10 Video Game Franchises That Never Got Better Than The First Instalment

7. LEGO

The Franchise: The guys over at LEGO must have some of the best brand managers on the planet. Ten years ago the Danish plastic blocks were a little nostalgic throw-back. Now they've just had a massively successful blockbuster movie and own one of the most successful family game franchises. Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Pirates Of The Caribbean, Batman, Marvel and The Lord Of The Rings have all received the digital-brick treatment and delighted just about anyone who's had a go playing with games' massive rosters of characters. Remaking the famous films in bricks with a little bit of tongue-in-cheek humour, the gameplay is deviously simple yet addictive; it's impossible to play a level and not try to collect every single stud. Why The First Was Best: The first game was the self-explanatory titled LEGO Star Wars and although the series has added many cool features over time (flying, aiming arrows and batarangs), much of what makes the games such a delight to play was already present here. For such questionable source material to be elevated to something so fun (there's no talk of trade routes here) is impressive enough, but with the first game the whole LEGO concept felt so fresh and unformulaic that it was hard for any subsequent game to capture the same joy. In fact, the only other game that came close was the sequel, The Original Trilogy, although that's just because those films are better.