only 3 preorders for the highest volume store in a wealthy area, and one of those was my sister "mannemily". Target doesn't carry it. Walmart doesn't either. Bestbuy doesn't too. And when I went back to Gamestop to preorder the FFXII remaster the next day, my heart sank when I saw a used copy on the wall after just 1 day post-release. They should make a Gold trophy called "Racing With Unicorns" where it pops when you get beat by someone playing in a US region. They should also have a bronze one called "This is Likely The Only Trophy You'll Get" that pops when someone playing in an US region installs it to their PS4. I hate to say it, we suck at AG racing here (I don't and the other few that bought it here don't of course), but there is no hype at all. I suspect that a lot of the US players for HD/Fury only got it after the price drop (once again, no offense to the other pilots this does not apply to). I'm trying to give a general overview of how people perceive it in my area. It might be different in other places in the US. I saw no marketing, no commercials, no hype, and the only preorder bonus we got here was the Van Uber. Please someone send me a steel book, because they don't exist on this continent.
CORRECTION: Best Buy is now carrying it in my area, there were no preorders apparently, and their shipment was delayed (according to a friend that saw it and told me about this), but at least it is getting some coverage now from a Big Box Retailer.

I've spoke with a lot of people my age and they all seem to remember playing Wipeout back in the old days and probably didn't even know it exists still. It is almost like Sony US has a personal vendetta against it, and it received no marketing coverage at all. I work for the government here as a contractor for UAV training programs. If that doesn't fit the bill for target demographic for a game like this, I don't know what does. But all my peers, and literally ALL of them in a large room chocked full of ace developers that write training software for unmanned aircraft with weapons (sound familiar???) obsess about Overwatch's new DLC. They don't care about Wipeout, and despite many of them looking to get that 0.1% new trophy for Overwatch simply because it is a "badge of skill", when asked why they didn't have interest in Wipeout conceded that they "didn't have time for it." Yet I see all of them online playing Overwatch until late at night. I would give anything for just 1 person out of a building of 1,000s of people to say to me "Oh Wipeout Omega? Hell ya! What is your screen name? Have you finished the campaign yet?" That will never happen here. I spread the word when I can. But going up against mannjon for a first race will not be conducive to a good online experience for beginners. I'm not going to sellout by acting like I can't race just for the purpose of trying to get someone interested. That isn't the spirit of Wipeout gameplay, and it never has been.

And... let's be honest. Would you want a watered down new pilot friendly Wipeout game anyway? Based on all the "how do I get to rank 50" posts, it would seem like Wipeout fans don't like grinding for trophies. I sure as Hell don't. For Wipeout to be mainstream here, it would need to be easier. It would need to be easier to the point that us experienced pilots (or new committed pilots) wouldn't even recognize it anymore. The only way this could theoretically work is by having a matchmaking system. But anyone who was playing HD on the PS3 up until launch of Omega knows that just finding an online lobby at all was challenging enough (of course HD is a 9 year old game now).

What we really need here is a competitive scene that puts pro's together at some play-off for money (like they do for Tekken and Street Fighter) or exposure. That would significantly raise people's awareness. Nothing wrong with streaming, but to generate any hype here, some US pilot needs to go become the poster boy (or girl) expert and compete in a massive tournament somewhere, and make it look good too. It really has to be that grandiose, or no one will pay attention. The same people I work with (who are all super amazing people by the way) watch Overwatch matches at work on their second monitor in the background. There is a market for it that just doesn't exist with streaming. I watched all of the Equilibrium Tournament footage a few years ago myself. That wasn't exactly a Youtube sensation.

I just worry that they will make a totally new Wipeout game that never makes it here. That might be the only way to actually move forward to a new game. That same logic applied to the release of Xenoblade, which actually was eventually brought here by enough fans making their voices heard, and we got a Spiritual successor and now a direct sequel, so there is a small ray of hope. It is a sad thing for me to consider but I feel as though I'm in the vast minority here, and to have any hope of a new game, we would need to have that type of support before it ever happens.