Sequels that far surpassed CRAPTASTIC original games, *NOT GOOD ORIGINALS*

[Martimus]

Thread is full of great sequels to games that were good...

To be fair craptastic games dont usually get sequels so if we stuck to that rule it would be a really short list.

The original question was to name great sequels to mediocre games, not craptastic games. While many are bringing up sequels to good games, there are still a few that show sequels to average games (mediocre) and bad games.

To list a few that were mentioned:
Warcraft 2
Mechwarrior 2
Fallen Enchantress
Street Fighter 2

 

[surfsatwerk]

I'm going to stand up and say I enjoyed the first Warcraft. Necromancers were OP with that summon Demon ability.

 

[Red Storm]

Here's how I see it. An example...

Age of Empires was a good game. Age of Empires II is a really good game, so much so that it makes the original look bad in comparison.

So, the original game could have been a good game and still be considered bad when compared to the sequel.

 

[Arkaign]

I think if one considers 'Mario Bros' the first mario game (mario is playable), then it was pretty mediocre even for the time (single screen, not very much to do). It was kind of fun, but nothing really special.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8PI5VxN444

1983 saw much more interesting Arcade games such as Star Wars, Spy Hunter, etc.

Then Super Mario Bros came out, you had powerups, bosses, warps, hidden items, and all kinds of stuff that made it a stellar move forward. Only two years later.

 

[evident]

I'm going to stand up and say I enjoyed the first Warcraft. Necromancers were OP with that summon Demon ability.

lol yeah. demons were totally op

 

[KeithTalent]

They wanted to make it accessible and succeeded, even going so far as to incorporate a "crits" system, but in the process the fanbase became more and more casual and less-skilled. I played TF since the Quake 1 mod days, and TF:C, and TF2, so I've played them all except the fan-made Fortress Forever. Case in point: Dead Ringer is so easily abused against typical players. Sometimes I switch to Pyro just to counter them properly because my team's noobie pyros suck too much to understand that the only way you can reliably kill the super-easily-abused DR is to light them up and blow them against a wall to immobilize them until the invulnerability expires. Stuff like that never happened in prior TF's because there was no super-easy-to-abuse DR bullcrap in the first place, and players were more hardcore back then so the average skill level was higher imho. Ditto situations like ubers and crits which didn't used to exist.

Although there's something to be said for accessibility, if a game gets jam packed full of casual fans vying to get hats or whatever, it turns off some of the hardcore players. When I still played TF2, I played to win, e.g., as a demoman on D my team almost always won because I would play very hardcore defense on capture points and carts instead of going for kills. I still ranked in the top 10 hlstatx globally all the time anyway. But I know a lot of people play casual or for stats, and it frustrates me. I used to play on two servers that was jam-packed with like-minded, very skilled players, but I think they no longer exist... not sure.. haven't played TF2 in a long time now.

I do find it amusing that people who crap on TF2 just bring up the hats. I play relatively often and I don't see anyone really caring about hats, people play to have fun, which is what I do (of course I do change my gear on occasion, I am only human after all ). I'm sure there are more "hardcore" servers out there where people can try to play competitively, but I have zero interest in a competitive version of Team Fortress.

I agree it is a more casual game, but that's what I love about it. I can jump on and play for twenty minutes, then shut it down and walk away. Having to play for hours at a time is why I do not play as many games these days as I used to. It's a different game, it does not make it a worse one. It's damn, damn fun as I said before.

KT

 

[SMOGZINN]

I think if one considers 'Mario Bros' the first mario game (mario is playable), then it was pretty mediocre even for the time (single screen, not very much to do). It was kind of fun, but nothing really special.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8PI5VxN444

1983 saw much more interesting Arcade games such as Star Wars, Spy Hunter, etc.

Then Super Mario Bros came out, you had powerups, bosses, warps, hidden items, and all kinds of stuff that made it a stellar move forward. Only two years later.

This is probably the thread winner. Mario Brothers was a completely forgettable game, but then Super Mario Brothers came out and changed the video games forever.

