Video Game Spin Offs That Killed The Main Series

I’ve talked about video game spin-offs that have ended up as pretty much forgotten a few times on the channel in the past. But what about spin-offs that have managed to outshine their main series, and basically take over the mantle entirely? It doesn’t happen all that much, and in fact it might’ve happened a few times without you even realising it. Here’s hoping this first guy gets his great escape soon.

 

Rabbids (Rayman)

I’m not trying to be dramatic here, but Ubisoft should definitely be tried in The Hague for crimes against humanity when it comes to these bug-eyed bunnies. It’s not that Rabbids are necessarily bad, even if they were specifically designed to giga-fry a child’s developing brain in the same way Cocomelon is. The problem is that Rabbids’ success seemingly came at the cost of Rayman.

Starting out with 1995’s original release, which appeared on pretty much every platform under the sun at that point, Rayman became a pretty quick rival to Mario and Sonic. Several spin-offs were created featuring the limbless lover of Lums, including Rayman Raving Rabbids. Rayman was slowly pushed out as the focus of these spin-offs, until he was gone entirely in Rabbids Go Home.

Since their debut, Ubisoft have inflicted upon the world over a dozen different Rabbids games. A few TV shows have also been released, a film deal has been in the works though thankfully it’s in development hell, and the Rabbids even managed to team up with Mario for two crossover games.

While “killed” isn’t best to describe what’s happened to Rayman, as he’s received two mainline games and Ubisoft have confirmed a new one on the way if it hasn’t been cancelled by this time it comes out, IGN said it best when reviewing the first Raving Rabbids game for the Wii: the bunnies have actually upstaged Rayman.

To use another example, Rabbids are the Minions of the gaming landscape; introduced as a joke side character in one thing only to become an overwhelming bigger cultural juggernaut instead. In fact, we even have to give the Rabbids credit on that front, considering the first Raving Rabbids launched 4 years before Despicable Me. Clearly, Illumination just copied a winning formula, and they Nier-ly got away with it.

 

Nier (Drakengard)

Unless you were an early adopter of the PS2 action JRPG sicko lifestyle, you probably would’ve never heard of this series, let alone played it before Nier came out.

You see, the phenomenon that is Nier is actually a continuation of Drakengard’s worst ending. That’s the one where you and your dragon are transported into the real world, getting shot down by fighter jets and accidentally unleashing a horrible plague on the world.

Before Nier, Drakengard was a niche action RPG series on the PS2 that dealt with dark themes and lofty storytelling, only it also had lots of enemies on screen and you could control a massive dragon. Everything that a healthy, growing game needs, but the Drakengard games were never critical or commercial darlings.

When Nier appeared as a continuation of one of the first game’s endings, there were more eyes than ever on Drakengard, leading to a third game in the series on PS3. Sounds like Nier might have resurrected the series then, but then Square and PlatinumGames just had to release peak with Nier Automata.

Both the original Nier and Drakengard series dealt with mediocre critical reception and sales, but Nier Automata’s tale of androids dreaming of electric waifus became the best selling and reviewed product in either series. This surprising success birthed a new multimedia franchise, and Square even remade the first Nier, now as the catchily titled Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139.

Reviews for Nier We Go Again were way more positive, but Drakengard is still waiting for that reassessment. Thanks to Nier’s freight train levels of runaway success, it might never get it, just like you’ll never get your dad to come home if you play this next game.

 

Counter-Strike (Half-Life)

OK, so this one’s not a spin-off in the absolute strictest sense. But it basically changed its developer forever, and also multiplayer games in general.

When Counter-Strike launched in 1999, it wasn’t even its own game. It was a Half-Life mod. Just two guys tinkering away to turn Valve’s sci-fi shooter into a tactical, round-based multiplayer experience with more salt than a mine full of forgotten action movies.

But what started as a community project quickly exploded. Valve took notice, and rather than sue them into the ground, coughing sounds, hired the creators, and officially released Counter-Strike as a standalone game in 2000.

Counter-Strike’s success snowballed with CS: Source and CS:GO, becoming one of the most played games on the planet.

