Are classic franchises becoming too bland?

With the recent releases of Front mission Evolved, and Castlevania Lords of Shadow, it makes me think about what these franchises are becoming. It makes me think that the older games of some franchise are becoming stale, so they decide to hand them off to a 3rd party developer. Now this is not a bad way to come up with some creative and fresh ideas to make the game appeal much more to a broader audience, but in the end it may destroy the interest of older fans.