Gaming World Forums
General Category => Entertainment and Media => Topic started by: Supra Mairo on May 08, 2008, 10:42:06 pm
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So the other day I was reminiscing how once long ago I bought two really well-received games based almost solely on what other people thought about them. I bought We <3 Katamari and it was one of the best games I've bought for the PS2 and as such a very good purchase. I bought it because I had heard great things about it and with some further inspection it seemed like just my type o' game with them crazy looks and crazy gameplay.
Then there was this other much praised game that everyone just raves about and whenever someone mentions it everyone seems to think its the best game ever. I'm talking about Ico for the PS2. Now, I bought this game upon its rerelease in 2006 or whatever for 20 euros after reading some reviews that just seemed to praise it as the best PS2 game yet but I might've aswell shoved the 20 euros up my ass instead.
At first when you start playing it you prolly think oh my this is the most beautiful game i've seen really awesome!!! and it is for the first 2 minutes i guess but then it just starts a downward spiral that never seems to end. Where should I start? Well lets start from the beginning of the game.
It's all great up until the point Yorda or whatever opens the first set of doors. After that there are approx. a total of 5 new gameplay features that are presented to you at regular intervals like pushing blocks, picking up shit, torches and bombs. Then it stops introducing anything new and thats basically it. You push blocks over and over, then climb a rope, turn a switch, kill some shadows, back to the block pushing, yell at yorda to get her ass over there and after less than hour of this the game is already over. I recall beating this in about 1:30 on my first playthrough and then being all WAIT!! THATS IT?!? I made another playthrough just to see if I could beat it in less than an hour and I did but I recall beating it in 50 minutes, but theres a speedrun that is 52 minutes so I'm prolly confusing the 50 minutes with my Zone of the Enders playthrough, another fucking disappointment although not nearly as hyped as Ico (PS I'm pulling those playthrough times out of my ass but it was something like that, honest).
So if I would have to sum up all that I think is wrong with ico it would be like this:
Its a game that has really limited and repetitive gameplay, the game is not really hard but the camera really seems to hate the player when it comes to precise jumps (especially the prison cells near the end of the game), the enemies are limited to 3 or 4 different types of shadows that dont really put up a fight +the camera, all the puzzles are either pushing blocks around or turning switches which is just boring, and you can divide the gameply into pushing blocks and killing the shadows. There is total of 1 boss in the entire game if you dont count the army of shadows that cant even kill you near the end, and besides the boss tune and the savepoint tune there is no music at all, theres hardly one page worth of dialogue and I can't really say that I liked anything else about this game except the beautiful environment.
So I really dont get why this game gets some much praise from EVERYONE. I will admit that its the best looking game for the ps2 I've ever seen but it certainly isn't the best GAME for the ps2, not even close. Bashing Ico out of all the games I could've bashed might piss some people off, yes, but come on now, it really isn't all that good.
But what about you, what games have you bought based on excellent reviews only to discover that its just garbage all around?
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Fumito Ueda takes a minimalist approach to his game design (he also produced Shadow of the Collossus). Basically, if a feature is unnecessary then it gets cut. Ico is exactly what it is; a run and jump adventure game with lots of puzzles. It doesn't try to encorporate a pretentious storyline with long cinemas or multiple different gameplay styles; it's just you, Yorda, and the goal to escape the castle.
In my opinion (because I'm sure a lot of people had different reactions to Ico considering the game only sold about 75,000 copies before Shadow got uber popular and everyone started masturbating to it), the simplicity of Ico is its biggest appeal. The puzzles basically boiled down to pushing blocks and swinging on chains but they are were all encorporated into the overall design of the castle which was pretty awesome. You could see every part of the castle depending on your location and for a 2001 game it was pretty awesome running above a ledge, looking down and going "holy shit i just came from there." Adding in that there was no music or cinematics interrupting your progress at every turn, the game had a very "natural" feel. I felt immersed in the game's atmosphere more than any other game to date which was pretty phenomenal for a turn of the century release.
I have yet to play a game where the majority loves but I really hate. There's solid criticism for pretty much every game but I guess I can put down Final Fantasy 12 because that game seriously bored the fuck out of me. There's this one point in the game where you go without advancing the story for like... 20 hours straight.
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That would be Bioshock for me. One of the most hyped games in recent years that just fell flat on it's face. First time I played it on my friend's system, I loved the graphics, but couldn't stand the choppy framerate. I didn't get far past finding the wrench till I gave up from being disgusted by the framerate. While dicking around on my 360 online, I found the demo and proceeded to download it and play it. Playing less than I did before, it looked beautiful in HD, and the framerate was smooth as hell, but I just couldn't in my right mind play an FPS on console with a controller. Fast forward to me getting my first 8800 and getting Bioshock from my friend to finally try it out for myself. The graphics still amazed me, but finally seeing the gameplay, I was thoroughly disappointed. What was explained in several instances to me as a "FPS RPG" and a "spiritual successor to System Shock 2", became nothing more than a revamp of just about any other FPS I played. Gameplay was flat, upgrades were few, with very little customization, and the whole infinite respawn deal took the whole thrill out of trying to avoid death. Graphics were great, but that's the unreal 3 engine for you. Story seemed alright, but I hear even that starts to peter out about halfway in. I'll never know cause I'll never get that far.
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FF7 - Terrible writing, and one of my least favourite FF's, yet there it is with like 5 sequel/prequels. The only saving grace is the materia system. Too bad battling is so god damn easy that it makes this point moot. The sequels/prequels further my distaste. They all kind of went in a weird direction, making FF7 sound like it was this amazing game, when if you go back to it now that you've played Crisis Core or seen Advent Children; it'll be a major downer from whatever style they polished the series with.
Halo (any #) - It's a story-based Quakefest. Each game the story got gayer and gayer, the weapons got nerfed and nerfed, and now it's like this horrible series. The multiplayer is the worst, man. Had more fun with Red Faction 1, for Christ sakes.
Halo 1 managed to keep me interested enough to play storymode, so I'll sidle away from that topic.
Gears of War - I... I really don't see what anyone sees in this. Seriously the worst shooter I've ever played.
Yeah, that's about all. I mean, there's some others, but usually games slide with me. The above however, well, piss me off that they're popular frankly.
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I'm sharing the same opinion as ABM, ICO was seriously nice to play, and the puzzle aspects just boggled my mind as to "shit now what?" and I admit I did all kinds of crazy things (like falling from the ceiling "HES GONNA MAKE IT!")
The only most annoying part ever was that bit where you had to time your jump on top of that pump thing that jetted you upwards.
