Not Every Game is a Sequel

Earth Wind and Metal writes "In response to a recent article from the Guardian about the lack of original games, Siliconera selected ten brand new titles set for release in 2006 to keep your eyes on. Five of the games are new to the USA and the other five are making their world debut. The list includes the robot house sim Chibi Robo, sandbox mecha RPG Steambot Chronicles, Taito's DS cooking game Cooking Mama and of course Okami." I am *really* looking forward to Okami.

Comments

Other games

[scragz]

There are also spinoffs and prequels.

Where are the PC games?

[Chowderbags]

Seriously, what about Spore? Ok, maybe there's a tenuous connection to Sim Life, but seriously, Spore is gonna be a whole new thing.

The article doesn't mention a single PC game. Why talk about sequels vs original games without at least mentioning computer games?

Re:Where are the PC games?

[HunterZ]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/05/27

Blah Blah Blah

[th1ckasabr1ck]

Video game developers manage to do something which Hollywood has never been able to do - The sequels that we make are consistantly BETTER than the previous entry in the series. How many movies can say that?

People love to talk about how so many new games coming out are sequels, and they are - But so what? If the games are high quality and you have fun playing them, then just enjoy! I could understand this a bit more if people were saying "this game sucks", but all they seem to be saying is "this game is a sequel".

I'm not saying that some more original IP wouldn't be nice, but it gets tiring seeing all these blogs/comments/websites/etc stating the obvious.

Re:Blah Blah Blah

[AuMatar]

If only that was true. The problem is, most video game sequels are the same thing with a new engine, or just additional levels for the same engine sold at the same price. The same thing repeatedly gets boring. So the sequels aren't as good, even if they still may be better than most movie sequels.

Re:Blah Blah Blah

[Shadarr]

Not true. Generally, even the "derivative" sequels are better than the original. They look better, they have more options and content. Basically, once you get the sequel you have no reason to play the original again. People who complain that Doom III isn't as good as Doom aren't really comparing the two games on their merits, they're comparing the original against what they wanted Doom III to be. Doom III is still better, it's just not innovative. It gets points off for doing a lot of the same sorts of things as Doom.

Also, some "sequels" are really quite innovative. Grand Theft Auto 3 was a sequel, as was Dune 2. Resident Evil IV and Civ IV should both be game of the year on their various platforms, yet they are sequels.

Compare that with movies. It's very rare that a sequel is better than the original. The only ones that spring to mind are Aliens, Terminator 2 and Return of the King. ROTK is very similar to a videogame sequel in that it used the same engine, but they'd had time to refine it.

Conversely, something like Matrix Reloaded not only was worse than the original, it also crapped all over it.

Re:Blah Blah Blah

[AuMatar]

I disagree. The derivative sequels, by and large, tend to be worse than the original. Exceptions exist, but by and large their very lack of original gameplay makes them worse, because I played the first one. Having done it once, the second time is less fun, even if it is more polished.

Re:Blah Blah Blah

[cgenman]

Video game developers manage to do something which Hollywood has never been able to do - The sequels that we make are consistantly BETTER than the previous entry in the series. How many movies can say that?

People love to talk about how so many new games coming out are sequels, and they are - But so what? If the games are high quality and you have fun playing them, then just enjoy!

What we're selling is a visceral experience. When you first get a game like, say, Dance Dance Revolution USA, you have an amazing experience that is like none you've ever had before. You're blown away by the experience.

But players acclimate. If you find an arcade with DDR 5th mix, the increase in framerate and the addition of hold arrows is a nice touch that helps keep you interested. And maybe DDR Max 2 has a ton of new songs, many of which are in genres that you're interested in. Even though they're both technically superior, neither of these creates the same sense of awe that you had the first time you found this amazing new game. By DDR Extreme 2, the 9th or 13th in the series, you're burned out on it all and want to recapture that original rush.

Sure, in many ways it is the player's fault for buying something they're familiar with instead of taking a chance on something new. But it is also our fault for not providing them with new experiences, but rather more content.

Gamers in some ways are drug addicts. They get that amazing high of the new game. But their systems get acclimated and they take larger and larger doses for less and less payoff. In reality what they need is a new drug, one their system hasn't adapted to.

