Poll: Which Video Game Franchise (besides Sonic) Most Deserves to End?
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Why all the Spyro hate? I played the old ones on PS1 and they were fantastic. After the initial 3 those games did start to suck. It went the same way as sonic bringing along way to many critters and just poor gameplay.
But then along came a series re-boot called "The Legend of Spyro" and the trilogy that came with it. It was fantastic. Solid gameplay, better then average story (its weakest point in my opinion), FANTASTIC voice acting. I could go on all day about how good they were.
Yes there was a time when spyro sucked more ass then a gay porn star but it has come and gone. People just look and say "o ANOTHER spyro game" without knowing anything about it. I challenge anyone who hasn't played the new ones to do so.
But then along came a series re-boot called "The Legend of Spyro" and the trilogy that came with it. It was fantastic. Solid gameplay, better then average story (its weakest point in my opinion), FANTASTIC voice acting. I could go on all day about how good they were.
Yes there was a time when spyro sucked more ass then a gay porn star but it has come and gone. People just look and say "o ANOTHER spyro game" without knowing anything about it. I challenge anyone who hasn't played the new ones to do so.
Tomb Raider needs to come to an end. There's been too many random incarnations of it with VERY little progress in terms of gameplay. Sonic could still be cool if they went back to old school a'la Mega Man 9, Mario games are still fun, Halo and GoW have declared they are ending, but unless we have a major change in the series that doesn't involve remaking older games, it's time to put her to bed.
All WW2 shooters... seriously. We won. It was half a decade ago. Get over it.
Guitar Hero should also die. After I bought RockBand on a whim last year after getting impatient waiting for World Tour. I can honestly say that unless they magically get a setlist that matches my iPods 'Favourites' playlist, I will never ever need to look back.
After the Sims 3 does the whole 'no loading times' thing I think that will just die. What the hell else can they do with it?
Guitar Hero should also die. After I bought RockBand on a whim last year after getting impatient waiting for World Tour. I can honestly say that unless they magically get a setlist that matches my iPods 'Favourites' playlist, I will never ever need to look back.
After the Sims 3 does the whole 'no loading times' thing I think that will just die. What the hell else can they do with it?
I think you meant to say half a CENTURY..nicole1207 said:
As far as GH goes, I don't think they should go and just have songs on it that you know and love already. Granted it is good to be able to play songs that you already love, but it's also good to be exposed to a wide variety of songs. It's also the only way many classic artists like Elvis Costello or Paul McCartney can get exposure to younger audiences nowadays. However, that doesn't mean they should just throw ANY song in there. I for one am upset at Harmonix for promising us 20 free downloadable tracks with Rock Band 2, only to later reveal that it is 20 songs from 20 no-name artists that you wouldn't know if they came up to you, showed you their driver's license, then punched you in the face. I have not even downloaded them because I have enough songs in RB2 to deal with in Career mode already.
Whoops. So I did! People talk about it so much you'd think it only happened 5 years ago.yourbeliefs said:
I agree with what you're saying about the track lists. Luckily thanks to my dad I appreciate the classics they have on there. But I will draw the big chalk line when I start seeing Cliff Richard on there. Theonly band I know/like in the 20 free tracks is Endeverafter, and thats only because they do Jeff Hardy's WWE entrance music!
Final Fantasy, and Mario.
Enough with them
The spinoffs on all the games are pretty annoying.
I think its just a way to suck money out of the moms who buy it for their children.
Enough with them
The spinoffs on all the games are pretty annoying.
I think its just a way to suck money out of the moms who buy it for their children.
Pokemon. 
Or, I would at LEAST like them to stop making new Pokemon and just focus on expanding gameplay.
Or, I would at LEAST like them to stop making new Pokemon and just focus on expanding gameplay. 
The ones that haven't travelled in worthwhile new directions... so pretty much everything there except Mario (Galaxy was excellent, and the main series hasn't become oversaturated), though I'd perhaps be willing to let Zelda and Guitar Hero off the hook, presuming their developers could deliver solid iterations in the future.
Opinions
Final Fantasy - Has been on a downward slide since VI & VII, excepting maybe IX - in any case, the CGI saturation of FFX seemed to guarantee this franchise would never return to relevancy; MMORPG and FFX-2 doubly (in hindsight, actually, Sakaguchi's departure could be viewed as the last straw).
