Sequels and How They Grow

When I say “sequel” the things that come to my mind are either “movies” or “video games” and I honestly care much much much more about video game sequels than movie sequels. Like, yeah, a new movie sequel comes out and it’s more of the same with some nice twists, good entertainment for 2 or 2 in a half hours. It’s why Marvel movies are a success. Video game sequels, though? Those are much more nebulous and can be outright strange in both approach and implementation because they are expected to take up so much more of our time. When making a sequel to a game what is it that we, as designers and players, come to expect out of these sequels? When observing game sequels I believe that, historically, two common patterns arise in their creation; the “new take” and “built-upon” sequels which drastically alter how the new entry comes out. While there are definitely financial reasons for one approach versus the other, I would like to examine several franchises purely from a design standpoint and  determine what impact these decisions had on the overall project.

Let’s take a look through the history of games to see the trials and tribulations developers hit when they first started making sequels to actually form some of the bigger franchises of today. Specifically, once the game comes out, what is its identity? What did the game do well and what is intrinsic to that game’s execution? For example, consider the different versions of Super Mario Bros 2 that released across the globe: one in Japan (now called Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels) and the one which eventually made it to the States as a rebranding of Doki Doki Panic, but why exactly? Well, at the time, it was believed that the original sequel was too similar to the original Super Mario Bros and, therefore, would not sell as well as the original, so they needed to release something different. This fear of failure mostly stemmed from Nintendo trying to innovate in the wake of the Video Game Crash of 1983 causing the usual approach in game development to be second guessed. What was released instead was a puzzle platformer with four playable characters, each with unique mechanics, and multiple rooms per level. It bore basic similarities to the original (you run and jump, that’s basically it) and only some of these mechanics were picked up in the third entry. It added to the franchise overall, but the extra characters and mechanics were seen as superfluous to Mario’s high-flying, fast paced adventures in eventual sequels.

Pictured: Super Mario Bros vs Super Mario Bros 2

Source: Found on Wikipedia, whatever

As a matter of fact, the Nintendo Entertainment System era was rampant with the “new take” approach as developers just did not know what expectations existed for sequels in a post-Video Game crash world. Observe some sequels to see the oddities when compared to their predecessors and eventual successors: Castlevania Vs Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest, The Legend of Zelda Vs Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, and many others. Castlevania’s first entry was the gold standard for 2D action games copied by many (such as Ninja Gaiden and Batman: The Video Game) and it’s sequel, Simon’s Quest… isn’t. Konami’s team clearly did not know what they should do for the sequel. Perhaps they thought to shake it up by avoiding releasing the same game as last time by adding ill-advised RPG mechanics to squander the game’s fast-paced action. Meanwhile, Legend of Zelda just had no idea where to go from the top-down perspective and changed completely: Link’s Adventure leaned heavily into the action element as a 2D platformer. Some times, you just don’t know what the audience wants out of a sequel and feel like the original did everything you set out to do so the sequel must be different to provide a new experience. This leads to a… very odd view when looking through the origins of certain franchises and noticing how these reinventions really did not add much to these properties overall; they were just far too different to really gel with the rest of their ilk and core mechanics.

Pictured: Zelda 1 vs Zelda 2

Source: Wikipedia, again

The other side of this metaphorical coin comes in the sequels and franchises that merely “build-upon” what is already there so the sequels provide either the same experience with new segments and mechanics or uses the mechanics from the original to present a new gameplay structure. Of the former, what comes to mind are the myriad of trilogy games released by AAA studios, such as Jak and Daxter, Ratchet & Clank, God of War, Assassin’s Creed, Batman Arkham Series, Uncharted, and many other trilogy franchises (especially ones on the same system) follow a similar pattern. There is a steady ramping-up of features and set pieces where the second entry tends to fine tune the original’s rough edges, but the third entry tends to continue adding features to the formula that reaches excess. For example, take the mechanics added to God of War II compared to the mechanics added to God of War III where weapons added onto Kratos’ arsenal were simpler than the base chained blades (the Barbarian Hammer, Spear of Destiny, etc) and had specific uses. Meanwhile, God of War III adds on weapons which faced much criticism, namely because in trying to one-up the previous entry they created weapons as versatile as the chained swords but almost identical in practice (Claws of Hades and Nemesis Whip).

He even holds them the same way as his normal blades...

Source: God of War Fan Wiki, this time

Warner Brothers’ Arkham franchise is one of my favorite newer 3rd Party franchises because it mixes together three of my great loves: action, stealth, and a good licensed game. The Batman franchise from Arkham Asylum to Arkham City was done very gracefully as the original was somewhat bare-bones, but the jump from Arkham City to Arkham Knight was less so. Similar to God of War (but on a larger scale), Arkham Knight at times felt like it over-complicated the most well received parts of the original and the addition of the Batmobile continued to dilute the successful cores of the franchise. In three core game entries, Rocksteady Studios clearly wanted to keep adding more and more to the game seeking to fully flesh out the Batman experience but hit a wall after Arkham City had already delivered on that completed promise. This is not an isolated case as many “built-upon” sequels fall into the habit of adding too much by their third entry where the weight of their success becomes overbearing for the player. These constant new additions work for the first sequel, but can become over-complicated once you go beyond that entry and, quite frankly, too daunting for a player to jump in anywhere but the original game.

When speaking of excess, look no further than the Batmobile

Source: Arkham Fan Wiki

While there is a trend of two types of sequels, the idea of these reinventions for sequels is not just an old one, in fact many of the “built-upon” sequels eventually make their way to taking a stab at a “new take” sequel! Super Mario 64 was followed up by Super Mario Sunshine, Super Mario Galaxy, and Super Mario Odyssey as sequels that only innovated by carefully adding to the original’s base gameplay tool-set; not a full reinvention as in the past but clearly using 64’s mechanics wholesale. Atlus’ Persona franchise went from being very representative of the greater Shin Megami Tensei franchise before shaking everything up with the calendar system and increased character focus in Persona 3-onward. These “new take” sequels are much more prevalent after the “built-upon” sequels run their course: some franchises are saving themselves by being almost completely different than anything that came before while staying true to the spirit of the originals. Take, for example, God of War (2018) abandoning the old camera perspective and sliding-block puzzles for a more cinematic viewpoint and more key-based puzzles while maintaining similar combat. It seems more likely than anything else that the natural conclusion of the “built-upon” sequel is to eventually approach the “new take” revision with acceptance of what exactly it was that made the original work so well. I would even go so far as to say that most video game series go through a cyclical nature: if successful you get a better sequel made, followed by a third sequel that’s hampered by trying to outdo the well received second, then an eventual “soft reboot” that embraces its predecessor's best aspects in a new style.

If it was not clear from all the examples and entries I pulled from, I play a lot of different types of games and I try to understand why some games merely come to an end while others continue to strive. In examining these properties, the most active pattern is the “built-upon” sequel of development teams making three versions of the same type of game, exhausting their ideas (for better or worse), and putting these properties on the back burner until either new blood or a new idea comes to the team. This eventually leads to the “new take” sequel, but not to the same degree as back in the 80s on the NES. Instead, the “new take” has made a resurgence as a soft reboot that openly embraces the strengths of previous entries, either of a “built-upon” base or the Nintendo-styled multi-year gap. I believe most sequel models can be put into these two categories and each one can learn from the other to make overall better games, as we have seen with the combination of both practices with God of War (2018). When approaching video game sequel development and analysis we really have two questions that need to be answered: what did we not get to do in the original that improves the old and what new approach can be taken with that first entry?