What obscure games do you think deserve a sequel or a spiritual successor and why?
What they did well in regards to story, gameplay, characters etc.
Ideas that you thought were good in the game but were poorly implemented that a sequel or spiritual successor could improve upon If done right.
How you think a sequel or spiritual successor could improve upon the original game based on what it’s weaknesses were.
For me it would be Herdy Gerdy, a game based around herding creatures which many of you I would imagine have never heard of and isn’t a game that’s for everyone due to it being based on a mechanic that is hated in most games.
In Herdy Gerdy each of the creatures you herd have their own behaviour and interactions with other creatures and the environment but the herding mechanics could be tedious as it was easy for creatures to break off the herd and it didn’t spice things up enough with the gameplay as you are mostly doing the same thing throughout the game, which is getting creatures from one point to another.
If this game was to be brought back in some way I could see it having a spiritual successor that makes it easier to herd the creatures by providing you with better tools, AI that is less likely to get stuck on a fence and more variety in terms of the predators that prey on the creatures you herd.
The gameplay could also be spiced up by changing the way in which you herd or what you herd, like instead of just herding defenceless creatures there could be stages where you herd dangerous creatures as well and use their unique abilities against predators that would normally stop you from leading your defenceless creatures to safety.
I think, given the ambiguous ending, and that much more can be done with the concept, a third Evoland would be cool.
Firestriker, which was like an Arkanoid fantasy RPG multiplayer thing for SNES, was a really cool concept, but a pretty bare bones game. I’d love to see something like this again.
If I could pick any game, not just obscure ones, I would say Night in the Woods, a legit sequel to Chrono Trigger, and/or a direct sequel to FF6. No idea how FF6 would work considering how it ended, but I’m sure there’s some way lol.
As much as I adore Chrono Trigger (or perhaps because of it), given the combination of the various efforts of Tokyo RPG Factory to make Chrono Trigger inspired games and the way Squeenix handles most of their legacy content/IP I’ll be happiest if they never make a sequel or attempt a remake.
An FFVI sequel, on the other hand, would be interesting.
I’ve never played evoland 1 or 2 but I was interested in how the games evolve as you play them a bit like buddy simulator 1984 if I remember correctly.
Cool Firestriker is a top down action fantasy game mixed with pinball, I mean the concept itself has so much potential.
I also would like to see a sequel of Night in the woods, but just don’t know how it would go considering how the game ended, though I guess If perfect tides can get a sequel it’s possible for night in the woods as well.
Buddy Sim, if I remember watching it, is kind of like Evoland 2. The first one was more a proof of concept, but the evo bit was progressing from video game origins through to like HD 3D. The second one had time travel involved, where each time was modeled on a generation of games, a la Gameboy, SNES, etc.
I just randomly stumbled on and bought Firestriker at some point in the 90s, it’s a lot of fun.
And I think the appeal of a NitW sequel is that anything could happen, really.
I really enjoyed Biomotor Unitron as a kid. I think a turn-based JRPG with that mix of dungeon-crawling, parts crafting, and mech building would be really cool with better graphics and less reliance on very long text crawls with its story.
As I’m writing that, I realize that I feel the same way about Magic Pengel: A Quest for Color. Way too much of a slog to play today, but that UI for “drawing” 3-D characters would be so much easier on a modern touchscreen! And it’s such a neat concept overall.
Floigan Brothers is a Dreamcast game that was trying to be a classic cartoon with Abbot and Costello leads. It played a little like an adventure game, which felt appropriate. I would love to see modern technology used to make an explorable classic cartoon in 3-D rather than 2-D.
I was just taking a look at Magic Pengel: A quest for color and I do like the idea of an rpg where you create your own creatures rather than only being able to choose from existing ones , don’t know how balancing would work though.
Don’t think I’ve see anything like the Floigan brothers, it’s interesting how it uses the interactions between the brothers to solve puzzles, I’m assuming the only way I’d be able to play it is on dreamcast or an emulator.