FF7 - Terrible writing,
ahahahaha *wipes tear*
and what are you? Some kind of writing/literature scholar?
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That would be the new smash bros game for me.. I mean I know its totally fun but I was expecting tons of new characters... but to me it just seems like they added a couple new ones...changed a few movesets..added a couple of powerups.. but I was expecting a minumun of a 60 character rooster...
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let's see for me...
Assassins Creed: A lot of magazines, websites, and people were claiming this game to be so amazing and innovative blah blah blah. well, when I bought the PC release of the game, I was insanely disappointed; the gameplay was really repetitive, HEY GO KILL THIS BAD GUY AND THEN COME SEE ME, KILL THE GUARDS ATTACKING CITIZENS, FIND ALL THE POINTS, BLAH BLAH BORING. I can't believe I actually played through this piece of shit. I guess I can give the story some credit, it was pretty neat, but still the gameplay ajdfsdaflksdjfsajf. also, the graphics really blew me away! (not like crysis, but still this game has amazing graphics.)
TESIV: Oblivion: I really was not impressed by this game, I don't know how it won game of the year 2007 from so many places. Maybe I'm not intelligent enough to play it's type of game, or something. Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind was awesome, don't get me wrong, I spent probably over 300 hours trying to get everything on it (don't have xbox anymore :((), but I just kind of couldn't stand this one.
On another note, I really enjoyed Bioshock, sure it didn't live up to its hype, but it was a really great game. The idea was good, but they didn't implement it as well as they could have I guess.
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Crysis - I bought it and it doesn't really do anything for me. It runs great on the High setting and looks beautiful (especially the Icey alien cavern and the no gravity alien place), but people were saying that it was the best FPS ever and that it reinvented the genre, but honestly it didn't. Way overrated. I think the people who hyped it barely played the game, or just saw screenshots and saw how beautiful the graphics were without experiencing the gameplay or story, honestly.
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I'm sharing the same opinion as ABM, ICO was seriously nice to play, and the puzzle aspects just boggled my mind as to "shit now what?" and I admit I did all kinds of crazy things (like falling from the ceiling "HES GONNA MAKE IT!")
The only most annoying part ever was that bit where you had to time your jump on top of that pump thing that jetted you upwards.
ahahahaha *wipes tear*
and what are you? Some kind of writing/literature scholar?
ahahaha *wipes tear*
what are you some kind of 7 year old with absolutely no concept of taste or standards? i love how every post you make about this shit shows how completely oblivious you are to why people say this, like you're totally unable to grasp the fact that the writing isn't just bad if you compare it to literary sources, but bad if you aren't an idiot who thinks crisis core is good storytelling (hint: it's not and only dumb gamer manchildren think this)
also idk ff7 is pretty overrated, and so is assassin's creed because ff7 is subpar in a lot of ways and ac is actually a pretty bad game and both get a lot of credit! there's probably some more insightful ones i'm missing here like xenosaga or something but i can never think of these things when i try to.
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ahahahaha *wipes tear*
and what are you? Some kind of writing/literature scholar?
Ignoring the fact that you are indeed a fanboy, have you ever read Hundley's rants against Final Fantasy games? He's a writing/literature scholar!
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ahahaha *wipes tear*
what are you some kind of 7 year old with absolutely no concept of taste or standards? i love how every post you make about this shit shows how completely oblivious you are to why people say this, like you're totally unable to grasp the fact that the writing isn't just bad if you compare it to literary sources, but bad if you aren't an idiot who thinks crisis core is good storytelling (hint: it's not and only dumb gamer manchildren think this)
also idk ff7 is pretty overrated, and so is assassin's creed because ff7 is subpar in a lot of ways and ac is actually a pretty bad game and both get a lot of credit! there's probably some more insightful ones i'm missing here like xenosaga or something but i can never think of these things when i try to.
god dude you need to chill out.
Ignoring the fact that you are indeed a fanboy, have you ever read Hundley's rants against Final Fantasy games? He's a writing/literature scholar!
why yes I have ^^ he indeed has some very good points, though I read it a long time ago I believe.
edit:
maybe games get good ratings because they are given by professionals doing their jobs, and not random people that whine about it on the forums? idk
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Eh, whether FFVII is overrated or not is debatable but it was an amazing game for its time. It was one of the most influential RPGs ever and it pretty much redefined the genre.
Games I find overrated:
Pretty much any of the Halo games. I've tried to give them a shot, both single and multiplayer, but I just cannot seem to get into them. Multiplayer is pretty shit unless you're playing on a giant TV, but then again, that's true with many split screen games.
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I really don't get Majoras Mask at all. I know lots of people appreciate all the little details they crammed in, but all I see when I play it is a shorter, easier and more annoying OoT with... some kind of syndrome.
Worst game purchase i've ever done based on other peoples opinions? Got told by several people that WarioWare for Wii is a great game and awesome if you have lots of people over. So thought i'd buy it, and then a few chums came over and got drunk, and one of them saw it and started playing it. What a piece of dull pointless nerdy fucking crap. One of my chums asked straight out, "is this supposed to be fun?". Changed it in the next day for Burnout Paradise first thing in the morning, which was a good idea because it gave me an hour to try to remember what happened the day before and why I woke up in my bed holding some goddamn cat. MEOW.
Also you're wrong about Ico but whatever.
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I like Final Fantasy 7. I don't really want to fight about it because everything bad people say about it is true but I have fun replaying it once in awhile. I think it's pretty solid as far as boring jRPGs go but holy crap the graphics are horrible.
Shadow of the Colossus and Resident Evil 4 were both these kinds of experiences for me. I had read the reviews and chatted with people etc and was expecting the best two games ever made! I thought that RE4 was okay and that SotC was terrible. In my opinion at the time, I had judged SotC as boring, cheesy, and I didn't think the boss fights were much fun at all past the first one. I had rented both and I think it may have been at the same time (RE4 on PS2 came out the same week as SotC I think?).
Later on though someone gave the Greatest Hits version of SotC for Christmas because he knew I am pretty hardcore into games and he was sort of into games and was under the impression that SotC was an ART GAME or something and thought I should play it. My girlfriend had told him I didn't have it so to him it was the best gift ever. I hid my disappointment when I opened it and thanked him and said it was a good pick because it was so well-regarded.
So anyway I played it out of courtesy when I got home and it actually clicked and I realized it was really amazing! I played it nonstop for a weekend and now consider it one of my favorite games.
