Playing through a whole game series

How many of you have to play thought a complete game series to know you have completed it all? I definitely do.

So often I discover a series after at least a couple of sequels, buying into the 3rd or 4th game, and then wondering how it developed and evolved, so then having to go back and find copies of the older games in the series to play.

The biggest genre for this is definitely RPGs. And a good example in the west has to be the Final Fantasy series, with FFVII being the first most people in Europe especially will have seen. And being the 7th game in the series this instantly got a lot of people asking about the previous 6 games and what they were like.

So do you have to complete a whole series of games?
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Some games I'll try the whole series or at least the games i can get hold of like Zelda or the Goldbox series for the Miggy.
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I play the games in no particular order, as often there are already more sequels and I didn't play the previous ones yet. I'm soon gonna play MGS4 but did not finish any of the previous ones. The only series I finished was Xenosaga 1-3, in the correct order. But I guess that was because I began playing the first episode immediately when it was released, and I enjoyed it a lot.
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There are obviously some series that do need to really be played in order. Xenosaga is a very good example of this. As is .hack
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Originally Posted by Demon Cleaner:
I play the games in no particular order, as often there are already more sequels and I didn't play the previous ones yet. I'm soon gonna play MGS4 but did not finish any of the previous ones. The only series I finished was Xenosaga 1-3, in the correct order. But I guess that was because I began playing the first episode immediately when it was released, and I enjoyed it a lot.

Ahh ... too bad you didn't finish the other Metal Gears (didn't finish MGS3 myself). I'd recommend at least playing through Metal Gear Solid 1 (or view a compilation video of the cutscenes). MGS4 will have much more emotional impact that way.

As for the question, I guess I will play through a whole series if the stories are interconnected, if I liked the first game AND if any follow-ups aren't blatant cash-ins, (sloppily) designed only to make a quick buck.

I've considered playing through earlier episodes of a game after finishing a sequel (Shadow Hearts: Covenant), simply because the sequel was so good.
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Originally Posted by Demon Cleaner:
I play the games in no particular order, as often there are already more sequels and I didn't play the previous ones yet. I'm soon gonna play MGS4 but did not finish any of the previous ones. The only series I finished was Xenosaga 1-3, in the correct order. But I guess that was because I began playing the first episode immediately when it was released, and I enjoyed it a lot.

WHAT! U haven't played the others? SHAME!

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Originally Posted by Submeg:

Originally Posted by Demon Cleaner:
I play the games in no particular order, as often there are already more sequels and I didn't play the previous ones yet. I'm soon gonna play MGS4 but did not finish any of the previous ones. The only series I finished was Xenosaga 1-3, in the correct order. But I guess that was because I began playing the first episode immediately when it was released, and I enjoyed it a lot.
WHAT! U haven't played the others? SHAME!

I know, I know. But with so many games to play and no time, it's rather difficult to play everything. And as I'm almost playing RPGs all the time, the other ones come a bit short.
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Yea fair enough, I know what you mean
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There are definitely too many great games being released to ever be able to play them all. And at the moment there are a large number of really good ones just released making it very hard to choose what to play.

However, regarding MGS. You really should set aside some time to play the first PSX game as in my opinion it was the best one.
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Ahum, what about Metal Gear 2 Solid Snake then?
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