Hyenas Gamescom Interview - This Is A More Intelligent Game Than It Lets On

thegamer.com:

I have no idea what Hyenas really is, and that's a huge problem. I was a little unsure about the game from the reveal trailer, but figured 'hey, they wanted to make a big splash and now they'll take the time to break the game down a little bit'. Flashforward to Gamescom, and I now know a lot about how the game plays, but nothing about what it actually is. This is even after a ten minute gameplay presentation and an in-depth interview with Sega’s Alex Hunnisett, the game’s live product director, for around the same amount of time. My biggest issue is that the game he described, what he told me it represents, wants to say, and stands for, sounds excellent. But I'm not sure it exists. Nothing that I have seen from any of the game's trailers, press releases, or indeed the gameplay presentation itself suggests anything close to that game will be what I play when Hyenas launches next year.

Here is the crux of my issue with Hyenas. Culture is becoming more and more IP obsessed, with everything getting a franchise, a spin-off, a cinematic universe. Media's popularity is rapidly becoming entirely dependent on 'hey it's that guy from that thing!', and stories are worse for it. Hyena's central aim of collecting pop culture trinkets seems to play into that. The gameplay presentation even revelled in it, gleefully detailing the how the Sega Genesis features in the game, including an indulgent joke about the Mega Drive. At one point the narrator woops "yay capitalism?" in a confused tone, and that's about as sharp as the satire gets. Meanwhile, staff joke about the irony of giving away free tote bags in the Sega booth when the game is a critique of capitalism - I smile and nod, having clearly missed the joke.

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