Why do I think that last paragraph is going to be taken out of context someday?

We screw up, too, in thinking that just because we devote our lives to an experience that the player should too. Game designs don't last forever... not even close. Yet we keep pushing ones we've felt were successful because, while everyone else has moved on, we still think the original game was pretty awesome.

And it was. That's great. Get over it and make something else.

Re:Blah Blah Blah

[myster0n]

Grand Theft Auto 3 was a sequel, as was Dune 2.

I just have to correct a mistake here :
Dune 2 was NOT a sequel. Westwood never made a Dune game before that game. The original Dune game was made by Cryo Interactive. And it's a totally different game. No-one in their right mind would (after seeing both games) call Dune 2 a sequel.
I think that the only reason that it was called Dune 2 was that both games where published by Virgin, and they wanted to make sure people didn't think those two games were the same.

So they might have been named sequentially, but it's not a sequel.

Pondering...

[SpacialCoogs]

My question is what therefore becomes an original concept for a game? Don't we really already have the most strangely unimaginable games out there? With games being the most lucrative form of entertainment and appealing to all sorts of genres we fall into the same stereotype as with movies. Every so often a gem comes out that everyone loves, but don't we still all go back to our old favorites, it's like comfort food. They become old friends and the sories and plots become our own sort of mythos. Therefore to me the idea of griping about original games is the same as griping about all the fantasy books being based on Tolkein, etc. Debate anyone?

Some games only look like sequels...

[smbarbour]

Such as the Final Fantasy series. With the exception of Final Fantasy X-2, each game is nearly unique except for some common elements (Like the theme song, chocobos, and the fundamental underpinnings of any RPG like hit points and experience). It would be like calling episodes of The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits sequels, the story is completely different, but the theme song is the same.

Re:Sequels

[jclast]

It doesn't even necessarily need to add something to the gameplay of the original.

Some games have a good enough story that I just want to know what happens next.

*sigh*

[HunterZ]

I like how they try to respond to a cynical article about lack of originality in games by pointing out a bunch of cutesy Japanese titles (with the possible excpetion of the mech one).

And what's up with the Dynasty Warriors clone? "But it has more bad guys!!!111" It's good that someone broke the mold - and hey, maybe it's a fun game - but I wouldn't trumpet it as a genre-defying revolution in video games.

I guess what I'm trying to say is: Where are the gritty, realistic, 0% cute, immersive, nonlinear (within reason) sci-fi RPGs? Have any even been made in the past few years (other than KotOR of course)?

Re:*sigh*

[CastrTroy]

I think the problem with a non-linear RPG is that people have trouble finding out when they've advanced in the game, or even beaten it. The probably get frustrated wondering if they are on the right path too. You spend all this time trying to do one thing, and you find out that the result of what you just did isn't really what you wanted to accomplish. I think people like to have a defined starting and end point in a game, and a well defined path between the start and end. If the game is non-linear, how does anyone know what to do next? if you have 5 missions to choose from? which do you choose, and if you choose the wrong one, do you end up with a bad result?

Re:*sigh*

[HunterZ]

It's important to note that there's a spectrum between linear and open-ended, and the term "non-linear" covers a wide area in between the two. While I personally enjoy the open-ended RPGs that the parent poster described, I also tend to never beat them (after spending days looking under every rock and carting every piece of trash back to a shop, I eventually get distracted by some other game). On the other hand, Linear RPGs - which covers the vast majority of Japanese console RPGs - are something that I invariably get tired of because they start to feel like watching a (bad, really long) movie except that I have to hit the A button to keep going.

There's a balance, and I really *really* enjoy the exploration aspect of good RPGs, especially when it's mixed in with the right amount of story to keep me from feeling lost on my way to the end. In contrast, I *detest* being hand-held through a sigh-seeing show while being bombarded with boring dialogue and cliche story.

I also find the "getting lost" argument a little weak when I compare open-ended RPGs to platformers and such, although I suppose you could claim the latter to be harder to get lost in due to the subdivision of content created by having levels.

Re:*sigh*

[HunterZ]

MMORPGs don't count! Nice try though.