Meanwhile, Half-Life 2: Episode Two came out in 2007… and then nothing. Well, we did get Alyx, which was great! But not quite what the majority wanted.

It’s not a stretch to say that thanks to Counter-Strike, and of course the money printer that is Steam itself, Valve kinda let Half-Life fade away into the background a little. Why slave over an intricate narrative campaign when a streamer who definitely doesn’t have a gambling problem can press nine buttons and make you thousands of dollars?

Even now with CS2, Counter-Strike is Valve’s crown jewel. The same fate has really befallen Left 4 Dead, Portal, and pretty much every other Valve franchise. Even the hat game isn’t safe. What is the world coming to? The World…of warcraft.

 

World Of Warcraft (Warcraft)

1994’s Warcraft: Orcs & Humans for the PC was a vital part of the rise in RTS gaming on the PC, particularly when it comes to multiplayer. Between 1994 and 2003, Warcraft would join alongside the Command & Conquer series and Blizzard’s own sci-fi spin-off, Starcraft, as the standard bearers for an RTS revolution.

Much like how FPS games were the premier PC game to start with, Warcraft led the RTS genre to being the multiplayer experience on PC, with two sequels and a few expansion packs thrown in for good measure. Unfortunately for those who love to build bases and fiddle with their units (wink), Warcraft would be used to spearhead another revolution.

Released in 2004, World of Warcraft wasn’t the first MMO ever made, but it quickly became the byword for an entire genre. This titan of the industry exploded with popularity in the first two years of sale, continuing that momentum for over 20 years to still be played by millions to this day. Whether it’s current WoW or Classic, World of Warcraft is undeniable, but the Warcraft RTS series has been functionally dead ever since 2004.

Sure, Blizzard will throw out some HD re-releases of old Warcraft games to keep fans satiated, but a new Warcraft game? There’s no need to bother when WoW generates more money every year anyway. This is without getting into the whole decline of RTS popularity too, which devastated Warcraft, Starcraft, Command & Conquer and more.

Ware did it all go wrong?

 

WarioWare (Wario platformers)

It’s disappointing to see a character resigned to their fate, no matter what medium they’re in. Take Captain Falcon for example. Nintendo might say they love F-Zero, but Captain Falcon isn’t getting a new game any time soon, as much as we may cry. Wario is another example.

Introduced in Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins, Wario is often used as Mario’s direct rival in whatever sports game Nintendo was making at the time. Still, the farting, motorbike riding bastion of all men has appeared as the protagonist in a number of games, including the Wario Land quadrilogy on Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance.

Nintendo even partnered with our beloved Treasure for the 3D action platformer Wario World, which got decent reviews if unspectacular reviews, but it did also let you piledrive enemies, so it’s officially a whipper. The last traditional standalone game was Wario: Master Of Disguise for the DS, which wasn’t a critical darling in the slightest, and may have prompted Nintendo to focus more on Wario’s other series.

Starting with the 2003 release of WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgames! and Mega Party Games! for the Game Boy Advance and GameCube respectively, Nintendo have been milking the WarioWare series for decades now. And honestly, fair play to them. WarioWare’s focus on being a mini game collection allows Nintendo to affordably develop games that showcase a console’s gimmicks quite well.

All the DS, 3DS and Switch WarioWare games use all the features of those consoles, and with an inevitable Switch 2 WarioWare coming, there’s even more features to play with.

Modern indie platformers have been channelling the spirit of classing Wario games, though. Just look at games like Pizza Tower or Antonblast for instance. Clearly there’s a desire for platformers like the old Wario games, but we’ll see if Nintendo ever capitalise on that. Seems pretty simple stuff.

 

The Sims (SimCity)

Sometimes, you just need to go where the money is, and that’s definitely true of Maxis when it comes to SimCity. 1989’s original city-builder, SimCity introduced players to a world where you don’t need to shoot, explode or murder-death-kill everything in sight in order to have a fun and enjoyable game. Instead, players could create their ideal metropolis utopia, or just call in as many natural disasters as possible and level an entire city. The fun was in how open ended SimCity could be.

