In this thread, take a game series and state what you would do to "bring it back" or make it better.

Here's one that Ix and I discussed the other day.

Star Fox - Go back to vehicles only. Mostly spent in arwings. Pretty much follow the mold set in Stafox 64. But instead of it being 1 player, open it up to 4 player co-op. Let someone pick one of the four pilots: Fox, Slippy, Falco, and Peppy. Give each one of them specific strengths and weaknesses. In the actual levels, give it a Left 4 Dead kind of system that requires you rely on the other people playing. For example: Take out the loop-t-loop move that you've used to shake enemies off your tail. Make it to where one of your team mates HAVE to get it off of you. You could still barrel roll to reduce the damage (and probably just not take any at all). Boss fights would open up in free-range mode like in 64. But make the bosses have like... 4 weak points that have to be hit at the same time by all 4 players (or at least with some kind of time restraint). All this with VOIP... sounds like a good time to me.

And here's one everyone at least has an opinion on.

Sonic - Go look at a game on Xbox arcade called Trials HD. I want sonic to be JUST like that but without the motorcycle and with a blue hedgehog. It's all in 3D but locked down in 2D. The camera is at a slight angle so you can kind of see slightly what is farther ahead... and just apply the old Sonic formula to it: No friends aside from Tails and Knuckles, no dialog (just sprites interacting), and for the love of all that is holy make the chaos emeralds optional and not storyline.

Star Fox

Story:
The game should strip everything from the cannon after Star Fox 64. Dinosaurs and Krystal and psychic powers don't belong in Star Fox. The good guys are the second Star Fox team (Fox/Slippy/Falco/Peppy). The bad guys are a new military power from another galaxy who are also animals (no Aparoids who are devoid of character) and, of course, they hire rival mercenary team Star Wolf (Wolf/Pigma/Andrew/Leon) to fight the team. Star Wolf wants revenge on them.

The invasion and repulsion of said invasion are really strong themes that work for the game.

Characters:
Everyone should have cheesy one-liners or at most two lines of dialogue per transmission. This guarantees that the stuff will be endlessly quotable forevery. "Incoming enemy from the rear! Drop altitude!".

Star Fox is universally good. Star Wolf is ALL BAD. No horrible "friendly nemesis" stuff for these guys. And they should be bloodthirsty as hell.

In fact, there should be in-game cutscenes where you can see, in the distance but too far to stop, Star Wolf destroy a ship begging for mercy. We should want to hate these guys.

Andross is a give or take. I think that with a sufficiently-built enemy, he'd be unnecessary.

Gameplay:
All 3 vehicles in SF64 worked. The Arwing was fantastic, the Landmaster shook it up a bit, and the Blue Marine was also different. I would also add the B-Arwing, which would be used for the new Bombing Run missions, where you have to cause as much damage as possible with unlimited bombs while your wingmen protect you from enemy fire.

Escort Missions:
Basically these would be missions like the Sector Z stage in 64, but not stationary. In fact, one level would be where you escort a rescue vehicle to the evac point, wait for it to get the hostages, and then have to fight your way out, all amidst intense enemy fire and, yes, even the boss is attacking you while this is going on.

On Foot Missions:
As much as people hate the on-foot gameplay, I actually thought that in SF Assault, it was decent but weak. Clearly given to a B-team of developers at Namco. SF is a mercenary group, not just a group of pilots, so I think that it COULD work if they were sent on other types of missions. But I'd rather leave this alone to focus on air combat.

Stages:
Expanding on Lantis' idea, I would have the following:

24 stages
8 stages available per game run

18 air stages
4 ground stages
2 sea stages

I'm going to agree with Ixzion on the foot stages. But the game should definately be mostly in vehicles, with the on-foot missions being one of the less-frequent ones. Actually, maybe the on-foot ones could be like Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles.


Anyway, Final Fantasy. Bring back the traditional world map. 'Nuff said on that.

Bring back the ATB system from FF4-9, where you stand at each end of the arena (or stuck in the middle, for those surrounded events that we only saw in FF6 and 7), waiting for your guage to fill up, taking turns attacking. Make sure the ATB is speedy enough; don't make it like FF9's. FF4-6 proved you don't need the guage filling slowly when we have parties larger than three. Allow us to control everyone, again. Have it optional to have other players control other members. Go ahead and keep the idea of summons being able to take part in battle. And for the love of Cheese, keep the magic animations short! The obnoxiously long animations were probably the only reason the ATB guage crawled in FF9.

Let's make the mini-games and subquests fun, again. You had a good idea with the hunts in FF12, but it seemed like those were the only subquests. Let's make them more like they were from FF8 and before. FF9 and 10 had some obnoxiously difficult mini-games, that simply weren't fun. Let's not force the player to rush through the game just to win one item, like in FF9, again. Let's not jump rope 1000 times, dodge lightning 200 times, or race for a time of no more than 0 seconds. I think you should look towards FF7 for inspiration. IMO, it had the largest and best collection of subquests and mini-games in an FF. Go ahead and bring back another uber-mini-game like the card games or blitzball, but keep it simple and fun. I could never understand Tetra Master from FF9, and Triple Triad from FF8 started out fun but got ridiculous once you added the rules from other regions. Actually, let's steer clear of card games. They had their fun in the sun in three games, already. Go more in the direction of blitzball. Not the same game, and it doesn't have to be a sport, just some sort of new "popular activity".