 

[Olikan]

Duke Nukem was awesome compared to those plataforms games

 

[Chiropteran]

Wolfenstein 3D far surpassed the original-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castle_Wolfenstein

 

[gorcorps]

Came in here to say Assassin's Creed, but it was ruined in the OP so now I have nothing.

 

[Daishiki]

the atmosphere in D2 cannot hold a candle to D1.

the long-term playability is much better though. still, i think of the three, i look back most fondly on D1.

Ugh, I could never forget being in 6th grade, in the house at night all alone, with the Butcher wanting some fresh meat. Gave me chills.

 

[Chiropteran]

The Butcher was terrifying to me the first time I played Diablo. Everything up until him was a joke, the slow moving skeleton/zombie monsters were incredibly easy to kill and never really hurt me at all.

I open the door and this demon comes running out and kills me in 3 hits.

 

[Mopetar]

Really hard to think of any as most craptastic games don't get sequels.

Maybe the Ninja Turtle games for the NES. The first wasn't terrible, but it had some bizarre game elements among other issues. The second game was like the arcade game and generally a better game. However, the two are so different I don't even know if it's fair to compare them.

Both Street Fight 2 and Mortal Kombat were huge improvements over the original, but I don't think I would label either game craptastic. The second TimeSplitters was also a lot better than the first, which I would say was mediocre. I haven't played any of the AC games, but the first was also mediocre so it wouldn't surprise me if the second was a lot better.

I haven't played any of the Kid Icarus games, but there has to be a reason why it took them something like 20 years between games.

 

[surfsatwerk]

The first Kid Icarus was awesome.

 

[Scooby Doo]

EDIT: this is what i get for opening a page and letting it sit for a couple of hours before getting to it at least no one mentioned HW2

EDIT2: omg fail edit to my above post...so much fail

I thought homeworld 2 was worse than the original (never played Cat. so can't comment on it)

 

[KeithTalent]

The first Kid Icarus was awesome.

Yes it was. Loved it.

KT

 

[gorcorps]

Really hard to think of any as most craptastic games don't get sequels.

Maybe the Ninja Turtle games for the NES. The first wasn't terrible, but it had some bizarre game elements among other issues. The second game was like the arcade game and generally a better game. However, the two are so different I don't even know if it's fair to compare them.

Both Street Fight 2 and Mortal Kombat were huge improvements over the original, but I don't think I would label either game craptastic. The second TimeSplitters was also a lot better than the first, which I would say was mediocre. I haven't played any of the AC games, but the first was also mediocre so it wouldn't surprise me if the second was a lot better.

I haven't played any of the Kid Icarus games, but there has to be a reason why it took them something like 20 years between games.

I think the TMNT reference is valid. As a kid I didn't like the original one at all. Clunky platforming view with quite a few bugs and such... plus I remember it being really friggin hard and never getting far. The 2nd one was the isometric "2.5D" view that got wildly popular during that time with similar brawlers. I'm not sure which was the first to do it, but the 2nd TMNT game was a good one.

Just so I have another example, FarCry 3 is the awesome sequel to FarCry 2 which sucked donkey gibblets.

 

[Fallen Kell]

I'm surprised to be the first one to mention MechWarrior 2

Yeah, but I wouldn't called MechWarrior a craptastic game by any means. In fact, MechWarrior far surpassed MechWarrior 2 in many ways, just not graphically (such as having a story that you could do or completely skip. Open ended allowing you to go from world to world and accept missions that you wanted to accept. Actual negotiate on mission payouts, percentage of salvage profits, etc. Find and hire other pilots for your mech lance. Become an arms dealer by buying ammo, weapons, equipment, mechs in places that prices were low and shipping/selling them in locations which prices were high (following ComStar News articles on events occuring such as conflicts, uprisings, labor strikes, etc.)). In other words, a much more immersive game into the "game universe", then MechWarrior 2's simple you can do this fight or that one, but in the end, you will always do battle X, Y, an Z. And looking at the technology at the time, Mechwarrior was pretty advanced piece of work which was probably one of the first times in a game that specific hit boxes were used for shooting at specific locations of something else, allowing you to kill with a "BOOM! Headshot" for the first time that I am aware of in any game (2-3 years before Wolfenstein 3D even came out and another 3-4 more before hitboxes for specific body areas were added to FPS games!). And oh, did I mention that PPC's were not floating blobs that moved at about 5mph?

