Game series' that went downhill - What are some series' you think fell from grace?

Dead Space.

DS1 was good a fun Survival Horror game.
DS2 was still fun, but got dumb with the "online multi-player" and the whole "Your mom is gonna hate this game" edgy ass as campaign.
DS3 ended it all, and I'm glad it ended the way it did.
 
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Dynasty Warriors.

It was basic-bitch simple and even stupid at that, but with the "open world" aspect they introduced, they somehow also managed to rip away the iconic weapon types of all the characters. They've stuck to the same formula for so many years, why would they suddenly cease.
 
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Cactus Wings said:
Dynasty Warriors.

It was basic-bitch simple and even stupid at that, but with the "open world" aspect they introduced, they somehow also managed to rip away the iconic weapon types of all the characters. They've stuck to the same formula for so many years, why would they suddenly cease.
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I didn't understand this either. You have a cash cow. Make it pretter each time and you're done. It's like EA saying Madden needs more branching dialogue and exploration mechanics.
 
Rollercoaster Tycoon. 3 was more of a "design for fun" game than a business Sim. The only reason people played it was to make cool rides and post them on Youtube. Then planet coaster came out and it was better for that that RCT3 and now I presume no one cares about it anymore
 
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While I'm totally fine with Paradise, Burnout.
SSX On Tour was a highly inferior game to the original trilogy.
Shadow of Oblivion doesn't deserve all the hate it gets but I'm going with Turok.
As soon as Neversoft pissed away the IP, the Tony Hawk series started going downwards.
Twisted Metal tanked at 3, got slightly better with 4, got a lot better with Black and Head-On and then the reboot came along.
Soul Calibur hit a downward spiral after 3
Splinter Cell jumped the shark after Chaos Theory
 
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Skylanders.
I know, it's a kid's game, kids don't care about quality/too dumb to notice a change in quality, yadda yadda yadda.
But, it did go downhill.
It started out as a somewhat nice concept and the story was good enough. The characters seemed natural and their interactions with the player and each other was quite pleasing.
After that, the series went down the shitter.
The series makes no attempt at improving its gameplay other than adding a jump button (which barely makes a difference anyway), every new type of Skylander was the only way the installments differentiated themselves from each other, the new NPCs were bland with the pre-existing characters being flanderized. Overall, every sequel seemed like the first game rereleased over and over.
Gives me the impression that the first game was made for a quick buck, and when fans demanded a sequel, the devs had no idea what to do.

Also the series having Spyro in it is in itself a reason why his own series has practically died.

tl;dr: Every sequel of Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure is just the same thing with the only difference being some shitty gimmick to get Activision some shekels.
 
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Cactus Wings said:
Dynasty Warriors.

It was basic-bitch simple and even stupid at that, but with the "open world" aspect they introduced, they somehow also managed to rip away the iconic weapon types of all the characters. They've stuck to the same formula for so many years, why would they suddenly cease.
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The open world part isn't so frustrating for me, I do appreciate the fact they tried to make that work, even if the execution left a lot to be desired.

But the weapons bit is pretty dumb. They caught a ton of shit for it in DW6, spent DW7 walking that back, and by DW8XL, they finally managed to piss off the least amount of people by giving everyone a unique weapon.

Why they threw that away in 9 only to have to promise to fix it again is idiotic.
 
FEAR was a fun game as was its expansions. FEAR 2 wasn't that bad. FEAR 3 on the other hand? Wasn't as good as the others. Besides adding a cover mechanic, the game didn't really give much moments of suspense beyond maybe the giant superstore that was converted into being a mad house full of people that either are cultist or went completely feral and the neighborhood area which also had said people that were either cultist or just glorified feral animals.
 
This might be preemptive, but with Tencent buying out Grinding Gear Games today, I'm just going to say Path of Exile for this one since all signs are pointing towards a grim outcome...
 
