Do long running game franchises inevitably go downhill sooner or later?

[bug_of_war]

I disagree there, I'm a huge mass effect fan (still thourght ME3 was great right up untill the actual ending itself) but I never dived too deep into material outside of the main games, I dislike EA as much as anyone but their name on a product wont stop me from buying it...and I still maintain my liking for bioware but remain cautious as to their future games

[b/]in my opinion[/b] and regardless of ANYTHING else (brand name,EA, my attatchment to charachters,ect) from every single perspective, gameplay, story,logic, THE GAMES OWN LORE whatever the orginal ending is absolutly awful (I have not played the extended cut..no spoielrs), there are in depth articles that explain it better than I can

my point is the reason people fan rage over things is not always arbitrairy reasons (like EA,hate,not being happy enough or whatever) you dont have to agree but understand somtimes people have valid reasons to be pissed off

Oh I totally agree that some people appear to have legit reasons for not enjoying the ending. Gav, the bloke who does Miracle of Sound seems to have a reasonable argument as to why he didn't like the ending, also friends of mine who didn't like the game said they didn't like it because they didn't like the series in general/the ending felt somewhat contrived.

HOWEVER, while I can see you are totally not this type a person, there has been quite a lot of evidence that supports the idea that most Bioware fans seem to be very entitled/have very high expectations, and can blow things waay out of proportion. For example, after the game came out and the ending was revealed yada yada yada, people were demanding a new ending be made, and also that it come for free. Bioware decided to meet their fans half way and realease the Extended Cut for free, thus explaining more on the ending, but not changing what the had made. Some people, such as Gavin were happy to see Bioware at least listen to their fans and dropped the whole "Oh woe is me, this ending ruined everything" thing, and were now like, "Eh, the original was disapointing, but the EC made it better for me". Unfortunately though, there is still a significant portion of Bioware fans that still had some vendetta against the company, and were still unhappy with the game. Instead of just not playing the game or moving on though, they continued to complain, and when DLC was announced some demanded that it be for free.

Nearly 12 months on and we're still seeing people attack Bioware for a game that was, as you said, relatively good for most people until the last 5 minutes. Instead of moving on, and doing something like, oh I don't know, listen to the developers when they say, "After hearing complaints, and the fact that we want to continue the series, the next game is being planned, what do you want to see in it" (very poorly paraphrased) and then realise, "Hey, I can totally just tell them what I would like to see in the next game in a civil manner, and then hopefully all works out". It just frustrates me that so many people are hating on Bioware and EA when companies and developers like Nintendo, Capcom, etc do very similar things.

Anyways, I respect the fact that you didn't like the ending not because of background info etc, and it's good to see that your not one of those people whom after playing ME3 decided to retract every good statement ever made about ME 2 and 3 and come out and try and convince everyone that the series died on the second game and what not.

 

[Tropicaz]

I assume I'll get alot of people here disagreeing with me as it's not the Escapist's kind of game but Football Manager has been consistenly awesome and improving, and it's been in the current FM format sinceFM05 I think, so is on its 9th game.

 

[Stavros Dimou]

Yeah it's happening. Lots of times. Most of them actually.
Perfect Dark,James Bond,Duke Nukem,Wolfenstein,Mortal Kombat,Zelda,Bomberman,Sonic...

Very rarely though the opposite have happened too,and some series got way better than they were before,like STALKER.

But the single game series that always has been on the same level is the main Super Mario series. From Super Mario Bros to Super Mario Galaxy,Mario is still a winner.

 

[getoffmycloud]

There is an exception I can think off which is the total war series. None of them have ever been really bad, Empire was a bit wobbly at first but patches fixed most of the issues.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

A good game becomes a series, the series becomes a franchise, the franchise becomes an undead cash cow. That's how franchises roll. They're not in for the art, they're in for the quick buck. Nintendo being the lead cow-cash rancher.

Not that I'm complaining. You wanna play a downhill game series, it's nobody's business but your own (and Nintendo's!). Let's just not keep wondering aimlessly whether or not business is cynical, because I think we got the idea by now.

