Franchises that failed to "evolve"

[oxymoron]

Dr. Muto

It didn't sell well in the first place but It seems to be a pretty good game. My guess is that their goal was to make it into a franchise. I say that due to the game looking very susceptible. It probably would have made it too if It had gotten more exposure.

Edit: typo

[Xeogred]

I'll never find a JRPG that is as engaging as Mass Effect, unfortunately. Now that's a series, its ending aside, which evolved rather well from its KoToR roots.

Definitely not in terms of roleplaying, though. I mean the trend is apparent in the ME trilogy itself, by the game the dialogue choices became more and more limited and the games are just so black and white. KOTOR II blows it out of the water in terms of being able to play truly neutral and other variations.

Definitely love the series myself, but Obsidian writers would have made it 100x better.

[Pulsar_t]

I'll never find a JRPG that is as engaging as Mass Effect, unfortunately. Now that's a series, its ending aside, which evolved rather well from its KoToR roots.

Definitely not in terms of roleplaying, though. I mean the trend is apparent in the ME trilogy itself, by the game the dialogue choices became more and more limited and the games are just so black and white. KOTOR II blows it out of the water in terms of being able to play truly neutral and other variations.

Definitely love the series myself, but Obsidian writers would have made it 100x better.

Didn't Obsidian kickstart a project of their own? Hopefully it'll be better than the recent Shadowrun and its tablet-y interface.

[BogusMeatFactory]

A lot of Sega Franchises are guilty of this sin. As previously stated with Golden Axe, the same could be said of Altered Beast's sequel, Nights, Samba De Amigo (although Samba De Amigo isn't totally their fault, they weren't given the Wii Motion Plus to work with, which could have fixed some issues).

with Nights, they tried to evolve, in an awkward and unusual way. By trying to implement more of a story, voice acting etc. they killed the magic of what Nights was.

I found that Sega was a master of telling a story with little being said in the past. The Sonic games of the Genesis era told a simple story perfectly and it was fun and entertaining. The same with Nights on the Saturn.

Mentioned in the original post, Street Fighter is evolving, but it has a problem that the fighting game genre always has; those evolutions are only noticeable to the die-hard fans. SFIV created new mechanics like the Focus Attacks, really changed the game and added a new level of depth to the series. The problem with Focus Attacks is that the uninitiated won't know how to use them properly, if they know it is there at all.

I think that some franchises need to evolve, whereas others need to stick to their roots. It all depends on how the game is made. The Dynasty Warriors series needs to evolve and utilize the technology to create new mechanics and new ways to play the franchise, while keeping some of its roots intact. Sonic, needs to go lighter on story and try to convey it more simply. Look at Sonic '06 and you can see the fan-fiction clusterfuck that is that games story.

[Pulsar_t]

Thank you, you explained the gist of my topic better than I could We can add Yakuza, although I haven't played the fifth entry. It's still really Shenmue with bigger towns.

[Sasha_Blue]

Psychonauts. It's such an underrated game and beloved within the PC community. It's easily a 9 out of 10 and yet not many people heard of it outside into the mainstream.

[Gunstar Green]

I think that some franchises need to evolve, whereas others need to stick to their roots.

Pretty much this. I think some franchises or even entire genres are trickier than others when it comes to modernizing them without losing what made the franchise good or loved in the first place.

[oxymoron]

Psychonauts. It's such an underrated game and beloved within the PC community. It's easily a 9 out of 10 and yet not many people heard of it outside into the mainstream.

I just bought a copy.

[Pulsar_t]

Psychonauts doesn't really concern us in this topic. It was a one-off platformer and its creator has moved on to other projects.

[Sasha_Blue]

Psychonauts doesn't really concern us in this topic. It was a one-off platformer and its creator has moved on to other projects.

It concerns me so