Failed Series Reboots

[Nz17]

Rather than giving new series to us, or true sequels or spin-offs to continue a story, it has become vogue for publishers and developers to give gamers endless reboots of series. From big studios to indie games, reboots seem to dot the landscape. Even series that don't have a lot of character or story depth to catch up with tend to reboot only for the "fun" of it.

As you can imagine, most seasoned gamers don't want reboots. We are invested in the characters and stories as-is and want continuations of those. And many cry out for innovation, to bring new game-play or story elements to the table as new series. But new entries in established series sell whether they are reboots or not.

What are some failed reboots, remakes which just didn't work for you? Granted, failure is in the eye of the beholder, so you can establish what "failing" means in your posts. What titles just didn't need a modern day "re-imagining?" And conversely, what would benefit from a modern day remake?

[Tupin]

Bomberman: Act Zero is an obvious one.

Any Spyro game after Year of the Dragon.

[SpaceHarrier]

Sonic the Hedgehog (2006)

Easy target, I know. It was marketed as a fresh start, yet seems to lazily follow the Sonic Adventure mold. Except it lacks all competence. It's buggy, Sonic is s-l-o-w, the hub world is too big and full of dum-dums looking to have their problems solved, the story's pacing is wacko, the objectives are unclear, and this is all in the first hour of gameplay.

Ace Combat: Assault Horizon

The 'on rails' chase sequences seem to be targeted at casual fans who want things to be exciting without requiring much skill, but that isn't a deal-breaker on its own. AC games have always had their own ... thing, their own world, if you will. They always took place is a slightly futuristic, fictional Europe, often with one country laying claim to another. Not hurr fightin the middle east terrorists. TBH, I only played the first bit of this game, then decided the most fun I could have was driving my aircraft into the ground as quickly as possible.

[Jorpho]

Hmm. How about that attempt at XTREME Goemon?
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/goemon/goemon6.htm

[jonebone]

The PS3 version of Twisted Metal. Of course I was a sucker and bought it but I probably played it for a week or two tops. Just didn't have any staying power with me.

[kupomogli]

The PS3 version of Twisted Metal. Of course I was a sucker and bought it but I probably played it for a week or two tops. Just didn't have any staying power with me.

Twisted Metal is my favorite in the series. There are only two things I'm disappointed in. There are too many classic vehicles with their unique specials that are missing, while there are atleast three vehicles that have the same or similar specials as three others. There's no classic stage based mode anywhere in the game. You can do the challenge mode to set it up yourself, but you only get a single life and in that same custom mode, and you have a limited amount of parameters in comparison to what can be set up in multiplayer. In terms of stage design, random weapons, and the control of the game, it's much better than the others imo.

--

I'll say Tomb Raider. For some reason everyone loves the reboot. I don't think it's that good. The storyline is okay, how the combat handles is okay, but it's everything surrounding that. Even with the worst Tomb Raider games, the series was always about the pretty well designed 3D platforming. In the reboot, Michael Jordan inhabits Lara's body with low gravity, and platforming from area to area just isn't any fun at all. The game to me feels like how an Assassin's Creed world feels. There's is a whole bunch of random crap to find scattered every two feet around each area. The game feels more like a fetch quest the majority of the time. The only part I had fun in the game is at the beginning when the platforming started off with an Uncharted style, but shortly after it dropped off and there was very little of the Uncharted style climbing going on until the point that I decided to quit. According to the game I got 60% of the way through from the last point I remember looking.

[Edmond Dantes]

How long do you think it will be before someone besides me mentions the Devil May Cry reboot?

(I never played the game myself but I've heard it was divisive as hell)

[PizzaKat]

The Devil May Cry boot is actually really good. I enjoyed it more so than the first and second. I never played the third and fourth. Although I did miss the original Dante especially after playing him in Marvel vs Capcom 3

[Tupin]

Wasn't Bionic Commando 2009 supposed to be the start of a new series?

[YoshiM]

The new Devil May Cry wasn't bad. I couldn't get into the original series. This I could but my tastes in content has changed after becoming a father and even when the little one isn't around the violence was a bit more gratuitous than I'd like in a game.

Probably sounds weird but that's how it is. I don't even play the God of War games as it just seemed too over the top and wasn't very fun for me.

[kupomogli]

How long do you think it will be before someone besides me mentions the Devil May Cry reboot?

(I never played the game myself but I've heard it was divisive as hell)

Just about everyone who talks crap about the game, talks crap because of emo Dante. DMC1 and 3 are amazing games, but I think DmC is overall better than both. The bosses and enemies aren't as good as the third, but story is better, the combat is better, and I like the level design how you go through a unique area in each level rather than a lot of backtracking.

