While the last bit seems true and I would like to have games soften their needlessly rough edges, some games are easier to redo than the others, and most require making decisive stylistic choices, some making it either a worthy tribute or a shitshow. I think, there can be a low-tier study examining and classificating different approaches.

Take for example Quake 1, that was aimed at delivering QoL-oriented updates without changing anything else. Or Yakuza series having a couple of generations of remasters that did have a huge benefit of reusing world scenery, animations and movesets, models across many games. Then, Pathologic 2 that required a complete recreation. And, in contrast to that, purely visual updates, sometimes of questionable value.

From the management standpoint, remasters are more predictable and usually more streamlined than creating original content. Take Diablo II Reforged. Devs had D4 engine ready, D2 as a reference and D3 as an anti-reference since it’s presentation was rather unpopular. There were nearly no unpredictable parts and all teams in this project can start working right away. It could be easily outsourced, also one can borrow some experts from other teams short-term rather than having them full-time. This isn’t only cheaper, it also synergetic with existing projects and comfortably manageable.

But I can see deeper remastering works being unpopular not because they are more expensive than asset swaps, but because, well, to pitch that before the board of directors, you need to, first, know the value of mechanical changes yourself, and second, having board understanding it too or at least become convinced by your rhetoric. That’s so if everything is transparent, and these changes aren’t happening under the table after securing the budget first, that, I believe, is how it sometimes happens. The board usually can’t tell the difference in handling gameplay and the only thing they can discern is graphical fidelity between original and projected result, the efficiency of the workflow, the budget. While I can tell some more involved scene like fighting games have people educated about the importance of game mechanics, frame-sync etc, I’m sure that games made for more general public get greenlit by the least curious decision-makers. That select layer of governance is probably why the word ‘remaster’ sometimes gets perceived as a pejorative.