How important are gameplay additions for sequels?

[the-pi-guy]

I am probably way in the minority for this.

There are a lot of sequels that solely improve the previous title's gameplay, but there are a lot of sequels of course that add new gameplay features. And I'm really talking about moment to moment gameplay. If you had someone play a random 5 minute stretch of a game, what would a typical 5 minute stretch look like?

Uncharted 2 is a game that I view as not really adding many gameplay features.
The Dark Souls games I think are better examples. You can pretty much pick up any one of the three games, and play them just fine. There are sub differences, in terms of how fast the character moves. But the actual moment to moment gameplay mechanics are pretty much identical throughout the titles.

What i really want to talk about here, is that there are a lot of games that want to add mechanics.

Kingdom Hearts 3 added this gameplay where you basically summon disney park rides:




I was really irritated by this. Not just because it felt weirdly on the nose, but it just felt like it was a needless mechanic.

I think it's really awesome when games make improvements to their current gameplay. But I don't feel like I tend to like these kinds of gameplay additions. I feel like more often than not, they get in the way of the gameplay that I really enjoyed in the previous titles.

[the-pi-guy]

I should clarify slightly.

My problem isn't that game developers add new mechanics. My problem is that it feels like developers have a need to differentiate their games more, that they add mechanics that don't make sense or don't work as well as they should.

In those cases it feels like the desire to make progress actually takes away from the experience.

[Legend]

I love disney parks so I really love that mechanic in theory, but I haven't played it yet.

I think dual wielding in Halo 2 is a good gameplay addition. It just feels like Halo. Same with interrupts introduced in Mass Effect 2. They're a small thing but they feel like a natural expansion of the mechanics in the first game.

The jump button in TLOU2 is also a good one. It made TLOU2 play like I remembered, since the lack of jumping never felt important in the first game.


Bad examples however are when they make the game feel like a spinoff. Halo 5 overhauled everything so it could be a squad based game and it was really stupid. If the game was successful then maybe all future Halos would have been squad based, but there would always be a large chunk of fans preferring the original. Same goes for the grapple hook in Halo Infinite. It's pretty cool and will probably stick around in multiplayer, but in single player it's too large of a departure from what the series is about. People have mixed opinions about wanting it back in the next game.

Meanwhile the grapple hook in Uncharted 4 felt great. I think the difference is that Uncharted is based off classic adventure movies and rope swinging feels right for the character. It feels like a mechanic that could have always been there.

TLDR: I like gameplay additions to find the middle ground. Change nothing and you just keep your flaws and become dated. Change too much and you risk alienating a lot of og fans.


It's kinda similar to graphics. Clean them up so they look like how we remember the previous games. Don't go full nidhogg.

[darkknightkryta]

I disagree with your assessment of Uncharted 2.  It added, in my opinion, massive gameplay changes.  They were probably one of the first to do that motion gameplay in 3D.  I would say Uncharted 3 had less additions and more refinements and would fit your ideas better.

For the overall idea?  I think refinements and small additions are fine for sequels.  When you keep adding and going overboard it gets harder to reign things in since you have to keep outdoing what you did before.  It becomes a monster at that point, and I think God of War (Old series) and Uncharted got to that point.  
Games are luckily one of the few mediums where you can take the previous game and wrap it up in a new package.  I personally wouldn't just reskin things the way NIntendo does, for instance, but I'm good with what they did with Forbidden West.  Took the last game, wrapped it up with a new story/cutscenes and just made adjustments to the game play with a few new enemies.  They didn't do anything drastic, but they gave us a full game with a new story.
On another note, I miss that old PC style of expansions.  I remember when I was playing through Arkham Knight and thinking to myself "You know what would be cool?  Making a full 10+ hour Catwoman game, but just reusing Arkham Knight's assets"

[the-pi-guy]

I disagree with your assessment of Uncharted 2.  It added, in my opinion, massive gameplay changes.  They were probably one of the first to do that motion gameplay in 3D.  I would say Uncharted 3 had less additions and more refinements and would fit your ideas better.

Changes ≠ additions

It made some changes like remapped the grenade, but it didn't add grenades. It was already in the previous game, but done clunkier.

What new moment to moment gameplay changes did U2 make?

[darkknightkryta]

Changes ≠ additions

It made some changes like remapped the grenade, but it didn't add grenades. It was already in the previous game, but done clunkier.

What new moment to moment gameplay changes did U2 make?

The 3D motion stuff.  Technically it was only the truck part as the train part was just background.
vs Uncharted 3 that took that idea and refined it into a global rotation.

[kitler53]

eh, it just depends.

for a story driven game just telling a new story or expanding on the previous story may be enough to make me want to play a sequel.   if the gameplay is amazing just having more levels to play may be enough too.

but regardless of anything,.. updates to gameplay help a game feel like it was worth while releasing a sequel as opposed to just DLC or just not needing to exist at all. 

[the-pi-guy]

The 3D motion stuff.  Technically it was only the truck part as the train part was just background.
vs Uncharted 3 that took that idea and refined it into a global rotation.

That's not really what I mean by (moment to moment) gameplay.  

I'm more talking about how the player interacts with the game, what the controls do.

Nate punches the same, he shoots the same, he climbs the same, etc.  He didn't get any new powers.

[the-pi-guy]

Are there words describing these different gameplay mechanic related things?

• How the player character interacts with the world
• How the world interacts with the player character
• How the player interacts with the player character (control scheme?)

[kitler53]

That's not really what I mean by (moment to moment) gameplay.  

I'm more talking about how the player interacts with the game, what the controls do.

Nate punches the same, he shoots the same, he climbs the same, etc.  He didn't get any new powers.

i feel like that's pretty unfair to uncharted.


the set piece moments of the building collapsing was a first of it's kind and dang impressive.  my jaw was dropped after that scene.  it wasn't just more than U1,.. it was more than any other game on the market up to that point had ever done.

...but even then they added new stuff to the "moment to moment" gameplay.  climbing was expanded with the rope swinging and the pick axe.  they added those slidy hills stolen from tomb raider.  they added the ability to throw live grenades' back.  they added stealth.  they added wide/linear level design which massively changed the way i played fight sequences.  they added fist fighting brawls.

gameplay isn't entirely about what's mapped to the controller...

[darkknightkryta]

That's not really what I mean by (moment to moment) gameplay.  

I'm more talking about how the player interacts with the game, what the controls do.

Nate punches the same, he shoots the same, he climbs the same, etc.  He didn't get any new powers.

Yes.  But he interacts with the environment differently; the train and truck parts of the game haven't really been done before and only sort of after in 3.

[the-pi-guy]

gameplay isn't entirely about what's mapped to the controller...

I didn't say that it was.  I'm just trying to talk about a certain specific aspect of gameplay.

I know that it does a lot of other new stuff, gameplay wise.  

[Legend]

Are there words describing these different gameplay mechanic related things?

• How the player character interacts with the world
• How the world interacts with the player character
• How the player interacts with the player character (control scheme?)

I don't think there's anything consistent. Definitions change from genre to genre and from studio to studio.

I'd personally describe the first two as gameplay systems though.