Genre facelift: Yay or nay?

What happen when your favorite game series suddenly changed its genre? Do you like it or hate it?

Perhaps the most famous example of this trend is Final Fantasy XV which abandoned its linear turn-based battle system for button-mashing real-time and vast, empty open world. While most critics and consumers seemed to welcomes it but most fans of old-school turn-based previous series felt betrayed by these changes. From my perspective, it looks like Square-Enix wants to cash-in on the recent popularity of open world games in the West such as Elder Scrolls, Fallout, Grand Theft Auto, etc. While I don't think FFXV is a bad game but I do think SE preferred styles over substances.

Final Fantasy VII Remake also heading in the same way as FFXV did but unlike FFXV, original FFVII was a turn-based game but SE's decision to change its genre completely cemented their "go west" attitude. Even more infuriating the director Tetsuya Nomura announced that he personally hated the turn-based system and he also think that turn-based no longer relevant in this generation of consoles. Ironically two of the most recent RPGs from SE, Octopath Traveller and Dragon Quest XI are turn-based. Both also got good scores from critics and relatively good sales from consumers. I hope it will changed Nomura's attitude towards turn-based system.

Speaking about SE and there's Left Alive, an upcoming third-person shooter game that take place in Front Mission universe. While this one may not considered to a facelift but it ignores what FM is known for, turn-based strategy game with robots. Squaresoft's(now Square-Enix) answers to Mobile Suit Gundam. But instead it went into SE's own answers to Metal Gear Solid series with wanzer battles are afterthought.

Genre facelifting isn't a new phenomenon. Back then in 2008, after they bought Fallout series from then-defunct Black Isle Studious, Bethesda changed it from isometric RPG similar to Diablo and into a first person perspective RPG. Most people are actually more familiar with Bethesda's Fallout 3 and onward instead of first two made by Black Isle Studious. Some changes aren't that too bad though.

Depends if the game was ever good before or just a gimmick of the past people bought due to marketing.

I think Resident Evil has shown to go back what made the series special because it was focused on raw item management and being thrown in tough situations. It went through a Gears of War coop bro shooter stage for a few years but luckily Capcom learned its lesson and is going back to pre-Resi5. Revelations 2 I think was the first step in what we are returning to. It felt like playing Outbreak and that was pretty cool.

CastleVania has technically gone through three stages- Platformer, MetroidVania, and God of War clone. I like the first two but Lords of Shadow I'm glad died and can stay that way. Bloodstained Backer so I am a little bias anyway, and a little interested in the upcoming Grimoire of Souls mobile game as well.

Mass Effect 3 was a big pile of poop, so that changed IMO.

Army of Two: The Devil's Cartel was a lot different to the first two as well, and I didn't enjoy it half as much.

On the flip side, God of War is massively different to the original trilogy, and I loved it. Sometimes change is good!

@RSM-HQ: Funny thing about Resident Evil people complained about tank-like controls in first 3 games, Capcom responded by changing its genre from a survival horror into an action shooting game with very few horror elements in 4. Exact same people complained Capcom stripped the horror elements in 4, 5 and 6. Capcom made even more drastic changes in 7 by making it into an FPS game but this time they returned to its survival horror roots, stripping most of its action elements away.

While not really a facelift but Sega was embarrassed with the failure of Valkyria Chronicles Revolution, a Dynasty Warriors-like game that take place in VC universe. It was critical and commercial failure for Sega, killing any potentials of its sequels. Sadly this is the first VC game that is available to Xbox while the rest of games that time only on Sony consoles(PS3, PSP, PS4) except for the remastered version of first game which also available for PC. Sega attempt to make money on Western markets failed miserably and thankfully it returned to good old turn-based strategy roots which focused more on Japanese markets instead.

I remember buying the Gamecube remake and it's true almost everyone complained tank controls and fixed cameras was a dated trope, I still personally liked the game but Resident Evil 4 set-up in my view was the way moving forward from a mechanical point of view.

In my opinion 4 still had a few great moments, and pacing that fit in the series perfectly. Only lessened by the final act. Resi4 was still structured very similar to previous games, when night falls and you meet your first awakened Plaga that is crazy how tense that scene is, Dogs in the garden maze, jumping bag of flesh, fireman, not to mention meeting your first Garrador and Regenerator.

The biggest exceptions being enemies dropped loot, and far more simplistic puzzles. 5 is what took it too far in my opinion, it was just constant run and gun, no tension, just machine gunning down fodder, head stomps, and punching boulders. Even the Licker room was really underwhelming because it was a race towards the elevator. .

And while I like Resident Evil 7 the perspective just doesn't fit the linear level design. Everything else about the game works well and fits what made the series great. It's not a perfect game, like Resi4 the final act is really weak but it's still a good Resident Evil game.

The only numbered Resident Evil games I personally complained about are 0, 5 and 6, they didn't seem part the same franchise. 6 had two ok campaigns, but that was about 20% of the game, and the rest was Gears of Evil. Zero? well it's a bag of poorly thought out gimmicks. And I'll leave it at that. .

While not really a facelift but Sega was embarrassed with the failure of Valkyria Chronicles Revolution, a Dynasty Warriors-like game that take place in VC universe.

Hmm, I think most gaming franchises get bad spin-offs if they get a big enough install-base. And SEGA is no stranger with throwing IPs around to make a bit of money.

I was alright with the transition of battle mechanics on Final Fantasy XV. Having played Kingdom Hearts I was already adapted to this style of gaming.

Back to the question, do I like genre facelift? Yes. I like to see change and advancement. One thing I dislike about Square-Enix is the execution of releasing FFXV. Having heard that FF7 Remake will be released episodically, I am not certain I will be happy with that. Sounds like it will be a mess like FFXV is.

It was only for one game, but when Naughty Dog switched to the racing genre for their last Crash Bandicoot game, Crash Team Racing, I thought it worked well. I finished my first playthrough yesterday, and I think it might be my favourite kart racing game; even more than Mario Kart.

Command and Conquer turned into some crappy MOBA that killed the entire franchise.