As gaming becomes an older medium, many newer titles take direct inspiration from and serve as unofficial successors to older games or IPs; which of these do you feel best recapture the spark that made their muse so great?

Many people will appreciate seeing this thread, thanks for starting it up, Curl.

Tempest Rising perfectly modernizes the Command & Conquer formula. Probably my favorite spiritual successor yet!

The Last Story & Lost Odyssey capture what people loved about Final Fantasy in the 90s on 7th gen consoles. FF series has never been the same since Sakaguchi left. These two games recaptured the magic.

Not that DMC lost it but Bayonetta when it came out felt like a fresh spin on something familiar. Bayo has evolved fully into its own series, but the very first game is a better game than DMC4 which is still great. But Bayonetta, within the game, took shots at DMC4 and said we can do it better.

GRIP. It's a fun successor to the PS1 game Rollcage. When everyone made futuristic racing games, this put a nice spin on the gameplay. GRIP is rollcage without the name.

Horizon Chase Zero. It really captured the style and presentation of Top Gear on SNES/Genesis in 3D for modern systems.

Hot Shots Racing. If you miss SEGA Model 2 racing games and 90s arcade racers in general. This will bring you back to games like Daytona USA. Scud Race (tho that was Model 3) Virtua Racing and more.

Xenoblade. Gears/SAGA. What more do I need to say? 

Bomb Rush Cyberfunk. I waited 20 years for a sequel to Jet Set Radio Future. This is what I waited for and it was worth it. They nailed it in every way. The look. The vibe. The OST. The gameplay but even improved on it. It's everything I wanted.

Odin's Sphere. A spiritual successor to Princess Crown on the SEGA Saturn and they captured it. When they made Princess Crown they worked at Atlus before forming VanillaWare so they did not have the rights to it. 

On that note. Dragon's Crown was meant to be a spiritual successor to Capcom's Dungeons & Dragons Tower of Doom. Director of DC worked on those games when he worked at Capcom. It's a great game that captures the spirit with VW's own flair.

Nex Machina. A successor and love letter to Robotron 2084. Eugene Jarvis advised them. The game ends up being the best twin stick shooter I've ever played.

Resogun. An updated take on Defender, much more so than the mediocre PS2 3D game. Probably the best PS4 launch game. 

Prodeus. After the amazing Doom 2016, I wanted something that was similar but evolved. After the letdown that was Eternal, I played Prodeus. In many ways, Prodeus does feel like the proper sequel to Doom 2016 and is an amazing game.

Gunhound EX on PSP. This was a loveletter to the Assault Suit Series from Leynos to Valken (Cybernator). So much so, this game got the studio the gig to remake Assault Suit Leynos on PS4 and PC!.

Blue Dragon to Dragon Quest. Not as good as LO or TLS, but a really good RPG and using Toriama's art style again. They add some sci fi to I,t and you have Dragon Shadows (Personas kinda) but some of the same spirit is there and a great game.

The Book of Unwritten Tales is well to the spirit of early 90's Lucas adventures - with a straight up tribute to Monkey Island 2.

The Messenger captured the Ninja Gaiden spirit pretty well and added a few twists.
Continuing with Sabotage Studio, Sea of Stars is a worthy spiritual successor to the games that inspired it (Chrono Trigger, Mario RPG)
Bloodstained doesn't reach the heights of Symphony of the Night but it fits right in with all the Igavanias.

Shadow Complex did Metroid justice... and then some. What a great game it was.

Not Yooka Laylee, ill tell you that much.

I liked Eiyuden Chronicles and Bloodstained quite a lot. They were made by the same creators of Suikoden and Castlevania respectively. They do not reach the same highs that the OG franchises do obviously, and they are not without their flaws, but both are pretty solid good games that do recapture their essence imo.

I dunno if id consider Shovel Knight a "spiritual successor" of classic Megaman games, but it certainly captures that magic much better than the horrendous Mighty No 9 did.

Yooka Lyalee was decent but too flawed.  The 2D sequel The Impossible Lair was really good. 

I havent played that one, i should probably give it a try. I played the OG Yooka Laylee and I really didnt like it.