 

[Martimus]

Yeah, but I wouldn't called MechWarrior a craptastic game by any means. In fact, MechWarrior far surpassed MechWarrior 2 in many ways, just not graphically (such as having a story that you could do or completely skip. Open ended allowing you to go from world to world and accept missions that you wanted to accept. Actual negotiate on mission payouts, percentage of salvage profits, etc. Find and hire other pilots for your mech lance. Become an arms dealer by buying ammo, weapons, equipment, mechs in places that prices were low and shipping/selling them in locations which prices were high (following ComStar News articles on events occuring such as conflicts, uprisings, labor strikes, etc.)). In other words, a much more immersive game into the "game universe", then MechWarrior 2's simple you can do this fight or that one, but in the end, you will always do battle X, Y, an Z. And looking at the technology at the time, Mechwarrior was pretty advanced piece of work which was probably one of the first times in a game that specific hit boxes were used for shooting at specific locations of something else, allowing you to kill with a "BOOM! Headshot" for the first time that I am aware of in any game (2-3 years before Wolfenstein 3D even came out and another 3-4 more before hitboxes for specific body areas were added to FPS games!). And oh, did I mention that PPC's were not floating blobs that moved at about 5mph?

I remember Mechwarrior as a top down RPG on one world, that was 2D with dice rolls to hit. I remember being able to buy stocks in aggressive, conservative, or moderate stocks, and that was it for making money. I also remember there only being a couple of options for your mech. Maybe I am thinking of a different Battletech game, but I would call the original Mechwarrior quite mediocre.

 

[SMOGZINN]

I remember Mechwarrior as a top down RPG on one world, that was 2D with dice rolls to hit. I remember being able to buy stocks in aggressive, conservative, or moderate stocks, and that was it for making money. I also remember there only being a couple of options for your mech. Maybe I am thinking of a different Battletech game, but I would call the original Mechwarrior quite mediocre.

You are thinking of BattleTech: The Crescent Hawk's Inception
Over all not a bad game for it's time, it was just simplistic. Personally, I would love to see a new BattleTech RPG of that style come out.

 

[Fallen Kell]

I remember Mechwarrior as a top down RPG on one world, that was 2D with dice rolls to hit. I remember being able to buy stocks in aggressive, conservative, or moderate stocks, and that was it for making money. I also remember there only being a couple of options for your mech. Maybe I am thinking of a different Battletech game, but I would call the original Mechwarrior quite mediocre.

Yeah wrong game. This is mechwarrior:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MechWarrior_(video_game)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFE-JjQEgV4

 

[BrightCandle]

Mechwarrior 2 was such an amazing game compared to the original Mechwarrior. But then Mechwarrior 4 surpassed 2 by quite a bit.

 

[silverpig]

Half Life and early TW games "craptastic"?

GTFO. Either you're a troll or 15 years old and never played any of those games CLOSE to when they were new.

Pretty much this. The original Half-life was one of the best games ever made. I had more fun playing it back in 1999 than I ever did playing HL2.

Now, HL2 is a pretty damn good game too.

 

[foolish501]

I think it's hard to find a truly poor game that got a sequal that was so much better, but for me it would Street Fighter to then go to Street Fighter 2. The first SF was so poor, when i was a kid our local arcade have the stupid version with the big buttons you punched, hated the game. And yet i was addicted to SF2, and bought a SNES because of it

http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/9/2012/01/medium_c692770b89a2a32f9e83c6ed42dbd541.jpg

 

[exdeath]

System Shock 2? I don't know anything about the original and never hear about it so assuming its not great.