I don’t know about Defiance… I played in a sneak preview weekend thing, and I ended up shutting it off after like twenty minutes and uninstalling. I felt like the entire presentation was so mediocre. It felt, as I guess you’d expect, like a game that was being slapped together and pushed out the door to coincide with a TV show. The whole “movie franchise video game tie-in” phenomenon, except on a larger more committed scale, in that this is a game they hope people will continue to play for a duration.

However the concept, I have to admit, is intriguing. The show hasn’t started airing yet, but there’s a factor that may end up playing into consideration, and that’s “What if the show is so enjoyable that it elevates the game above ‘meh’?” What I mean is, if Battlestar Galactica (another SyFy series and one that I really enjoyed) had launched with an ongoing video game tie-in that would share and receive influence with the show… I might have played it despite any shortcomings. My enjoyment of the show might have made me excited enough to overlook issues with the game, just to be a part of the world for a while.

I haven’t seen Defiance: The Show. It doesn’t air for another couple of weeks, so it’s far too early to tell if it will be good, let alone stick around for multiple seasons/develop a large fanbase. But I’ll certainly check it out.

I tried the game probably a couple of months ago. I was clearly not impressed. I have, however, received a lot of feedback from readers that have played it more recently that thought it was pretty good. Could it have changed enough in a couple of months to turn my opinion from “meh” to “pretty decent”? I suppose so.

I’m going to end up checking it out this week regardless, since Gamestop refused to cancel my online pre-order. It will be showing up at my doorstep despite my best efforts, so I figure I’ll just give it another chance to make an impression.

I’d like it to suddenly be engaging and interesting… I’d also like the show to be really solid… I’m rooting for the whole project, really. But I wouldn’t bet any money on it.