Game Franchises, Ranked

The best-selling video game franchise of all time (over 830 million units across the Super Mario series), and Super Mario Odyssey scored 97 on Metacritic alongside Galaxy's 97 — commercial dominance plus elite critical scores.

Ocarina of Time holds a 99 on Metacritic (the highest-rated game ever) and Breath of the Wild scored 97 and won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2017 — one of the most critically decorated franchises in the medium.

The highest-grossing media franchise of all time (estimated $90B+ across all media) with roughly 480 million games sold, making it the top-grossing entertainment property on Earth.

One of the best-selling franchises ever at over 500 million units and the most-ported video game in history, released on more than 65 platforms.

The Witcher 3 is one of the most acclaimed RPGs ever made, with dense writing and world-building, and it spun off a hit Netflix series that pushed the franchise mainstream.

GTA V alone has sold over 210 million copies (among the best-selling games ever) and GTA IV scored 98 with GTA V at 97 on Metacritic — elite sales and scores, held from S only by its slow release cadence.

The best-selling single video game of all time at over 300 million copies, though as a franchise it leans on one titan rather than a deep catalog.

Skyrim scored 94 on Metacritic and has sold 60M+ copies across a decade of re-releases, cementing the series as one of the most acclaimed open-world RPG franchises.

Defined console shooters for a generation and made Xbox a viable platform; Combat Evolved and Halo 2/3 are landmark titles with a massive cultural footprint, though later entries cooled the franchise's momentum.

The foundational fighting-game franchise; Street Fighter II built the modern arcade fighter and the series still anchors the competitive FGC decades later.

Created and codified the 'Soulslike' genre, reshaping action-RPG design industry-wide with its punishing combat and interconnected worlds; enormous influence outsized to its sales.

Pioneered survival horror and remains its flagship franchise, evolving successfully from fixed-camera scares to modern remakes and RE7's first-person reinvention.

One of the best-selling franchises ever (over 425 million units) but critical consensus has cooled — recent annual entries often land in the 70s on Metacritic amid franchise-fatigue reviews.

Over 190 million units sold with beloved peaks like FFVII and FFVI, but the series is famously inconsistent — FFXIV launched so broken in 2010 it was shut down and rebuilt as A Realm Reborn.

A perennial global best-seller (over 325M units) that tops charts every year, yet review scores have slid into the low-to-mid 70s amid criticism of Ultimate Team monetization.

A beloved, long-running Nintendo platformer known for approachable design and the iconic copy-ability mechanic; consistently charming but rarely genre-defining.

Over 200 million copies sold, but the series is the poster child for open-world formula fatigue and shipped the notoriously buggy Assassin's Creed Unity in 2014.

An iconic mascot brand with 140M+ units sold, but wildly inconsistent in quality — Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) scored a dismal 46 on Metacritic and became a byword for a broken game.

A spin-off franchise so broken that Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric scored 32 on Metacritic and its infamous 'knuckles infinite jump' glitch became a viral punchline.

Superman 64 is routinely ranked among the worst games ever made, infamous for its ring-flying gameplay, and helped bury Titus Interactive's superhero line as a cautionary tale.