Nostalgia

[AnarchistFish]

Last night I decided to boot up my Halo: Reach game and play some multiplayer online. As I did so, I was greeted with a message telling me about the upcoming Halo: CE Anniversary game. I made me think about the original, and what made me love it in the first place, so I ejected the game from the machine and inserted my original Halo: CE game, which I hadn't played in years.
I didn't play on it for long but having played it side by side with the newer Halos I was surprised by the contrast between them. Halo: CE is dark, mysterious and enthralling. All the way from that moment early on in the first level where, unarmed, you walk through a door to be faced with an angry Elite, ready to pounce, to the epic levels set in a variety of different types of terrain that could take hours to complete. The spartan you played is thrown in at the deep end, all but alone in a mysterious and dark world. Multiplayer is limited and most of the effort is put into a gritty, fun and immersive gaming experience.

I look back at Halo: Reach, and more than ever I see this: a tepid, CoD ft. Aliens game focused on a glossy multiplayer, big guns and big macho armour, a short and dull campaign and completely devoid of any of the excitement that the original game gave me. I knew that Halo had gone downhill in recent years, but never before had I actually felt betrayed by the game developers. I've bought every game and stayed loyal to the series but it feels as if they've cashed in it's vibrant story and potential for a game that appeals to casual gamers. Of course I enjoy the multiplayer to a short extent, but I'd trade it in without hesitation for them to go back to how it was before. Of course, 6 games into the series it's lost a bit of it's mystery and it would be pretty hard to top the first couple of games, but it still has tons of potential still left in it that I really hope they'll follow.

tl;dr: Halo's gone to shit and I'm butthurt.

My question to you is, have you ever felt betrayed by a game series?

 

[Space Spoons]

I feel this way about Kingdom Hearts. It was an opportunity to merge the best aspects of Final Fantasy with the best aspects of Disney, and for the first game, it worked really well... But then the balance started shifting in favor of melodrama and "Original Character DO NOT STEAL" nonsense and the whole thing got top-heavy, until by the time I was done with KHII, I was so disgusted that I never wanted to play another KH game.

I've never seen a series fall so fast.

 

[krazykidd]

I would say final fantasy , but i don't really consider them a series since they have little to no connection other than the name .

My second option would be the prince of persia series . The first 3 were great , though slowly declined since the first one. But the xbox360 versions are utter shit compared to the first three . They aren't really bad games ( except maybe Pop 2009) but they failed to deliver what i loved about the series . Of course usually when something is planned as a trilogy ,and the they make extra games afterwards they turn out to be pretty awful. 3 seems to be the magoc number in where to end games like: DMC, MGS, crash bandicoot ,spyro , PoP etc... But thats just my opinion

 

[Zhukov]

Uh... no, I don't think I ever have.

All the series that I like have gotten better over time, at least in my opinion.

 

[AnarchistFish]

Uh... no, I don't think I ever have.

All the series that I like have gotten better over time, at least in my opinion.

Well Halo is the only one I can think of. But Halo CE was my first proper game so yeah

 

[dessertmonkeyjk]

For some reason, Halo: CE I just adore over all the rest. Maybe it's the atmosphere or the fact that Sgt. Johnson gets blown up by the elites breaching the escape pod at the beginning of the game He randomly pops up at different places in the game and this is where he ended up? That was kind of hilarious.

In all seriousness though, the only other game that came close for me was Halo 3 and that's about it.

I am kind of a fond person of old games so you typically find me playing them. I keep an eye out for something unique then some type of experience overplayed to death.

 

[emeraldrafael]

It was painfully obvious when halo 2 came out how different the games were and how much the mediocrity was setting in.

...

i went to play ruby (I wnat to get a blaziken and some other pokemon to pal park to pearl and then trade to white once I have a second DS) and the older games and its painful when you cant run in buildings. or certain pokemon/moves dont exist yet.

 

[Strain42]

I don't feel betrayed by a series, but in the case of Ace Attorney I feel betrayed by the company.

I've loved the Ace Attorney since I started playing them. They were all localized, and I knew they weren't the most popular titles in the world, but since they kept coming out I assumed they just...would keep doing that.