FF is more like the exception than the rule

[Moraelin]

The FF series, ok, it does manage to have different stories, swing between medieval and SF, and even change the game mechanics (whether it's needed or not). Duly noted, and true.

But how many others do that?

E.g., to pick on another long series of games, take Sierra's empire building games. Exactly what was the fundamental change between Caesar and Emperor: Rise Of The Middle Kingdom? I've actually had Caesar III, Pharaoh, Zeus and Emperor installed at the same time at one point to make a comparison, and make no mistake, they were the same game with different sprites.

The only noteworthy tweak I can remember was that after Pharaoh they finally introduced road-blocks, so you can make essential NPCs (e.g., those supplying a city section with food and water) move in a loop instead of wandering stupidly into the desert while everyone in town leaves in droves. Otherwise, other than changing the sprites to fit a different civilization, they just largely kept releasing the same game over and over again.

It took PopTop's Tropico to shake the status quo, and give that team the idea to finally give NPCs a brain. E.g., to have each person on the map go to the market when they're hungry, instead of having pinball supplier NPCs walking in a loop. So they dutifully produced another mindless clone, I'm talking about Immortal Cities: Children Of The Nile, except this time they cloned Tropico instead of their earlier games. (And to add insult to injury, accompanied by a mess of interviews and trailers in which they act as if they're the ones who invented that, and noone before COTN ever thought of that.)

Which brings us to another phenomenon: mindless clones of whatever sold well last year.

Worse yet: often _clueless_ clones, by people who don't even like or understand the genre, but just have to make a RPG or The Sims clone or whatever, without even understanding what people liked about those games.

And city building is used above just as an example. It's not even the worst offender. Other genres are worse offenders.

E.g., take EA's neverending series of "Some Sport 2006", where the only major difference from last year's installment are the player names. 'Nuff said.

E.g., take economic games. For every occasional gem like "Die Gilde" ("Europa 1400: The Guild"), you have about a hundred clueless "me too" exercises, often missing the whole point. Everyone and their grandma just has to imagine that giving people a rectangular area to place shops on, and slapping on a title ending in "Tycoon", is all there is to it. Actually worrying about gameplay, balance or diversity is obviously not needed.

E.g., heck, take FPS, the genre which pretty much made mainstream the practice of releasing two dozen identical games per year. Get a graphics engine, bolt on two dozen unrelated maps, and the bog-standard assortment of guns (knife, pistol, SMG, sniper rifle, shotgun, flamethrower) and call it a new game. Oh yeah, and bolt on a half-baked multiplayer mode where no thought was given to weapon balance or map layout for multiplayer, and just reused whatever the single-player game had.

In some cases the sequel not only didn't really add anything new, but was actually a step back and folded back into the comfy mediocrity of being another "me too" clone. E.g., Unreal 2. It did away with all the Unreal universe and unique weaponry (e.g., the flak gun being a unique something in between a shotgun and a grenade launcher, but not quite either), and replaced that all with a generic SF universe and generic FPS weapons (yay for having a standard shotgun again.) In fact, it was another dime-a-dozen generic FPS that only reused the franchise name.

I could go on, but methinks you get the idea already. When some of us complain about sequels, spin-offs and raping a franchise name for a quick buck, what we have in mind is the above. It doesn't mean literally that exceptions like the FF series don't exist. It just means they're just that: exceptions.

Re:FF is more like the exception than the rule

[itscolduphere]

Some good points there, but I'm not with you on all of them.

First off, there are two genres that really, in my opinion, don't leave much room for originality...FPS's and sports. Sports more so, because once you have emulated the real-life sport, how much more is there really to do? You can adjust control schemes, improve graphics, make an even MORE in-depth "team management" engine (which many players actually don't like...some of us just want to play some hockey), and update rosters. I mean, what are you chances of actually successfully re-inventing the football game?

FPS's aren't quite as bad, but really you're still going to run into a bit of a wall as far as original ideas. You can change the weapons around a bit, add vehicles, have distinct character classes, or have some sort of levelling system for single-player mode. All of these have been done. Go much farther than that and you run a strong risk of departing from what fans of the genre actually enjoy.

