Rehashed Sequel Fatigue Syndrome
Though I guess New Vegas does have 100% more T-Rexes.
I’m not saying these are bad games. They’re not. They’re clones of very good games I’ve enjoyed. But it’s just that once I’ve spent 80 hours across two Assassin’s Creed games buying the shops, getting the best gear and so on, I really don’t want to do EXACTLY the same thing for a third time.
Rather, I would much prefer that the energy put into making these quasi-sequels be spent making either A) DLC packs that use your existing character that’s already been leveled up or B) the time should be spent concentrating on the next TRUE sequel in the series. How much earlier could Assassin’s Creed 3 have been out had we not spent the time it took to make TWO intermediate games that were more or less copies of the second title?
Full-sequels have this problem on occasion too. That’s why even if Gears of War 3 is a good game, it feels like you’ve been there and done that already because it’s the same as the other two and all they’ve added is a giant meat cleaver. The same goes for Call of Duty, where each new annual title is just like forced prestiging, making you start over from scratch with all your stats. It’s funny, in Modern Warfare 2, I was 5th prestige. In Black Ops, 3rd. In Modern Warfare 3? I haven’t even done it once yet. And now, I doubt I’m going to buy the best title at all.
I can’t keep doing this.
My favorite game experiences are usually discovering something new. That’s why the first games in series often feel like the best. The first time I played Gears, my jaw dropped. The same goes for Uncharted, God of War and so on. But by the third or fourth game? It’s not really the case anymore.
I’m not saying there should never be sequels. Games like Portal 2, Halo 3 and even Assassin’s Creed 2 show that games CAN move forward in significant ways to keep themselves fresh. But then to stall out and make two games that are essentially clones of AC2? I don’t understand the logic, other than the fact that the crew wanted something easy to work on and spit out before they REALLY set to work on their next “real” title.
I guess my time is getting too limited for gaming where I don’t want to feel like I’m constantly repeating myself, and lately, I’ve felt that a lot. I’m sure Ezio can figure out where those last few keys are without my help.
Fallout New Vegas didn’t change much game play wise but it was much more consistent story wise with Fallout 1 & 2. I enjoyed it much more than 3 because of that. I am hoping now that Skyrim has come out that they can use the same engine and gameplay improvements from it to Fallout. I’d love a new game in the wasteland with Skyrim graphics and improved physics
Yeah, I know.what you mean. Although I have to confess that Brotherhood was the only game from this series I finished because of the improved combat system. Despite that, it felt like the narrative was crawling across these sequels, and I do tire of the “he lost all his weapons and has to start over” device. Happens way too often in games.
I agree, I’ve had revelations for a while now, a christmas gift, and play the multiplayer pretty often, but only started the story just last night. I’m forcing myself to get through it at least so I can be up to date with Desmond’s storyline though. I do have to give a little credit to Revelations though, while you do lose some equipment, it’s not quite as bad as II to Brotherhood. You still had dual blades, throwing knifes, poison and poison darts, the hidden gun, a sword of course, as well as the ability to buy a crossbow asap. So there was that at least.
Lastly I think the bombs are sort of fun, I thought they’d be pretty lame, and not used, but after I found out that you don’t get detected after throwing one, and having that secondary weapon feature, I throw them more often than I probably should. I’m sure I’ll tire of it in a day or two though.
I think your complaint has more to do with growing up and having less free time. I can empathise with you but I can also sympathise with the development teams.
Radical innovation is nice and all, but can just as easily blow up your face. Try to expand or deviate too much and the whole house of cards risks collapse. Plus, people expect the games they like to be followed up by sequels, and most demand that they come sooner rather than later. I imagine this can be pretty taxing on developers. When you’re in a rush I’ll bet it’s easier to follow a formula you already know works well.
Personally, I’m happy to wait for a well polished sequel because it lessens the chances of disappointment. And as far as expectations go I’m generally happy as long as a sequel isn’t WORSE than the previous title. *cough*Saints Row The Third*cough*Mercenaries 2*cough*cough*
Have to agree with you about AC:R.
I could stand Brotherhood, as it seemed an entertaining diversion before the next true game. It also added a lot of stuff like the crossbow, poison darts etc and massively improved the combat. Rome felt large and took some exploring. It also had an interesting Borgia plotline that held my attention.
