Blade Runner: Enhanced Edition disappoints buyers and makers of a fan restoration

Released this week, the Enhanced Edition of Westwood’s classic Blade Runner does not generate much excitement immediately after launch.

Among other things, the remaster is available on GOG, where it has replaced a previously available version of the original, which you now only get as a bonus when you buy the Enhanced Edition.

dissatisfied fans

This old version was a fan-made SummVM restoration of Blade Runner. ScummVM member Thomas “madmoose” Fach-Pedersen expressed his disappointment with this development on Twitter.

“Over a number of years, along with friends, I have lovingly reverse engineered Westwood’s Blade Runner for ScummVM, bringing the game back to life and helping GOG put it back for sale,” the statement reads. “We didn’t ask for anything and we got nothing else than the honor of being able to work on it.”

Additional Blade Runner: Enhanced Edition news:

“Now Nightdive Studios have released their ‘Enhanced’ version. It’s ugly and buggy by all accounts, and doesn’t offer any tangible advantages over ScummVM, apart from very poor console support. They even forgot to give me a credit for to give the subtitles that we left them to.”

“Unfortunately, it’s now no longer possible to buy and play a digital copy of Blade Runner in ScummVM without getting paid for it by Nightdive Studios. It saddens me how GOG has treated our free work as a mere appendage to a mediocre, someone else’s paid product.”

The reactions to GOG and Steam are correspondingly negative. A few select comments on Blade Runner Enhanced Edition:

• “What the…? How is that even possible? Look at the writing! Look at the menus! Look at those blurry backgrounds! Look at the… I mean, oh my god! I can’t believe that this is a finished product. Please don’t waste money or time on this ‘Enhanced’ joke. Get the original with the ScummVM emulator.”
• “What a disaster. The original is one of the best games ever, thanks largely to the excellent atmosphere. This completely takes away the atmosphere and makes it a game half as good as the original was. Absolute rubbish.”
• “This is what the original game looks like standing in the rain with tears in your eyes.”