5 Games That Took Their Series In Different Directions
5 Games That Took Their Series In Different Directions
Sometimes you have to think outside of the box for a follow-up, and sometimes you kick that box down a hill after setting it on fire.
Sometimes you have to think outside of the box for a follow-up, and sometimes you kick that box down a hill after setting it on fire.
The Final Fight series is one of the most well-loved arcade beat 'em ups of all time. The original arcade title stole tons of quarters and I can remember it being the first arcade game I ever completed with someone at the local arcade.
The series would have a few follow-ups on the Super Nintendo that were pretty impressive for time but when the 32-bit generation came around the series wanted to try something new. Produced by the American division of Capcom, Final Fight Revenge took the series from a traditional beat 'rm up to a 1-on-1 fighting game. This is interesting as the original Final Fight was pitched as the sequel to Street Fighter.
Unfortunately, the move to 3D fighter wasn't a good one. The game first hit the arcades back in 1999 as is the only other Final Fight game aside from the original to see an arcade release. Final Fight Revenge eventually came to the Sega Saturn but never left Japan.
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The original two Duke Nukem was were fun little platform games that every DOS-era gamer remembers. They were color games that had you shooting silly looking aliens and generally goofing about.
It was a lot of fun for the time that didn't take itself too seriously. So when the sequel to Duke Nukem 2 released and changed the world, people took notice. No longer was this a kid-friendly side-scrolling shooter, but instead it was a gritty nearlt X-rated FPS.
Duke Nukem was now a testosterone fueled , stripper loving, movie quote spitting asshole that loved kicking alien ass. 3D Realms took a kid-friendly hero and turned him into a parody of every 80s and 90s action hero.
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Star Fox Adventures is a title that causes a lot of opinions with fans of the series. The game ditches the on-rails flying combat in favor of an Ocarina of Time type adventure. I personally thought the game was utterly fantastic, but what do I know.
The story behind this one is pretty interesting as it was developed by Rare before Microsoft bought the studio. It wasn't a Star Fox game at all, instead titled Dinosaur Planet was would have be Rare's big goodbye to the N64. Shigeru Miyamoto saw the title and thought it would work as a Star Fox sentry without much tweaking and Rare was happy (or at least happy enough) to oblige.
While it didn't sell as well as the first two entires in the Star Fox series it sold well and showed that Star Fox could venture outside its comfort zone. And with Star Fox Zero going back to its roots and not being all that well received, Star Fox Adventures is finally getting the love it deserves.
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Dynasty Warriors 2 is a weird game on this list because there are a lot of people out there that have no idea the Dynasty Warriors series was ever something other than the massive crowd combat that dozens of entires have featured without much change.
The original entry that kicked off this monstrous series was actually a one-on-one fighting game based on the famed Romance of the Three Kingdoms story and Koei's own strategy games based on that story. Usually when a game tries something new it doesn't always stick or is relegated to a spin-off so as not to taint the core series.
Dynasty Warriors 2 threw all that out the window and changed everything and hasn't looked back since. They loved this new direction so much that Koei went as far as copyrighting the gameplay style which is why no other games are allowed to do the massive crowd combat thing.
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Pac-Man is one of the most important video games of all time and still has players and sees releases to this day. It's a very simple premises with near-perfect gameplay that makes it easy to pick up and play whole being hard to master.
So when you think about the game getting a sequel you'd imagine they wouldn't mess with what works and instead simply add some fun features while keeping close to the original. Well, Pac-Man 2 doesn't play by anyone's rule, instead being happy to kick fans of the original right in the nuts.
Pac-Man 2 is labeled as the official sequel and not some spin-off title. Instead of being an arcade game the series decided to go the route of an adventure game on the SNES that required pointing and clicking and not even controlling Pac-Man. Whoever thought this was a good idea must have hated video games.
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