Halo 1-3, both the single player story and the evolution of the multi-player.
Single Player on Heroic or below.
Came here to say exactly this. My favorite video game trilogy of all time, played through each campaign countless times and multiplayer on MCC from time to time. Never gets old.
Chronicles of Narnia
Also, not technically a trilogy, but the three seasons of Deadwood are pretty much perfect.
Narnia has seven installments though.
That’s what makes it such a perfect trilogy! (I don’t know what I was thinking, as I have the whole set on my shelf.)
Do they hold up? I read the series when I was probably still a single-digit age. I’m wondering if they’re worth re-reading as an adult.
First 3 Fatal Frames.
And Portal. Even if there’s only two, they were great lol
First 3 Fatal Frames
My man! Some of the best horror content ever created! Best part is nowadays there’s efforts going on to reverse engineer them!
There are some good emulators/roms for the PS2 version!
I would love for them to get the remake treatment, but I doubt they’ll do that lol
Portal Revolution to me is the third game. Not the best, but considering it’s free it fits as a way to complete the series.
croissant, butter, jam.
Croissant, egg, and cheese, too
I have no complaints about the Deptford trilogy
Whenever I think of the answer to this question, I always lament at how many film trilogies or games could have been absolutely immaculate duologies but were, for various reasons, sort of forced into a third installment through fan expectations, studio pressure, or just plain Hollywood/corporate greed.
It usually begins with a film or a video game that is an unexpected success, something that was written off by the execs that turned out to be not just a work of art, but a pop culture sensation. Star Wars, The Matrix, The Terminator, Assassin’s Creed, Mass Effect, etc were probably never intended to have a sequel. Their original plotlines all tied up the loose ends nicely and made for a perfectly adequate self-contained story. Then the second film/game in the series comes out and it’s another well received installment. Maybe it’s because the second rides a bit on the coattails of the first, or maybe because the first walked so the second could run, it’s hard to say, but in every case the second always sets the bar too high. The third installment is typically the one that sours the soup, so to speak. I’d wager that even a really well written story can’t really live up to the expectations that fans have for the third installment of a well-beloved series. Having the perfect three-peat is a feat rarely seen accomplished, but nobody ever seems satisfied with just two good pieces of media with no plans for a third.
The Matrix is actually an interesting thing if I recall correctly.
The Wachowskis really wanted to tell a huge story, they had so many ideas and multiple sequels across many mediums.
They had funding issues, or there was little confidence the film would be a success, so the very ending of the first Matrix is just sorta tacked on.
Neo in the phone booth telling the machines he’s about to change everything as he just flys away, completely breaking their reality. It’s a “and they all lived happily ever after” ending.
Of course The Matrix was then hugely successful.
So now the Wachowskis get to tell the story they intend, hell they get to do pretty much whatever they want.
As a result Neo is weirdly much less of a badass (but still badass) as he sort of finds himself during the events of Matrix Reloaded.
But if course I bring this all up because the Wachowskis did get to make all the things they wanted. Reloaded & Revolutions were at least part of the story. The Animatrix and other shorts, part of the story. The multimedia continuation of the story where you could jump into a video game to see part of the story, or into a an MMO and live in the Matrix.
The Matrix was always envisioned as this huge thing. It just turned out that having the idea and executing on that idea is hard. The films didn’t quite live up to expectations (still good mind you, but a step down). Part of the films “missing” with the idea that it would be something you can experience in a video game. The story continuing on in an MMO that took a while to launch and then had major issues.
Which is all to say sometimes even with good intentions and ideas, it’s just difficult to get an idea perfectly onto screen.
SOAD albums Mezmerize and Hypnotize.
Not all their best songs on those two albums, and some of them kind of sucked tbh.
However. How the fuck ever.
Listen to the entire pair, all the way through, in order, longhand. I don’t care, just do it.
When you get to the last track, Soldier side, it pulls together all the themes that have been foreshadowed and hinted at across two entire albums, and oh holy fucking shit. When it breaks, your jaw will drop.
SOAD had two great albums, and they most certainly were not Mezermize/Hypnotize. And Steal This Album wasn’t even a real album.
like I say, they definitely weren’t their best songs. But the way they slowly lead up to Soldier Side was fucking genius.
That’s… not 3?
Trilogy started out meaning three works, but in common usage it generally doesn’t any more.