Revelations just feels small. I bought it ages ago because I was really interested in Desmond’s story, but was disappointed that he was literally paused for the entire game. Also, too many items (Bomb stations) in too small a sandbox. Constantinople, whether it was the same size as Rome or not, felt really tiny to run about. I was also really annoyed that you always had a “safe” area in Galata from the very beginning.
Also the area capture was far too easy to avoid. I actually started provoking Byzantines to get the Templars to attack. Why does buying a shop annoy Templars exactly? It seemed a bit too linear, and penalising you for carrying out the basic aim of the game (kill enemies, buy shops etc) was a bit wierd.
I’m hoping that AC3 will be a return to form, and hopefully we will get to be able to play as Desmond as well for a bit.
THIS – “he lost all his weapons and has to start over” device. is the most annoying thing every. Batman Arkham City avoided it, for the most part.
that said, once i ‘Save the Earth’ in ME3, I’m jumping into Uncharted 3, followed by AC3. anyone else see a pattern?
Paul, i suggest trying Battlefield 3. I haven’t played CoD since i picked this up. You want ‘new’ – tanks, fighters, HUGE maps. its all there.
Overall, I understand your complaint but that’s just because sequels have really no choice to stick to the same formula. Developers don’t want a backlash from their fans for changing too much, and I can see that being a major headache for everyone involved to try to come up with something new and fresh for an established franchise, but still want to dish out games while the iron is hot. If Skyrim 2 came out tomorrow, with new quests, dungeons, story, armor, and weapons but ran and looked exactly the same, people would throw money at it.
IMO, this is what Ubi did with the AC games. AC2 came out and it was a huge hit, and so they created annual spinoffs for fan’s enjoyment and money. They did this while another team worked on AC3.
@MurderBot
Ugh, Saints Row 3 was an abomination that I successfully managed to block from my memory until this exact moment. So… thanks for that.
On topic, the sad truth is that the video game business is just that… a business. Every company under the sun is attempting to make money at the end of the day. Of course some companies are a lot more transparent about that than others.
Making a new title from the ground up requires a lot more effort than slapping a new coat of paint on an existing piece of work. It just makes way more sense financially for companies to exploit this. Also, it seems to me that gamers (regardless of how much this annoys them) are unwilling to band together and start a boycott of this practice, so there is really no reason for companies to stop, anyway.
I thought Assassin’s Creed 2 was terrific, and I can’t wait to see how the trilogy concludes, but like you, I’m not gonna bother with these half-assed pseudo sequels that are just milking the franchise until gamers get tired of it and call them out on it.
This is why I never finished Mass Effect 2. It was just the same as the first one with the best parts (the roleplaying mechanics) stripped away.
In defense of Assassin Creed 3 – after the team finished AC2, they immediately started working on AC3. A small ubisoft studio worked on Brotherhood and Revelation. That small team is now working on multiplayer aspect of AC3.
But i do have to agree regarding Revelation – while i finished Brotherhood on 100%, i barely finished Revelation because of how monotonous it has become. I finished it just for the story.
@Aether McLoud
What do you mean??? They ompletley revamped ME2! I know a few people that hated all the changes they made and say that ME 1 was the only game they actually liked
The change from Uncharted 1 to UC2 was pretty big.
But from UC2 to UC3 not so much.
However! Everywhere Uncharted game is vastly different from one to the other visually. I’m talking here about the environment/level design.
So it kinda keeps it refreshing.
*Every-
While I did enjoy AC:R, mostly because I love Ezio and this was his final entry in the series, I agree that a lot of it felt re-used, and I only did the tower defense mini game once, then would just recapture my Den later. However, I hope this doesn’t mean you won’t be buying AC3! I think they started development on it somewhere toward the end of Brotherhood, and from what I hear it’s not like any of the other ACs aside from a few core gameplay similarities (like crowd-blending).
As for Vegas: I saw through the bull early and never even played it.
This has been a convention for years and years in a different genre of the gaming business: sports games. Only sports games aren’t veiled about the fact that their products are annual releases – they don’t come up with clever, after-the-colon titles. They just slap a new year on the game. Incremental tweaks and new cover art are supposed to keep you coming back every year.
CoD, AC, and the other franchises should just drop the charade and start naming their games the same way. CoD: 2012. Assassin’s Creed 2K13. Because that’s really what it is now. Annual releases with incremental “improvement” that doesn’t really innovate or do anything fun and new.