The same thing happened with RE4 -- when it was ported to Wii I bought it because at the time I was buying every video game that came out (I was depressed for a few months and spent a lot of money =\ ). It might have been the new Wii controls or something but I was enthralled and now I consider RE4 to be one of my favorite games too.
I dunno I just think it's kind of cool that two of my favorite games I thought were garbage the first time I played them. I think sometimes that if you are in a bad mood or something you can not like a game even if it's really good?
I really don't get Majoras Mask at all. I know lots of people appreciate all the little details they crammed in, but all I see when I play it is a shorter, easier and more annoying OoT with... some kind of syndrome.
I actually haven't liked any of the 3D Zelda games which is kind of weird I guess. With Twilight Princess though it has nothing to do with the game but more that the controls make me want to amputate my hands (maybe I should play it again in a year because it will probably be my favorite game).
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Ignoring the fact that you are indeed a fanboy, have you ever read Hundley's rants against Final Fantasy games? He's a writing/literature scholar!
I didn't think Hundley thought that badly of 7 or 8.
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The most absolute CRAP I ever bought because people said "its amazing" was
Shin megami tensi 3 nocturne (or whatever)
Absolute crap, in every way. Except I think the music was good. Heavy metal type music.
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I think that when you hear a game is hyped and play it, then the experience goes down, more so than if you've never heard of the game before. Like if I hadn't heard of Crysis before and just saw it on the shelf and bought it, I'd say it's an ok game, but seeing and hearing people talking about it all the time gets the idea in my head that this game is mindblowingly good and makes it less enjoyable. If you get what I'm saying.
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I'm going to defend ICO here because it truly is one of the finest video game experiences that I have experienced. When I first say it in the discount bin in Walmart I took a look at the cover and dismissed it as a worthless game. Later when I got home and looked it up I was surprised to find it had gotten good reviews, so I went back and bought it.
As for gameplay, of course it is limited and can be considered dull to some people. That's not the charm of the game however - the whole atmosphere, tension, fear, excitement, sense of loneliness is what defines it and makes the game extremely memorable. When I played it I was amazed at the amount of character development that was portrayed in such a small amount of dialogue and storyline. I actually felt for these 2 characters. Right at the outset my sense of justice made me saddened at Ico's plight and Yorda constantly pulled on my heart strings. My heart beat would always increase when I was forced to separate from her - and the game would leave me stumped numerous times, forcing me to closely examine the surroundings and figure out a way to proceed further. Looking back now I don't remember the puzzles or swordswinging gameplay - it's the emotional experience that is long-lasting and ICO will thus forever stay fresh in my mind as one of the few games that was able to reach deep within me.
That may sound corny but seriously, that's how I feel about it.
I'm currently still playing through SotC, and while I like its atmosphere and boss puzzles, it doesn't affect me the same as ICO did. That emotional attachment is just not there. I'm sorry, but I don't really have any personal feelings toward the maiden lying dead on the stone slab - so the game just feels like: Go to location X, fight colossus, repeat. It's a great game, but not as much of an emotional experience.
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The Halo series is the most overhyped and overrated games ever. Jesus...I really don't like that series. The single player campaign in the first Halo was pretty good, but the multiplayer really lacked. Halo 2 completely reversed that, focusing only on the multiplayer and not the single player. I do have a blast playing the game with friends, but it simply does not deserve the hype and ratings it gets. Crysis was also overhyped. People who upgrade their system just to play that game are pretty crazy. While the graphics are nice, the single player ends in the worst way ever, and the gameplay seems to change half through the game. The multiplayer is okay, but that also gets boring after a few days.
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I just want to say that I don't think something can be "overhyped" or "overrated" I mean, to me I see it as "peer pressure" It's kind of YOUR fault if you fall for the hype. It's not like a bunch of people get together and say "hey, lets force everyone to buy this by saying it's da bomb!"
so I never really seen anything as overhyped... I buy what interests me, I don't read reviews unless I want to find out if I'm being ripped off or something by false advertisement. I certainly do not go by what I hear people talking about. Hell I remember how I got into Halo, I heard for so long it was awesome; but I didn't really feel it until it hit PC and tried the demo and I fell in love with it.
Basically what I'm saying is that I think it's your fault for falling for hypes. To say a game doesn't deserve the attention it gets is...impossible because everyone has the right to talk about their favorite game and if that happends to be ff7 or halo or half-life 2, then hell obviously the game deserves it.
now if you want to get into the cemantics of "well those people don't have taste" then why the hell are you falling for there hype?
Anyway there was ONE game who's hype I fell for GRAW PC recently, what a dissapointment, fucking WOW...the xbox 360 version was so much better.
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I like almost every game mentioned in this topic, so I won't bother defending any of them.
I would dare say Dead Rising is overhyped since I just got 360 and didn't like it, being one of 3 games I bought, but then again Hundley probably liked it (he's a scholar), so nvm.
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most of the games i think were overrated aren't terrible games, i would say either average or above average. this isn't in any order, but off the top of my head:
GEARS OF WAR. in general this was a mediocre game in every way except graphics. the story isn't interesting at all, it ends up going no where, the AI is really bad, and a lot of the parts in the game just aren't fun (have no idea what the fuck they called those bats, but any level that had them in sucked). people really bought into the graphics for this and i think is why it got such high ratings.
the HALO series. i could go on forever about the problems with the three in the series, but i'll simply say halo only did well because the console it was on did terrible.
XENOGEARS. this is at most an average RPG. the battle system was terrible, the game was much longer than it should have been, the pacing was bad, the story was ridiculous, and even the storytelling itself was poorly done. the one credit i give to this game is that is does a decent job with the locations and being a pretty big scale, it was an ambitious game but it executed a lot of it badly.
METAL GEAR SOLID 2. i have no idea why this game is so highly acclaimed. the game had the fundamental metal gear set-up, but did mostly everything wrong. i don't have a problem that they let the story / cinemas hijack the gameplay, but they did terrible in this regard. it would have been a great game if they could have succeeded in telling some kind of meaningful story with better characters, but this wasn't the case. technically this game is very sound, and has good core gameplay, but it is very hard to get into when the main drive of the game is such a trainwreck (for those of you who played MGS2 and may have forgot, THE PRESIDENT GRABS YOUR DICK).
man, i could spend all day listing stuff. i'm going to cut off here and just say generally everything is wildly overrated.
also, ICO and SoTC aren't fun games. they heavily rely on the story and atmosphere to drive the game, and if you're not into it, you won't like the game. that said ICO didn't appeal to me at all, but i liked SoTC a lot more because i thought it was very unique in going for a boss only game. i wasn't really impressed with what they did in terms of storytelling or atmosphere, but i admit they did a better than typical job with it.
maybe games get good ratings because they are given by professionals doing their jobs, and not random people that whine about it on the forums? idk
there is nothing professional about the vast majority of video game reviewers. the average rating for any given game last time i checked on gamerankings.com was something to the effect of 72% across all sites. i have played maybe a handful of games this year, but according to what the average of these sites say i should virtually be checking out every game. most reviewers are just guys who somehow land a job rating games, and there are huge conflicts of interest because you don't want to piss companies off with low ratings when they give you exclusive previews and send you free shit.
you are much better off reading what people said about the game who actually had to dish out money for it and don't have to speedplay the game to get a review done in time.
