Because everything is taking elements from them. The moment certain RPG elements were successfully implemented in genres they didn't it was all downhill from there. I remember years ago when it took 4 hours to unlock the move arsenal in Mirrors Edge Catalyst that were literally available to you the moment you touched a controller in the original.
“Mirror’s Edge Metroidvania” probably sounded incredible in the pitch meeting(and to be honest it still does). Then they just made bad decision after bad decision after bad decision. Mirror’s Edge Catalyst’s issue is much larger than this thread’s topic and might even be unrelated to it when I think further on it.
1) Locking basic parkour moves up, instead of creating new tech for Faith to use to enhance the already-good parkour from the first game and make it flow even better. Simple idea that everyone on the team didn’t think of.
2) Making the level design constantly fight the player and present roadblocks, instead of enhancing the flow of parkour and letting you sequence break if you were good enough. Travesty what we ended up with.
3) Not making the combat more engaging and instead it ends up slightly less frustrating than the first game. You’d think the weakest point of the first game would be the first thing to be critically looked at. Or, better yet, make it less about combat and more about the level itself being the challenge, like old Tomb Raider games.
4) The story somehow being less impactful that the original, even though the set pieces were more bombastic. It felt like one of the worst Milla Jojovich Resident Evil movies (The second one with Jill) where you eventually stop caring about every single character halfway through and your eyes start to glaze over at the explosions and chases.
ME: Catalyst is one of my most disappointing sequels(or reboot, whatever) of all time, because it’s just such middle of the road nothing burger of a game. It shouldn’t even get the honor of being mentioned in this thread because the other games people are listing actually evoke some feelings within people, whether like or hate. Some are even torn on certain titles mentioned due to that.
ME: Catalyst just makes a person feel apathetic instead. And that’s sad.