Pokémon. Like to me the peak was ultra sun and moon. Like yeah they were the same game they previously sold with a few tweaks but considering they made their workers put a new game every year it didn't surprise me they had to continue making it.
The game is fun, not that challenging for some but not as easy as sword and shield. The story is good and gets a bit in depth about the legendaries background. You can actually do something with the legendaries rather than having the as the MVP, the "rivals" have deep personalities and noticed (as deep as a Pokémon game can be) the Pokémon feel alive and so do the sites you go around, the fact that they gave depth to the relationship between humans and Pokémon, the fact that while on the main island you can't catch all of the Pokédex you can actually catch the Pokédex post game, also the post game is actually entertaining and the fact that they made some activities like surf,collecting stickers, making pictures and more makes it so if you get bored of progressing the story you can do something.
Tbh it's not surprising that swsh got so dunked on. It seriously has less than half of this stuff that was made for the 3ds imagine the stuff they could've have added if it was for the switch
 
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c-no said:
FEAR was a fun game as was its expansions. FEAR 2 wasn't that bad. FEAR 3 on the other hand? Wasn't as good as the others. Besides adding a cover mechanic, the game didn't really give much moments of suspense beyond maybe the giant superstore that was converted into being a mad house full of people that either are cultist or went completely feral and the neighborhood area which also had said people that were either cultist or just glorified feral animals.
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i brought fear 2 over one line of dialogue "your like a free pizza at an anime convention she can smell you, she wants to consume you"
 
Carmageddon and Postal both have similar fates:
1st one was a great game back in the day.
2nd one was a great improvement to the first one.
3rd one was developed by someone else because publisher owned the rights. It was garbage.
4th one was supposed to revitalize the series, but it's both too big to succeed, and with high expectations from people, by a team too small to deliver, with a little hint of "the game doesn't hold up/isn't as impressive as it used to be" which is a recipe for disaster and the 4th instalments are average at best.
Disappointing.
 
Franchises that are still producing or those that died?

For the latter, Empire Earth
1 was a pretty good RTS made by some of people that made the original Age of Empires.
2 improved on some of the aspects of 1 albeit was made by a different company.
3 was the death nail and pretty much threw everything the first 2 did that made the franchise great out the window.
 
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Bugaboo said:
Rollercoaster Tycoon. 3 was more of a "design for fun" game than a business Sim. The only reason people played it was to make cool rides and post them on Youtube. Then planet coaster came out and it was better for that that RCT3 and now I presume no one cares about it anymore
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The other part about this story is when Roller Coaster Tycoon World came out, and was an absolutely broken mess. It's still one of the lowest rated games on Steam to this day.

As for the topic at hand, the Battlefield series definitely fell from grace.

-First there was Battlefield 4's terrible launch, although they managed to fix the game, and people still play it to this day.

-Battlefield Hardline was released while BF4 was still being fixed, so the game didn't retain players.

-Battlefield V had a controversial marketing campaign, and EA even said that "if you don't like it, then don't play the game". DICE also decided to make random TTK changes, as if they were tossing coins to decide the numbers. The live service aspect of the game was also cut short, to go all-in on Battlefield 2042's development.

-Speaking of 2042, it is the definition of an absolute shitshow. First, the game being changed in development, from a battle royale, to some sort of patched together abomination that is a game with the Battlefield named slapped on it. Specialists were added to the game, which almost no one in the Battlefield community wanted in the first place. The Specialists aren't even memorable at all, compared to characters in other hero shooter games. Games were also changed to be 128 players, because EA likes big numbers, like how the CCP likes gigantic uber-mega projects, just to flex their e-peens. (Looking at you, 3GD) The game released in such a horrible state that a proper scoreboard wasn't added until months later, VoIP only came out in this week's patch, and the live service was also delayed to this summer.
 
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Command and Conquer. Westwood was on to something with Red Alert and Tiberium Sun just the series went down hill from there. Red Alert went corny, over the top B movie; Tiberium series did ok with the 2007 game but it just didn't have the same dark feel to it like Tiberium Sun did.

Age of Empires just went downhill after 2. Ensembles studio lost a lot of the original team and Age of Empires 3 just didn't feel fun. The fact that two has had two modernization installments shows how well made that game for people to still play it.

Halo lost the plot after 3 and ODST. Infinite may look pretty but the multiplayer is deeply flawed.

Someone mentioned F.E.A.R. earlier, hard to call it a series that went downhill when only the first game was great and notable and the other two installments were average and meh. But the sympathy is there, it could of been something better.

BioShock really did weird things as a series, BioShock 2 was just off putting, lore wise, it didn't make sense that Rapture somehow continued after people lost their minds. Infinite had potential but the ending was weird, I did like that last DLC installment, it redeemed itself despite having some blemishes.

Daisy Fitzroy lost all agency for her actions and nullified the game's simple commentary on socialist revolutions. That was lame. Keep villains villains.

Finally, all Paradox games are somehow being driven into the ground with post 2016 installments. Quit casualizing strategy games!
 
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