6 ms·

Is it just me or does it seem like there's something wrong that these 30-year-old game franchises are continually being milked? Is it really that hard to come

by Arizhel 10y ago

Is it just me or does it seem like there's something wrong that these 30-year-old game franchises are continually being milked? Is it really that hard to come up with something new these days? Back when these things were new, there were no other, much older franchises to draw from. Metroid, Zelda, etc. were all brand-new and came out at about the same time.

Pfhreak 10y ago
They aren't mutually exclusive. Splatoon received critical acclaim, for example. This is also true for every other media -- we relentlessly rebuild, recycle, and remix old work to create new content. It's a part of being human.
- Arizhel 10y ago
  >we relentlessly rebuild, recycle, and remix old work to create new content. It's a part of being human. I addressed that before: this simply isn't true for Nintendo games circa 1985-6. At that time, these characters and games were all-new, except perhaps for Mario, and he came from Donkey Kong which only came out a few years earlier. So why were they able to come up with so many original characters all in such a short span of time, which have lasted this long, but they haven't created anything original in the last 10-20 years that even remotely compare? Personally I think it points to some change in our society.
  - aikinai 10y ago
    As posters above have mentioned, all "sequels" in a Nintendo franchise tend to be completely independent with basically the character models swapped in later in development to make it part of a series. There's no shortage of ideas for new characters and stories, but if you don't put a recognizable name on the box, you immediately sacrifice half your sales. Movies are the same, so maybe you're right there's something different about society's taste these days.
    - Arizhel 10y ago
      I think it reflects on a severe amount of risk-averseness on the part of the corporate producers these days. Decades ago, they were willing to take risks on new ideas, both in movies and in video games. Now they're not; they only want stuff that's basically guaranteed a profit, even if it's not that large. So we get a lot of "safe" stuff, like ever-more installments in some comic-book movie franchise, or video games that reuse the same characters over and over, instead of truly all-new concepts. You can't have truly new stories if you're using the same characters; that limits you.
aaron-lebo 10y ago
Honestly I find it pretty lame, but I'm just not a huge fan of Nintendo's franchises. If you love them (and there are a lot that do), then it's heaven. It's what Nintendo does. That being said while they recycle the same old franchises year after year, they've constantly got new good franchises (Pikmin, someone else mentioned Splatoon) and interesting mechanics like Mario Galaxy. Can't hate them too much for finding a niche and sticking to it.
emsy 10y ago
As long as the gameplay changes, there is little to be gained in creating a new franchise. The story of most Nintendo games is banal to begin with, they merely exist as a vessel for gameplay. Nintendo games are pretty much unlike games like Assasins Creed, COD or Fifa, where new games offer minor tech and feature bumps.
mynameisvlad 10y ago
It's not like these games are the same. Super Mario 3D World is completely different than Super Mario Galaxy which is completely different than New Super Mario Bros, even though all of them are in the "Mario" franchise. Zelda is a bit more similar game-to-game, but even then there's massive changes, and Breath of the Wild is pretty unlike any other Zelda game before it. So if only the characters and some of the core mechanics (like hearts in Zelda) are the same, then is it really milking the franchise to release different games? As another commenter pointed out, it's not like FIFA/NBA/NHL or CoD where each release is a minor change over the previous.
plussed_reader 10y ago
In many other facets of entertainment I would completely agree about that lack of new narrative in modern IP; but on this point I think it's just you.
- mercer 10y ago
  In defense of OP, sequels tend to be derivative across the board (film, games, music). Nintendo is just the odd one out. I don't know if this is maybe also a cultural difference, but in the case of Nintendo innovation is more focused on gameplay than on characters, universes/world-building, and storyline. In the light of gameplay innovation, every (major) Mario or Zelda title, among others, is completely different and arguably quite innovative. Basically, if Halo were a Nintendo title, it would've had a minimal story, repeated over and over, but cross and invent gameplay genres instead of fundamentally remaining a typical (but excellent!) FPS.
cholantesh 10y ago
It's not just you, but I think this is a pretty silly gripe. The vast majority of games that see release are essentially the same. Year after year, they tell the same stories with the same characters with the same quick time events and overpriced DLC (atop an already overpriced base title). Reusing the same characters is comparatively a non issue, particularly when the experiences tend to be of such high quality.
mamcx 10y ago
A way to look at it is with the fan-theory that all the games of nintendo are played by "actors" (ie: Mario is a actor that play "Mario Kart" and "Mario Bross" etc). With this, you can say that all characters, Zelda included, loosely play a cliche but each story is a new one. This is how Link also fight in Smash!...
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
hnbroseph 10y ago
> Is it really that hard to come up with something new these days? legitimately "new"? sure, for the most part. however, "something new" isn't always the ends of game development.

by Arizhel 10y ago

Pfhreak 10y ago

They aren't mutually exclusive. Splatoon received critical acclaim, for example. This is also true for every other media -- we relentlessly rebuild, recycle, and remix old work to create new content. It's a part of being human.

