Skull and Bones and Light No Fire are chasing trends that have already gone stale

Video games take a long time to make. Longer than films and books (unless you’re George R. R. Martin). This means they don’t have any time to react to trends. If you start developing based on what’s popular now, you’ll be old news by launch.

First revealed in 2017, Ubisoft Singapore’s Skull and Bones has sailed through some treacherous seas to get to where it is today. It’s now slated for a Feb. 16, 2024 launch date, but when I watched the latest trailer, I just couldn’t see the point of it—and I’ve got an anchor tattooed on my ribs, so if I’m not excited by the pirate game, who will be? What does Skull and Bones offer that Sea of Thieves hasn’t been doing for years? Reportedly in development since 2013, it will launch 11 years later, when the golden age of piracy has truly faded for gamers.

Had Skull and Bones launched hot off the heels of Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag, it could have capitalized on our love for swashbuckling. Hell, the new trailer even had a rendition of Wellerman, a shanty that swept the internet back in 2021. If the game had managed to launch then, during this renaissance of pirate love, I could see it doing reasonably well, but now, I think the ship has sailed, crashed, and sunk to the bottom of the bay.

Pirate TV shows are doing well—Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death are both very popular—but with Sea of Thieves already out, and free, I just don’t see what Skull and Bones has to offer. Hopefully, I’m wrong, and it’s nothing like Rare’s sea-faring game, but right now, it feels like it’s doomed to be a ghost ship.

I have similar feelings about Hello Games’ Light No Fire. From the developer of No Man’s Sky comes a procedurally generated world filled with exploration and survival elements. Sounds a lot like No Man’s Sky, doesn’t it? Oh, and about a dozen other games that have come out in the last few years. Valheim is what first came to mind when I saw the trailer for Sean Murray’s latest project. I’m more hopeful for this than I am Skull and Bones because we’ve all seen how well Hello Games turned No Man’s Sky around after its disastrous launch, but I’m disappointed the studio is doing more of the same rather than pursuing something new.

There are so many multiplayer survival games out there to choose from now, what will make Light No Fire stand out? There’s Valheim, Grounded, Rust, Ark, and so many more. It’s an absolutely saturated genre, and what I’ve listed doesn’t even scratch the surface. Remember last year when Summer Games Fest had endless spooky space games? How many of those does anyone actually remember? Again, I hope I’m wrong and Light No Fire is great, but it just feels like too many developers are chasing trends rather than innovating.