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i don't think sotc relies solely on atmosphere! also i'm not sure why you're even bringing storytelling up because i think it's pretty unfair to judge it on the basis of something that clearly didn't play a significant part in the development. but yeah most of the boss fights were more or less FIGURE OUT GIMMICK, BEAT BOSS but the actual mechanics of it were pretty well done i thought, and there would've been a lot worse ways to have your character kill giant stone things. atmosphere was a big component, but imo the game played pretty well too so i don't think i'd say it flatout wasn't fun. i didn't play ico though so i can't really comment on it.
also halo is definitely overrated but i always get a little amused when people HATE it or whatever, because honestly i don't think you can say it's a terrible game! i could see someone calling it average, but mostly i think it's an above average one, just not amaaaaazing. i don't play every shooter ever, but i've played a pretty decent amount and i would say it's probably better than most.
ALSO also i hate resident evil 4 a lot. i always found the controls really awkward and nothing about the gameplay seemed especially fun to me and it never struck me as being especially atmospheric or scary, so idk i sort of missed the boat on that one. i don't get why everyone loves it.
oh yeah and suikoden 2. it's such an average rpg and i have no idea why people rave about it. imo suikoden 3 is pretty much the only exceptional game the series ever put out.
I just want to say that I don't think something can be "overhyped" or "overrated" I mean, to me I see it as "peer pressure" It's kind of YOUR fault if you fall for the hype. It's not like a bunch of people get together and say "hey, lets force everyone to buy this by saying it's da bomb!"
jesus christ you say the worst stuff. this is EXACTLY HOW HYPE WORKS have you never heard of marketing or publicity stunts or any of the things companies routinely do to pump up their games more than the actual quality of them would merit.
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btw just putting it out there that there's no distinction between professional reviewers and people who whine on forums whatsoever. these people didn't go to school or receive some sort of formal education for this shit; they're the same nerds you meet on the internet only they happened to stumble into jobs where they're paid to say games are good. you're pretty naive if you think that being a professional reviewer somehow guarantees a heightened sense of judgment!
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XENOGEARS.
METAL GEAR SOLID 2.
I agree with these, oddly enough. I love Xenoha to death, but sometimes the story dragged on forever, or you'd waste your items on boss battles you're Supposed to lose, or Disc 2 happened... I mean, yeah, it was great (imo) but had some major flaws.
MGS2 (being a huge MG fan, it's sad to say this) sucked. The tanker mission had me hooked, but when you get to Raiden's chapter, it sort of... felt confused. Like it wanted to copycat MGS1 (for obvious reason later) and at the same time, have you running around doing seemingly random shit. I get what they were trying to do with the series, or what they were trying to say in the story, however this game is definitely overrated.
Eh, whether FFVII is overrated or not is debatable but it was an amazing game for its time. It was one of the most influential RPGs ever and it pretty much redefined the genre.
It didn't redefine much. It was a paint-by-numbers Final Fantasy.
I do agree that the level of easiness is kind of like a pain killer sometimes. In the past, I've enjoyed speedplaying FF7 through, skipping as much text as possible and loling at that death sequence. (I seriously find this one of funniest deaths in videogames, ever... and it too was over-rated, ha!)
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It's not like a bunch of people get together and say "hey, lets force everyone to buy this by saying it's da bomb!"
I know like two people have said this but it bears repeating this is exactly what happens.
also I think Kezay got to review some shit for Nintendo Power once so yeah it's pretty much completely fucking meaningless.
It didn't redefine much. It was a paint-by-numbers Final Fantasy.
that second part has nothing to do with that first. we're talking about the game that essentially saved the playstation, reestablished the genre, had a general cinematic feel, and is pretty much the reason any of us are on this board. however much you may disliked FF7, its effect on the next generation of games is pretty undeniable.
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Then I digress into my original statement about FF7, and leave it at that.
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The correct answer to this topic is "Persona 3." When it was first announced, I planned to buy it because PERSONA, but then the information started coming out and well it sounded just awful. But the reviews were all so overwhelmingly positive, frequently giving it a 95% or higher score, so I bought it. I learned to trust myself and not Weeaboo McReviewerson.
Now, obviously, a lot (most) RPGs aren't particularly great even though RPG fans treat them like the best thing ever, but Persona 3 is actually QUITE bad, not just offensively mediocre, yet it was universally accepted by reviewers and RPG players. Well, almost. XPlay did a review of it, where they did their typical spill, and ended it by saying, "It's an ok game, but we wish there were more dungeons or puzzles to break up the monotony. 3 out of 5." And the shit hit the fan y'all.
oh yeah and suikoden 2. it's such an average rpg and i have no idea why people rave about it. imo suikoden 3 is pretty much the only exceptional game the series ever put out.
Because it was 2D, and that automatically means it has more soul than any 3D game. I liked a lot of the concepts in Suikoden 3 but they didn't work out very well. I'm sad they didn't bother to expand on them in future installments.
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No, they really didn't, did they? Suikoden 4 is literally probably the worst RPG I've ever played, and while people talked up Suikoden 5 to be really good, I played it for a few hours and found it pretty boring, especially since people talked about good characters and it was the run of the mill JRPG cast. Anyway, even going being the absurd and convoluted battle system, and the penchant for throwing random giant crab bosses in ridiculous and inappropriate places (turn a corner find a boss GREAT IDEA GUYS), Suikoden 3 had its faults, but like you said it had very cool concepts and it's pretty infrequent to find an RPG that actually has a sense of thematic vision. You know, like one that TRIES STUFF beyond just talking about going on a journey. I appreciate it for being one of the few games in the genre where the developers clearly sat down and said, "let's uh... let's at least try to do something different."