While you’d think making a non-action game in the late 80s to early 90s would get you attacked by angry mobs with pitchforks, SimCity would grow to be a huge success, selling over 1 million copies and spawning sequels and spin-offs alike. Some of those games would be awesome, like 2003’s SimCity 4, while others would be Streets of SimCity.

One spin-off managed to be head and shoulders above the rest though, with life simulation The Sims becoming an overnight sensation when it launched in the year 2000. It seems counterintuitive, shrinking down the scope of SimCity to just one household for The Sims, but it led to The Sims becoming a globally recognised franchise. 2014’s The Sims 4 is still getting DLC packs over a decade later.

So did The Sims actually kill off SimCity? The Sims’ success definitely lowered SimCity’s coffin into the ground faster, being a more lucrative franchise and all.

Still, the real death knell for the SimCity series was the now infamous 2013 reboot, in which EA tried to implement always-online capabilities only to not have working servers when the game launched. EA and Maxis would try and rehab the game’s negative reputation through updates, patches and even an expansion pack later that year, but the damage was done.

SimCity 2013 had basically been given the scarlet letter, and a new game is just not written in the stars.

 

Phantasy Star Online (Phantasy Star)

Before Persona, before Tales of, before Mana, there was the Phantasy Star series. For a good couple of years, it looked like Phantasy Star and Final Fantasy would drive a new wave of RPGs forward.

Between 1987 and 1993, or later depending on localisation, SEGA released four Phantasy Star games and two spin-offs, all of which told a millenia spanning story about a star system’s battles with an evil entity known as the Dark Force.

It’s a sci-fi epic for the ages, but 1993’s Phantasy Star IV: The End Of The Millennium put a pretty harsh stop to the story being told, wrapping everything up neatly and ensuring a new Phantasy Star game would have to be a departure from the previous entries.

Enter Phantasy Star Online, SEGA’s stab at cracking the world of online gaming while also showcasing the forward thinking capabilities of the Dreamcast.

Even though the Dreamcast isn’t largely considered a success, Phantasy Star Online certainly was, boasting hundreds of thousands of players across the world within months of the game’s launch. MMOs could work on consoles. SEGA would port PSO to the GameCube and Xbox with updated features, along with a card game spin-off for some reason, but the success of the MMO formula set the tone for Phantasy Star going forward.

There was Phantasy Star Universe, and while it did offer both a single-player campaign and solo focused spin-offs in the form of the PSP’s Phantasy Star Portable, the main attraction was the online play. Even today, Phantasy Star Online 2 is still bringing thousands of players, proving the decision was likely a right one. Besides, there’s a lot of RPGs already out there at the minute. Speaking of:

 

Trails in the Sky (The Legend of Heroes)

Okay, this one is a lot, so bear with us as we might miss something. Apparently Falcom have just done whatever the hell they want for decades now, and we’re just supposed to pick up the pieces and figure it out.

So, we start in 1984 with Dragon Slayer, which is considered by many to be the amber mosquito of the action RPG genre. Each full release in the Dragon Slayer series would have its own plot and world, with some even changing mechanics completely. Falcom would follow that up with Dragon Slayer II: Xanadu, the first of several spin-offs, with Xanadu becoming a commonly revisited property for Falcom. Any Tokyo Xanadu fans in the chat?

Anyway, Dragon Slayer would see a couple more sequels, with the fifth and seventh entries. Sorcerian and Lord Monarch, receiving plenty of ports, add-ons and support in the years since. It’s the sixth entry, Dragon Slayer: The Legend Of Heroes, where our story takes an interesting turn, as The Legend Of Heroes would end up becoming the moniker going forward.

Nihon Falcom released Dragon Slayer: The Legend of Heroes 1 and 2, both of which are set in the same world but would be the last to bear the Dragon Slayer name. The next game, The Legend of Heroes II: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch, started what would be known as the Garghav trilogy, with its own story and world that’d be featured across A Tear Of Vermillion and Song Of The Ocean.

The Legend of Heroes took a few years off, before re-emerging with The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. Here, the series would see an unprecedented level of success compared to previous entries, leading Falcom to just stay within the Trials world for good. The series has been going strong for 20 years since, with Dragon Slayer all but a distant memory.