 

[SajuukKhar]

In some situations yes, franchises just go downhill.

However, in many situations, I think franchises "go down hill" more because fans get this notion that every single sequel HAS to top the previous game in every single way, or else it sucks, leading to unrealistic standards for games, and thus causing gamers to act like a series has gotten "worse" when, in fact, it has stayed the same.

 

[Uriain]

I think that games suffer the same pitfalls (albeit at a slower rate) that comics have. You create a good game/comic, it does well and you get a good fan base going. Your fan base now has a bar (the first game/couple of comics) in which they measure everything else against. So your second game comes out and you fall above/below that "bar".

While you start work on a third game/continue comic story, your artist gets shifted to a different project, or someone new takes over the story. Now they have their own vision of how the game/comic should be, and take it in a different direction, which may or may not be the direction the fans of the series were expecting/wanted.

Your new product comes out (with these new people at the helm) and since it doesn't match the "bar" set in the first game/run of comics, there is now backlash at this direction/art style/story arc etc.

 

[MammothBlade]

It's not inevitable that a series has a limited lifespan, but it's down to: a) the creative plasticity of the content - or how much it can be reinvented without becoming a tired parody of itself, b) the creative resources & vision put into it, and c) just how well its gameplay paradigms stand the test of time.

Games based on a story arc tend to peak as they often tread the same ground after say, the third or fourth installment. Characters might become either predictable and boring as heck or the story threads might become tangled up and increasingly ridiculous relative to the original plot. Then I'd say give it a rest, kill the series. With exceptions of course. Classic series such as Zelda and Mario are redone all the time, having near-legendary folklore status in their own right. They can seemingly get away with reiterations of the same story and characters over and over again. But that's because they do other things well, and the characters + formulae have become so iconic that to tamper with them now would destroy their magic.

Series which aren't dependent on story - such as various strategy games - depend on reinventing their mechanics, and they are fortunate in that they have many different ways in which they can change about the formula. There's a lot that can be said just from revamping the gameplay model to satisfy peoples' desires for novelty.

People can become too attached to one series I think. If the content is becoming stale, move onto a newer, fresher game and let the poor dog die with dignity. Don't let publishers milk its corpse. I don't mean to say that one bad installment spells the death knell of a series, but that if it's just become a succession of mediocre sequels after mediocre sequels, then it's time to pull the plug on the shit-recycling machine.

 

[squidface]

There are basically two things covered already that express how I feel about this. Yes, eventually, I think they do.

Unless they are PLANNED to cover more than one game/film, I think that ultimately game/film franchises do go downhill. This really doesn't happen with books - why? Because they are mostly meticulously planned so much more than games and films are. I think that happens because the success of the first game/film depends on whether they'll make a second one etc. and expand it out into a trilogy. There's a lot more money involved in the gaming and film industry so yeah.

But yeah, they turn into cash cows, and I think the success of the first one means they'll make another, and by the second game/film they've learned what they did wrong in the first one and improve on that. Then they usually feel as though they have to tie things in with a third one, or that it's doing so well with the first two that they can squeeze out another third one, but by then some of the actors and people involved have grown bored of the franchise and want to call it quits.

Basically my feelings about the whole thing.

 

[BrotherRool]

(say 3+ games in the main series) that is as good now as it ever was.

If we stop at 3 games we don't get CoD: Modern Warfare, Fallout 3/New Vegas, Final Fantasy 6, Final Fantasy 7, Final Fantasy X, Goldeneye, Or World of Warcraft (sequel to Warcraft 3) and I'm sure I could name multiple non crud mario games if I cared about Mario. There have been good Zelda games after the third. I personally enjoyed MGS4 the most and Peacewalker was good as well. Persona 4 is often considered a franchise best (and I believe there have been a lot more Shin Megami Tensei than 4).

GTA: San Andreas is actually the 8th in the series. Metal Gear Solid 3 is the 5th in the mainstream series.

