Franchises that you used to love, but now can't stand.

I personally used to love the Resident Evil and Halo franchises but after every new installment in each I end up losing more and more love for them. I simply adored RE up until after they released RE5 and then I felt everything went downhill with Operation Raccoon City and RE6. I loved every Halo game up to this point and thought Halo 4 was a step in the right direction, but man does Spartan Assault put a big poo stain on an almost immaculate franchise. This game alone, along with how microtransacty Microsoft has been, leaves me with very little fate for that franchise. So I was wondering. What franchises did you use to adore, but now can't stand?

What you said about Resident Evil is pretty much how I feel.

Silent Hill 2 is my favourite game, but at least half of the games following it in the series don't do anything for me.

So, you mean Franchises that you used to love but was run into the ground because they were selling well?

I been disappointed by the recent Halo games and I love them games before Reach.

This is sadly accurate. Are you like me as well and still buy every new entry in hopes one will be the next Silent Hill 2?

Used to love Final Fantasy. My love peaked with FF6 on the SNES, then I gradually fell out of love little by little. Finally, with Final Fantasy 10, my love shifted to hatred (modern JRPGs are just too indulgent with cutscenes and hollow blabber, so the pacing goes right out of the window). I did play FF 12 still, and liked it well enough, but everything about FF13 repelled me to the point of not playing the game at all. For my young self, that'd have been unimaginable.

Metal Gear Solid is quite a similar story. Loved the first one. Was kinda disappointed by the second one. MGS 3 just felt so mechanically outdated (the version with the fixed camera) and burdened by excess complexity, my love again shifted to hatred. I also kinda am over the whole anime-style over-the-top storytelling which prevails in most Japanese productions, so that didn't do the franchise any favors. I've since warmed up to the franchise again. I enjoyed Peacewalker a lot, and what I've seen of MGS 5 looks promising gameplay-wise.

Those are the big two really. Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid. Hopefully I'll be able to embrace them yet again at some point in the future.

Nah, i'll admit I haven't been hugely open to appreciating the newer games; mostly gone off of preview videos and critical buzz to determine whether it's worth checking the game out, and from that only Shattered Memories has really peaked my interest. At some point maybe i'll go on a heartbreaking journey through everything post-SH3 to see if I can dig up something to enjoy.

Final Fantasy. Some Final Fantasy installments were my favorite games growing up, but today I just don't have the temperament to sit through them. The story and characters still interests me, but the gameplay is so boring and grindy I just can't do it. That applies for most JRPGS.

Mario and Zelda. When I was a kid I loved the NES-N64 Mario games and the N64 Zelda games. But I don't think the new games bring enough new to the table for me to enjoy them, It feels like the same game I've played for 20 years only with better graphics and in some cases motion controls tacked on. I'm also a very story oriented gamer and there's barely any meaningful story to speak of in those games.

4 gets a bad rap, but I really enjoyed it. The apartment stuff in particular is great. I haven't played any of the later ones except Homecoming (woof), though. At least Yamaoka's music never dips in quality... even Homecoming (another woof... holy hell, was that game bad, especially on PC) has some incredible tracks.

Final Fantasy is up there for me kinda. The entire XIII saga is trying it's hardest to kill any love I have of that series. Luckily, I enjoy XIV (stopped playing because my laptop is a piece of shit -_-) and XV looks great. I only hope it is great.

Guild Wars. I was big into Guild Wars 1 for a while and tried multiple times to really get into Guild Wars 2, but I just can't do it. The fact it's using the Guild Wars name kills me inside.

I don't mind the grindy aspect so much as the "gameplay is so boring" now. FF used to be an automatic pre-order for me, and I thought the PS2 releases really took the series forward with X being even better than VII imo, and XII having the best combat and leveling systems to date. XIII was like a movie on rails where you had to push buttons to keep the film rolling. Severe disappointment turned into almost passionate angst for the automated gameplay and leveleing, and I haven't cared about FF or Square since. But...

Sonic.

It was all well and good on the Mega Drive, but outside of the early 90s, the series turned to shit. The cartoons and comics were lame too.

I want to reiterate how bad that game is. Homecoming is really bad in just about every way, but I still adore that soundtrack.

