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Sequels Turning Off Game Consumers
Next Generation reports that the constant trend towards game sequels is lowering interest among game consumers. From the article: "A weak consumer environment leaves us questioning whether sales will rebound sufficiently to drive growth for the full year. In particular, consumers appear to be indifferent to the proliferation of sequels, indicating a slow start to holiday sales and risk of continuing weakness." That, right there, is the problem with the PSP's library at the moment.
BAD sequels turn off gamers. By bad I mean sequels that offer nothing new in the terms of gameplay, just a shinier appearance. Pretty much any EA sports game in the past 3 years have offered very little in innovative gameplay. However, sequels that offer new gameplay, storylines, etc (Zelda, Metroid, Final Fantasy), alway bring me back. There's always a draw to games that are obviously something new in a series of games, rather than just a re-hash of the same game, with a minor addition (madden, etc).
How Jaded Are You?
But give us crap, and amazingly, we don't want to buy it. Many games recently have been heavy on graphics and crap on gameplay -- so great for an hour or two, but boring.
I don't mind some sequels, when there's some genuinely new developments in game mechanics or a good story line to go with it. I don't mind add-ons, as long as they hit the same criteria. A lot of sequels do seem to just bank on the success of the prior game, and might have slightly different enemies/graphics. Those don't do it for me, and movie tie-ins don't do it for the same reason. I'm not going to play a mediocore game because someone slaps "Star Wars" in the title any more than I'm likely to pick up GTA:That One City Just South of the US-84 Interchange because I happened to enjoy the original. Especially if GTA:TOCJSOTU84I is just like GTA:TOCJNOTU84I with slightly different cars.
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
if this will drive the industry to be even more on the safe side. Which is why we are where we are now....
M$ it's whats for diner!!!!!
There are 18 games in the Xbox 360 launch catalogue. 14 of them are sequels. (11 of them are sports/racing games!)
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The problem with the PSP is that right now you're seeing almost nothing but PORTS, not sequels. Lets face it, Burnout Legends, while a fantastic game for the PSP, is basically a port of Burnout 3. Ditto for practically every sports game on the platform.
The games developed for the platform specifically seem to be getting the best reviews - Lumines is a prime example, and is an excellent game.
Some commentary I've read tends to blame this on the push for the next gen consoles. Developers might be more likely to push for original title development for the new consoles rather than handhelds, because the big money this Christmas will be there.
I'm still enjoying my PSP, though. Am I playing it as much now, months after it launched? Probably not. But it's not gathering dust.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
The plethora of sequals has nothing to do with any slumping sales. Keep in mind, kids -- your average, brainwashed-by-the-public-"education"-system consumer is actually more comfortable purchasing a product that is percieved as a "known quantity", rather than trying something new and different. Those of us who enjoy "new and different" are among the minority, and are atypical consumers.
Madden, Final Fantasy, ad infinitum will continue to sell in mass quantities, so long as the designers don't churn out pure and utter crap (ie. creating a game that even their long-time loyal fans would hate).
EA are great at flogging sequels off. FIFA 2006 is the 13th (not to mention another 13 odd games outside the yearly releases) in the FIFA series. How could they not have the formula right by now?
I would think the largest market turned off by the use of sequels would be new buyers. I would be willing to bet that the vast majority of people that see the VIII after the last Dragon Quest game will assume that it is an ongoing story and would be hard to just jump into at this point. With this in mind, and the fact that you can't get the earlier ones, I would not be surprised if many that would enjoy the game are skipping it.
How is this any different from movies? All the money goes to sequels, because there is a guaruntee (sort of) on a return on the investment.
Halo sold well, Halo 2 sold better. GTA III sold well, GTA: VC sold better. Super Mario Brothers sold well, SMB 3 sold better.
As long as people buy sequels, sequels will be made. Let the creativity be done by developers that don't own properties, or have properties that have run their course (like Rayman). The problem of course is getting these people funding.
Right, because last year at this time, the industry was irrevocably damaged by the sequels being thrust upon us: Doom 3, Halo 2, Half Life 2 and GTA: San Andreas.
There are already a few comments about how it's not "sequels" but "bad sequels" that are the problem. However, i think the root of the problem is that too many publishers are relying on "sure bets" or franchises they can guarantee will make X amount of sales. If they see that there's a market for some entertainment franchise, they will continue to develop games using that franchise until it's run into the ground. Movie producers are the same way. Stick to the formula, make movies and sequels where we know there's a market, keep the money moving, don't take any risks. That's why there are 6 police academy movies. There was enough of a market for the movie execs to keep making them with no regard to entertainment value.
