Games that killed Franchises?

[calthaer]

I still think Warcraft II is the best they've ever made).

What about Warcraft III? I thought that game was a lot of fun, and definitely better than WC2. I went back and tried to play WC2, but without some of the innovations in RTS in the last 10-15 years (whenever it was I tried to play it again), I found it almost unplayable. For example: you couldn't assign units to a "squad" (1-0) and then send them places...you had to select all units every time you wanted to give an order.

And I'll end with a completely personal one: Metroid Prime does not exist and the series ended on the Super Nintendo. I don't think Nintendo will ever make a true Metroid IV.

What about Metroid Fusion? Zero Mission was kind of a remake of the original, but it did expand upon it. Either one of those was a pretty solid entry in the series, IMO.

[TRM]

And I'll end with a completely personal one: Metroid Prime does not exist and the series ended on the Super Nintendo. I don't think Nintendo will ever make a true Metroid IV.

I feel this way as well.

As someone else mentioned a few posts earlier, I also felt as though Castlevania SOTN killed that series. I enjoyed that game, but have always felt that the countless sequels of this style really destroyed the true feel of the Castlevania series, i.e. 1 - IV. The switch from 2D to 3D did not bother me, and I enjoyed the two Castlevania games on the N64. I felt that the second one was what the first game should have been, if it had not been rushed to meet deadlines, but I enjoyed part one as well. This is akin to me liking both Super Mario Bros. 1, 3 and World, and also enjoying Super Mario 64 and the Galaxy games. But a series of 2D Castlevania games that play in the style of (the real) Metroid and not in the style of Castlevania? SOTN was fun, but one of those was enough, please give me a true Castlevania game again!

[TonyTheTiger]

It may be too soon to tell but Cruis'n for Wii could have killed the franchise and might have even helped kill Midway itself.

[exit]

The 2008 Alone in the Dark reboot pretty much buried a franchise that was on life support for quite some time. It didn't help that they released a "fixed" version for the PS3 that only put a band aid on game that was hemorrhaging with issues, which is tragic since the game really did have some good ideas.

[Richter Belmount]

Speaking of poor 3D games, what about Bubsy 3D? I've been playing both and well, they really are as bad as people say.

Your a idiot that game is a masterpiece!

[Kiddo]

I'm kind of bummed out that this has become more an opinion-fest about "when I think X game franchise jumped the shark" rather than proper analysis of "X franchise that hasn't had a sequel in years because a poor market performance led to publishers avoiding making sequels".

Let me think of games that haven't had a sequel (not counting any simple ports or rehashes) in over a decade, even if logically one could be well-done, probably because a particular game entry performed poorly in the market;

1) A few game franchises appeared to be buried along with the Satellaview - in particular the last Famicom Tantei Club game is still "BS Tantei Club", and "Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman Zero" is the last Shockman game. It appears to occur quite often that a franchise released on a platform that isn't a success tends to not be renewed even if it could easily find success outside said platform. There's probably a good amount of other "Franchises that went down with the console" as well, as I can recall a few sequel-laden franchises on the PC-FX, Dreamcast, and Wonderswan that abruptly stopped when those systems expired.

2) In fact, let me get to the DC now; off the top of my head, the Dreamcast has the Power Stone games, the Shenmue saga, and Space Channel 5.

3) There hasn't been a new "Cyber Troopers Virtual On" proper game since "MARZ", probably because "Oratorio Tangram" is still the pinnacle of the franchise, and since then the newer entries attempted taking it in different directions with mixed results.

4) In a bizarre case of a media tie-in killing a franchise, the F-Zero: GP Legend anime not performing in Japan and not even being dubbed past 12 episodes in America appears to have killed the F-Zero franchise as opposed to any particular game entry. I find this rather sad myself, since the games were great and, while I still don't know an extreme amount about the anime, no one really gave it a chance.

[TonyTheTiger]

I find this rather sad myself, since the games were great and, while I still don't know an extreme amount about the anime, no one really gave it a chance.

Which is funny since one scene of Captain Falcon performing the Falcon Punch became something of a YouTube sensation. I think it goes to show that the series simply started too damn slowly. By the time stuff started happening the ship had sailed.

[Aussie2B]

I can recall a few sequel-laden franchises on the PC-FX, Dreamcast, and Wonderswan that abruptly stopped when those systems expired.

Hmmm, I can't think of anything like that on the PC-FX, unless you're counting the Anime Freak series which weren't games anyway. Most of the PC-FX library is one-offs and sequels in series that started on other systems (and either continued on past said entry or the game was on multiple systems so the death couldn't really be attributed to the PC-FX). Maybe you're thinking of the PC Engine?

Although the cancellation of Tengai Makyou III for PC-FX definitely didn't do the series any favors, and it probably hurt the PC-FX even more. Who knows, maybe the system could've been somewhat of a success had it got that crucial game. The FMV fighter definitely wasn't what Japanese players really wanted. The series did move successfully forward, though, what with the Saturn game and the PS2 Tengai Makyou III. The series does seem dead and buried at this point, though, since the GBA and PS2 games just didn't seem to have the impact of the PC Engine classics.

[Edmond Dantes]

What about Warcraft III? I thought that game was a lot of fun, and definitely better than WC2. I went back and tried to play WC2, but without some of the innovations in RTS in the last 10-15 years (whenever it was I tried to play it again), I found it almost unplayable. For example: you couldn't assign units to a "squad" (1-0) and then send them places...you had to select all units every time you wanted to give an order.

