2 great PS3 and Xbox 360-era games that need a remaster

Recently, Pomu Rainpuff of Nijisanji EN — one of my absolute favourite VTubers and just favourite all-around personalities on YouTube, for that matter — did a playthrough of the 2013 game Metal Gear Rising Revengeance. Not only was this playthrough an unbelievably entertaining thing to watch, but it got me thinking about some of those games that came out in the early 2010s that came and just sort of dwindled out… games that could do with a remaster. 

So, I want to list off a couple of titles that I loved from this era of games that I believe deserve some kind of re-release, remaster, or sequel — as unlikely or maybe downright impossible as that may be. Let us begin!

God-tier cover art by @Xsidia.

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance

Of course, this was going to be on the list; this game is the reason that I’m writing this piece right now and it’s a game that has only gotten better over time. And considering more recent events in the world, it honestly seems downright hilarious looking back. I do want to seriously shout out Pomu’s playthrough of the game though; please go and watch it if you’re a fan of either VTubers or Metal Gear Rising — it’s peak entertainment. 

So, my relationship with Metal Gear Rising goes something like this — I never played the Metal Gear games growing up on the early PlayStation consoles, but I remember seeing the first trailer for Metal Gear Rising and absolutely loving the way Raiden was designed. This mostly machine super-soldier whose whole thing was slicing literally anyone and everything up into hundreds of tiny pieces — genius. This game would also be my first interaction with something made by Platinum Games, and this resulted in me playing Bayonetta and Nier Automata. 

This game is as hammy and corny as they come, and the game absolutely owns it and uses it in such a way that it doesn’t take away from the experience — it bloody enhances it! The characters are memorable as well, especially Jetstream Sam, the true rival to Raiden throughout the game… and how could we ever forget Senator Armstrong. This final boss appears for less than an hour in total, and yet he has become such a memorable character thanks to his hammy animations and incredible speeches as he battles Raiden. 

Finally, the music — good Lord, the soundtrack in this game might be one of the most phenomenal uses of music in video games. Metal Gear Rising’s soundtrack not only makes you feel like a badass cyborg-ninja, it also gives you insights into characters’ mindsets as you fight them. Considering how amazing the songs are on a purely instrumental level, having the addition of the music telling a character’s inner thoughts and feelings makes the game even more amazing in my mind.

A remaster of this game would allow a whole new audience to experience it for the first time — plus I bet the additional power the new consoles bring to the table could make the whole thing look even more spectacular than it already is.

Asura’s Wrath

This is the other game that I always think of when it comes to bringing a game from the PS3 era to modern consoles: a whole new audience deserves to be able to partake in and experience what I can only call a spectacle of video game cinematics. If you’ve played any of the Naruto Storm games or are familiar with CyberConnect 2 then you’ll know just how good these guys are when it comes to making quick-time events fun — and this game is full of them.

Asura’s Wrath is a game about gods, greed, deception, betrayal, but most of all it’s about a dad getting very angry after his daughter is kidnapped and his wife is killed by those he thought were his allies — understandable, to say the least. Asura then proceeds to run through every other god who stands in his way as he rampages his way up to the top to kill the man in charge of this entire scheme.

This game is absolutely bonkers, and I really mean it takes “larger than life” and multiplies that by 200… and then it does it again. Combine this with the insane cinematic sequences during boss fights throughout the game and you have a recipe for some of the most out of this world and memorable encounters in video games — I think everyone is probably familiar with Asura vs Wyzen by now.

Asura’s Wrath was one of those games where I can remember walking into a game store here in the UK, browsing the games for a while, and deciding on it purely because of the box art. It was at a time when I was at the age where I didn’t really mind trying out a completely new game that I had never heard of (This is my life now, and I’m way older than you – Ed.)… and thank God I did.

A remaster of this game would be fantastic, because not only would it be great to see new people experiencing this game for the first time, it would be an opportunity for us to finally get a “Complete Edition” of the game featuring all the DLC bundled in with the main game.

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There’s plenty more games from this era of gaming that could benefit from a rerelease — what are some of your favourites? Let us know down in the comments or via the usual social channels!

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