Pokemon really hasn't got that much worse and at the very least Gold/Silver are agreed as class even by the purists and they're technically 4-5. Need for Speed Most Wanted (the original) rocked, was probably franchise best and was the 9th in the series. Gran Turismo 4 was franchise best probably. Dragon Quest 1 billion or whatever is still popular

Halo 4 was pretty well received. Streetfighter IV. Assassins Creed: Brotherhood. Kirby, Mortal Kombat, Ratchett and Clank



So yeah, some of the best games of all time have come well after no.3 and I can name a couple of long lasting franchises that were still producing good games =D But technically you're right, at some point in time random luck will create a bad string of games and at that point the franchise will probably die, on a low note. And there are definitely examples of franchises being turned into cash cows etc. But the iterative nature of game design means a sequel in most cases is likely to play a lot better than the original, even if some of the charm and narrative is lost.


In fact I have a whole genre of games that get better with every single release. Sports Games.


Play Fifa 13 and then try Fifa 97. Sports games don't peak, they just get better (normally) very slowly

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Every series will go downhill unless there are fresh ideas in the continuity. People love to see their familiar characters, but after a while, it seems like a long enough series will become Yet Another Adventure Of (Characters), and once games have gone episodic, unless it's a schtick of the series (see: Sam and Max or some such), then it will feel strung-out, unfinished, and cheesy.

 

[Kl4pp5tuhl]

-snip-

Point in case: Metal Slug. It never gets old, and is a ton of fun.

Then again, what you describe has to do with the so called "Police Academy Budget To Profit Ratio". Mike from RedLetterMedia explained it better (http://redlettermedia.com/half-in-the-bag-the-amazing-spider-man)

What I think is, that if you are limited in your resources/creative outlet, you start to get smarter in what you put into e.g. a game than if you have a massive budget and couldn't give two turds about what is put into it. It doesn't matter what the next Call Of Duty/Final Fantasy/etc. puts into it, it has a fan base, and they eat that stuff up like an overweight kid in a pool of M&Ms. But if you have a new idea (e.g Portal, Minecraft, FEZ), and it works great, it sticks. People will love it and replay. Then again, some franchises have their ups and downs, like FarCry. First one was short and fun with an ending straight out of Doom/Serious Sam, second one was a randomly generated conflict without resolution, and now the third centers it's focus on a random tourist, but you stay for Vaas, a complete nutter.

 

[Tom_green_day]

if its 3+ games you need to include TES 5- which was probably the biggest and most popular game of 2011 and shows that the series is definitely not going downhill.
People are mentioning the CoD series however I'm not too sure if that is straight downhill or more a bumpy road. I hear it started well, and got worse, however MW1/2 are viewed as alright and I actually like Black Ops. The most recent 2 are terribly though I'll agree.
Does SSX count as a long-running series? There have been a few now and they haven't been too bad at all.

 

[lapan]

but its also that a complete "set" like LOTR or the orginal starwars trillogy or even nolans dark knight are enjoyable as one big expereince, with ME now the enjoyment gotten from replaying has been diminished...because you know where its all going to end...in fact from the very first games there was a huge emphasis on the ending

Well, you know where anything is going to end once you've seen, read, played etc. I don't think ME3 was bad, I just think people got too caught up in the words "Everyones ending is going to be different". If Casey Hudson didn't say that, I don't think people would have been so butthurt about the ending.

Regardless of what he said, i expected choices of the earlier games to have at least a little impact.
For example hearing that the Rachni got streamlined into: "You killed them, so here is a different set of Rachnii to fight" or "You freed them, but now they are indoctrinated and you have to fight" just reeks of lazyness. At the same time characters which could possibly have died got written into tiny sideroles or replaced by placeholders.

 

[bug_of_war]

Regardless of what he said, i expected choices of the earlier games to have at least a little impact.
For example hearing that the Rachni got streamlined into: "You killed them, so here is a different set of Rachnii to fight" or "You freed them, but now they are indoctrinated and you have to fight" just reeks of lazyness. At the same time characters which could possibly have died got written into tiny sideroles or replaced by placeholders.

