{"id":72359,"date":"2015-02-23T14:01:50","date_gmt":"2015-02-23T12:01:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/?p=72359"},"modified":"2015-02-23T14:03:38","modified_gmt":"2015-02-23T12:03:38","slug":"the-evolution-of-2015s-big-gaming-franchises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/features\/72359-the-evolution-of-2015s-big-gaming-franchises","title":{"rendered":"The evolution of 2015’s big gaming franchises"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some decade-old gaming franchises are going to be hitting it big this year, and it’s a thing of beauty to see their humble beginnings.<\/p>\n

PC gamers will finally get their hands on Grand Theft Auto V (releasing 24 March) – just under 20 years after the original’s release in 1997.<\/p>\n

Mortal Kombat, first launched in 1992, will see the tenth title in the series hitting shelves in April this year, and Tomb Raider, a gaming staple since 1996, will get its Xbox One exclusive period late 2015 with Rise of the Tomb Raider.<\/p>\n

The Metal Gear series will also see its latest masterpiece hit shelves in 2015, and, with 11 games in as many years, Call of Duty will undoubtedly get its annual go around November as well.<\/p>\n

Take a journey with us to see where these game series have come from and marvel at how technology has catapulted visuals over the past 20 years.<\/p>\n

In the timelines below we’ve excluded spin-off titles, sticking to the “main” releases of each series.<\/p>\n

Metal Gear: 1987 – 2015 (28 years)<\/h3>\n
\"Metal<\/a>

1987 – Metal Gear<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

1990 – Metal Gear 2 Solid Snake<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

1998 – Metal Gear Solid<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

2001 – Metal Gear Solid 2 Sons of Liberty<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

2004 – Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

2008 – Metal Gear Solid 4 Guns of the Patriots<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

2014 – Metal Gear Solid 5 Ground Zeroes<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Metal<\/a>

2015 – Metal Gear Solid The Phantom Pain<\/p><\/div>\n

Mortal Kombat: 1992 – 2015 (23 years)<\/h3>\n
\"Mortal<\/a>

1992 – Mortal Kombat<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

1993 – Mortal Kombat 2<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

1995 – Mortal Kombat 3<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

1997 – Mortal Kombat 4<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

2002 – Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

2004 – Mortal Kombat Deception<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

2006 – Mortal Kombat Armageddon<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

2008 – Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

2011 – Mortal Kombat 9<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Mortal<\/a>

2015 – Mortal Kombat X<\/p><\/div>\n

Tomb Raider: 1996 – 2015 (19 years)<\/h3>\n
\"Tomb<\/a>

1996 – Tomb Raider<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

1997 – Tomb Raider 2<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

1998 – Tomb Raider 3<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

1999 – Tomb Raider The Last Revelation<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

2000 – Tomb Raider Chronicles<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

2003 – Tomb Raider The Angel of Darkness<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

2006 – Tomb Raider Legend<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

2008 – Tomb Raider Underworld<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Tomb<\/a>

2012 – Tomb Raider<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Rise<\/a>

2015 – Rise of the Tomb Raider<\/p><\/div>\n

Grand Theft Auto: 1997 – 2015 (18 years)<\/h3>\n
\"Grand<\/a>

1997 – Grand Theft Auto<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

1999 – Grand Theft Auto London 1969<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

1999 – Grand Theft Auto 2<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

2001 – Grand Theft Auto 3<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

2002 – Grand Theft Auto Vice City<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

2004 – Grand Theft Auto San Andreas<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

2008 – Grand Theft Auto\u00a04<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grand<\/a>

2013, 2014 and 2015 – Grand Theft Auto 5<\/p><\/div>\n

Call of Duty: 2003 – 2015 (12 years)<\/h3>\n
\"Call<\/a>

2003 – Call of Duty<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2004 – Call of Duty Finest Hour (first console game)<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2005 – Call of Duty 2<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2006 – Call of Duty 3<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2007 – Call of Duty Modern Warfare<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2008 – Call of Duty World at War<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2009 – Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2010 – Call of Duty Black Ops<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2011 – Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2012 – Call of Duty Black Ops 2<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2013 – Call of Duty Ghosts<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Call<\/a>

2014 – Call of Duty\u00a0Advanced Warfare<\/p><\/div>\n

Even though Call of Duty is the youngest game on this list, the series has delivered\u00a0the most full titles. It’s kind of known for that.<\/p>\n

Progress in key series aspects is up for debate, but the graphical changes are definitely apparent.<\/p>\n

The next Call of Duty will be developed by Treyarch (the Black Ops and World at War line), and is expected to be revealed sometime in May.<\/p>\n

More gaming news<\/h3>\n

What is your gamer level?<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Every PS4 game coming out in 2015<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

What it\u2019s really like to play Evolve<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I was your age, we still gamed in a 4:3 aspect ratio<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":167,"featured_media":72463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[23,13307,625,21,5726,601,201],"class_list":["post-72359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","tag-call-of-duty","tag-evolution","tag-grand-theft-auto","tag-headline","tag-metal-gear","tag-mortal-kombat","tag-tomb-raider"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/167"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72359"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72529,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72359\/revisions\/72529"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}