Nintendo blames... itsself???

[A Black Falcon]

Well of course they're not nearly as revolutionary as their predecessors, but saying that they "fall short of the improvement curve of the rest of the industry" is ridiculous.

That comment well might be true for Mario Sunshine, but not for Wind Waker. Mario Sunshine is a fun game, but I agree with Nintendarse -- its just so similar to Mario 64, with less variety! Sequels which are nearly identical to their predecessors often dissapoint me... not because they are bad games (for the games we're thinking of, they aren't), but because I want MORE.

Take Age of Empires 2. Its a quality sequel to the very good RTS Age of Empires. It puts it in a newer setting (medieval, not ancient), improves the graphics, adds some features, makes the campaigns more fun... but I was dissapointed by it and honestly probably should have spent my money elsewhere. Or SimCity 3000. Good game... but quite dissapointing considering what I was expecting it to be.

True, most sequels fall into that category... and in many other cases I actually don't want lots of change. It really depends on the game... but when the game could improve more, and should improve more, and the company has the time to improve it more, and it doesn't get improved more, its dissapointing.

So they are still great games... but they just don't match up to the originals.

Sure, it is true that you risk going too far and losing what the game or series its a sequel to is about, but if the alternative is a good but unimaginative sequel in most cases its best to take the risk.

And when we're talking about sequels to Mario 64, or OoT, or SimCity 2000... 'slightly improved with minor new features' just doesn't cut it. Not after so many years.

Wind Waker, I would say, did a much better job of innovating... the basic game is the same but it adds major new features to the game, unlike SMS. So that was better done. But SMS? Good game. Fun to play. Makes me remember Mario 64...

But it feels like PLAYING Mario 64, with a jetpack. And the graphics haven't improved nearly as much as they should either... and those aren't good things. So its nowhere near SM64. Just like SimCity 3000 isn't nearly as good as SC2k even though it adds a bunch of features and (when you have the expansion pack too) doesn't remove all that many.