Well, I do believe there were choices that effected the end game. WARNING TO ALL WHOM ARE ABOUT TO READ THIS, I AM NOT GOING TO BE USING SPOILER TAGS AS I'M ASSUMING THAT MOST PEOPLE HAVE KNOWLEDGE OF THE 3 GAMES BEING TALKED ABOUT

Okay, so in Mass Effect 1, if you kill Wrex the residual effects that pass over to the third game are that his brother, Wreav takes over the Krogan as their new leader. Unlike Wrex, who wants nothing but peace and respect from the rest of the universe, Wreav want's revenge and wants the Krogan to basically take over the universe. This can effect the players decision in ME3 as now you have a leader whom is not exactly the most forward thinking creature whom is demanding that you cure his people so they can begin having thousands of children again, all so they will fight for you. This makes the Salarian option much more appealing. THAT is quite a big choice, and while Wrex and Wreav follow similar paths, their ideals and future is vastly different.

Mass Effect 2, the trust missions with your squad play a vital part in the 3rd game as well. If you did not complete a squad members' trust mission, and they survived during the ending of the second game, they will die in the third game, such as Jack, Miranda, Jacob, Grunt etc, or, in Tali and Legion's case, you will be unable to unify the Quarian and Geth to bolster your defence.

Yes, the Rachnai choice in the first game was basically thrown out the window, but it would be somewhat annoying to those player's whom either did not own Mass Effect 1 or 2 whom the bought Mass Effect 3 to have a majority of it's plot and gameplay unavailable to them. Yes, this is a lame excuse. Yes, being the third game in a series, players with no experience with the previous games should really not be starting at the 3rd game. However, that is not how everyone thinks, and when it comes to gamers who watch or read game reviews, and they see that most places are giving the game a high score, you can see how some people would say, "I'm not looking for an intelligent, highly detailed, well thought story, I just want to play a game that has been getting good reviews because I'm bored". Yeah, it can be annoying for players whom were invested into the story, but it is undoubtably a good business decision.

Now, onto what you said about side characters being written out of the story/killed off screen etc etc. I really don't see a problem with getting rid of characters that some players may have never even heard of. I know I went through a majority of ME1 doing very few side missions, and I enjoyed the game much more because I could not be bothered running around trying to find one person who wants me to drive around on a desolate planet to find some insignificant item for them. Same goes for Mass Effect 2, when a side mission character came along, I generally didn't care for what they had to offer, I would only complete the side mission if it sounded fun or interesting, which to me, most didn't sound fun. So, to then have a side character suddenly get a big or significant role in the third game would be lost/confusing to a person such as myself, or even those whom did play the side missions, but had not played the 1st or second game in a long time, to then have a character be like, "Hey Shepard, good to see you again/your an asshole". It would make the game more jarring than just putting in a place holder to have them say, "I'm new, how are you". The only character whom I thought did get screwed by this was Morinth, but even with that, I didn't feel too pissed off because the game already explained what the Reapers were doing with Asari Ardat Yakshi. So it made sense to me that an Ardat Yakshi that followed Shepard, the Reapers' greatest threat, would be hunted down and turned into a Banshee.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

It's inevitable there will be dips in quality, but it's certainly not inevitable. Personally, I loved MGS4. And I would say that the Total War games have been consistently pretty damned good. I guess it gets tougher to keep things fresh and interesting though.

 

[Mr. Omega]

Thing is, everyone always sees "I'm tired of this kind of game" as "this series is going downhill".

Look at Pokemon. Can you honestly tell me that the original Red and Blue were objectively better than Black and White? When Psychic types were almost invincible, the opponent using Bind or Wrap meant you were rapidly tapping A for 5 minutes, Pokemon were useless because they were a physical type that had high special stats and you had to trade by wires? Between the fans with rose-tinted glasses and people who look for any reason to bash certain types of games, Pokemon has been "declining" for the better part of a decade now.

If the people making the games still give a fuck, it'll be fine. Yes, some series will decline, and sometimes a bad game might be made, but it's not permanent, it's not inevitable, and it's certainly not exclusive to long-running series. Games with just 2 or 3 entries can fuck it up just as badly.