Actually you *can* group them into squads. IIRC you have to highlight the units then press Ctrl + number, then pressing that number always picks that squad.

Also, you can mass-select by holding down the button and dragging the mouse anyway.

I've never played Warcraft III but when I heard about some of the plot directions it sounded... iffy.

What about Metroid Fusion? Zero Mission was kind of a remake of the original, but it did expand upon it. Either one of those was a pretty solid entry in the series, IMO.

Never played either one. I kinda wanted to, but after Prime I started having my doubts... especially since near everyone else liked Prime and I was like, "if they like Prime, and they like Fusion, and I hated Prime..."

If I ever find it cheap and boxed though, I might consider.

I feel this way as well.

As someone else mentioned a few posts earlier, I also felt as though Castlevania SOTN killed that series. I enjoyed that game, but have always felt that the countless sequels of this style really destroyed the true feel of the Castlevania series, i.e. 1 - IV. The switch from 2D to 3D did not bother me, and I enjoyed the two Castlevania games on the N64. I felt that the second one was what the first game should have been, if it had not been rushed to meet deadlines, but I enjoyed part one as well. This is akin to me liking both Super Mario Bros. 1, 3 and World, and also enjoying Super Mario 64 and the Galaxy games. But a series of 2D Castlevania games that play in the style of (the real) Metroid and not in the style of Castlevania? SOTN was fun, but one of those was enough, please give me a true Castlevania game again!

I agree, but for a different reason: I honestly felt like Circle of the Moon etc. just weren't as good as SOTN. SOTN was good because it was well designed and interesting, but the GBA trilogy felt rather half-hearted IMO.

I never got to play the third one (Aria of Sorrow, I think?) though.

[kedawa]

Fusion isn't that great.
Zero Mission is reason enough to never play the original again.

[Crocket]

I suppose you can throw in Final Fight StreetWise too. I don't think that game's even in the Street Fighter/Final Fight canon anymore(If it ever was).

[Robocop2]

Zero Mission is reason enough to never play the original again.

I couldn't agree more

[Vlcice]

I suppose you can throw in Final Fight StreetWise too. I don't think that game's even in the Street Fighter/Final Fight canon anymore(If it ever was).

Streetwise and Revenge were the one-two punch that killed the series. Revenge may not have come out over here, but it made sure no one in Japan would ever care about Final Fight again...

[Baloo]

Reading through it again, I don't think he meant those were all bad games, just series that got lacklustre sequels or were neglected entirely.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Not in the sense that those games are bad, just totally ignored. Franchise. You can throw in Shenmue 2, Virtua Fighter, etc. in there as well. Though I suppose it's better that Outrun 2 and Panzer Dragoon Orta and Sega Rally GT and some of those other games WERE good so that the series didn't get tarnished at least.

I feel this way as well.

As someone else mentioned a few posts earlier, I also felt as though Castlevania SOTN killed that series. I enjoyed that game, but have always felt that the countless sequels of this style really destroyed the true feel of the Castlevania series, i.e. 1 - IV. The switch from 2D to 3D did not bother me, and I enjoyed the two Castlevania games on the N64. I felt that the second one was what the first game should have been, if it had not been rushed to meet deadlines, but I enjoyed part one as well. This is akin to me liking both Super Mario Bros. 1, 3 and World, and also enjoying Super Mario 64 and the Galaxy games. But a series of 2D Castlevania games that play in the style of (the real) Metroid and not in the style of Castlevania? SOTN was fun, but one of those was enough, please give me a true Castlevania game again!

I agree, I miss the old style Castlevania. Never cared for the Metroid-vania stuff, too RPG-like for my tastes, and I hate wandering around aimlessly in games.

It may be too soon to tell but Cruis'n for Wii could have killed the franchise and might have even helped kill Midway itself.

Midway went bankrupt a ways back, got bought out by WB.

[ishashobar]

A few game franchises appeared to be buried along with the Satellaview - in particular the last Famicom Tantei Club game is still "BS Tantei Club", .....

But... the SuFami version of Famicom Tantei Club 2 came out over a year after the Satellaview game, just like the Heisei Shin Onigashima carts.

[Ackman]

I agree, I miss the old style Castlevania. Never cared for the Metroid-vania stuff, too RPG-like for my tastes, and I hate wandering around aimlessly in games.

This x 1000 I hate metrovania, meh. Bring back the oldschool style! I hate people complaining about games being linear, okay so you have a big world hub and now you have slog from place to place looking at your map, getting confused sometimes, *newsflash* it's still linear! It's just pointless busywork and padding to make the game longer. I wonder how many hours are spent wondering around getting lost and traveling from place to place in these marathon hour games, meh.

[Edmond Dantes]

Zero Mission is reason enough to never play the original again.

I have yet to play a video game remake that was better than the original incarnation.

(Keep in mind I said "remake," not "port.")

[Ackman]

What about Double Dragon Advance?

[Edmond Dantes]

Haven't played it.

Oh by the way, I came up with another game that killed a franchise:

The Cheetahmen II

[T2KFreeker]

Dunno if it was said, but something must be said about Bubsy 3D. Even though a VERY acquired taste, 99% of people hate the game and nobody absolutely loves it either. The nail in the coffin of that series for sure.