If this was an underrated/underhyped game topic then I would for sure say THAT because a) it's never present in the deluge of shitty RPGs people list to represent the genre, and b) it really didn't get that much press leading up to its release, as I recall! It's ironic that games like Star Ocean are PUMPED UP for months or even years leading up to their release, and fans everywhere love them, but something good like Suikoden 3 gets very little hype and is more or less ignored. I wonder whether it's because people have bad taste and ignore legitimately good games, or because they really do buy into all the bullshit hype in the industry and go after whatever they see the most coverage of.
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I would dare say Dead Rising is overhyped since I just got 360 and didn't like it, being one of 3 games I bought, but then again Hundley probably liked it (he's a scholar), so nvm.
How was Dead Rising overhyped when no soul on the internet ever spoke or speaks of it?
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How was Dead Rising overhyped when no soul on the internet ever spoke or speaks of it?
if at least one person says anything good about a game(or anything else) you don't like, it automatically because over hyped and over rated, regardless of how many people have even heard of the game before.
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How was Dead Rising overhyped when no soul on the internet ever spoke or speaks of it?
All I ever hear from the 360 crowd is 'go play Dead Rising it's da bomb' or some variant.
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eer... I've never heard Dead Rising being the selling point of the 360, but okay.
By the way, Nintendo is Scientology and Smash Bros Brawl is overhyped, yes sir.
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GEARS OF WAR. in general this was a mediocre game in every way except graphics. the story isn't interesting at all, it ends up going no where, the AI is really bad, and a lot of the parts in the game just aren't fun (have no idea what the fuck they called those bats, but any level that had them in sucked). people really bought into the graphics for this and i think is why it got such high ratings.
I just have to defend this by saying that, well, the single player is shit and I haven't played more than like 15mins of single player in it. The whole deal with it and why everyone loves it, is the co-op. It's only like... the best co-op game I have ever played. In single player it's a pointless shooter with a cover system, but in co-op it's a mindblowing experience where you can flank the enemy, work together to clear tough areas, parts where you have to rely on the other player to save your ass, cover the other other player so he can reach a turret and gun down the room, and so on. It does a two-man army a million times better than Army of Two and is probably the best FPS experience i've ever had.
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One game that got me that felt overhyped, was Hoshigami, I dont' recall if it had positive reviews or not, but that game was just downright terrible, when I first played it I swear it took me 2 fucking days to figure out that damn combo system, it was too confusing and I couldn't get passed the 3rd mission, hell the 2nd mission took me half a day, well... it could've been less, but I'm sure it was around there...
After the 2nd day, I wanted to smash this thing to bits, because the battle system was ridiculous, I wanted an FFTactics, not a tactical game with a twist that confuses the living fuck out of the guy... christ...
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For overhyped I am going to say anything Nintendo, BY FAR.
Seriously, they make like... 50 god damn commercials for every game they do release, which are invariably show on EVERY GOD DAMN CHANNEL DURING EVERY GOD DAMN AD BREAK (sometimes more than once).
I was watching TV for an hour or so earlier on today, and saw about 12 ads for Wii Fit (and I am pretty sure they were all different). They are already in the lead this time, so why do they feel the need to shove so many ads in peoples faces??
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because they make horrible games that appeal to people who would be influenced by ads?
i'll have to go with the Halo series. all three of them are really, really mediocre and in no way deserve the MASSIVE amount of hype and acclaim they have.
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Finally some people agree with me about Metal Gear Solid 2, I hated that game after playing the quite enjoyable(Yet no where near as EPIC as people say, that kinda goes for the whole series as well) original.
Chrono Cross(And sorta Trigger) is an overrated game, seriously the game had everything going for it, incredible music, graphics, and a nice selection of characters(A few characters) and a good back story from the Trigger but they STILL managed to fuck it up with the boring story, gameplay and so many characters were not even needed or done well for that matter. Trigger was great, but from what everyone was saying about it I kinda was letdown, but I don't think it was the game it self that let me down because I quite enjoyed it, but the HUGE expectations I had for it.
Mana Series(PS/SNES) - Legend of Mana is like Chrono Cross, a beautiful game with good music and an alright battle system, but the actual game behind that was fucking boring, I didn't even know what I was doing half the time or what the point in everything I did?
Seiken Densetsu/Secret of Mana I just didn't like, it was cool to see where most of my graphics came from but I didn't really like the games themselves and thought they were overrated from again what people were saying about them.
Jade Empire MY GOD that game was over hyped, I thought it was an alright game but seriously it deserved the score Gamespot, the only big review site I know that gave it an accurate score. The combat sucked, wasn't nearly as much decision making as KOTOR and being evil hardly effected anything in the end.
Halo series is probably the most hyped series in the industry, I thought they were fun games to play and did kinda get me more into FPS games but they don't warrant that much attention in the end.
I think I'm done.. until more games I play are over hyped that I don't like!
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I second Gears of War.
Played it with some friends and the whole experienece was "egh" for me. The graphics were all so gritty and boring to look at, hardly differentiating the levels we played, and I just wasn't having much fun playing it. It wasn't all EPIC either like everyone and their dog had led me to believe.
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I like almost every game mentioned in this topic, so I won't bother defending any of them.
I would dare say Dead Rising is overhyped since I just got 360 and didn't like it, being one of 3 games I bought, but then again Hundley probably liked it (he's a scholar), so nvm.
I'd say that Dead Rising is such a good game because it doesn't take itself seriously at all. There's a sort of enjoyment in replaying it, and I loved that game. I still want to go back and play it again. It had some of the best bosses in a game I've seen, even though they were simple; it was the insanity that brought the game to life.
Also, I would agree with Marcus on Final Fantasy XII. I got so bored to death of the game I stopped playing it.
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where are these Hundley rant articles everyone keeps talking about?
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I really don't know, I think people just remember Hundley talking about FF7 with *gasp* real thought and have somehow conflated it into a long series of posts?
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To everybody saying that Gears of War is overhyped, I have to agree with you. But I also have to say that it is NOT a shitty game. At least, not within the shooter genre. It has absolutely wonderful level design, the maps flow really nicely and the game has a pretty nice pacing to everything. There isn't much exciting about it besides the entertaining combat and the visuals, but it's a whole lot better than most shooters I've played that aren't made by Valve, Rare, or Free Radical.
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halo cockfucking 2
what a horrible piece of shit that was (except from the earth levels)
also gears of war is kinda average too except the multiplayer which is pretty damn fun after you learn the basics
weird that no one here is mentioning gta4 since its getting 10 all over the place. personally i feel like it deserves it because i have so much fun playing it but i'd assume some of you would consider that extremely overhyped and overrated.
