Games that were better than their sequels

[Jackstick]

Donkey Kong Country.

I couldn't enjoy any of the DK games after that one. I still need to give DKC Returns a try, though.

Ugh lol, that comment makes my blood boil >.>

I don't really see why some folks really like DKC aside from the music. DKC2 on the other hand is better than the original in every way. The levels are more varied, characters have specific roles, music is better, more animals, more levels, more secrets.

This is only my opinion but it just boggles my mind.

DKC:R is great although difficult for the wrong reasons at times. It's definitely its own thing.

I like the original Roller Coaster Tycoon & expansions over the sequels.

Eh, don't take it the wrong way. I played DKC at a very early age, and waited quite a few years to go back and try some of the others. I guess there's a huge nostalgia factor in my reasoning.

 

[rda_Highlander]

Come on, man, is it a joke? Not counting graphics, almost EVERY piece of entertainment is better than it's sequel. People are wasting their time, looking for sequels that are at least as good.
But on topic, play Pokemon Red. Granted, it's not the very first, but a remake of it, so it counts. Other ones are good, but they are really distracting and pointlessly complex.

 

[Doowoo]

hmm.. Red alert 1 and 2 were good. But Red alert 3 was horrible.
Command and Conquer 4 was horrible. Tiberian Dawn, Tiberian sun and tiberium wars was great.
Sup Com 2 was horrible. Original Sup Com was great.
Call of Duty 1-2 was great, rest was shit.
Warhammer 40kawn of War was great, Dawn of war 2 was stupid.
Far cry 1 was nice, Far cry 2 was shit.

 

[kayisking]

Knights of the Old Republic is what first springs to mind. The sequel was a letdown in every way imaginable.

 

[efeat]

Are there any games that you played that you thought were much better than their sequels? Why do you think the sequels weren't as good?

I think you're going to see a lot of games that fit this criteria. Sequels that surpass the original are the exception, not the norm. Why this happens seems a bit harder explain, but I think I've got part of it figured out.

When a new title comes out, people have little to no expectations - it's a new game, after all. Because of this, people can be more open to and accepting of new ideas and mechanics. There's a novelty to the game and the experience it creates.

Sequels are burdened by the fact that people have expectations and the game isn't shiny and new anymore. If the sequel is too similar, people criticize it for being more of the same and a moneygrab. If the sequel is too different, people criticize the changes for not being faithful to the original and for alienating the fanbase. Finding the balance of changing enough to keep it interesting, but similar enough to keep it familiar is a tricky task that every developer has to face. To exacerbate the problem, you can't make everybody happy, so no matter what you change, somebody, somewhere is going to hate what you've done.

To me, the poster child for this phenomena is Knights of the Old Republic 2. KOTOR1 was a heralded as a masterpiece, and rightfully so. Unfortunately, KOTOR2 did not get to enjoy the success that KOTOR1 had.
First, Lucasarts changed developers. This move nearly always puts the inheriting developer at a disadvantage. Second, Lucasarts demanded that KOTOR2 be released in less than a year, which is an insanely short development cycle. Third, KOTOR1 was such a hit game that even even the tiniest flaw in KOTOR2 would incite backlash.

Those three factors all fed off each other and doomed Obsidian before the game ever launched.
Was KOTOR2 a flawed game? You bet it was. Was it as good as the original? Not a chance.

Did Obsidian deserve all the flak they took for it? I really don't think they did.

 

[Veldel]

Perfect Dark was vastly better then its shitty sequal perfect dark zero

 

[Veldel]

Dragon Age: Origins is gonna get a metric assload of mentions in this thread.

Xenosaga I was better than Xenosaga II. More appealing art style, better story, better gameplay, etc.

You forgot to mention how they made some of them look and the voice changes.....


Xenosaga II. Is somthing I just cant stand playing they just gah

 

[Veldel]

Metroid Prime is better than the other Retro Metroid games by a mile, but the other Retro games beat most other games by a few miles,

That can be debatable depending on person I dislike the Prime Trilogy quite a bit compared to the orginals. now Other M that it is better then based on the playthrough i saw.


Super Metriod and Metriod Fusion are the best in the series tho IMO

 

[Veldel]

Knights of the Old Republic is what first springs to mind. The sequel was a letdown in every way imaginable.

Blame Lucasarts forcing such a asinine deadline.


I wouldnt say every way imaganble tho I did enjoy KOTOR2 some but its nothing compared to KOTOR

 

[Vivace-Vivian]

Any Crash Bandicoot, Spyro or Tomb Raider not on the PSOne.

And eternally Fable D:

 

[Grand_Arcana]

The Force Unleased

Final Fantasy X (shame, isn't it?)

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time.

 

[Veldel]

Metroid Prime is better than the other Retro Metroid games by a mile, but the other Retro games beat most other games by a few miles,

That can be debatable depending on person I dislike the Prime Trilogy quite a bit compared to the orginals. now Other M that it is better then based on the playthrough i saw.


Super Metriod and Metriod Fusion are the best in the series tho IMO

Super Metroid is the best of them, with Prime 1 following it very closely, and Fusion is no slouch. I was talking about the Retro games. The third Prime game felt way too out of place, the constant planet-jumping completely took me out of the experience, so much so that I never beat one of the games in my absolute A+ favorite game series of all time. Not only that, voices should not exist in a Metroid game. Ever. The text at the beginning of Super Metroid was alright, it was Samus' words and they were nought more than an introduction. The text boxes in Fusion were annoying but I'll give it a pass for being interesting and only having one character aside from Samus. I don't give a fuck how advanced we get in games, they should never give voices to a Metroid game. It takes way too much out of the completely solitary experience that Metroid is supposed to be.

I'm irrationally hateful toward the way that Other M made Samus out to be a pre-teen ***** who has damn daddy problems. Sorry, I understand opinions are different, but what little I've seen of the characterization of Samus in Other M gives me an unparalleled sense of rage that says I must say something. I can't bear to let that game exist without saying something bad against it. It ass-raped a classic series and then left it to die a slow bleeding death.

/rant over.

I think i got my wordeds scrambled a bit I was meaning Metriod Primes where better then Other M and I was kinda excited for her to say somthing til it had her speak then I didnt like it they really seemed to make her seem so weak in it and everything

 

[K84]

Viewtiful Joe,
Crackdown,
Bioshock.

All were awesome, the sequels were fun, but less awesome.
Okay, Crackdown 2 just plain s*cked.

 

[Imat]

So recently I replayed Digimon World, which to me is a classic game from my childhood. I haven't played anything quite like it since and I loved it as a child. The game actually did have sequels, but they were almost universally regarded as worse than the original.

I recently played DW as well...Although I will say that DW3 is also enjoyable. Hard to compare them, seeing as how they have completely different play styles. DW2 I played for about 10 minutes and decided it wasn't nearly as good...

 

[Johny64]

fable II is better than fable III. There was more to explore and experiment with in Fable 2, fable 3 is more linear and doesn't give you many options.

 

[AbstractStream]

Kingdom Hearts. Don't get me wrong, I liked Kingdom Hearts 2 but the first one was way better...then there the spinoffs and everything *grumble grumble*

fable II is better than fable III. There was more to explore and experiment with in Fable 2, fable 3 is more linear and doesn't give you many options.

Agreed.

 

[AlternatePFG]

Kingdom Hearts. Don't get me wrong, I liked Kingdom Hearts 2 but the first one was way better...then there the spinoffs and everything.

Yeah, I dunno, I did like Kingdom Hearts 2, but after that the series went way off track into millions of spin-offs territory, and it made the story way too convoluted.