Sequelitis

I love you! But not that much.

Is the gaming industry relying too heavily on sequels?

I love sequels, I really do. I think overall video games fare well when it comes to the business of creating sequels to beloved franchises, which is much more than what I can say for your average movie sequel (Mortal Kombat II, you’ve failed me). Once a good game concept is implemented those foundations can be easily replicated and improved upon and refined to perfection, creating a massive fan base who cling to every nuance of their favorite characters and demand to see more. Which is understandable, why wouldn’t you want more of the games you love?

But over the years, I’ve been noticing a trend in the industry. Publishers are giving us more of what we want and they are doing it at a pretty fast pace. Sequels are now coming more frequently and what I would argue, less innovation. Some publishers, such as Activision have even gotten to the point of releasing a new version of their games on a yearly cycle. Choosing to develop one franchise with multiple studios in order to hit their yearly sales numbers. This isn’t a new phenomenon by any means and even today we still see sequels to some of gaming's biggest franchises of the last 20 years still being reworked and played by millions of fans worldwide. But I feel like over the last eight years or so the world has been filled with more Marios, Zeldas, Master Chiefs, and games with the number 4 in their titles then I feel comfortable with. Often these games are great in their own right, but often they feel a lot like there predecessors. It may be nostalgia creeping into my mind, but I remember sequels to games really feeling like a whole new upgrade to me when I was a younger gamer. Nowadays I feel like I’m just getting slightly modified upgrades to my favorite games. Pretty graphics and a few new mechanics mixed in.

I can understand why some companies seem to rely heavier on their franchises for income and opting not to spend their time, money, and development resources creating new IPs. It’s expensive as hell to produce a game in today’s market. We’re getting to the point where the creation of a video game can rival the cost of a major Hollywood blockbuster movie. It makes more economic sense to keep your bread and butter franchises coming down the pipeline as fast as possible. If that cuts into some development time for new ideas to be fully realized until the future, than that's preferable to losing money on top of your investment already in development and marketing. That’s the main issue I see; it’s the risk. You can see it happening now, studios are forced to either close their doors or mass layoffs, due to lack of sales of their big budget games. The creators of Lair, Factor 5 were one notable studio to feel this sting of a failed big budget new IP, back when the PS3 came out in 2006.

How did we get to this point?
We can’t only put the blame on money, greed, or risk as the main drivers here. I think it’s more of a symptom of another factor that has been there ever since the very beginning of gaming. Us. We as the consumers have been the main drivers for the cost of gaming and its now that's its more of mainstream success, more of us than ever are making our voices loud and clear. It’s only natural, we’ve grown accustomed over the years to getting more innovation and content for our money. I would even argue that we demand it and we all can agree that we can be a finicky bunch when it comes to getting games that we want. More frames per second, more blood, more online, more levels, more tea-bagging animations. More! More! More! I’m not trying to make you feel guilty about wanting amazing games, but I think we have to insert ourselves into the equation here to help understand how development some of the decisions companies are forced to make in today's market.

I think we have reached a point where it makes more sense for some companies to produce slight upgrades to their franchises with filler content instead of investing in new ideas with innovative game play. Granted, we can’t apply this to the whole gaming industry and there have been some fantastic new IPs to come out in recent years that will go against this trend. The current state of technology and venues for distributing games has given way to a burgeoning Indy game industry that is starting to make big game companies look like people with thumbs up their asses.

But I think that companies more than ever are having a harder time dealing with satisfying us as well as turning a profit without burning out their franchises. I just get the feeling some are going a little too far. So think about that when you pick up the latest version of you favorite franchise. Your money might be having more of an impact than you think.

It’s also entirely possible that I’m just a cranky old coot.

So what do you think, am I crazy?