The Spiritual Successors I'd Like

And how to make them actually different

I’ve made no secret of dreaming of making video games well beyond my current skill level. And a large part of this is being inspired by video games that I’ve played that likely aren’t getting sequels anytime soon, or liking parts of video games that other people complain about until they get removed in rereleases and effectively deleted from the perception of the game.

However, one thing I dislike about many games designed like this is how attached they are to the specifics of their inspiration, where they feel more like a clone than a successor. Which can often leave me thinking ‘you know what, I’ll just play the original instead since this game wishes it was that so badly.’

So in addition to saying what I’d want to mimic about the inspiration games, I’m also going to try and list off ideas for how to make a successor actually distinct from the original. Because I want to see something new built off of these games rather than an empty appeal to my nostalgia, I want to go somewhere new, if I wanted to return I’d replay the originals.

Sonic Riders

While Sonic is obviously going strong, the Riders subseries of hoverboard racing games has been seemingly dead for a while now, with its last appearance on the Kinect for the Xbox 360. Never a good sign when the last entry of anything is an exclusive for a failed peripheral.

Like many other Sonic games, Sonic Riders has a lot of style it hits you with from the start with its opening move. Putting the characters on hoverboards and rocket skates over more typical vehicles immediately gave it a cool factor over other racers. The overall aesthetic is something that I would want to keep, since it’s a large part of the appeal, it does in fact need to feature hoverboards or options of equal coolness.

Gameplay wise, the main things I’d want to keep are the different character types with their own distinct routes they can take in a course, as well as a focus on mechanical execution for shortcuts. One possible way to actively build on Riders as a base could be to compress the different options, make the different character types be what they race on, like choosing between a hoverboard or rocket skates user.

To distinguish it from Sonic Riders, I’d avoid having any sort of stand in for the air meter mechanic (one of the game’s distinguishing features), and play up a focus on combat by letting you outright KO rival racers. I’d also have the tracks change over the course of a race, leaning on another Sega racer for reference.

These feel like radical enough changes that’d they be out of place in a new Sonic Riders, which is exactly the point. But fighting your rivals at low health as the track undergoes a radical transformation with the start of the final lap is its own form of cool not dependent on memories of a PS2 game.

Overlord

Overlord was a short lived series of video games for the Xbox 360 and PS3, with a few spin-offs for other systems. It’s difficult to describe neatly in terms of genre, almost a sort of pseudo RTS action adventure, where you play as an evil Overlord who goes out to conquer, mainly by commanding your Minions to fight and solve puzzles using their different abilities as you push through each level.

There are some similarities to Pikmin, both are about controlling little creatures of differing colors and increasing their numbers to serve your ends. But Overlord has no day system and a completely different approach to level design. I feel like they are in the same yet to be clearly codified genre (alongside Little King’s Story and a few others) since even its brightest star isn’t the most prominent. And sadly I do not expect a new Overlord anytime soon if ever.

With plenty of other games I can go ‘well these other racing games are great even if they don’t give the same kind of hit as Sonic Riders.’ I can’t do that for Overlord. And it being so distinctive means there is still plenty of ways and directions for the concept to grow because they were working in a sparsely populated genre.

The main things I’d need for a game to sate my desire for a new Overlord is the same general approach to exploring the world, and a horde of little creatures to command with different abilities. And the fun of being at least a little evil is part of the appeal, a villainous protagonist is a broad enough concept to not be too deferential to the specifics of Overlord I feel.

This might be one of my least practical to make video game ideas in a head full of unpractical video game ideas, but I have a pitch to make it super marketable and build on the inspiration, vague dating sim elements.

Both mainline Overlord games offered a choice of wife or favorite wife that had minor gameplay ramifications. I’d go further and give this spiritual successor a player character you can choose the gender of and a range of different options for consorts that you can romance, with associated upgrades you can get without romance. An added focus on relationships would broaden the appeal and fit what’s already there.

Also, Pikmin 4’s introduction of a tower defense mode had me realize something similar would have fit Overlord, so this successor would pick up the slack and distinguish itself in the process. Sequences where you need to defend a location from an opposing army would fit the vibe of being an evil overlord even if you can’t have that title for legal and SEO reasons.

It makes me sad whenever I think about how Overlord could have evolved alongside Pikmin, but at least one of them is keeping on.

Chronicle of the Sword (Soul Calibur III)

This is a little different since I’m referring to a side mode specifically rather than the full game. Yet it fits into the category of distinct gameplay experience that I feel hasn’t been given a chance to grow and evolve through sequels or imitation, since it was just a single one-off side mode.

For Soul Calibur III the developers asked “what if our fighting game was also an RTS” and went to work with a side mode that had its own story and characters separate from the main Soul Calibur world. In it you direct your units along paths to fight the enemy and take their bases while protecting your own, with the taking of bases and other key moments settled in classic Soul Calibur matches.

And I’d think it’d be interesting to see what would it be like if this mix of RTS and fighter was designed as the main attraction rather than a reframing of the core gameplay. Since in the time since Soul Calibur III I at least have not become aware of any full games built around similar gameplay to Chronicle of the Sword.

Some other games mix fighting game elements with strategy, like Project X Zone, but they don’t do full on fighting game matches. I know of an upcoming indie game, Kronian Titans, that is a fighting game with its own strategy based story mode, but I believe it’s set to be turn based and again is just one mode among others that lack strategy elements.

As a fighting game Soul Calibur generally aims for balance when putting different characters against each other, match ups are polarized but still winnable. But in a full on RTS/Fighter fusion you wouldn’t need that kind of balance for individual character fights, the balance is instead about the armies as a whole. It’s a whole different lens for designing fighting game movesets compares to the likes of Soul Calibur.

There’s also room to bring the two halves closer. For example, what if you could do actions on the tactics side that resulted in different stage hazards on the fighter side, like setting fire to a location or bringing out artillery. Or perhaps borrow the assist mechanics from tag fighters to incentivize keeping units together.

However, I take back what I said about my Overlord idea, mixing two notoriously niche and hard to develop genres probably beats it out in lack of practicality and difficulty to make. But I’d be down to support any kickstarters from people brave and experienced enough to do it.

Honorable Mention: Code Name S.T.E.A.M

I wanted to put Code Name S.T.E.A.M (a game I’ve written about before) on the list, but genuinely couldn’t think of a way a spiritual successor could keep the core feel and still be its own thing.

My only ideas of what I’d change are sequel tier adjustments rather than ‘new thing built on its foundation’ tier, like map previews before selecting your squad and less tedious unlocks. But it fits into the category of ‘game that leaves me wanting a follow up that will likely never happen.’

Honorable Mention: Subspace Emissary (Super Smash Bros Brawl)

Subspace Emissary is one of my favorite game modes in Smash of all time and I’d love to see games based on it specifically with its blend of classic Smash gameplay and platformer levels.

Then I remembered the existence of a recently released indie game called Decline’s Drops, that seems to be exactly that. I feel there’s likely still plenty of room to explore in the notion of a full game based on Subspace Emissary specifically, but it’s great to see at least one game doing just that. I hope ‘platform brawler’ can become its own subsubgenre and escape Smash’s shadow the way platform fighters themselves still struggle to.

That’s all for now, thank you for reading.