Worst gaming sequels?

[DirgeNovak]

Devil May Cry 2 and Final Fantasy XIII were two of the biggest disappointments I've had in gaming.

Devil May Cry 2 took everything that made the first game so good - tight controls, perfect level design, creepy atmosphere, well-designed enemies, charismatic protagonist... and threw all of it in the garbage. The controls are loose and unresponsive, the level design is shit and you never know where the fuck you're supposed to be going, there is no atmosphere of any kind, all enemies look stupid and Dante has maybe 10 lines of dialogue in the entire game.

Final Fantasy XIII basically did the same thing. I won't complain about the corridor thing because X was also a corridor and it's among my favorite Final Fantasies, but the main things that drew me to the franchise, combat mechanics and story, are completely ruined in XIII. I don't completely hate the idea of paradigms shifts, but their implementation was horrible. Reliance on auto-battle and AI essentially mean status effects and elemental damage are rendered useless, and healing, buffs and debuffs are unreliable; unless you're controlling the synergist/saboteur/medic yourself, you'll get what the AI decides to give you, and they might very well heal themselves instead of you, and if you die, they don't give you a phoenix down, you have to start over. Same thing when sentinels become important later in the game; if you're not controlling the sentinel yourself, there is no guarantee they'll provoke the enemy and keep the heat off your back or that they'll use steelguard in time, making a lot of the tougher fights basically a game of chance. And the story is garbage. The only two characters I could describe as likeable, Sazh and Fang, are barely involved in the story at all, and the other four are completely insufferable. The premise makes no sense. If the fal'Cie wants something done, why wouldn't it just fucking tell the l'Cie what their mission is? I got through more than half the game before quitting and I still don't know who the villain is or what the point of the story is. It's ridiculous.

 

[CannibalCorpses]

Mass effect 2...damn that game was a disappointment. I loved the first game and expected them to expand upon it. Instead they strip away most of the rpg elements and sideline the cool main story for some tedious pointless crap. Typical Bioware...they are only good for 1 game in a series and even mass effect was mostly a cut and paste from KOTOR

 

[TheSYLOH]

I am disappointed.
Not one of you said:

-DUKE NUKEM: FOREVER
It's not just one of the worst sequels ever, it's one of the worst games ever.
I don't really need to add much, you've all seen the reviews.


also
-Command & Conquer 4

Command & Conquer 3 was ... ok... not bad but not really great.
Command & Conquer 4 was a total abomination. It was Command and Conquer in NAME ONLY, the game play had nothing to do with C&C. Instead we get an awful looking game, with always on DRM. Multiplayer matches that weeeeent on and on because the game was setup to basically make gaining/pressing an advantage mechanically impossible. Oh and you had to worry that the other guy was higher level than you, thus having his units/abilities be better than yours in every single way.
Even the cutscenes made me want to shout 'I'M ACTING!!!!!!!", the other games at least had Sci-Fi C/B listers to entertain me.

I actually liked Command & Conquer: Generals. It was not Command and Conquer. But it copied Age of Mythology's formula so closely and competently that I could mentally replace the title with "Age of Generals" and enjoy it. That game knew what it was trying to be, and succeeded. This C&C 4 had no idea what it wanted to be, and failed in every respect.
It was stitched together from elements of other games with no knowledge of why those things worked.

 

[[Kira Must Die]]

Another one for Devil May Cry 2.

I've only recently played it with the DMC HD Collection. I haven't beaten it yet, but boy did it leave a nasty impression. Anyone who says the reboot is the worst DMC game are kidding themselves.

Combat was broken. Controls feel sluggish and awkward (Your stinger is laughable), your devil trigger is a pain to use, and most importantly, it's offensively easy. The first game was known for it's harsh, challenging difficulty, but here it seriously wasn't until several levels later when I got hit once. Most of the time I'm just hacking away at an enemy while they take ten minutes to finally attack me. The level design is awful, too. Sure, they're big, but there's nothing in it, so you're just left traversing these large, empty areas. Not to mention Dante barely talks in the game. Overall it just feels like a empty, soul-less sequel.

 

[Killclaw Kilrathi]

Privateer 2: The Darkening. Anyone who played the original can tell you why this one is utter rubbish by comparison.