[Kitsune Sniper]

Wasn't Bionic Commando 2009 supposed to be the start of a new series?

Yes. Despite all its faults, the game was very entertaining. Too bad Grin no longer exists and we'll never see a sequel.

[Spartacus]

The Conflict series by Pivotal games immediately comes to my mind. I had always enjoyed playing Conflict games even though they never really were great games. The Conflict games were third person shooters that had the player controlling a four man squad. The player could freely switch back and forth between any of the squad members and could also give or take weapons and items from other members.

In the last game of the series, Conflict: Denied Ops, it was changed to a first person shooter with a two man team that were not able to exchange weapons. It seemed to be trying to recast itself into a co-op style game.

In the original Conflict games, squad members could and often did run out of ammo, which necessitated picking up enemy weapons and ammo to husband and divvy up amongst squad members running low.
In Conflict Denied Ops ammo was limitless, making it almost arcady.

The Conflict games never scored well with reviewers and Denied Ops didn't do significantly worse, but it was the last game produced by Pivotal Games.

It's a shame, because I enjoyed playing the squad style of game the Conflict games were originally and the only other game that I found similar was Microsoft's Brute Force. It's producer, Digital Anvil, has also closed down.

[Edmond Dantes]

Is the Conflict example really a series reboot?

I recall recently hearing that Ubi Soft made a reboot of the original Rainbow Six called Shadow Vanguard, which retells the first game's story but with the more modern game mechanics. All I can say is that I hope those mechanics are better than the ones in Rainbow Six: Lockdown or the game will likely just blow.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

How come no one mentioned Altered Beast: Guardian of the Realms for GBA? The game was ugly as sin and the stages horribly repetitive and drawn out. The original was good, campy fun. The sequel was not.

The Turok reboot seemed to fly under people's radar, too.

[Robocop2]

I have to vote twisted metal as well. I was woefully underwhelmed by the newest one. Story mode for only 3 characters and everything else was kind of just meh. I wanted it to just be a new game in the regular series because that was what made it fun. Playing different cars to get each ones ending.

[Gameguy]

How come no one mentioned Altered Beast: Guardian of the Realms for GBA? The game was ugly as sin and the stages horribly repetitive and drawn out. The original was good, campy fun. The sequel was not.

It can be argued that the original game wasn't any good either, it only served as a tech demo to show off the power of the new Sega Genesis console. Pretty sure that's why nobody thought of it, that or nobody remembers they made a sequel for that game.


I'm having a bit of trouble defining "reboot", do you mean rebooting a stagnant franchise with a new sequel, or by starting over the franchise with a remake or new game that doesn't tie in with previous entries?

I'm going with Splatterhouse from 2010 and Golden Axe: Beast Rider as I'm assuming the creators planned to make more sequels to those games but didn't due to lack of demand. At least I'm assuming that's what happened with those.

[Tanooki]

I'm surprised no one is going into Duke Nukem Forever which should have stayed in purgatory forever. Before that I think the last release in the style was the GBA title which was solid overall especially for the handheld, but damn did they ever blow a game that well too long to cook in the oven with those delays.

Splatterhouse I know wasn't very appreciated by many either much like the Bionic Commando game that took some pretty big heat.

[Nesmaster]

I'm surprised no one is going into Duke Nukem Forever which should have stayed in purgatory forever. Before that I think the last release in the style was the GBA title which was solid overall especially for the handheld, but damn did they ever blow a game that well too long to cook in the oven with those delays.

Splatterhouse I know wasn't very appreciated by many either much like the Bionic Commando game that took some pretty big heat.

I'm actually in the process of playing DNF right now, and while there's no denying it "bombed" and sat far too long in limbo, I'm kinda enjoying it. I went into it with zero expectations though. It's Duke in the 2010's, but feels like a 90's FPS with controls from the 2000's.

[PizzaKat]

It can be argued that the original game wasn't any good either, it only served as a tech demo to show off the power of the new Sega Genesis console. Pretty sure that's why nobody thought of it, that or nobody remembers they made a sequel for that game.


I'm having a bit of trouble defining "reboot", do you mean rebooting a stagnant franchise with a new sequel, or by starting over the franchise with a remake or new game that doesn't tie in with previous entries?

I'm going with Splatterhouse from 2010 and Golden Axe: Beast Rider as I'm assuming the creators planned to make more sequels to those games but didn't due to lack of demand. At least I'm assuming that's what happened with those.

Lol yeah that games a piece of crap, whatever you do don't play the Master System version. Good God just horrendous.