10 Video Game Franchises That Keep Making The Same Mistake

There's perhaps no single video game franchise more infuriating than Sonic the Hedgehog.

Despite its immense popularity and status as one of the most iconic platformers of all time, the series has categorically failed to substantially innovate itself for new generations of gamers.

While Mario impressively maintained relevance during the potentially awkward switchover to 3D, Sonic has stumbled through mistake after mistake, with only the occasional success in-between.

It's incredibly telling that Sonic Mania, the best-reviewed Sonic game in a quarter-century, was effectively an homage sequel remixing Sonic's greatest hits, because Sega knows just how catastrophically their attempts to genuinely reinvent the franchise have failed.

Massively high-profile embarrassments like 2006's Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic Boom: Rise Of Lyric prove the lack of a compelling creative vision for the series, and so it's far more likely we'll simply get more nostalgia-laced retro homages in the future.