Mine would have to be The Elder Scrolls & Skyrim. Not because Skyrim isn't a great game, but because the watered down magic creation system, and the elimination of speed & jump modifying stats and magics, just destroyed the high mobility play-style I liked to role-play in TES games. And also the Souls series (and Dragon's Dogma) completely raised the bar for what I need from Action RPG combat in order for it to be fun for me.

Hack and slash, with nothing more than stat differentials and background dice-rolling determining the outcome of a fight, does nothing for me anymore. I feel like I'm just mashing buttons. I can still enjoy some turn-based or menu-driven strategy in the JRPG style, but if the combat isn't more deliberate... I just can't endure it anymore. It made Skyrim, for me, fun but just not fun enough.

Call of Duty

I was the biggest Halo fan. Played and finished Combat Evolved on legendary half a dozen times. Spent hundreds upon hundreds of hours online in 2. Bought the legendary edition of 3..... And then my Xbox broke. I've recently got my hands on another 360 and I've just played through ODST and man, I though it was dog shit. Occasionally the Halo combat that i love shined though but for the most part it was a train wreck. Now I'm wondered if it's just ODST or if I'm just remembering the earlier games with my rose tinted glasses on?

Sonic, FF, Silent Hill, and now I guess Call of Duty...

Is it ok for disliking a franchise for a fan base? Because, while I still love the Metal Gear Solid games, the fan base for them is the worst thing ever. All people do is bicker about MGS2 and MGS3, how MGS4 was terrible, how the real Snake is from MGS3, how Peace Walker is or isn't a good game, how Kojima screwed this up, how the next game HAS to be terrible, when are we getting this, Raiden is terrible, why isn't this random character coming back, this game was too serious!, this game was too silly!, this game was too convoluted!, this game was too simple!, something something David Hayter, something something Paz, blah blah blah, the complaining goes on and on forever.... I just hate looking up anything or following the development of any of the MGS games because of the pessimism and anger surrounding each game.

Yep, I played the hell out of every Call of Duty game because they progressed the series a lot in every iteration right up until Modern Warfare 2. Now I'm totally ambivalent towards the series.

Tony hawk's pro skater. However, the hd remix was alright. I couldn't be bothered with anything after underground 2.

@guesty_01: ODST is arguably the best Halo game, so...

I have never really LOVED these, but i've grown tired of AssCreed and Call Of Duty

Guitar Hero. Once Harmonix left and made Rock Band, I eventually moved on with them. The last Guitar Hero I spent any major time with was World Tour and I just didn't enjoy it nearly as much as Rock Band or Rock Band 2. I skipped over 5 entirely and played a little of Warriors of Rock because it had a few songs I had hoped for years would make it to Rock Band, but never actually finished the little story mode included.

The DJ Hero series, however, I had a blast with.

It kills me to say it, but Mass Effect. Man, why did they have to turn it into a 3rd person hallway shooter? I just replayed #1 and #2. I can't bring myself to even install #3.

It doesn't help that the story got so dumb by #3 either. And that dialog. Ugggh. That Krogan world dialog was so bad. Hahahah oh yeah and the Reaper ledge fight and those dumb "think of the children" dreams! Man fuck that game.

Yeah probably has to be Call of Duty for me too. Haven't played the last 3. Call of Duty 1 and 2 are a few of my favorite games of all time for single and multiplayer, 4 was incredible, really enjoyed MW 2 and Black Ops, then... just too much for me. The campaigns really fell off to become not worth player (probably by Black Ops to me) and the multiplayer just has hardly evolved.

Always been a big Battlefield guy and it's all I can play of that kind of shooter. I've had my fill of CoD.

I want to say Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy, but the basis behind the story of KH3 sounds amazing (mainly the villains) and Final Fantasy XV looks fantastic.

I don't know. Dance Dance Revolution I guess?

Legend of Zelda

BOOM!

Resident Evil, Final Fantasy, Metal Gear and anything Nintendo does.

Metal Gear Solid 4 was not good at all and i never finished Peace Walker but i'm still invested enough to give Ground Zeroes a try. We'll see how this one goes.

Final Fantasy XIII is a steaming pile of shit and while one bad game shouldn't kill a franchise in which i liked every single game i played before it, aesthetic and character design goes a long way and XV looks equally unappealing to me.

Resident Evil 4 was a masterpiece. It straddled the line perfectly between survival and action. But no matter how good that game is i never wanted more of that style of RE. RE5 was good enough for one playthrough and little more and i have no interest whatsoever in playing any RE games as long as they keep going in that direction. Tank controls 4 life yo!