I think they're turning off the new XBox,too.
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
lets call them Weak-quels
"He's a real midnight golfer"
The "sequel" tag is deceptive. In most cases, it's used just to piggyback on the success of a previous title. I wouldn't call Civ 2, 3, or 4 sequels so much as "iterations". There's no ongoing storyline or plot between the titles. Same goes for sports games - Madden '06 is Madden '05 with a few tweaks and newer player rosters. The Final Fantasy series typically introduces new gameplay dynamics with each title, but sets them in totally different game worlds (at least until FFX-2). To me, the sequel tag indicates some sort of storyline continuity between the games, even if the gameplay isn't exactly the same.
By that definition, real sequels are a lot less common than iterations. Quake 4 and Doom 3 have a at least a passing relationship with previous games in the series, though in both cases I don't think the storyline continuity is a major selling point. Even Knights of the Old Republic II only pays lip service to the previous game. The Myst series, on the other hand, is very closely tied together, especially in the later games in the series where the events of previous games are tightly woven into the storylines.
It's all about marketing and sales. Publishers won't to release "Final Quest XII" if has so much tie-in to previous titles that it isn't accessible to someone new to the series. Even the hallowed Ultima series, which was very tight between 4 - 6, seemed to distance itself between titles towards the end, both in gameplay and storyline continuity.
Bottom line? I think "iterations" have more potential draw (Ooh, I liked NFL '05, and '06 is going to have *insert new favorite player here*!) and more potential drawbacks (Bleah, NFL '05 wasn't any better than '04, why would I buy '06?). Genuine sequels have to toe the line between too much continuity (scare away new customers) and not enough (turn off the loyal customers of the series). If that balance isn't just right, the sequel flops. All the publishers (_publishers_, not developers) really care about is what is going to sell, and iterative series are much safer investments. But maybe, just maybe, the general game-buying public might be starintg wise up to the fact that they've just bought the same thing for the 4th or 5th year in a row and realize it's time to start demanding more.
Nah, who am I kidding? Recent sales charts are all stacked with the latest Sims, Madden, Quake, Doom, and Battlefield titles and add-ons. Hell, I just picked up Sly 3 for PS2 and will probably pick up Dragon Quest VIII this weekend and FFXII whenever it comes out, too.
Give a man a beer and he wastes an hour. Teach a man to brew and he wastes a lifetime.
And yet, the two best games ever, Sacrifice and Total Annihilation, had one expansion pack between them and no sequels.
And no, TA: Kingdoms doesn't count.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Unfortunately this is where the industry could be heading. Think about it, games are costing more money to make each generation, forcing developers to stick to what sells (*cough* EA *cough*). This works because they don't need to worry about whether or not it will sell especially if the last one was a smash hit.
On the same line, assets from the previous game can be re-used. Art, game setting, engine, characters, etc. can be re-used (and maybe touched up some) for a cheaper cost than having to pay artists to create new characters, programmers to research and develop the new engine, getting a writer to cook up a new world to set the game in, etc.
I'm a big fan of Square-Enix and Final Fantasy, but when you look at Compilation of Final Fantasy VII and take the above into account, you realize that there's gotta be a lot of art being shared between the 4 projects (Advent Children, Before Crisis, Crisis Core and Dirge of Cerberus). I wouldn't be surprised if they took the character models from Advent Children and downsampled them for the other platforms (or the FMV sequences in said games).
Need another example? Go take a look at screenshots for Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories.
Despite this, it is good to see companies like id, Square-Enix, Epic actively stating that they are working on new IP for games.
I've also been thinking a lot lately about Nintendo's "Revolution". Sequels in a way are the purist emobidiment of the way games have been going for the last 20 years. I don't think it's coincidence that Nintendo is attempting to cause a paradigm shift in how games are played at the same time when the number of sequels and copycat games are on the rise. This was the same reason why Nintendo was able to get into the marketplace in the first place, since the first game crash happened in the late 70's/early 80's with all the copycat games on the market for the Atari era systems. Lack of innovation = stagnation = market crash.
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The reception of Quack 4 after years of hype has been lack luster, a minor update to an exhausted game franchise.
It's not so much that sequels are bad, its just when people don't innovate new ideas and revamp franchises is when I get a little ticked off with the same old rehash of an existing game.
