5 Video Game Franchises That Need a Break

Sometimes, time off is a good thing for a video game franchise. Having frequent releases, which are often early, is not really a good thing, even for the biggest developers and publishers. Good games take a long time to make, so pushing them out in rapid succession usually means there’s a drop in quality.

Taking years and years off in between games (a la BioShock) is not always great, either, but at least it means the development team attempted to take its time. That’s certainly not the case for these five game franchises, all of whom need to take some time off to reset and come back with a better focus on making good games. Quality over quantity.

5. Call of Duty

There’s zero reason for Call of Duty to still be putting out yearly games, especially when they’re live service. Live service games literally have a longer shelf life than most games, because the developers keep the servers up for online play for a long time. The end of a Call of Duty‘s relevancy comes when a new game is dropped, not when an online shooter has naturally run its course, which in this case would probably be several years.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is drying out, but it’s going to die off so much sooner because of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 just one year later. And in the last 10 years, there have been maybe three good Call of Duty games that most of the gaming community can agree are good. Ordinarily, that’s a really strong ratio, but not when the series has had 10 entries in that time frame.

4. Sonic the Hedgehog

As painful as it is to admit, Sonic the Hedgehog is a little bit lost, too. Sega has done well transitioning to the big screen, but the Sonic games have been pretty hit or miss, especially in the 3D area. Sonic Frontiers was perhaps the biggest entry in the last few years for the series, and it was a bit of a miss (an earnest attempt, but a miss nonetheless).

The 2D games have generally been much more well-received, and they have avoided major duds like Sonic Forces there. Some time off would be good, that way Sonic Team can determine what their best path forward is and recognize that their strengths are not exactly suited to 3D.

3. Assassin’s Creed

There was a time when Assassin’s Creed games were all the rage. Ubisoft had an incredible hit rate for them, but that really began to shift in the mid-2010s. Assassin’s Creed Unity was seen as a change for the series, and not in a good way. Since then, they’ve had some decent games, but none that really matched the level of the originals.

After numerous delays to get it right, Assassin’s Creed Shadows received decent reviews from critics, but was mixed for gamers. Unfortunately, even decent reviews were disappointing given how badly Ubisoft needed a win. While this is far from disastrous for the series, it’s clear that all their effort couldn’t produce a masterpiece, so they need to take some time off and come back fresh in a few years with something that will reinvigorate the player base.

2. Sports Games

I totally understand why sports games (Madden, NBA 2K, MLB The Show, FC, NHL) are yearly releases. There is a new season for the sport they’re mirroring every single year. That doesn’t make it a good strategy, though. It’s actually detrimental to the gaming world. These games are most often uninspired and they charge players $70 for a slightly different game every single year.

There’s no reality where these game series ever end. They’re too popular and too many people are more than willing to spend $100s every single year for slight changes and an updated roster. My solution would be to hit pause for a couple of years, perhaps letting the most recent game be live service with less devotion from the development team in order to allow for a much better game whenever they’re ready to drop a new release. That would only increase the hype for that release, too.

1. Pokémon

Once again, it’s a bit painful to admit that Pokémon is struggling. Even though entries like Pokémon Legends: Arceus are really great, the hits don’t outweigh the misses, and even the good games are particularly unsatisfying because they don’t do a whole lot new or differently. Fortunately, there’s a very easy path forward.

There is no mainline Pokémon game scheduled yet. Pokemon Legends: Z-A is coming in October. After that, The Pokémon Company and Game Freak should prioritize medium-effort remakes for past generations while working mainly on a new generation that won’t be out for several years. This would give them the chance to really lock in and make something that Pokémon fans have been angling for for a long time, but it would prevent them from losing money in the meantime with the remakes everyone has also been asking for.

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