Weekend Open Forum: What is your favorite video game franchise?

Shawn Knight

Posts: 15,240   +192
Staff member

I’ve seen a number of franchises come and go since I started playing video games some 25 years ago. Regardless of genre, there’s no shortage of franchises that have been stellar over the years with many living on even to this day through a myriad of sequels and reboots.

Some of my all-time favorites include Metroid, Mega Man, Twisted Metal, The Legend of Zelda, Need for Speed, Resident Evil, Mortal Kombat, Street Figther and Sonic the Hedgehog, just to name a few. I’ve played some of the newer franchises like Tomb Raider, Battlefield and Call of Duty as well but there’s just something about the nostalgia around classic titles that draws me in.

With this week’s open forum, we want to know what your favorite video game franchise is. Do you prefer classics like Mario and Final Fantasy or are you more into newer hits like Halo, God of War and StarCraft?

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The games I'd play today really can't compete with the enjoyment I got out of Zelda when I was a kid. I can still hum the music to the original. I probably played more Mario, but Zelda was the coolest in my book.
 
Fallout (1,2 & Tactics available at GOG.com , Steam has the 4 best) is #1 in my book.

Jagged Alliance (wish there was an updated version for 1st one) & Elder Scrolls (including Nehrim, a total conversion mod) tied for #2 spot - subject to revision as soon as I get hardware capable enough to do Skyrim right.
 
If I have to pick one, it would have to be Battlefield, because of how amazing BFBC2 and BF3 are.

Second place goes to Rocksteady's Batman games.
 
I'd have to say Metal Gear Solid on the PS one thru MGS 4 on the PS3. Close second is the Battlefield games. Still playing BF3 like the first day.
 
Metal Gear Solid for me. I just love the development and thought that's put into the games, plus I was pretty much born on MGS1 in a gaming sense.
 
The Witcher for the atmosphere. Nothing 100% white, nothing 100% dark. Everything is shades of grey. I like that. And it's prob the only real Mature game out there. My favorite franchise so far.

Mass Effect would be in my top 3 too. It's also very immersing. For me, it just felt like every little detail of the game has it's place, that every one of them is thought deeply and has a reason to be. I liked the 1st one better because of that.

To this list, I would add Halo. Always fun for the multiplayer aspect. And with all the custom gamemodes, it's hard to get tired of it.
 
A franchise that I've learned to enjoy, not for playing but for poking fun at, is Tomb Raider. A franchise centred around a completely unlike-able sociopath. A rich, snooty, glorified grave-robber with a penchant for eviscerating endangered wildlife and murdering evil people. Evil, of course meaning people who are significantly poorer than her and could probably do with selling a few ancient treasures so they can afford to do rather silly things like eat and pay the rent.
The latest incarnation, Tomb Raider 2013 dials up the stupidity even further by being the Rambo wannabe (seriously, watch Rambo first, then play through TR2013 and you'll see what I mean) that walks like a reboot, trying to turn Croft into a grizzled, desperate survivor on a semi-tribalistic island that just happens to have an army of samurais in gleamingly clean, full plate armour to boot. She goes through apparent pangs of guilt the first time she kills Bambis mum and a man who looked like he was trying to rape her but turns out he just wanted to throttle her (the timings on the QTEs are a bit obtuse), but after the one kill of each, you're happily wiping out all of the wildlife in each area map and building up for the Accomplished Killer perk. Such a brilliant game with tone that couldn't be more consistent if the developers had Croft gently giggling to herself as her bodycount rises higher and higher.
The big thing that makes me laugh though is the way the focus shifts around Laras body from game to game. It started with an apparent mouse slip accident on the first game that gave Croft a Kim Possible-esque pointy set of double Ds, then it's moved around to her rear, her legs, her skin getting dirty and now to her hair. I wonder if the bookies are willing to take bets on what's going to get the key focus in the next game...

Oh, I also quite like the Fallout series.
 
Long story short..
1: Diablo // 3rd was dissipointment for me. *wow style cartoonish*
2: Staract
3: Half-Life
4. Witcher
5. Mass Effect
 
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