Job system. I know you haven't given up on it completely. It resurfaces in the series every so often. I think it's that time, again.

And that's all I can think of.

Sonic the Hedgehog

Story:
Dr. Robotnik is at it again! This time, he's slowly taking over the colorful planet of Mobius from his metal city, Robotropolis, spreading his technological designs everywhere. Sonic finds that his friends all over Mobius are being turned into robots. Sonic's gonna kick Eggman's ass once and for all.

Characters:
Sonic - Hero
Tails - Sidekick
Knuckles - Nemesis
Amy - "Love" Interest/Damsel

Dr. Robotnik - Evil Genius
Snively Robotnik - Robotnik's nephew
Metal Sonic - Robot

Why add Snively? Because Robotnik's never had a lackey in the games before. And in the comics, Snively is one devious SOB. A good match for the doc.

There are no other people in the game. No gray cities. No damn people.

Music:
The music would go back to the basics. Green Hill, Chemical Plant, Hydrocity. There should be no one talking in my Sonic game. Not even the music.

It should be built to be catchy and memorable. You started humming those 3 right away even if you haven't played in a while. I don't want to be a "SAWNIK HEROOOOOO".

Style:
The graphic style needs an edge. Sonic is supposed to be edgy and cool. It should be 2.5D with a sharp neo-cel-shaded look. Look to Green Hill Zone. The palm trees are 2D, but made to look 3D. That's the kind of stuff we need.

Sonic, 3D, and Sonic Team don't mix. Unless you give it to Nintendo's Tokyo EAD (Super Mario Galaxy) team, then leave Sonic 2D.

Sonic is all about COLORS! Sonic games used to use other parts of the spectrum besides gray, black, and brown. Get creative. I've never seen a fire-red octopus that has 8 guns and fires alternating patterns of rings and spikes at Sonic.

The backgrounds should be as colorful and varied as a tropical paradise SHOULD be. Pinks, green, orange, blue. They are Sonic's friends.

Gameplay:
Choose between the 3 protagonists and go. They don't have separate stupid things like mech exploration or a fetch quest. They all transverse the stages, but have to find different paths, because their natural features prevent them from going down another's path at certain points.

In fact, have each of them going to different zones at different points.

Sonic -> Green Hill - Spring Garden - Paradise Plains
Tails -> Green Hill - (they split up to cover more ground in the story) Icy Forest Zone - Paradise Plains
Knuckles -> Angel Island - Green Hill - (choice - Spring Garden/Icy Forest) - Paradise Plains

Also, get rid of Sonic's "homing" jump and enemies that take more than one hit to destroy, other than bosses. Keep his Spin Dash. Tails and Knux can keep that they have, but add the punch for Knux.

Bring back Super Sonic and Hyper Sonic in each stage after you get all 14 emeralds. These were a bonus for being an awesome player. Not as part of some weak-ass story about them. You can beat the game without gathering them, but that means you suck AND you have a reason to replay them.

Stages:
There should be 14 stages with a special final stage NOT IN SPACE. We've been to space ever since S3K. OR make the space chase more interesting.

I'm thinking maybe Robotnik took Amy Rose and threw her out of the airlock, all the while he's about to use the Master Emerald to become Super Robotnik. So after you get her back, you go to face Robotnik and he's just crazy powerful and you both have to recharge yourself on the Master Emerald during the battle on the space station.

Also, stage names should be fun and descriptive. The design should actually make an effort for unique mechanics in each stage, besides series staples like springs.

Maybe in Icy Forest, there would be frozen trees you could spin dash through, which would led them to topple over, revealing shortcuts and maybe longcuts.

Green Hill, Spring Garden, Paradise Plains, Icy Forest, Angel Island are great names.

Robotnik's areas should be like:
Steel Fortress Zone
Egg Prison Zone
Final Break Zone

Earthworm Jim:

Get the hell back to 2D first and foremost. Don't even bother with 2.5D. Keep it as cartoon-y as possible. The storyline for EWJ 3 was okay, but the 3D aspect and change from side scroller to aventure collect-y type didn't work well. So go back to the way it used to be but keep the humor levels right where they are. Keep all the wacky weapons, and bring a few back from 2 and 3.

I think you forgot "don't skrew around with the camera". The 3D games, the camera's all over the place. It's disorientating, and you really have no idea which direction you should be holding the analog stick.

If it's in 2D, then the camera's going to be locked down anyways.

Zombies Ate My Neighbors:

Cell-shaded.

Online multiplayer.

Leaderboards.

More levels.

I was referring to Ixzion's post, actually. I dunno how I missed your post.