Verdict: end
Halo - I was always critical of Halo: Combat Evolved for its shortcoming - among them a lack of bots, unacceptable in a post-Perfect Dark console shooter with no online play; the repetitiousness of its single-player mode, and design faults like how the largess of its maps resulted in tepid two or four single-player games (not everyone had a friend with an Xbox and the game). Still, the franchise had two chances to redeem itself. The problem is: it didn't, and by the time Halo 2 arrived, veiling its trifling additions with admittedly strong online play, and Halo 3 imparted even less, it seemed clear that this one ought to go the way of the dodos.
Verdict: end
Crash Bandicoot/Spyro the Dragon - Does anything need to be said? These games haven't done anything in the post-PSX world except tarnish their posterity, already jeopardized by critical comparisons between either of them and the best 3D platformers being released on the N64 at the time of their heyday.
Verdict: end
Guitar Hero - I'm not so fervent about this one since it's not a game per the traditional sense: it seems to me that Guitar Hero could theoretically go on happily forever, introducing new songs to its canon and marginal gameplay adjustments (isn't DDR still around?) while hardly offending anyone. On the flipside, I would hardly describe the sales it's inevitably preventing of more worthwhile products as a good thing.
Verdict: indifferent
Grand Theft Auto - Some may differ, but my feeling was that Vice City felt like a rehash, characterized as it was by the map being reduced to "the strip" and '80s stylings not genuinely sufficing for significant gameplay changes from that venerated title, GTA III. San Andreas, to my surprise, didn't: it was expansive, and the ability to do things like swim, peruse three cities and boost stats made it feel something like the game VC should've been.
Mixed emotions set in, again, however with GTA IV: yes, the game's large, but after SA sheer largeness feels less revelatory, and the fact is the game represented a peculiar regression in many ways - number of cars, side-missions, etc. - from SA. As it stands, this series can still earn a second life, but it would take a risk to do so - say, a cel-shaded GTA set in Tokyo in the '50s, or some such thing.
Verdict: pending
Gears of War - The conceit was lame-o in the first place, and the fact the game could be said to be "categorically superior" to most things on the market (gee, that's hard) didn't mean it earned the sequel pass. Simply put: gameplay clichés like this may be worth a guilty spin, but they don't deserve a second. Or third. Or fourth.
Verdict: end
Legend of Zelda - LoZ: Twilight Princess hit lows not seen since Zelda II for the NES - and frankly, that's not good, for Nintendo or anyone. Of course TTP wasn't the first Zelda iteration that felt stale, atleast in relation to the series' history: after OoT, after all, Nintendo seemed to make the decision that nonillion new Zeldas would follow, all copying the same essential gameplay and featuring a new gimmick ("it's time-based and features shape changing!" "it's cel-shaded!" "you can be a wolf!"). Cynical, yes. But here's the good part: the series has a strong history, and the lead developer of OoT said recently to the media he wanted to top that title. So if he does - or produces something worthy of the franchise's best in the process - good. If not, then this one is due for a shelving, or atleast a reimagining.
Verdict: pending
Mario - There will inevitable be haters, fueled by the fact Sunshine was a giant misstep and the Wii lately is more ebb than flow, but the fact is Super Mario Galaxy redeemed the franchise, bringing to the table a game that was every bit as fun to play as Super Mario 64, if not as influential, and creating one - and there isn't many, after all - good reasons to own a Wii. The new concepts and refinements featured in SMG, however, represent franchise cred Ninendo should be careful not to burn, lest Mario becoming as prone to rehash as Zelda. To paraphrase Yahtzee: "where do you go after you've went to space?" The answer: the history books, and hopefully with no blemishes.
Verdict: stay
Opinions
Final Fantasy - Has been on a downward slide since VI & VII, excepting maybe IX - in any case, the CGI saturation of FFX seemed to guarantee this franchise would never return to relevancy; MMORPG and FFX-2 doubly (in hindsight, actually, Sakaguchi's departure could be viewed as the last straw).