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I really don't know, I think people just remember Hundley talking about FF7 with *gasp* real thought and have somehow conflated it into a long series of posts?
couple of years ago me and hundley had a "rap battle" about how i thought final fantasy x had decent character development and final fantasy 7 was bad because it negatively influenced the RPG genre into a series of static and dull archetypes.
he completely torched my argument but agreed to some of my points. hundley agreeing was victory enough for me and my head swelled two sizes that day (ah memories)
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weird that no one here is mentioning gta4 since its getting 10 all over the place. personally i feel like it deserves it because i have so much fun playing it but i'd assume some of you would consider that extremely overhyped and overrated.
well i was actually going to mention it, but for a game that is still really good there's no point. you'll be hard pressed to find anyone who can legitimately bash the game simply because it's better than 99% of the garbage out there. even though i don't like a lot of things in GTA4, you are guaranteed to at least play for 10+ hours that you'll have a lot of fun in (i lowballed the hours at 10 just to be safe). most likely more, but it gets stale the more you play it obviously. you can barely say the same for any other game, since many games these days are under 10 hours, are maybe fun for a few of those hours, and you'll never play it again.
basically the production values in GTA4 are so sky high you can say rockstar really fucked up and the game should have been even better, but it's still a good game.
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Chrono Cross(And sorta Trigger) is an overrated game, seriously the game had everything going for it, incredible music, graphics, and a nice selection of characters(A few characters) and a good back story from the Trigger but they STILL managed to fuck it up with the boring story, gameplay and so many characters were not even needed or done well for that matter. Trigger was great, but from what everyone was saying about it I kinda was letdown, but I don't think it was the game it self that let me down because I quite enjoyed it, but the HUGE expectations I had for it.
This.
I loved Chrono Trigger, so I became a squealing fanboy when I heard about CC. I bought it, played it, and hated it. Oh man, did I hate it. Sure, the music is mostly great, and the battle system is actually kinda fun (I love the element grid thingy) but... man, the story. The story! And the ending! :cry:
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The story and ending to Chrono Cross was clearly superior to Trigger. Most people just dont understand it.
Edit: Oh yeah, overhyped game....uh...FF7. One of my favorite games, but very overhyped. And God of War. Shit is boring.
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FF7 - Terrible writing
ahahahaha *wipes tear*
and what are you? Some kind of writing/literature scholar?
Ignoring the fact that you are indeed a fanboy, have you ever read Hundley's rants against Final Fantasy games? He's a writing/literature scholar!
i never ranted against final fantasy 7 and have only ever defended it on these forums.
SPLAT.
i wish i never mentioned that i have a degree. i feel like such a CREDENTIALS dick even though having a degree doesn't mean a goddamn thing
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And God of War. Shit is boring.
This.
I really don't get all this wanking to God of War. I mean, it's not bad, per se, but Jesus it's not THAT good either!
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This.
I really don't get all this wanking to God of War. I mean, it's not bad, per se, but Jesus it's not THAT good either!
Yeah specifically CoO. I dropped 50 buckers on it and it was a 3 hour game with shitty level design, like seriously you could tap the square button and run to win.
War 2 was better but JESUS FUCK did it get annoying fast.
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I gotta agree on God of War, it got all these great reviews and generally everyone considered it as a 9/10 game (whatever that means).
But the reality was that it was just like some medieval DMC except there was less acrobatics and more precise jumping and leaps of faith. I remember being bored out of my mind when I had reached the second half of stage 2. Good thing that we had it borrowed from some random guy and never had to regret buying it.
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i never ranted against final fantasy 7 and have only ever defended it on these forums.
I never said you did. I've only heard you speak out against FFX.... and that's close enough for me. I'll use anything to keep Aten's rampant fanboyism at bay.
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I gotta agree on God of War, it got all these great reviews and generally everyone considered it as a 9/10 game (whatever that means).
But the reality was that it was just like some medieval DMC except there was less acrobatics and more precise jumping and leaps of faith. I remember being bored out of my mind when I had reached the second half of stage 2. Good thing that we had it borrowed from some random guy and never had to regret buying it.
see i am completely opposite in this thinking. i thought DMC was a complete fluke as every subsequent release was pretty lame (and even then, devil may cry's level design was pretty shit in all games) and god of war both delivered in a pretty decent plot for an action game, solid level, and they were pretty difficult (well, i played on spartan mode and they kicked my ass). i loved pandora's temple as the game took a major turn from HACK N SLASH to having tons of puzzles and traps to move through and man, the final boss battle.
man, the final boss battle. i was totally predicting a hollywood move where kratos revives his family and lives happily ever after but jesus christ THAT GUY CANNOT GET A BREAK!
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To defend Gears of War, you guys were all clearly playing it on single player. The co-op is okay and fun, but even then that wasnt the point of the game. It was a ridiculously sick shooter which thrived on online play aka the team deathmatch and execution, etc. It was extremely fun, fair (if you were good), and incorporated new things to involve everyone (like downing people and picking them up, grenade tags, chainsawing, among other things). Most of the maps offered in multiplayer were also very awesome, balanced, and they all incorporated a different playstyle. So if everyone was talking shit on Gears of War solely based on the single player, you havent played the game yet.
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I managed to get Gears of War for free due to some promotional shit and while I've only played single player I enjoyed it. I could imagine being SUPER PISSED OFF paying 60$ for a grand 5 hour experience (i rarely play console games online go figure) but I enjoyed it for what it was.
If a game is going to be retardedly short then I expect it to be really good. Uncharted really held my attention because (like GTAIV) the production values were RIDICULOUS but Gears of War was like watching a B-action flick.
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Good to see I'm not the only one who doesn't think that highly of the God of War games.
I can't say they're completely bad (the story and I guess you call it "scale" were awesome) but because there are much more better games in that genre it makes God of War look like a cheap imitation.
Another series that I've always thought was overrated are the Virtua Fighter games. Most people consider them to be the best fighting games in existence but to me they just feels like crap. Heck I remember when the 1st one came out in the arcade. Everyone and their mama was in there playing it and here I was looking around at all the much better fighting games that were out. At the time I thought it was just the 3D graphics that blinded everyone to how crappy this game was but even till this day when 3D fighters are the norm people consider Virtua Fighter 5 to be incredibly awesome while I still view it as a piece of crap. The only thing I've liked that (sorta) had anything to do with Virtua Fighter is Shenmue.
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have you... played a virtua fighter? it's a slower and more methodical fighter (you can't really compare it to super fast games like street fighter) and it was basically a rival to tekken which took a huge shit turn after tekken 3.
