Games in Need of Sequels Part One (Page 2): Features

In part one of this series, we look at five very different games that need sequels.

Newsletter

Be notified of site updates. Sign-up for the Newsletter sent out twice weekly.

Enter E-Mail Address Below:

Games in Need of Sequels Part One

Chakan: The Forever Man

If there’s any one sort of hero that game publishing execs seem to love it’s the dark, brooding, bad-assed sort. Just look at games like Devil May Cry, or any number of recent Final Fantasy games and you’ll see the hero, or at least one of the main characters is brimming with attitude, and is sure to be merciless when clobbering the bad guys. That being said, one has to wonder why we haven’t seen a return of one of gaming’s original bad-assed heroes, Chakan.

The thing about Chakan and his bad-assed ways that makes him so appealing is that he shows the dangers of hubris. He was a great warrior whose arrogance cursed him to live forever after losing a bet with Death, and the only way to lift the curse was to defeat all of the evil spirits. In the original Genesis game, when players had defeated all of the demons of the world, Chakan thought the curse would be lifted, but Death came and informed him that there was a lot more work to be done. We won't go specifically into what was said, as it will inevitably lead to lots of angry emails about a lack of spoiler tags in this article, but we'll simply say that this was the perfect setup for a sequel.

What’s interesting in the case of Chakan is that work had actually begun on a sequel for the Dreamcast. Ed Annunziata, the designer for the original Chakan, as well as Ecco the Dolphin, Spider-Man, X-Men, and 688 Attack Sub, had started a new development studio in 1996 called AndNow, and were plugging away on a new 3D Chakan for Sega’s last console. The game was meant to be the antithesis of a lot of hack n’ slash games on the market at the time, as Chakan was hunting beasts that were far more powerful than him, and could easily defeat him in battle if he attacked head-on. As such, players had to stealthily stalk the game’s various demons, learn the beasts’ weaknesses, and strike when the time was right. These days we’ve seen the idea of stealth played to death in games, but it has been almost exclusively focused towards cloak and dagger games as Black Ops personnel, or spies, but the thought of sneaking up on demons is quite appetizing. There’s no need to speculate about what a sequel to Chakan could be in this feature. This original concept would do nicely.

Advertisement

While some could argue that the original Chakan was so difficult that the only people who could have possibly enjoyed it must surely have some masochistic tendencies, but there’s no denying that the game is a cult classic in desperate need of a sequel. Hopefully one day someone will come along and finally decide to go through with making the thing.

Advertisement

System Shock

Looking Glass Studios may be long gone, but most can agree that they made some of the finest first person games to ever hit the PC. While the Thief series managed to get a sequel from time to time, what we haven’t seen in a while is a new System Shock game. What made the System Shock games so special was that combat wasn’t as ceaseless and merciless as that found in similar games of the time. System Shock wasn’t about running, and gunning, killing everything in sight. It was about using one’s brain to pick the right time to fight, and the right time to hide. Since the release of System Shock, and its sequel plenty of other games have come along trying to do the same thing, but very few have ever managed to get the pacing just right between combat and stealth. Adding to the value of the System Shock games was the quality of storytelling within the series. There was always a sense of foreboding, while trying to solve the mysteries of the games.

It would be great if gamers could get a new System Shock game to remind everyone what a first person game that isn’t focused of frenetic firefights should be. Plenty of games have come and gone trying to recapture what System Shock was all about, but most of them felt like hollow shells when compared to the real deal. The challenge in making a new game would likely come in finding ways to tweak everything, to bring subtle new touches to the experience. With all of the game design innovations to have come along since System Shock came onto the scene, it may also prove a challenge to modernize the series without long-time purist fans crying fowl. However, if a developer could come along and take the central pieces of the series that made it into a classic, then add new components on in a tasteful manner, perhaps a new System Shock game could turn into something pretty neat.

Road Rash

People who have seen the Mad Max movies probably remember the chase scenes from the films where Max was tearing down the road in a heavily armored, futuristic sports car, while being chased by a small army of spiky-haired punks that want to beat him to a pulp. About the closest thing that gaming has come to recreating this is probably the Road Rash series.

Above: Road Rash Jail Break (PlayStation)

Players raced from one checkpoint to the next, punching, kicking, and smashing the competition for the entire trip. If you could get your hands on a pipe or a chain, well, the game just got a whole lot more interesting. The series did quite well for itself during the 16-bit era, and made its way onto the following generation of consoles with Road Rash 3D and Jail Break, but after that we haven’t scene or heard from it, and that is a real shame.

Road Rash is a series that has been absent for far too long. Sure, there’s other games that have come along that allow you to race around and smash stuff (ie. Burnout), but it’s just not the same as hopping on a hog, 2X4 in hand, and hitting the open road (not to mention other people!). EA likes gazing fondly at their profit margins each quarter, and it’s hard not to imagine that a new Road Rash would do anything but benefit them, not to mention gamers in general.

There was a Road Rash in the works for the PlayStation 2, but it never saw the light of day. For now all we have are the classic games to enjoy. Hopefully, EA won’t give up on the series. With a new generation of consoles out and about now, there are plenty of new possibilities that could be explored. We could have a super pretty 360 Road Rash, or what about a Wii version. Now that would be something!

This ends this entry into our ongoing discussion of games that need sequels. Be sure to check back when we revisit the subject and talk about another batch of games that need to make a comeback.