Verdict: end
Halo - I was always critical of Halo: Combat Evolved for its shortcoming - among them a lack of bots, unacceptable in a post-Perfect Dark console shooter with no online play; the repetitiousness of its single-player mode, and design faults like how the largess of its maps resulted in tepid two or four single-player games (not everyone had a friend with an Xbox and the game). Still, the franchise had two chances to redeem itself. The problem is: it didn't, and by the time Halo 2 arrived, veiling its trifling additions with admittedly strong online play, and Halo 3 imparted even less, it seemed clear that this one ought to go the way of the dodos.
Verdict: end
Crash Bandicoot/Spyro the Dragon - Does anything need to be said? These games haven't done anything in the post-PSX world except tarnish their posterity, already jeopardized by critical comparisons between either of them and the best 3D platformers being released on the N64 at the time of their heyday.
Verdict: end
Guitar Hero - I'm not so fervent about this one since it's not a game per the traditional sense: it seems to me that Guitar Hero could theoretically go on happily forever, introducing new songs to its canon and marginal gameplay adjustments (isn't DDR still around?) while hardly offending anyone. On the flipside, I would hardly describe the sales it's inevitably preventing of more worthwhile products as a good thing.
Verdict: indifferent
Grand Theft Auto - Some may differ, but my feeling was that Vice City felt like a rehash, characterized as it was by the map being reduced to "the strip" and '80s stylings not genuinely sufficing for significant gameplay changes from that venerated title, GTA III. San Andreas, to my surprise, didn't: it was expansive, and the ability to do things like swim, peruse three cities and boost stats made it feel something like the game VC should've been.
Mixed emotions set in, again, however with GTA IV: yes, the game's large, but after SA sheer largeness feels less revelatory, and the fact is the game represented a peculiar regression in many ways - number of cars, side-missions, etc. - from SA. As it stands, this series can still earn a second life, but it would take a risk to do so - say, a cel-shaded GTA set in Tokyo in the '50s, or some such thing.
Verdict: pending
Gears of War - The conceit was lame-o in the first place, and the fact the game could be said to be "categorically superior" to most things on the market (gee, that's hard) didn't mean it earned the sequel pass. Simply put: gameplay clichés like this may be worth a guilty spin, but they don't deserve a second. Or third. Or fourth.
Verdict: end
Legend of Zelda - LoZ: Twilight Princess hit lows not seen since Zelda II for the NES - and frankly, that's not good, for Nintendo or anyone. Of course TTP wasn't the first Zelda iteration that felt stale, atleast in relation to the series' history: after OoT, after all, Nintendo seemed to make the decision that nonillion new Zeldas would follow, all copying the same essential gameplay and featuring a new gimmick ("it's time-based and features shape changing!" "it's cel-shaded!" "you can be a wolf!"). Cynical, yes. But here's the good part: the series has a strong history, and the lead developer of OoT said recently to the media he wanted to top that title. So if he does - or produces something worthy of the franchise's best in the process - good. If not, then this one is due for a shelving, or atleast a reimagining.
Verdict: pending
Mario - There will inevitable be haters, fueled by the fact Sunshine was a giant misstep and the Wii lately is more ebb than flow, but the fact is Super Mario Galaxy redeemed the franchise, bringing to the table a game that was every bit as fun to play as Super Mario 64, if not as influential, and creating one - and there isn't many, after all - good reasons to own a Wii. The new concepts and refinements featured in SMG, however, represent franchise cred Ninendo should be careful not to burn, lest Mario becoming as prone to rehash as Zelda. To paraphrase Yahtzee: "where do you go after you've went to space?" The answer: the history books, and hopefully with no blemishes.
Verdict: stay
FF can continue as far as i'm concerned, but thats just my RPG-love bias. The new marios are still enjoyable, so the franchise doesn't deserve to be killed off yet.
From those choices I'd say GTA. I don't think the series should end entirely, just stop making the bloody "expansions". Games like VC stories, LC stories and that new one, "legend of the damned" or whatever the hell its called, I really don't care. They're especially pointless because they're worse than the originals anyway. Actually, after vice city, i really can't think of a GTA I genuinely liked...
From those choices I'd say GTA. I don't think the series should end entirely, just stop making the bloody "expansions". Games like VC stories, LC stories and that new one, "legend of the damned" or whatever the hell its called, I really don't care. They're especially pointless because they're worse than the originals anyway. Actually, after vice city, i really can't think of a GTA I genuinely liked...