Callisto Protocol (Odds of Success)

The Callisto Protocol is an upcoming sci-fi survival horror set in the distant future taking place in outer space. If this sounds familiar, it’s because the same tagline could be used for Dead Space. The big difference this time around is that The Callisto Protocol is being developed by Glen Schofield who is the creator and director of Dead Space.

The Callisto Protocol seems like where Glen Schofield wanted the Dead Space series to go before he left EA for other endeavours, which would technically make this game the spiritual successor, which in my opinion would include either the same studio or a bunch of the same staff that have departed to another studio or formed their own, which is what we have with Striking Distance as many have worked on either Dead Space 1, 2 or both.

I am already all in on The Callisto Protocol with Dead Space being somewhere in my top ten games of all time but to get a better idea for the chances of success, let’s take a look back at five of the more notable spiritual successors in gaming to determine if history is on the side of Callisto Protocol or not.

Mighty No.9 (Mega Man)

Mega Man slowed down from the ultra fast release pace of the 80’s and 90’s after the release of Mega Man 8 in 1996. It wasn’t until 2008 when Mega Man 9 was released and it was also the first game in the series to not have a physical release upon launch.

In 2013, Keiji Inafune launched a kickstarter for Mighty No. 9 with a goal of 900k that was reached in just a few days as many had fond memories for the early days of Mega Man. By the time all the public funding phases were over the game had raised over 4 million. After many delays, the game finally released in June 2016 for some platforms to very underwhelming reviews of around 50%, as the common thread was buggy and uninspired.

Bioshock (System Shock 2)

Ken Levine and Irrational Games seemed ahead of their time with System Shock 2. It combined many genres into one including FPS, survival horror and RPG. System Shock 2 was a critical success that many outlets consider to be one of the best games of all time, but commercial success was missing.

That changed in 2007 when Irrational Games released the spiritual successor BioShock. It featured many of the same themes and mechanics and BioShock was a smash across the board with a 95 review average, sales of over 2.2 million in the first year and two sequels since with a third in development.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (Castlevania)

When Koji Igarashi left Konami in 2014, he wanted to make more games in the vein of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Like many others on this list, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, turned to the fans who love the series and raised over 5.5 million on Kickstarter with one of the stretch goals being a prelude that would become Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, which would also spawn a sequel. Bloodstained was big success with a review average of 83 and in 2020, the studio announced the sales had passed 1 million.

Dark Souls (Demon’s Souls)

In 2009, Demon’s Souls came out for the PS3 and began the slow mass acceptance of Fromsoftware games that would eventually be fully reached with Elden Ring. However, since Demon’s Souls was a Sony IP and the studio wanted to continue with the formula, Fromsoftare created the spiritual successor Dark Souls so that it could be released on other platforms. To no surprise, Dark Souls continued to evolve the formula that proved popular with Demon’s Souls with punishing gameplay and imaginative worlds. Reviews floated around 90 and the studio announced that in under two years, Dark Souls had sold 2.37 million units. It also led to Dark Souls 2 and 3, which were both big hits as well.

Yooka Laylee (Banjo Kazooie)

Public funding seems to be a theme for spiritual successors. Playtonic was formed by many former Rare developers and raised over 2 million pounds for the spiritual successor to Banjo Kazooie on the N64. While Yooka Laylee felt like the Banjo games from the 90’s many critics felt the game failed to modernize the formula. Reviews averaged around 73 but it did enough to warrant a 2D side scrolling sequel, that would release a few years later to much better reviews averaging an 82.

History Repeating

The chances of success appear to be typically high when looking at the precedent of spiritual successors in gaming. When looking at these examples 4 out of 5 are considered big successes with strong sales and sequels. This leads me to the theory that gamers want something very similar to what they once loved. While this isn’t a scientific method, history has a tendency to repeat itself and The Callisto Protcol looks to have history on it’s side.