Arizhel 10y ago
>we relentlessly rebuild, recycle, and remix old work to create new content. It's a part of being human. I addressed that before: this simply isn't true for Nintendo games circa 1985-6. At that time, these characters and games were all-new, except perhaps for Mario, and he came from Donkey Kong which only came out a few years earlier. So why were they able to come up with so many original characters all in such a short span of time, which have lasted this long, but they haven't created anything original in the last 10-20 years that even remotely compare? Personally I think it points to some change in our society.
- aikinai 10y ago
  As posters above have mentioned, all "sequels" in a Nintendo franchise tend to be completely independent with basically the character models swapped in later in development to make it part of a series. There's no shortage of ideas for new characters and stories, but if you don't put a recognizable name on the box, you immediately sacrifice half your sales. Movies are the same, so maybe you're right there's something different about society's taste these days.
  - Arizhel 10y ago
    I think it reflects on a severe amount of risk-averseness on the part of the corporate producers these days. Decades ago, they were willing to take risks on new ideas, both in movies and in video games. Now they're not; they only want stuff that's basically guaranteed a profit, even if it's not that large. So we get a lot of "safe" stuff, like ever-more installments in some comic-book movie franchise, or video games that reuse the same characters over and over, instead of truly all-new concepts. You can't have truly new stories if you're using the same characters; that limits you.

aaron-lebo 10y ago

Honestly I find it pretty lame, but I'm just not a huge fan of Nintendo's franchises. If you love them (and there are a lot that do), then it's heaven. It's what Nintendo does. That being said while they recycle the same old franchises year after year, they've constantly got new good franchises (Pikmin, someone else mentioned Splatoon) and interesting mechanics like Mario Galaxy. Can't hate them too much for finding a niche and sticking to it.

emsy 10y ago

As long as the gameplay changes, there is little to be gained in creating a new franchise. The story of most Nintendo games is banal to begin with, they merely exist as a vessel for gameplay. Nintendo games are pretty much unlike games like Assasins Creed, COD or Fifa, where new games offer minor tech and feature bumps.

mynameisvlad 10y ago

It's not like these games are the same. Super Mario 3D World is completely different than Super Mario Galaxy which is completely different than New Super Mario Bros, even though all of them are in the "Mario" franchise. Zelda is a bit more similar game-to-game, but even then there's massive changes, and Breath of the Wild is pretty unlike any other Zelda game before it. So if only the characters and some of the core mechanics (like hearts in Zelda) are the same, then is it really milking the franchise to release different games? As another commenter pointed out, it's not like FIFA/NBA/NHL or CoD where each release is a minor change over the previous.

plussed_reader 10y ago

In many other facets of entertainment I would completely agree about that lack of new narrative in modern IP; but on this point I think it's just you.

mercer 10y ago
In defense of OP, sequels tend to be derivative across the board (film, games, music). Nintendo is just the odd one out. I don't know if this is maybe also a cultural difference, but in the case of Nintendo innovation is more focused on gameplay than on characters, universes/world-building, and storyline. In the light of gameplay innovation, every (major) Mario or Zelda title, among others, is completely different and arguably quite innovative. Basically, if Halo were a Nintendo title, it would've had a minimal story, repeated over and over, but cross and invent gameplay genres instead of fundamentally remaining a typical (but excellent!) FPS.

cholantesh 10y ago

It's not just you, but I think this is a pretty silly gripe. The vast majority of games that see release are essentially the same. Year after year, they tell the same stories with the same characters with the same quick time events and overpriced DLC (atop an already overpriced base title). Reusing the same characters is comparatively a non issue, particularly when the experiences tend to be of such high quality.

mamcx 10y ago

A way to look at it is with the fan-theory that all the games of nintendo are played by "actors" (ie: Mario is a actor that play "Mario Kart" and "Mario Bross" etc). With this, you can say that all characters, Zelda included, loosely play a cliche but each story is a new one. This is how Link also fight in Smash!...

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

hnbroseph 10y ago

> Is it really that hard to come up with something new these days? legitimately "new"? sure, for the most part. however, "something new" isn't always the ends of game development.