Most Wanted Remakes or Remasters - Part 3 - Gaming Thoughts

This is the third and last of our articles in this series. This is a gathering of the top games in everyone's wish list - and more staff members chipped in than ever on this series. So let's wrap this up!

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Susan

MechCommander

I would LOVE for MechCommander to be remastered. While I often am not a huge fan of reskinning a game, MechCommander was a turn based tactical game like Battletech that I fell in love with. I spent hours outfitting my mechs and trying to complete all of the objectives. Often, my brother would beat mom and I in succeeding at the mission. I remember one particular one all too well... Anyways, the graphics are a little dated if you were to look at it now, but I'd love to have more mech based tactics games because it had a single player campaign mode as well as a multiplayer mode! So, my mom, brother, and I used to play a crap ton of it back in the late 90s. What's also cool about MechCommander is that it was made by FASA Studio who developed games from 1994 until 2007, and made MechCommander 1 and 2 as well as MechWarrior 4, MechAssault, and in its final year, Shadowrun on Windows and Xbox 360. After that, there weren't many mech based tactics games that really grabbed me other than BattleTech. Honestly, it would be great if we could have MechCommander back - so long as it had both the single and multiplayer features.

 

Robert

Final Fantasy VII

You read that right... I'd like to see Final Fantasy VII remastered. Don't get me wrong, Final Fantasy VII Remake is fantastic but that's not what I'm hoping for. A part of the magic of Final Fantasy VII was in its stellar-for-the-time graphics. The Remake doesn't preserve that piece of gaming history (especially because Square was sued and lost for false advertisement) and I'd love to see Cloud's pointy feet in glorious 4k. The pre-renderered backgrounds being re-rendered at modern resolutions would, to me, present some of the best-looking backgrounds in gaming. A simple, straight, 4k remastering of the original content would be such a dream come true that I'd be happy to purchase it all over again. Final Fantasy VII was magical; why not preserve that?

 

Valerie

Descent

This awesome first of its kind 3D 360 degree space first person shooter I really loved to play, and no I have not beaten it cuz of life, ranks as my number one for a remake. Why? Because I would have loved to save my progress and continue on to the end! The story grabbed me from the first and the 3D 360 degree play kept me on my toes all through the levels I got through. Also, I would love to have a crack at the spiritual successor Overlord, but that will have to wait.

Nick

Dragon Force

During a time when I was hooked on turn-based strategy games, Dragon Force stood out as a real-time strategy game that kept me glued to the Sega Saturn. With one of 8 different leaders you can select from, there's a decent amount of replay value to be had here. The RPG elements mixed wonderfully with the strategy elements, and all of it was wrapped up in one of the better stories of the time period. As a bonus? How about bringing over the sequel, which I never experienced, because it was only released in Japan at the time. 

Pierre-Yves

The Legend of Dragoon

But didn't this just drop on the PSN last year? Yes. It did. With a few quality of life improvements in the form of emulation, this classic was made accessible on modern day systems.

But that's not a remake. And while I don't necessarily NEED 4K and 60fps, we all know we want it. But more than that, I would hope for a Final Fantasy Remake and Rebirth treatment. Take what was originally available and expand on it.

The Legend of Dragoon for me was one of the best PS1 entries. It still holds up rather well all things considered. It had a good story of love, loss, and friendship. It also had a great combat system that could be easily refined for modern input speeds. And for the time? The graphics weren't bad either.

Best part? Nigel, he cut off my head. Did you see that?! He cut off my head!!

 

Mike

Tenchu

“Tenchu” the stealth assassin mechanics stood out as one of a kind title. With it's only competition in the unique genre being the early Hitman franchise, Tenchu being remade would spark the love and desire of many who missed the opportunity to dive into the franchise of stealth/action adventure. If they fixed the then buggy and at times cumbersome camera controls, it would rival the likes of “Ghosts of Tsushima” and “Sekiro Shadows Die Twice”

Jim

Xenosaga 1-3

The Xenosaga trilogy to me is a perfect fit for a remaster. These three great RPGs are getting hard and expensive for the PS2. I remember playing the first game and seeing the cutscenes in it and being amazed at how long some of them were. It felt like you would play a little and then watch for 30 minutes! I was young so it was probably a lot less than that 30 minutes, but I love games like that. Story-heavy games are my favorite whether it is RPGs or not. Xenosaga deserves more love from Bandai Namco.

Hamza

Need For Speed II

We'll call this the most conventional of my picks. Originally released in 1997, I stand by the opinion that NFS II remains one of the top installments in this long-running franchise. It’s still a great-looking game, even by modern standards—though the jagged car models, low-res skyboxes, and outdated FMV sequences could definitely benefit from a 4K remaster. Imagine Monolithic Studios and North Country—my favorite tracks—redone with a modern engine.

Richard

The Xenosaga trilogy and Xenogears, by extension

The Xenosaga trilogy is probably the first major non-mainstream JRPG I ever played. I'd love to see it where the second game wasn't handed off to a different department that disregarded the notes and plans from the original department. Replete with an amazing soundtrack, an incredibly interesting story and characters, and a really neat twist to the typical turn-based combat system. I would absolutely love to see a remake of this series.

Hayden

Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe

Going in a totally different direction (as I do), I give you "Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe" (1991). This was the last in a trilogy of WW2 flight sim games from LucasFilm, and took on a very broad scope for its time, allowing the player to control either the Allied or German air campaigns in the war, including a limited set of strategic decisions related to production. Add in a character-developing tour system, a variety of real (and experimental) aircraft types, and you have a 4.5/5 star game at the time of its release.

These days, I don't see much press for entries in the standalone war flight sim market - though perhaps I'm just blind to it - and I'd really like to see what current tech and graphics could do for this classic. Who needs War Thunder when you could have the entire war without worrying about connection lag or weird tier balancing choices?

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For this edition of Memorable Music in Gaming, I tried to pull inspiration from a handful of different places. Horror, strategy and RPGs make up the bulk of what I reflected on here. Horror in particular was a big part of the theme for me since we just recently experienced Halloween, and I've been playing a number of horror games in recent weeks as a result.

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Games that should have had sequels (Part 3) - Gaming Thoughts

Over the last couple of days, we have had a couple of the members of the team submit their list of games that they wish had gotten sequels. To cap off the week, I thought I would go ahead and share my own list of titles that I really would have liked to see live on just a bit longer.

Heavenly Sword

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