I respect you for this incredibly outlandish take. I will start saying a few but only meaning two. A couple? Could be anything. Several will now be seven only.
Who are you and what did you do to the real TheBananaKing?
Pretty sure I’ve been the only thebananaking since like 2009…
We got one of them counters here
I’m OCD like that xd
Order the 6 piece mozzerella sticks. You get 2 mozzerella sticks as a trilogy!
Mmmmmmmm, the perfect trilogy!
Lord of the rings (Peter Jacksons first run of the series not that shitty hobbit shit) movies extended edition of course. Halo 1-3. Mass effect 1-3.
I second the halo series.
For a brick, he flew pretty good
Mass Effect 3 forum flashbacks
Half Life.
…
…
…
…aaaaaaaany day now.
I mean Half Life 2 itself could be considered a trilogy
I haven’t played it, but doesn’t Half Life: Alyx effectively qualify?
It kind of falls out of there, being released out of order, and being VR-exclusive.
I‘d say Portal, but I guess we’re in the same boat.
You could say Portal Revolution is the third game (it’s free direct from Steam, and while not wildly unique it will still have you scratch your noodle until you realize how obvious it is).
So I vote Portal in that case.
See also portal reloaded for new portal concept in time (like that one level from titanfall 2)
I thought you guys were meming with reloaded and revolution playing off the matrix, but now it seems I have some gaming to do this week
It seems we are left for dead game series ):
as a functional trilogy the Back to the Future film series is pretty high up there.
Great Scott!
Also, apparently it has an animated cartoon series. Just learned about that the other day
Yeah it’s called Rick and Morty it’s great
Animated series plus you could consider the Telltale Games BttF the fourth movie, as it was written by Gale and has most of the cast. (MJF makes a cameo, Biff’s actor said his agent never contacted him)
Hard science fiction: Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson. What would terraforming Mars be like?
Video games: the three Castlevania games for Gameboy Advance, and the three for Nindendo DS. Not trilogies per se, but they came in threes :)
those books have been on my shelf forever. I should really pick them up after I finish this Expanse reread
Ah, I need to get ahold of The Expanse.The TV shows were good, but they seemed to end right when something interesting was going to happen…
the books are fucking exceptional.
all queued up, just 8 Expanse books to finish first
If you’re in your teens the original mass effect trilogy, from the storytelling to the going through the different genres of games
in your teens…
Are you saying you only enjoy mass effect in your teens, or only if you are a teenager then you would remember playing mass effect? Cause both of those are wrong.
Nah it just has a different impact when you’re still filled with wonder and not just jaded and conditioned to just fill checklists, the gameplay of the games isn’t that good it’s all about the world building and the branching paths in the stories
I disagree, but I appreciate your opinion.
Let me put it this way, when the games came out I would read every codex entry and mission description and do multiple playthroughs to see every possible scene, I have like 3k hours combined between the three games on record.
These days I just blast trough games and struggle to stop and listen to some audiolog
I understand what you are saying, I’m just saying I disagree. I think that’s a personal issue. I mean if you’ve played the games before and read it all sure, it’s gonna be harder to want to stop and smell the roses, and that’s fine, you enjoy it in a different way. But you can still make time to fall into a game the way you did before, just gotta try a little bit and you’ll be surprised at how easy it is to get drawn in the same way.
I’m in my 30s and when I play a new game I do that, I read all the little books in BG3, I visit all the extra hidden spots I can find in things like breath of the wild, and yeah I’ve played mass effect before, have a good chunk of it memorized, so I don’t play it the same way, but if I had never played it before I would play it the same way. Just got to take your time when you have it.
Maybe Im just tired of games in general, bg3 was the kind of game I wanted to inmerse myself in but I couldn’t be bothered to read about random lore, I just kept going through the motions doing multiple playthroughs with different classes, alignments and love interests but that’s as far as I was able to get into it.
Which to be fair is still very deep but it’s not the same process of discovery it was when I was a kid anymore
That’s fair, maybe you need a break, or even just playing another kind of game for a little while, give your mind a reset. I go through stages where I’ll play one kinda game for a while, and then switch to another, sometimes you just gotta switch it up a bit. Don’t force yourself when you aren’t in the mood.
Double Dragon.
Yeah, if we’re talking NES games, Mega Man 1-3, Ninja Gaiden 1-3 and Castlevania 1-3 all belong on this list
Star Trek II, III, IV