As for Nintendo, ever since the first New Super Mario they have essentially applied the same exact art direction in every one of their games and i can't stand that look. The colors, the shapes of everything with no sharp corners anywhere so kids don't hurt themselves. Their games don't just looks colorful and cheerful like they used to, they look like cheap fisher price plastic toys. I don't care if the gameplay is every bit as good as it used to be or even better, i can't play these games with my eyes closed and i'm certainly never going to spend time looking at something i despise the look of.

Definitely Silent Hill, and I have a feeling that in a few years I just won't give a shit about anything called Final Fantasy, which is a really sad thought.

Socom 2 was the best game ever. 3 was different but ok. After that..... let's not talk about it.

Mass Effect. Loved the first game. I thought it was a good attempt at RPG in third person and I loved the streamlined, retro-look of the game. I thought it was ambitious with the choices that effected the world across the series. Then EA bought Bioware and Mass Effect turned into serious shit. I liked Mass Effect 2, but I felt it was becoming an action game. Everything was dark now and it was all about Finishing the Fight, Fighting for the Future and Suicide Missions. Meh. Then Mass Effect 3 came out and I have no love for that game what so ever. Most of the game was OK but they just didn't wrap that series up in a good way. The whole premise with the war was kind of lame and none of the choices mattered in the end.

Forza. Maybe it's too early to call this, since they can still turn this series around. But I'm starting to see a pattern in how Forza games are getting made. Microsoft are getting increasingly greedy with this series. It started with Forza Horizon. The Season Pass was a lot more expensive than Forza 4's and there was less content, with a large part of the content being re-used assets from Forza 4. With Forza 5, they're taking this a step further by making the Season Pass even more expensive. I wouldn't be the least surprised if a lot of that DLC content is another round of re-used assets from previous Forza games.

Gran Turismo. I love 1-4 so much. The mother of all racing games. Now it's just a collection of stuff that doesn't quite stick together. The 10 year old PS2 assets are still there! The sound is still crap. The UI looks really dated (And GT used to look slick as hell). That series needs a reboot.

Call of Duty. Maybe it's beating a dead horse, but when I look back at Call of Duty, there's a lot of good memories. I remember when 1 and 2 came out and put every other WW2 shooter to shame. Then they followed up with MW1 and I probably played that campaign 3-4 times. Incredible game. MW2 was OK but after that I just lost all interest in that series.

God of War. First game was fucking awesome. So many brutal moments, great boss fights and stunning scenery. Second game was good too, but I went in with high expectations and just didn't have the same effect on me as the first had. By the third game I was over it. It was good but I'm so fucking tired of seeing Kratos now.

@wintersnowblind: Hmmm, I thought it was terrible, didn't enjoy playing it what so ever.... And yet I consider Combat Evolved to be in my top 5 games of all time.

I fucking loved the first 4 Call Of Duty games (especially 1 and 2). Sad to see where that franchise has gone.

Also, Mass Effect. The third one was such a huge letdown that I'll never return to that series.

I wouldn't say that you really hate the halo franchise. You didn't like Spartan Assault, but that's only one game and it's not even a full on halo game. If you hate 5, then maybe you're over the franchise

Need for Speed.

The glory days have long passed. Or for me at least.

I loved those games back around 2005. Underground 2 was incredible. From the car customizations to the variety of race types. Most Wanted (the original. Fuck the 2012 one) was and remains the most fun I've had with a racing game. Even liked Carbon. Still fun and also liked the dumbass story.

No game in the series since that era has come close for me. They've forgotten about street racing. The customizations. The SINGLE player. Too much has been invested in online and multiplayer. Leaderbaords and and completion with your fiends list which is hard when your friends don't play.

The latest Most Wanted had me hyped. Thought it was called that for a reason. Seemed more like Criterion wanted to make a Burnout instead, as they should by the way. But don't call it Most Wanted.

EA has taken massive missteps with that franchise. Even they don't know what Need for Speed is anymore, it seems.

Make a true Underground 3 or Most Wanted 2 and we'll be on our way.

ALL OF THEM !

I've cooled on Assassin's Creed. It ain't about infiltrating and assassinating anymore, and frankly they're just too easy.

