Three Popular Gaming Franchises I'll (Probably) Never Play

Never say never, probably.

We all have ‘em. Blind spots, some say. Glaring errors, others jeer. “What’s your problem? You’ve never played ­­­­­_______? How can you call yourself a gamer?”

That’s right. I don’t play the biggest games in the world. GTA Online, Minecraft, Roblox, Fortnite, any number of popular mobile garbage, games that make billions of dollars regularly with millions of people playing online as I type this. I could care less.

There’s no “probably” with the aforementioned games. I’m never playing them. They don’t interest me. If I had a son or daughter and they were into any of those titles, I’d be overjoyed to either join them or watch them play, to share in their delight. Well, except GTA Online. They are so grounded if I catch them playing that.

The following gaming franchises are ones I’ve considered playing over the years. Franchises that due to their popularity, their good-to-excellent review scores, and their overall subject matter, have at least piqued my interest once or twice. These franchises are established over years, if not decades, and are all considered to be consistently high quality. And yet, here we are. For all the time I’ve sunk into video games, I’ve never trodden down these well-worn paths.

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CALL OF DUTY

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The very first Call of Duty was a World War II shooter established in 2003 and was originally PC only, if you can believe that. The game sold well enough, so sequels soon followed. But the one that gamers the world ‘round lost their mind over, the one that started the Call of Duty onslaught as we know it, was Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare for Xbox 360 (it was on the PS3 also, but the series made its name on Xbox Live).

As of 2024, the series has 20 mainline games, with the 21^st to be released this November, along with plenty of spin-offs, free-to-play titles, and mobile games.

I have never played a single Call of Duty game. Not that I’ve been actively avoiding them, mind you. Back when the first Black Ops released in 2010, I enjoyed watching my friends Jacob and Brandon play online. From the looks of it, they’re tense, engaging shooters with a rewarding gameplay loop that makes you want to play “just one more match.” Then before you know it, it’s 3:00 am and your eyes are sore, but your ranking’s gone up a couple notches. Brush the dirt off your shoulder, champ, you’ve earned it.

Yeah brother, I get the appeal of Call of Duty. I just can’t see myself putting dozens or hundreds of hours into it, when I could be playing other games that appeal more to my strange sensibilities. Games like We Love Katamari: REROLL + Royal Reverie (actual title), where you roll up the world and everything in it.

Also, from what I understand, the last few Call of Duty entries have been marred by obnoxious microtransactions and even loot boxes. Sounds like something an already enormous gaming company would do to squeeze a few more dollars out of their loyal customer base.

I’ve considered making a video where I play every Call of Duty game ever released and report my findings, but 1) that sounds like a lot of work for, potentially, not much reward; and 2) what if I find that I don’t enjoy playing them, but I’ve already committed hundreds of dollars to buying the games? I’d feel obligated to finish, which would either taint the whole process or result in some sort of Stockholm Syndrome where I fall in love with the series and am unable to play anything else. I’d rather not take that chance.

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ASSASSIN’S CREED

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Assassin’s Creed has history! Lots of shady Knights Templar wheeling and dealing, and unique locales/time periods to explore like ancient Egypt, Greece, and America circa the Revolution. The only problem is (for me anyway) you play an assassin.

As an assassin, you have to kill people. But not just kill people, like shoot them from afar and call it a game, like in Call of Duty. Pretty much every game in existence (save, perhaps, for sports titles) involves killing something, whether it be Goomba, Cacodemon, or a nameless terrorist. In Assassin’s Creed, the goal is to be stealthy about your kills. Slit your victim’s throats, shove a knife in their jugular, then just walk away like nothing happened in your fancy killin’ cloak. All the pretty pyramids and Parthenons in the world can’t convince me that I won’t feel gross after performing those tasks time and time again.

Perhaps my reasoning sounds strange to you. As I mentioned previously, games are historically violent. Sure, they’ve become more so over the last two decades, but it’s not like you’re not killing people in retro games like Contra or Rush’N Attack. Or beating people to a bloody pulp in Streets of Rage and Street Fighter II.

The difference in Assassin’s Creed, for me, is the intimacy of the attack involved. Plunging a knife into a virtual someone’s throat, even if that someone is just a series of 1s and 0s, just feels wrong to me, whereas shooting that same series of 1s and 0s with a gun from afar feels slightly less horrible. I know it’s contradictory. Both are violent, unreasonably so, and yet, one makes me cringe much more than the other.

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POKÉMON

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My white whale.

Pokémon, above all other series, is one I’d love to get into. Cute monster animals are great. Collecting said monsters and leveling them up also sounds appealing. The mainline series are all turn-based RPGs, one of my favorite genres. What’s not to appreciate?

More so than Call of Duty and Assassin’s Creed, I know I’m the odd one out with Pokémon. The franchise has sold more than 480 million units worldwide, compared to CoD’s 425 million and Assassin’s Creed’s paltry 200 million. Pokemon’s beloved by generations, young and old alike. My 11-year-old nephew loves the series. So do a couple of my friends in their late 30s. What’s my problem?

I bore witness to the Pokémon phenomenon as it emerged in the late 90s, but Red and Blue, the original gamechangers, passed me by. By the time I was interested in giving the franchise a shot during the Game Boy Advance era, it already felt too late. I attempted to play either Ruby or FireRed on my friend’s GBA one lazy afternoon, but for one reason or another, I got about five minutes in before I turned it off, wholly uninterested.

From what I understand as well, the mainline games are largely all the same. Find Pokémon, train them, fight them against other trainers, level them up, get more Pokémon, repeat. If you love this formula, then you love Pokémon and fair enough.

But am I the only one who feels like there should be something more to these games? Or is repetition the point? To be bombarded by cute monsters that you can make stronger over and over, until you’ve become the One Trainer to Collect Them All… Sounds like a fraction of a game, not something you base an entire franchise around.

But hey, what do I know? I’ve never sold 450 million of anything, let alone created a successful franchise that spans multiple generations and decades.

I just know what I like, I know what I’m drawn to. The older I get, the less time I have for games, the more selective I am.

If I did start playing Pokemon, where would I begin? All the way back with the original Game Boy iterations of Red and Blue? The DS or 3DS era? There’s a weight and history with these games that’s intimidating.

Who knows, maybe in the year 2065, I’ll fire up Pokemon Quetzalcoatl and Teotihuacan for my Nintendo Swizzle and be saddened that it took me until I was 80 years old to fully appreciate this long-running franchise. Maybe… but probably not.

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What are some gaming franchises that you’ve never played before? I’d love to read your thoughts in the comments below!