 

Maximo (Ghosts n Goblins)

Alright, Ghost ‘n Goblins wasn’t explicitly killed by Maximo behind the back of the shed. Capcom literally developed and published a new game in the series a few years back in the form of Ghosts ‘n Goblins Resurrection. But Maximo did put it in the freezer for a bit, and then the main series kind of killed it back. Also, I never get to chat about Maximo.

Starting in 1985, Ghosts ‘n Goblins set out its stall from the beginning as a platforming game that wanted you to suffer. Following up in 1988 with Ghouls ‘n Ghosts, along with the improved Super Ghouls ‘n Ghosts in 1991, these three platformers became legendary for their challenging gameplay, amazing music and the fact that the main character could spend half the game running around half naked like she’s turned the weans against him.

Ghosts ‘n Goblins would see a couple of spin-offs, like Demon’s Crest, which we featured in our Dark SNES Games video, but the best was saved for 2001.

Maximo: Ghosts To Glory was the attempt of Capcom Digital Studios, their US branch, at taking the style and gameplay philosophy of the Ghosts ‘n Goblins series and applying it to a 3D action platformer.

The USA distinction will be important later. Subtle foreshadowing. It’s extra subtle now that I’ve mentioned it.

Critics would love this new version of the series, and clearly fans did too as the game sold well enough to spawn a sequel, Maximo Vs. Army Of Zin. Critics were equally as enthused as before, but for some reason, Capcom never released another Maximo game. Many cite low sales, but actual figures haven’t really been confirmed. Regardless, Capcom would shutter the studio just a few years later.

If we want to take a wander through tinfoil hat alley, the Maximo game’s director David Siller has been vocal in the past about how Capcom Japan had a tenuous relationship with Capcom USA. Siller goes as far as to say that Capcom Japan hated that the US branch managed to achieve success as it meant that the Japan branch couldn’t take credit for it. It’s worth noting here that there were no other Ghosts n Goblins between 2000 and 2005.

It’s a bold claim, though lead artist Johnathan Casco echoes this “Capcom Japan vs US” mentality when speaking to The Geek Gateway, using the word “iron-fist” to describe their management style. Maximo hasn’t been seen since. Might I interest you in today’s final game?

 

Heroes Of Might & Magic (Might & Magic)

Spanning back as far as 1986, the Might & Magic series is a grandfather to many fledgling RPG franchises that have emerged over the years, including both Final Fantasy and Phantasy Star. You want some early examples of science fantasy in gaming? Look up the overarching plot for the Might & Magic series.

Originally created by New World Computing, the Might & Magic series would release nine full RPGs between 1986 and 2002, along with multiple anthologies and collections. New World Computing knew that there was a growing strategy-loving contingent on PC though, as evidenced by 1994’s Warcraft.

So alongside the regular Might & Magic series, they developed Heroes Of Might & Magic in 1995, a turn-based strategy series.

This spin-off franchise saw four entries and multiple expansions between ‘95 and ‘02. During this time, New World Computing was purchased by The 3DO Company. New owners meant new funding meant more spin-offs, like Crusaders or Legends (of Might & Magic), an action RPG and first person shooter respectively.

Everything sounded peachy with the Might & Magic series, until The 3DO Company went bankrupt in 2003 and its assets were sold off as a result. Ubisoft, those dreaded Rabbid peddlers, purchased the Might & Magic rights in the aftermath. Might & Magic fans rejoiced that their favourite series was getting a second chance, but anyone would happened to prefer traditional Might & Magic would have to make do with 2014’s Might & Magic X: Legacy, which was… fine? 

Instead, Ubisoft have been more concerned with either yet more spin-offs, like their partnership with Arkane to create Dark Messiah of Might & Magic, or the puzzle RPG Clash of Heroes, or even new stuff in the Heroes of Might & Magic series.

Heroes of Might & Magic: Olden Era is set to launch in early access this year, so who knows? Maybe if this strategy game is successful, we’ll see a new Warcraft again, just to bring everything full circle.