Franchises

EA Sports American football series, named for coach and commentator John Madden. It was called John Madden Football until 1993, and EA has released a new edition each year since 1990.

Action-adventure series originally created by 2K Czech and published by 2K. Later mainline games are developed by Hangar 13, with remakes and remasters of the earlier entries.

Games based on the Wizards of the Coast card game. Secret Level’s Battlegrounds uses cards as real-time spells.

2K’s Major League Baseball games. The 2006 Xbox entry adds a morale system and the World Baseball Classic.

Nintendo franchise starring Mario. Spans platformers from Super Mario Bros. through 3D adventures such as Super Mario 64, Galaxy, and Odyssey, plus spin-offs across Kart, Party, sports, and RPGs.

Klei Entertainment side-scrolling stealth platformer, originally published by Microsoft Studios for Xbox Live Arcade in 2012.

Capcom’s tag-team fighting series crossing Marvel characters with Capcom fighters. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 fields teams of three from a 56-character roster.

BioWare military science-fiction RPG franchise starring Commander Shepard. The original trilogy spans Mass Effect through Mass Effect 3, with later entries including Mass Effect: Andromeda and the Legendary Edition remaster.

Mattel media franchise centered on He-Man and the defense of Eternia against Skeletor. Video games span Mattel Electronics’ 1983 Power of He-Man through 1980s computer tie-ins, early-2000s console and GBA titles, and later mobile games.

Activision BMX games licensed from Mat Hoffman. The Xbox sequel adds London and the rider Chad Kagy.

Neo-noir third-person shooter series from Remedy Entertainment and later Rockstar. Max Payne is a New York detective turned vigilante after his family is murdered.

Xbox BattleMech shooters from Day 1 Studios and Microsoft. The first game is a campaign of destructible cities with Xbox Live voice chat.

First-person shooter series created by Steven Spielberg. DreamWorks Interactive made the 1999 PlayStation original, published by Electronic Arts.

Capcom video game franchise, known as Rockman in Japan. It began on the NES in 1987 and includes the Classic, X, Zero, ZX, Legends, Battle Network, and Star Force lines.

Pandemic open-world action series. Playground of Destruction sends three mercenaries into a fictional North Korean conflict for a bounty on General Song.

Konami stealth action series created by Hideo Kojima. It began with Metal Gear on MSX in 1987; players typically hunt a bipedal nuclear tank as Solid Snake.

Konami stealth action series created by Hideo Kojima. Players typically control a special-forces operative, often Solid Snake, hunting the bipedal nuclear tank Metal Gear.

SNK run-and-gun series. Metal Slug 4, developed by Mega Enterprise and Noise Factory, sends soldiers against the Amadeus organization and its computer virus.

Post-apocalyptic novels and games that began with Dmitry Glukhovsky's Metro 2033. Ukrainian studio 4A Games adapted the books as Metro 2033, Metro: Last Light, and Metro Exodus, with Redux remasters and next-gen Enhanced/Complete Editions continuing the Spartan Rangers' story from the Moscow Metro to Russia's surface wilderness.

Nintendo action-adventure series in which the bounty hunter Samus Aran fights the Space Pirates. The games are side-scrolling or first-person, and the early entries helped define the Metroidvania style.