So when AAI2 wasn't localized I felt very betrayed by Capcom.

 

[targren]

So when AAI2 wasn't localized I felt very betrayed by Capcom.

Now you know how we Mega Man Legends fans feel.

 

[Episode42]

Silent Hill. Those first three games were masterpieces ( i had to reorder the original PSOne Silent Hill about a month ago just to play it again) Silent Hill 4:The Room was interesting, but the story was complicated for the sake of being complicated and i didn't like any of the first person parts or the new combat system.
From there the whole thing went into free-fall after the rights were out-sourced to different studios. I did get and play through the next two releases (Origins and Homecoming) Origins was just tedious and annoying to play on a PSP but Homecoming was by far the game that killed the series for me. It was dull and soooo tedious that by the end i'd completely given up caring what was even happening in the story, playing it on autopilot.
From then i haven't bothered to go near any Silent Hill games.

 

[CommanderL]

the fable games and the force unleashed 2 was just a big fuck you to the fans same with sypro and crash

 

[Veylon]

Betrayed? I think the worst was the Megaman X series. It seemed like after X3, they ran out of things to do. Still fun, but the originality had dropped. I've played (but not finished) X7, and 3D had the same deadly effect on Megaman as it did on most of the other 2D heroes. From what I hear, X8 was even worse.

 

[Thaius]

The developers that took over Crash Bandicoot after Naughty Dog sold it must suffer. He was amazing back in the day, then he got sold off and he's just awful. I'd really love to see Naughty Dog take him on again...

 

[ParadiseOnceLost]

Splinter Cell. I played them from the very beginning even though Ubi made some piss poor gamecube ports. Then Conviction was announced and I was super excited. I got it and blew through it in record time. The game is still very fun but it just doesn't feel like Splinter Cell. It is far too easy the hacking mini games are gone and there is absolutely no incentive to not kill everybody.

 

[daftalchemist]

The only series I've stuck with for a long time is Zelda, and while the DS releases have been lacking, I'm not about to get butthurt over a lowering in quality. That's just a waste of energy, and it's not as though it's going to make the developers put out a better product. So I'll just skip the bad games that come along (which seems to be all of the DS games), and continue playing the good games (which seems to be all of the console games).

 

[brinvixen]

Handheld Pokemon games. Or maybe the PokeUniverse on a whole (is that the acutal term?). I've owned at least one handheld for each generation of Pokemon handheld games, save for the latest Black and White. And I only didn't get them because I've had enough. For every new game, it's only minimal additions that did nothing to actual gameplay (the only NECESSARY and reputable addition was the running, and I'll give them that. Everything else was just so-so). Plus, for every 100 new Pokemon they added to the roster, I realized they were only widening the gap for me to become a Pokemon Master. And jeez, if only the new Pokemon didn't seem so obviously churned out to sucker in the fans' money. Pokemon that look like ice cream cones, and evolve into sundaes? Trash bag Pokemon? The fact that there's a 1 in 5 chance that a Pokemon you'll catch will be rare because EVERYONE can have rare status now?

Clearly this isn't about "catching them all" anymore. Clearly this isn't about having bouts with rare Pokemon and then circling that same spot of grass in hopes of seeing them again. Clearly its not about having fun. It's about money. And I just feel betrayed if I give any more to a series that has gone way past its prime.

I'll love you forever Pokemon. I'm just not in love with you anymore.

 

[irequirefood]

Gonna have to go with Spyro and Crash. Seriously guys, even though they were different developers for the newer games, how do you lose that much quality?

 

[Voulan]

The Silent Hill series for me have lost their original charm. They were so incredibly psychological and heart-rending, except now something about the series is just no longer what it used to be. Perhaps it's the polished aspect - now the controls aren't atmospherically bad and the characters aren't so realistically awkward and imperfect.

But then again, nostalgia makes everything lacklustre as it goes on and tries to be innovative.

 

[Manji187]

Definitely Final Fantasy. Haven't enjoyed the "overal feel" of the games (immersion, atmosphere, story) after FF IX.