Dredge Animated Trailer Review
This trailer for Dredge is a fantastic animated trailer which does a great job of presenting its hooky premise, and leaving you wanting more.
In the first shot it's a sunny day as we see a fishing boat puttering along. The sun rises as the fisherman walks from his boat to the fishmonger. The door rings and we see a paltry little fish which is exchanged for one coin.
The fisherman heads back out at night, and the next day has a handful of fish for which he receives a small handful of coins. The music builds in tempo and the next day he comes back with a swordfish which yields a much larger pile of coins. The fisherman hammers his boat to fix it up, and heads out again.
This time the weather looks much more cloudy and ominous. He returns with a large octopus, for which he is handsomely rewarded. He fixes up his boat and heads out once again. Upon his return, the air and fog are an otherworldly red. His haul shows misshapen fish, some with many more than two eyes, multiple heads, grotesque teeth, emanating red energy. The music is prickly and uneasy. The fishmonger's eyes grow wide as he examines the fish and rewards the fisherman with a pile of paper bills.
This is a great example of very linear progression that works. The great art direction helps tremendously too.
The fisherman affixes a large spotlight to his boat and heads out once again. The music takes a dramatic turn with a chorus as the fisherman is out in the midst of a red night. When his spotlight sputters on, it reveals a stone in the water with a glowing rune on it. Then it cuts to the main title with the release date.
I absolutely love this trailer. It essentially shows five game loops, then ends at the beginning of the sixth. In a very linear structure, things get progressively more interesting. After the first two loops the question is planted: "What sort of fish will the fisherman come back with next?" The true hook of the game doesn't reveal itself until about halfway through the trailer. For some game trailers this would be sort of late, but here the anticipation of the first several loops makes the payoff shot that much better.
The other reason this animated trailer works so well is specific to the game genre and mechanics. This is a fishing game, which don't typically have THAT much variation in how they're played. While they can be as different as Fishing Planet and Moonglow Bay, I feel like knowing a game is about fishing doesn't create many questions about how it will play.
Animated and cinematic trailers I think are best when they’re heavily dramatized depictions of what the player does in the game (like upgrade a boat). The further they stray fro the player verbs, the more disappointing they can be.
This is very different from if an animated trailer showed a fantasy character with a sword slashing at enemies. That could be a: rogue-like action game, turn-based tactical game, realtime tactics game, 3rd person action game, 1st person shooter game, League of Legends style game, card-battler game, Vampire Survivors game, MMO, side-scrolling metroidvania, Japanese RPG, Western Computer RPG... (you get the point)
Because the game is steeped in a role with lends itself to a very particular set of verbs, it's easier for the potential player to imagine themselves playing even if they don't know precisely how the fishing is done in the game. They don't know what buttons they'll be pushing, but they know they'll repeatedly go fishing, and catch different sorts of fish. And, unlike other fishing games, the fish they'll eventually catch will be some sort of Eldritch Cosmic Horror fish.
And of course, we also understand exchanging fish for money which is used to maintain and/or upgrade your boat. This trailer works well because despite having no player-controlled gameplay footage, I can see myself playing this and experiencing this story. My assumption is the fishing will involve some degree of sailing a boat, and playing minigames to fish (which I found to be entirely accurate after playing the game's demo).
This is a great: “Theres more… but you have to play to see it” shot.
This is a great example of a story which works by itself but also speaks to the heavily dramatized player experience. It's of course made all the better by the fact it does feel like it matches the experience of playing the game.
On Team 17's YouTube channel they released a full version of this trailer which I enjoy as a self contained story, but as a trailer I think doesn't work as well. By showing what happens after the boat approaches the red rune in the stone, they show a vision of what may happen in the future. This provides a somewhat more satisfying ending (which is what makes it fun to watch), as opposed to the version on IGN which leaves you with an itch in your mind as to what will happen next. They are both great, but the shorter version is much better tease.
Animated trailers are always somewhat risky, especially if the art style is too far off from the gameplay. At worst, this can create a bait-and-switch feeling in the audience. I find they're most effective when they come after some initial gameplay reveal so people don't feel like they're being distracted by something prettier and better than the actual game. It's most risky to make them for announce trailers, but for somewhere in the middle of the campaign, or the very end, they can be very effective at selling the premise, mood, and also production value of the game.
Top marks for Dredge's animated trailer! (The game is a lot of fun, I highly recommend it)