Over the last decade, most companies have strived to make graphics updates to their popular games, and for a while, customers loved each new revision that offered slicker 3D graphics. But now, 3D graphics are not improving as quickly as they did 10 years ago, so a new better looking Quake 4, with the same game play and themes is kind of a waste of time and effort, and the consumers believe its a waste of money as well.
It you IMPROVE upon the original, then you have a valid case for making a sequel, but if your just upgrading the graphics engine, you have failed, period.
At least with HL2, they introduced physics puzzles and a more cinematic game plot along with fancy new graphics. HL2 was a game to experience as well as watch.
Its no wonder that John Carmack, the guy behind Quack and Doom, felt that adding gameplay features like physics is meaningless compared to improving graphics quality. Doom3 and Quack4 have been dismal failures despite improved graphics. They are not capturing a new audience and are even losing those that still remember the day they first played Doom in a dark dorm room.
Like Star Wars Episode 3, sequels without substance can leave a bad taste in your mouth, and consumers are starting to throw up over them.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
Seriously, I can play by revision number wipeout 5, twisted metal 6 (or seven?), star wars battlefront 2, Ridge racer 8 (its the eigth revision released), ape escape 4, or Grand theft auto 5. Luminies is original, as is untold legents (original but horrible), Metal gear acid is also original. Why sony doesnt make any original games for this system is beyond me...I rented "infected" just to get and original game, and man is it pretty redundant, and I also rented "legend of heroes" and its pretty generic RPG, but seeing as its the ONLY decent RPG for the system that means its okay. What few orignal games there exist are not the best games. The PSP library really stinks, and I am a avid gamer and own every major system except a Nintendo DS, and the PSP has even a worse catalogue of releases than the Gamecube, or even the Gameboy Advance which has been replaced by its successor the Nintendo DS and still is comming out with more and better and more original games than the PSP (Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones, Gunstar Heroes, Rivera, Sigma Star Saga). Just buy a Playstation 2 or a Xbox, and buy the games you want for those systems, they will look and control better than the PSP version since the controls on the PSP are pretty awful, since besides the games on the PSP being watered down ports of sequels for home consoles, the analog control nub is way over responsive and the digital pad is the one of the worst I have ever used and makes fighting games nearly impossible, which sucks because Darkstalkers Chronicles (anohter sequel) is a great fighting game but I cant pull off any fancy moves. I will admit I play it quite a bit, but thats only because I bought star wars battlefront 2 for it and I Play it while I am waiting for DVD's to burn or stuff to download...not its a decent way to kill time...but the game is so much better on the xbox its crazy. As with most PSP games they cut out major portions of the game, no online mode, no story mode, missing maps, missing vehicles, missing playable characters etc....its really watered down.
Nintendo DS has way better games, I am just waiting for the Nintendo DS SP so i wont have to carry around a dual screen system the size of a freaking brick...seriously. If you want something that plays music and movies, buy a video Ipod, a video ipod is the same price as a PSP and a decent sized memory stick or a PSP and a game....and my ipod is used way more than my psp. My combination of Ipod video and Gameboy micro pretty much solves all my travel entertainment needs, I can play excellent and original games on my gameboy micro and can I play movies and music from the ipod and can fit roughly 100 times more than on the PSP and can output them to a tv at friends houses via the ipod av cable, which the psp cannot do. And both the Ipod and the gameboy micro take up the same room in my pocket as the psp.
Steve: We have many sequels for your Xbox 360 launch!
Bill: How many sequels?
Steve: Many sequels, many!
Bill: Steve, would you say I have a plethora of sequels?
Steve: Yes, Bill. You have a plethora.
Bill: Steve, what is a plethora?
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Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Big difference. In video games, sequels to videogames are the exception to the rule, where as in movies it's the opposite. In video game sequels most often the same people who worked on the predecessor work on the current game in the series. And in most cases these people see some of the mistakes they made on the first game and fix it in the next game. In movies however, it's not so easy to get all the same people together who made the first movie. And unlike in video games, trying to recapture the magic of the first movie just doesn't work as well if you just repeat all the things that made the first movie so good(see Terminator 3 or Jurrassic Park 3 for good examples).
Of course we can put all these facts aside and get to the fundamentals. It takes good artists and inspiration to make good movies or video games regardless whether it's a sequel or not. But for video game creators, a video game formula can stay fresh much longer than a movie formula can. Thus, video game creators can get away with repeating the same shit over and over much longer than they can if they were making a movie.
-Shawn "If the Name Don't Rhyme It Ain't Mine" Conn