This is a fun topic. I think the game that comes to mind for me first is Maken X for the Dreamcast. It was an action game played in first-person… but it wasn’t a shooter – it was hack-and-slash with a sword. You lock on to enemies, circle/strafe around them (or jump right over them Matrix-style to get behind them), block, and utilize a few different attacks. You could even bounce back enemy projectiles if your timing was right.
But what made the game stand out even more was the “mind-jacking” mechanic. Basically you play as a genetically-engineered entity thing that becomes a sword, and you control the mind of the person wielding you. So you get to play as a whole bunch of characters, each with their own playstyle (the sword itself changes form to match the sort of weapon each character fights with). This not only shakes up the gameplay from level to level, but also gives you alternate paths to take in the (completely insane) storyline. Choose who to mind-jack, and ultimately help out Bizarre Organization of Weirdos A, B, or C. It’s all… related to Shin Megami Tensei, I think? It’s all very dumb and delightful. More than anything else, I love the character designs in this game.
The game is also super jank though, so it’s hard to actually recommend to people. I imagine most newcomers today would call it unplayable and too difficult. Which is why I would love to see it get a remake or spiritual successor, to give the concept another try and give it some modern-day polish. Definitely a pie in the sky dream though! Remakes and the like sadly (but understandably) only ever happen for games that tons of people already loved a lot, rather than the oddball titles like this that are in much more desperate need of a refresh.
Clive Barker’s Undying. Awesome story that was prepped for a continuation, but never got it due to low sales. (I think a big part of it is that they relied on CB’s name to carry it and didn’t really market it beyond putting a trailer on the American McGee’s Alice CDs–but it doesn’t help that Silent Hill 2 came out a few months later, and good luck remembering any survival horror game from 2001 after that gem!)
I loved the design, the lore, and some of the gameplay innovations like the Gel’ziabar stone, and I thought the protagonist was excellent and the overhaul CB demanded of him was a wise choice. And while it had its weak points, I thought the writing was pretty good overall. I would love to see it get a remaster so it has another shot.
The Yoshi 1991 game that was released on the NES and Game Boy. I’m a sucker for a good puzzle game with a campaign, objectives, and unlockables. The original Yoshi game didn’t have any of these features so there is so much room to improve and build upon. For a game that had very little features, it was incredibly fun to play. I just want more reason to keep playing it.
I’d absolutely lose myself in hype if they announced a new Tokyo Extreme Racer game. They were very different and had all kinds of features I still haven’t seen in modern games at times. A 4k kanjo racer would look amazing and with today’s development they could probably do a majority of Japan’s highways instead of just the few they did before.
Maybe not super obscure but Alundra deserves a true sequel because Alundra 2 is just Alundra in name. No actual relation at all to the first game which is an amazing action-adventure platformer.
A game I’d call ‘forgotten’ that I’d really enjoy seeing a sequel/same style successor to would probably be Jazzpunk. The DLC that came out in 2017 didn’t do it justice and I kinda just want more dumb absurdism comedy in my life lol.
Magic the Gathering: Shandalar. Lots of other MTG games but nothing quite like the original. Playing like a top down RPG and you play a game of Magic whenever a fight starts. Fan updates have added some newer cards & mechanics. But a full remake or sequel updated graphically, mechanically, and with newer cards would be amazing.
Heretic 2. This game was nothing like the other games in the Heretic/ Hexen series and is sadly mostly forgotten. Instead of a fantasy themed fps, it was an admittedly somewhat janky 3rd person hack and slash with spells, set in the same world. If you can get past the Quake 2 era blocky polygons and the messy control scheme, it was a lot of fun. But a proper remake with modern graphics and refined controls, would be something I would love to see.
Drakan. Technically there are 2 games in this series, Order of the Flame on PC, and Ancients Gates on PS2 only. But they are longtime favorites of mine. I would love to see a modern sequel or remake.
Prey (2006). Not the Arcane Studios game, that was good but not old enough that a sequel is impossible. The original 2006 game by Human Head studios. That game was a trip, and I would love either a remake, a new version of the cancelled Prey 2 sequel (the preview trailers looked like a lot of fun, would have loved to play that game), or straight up sequel to the original. A spiritual successor could be cool too if it was done right.
I’m sure there are more I would love, but those pop into my mind right away.