Really, games just aren't much different than other forms of entertainment like movies or music: you have the occasional gem surrounded by a lot of derivitive crap. However, sequels specifically aren't really a bad thing by their nature. I really don't mind when a developer takes a game and refines it in the form of a sequel. It serves two purposes:

First, it gives gamers who did not play the previous games a chance to enjoy the experience in a "modern" form. As a newcomer to the series, I have a much greater chance of enjoying Simcity 4 or Civilization 4 than I would playing the originals...in both cases -I- have played every game in the series, and looking back each iteration, especially the first ones, while amazing at the time, are much too simplistic for my current tastes, as well as -badly- graphically outdated.

Second, it gives fans of previous games a chance to enjoy the core experience again, often with added/improved features...sometimes with drastically different gameplay. Again I'll fall back on Simcity 4, Civ 4. In each of these series, elements were added that drastically changed the gameplay. The addition of cultural victories in Civilization, for instance, or the use of a region in Simcity 4 which allows a player to create large "metro areas." No, if you didn't like the originals these features are far from guaranteed to interest you, but for a current fan of the series these features are more than worth the money for the new game.

And let's not forget "sequels" like Metroid Prime, which manage to fundamentally change the genre/gameplay, while simply keeping some of the core ideas of the franchise. And sequels in name/gameplay type only like the aforementioned Final Fantasy series.

And with all these sequels, let's not forget that at one point every one of them was an "original" game. At one point there was no Devil May Cry 2, or Gran Turismo 3, or Burnout 3, or Project Gotham Racing 3, or Halo 2. Just because a sequel was made afterwards does not retroactively make the orignal less...well, original.

Combine everything I said above with the number of original non-franchises that come out every year (which, while not a majority, is also a non-trivial number), and the whole problem of sequels seems to be a bit overstated to me.

I'm not holding my breath...

[Poromenos1]

Spore looks great in screenshots and theory and all, but I'm a bit disillusioned by all the games that promised depth. The most recent one being Fable, I thought I was going to be able to do anything I wanted, and it turns out the things they presented as only a few options were ALL you could do.

So, I'm waiting to see if Spore is the Holy Grail or just a Pacman/Simwhatever/Warcraft/Starcraft clone :/

Errrr WTF?

[HaydnH]

From the blurb:

"In response to a recent article from the Guardian about the lack of original games, Siliconera selected ten brand new titles set for release in 2006 to keep your eyes on."

OK, let's look at some of these "ten brand new titles":

Beatmania (Playstation 2)
After the success of Dance Dance Revolution in the USA, Konami has finally decided to bring the first Bemani game over.

So this is just another dance dance revolution but you press buttons with your hands instead of your feet... and that's not a sequel??


N3: Ninety Nine Nights (Xbox 360)
This brilliant game is developed by Q? Entertainment and action veteran Phantagram. On the surface it looks like a Dynasty Warriors clone

"Dynasty Warriors clone".... says it all really.


Every Extend Extra (PSP)
The second title from Q? Entertainment has more in kind with their other titles (Lumines and Meteos). Every Extend Extra is actually an extended version of the PC game Every Extend.

"An extended version" - heeellllooooo????


Drill Dozer (Game Boy Advance) & Exit (PSP)

Both are side scrollers - I 'm sure it would take a lot to make a new & innovative side scroller... and I'm sure I've seen a robot with a drill on his head before.


Seriously, the article is meant to be arguing that not all games are sequels, and they use these as examples?

Haydn.

Re:Sequels

[Delphiki]

Reasoning? There is no reasoning. Bashing sequels and spin-offs and movie licenses is the way to appear more indie or underground than the other gamers. As far as I can tell, it's all bullshit penis waving by gamers trying to seem more sophisticated than other games. It goes kind of like this..

"I'm too cool to play Madden. Football is for dumb jocks and frat guys."
"Oh yeah? Well, I'm too hardcore of a gamer to play any sports or racing games."
"But I refuse to play any sequels or movie licensed games because they're so unoriginal."
"Oh yeah, well I don't play anything but independent games developed in third world countries where every person on the development team had a Ph.D. in art or philosophy."

Re:Fun?

[AcidLacedPenguiN]

because the homeless smell like cigarettes and poor, not plastic game cartriges. . .