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

I'm surprised no one mentioned Metroid: Other M yet. I know it's obvious, so if you don't know what I'm talking about there are plenty of articles, reviews threads, and LPs discussing how it hurt a franchise of excellent games that had just come back from a 8 year hiatus not 10 years prior (and from Ninty, the "let's make sure each system gets a couple Zeldas, a ton of Mario games, and a few Kirby games" people, no less). I only talk about it because it's the only bad game I bought knowing about its ill legacy and, being a Metroid fan, had to check it out to satisfy my morbid curiosity.

I gave up on GTA after 4. Never really played much of San Andreas, either. GTA 2 might have kept track of your reputations across multiples crime syndicates, but that was only affected with what missions you took and if started shooting rival gang members. GTA 3 and Vice City limited your rep to story driven origins, although they did it pretty well and were fun. Four comes along with people nagging you on youf cell to go bowling and on dates. It was just too annoying. Details are nice, but I felt like I really had a nagging cousin, friends and girlfriends who would not leave me alone. That's not something good to put in a game, especially to a guy like me that doesn't really like answering the phone much after dealing with "friends" in and just after high school that wanted rides or to hang out across town at 2 in the morning.

[snip][Valid points on Skyward Sword, FFXIII, and the DS Zeldas being lame]

I agree wholeheartedly. If it wasn't for A Link Between Worlds dropping touch control, we'd still be waiting 10 or more years for a good portable Zelda title, just like how where still waiting just as long for Metroid to do the same. Skyward Sword was challenging because the hardware fought you (Just like in Soviet Russia!) more than the enemies. A "screw this i just want to sit back relax and use just buttons" mode could fix most of what I hate about the game. (The fact Fi is annoying and Beedle is more of an ass with each subsequent game probability can't be as long as Ninty has the writers they have.) And Yes, XIII is FF hitting rock bottom and, instead of dying, drilling straight to hell to drag with it as many fans hoping the series would return to the magic of the pre-X days of openess. XII plays different than them all but at least brought some magic back.(Combat's still boring at times, and you have to micromanage it since Square didn't make the useful gambits available until halfway through the game.)

[snip] [valid points on Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier being lame]

I'm trying to force my way through TLF, thanks to my renewed interest in the franchise (and the fact they shanked us with no Jak X in the HD collection, so I have to hunt for a PS2 disc), and it's hard (not the game itself, but allowing myself to play it). Yes, the story blows and the characters became one-dimensional. I'm only in it to see if there's some world building left to the abysmal story.

There's too much complexity to your abilities for the amount of controls the system has. You got the morphing gun modes assigned to d-pad up, switching eco powers to left and right, using them to down, camera to the shoulder buttons (and you will need them a lot, ugh), fire to triangle,[footnote]I would rather have triangle set up to be held down and use the analog nub to change camera angle, and freeing up the shoulder buttons for fire and something else.[/footnote] and finally punch, spin and jump at least still the same as the PS2. They also didn't let you remap this cringe worthy control scheme at all. The was just too much crammed in there. They should have either a) dropped emphasis on the gun combat b)dropped the eco powers or c) just made it a PS3 sequel to begin with.

Also I, too, haven't touched my copy of Size Matters since it's just lackluster and the two PSP God of War games were better things I had to put in the disc tray. I don't get how the Ready at Dawn crammed God of War into two good (except for hard to get used to dodge mechanics) PSP games (and Daxter) yet High Impact couldn't get the Jak formula right for one game.

 

[Skin]

Halo 2. Probably the worst game made that is still rated as a "good" game by the legions of pant shitting retarded fanboys, some who will claim it is the greatest game of all time, let alone the greatest Halo game. The game was an utter abortion and took a giant leap back from all the steps Halo:CE took forward.

The campaign - just horrible. How do you go from having levels like Halo and The Silent Cartographer to the unforgivingly linear bullshit you had in H2? There were a few section of the game that were open, but 90% of the game felt like The Library with some nice different colored walls and nice backdrops.

The ham-fisted set pieces. Some degenerate at Bungie got this stupid idea of "30 seconds of fun" and they ran with it, ignoring everything in between those 30 seconds. So what do Bungie do? Instead of having set pieces that flow well with the rest of the game, they just chuck something in that you are forced to do. For example, in Halo CE, there is a section where there is an elite running to his banshee and if you kill him before he gets into the banshee, you have a banshee you can use and if you don't, you can continue walking the normal way. In Halo 2, multiple mandatory Banshee sections... Like what the fuck. What about helping defend the marines from multiple dropships or the beach landing in CE? In Halo 2, scripted scarab takedown...

