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Licensed games that had actual effort put into them

You know those games that cash in on a popular license and they just end up being mediocre? Let's talk about the licensed games that actual effort put into them.

I'll go with the obvious arkham series (disregarding the pc version of arkham knight for obvious reasons.) Also the High Moon Transformer games were cool too. And one last one from long ago...Spongebob Squarepants: Battle for Bikini Bottom. This game had good gameplay, the humor was there and it had some pretty decent music for the bosses as well. It was just plain fun.
 
Goldeneye 007. Still one of my favourite FPS games.
Astro Boy: Omega Factor. One the best Treasure games.
Ducktales/ Ducktales 2 on the Nes were great platformers.
Aladdin (Mega Drive version) was another fantastic platformer.
Dungeons & Dragons Shadow over Mystara/Tower of Doom were fantastic scrolling beat'em'ups
I put ungodly amounts of money into X-Men: Children of the Atom, and the sequels - Marvel Super Heroes, Street Fighter vs X-Men & the Marvel Vs Capcom games - were also great.
WWE: No Mercy was a superbly designed wrestling game, as were AKI's WCW & Ultimate Muscle games.
The NES TMNT Arcade Game, as well as the Hyperstone Heist & Turtles in Time were all fun scrolling beat'em'ups.
Discworld Noir and Sam & Max hit the road all gelled wonderfully with their original licenses as well as being great point & clicks. The Noir setting of DN was incredible (The earlier discworld games were just as funny but had more obtuse puzzles, especially the first one).
I also rather liked monsters in my pocket on the NES. Not a classic, but love was put into that game,and double jumping was super fun.

I won't talk about indy/star wars, as those weren't "Licensed" per se. Indy : FATE is the best point & click ever though
 
X-Men Origins Wolverine (PS3 and 360 versions)
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
Basically, whenever Raven Software did something with Marvel. Damn it Activision, get them out of the CoD Camp.
 
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The Lord of the rings: battle for middle earth 1 and 2 were GREAT RTS games!
 
I guess most of Telltale's stuff lately would apply too.

Tales from the Borderlands, Wolf Among Us (Fables), Walking Dead are all pretty great.

Game of Thrones is fairly mediocre so far though.
 
X-men Origins: Wolverine, it was such a fun game and for once you actually felt like you was wolverine. I still remember fighting classic Wolverine to get his skin.
 
8- and 16-bit eras had quite a lot of these. In particular, a lot of the Disney games by Sega and Capcom were excellent. To name a specific one, Quackshot was great.
 
Blade Runner, best licensed game ever made.

Dbz budokai 3.

Aladdin.

I kinda like the ps360 pirates of the carribean. Was semi legit.
 
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Not just a licensed game, but a licensed game based on an upcoming movie. My friends and I had a lot of fun with this back when it came out.
 
I agree with a lot of what has already been mentioned but I'll add that some of the more recent Spider-Man games (Web of Shadows & Shattered Dimensions for PS3 & DS) and The Simpsons Game on PS3 & DS really impressed me!
 
Being a horror fan, I'll mention the Blair Witch games.

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They were made by the people who made NOCTURNE/Blood Rayne, and were better than the movie, if you ask me. Actually very solid games.
 
The Bourne Conspiracy and anything else High Moon have worked on.

The Simpsons Hit & Run and Treyarch's Spiderman 2 (not that shitty PC version).
 
Oh, another one. Chicken Run for the PS1. For a kid-friendly movie tie-in stealth game it's surprisingly fun and has the charm to it that you'd expect.
 
Chronicles of Riddick
marvel UA 1 and 2
X-men legends 1 and 2
spiderman 2, ultimate spiderman and shattered dimensions were all solid
the darkness 1 and 2
deadpool was pretty good
marvel vs Capcom games
shadow of Mordor
arkham series
 
Is that technically a licensed franchise? Aren't licensed games made when a publisher acquires a license for an IP to make games from and then gives it to a developer?

In Arkhams case, WB owns Batman/DC, WB owns Rocksteady/WB Montreal. Where is the license?

To be fair, Arkham Aslyum would apply. WB didn't purchase them until after that game released.
 
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