Video Game Sequels That Surpass The Original?

My friends and I are in the middle of a discussion about video game sequels that surpass their predecessors. We've come up with a few easy ones like Mass Effect 2, System Shock 2, Devil May Cry 3 etc.

What are your opinions dudes?

Burnout 2 then 3. For me Revenge is then a bit of a dip. Not much but it's there. I suppose you could say that most racing sims like forza and gran turismo have surpassed their originals.

Also I think Gears Of War 2 takes the original on every front. Also Assassin's Creed II is obvious.

Depends on if you're looking for specific titles I guess, and this topic will be extremely subjective.

I thought a lot of the Final Fantasy games after the first were better, for instance. Kingdom Hearts 2, Uncharted 2, Assassin's Creed 2, Dark Souls, Resident Evil 4, I felt Persona 4 was a better game than 3 (never played the first two).

All I can really come up with at the moment...

Silent Hill 2, Uncharted 2, Fable 2, any of the Halo games except 2, Persona 3/4, Saints Row 2, Gears 2/3, all Marios except 2, etc...

It's a really common thing for video games.

Uncharted 2. I might disagree with Ass 2 in that rather than expanding upon some of the more daring gameplay from Ass 1 it just stripped a lot of it out and polished what was left to be a big good old action game

Uncharted 2, Diablo 2, Starcraft 2

Most of them?

Zone of the Enders 2, Uncharted 2, Guitar Hero 2, Sonic 2, and... let's go with Mass Effect 3.

Pretty much.

Sounds about right to me.

Yeah games don't suffer the same issues as movies usually do when it comes to sequels. Specifically with the first one. Most of the good or great video game franchises end up starting with a solid first game that has a bunch of issues/stuff that they would of liked to iron out/include but it was a new IP. Then in the first sequel they are able to polish out the look of the game, the engine, and include much more that they wanted to while improving upon the base of the game. Which usually ends up being much better.

More often than not when you hit the 3rd or 4th game in a VG franchise, if they are plagued to go on that long...you see hyped expectations, disappointing endings, not enough new things, and ultimately the fanbase and VG world being much more harsh on the game for doing a lot of the same things. The second game is generally always the sweet spot when it comes to quality games in a franchise. Of course there are exceptions to this, but more often than not.

Definitely Mass Effect 2, Also:

• Age of Empires 2
• Borderlands 2
• Far Cry 3
• Portal 2

Condemned 2 - no matter what people out there claim.

You could makes peoples heads explode, with your mind!

Uncharted 2, Mass Effect 2, and Portal 2.

Mass Effect 2. The original isn't a great game, haters!

Games are kinda weird in this regard, compared to most other mediums. The first one in a franchise is a lot harder to get right, since you have to create so much from scratch. Sequels are a lot easier, because you can build on top of what already exists.

Then there's franchises like Mario, Zelda, GTA and others which can be completely different from where they started.

Almost all fighting game sequels are straight-up additions or improvements.

Streets of Rage 2 comes to mind. I'm of the opinion that they improve upon a game in sequel more often than not.

Yep. Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat II, Doom II, Assassins Creed II, Day of the Tentacle, GTA 3, Dynasty Warriors 2, Hitman 2, Shinobi II, Streets of Rage 2.

There are more and it's very common like you say. When a developer can get a second crack at an idea they obviously can do a lot of meaningful change and improvements and the results are better a lot of times.

You've already entered debatable territory.

It's probably way tougher to identify a third game in a series that is superior to its two predecessors.

Crash 1 from 2 was a massive improvement. Same with spyro up until year of the dragon I think. Jak 2 took away some of the more charming aspects of Jak and Daxter, but the gameplay itself was definitely a lot funner. I think generally speaking that most sequels to video games are a lot better. The second game in any series is always good, except for a select few.

Yeah, the more fun question would be: How many installments does it take for a series to break and start going downhill?

Three to four, usually.

Dragon Age 2 ;)

Assassin's Creed 2 is fairly obvious answer (though there was something kind of special about the tone of the first game).

Dammit! I was gonna say that, haha

But yeah, lot's of games tend to get better with their sequels.

NOT Bloodrayne 2

This isn't very hard to answer, you should ask for 3rd installments that are better than the second and it's already more challenging and if you want to get crazy ask for 4th over 3rd.

Yeah third installments better than the second or even the first are tough. AC Brotherhood is technically a "third" installment even though it's more of an expansion. Halo 3 is the best in the entire series or at least tied with ODST imo. I thought Fable 3 was the better than the second as well. Resident Evil 4, one of the best in the series. Super Mario...maybe. The Third in that was great. Grand Theft Auto. *Thinks* That is certainly tough. A few f them but not a lot of modern stuff to be honest. Skyrim I suppose.

While story and characters come down to personal opinion, the mechanics of Persona 4 are vastly superior to Persona 3.

Video games as a medium are special in that sequels to an original game are usually better. While movies live and die mainly by their stories, games also have gameplay and graphics to improve on. Sequels give developers more time to refine mechanics and flesh out details that the first game would not give them the time for. Video games also evolve much quicker than movies do, so newer and better experiences can be produced relatively quick.

What I'm saying is this isn't a hard question. You'd be harder pressed to find sequels that were worse than the original. Now, if we're talking sequels that came after a sequel, then we enter debatable territory because the quality of those sequels is dependent on a lot of different factors.

Most of them, but they got of rid of things like weapon fusion, combo skills, and the different types of physical damage. It wasn't a complete improvement.

@ll_exile_ll: Fair enough.

Well this is the one point where video games are kinda unique since the sequel is almost always better than the original.

The best example of this has to be Uncharted 2.

@redbullet685: I dunno, the leap from AC1 to AC2 is pretty astounding having played both of those this summer within weeks of each other.

Socom 2, Warcraft 2, Uncharted 2, Infamous 2, Mass Effect 2

@e30bmw: You do have a point there. Alright I'll give you that one. AC to ACII is a bigger jump in quality and therefore ACII is the best example of this with Uncharted 2 right behind

It would be more interesting to find the games where the sequel was worse.

Just wanted to throw Lufia 2 into the mix. I love the first game to death, but Lufia 2 improves on the original in so many ways: IP Attacks, New Game+, Capsule Monsters (love them or hate them, but how dare you hate them), party size, the new iteration on the Ancient Cave--even the plot builds on the first in an interesting way.

I thought the FFX-2 battle system was much more compelling than FFX, but I'm a sucker for job systems.

Also, Suikoden II! (And Suikoden III as a rare third entry in a series that holds up.) Breath of Fire 2 and 3 are also great!

I agree, the grand majority of the time the sequel is better in video games, so it's not a very interesting question. Crackdown 2 and Toejam and Earl 2 come directly to mind as sequels that were recieved much more poorly than their predecessers.

@redbullet685: Assassin's Creed 2 should be on all worst of the generation lists that game was abysmal, destructoid was right about everything.

Then again, Assassins Creed 1 in retrospect isn't much better than Ryse on the Xbone.

Lufia II

3rd better than the 2nd: Super Mario Bros. 3

4th better than 3rd: Super Mario World (although I know a lot of people would debate it)

yup, I agree with that 100% lets take a look back at Street Fighter 1

Ryse II*

(*comment postdated 3 years from now)

Easiest answer for me is Assassin's Creed. AC 2 is far better than AC 1. And now, AC 4 is far better than AC 3.