And the writing... Halo:CE was a simple, yet entertaining popcorn flick type of story. Halo 2, some pseudo-intellectual drivel from people who could NEVER EVER be a proper fiction writer in any capacity other than gaming. I don't think I have ever seen anything more stupid unfold before my eyes than Halo 2's story line. I was expecting a simple earth invasion story, but nope.

The multiplayer, awful and yet this was the sole reason that Halo 2 is spoken of today. If Halo:CE had Xbox Live, I am certain that Halo 2 would be universally despised. The multiplayer was broken in so many ways it is not even worth mentioning. Halo:CE had a much higher skill ceiling and better gameplay than Halo 2.

 

[Someone Depressing]

Final Fantasy 13-2. Oh my God, was 13 bad. It was boring, the characters were about as consistent and interesting as you'd expect from a game priding itself on its graphics and visual design, and those two things alone. The combat was awful, though it was interesting at the least, so it doesn't lose too many points for that, and the Crystarium was also a decent idea, that was just not used to its full potential.

Nice art, though.

But 13-2 was just so irredeemably bad. The horrible, time-travel plot and this game's Pretty Boy of The Week and the new Paradigm system and the new Crystarium and the QTE-filled boss battles, and I'm pretty sure Nomura's designs have reached a new level of stupid.

 

[ilayoeli]

Assassin's Creed Revelations:
Now, hindsight, I think the reason why I expected it to be good was because at the time I was naive enough to believe something good can come out of an annual franchise, and Brotherhood was the first AC I played so I was excited as hell for its sequel. When I finished Revelations after I was terribly worried about the next sequels: story which makes you wander if you really suppose to care for it, no challenge or any reason whatsoever to use the "cool" new gadgets of Ezio, repetitive missions and activities left right and center, dead innovation and that FUCKING ending. Boy, I literally starred at the screen wandering if Ubisoft actually let Ezio's trilogy and in that manner.
This game killed my expectations for AC3 (which good thing it did) and for the franchise as a whole.

 

[BathorysGraveland2]

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within
It took everything that I loved about the first game, and tossed it aside for some "dark and gritty" death metal, angsty piece of crap. I couldn't even finish the tutorial. Seriously my last image of the game is the FULL SCREEN CLOSEUP of the villainess' metal thonged ass as she walked up from the bowels of the ship. I shut it off at that point and never looked back. Totally terrible piece of crap.

I'd recommend giving it another shot. If you didn't even get past the tutorial then you never got to see the excellent, dynamic combat system, which is easily the best part of that game. Forget about Sands of Time, don't treat it as some sequel and instead go into Warrior Within for its gameplay alone and you may have a lot of fun with it.

Seriously though, fucking sweet combat system.

 

[Ando85]

Dino Crisis 2 - The first Dino Crisis was an excellent survival horror game. Resident Evil with Dinosaurs instead of zombies. Sadly they quickly took the direction that Resident Evil did eventually making it a run of the mill action game.

I'm gonna have to thoroughly disagree with you on that one.

With the first Dino Crisis (along with RE: Code Veronica) Capcom made the baffling decision to get rid of the prerendered backgrounds, BUT retain the set camera angles. Those camera angles and the tank controls in previous Resi games was the price we paid for the highly detailed and atmospheric backdrops. And then Capcom thought it was a good idea to take away the one benefit this play style had, and instead opt for you having to walk through poorly rendered cement-grey environments... with tank controls and a static camera.

And that freaking code disc nonsense... Oy...

DC2 thankfully went back to prerendered and just focused on giving you a good time blasting dinosaurs.

Yeah looking back I recall that now. My memory of the games is sort of vague considering that game did come out in 1999. Prerendered backgrounds were definitely the way to go so Dino Crisis 1 did suffer from that. I think what happened to me was the fact that I went into Dino Crisis 2 expecting another survival horror game. The tension of limited ammo and supplies was the main draw for me. So, I was a bit put off that they turned it into an arcadish action game. I really outta give the game another shot. I think I still have it in the closet somewhere.