Poll: Franchise Overshadowing

[Thyunda]

These days, the gaming market is practically dominated by franchises. Call of Duty and Battlefield seem to have the gritty shooter all locked up. The Elder Scrolls and World of Warcraft have fantasy role-playing games pretty much covered, and Fallout is sitting pretty cheerfully on the post-nuclear adventure games.

It seems that a lot of the time, when people want these genres of games, they go for pre-existing franchises - myself included. If a new Fallout game was released at the same time as another post-nuclear RPG, I would definitely choose Fallout...simply because I'm familiar with it.
I know people who would look at the non-Fallout game and essentially throw it out of the window for being a cash-in on Fallout's popularity.
And I also know (fewer) people who would choose the RPG because everybody else would choose Fallout, and they like to be unique.
And I also know people who have lots of money and buy both. And then rub it in that they have both.

So - what brought this on is my introduction to Metro 2033, which was pretty much overshadowed by the other...larger...post-nuclear role-playing games dominating that section of the market. The only reason I got the game is because my brother likes to tour YouTube for soundtracks, and he sent the main menu theme of Metro 2033 to me...and while listening to it, I did a little research...and I liked what I saw. So I got a used copy. And have not regretted it.

Discussion - can you name any examples of games that you preferred over the dominant franchise? And can you name any that actually WERE cheap cash-ins?

 

[DeadlyYellow]

I preferred Two Worlds over vanilla Oblivion. It does so many things poorly that it comes off as a Comedy of Errors, showing a lot more personality than Oblivion could muster.

 

[Thyunda]

I preferred Two Worlds over vanilla Oblivion. It does so many things poorly that it comes off as a Comedy of Errors, showing a lot more personality than Oblivion could muster.

Interesting you should say that - I own both on the 360, and I hated Two Worlds. I had it long before I had Oblivion, though, and I never made the connection...but Two Worlds was a bloody mess. Also, any enemy could be beat by hitting 'B' when your opponent starts swinging.

I see what you mean about a comedy of errors, though...and yeah, Oblivion is kinda dull and 'realistic' by comparison

 

[Aeshi]

As a general rule if it looks like a rip-off of [X] designed solely to be played by people who want to play [X] without having to play something mainstream then it probably is/

 

[BloatedGuppy]

I think the argument could be made that STALKER did the post-nuclear environment/survival game better than Fallout did. But people who enjoyed Fallout for its zany humor, SPECIAL role playing system, and pseudo 1950's milieu will find little of that in STALKER's dour, nightmarish Zone.

 

[targren]

There are only so many plots to go around.

Hell, Oblivion's "Rescue the fantasy world from the ancient evil badass" predates... well, just about everything, really. It goes back to Ancient Greece, FFS. As for the whole 'Save the Princess' shtick... Sorry Link, Mario, and everyone else. Perseus did that first, too.

Which of the endlessly rehashed plots a game uses is really not the question. The question, at least as far as the story goes, is how it's handled. And that doesn't even get into gameplay.

Thankfully, developers don't think like OP or the existence of the Elder Scrolls games would have precluded making 'Viking: Battle for Asgard.' Same plot, except in one of them, the dude's a viking. It wasn't a great game, just your generic 3rd-person hack-n-slash, but it was still infinitely more enjoyable for me than the horrible mind-numbing tedium of the Elder Scrolls games.

 

[aba1]

I bought saints row 2 a few years back because I wanted a grand theft auto type game and well lets just say I have run through that game around 4 times and still enjoy it alot.

 

[Zantos]

I was told to not buy Darksiders because it was just a blatent God of War rip-off. I much preferred it to GoW. And for that matter Legend of Zelda and Portal. I'd say it was on par with Devil May Cry. For such a blatant kleptomaniac it was actually a really fun game.

 

[krazykidd]

I play jrpgs , sooooooooooo, rehaching isn't a problem , it's how the game plays and how the story developes. Loved oblivion hated fallout3 , loved FF13 and 12 and all of the other FFs thats not christal chronicals.loved star ocean and xenosaga , also anything SMT . So the leave village go beat up bad guy that wants to destroy/rule the world has been done to death but i like seeing how the story developpes

 

[Thyunda]

I think the argument could be made that STALKER did the post-nuclear environment/survival game better than Fallout did. But people who enjoyed Fallout for its zany humor, SPECIAL role playing system, and pseudo 1950's milieu will find little of that in STALKER's dour, nightmarish Zone.

That argument could well be made, and I would very much like to try Stalker. It's just hard to get a hold of, for some reason. Is it out on 360, or is it PC-only?

Also, I used Fallout as an example because it's quite possibly the best marketed and most well-known in the theme.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

That argument could well be made, and I would very much like to try Stalker. It's just hard to get a hold of, for some reason. Is it out on 360, or is it PC-only?

Also, I used Fallout as an example because it's quite possibly the best marketed and most well-known in the theme.

You know, that's a good question. I see a lot of gibber on the internet about a 360 port, but I'm not sure if that ever came to fruition. It seems that STALKER 2, at the very least, will be cross platform.

Fallout is without question the definitive post-nuclear brand. Myself, I like the idea of a hostile and unforgiving wasteland, not unlike Cormac McCarthy's "The Road". Fallout has a hard time delivering that to me because it's so goofy and lightweight, although I love it all the same. STALKER on the other hand...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tX6l8g0qH4w&feature=relmfu

 

[AlternatePFG]

I love Fallout, but that doesn't mean I don't think STALKER or Metro 2033 are brilliant games. Post apocalyptic settings are pretty common anyway.

Besides, there is very few things similar between Fallout and STALKER/Metro 2033 besides the basic setting anyways. STALKER and Metro are somewhat more similar, but STALKER is open, while Metro is mostly story focused.

 

[Thyunda]

I love Fallout, but that doesn't mean I don't think STALKER or Metro 2033 are brilliant games. Post apocalyptic settings are pretty common anyway.

Besides, there is very few things similar between Fallout and STALKER/Metro 2033 besides the basic setting anyways. STALKER and Metro are somewhat more similar, but STALKER is open, while Metro is mostly story focused.

My point was this - When I first saw Metro 2033, I pretty much passed it off. I just tend to ignore this and many others on the basis that they have a near-identical theme to something else currently out. It's odd, because it's really only urban shooters that suffer from this...but you tend to generalise.
Metro IS a brilliant game. From what I've heard, so is STALKER. And I also love Fallout. But if given the option of the three at the release of New Vegas, I chose New Vegas.