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Yeah I've played all of them. You know what? I don't like Tekken much either so maybe slower fighters just aren't for me (I love Soul Caliber and DOA but I don't think theyre anything like VF or Tekken so this probably don't count).
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Yeah I've played all of them. You know what? I don't like Tekken much either so maybe slower fighters just aren't for me (I love Soul Caliber and DOA but I don't think theyre anything like VF or Tekken so this probably don't count).
I think you've just ruined any amount of credibility you had to talk about this.
Edit: VF5 wasn't even that hyped outside of the fighting game niche (ie only SRK.com). I don't really remember anyone but like Raziel talking about it ever, so yea I think most people were just expecting "oh VF with sweet graphics cool" rather than like "HOLY SHIT THIS IS THE MAGNUM OPUS OF GAMING."
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The story and ending to Chrono Cross was clearly superior to Trigger. Most people just dont understand it.
I understand it all too well, thanks. And I'm glad you enjoyed it. Me? Not so much. :)
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I think you've just ruined any amount of credibility you had to talk about this.
Meh I just threw DOA in there because besides Soul Caliber it's the only other 3D fighter I can think of that I have any interest in (well besides the questionable fighters like SSB and Power Stone). DOA is more of a casual interest than a game I love, although I do like it more than VF or Tekken (plus it gets cred for actually working on my crappy internet connection).
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I really enjoyed Crysis, why? Because of it's physics and sandbox2. I love dicking around and finding new exploits/glitches with shit like this, so a game built around DESTROYING TREES results in me going ocd and breaking every single tree into the smallest possible forms and then seeing what shit I can do. Anybody who expected DEUS EX from a game where the selling point is FINALLY A GAME WHERE TREES DONT LOOK RETARDED WHEN THEY BREAK is somewhat dim.
I would say the halo series are overrated, outdated interms of gameplay and generally the least important games in the FPS genre (the Turok series is more frigging innovative). They are just bad games and the height of mediocre. People make a deal out of it's story, but it's a dull story, but y'know it HAS ONE that people get all masturbatory over.
FF9 is another disappointment. We had a great new way with FF8. A character driven science fantasy story, it could only get better?
Fuck more cliches than an episode of Star Trek. The point of FF9 was to "reconnect with the fans"(fans being people who judge games based on how much fanwanking and INJOKES, rather than the game's individual merit) as a result it was an embarassingly shallow and detached game.
I would also mention Goldeneye, but I've said all I ever want to say about that horrid piece of shit a few months back, and want to wash my mouth of it.
Company of Heroes is fun at first but it's so grey, and the missions don't have much variety (hold this point til reinforcements come, move towards enemy). It's a game that for me personally gets so boring very quickly. Which is a shame, it should be so good.
Also Leric just admited he's a big perv :(
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Also Leric just admited he's a big perv :(
Heh you know the funny thing is THAT's actually not one of the reasons I like DOA in fact it's one of the things I hate about it. I'd much rather they included more variety to the cast instead of just mega hootered anime stereotypes. I mean sure alittle unrealistic proportions doesn't hurt anyone but it's alittle too blatant in DOA.
EDIT: lol that sounds like I'm saying I want more variety to the types of hot chicks in the game doesn't it? Well I hope you know what I mean (damn I might be a perv, heh).
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I didn't see Ico as simply pushing blocks, picking up shit, torches and bombs. You can say something like that about any game really. Ico was a sum of all its parts. The simplicity was what made it so charming and different. The way the game was presented, the unique art, the desolate atmosphere, and the best puzzle design in years is what really made the game. I don't know much about the praise the game got when it was first released. I think it is one of the most underrated games ever. Seriously, I haven't played a game with such an atmosphere or puzzle design since.
In terms of overrated games... Halo pops right to mind. As do the past Grand Theft Auto games. Haven't played 4 yet.
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FF9 is another disappointment.
I thought so at the time (like yeah I thought well this is a great game but not as good as Final Fantasy 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . ) but in retrospect it has aged much better than pretty much any other PSX game. If you go back and replay it, it feels much more solid as a game and its personality feels way less artificial and less like a Japanese fad than Final Fantasy 8 and 9 or other PSX RPGs.
Gears of War
I do not particularly like shooters but seriously I don't think anyone can say Gears of War is a terrible game and really have given it a fair assessment. There are a few retarded missions (STAY IN THE LIGHT . . . !), but overall it's still one of the best games on XBox360 and was one of the first good games on the platform. Single or multiplayer I think it's a meticulously-built piece of genius. I think the only really solid criticism are that the STAY IN THE LIGHT . . . ! levels are the worst levels ever seen in a video game and that the game was all about giant evil monsters but never really delivered memorable boss fights against those giant evil monsters.
God of War
I don't know about you guys but I always feel like the God of War games are for people who don't understand the fine acrobatics and tight back-and-forth action of Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden. I guess that they are sort of okay and everything, but in my experience all that a new God of War game does is make me want to replay Ninja Gaiden or something. God of War might have a slightly less retarded story that DMC or NG, but it's still a far cry from being good. Also Kratos always reminds of like someone from System of a Down or something and I just can't deal with that.
Dead Rising
Someone on a podcast or something described Dead Rising as "the best terrible game ever" and I think that is a pretty fair assessment of it.
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Meh I just threw DOA in there because besides Soul Caliber it's the only other 3D fighter I can think of that I have any interest in (well besides the questionable fighters like SSB and Power Stone). DOA is more of a casual interest than a game I love, although I do like it more than VF or Tekken (plus it gets cred for actually working on my crappy internet connection).
man SSB is like the best fighting game ever.
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man SSB is like the best fighting game ever.
I didn't mean questionable as in bad (how did you get that out of this? Seems like it clear states that it's one of the 3D fighting games I'm interested it. There's no way I'd ever call SSB bad, it's awesome) but questionable as a fighting game. Games like SSB don't really feel like the same type of game as other fighters to me.
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Enter the Matrix
Everyone fucking hated the game, but nobody hated it enough.
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weird that no one here is mentioning gta4 since its getting 10 all over the place. personally i feel like it deserves it because i have so much fun playing it but i'd assume some of you would consider that extremely overhyped and overrated.
I feel that way to an extent. I mean, I respect the fact that it is a highly enjoyable game. But people are putting it up on this pedestal and I feel that if they let gta4 be the definitive paradigm when it comes to "what makes a game good", It will be detrimental to gaming overall. My main argument for such being that I believe a game is less likely to work the more complicated/content-heavy you make it, and the pride behind GTA4(maybe the series overall) is exactly those things.
