What Do We ACTUALLY Want from a Sequel, Anyway? (A Case Study)

Comments · 141

• AR

  @ArtblockInsomniac · 1 year ago

  I really like that this is solely gameplay and did not touch on the story aspect of sequels. This is so gun from a game design perspective.

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• RI

  @Rikiflash99 · 1 year ago

  I think it's not about what we want, but what the series needs. None of the three approaches you mentioned are wrong, they just serve different purposes. There are many factors to consider: the reception of the games before, when the sequel will be released and what context it is in, development resources, etc...

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• AR

  @Aravanus · 1 year ago

  You were wondering what it was like when Legend of Zelda 2 came out: The thing you have to realize is that due to the rapid pace of tech advancement (relative to game development time) that most sequels (direct or implied) were often by default straying into your "reinvent" category.  As such, it wasn't nearly so jarring because that was sort of the expectation. A rough parallel would be to look at the chances between King's Quest 3, 4, and 5; that provides a pretty visually apparent just from screenshots at how things were just surging along within just a few short years.

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• MA

  @MAR_abisal · 1 year ago

  I got baited to watch a Bayonetta video, this means I have to play them now.

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• AI

  @airplanes_aren.t_real · 1 year ago

  It's simple, I want something that will give me the exact same experience as I had the first time watching while also being something completely different that improves on every aspect of it's predecessor

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• SU

  @SuperCaitball · 1 year ago

  I strongly disagree on your take on Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando. This game was a fairly radical rework of the previous game. They sort of reinvented Ratchet's character and changed his voice actor in order to make him less of a spunky, rebellious teen and made him into a more agreeable yet still somewhat snarky adult. The original game had a tight and strategic design to all of its encounters that rewarded cautious play and planning, with the concept of aiming your weapon being something that required pause due to how unreliable the entirely automatic lock-on system was. Going Commando made a couple of huge changes to the control scheme that completely flipped the script to be way more of a turn-brain-off run-and-gun third person shooter game, and the weapon and encounter design was simplified to match. Don't get me wrong, they're both fantastic games, but it was a little more than just an iteration on the formula.

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• RU

  @ruolbu · 1 year ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=md_PI50dm7k&amp;t=870">14:30</a> I was alive in that era.<br><br>And I was so young that I did not care much about continuity. Every game was so wildly different back then, they came out so frequently and always offered new things as technology advanced. My family had a PC and an NES, later the SNES too. I loved nothing as much as starting a new game and having ABSOLUTELY no clue of how to even play and control this game (controller, mouse, keyboard, joystick). Seeing how newer games obviously looked more advanced (even on the same NES) and also how different games used the ever same 2D perspective to make entirely different gameplay possible, my base assumption at that time was that games HAD to be unique. That making two games that were alike was harder than making them different. Mario 2 and Zelda 2 convinced me of that even further. When Mario 3 returned to the Mario 1 formula and especially when the SNES era of games often reinvented older NES games but in prettier, the opposing idea established itself, that recreating what&apos;s known is normal. So much that I distinctly remember how playing Mario 64 for the first time had me kinda bummed that there were no level goals and levels were reused so much instead of always being new and bespoke. Obviously Mario 64 was an awesome game for being more open, but my child mind wanted the - as quaint as it sounds - nostalgia of older generations.<br><br>This might have been due to my childhood stages. AFAIK kids have phases were everything new is good and then later on they prefer having established rules and predictability. So considering that many kids in that era grew up with games but they all were at different ages, maybe this is one indicator for why some people feel very nostalgic about experimentation and others for following tradition.

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• ON

  @onecreationleft · 6 months ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=md_PI50dm7k&amp;t=985">16:25</a> I love Solid Steak

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• RI

  @RitoWarrior2006 · 1 year ago

  Typically, what I want from a sequel is to expand what was established. But, depending on the series, I might want to see a complete reinvention of the formula. Like you said, Dot, sometimes it’s a combination of all three.

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• TH

  @ThatOneVoiceInMyHead · 1 year ago

  Bro, I LOVE The Bayonetta Series SO MUCH!<br>And you put this video out at the most interesting time... I JUST Started Cereza &amp; the Lost Demon a few days ago and am having a BLAST. Thank you for spoiling next to nothing. I hate spoilers, but love Bayonetta, so I had to watch.<br><br>I really hope Bayonetta gets more entries, Bayo 3 seemed to imply Viola is going to lead the way, and I&apos;m fascinated by that possibility, but I truly hope Cereza-Bayo doesn&apos;t stay gone. Bayonetta is one of my favorite series of games and I would be distraught to learn it&apos;s done.

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• DE

  @DefinitivNichtSascha · 1 year ago

  I find it interesting that even back on the NES, all three sequels to Super Mario Bros. each fall into one of these categories. The Lost Levels refines, Super Mario Bros. 3 expands, and Super Mario Bros. 2 reinvents.

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• S1

  @s18cyt · 1 year ago

  This was an excellent analysis and I especially appreciate it not devolving into another Bayonetta 3 hit piece

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