I might still play the next Final Fantasy but I don't feel excited by those games like I used to. I'm weird and loved FF12 but the 13 games haven't done much for me, although they've had their good points.

Used to be hot on Need for Speed games. I just stopped for some reason and now I don't care about playing another one again.

Resident Evil for sure. I'm not even a horror guy, but for whatever reason at age 12-14 I was writing fan fiction on the IGN RE boards with some of the original members there and loving it. I've put Resident Evil 5 on my queue thanks to when it was on PS+, but I never downloaded it and don't really intend to. The demo of that game didn't impress me and the RE6 demo was sickening. I really don't want anything to do with that series anymore, Resident Evil 4 was a perfect swan song in my mind (Napoleon Parasite King!) and I prefer to leave it alone.

Medal of Honor. No lie, my dad and I switched from a Mac house to a PC house for five years primarily for Medal of Honor: Allied Assault. We loved the first one and Underground on PS1, and that Omaha Beach scene was spectacular. Played it over and over. Thought Frontline on the PS2 was pretty groundbreaking as well. And then...it just died a horrible death somehow. I haven't played one since then.

@acidbrandon18: I wouldn't worry too much about Spartan Assault. It was a phone game experiment that they did. It probably did cover costs when released on the Windows Phone platform because who the fuck has a Windows Phone? So, they shoved it out as a downloadable title and tried to spark interest by making it the first Halo exclusive for Xbox One. The idea that the game couldn't have been easily ported to the 360 is a pretty funny joke. Regardless, I don't think it really says anything about the state of the franchise other than that they were trying to branch out to other platforms.

We'll see how Halo 5 does. I think that will be the most telling of where this franchise is headed. Personally, I thought 4 was pretty great.

Edit: Oh, and I almost forgot: Tony Hawk. My answer is outdated though.

I'm done with Halo. I've played all the Halo games multiple times. I have defended ODST. Reach was the breaking point. The combat was not fun. All the battles felt the same as all the groups you encountered were the same. I only played through 4 because someone bought it for me. I want to see how the story progresses, but I don't know if I can stand another Halo game.

Mario, Zelda, and Metroid. Seriously - I'm 35 and have been playing games based around these characters for nearly 30 years - can we let these franchises go for a bit now?

Resident Evil - 5 just killed it personally for me, too much of a focus on action.

Halo - Loved the first one, loved the multi in 2, haven't cared for any since.

Dragon Age - Love Origins, 2 is an abomination.

Madden - Haven't enjoyed those games since they bought the license in 05 and killed 2k5. Competition made them better and for a while there I was excited every year for a new madden and played a season or 2 and I was done. I didn't devour those game likes I used to.

Call of Duty for me. No question.

I generally try not to be one of those people that bashes the series, as they seem to still be generally well made games, and clearly a lot of people still like the series, but between tiring of playing it year, after year, and just a general decrease in having people to play multiplayer games with, my interest in that series is pretty much down to zero.

Occasionally I see a piece of footage that looks fun, and it makes me want to try out whatever the latest game in the series is, but I know I'd play it for like an hour, then never touch it again.

Call of Duty

I think I liked the first Assassin's Creed more than most people, and I absolutely loved AC2. For some reason, I couldn't get passed the first couple of hours of Brotherhood, and I have very little desire to play any of those games. I hate that they turned it into an annual franchise, and I don't like the combat and platforming enough to do it for 20-25 hours every year.

I absolutely loved the early-mid 2000s Madden games - Madden 05 is my favourite sports game of all-time - but ever since those games made the leap to next gen they became too bloated with unnecessary features, terrible UI, and mediocre gameplay.

Halo. Was really into the first three games, but once the trilogy was complete, I was done with it. (Yeah, I was one of those losers who cared about the story.) I haven't been able to drum up much interest in anything the franchise has done since. It's not that I think the series is bad; it's just no longer for me. I played Reach and ODST a bit, and they weren't bad games, but I just didn't care anymore.

Hell, I'm 34 and I haven't played a Mario Zelda or Metroid game in probably 15 years. I'm happy to let go, even if Nintendo isn't.

Man, oh man. Here we go:

• Final Fantasy
• Mario
• Zelda
• Metroid
• Halo
• Call of Duty
• Pokemon
• Kingdom Hearts (though I'll play 3 out of obligation, if it ever comes out)