Sequels in video game follows the same dilemma that in the movie picture industry : what to remove from the first opus, what to keep to maintain the spirit and what to add to make it exciting again. The bottom line is, whatever you choose, people will get disappointed and/or angry. Decisions on features will only change which people you will annoy. In the video game industry, I guess that it boils down to the following alternative:

If you change too much, long-time fans of the first installment will rant about the so-called “lost spirit” of the series. You will attract curious new players to your game, and they will be able to play the previous game if they enjoyed the new one, because it won’t be a copycat. And you’ll get the chance to win the long time fans back with the next game of the series.

If you change too few, long-time fans of the first installment will rant about the so-called “lack of creativity” of the series. You will attract curious new players to your game, but they will feel awkward playing previous game, because this will be the same game, but with less features. Next time you’ll announce a new game in the serie, expectations won’t be that much from either group of players.

Example : Dungeon Keeper series, both games are worth playing, Civilization series [fr], with the I-II-III being fairly identical, while the IV and the V being slightly different from each other.

Counter-example : Original Fallout series, playing the first game after the second is just a waste of time (or for the story only), Constructor series, with Street Wars (Constructor Underworld) being Constructor but better, or Anno series [fr], whose graphic enhancements doesn’t completely cover the lack of new game concept in each and every sequel.

Game designers are sometimes tempted to offer players a way to start over again the game while they maintain their first run. This is a great feature if the game offers multiple choices and big decisions processes. That way the players can explore different facets of the game and keeps enjoying the game over and over again.

Of course, if the second run is too close from the first, it’ll just seem a waste of time. And a faint attempt from the game makers to artificially over-extend the game lifetime at the expense of new features, which is often bad received.

Example : EVE Online‘s alternate characters are a great way to explore the rich skill tree of the game.

Counter-examples : TrainStation‘s second station, Simple Hospital‘s second hospital (and third and fourth and fifth), Dungeon Overlord‘s second dungeon…

Disclaimer : I’ve been a video game player for more than 20 years now, and even though I’m not myself a professionnal game designer, I’ve slowly built up over the time a sort of game design philosophy based on my gaming experience. These tips are ordered by arrival in my mind to write them up, there is no priority whatsoever.

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