Plenty of gamers grew up with their favorite franchises and watched these series expand and change. Tastes in games may have undergone drastic changes as gamers went from Mario to Master Chief to Minecraft, but fans always kept a vigilant eye on those special few series that got us into playing. Let’s start this list out with a big name and see where that gets us, shall we?
Tomb Raider
With eighteen entries into this series, some of which were released on mobile, it’s clear most people have at least encountered the character of Lara Croft. As a matter of fact, Lara is so popular that she’s had her own movie, animated series, comic and slot game. Yes. You read that correctly. Among the countless colorful titles at 32Red online slot games such as Gold Factory and Thunderstruck II, there exists a digital machine with Lara and all of her relic-hunting adventures. It’s not exactly where a fan might expect to see her, but after the successful reboot aimed at Croft’s origins, there’s no telling where she’ll pop up next. That’s why you shouldn’t be too surprised to hear that a film based on the reboot is set to release in 2018. Needless to say, if you grew up playing this on the original PlayStation, you’re either endlessly pleased or horrified (probably a bit of both) with what they’ve done with the franchise.
Monster Hunter
Starting on the PS2 as one of a handful of online games, Monster Hunter has had a long and profitable journey in Japan. It went from the PS2 to the PlayStation Portable to the computer to the Nintendo 3DS and then finally it’s seeing its time on a PlayStation console with the 2018 Monster Hunter World release, a title recently announced at E3 2017. While the series hasn’t received much love here in the states, the action-adventure title is a must have for anyone into cooperative gaming. Japan, on the other hand, fell in love with the Capcom classic and a MH exhibit can even be found at Universal Studios Japan alongside Resident Evil and Evangelion displays. That’s when you know you’ve made it in the land of the rising sun.
Hitman
Here’s another one that’s so popular they’ve started making video slot machines of it at, you guessed it, 32red.com. Next thing you know they’re going to have a Game of Thrones video poker game on Mr Gamez or Prime Slots just to compete. Despite that, Hitman is a series that’s been around since the turn of the century with its first release Hitman: Agent 47 and its caused its fair share of controversy over the years, and what would one expect from a game where the sole objective is to murder people? Two films have been released on the series and since the release of the latest Hitman film, producer Adrian Askarieh has said he would oversee a multi video game film universe with the likes of Just Cause, Tomb Raider, Deus Ex, Thief and Hitman.
Pokemon
The franchise keeps on chugging along, and after creating a craze as big as Pokemon Go, can you blame them? It all started on the Gameboy back in 1996 and has found its way onto the big screen, small screen, comics, trading cards and just about any other form of entertainment you could imagine. Labeled as a “fad” when it first came out, Pokemon proved the masses of disgruntled parents wrong as it’s been going strong for more than two decades and has released twenty films (the twentieth having released this past July in Japan). The trading card game is also still going strong and Nintendo has confirmed a full release for the Switch is in the works right now, so we think at this point it’s safe to say Pokemon’s here to stay. The only question is: what genre of game will it release as next? After all, there’s been a Pokemon pinball game. What more can they do?
Halo
Master Chief put Microsoft on the map with one of the biggest first-person shooters of all time, Halo. Released at a time when online gaming was fairly rare on consoles, Halo captured a generation of kids that wanted the thrill of warfare without the pain – that wanted to take on a swarm of aliens and live to tell the tale. While they certainly got those things, what they really got was the first game to popularize the online shooter, a genre of game still as popular as ever today. But most of all Halo gave folks the sweet, sweet memory of LAN parties in friends’ basement until four in the morning, fueled by nothing more than rage and bottles of Mountain Dew. So even though it might grow in ways underappreciated and new developers might take over, we’ll always have those glory days.
