Good series ruined by the biz

[zeit]

There's a lot of great games that we all wanted a good sequel to but we never got it because the developer was mismanaged into bankruptcy, bought out by big publishers, or some other type of disastrous corporate upheaval. Here's some I thought of:

Diablo - Blizzard fired all of the original Diablo team, so now Diablo 3 will be a dumbed down console game for kids rather than the violent, satanic hack & slash pseudo-roguelike we all know and love.

Fallout - A series of bad decisions ruined Interplay, thus ruining Black Isle. Now all we get is Oblivion with guns. Rest in peace, Van Buren.

Descent/Freespace - Freespace 2 was the best space sim ever made, and that series also died with Interplay.

Command & Conquer - EA bought out Westwood and just absolutely wiped their asses with this franchise.

Sim City - EA ruined this too, releasing a single Sim City game (which sucked) and then continuing to put out one shitty Sims expansion after another.

Theme Hospital, Dungeon Keeper - Also ruined by EA when they bought out Bullfrog.

Shenmue - Amazing series ended on a cliffhanger with little-to-no chance of a sequel due to SEGA going broke.

Everything made by Rare - The quality of Rare's games dropped significantly after they were bought out by Microsoft. Now they have shifted their focus entirely on developing games for use with the Kinect peripheral. R.I.P.

 

[zeit]

EA ruins everything. There's probably a lot more game franchises they've ruined but I can't remember them all.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

EA hate is off the charts, captain!

Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. Troika ran out of time and money and in the last quarter of the game, it shows, not to mention how many bugs the game shipped with.

 

[Fr]anc[is]

It's funny how you think it's possible to dumb down Diablo.

 

[zeit]

anc[is]It's funny how you think it's possible to dumb down Diablo.

I didn't think it was, but by God they found a way.

 

[dimensional]

What about Guitar Hero they just completely over saturated the market with it putting out constant expansions of arguable quality.

Legacy of kain series not sure whats happening here seeing as how the main writer now works for naughty dog on the uncharted series.

Its a shame I cant vent my EA rage here because for once they didnt have anything to do with these two.

 

[zeit]

Just thought of another one:

Freelancer. This was a great free-roaming, space-trading game for PC with online play and everything. Microsoft lost interest in it after the Halo franchise took off. I saw an impressive tech demo of a sequel they were working on, but it looks like its cancelled now.

 

[Tallim]

What about Guitar Hero they just completely over saturated the market with it putting out constant expansions of arguable quality.

Legacy of kain series not sure whats happening here seeing as how the main writer now works for naughty dog on the uncharted series.

Its a shame I cant vent my EA rage here because for once they didnt have anything to do with these two.

I think Legacy Of Kain just ended. Defiance wrapped everything up (more or less) and personally I never really suspected they would carry on as they had nowhere to go besides starting something new in the same universe.

 

[Wayneguard]

Final Fantasy... good lord Final Fantasy. Public apologies for the shitiness of their game? Jesus what has become of you Square...

 

[Aerosteam]

I'm surprised you didn't mention everything published by EA.

And I hope no one mentions Halo...

 

[endtherapture]

You forgot Mass Effect.

And Star Wars Battlefront.

And KoTOR. And how Jedi Knight was superceded by this Force Unleashed crap. I just want Jedi Knight 3.

 

[DoPo]

Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. Troika ran out of time and money and in the last quarter of the game, it shows, not to mention how many bugs the game shipped with.

Yeah, I was thinking of Bloodlines but it's not really series. Still pretty sucky as it was Activision that led to its and Troika's downfall.

Legacy of kain series not sure whats happening here seeing as how the main writer now works for naughty dog on the uncharted series.

I think Legacy Of Kain just ended. Defiance wrapped everything up (more or less) and personally I never really suspected they would carry on as they had nowhere to go besides starting something new in the same universe.

Well, Eidos thrust CD into the Tomb Raider development for quite a while. Thus denying them the chance to do another LoK game. And to add insult to injury, there was another LoK title in the works but it was scrapped.

Officially, though, it hasn't died. The LoK franchise is left in a sort of stale state - neither dead nor truly alive. Or at least was until about a month ago [http://au.games.ign.com/articles/122/1221161p1.html]. We'll just have to wait and see.

 

[Tallim]

Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. Troika ran out of time and money and in the last quarter of the game, it shows, not to mention how many bugs the game shipped with.

Yeah, I was thinking of Bloodlines but it's not really series. Still pretty sucky as it was Activision that led to its and Troika's downfall.

Legacy of kain series not sure whats happening here seeing as how the main writer now works for naughty dog on the uncharted series.

I think Legacy Of Kain just ended. Defiance wrapped everything up (more or less) and personally I never really suspected they would carry on as they had nowhere to go besides starting something new in the same universe.

Well, Eidos thrust CD into the Tomb Raider development for quite a while. Thus denying them the chance to do another LoK game. And to add insult to injury, there was another LoK title in the works but it was scrapped.

Officially, though, it hasn't died. The LoK franchise is left in a sort of stale state - neither dead nor truly alive. Or at least was until about a month ago [http://au.games.ign.com/articles/122/1221161p1.html]. We'll just have to wait and see.

Hmm interesting. I certainly won't complain if they want to make more LoK. As long as it isn't them just rehashing it for cash.

 

[Baldr]

I can only comment on these games:

Diablo 3: Much more complex in terms of combo abilities than the previous games. I generally think it is a good game.

Command & Conquer - Either the last installment was in such a rush or the developers to lazy. I can understand using Heroscape to prototype the game, but when it is clearly OBVIOUS that it looks and plays like Heroscape, then there is something wrong.

Star Wars Battlefront: The second game was clearly superior in most respects to the first game.

 

[Terramax]

Wouldn't it be easier to mention a series that hasn't been ruined by the Biz?

I can't think of a single game franchise that has continued to have a high level of quality throughout its entire lifespan.

@ the OP, I wouldn't say Shenmue was ruined by Sega going out of business. It was ruined by everyone buying a PS2 instead, hence making Sega go out of business

First series that comes to my mind though would be Silent Hill of course, when Konami, for reasons that only God knows, thought it would be a good idea to outsource the series to Western developers.

 

[Austin Howe]

@OP: Wow, you're about as stereotypical a 90's PC gamer as they come.

That said, I'm going to very, very cautiously throw Metal Gear on the stack. MGS4 was brilliant. Peace Walker is a good story, but gameplay is a mixed bag. And let's face it, Rising Reveangance is going to be removed from the canon so fast people won't even begin thinking of the implications on the saga overall.

That said, Kojima has said he is in the pre-production phase of a new game, which he has said will be the "shining moment" for teh series and his career. Honestly, I have faith in the dude, so we'll see what happens.

 

[Austin Howe]

anc[is]It's funny how you think it's possible to dumb down Diablo.

I didn't think it was, but by God they found a way.

It's funny how none of you think Diablo II wasn't dumb. That game wasn't dumb, it was mentally impaired.