I mean, how likely is it for indie-game developers to make it, if having an in-game radio with hours upon hours of unique scripted content (just so you can say it has an in-game radio that is "practically real") becomes the standard that all games are expected to live up to?
I mean, getting immersion and a feeling of reality from a game has been what makes them great over the years, but you play them for the parts that make the game unreal. The real parts are there just to make the unreal things more believable, and they simply aren't worth putting twice as much work into the overall game.
I just don't think the work it takes to include virtual comedy clubs, and making it so you can enter as many buildings as possible is worth it just so that you can increase the feeling of believing "I'm in a real place." when you blow up police cruisers and run over multiple pedestrians just for the hell of it.
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I thought so at the time (like yeah I thought well this is a great game but not as good as Final Fantasy 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . ) but in retrospect it has aged much better than pretty much any other PSX game. If you go back and replay it, it feels much more solid as a game and its personality feels way less artificial and less like a Japanese fad than Final Fantasy 8 and 9 or other PSX RPGs.
so i've been playing ff9 for the first time ever on the psp recently, and i've gotten to disc 3 so far and it's not good at all! i never thought ff8 felt like a japanese fad, but ff9 is just like the quintessential japanese fantasy rpg, complete with black mages (in existential crises........) and whatever else; its setting seems like much more of a fad than ff7 or 8's. i'm curious what you think about it has aged so well.
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the whole point of FF9 was to bring back the classic "fantasy" feel of final fantasy. I enjoyed it because the characters weren't the typical whiny emofags that Nomura shoves in every game (and Amano is a 10x better artist), it was a shorter experience and wasn't bogged down with pointless sidequests or annoyingly long dungeons, and the characters were much more interesting. Amarant and Quina were kind of a throwaway characters, but the rest of the cast combined with the special town events were really good. I hated how you couldn't control trances, but I enjoyed the ability system much more than the broken junction and materia system.
And the ending... fuck I loved how it came full circle.
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junctions were fucked, but how were materia bad at all? it just wasn't an especially imaginative system, is all. but seriously, there's nothing good about the classic fantasy feel and it was motivated solely by nostalgia i'm thinking, and yeaaaaah the visuals are alright but again kind of wasted in such a trite setting! the dungeons aren't annoyingly long or anything, but battles occur pretty frequently and the combat isn't especially involved or engrossing so they still end up dragging a bit nonetheless. i noticed a lack of control with trances too, and it's annoying, but i've yet to really need them so w/e. i think the ability system would be more interesting if most of the stuff you learned wasn't pretty much useless, but it's okay. it lacks gay and useless sidequests i guess but i don't really think it should get points for that.
i think the cast is seriously laughably bad, though. i mean it. zidane is just kind of flat and uninteresting, and the same goes for freya, but steiner is bad, even as comic relief, and vivi is flatout one of the single worst characters i've ever had to put up with in a videogame. at no point in time has anything he ever said been anything but terrible, heavy-handed, and generally pretty insufferable. amarant and quina are fucking dumb, like you said (why....why do you fight....), and garnet isn't offensively bad or anything but she's still not an especially good character. also, kuja is awful, man. oh man a psychotic villain who spend most of his time saying BUAAHAHHAHA and random weird shit to himself about plans coming to fruition, that's good writing! i think you're sort of overrating its significance because i think the whole "whiny emofag" thing didn't really get rolling in earnest until after it came out, and zidane and vivi still kind of fit that bill anyway. plus, just because they're not like tidus doesn't make them good. i can't believe this is what passes for a good cast of characters!
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so i've been playing ff9 for the first time ever on the psp recently, and i've gotten to disc 3 so far and it's not good at all! i never thought ff8 felt like a japanese fad, but ff9 is just like the quintessential japanese fantasy rpg, complete with black mages (in existential crises........) and whatever else; its setting seems like much more of a fad than ff7 or 8's. i'm curious what you think about it has aged so well.
Well I guess I'll be straightforward and qualify what I said by saying that I really do love all three of those Final Fantasy games.
Anyway, 7 and 8 seem really rough around the edges, and their gameplay mechanics and inconsistent visual styles and awkward translations and the general morbid seriousness of everything doesn't seem as awesome today as it did ten years ago. 8 in particular is pretty much a complete train wreck from a design standpoint (all of the effective battle strategies revolve around different forms of spending a lot of time doing nothing and winning easily afterwards) even though its story is pretty interesting most of the time. Final Fantasy 7 is an important game and everything and I still like to replay now and then but it feels extremely crude and sort of halfway between generations and I can really understand the internet meme Final Fantasy 7 sucks even though I disagree. But Final Fantasy 9 to me seemed really polished and realized; it was like the intent was not to revolutionize RPGs or break new ground like the previous two had tried to do but rather to color by number and focus on making a generic but pretty good game.
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that doesn't sound like a lofty ambition at all to me! i haven't played ff7 or 8 in forever, so honestly i don't really feel qualified to comment on them, but at least in 7 i didn't recall any drastically inconsistent visual styles (or do you mean comparing midgar to some random backwoods town? because while they're really different, i think that's to be expected when comparing a village to a somewhat modern city). i do remember the translations were lackluster, though, but even that's something ff9 didn't completely escape, and while stupid games taking themselves too seriously is irritating, and ff9 wasn't as guilty of this, i think that's sort of a minor thing. the tone wasn't as serious, but without that the story sort of lost some of its gravity and impact, as well, i would say.
but really you're right; it just feels like it is trying to do what games that came before it did, but better. i don't think this is a good idea! yeah the game is pretty polished or whatever but it is also really uninspired in pretty much every way, and not especially well written. polish is all well and good but i don't think it should be a substitute for actual creativity or new ideas, and it doesn't really go a long way to make up for poor writing, either.
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Need for Speed Pro Street. It wasn't hyped to my knowledge but it takes a huge shit on the Need for Speed name. No cops, no pursuit, no vast beautiful tracks or big cities. It was basically a very crappy version of the Grand Turismo games. It had like 1/4 mile drag race, 1/2 mile drag race, race around a short ass track 3 times, and drift around an obscenely short track with only yourself and win by scoring points, which could be racked up forever by backtracking.
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but really you're right; it just feels like it is trying to do what games that came before it did, but better. i don't think this is a good idea! polish is all well and good but i don't think it should be a substitute for actual creativity or new ideas, and it doesn't really go a long way to make up for poor writing, either.
Seriously I would get sick of video games pretty fast if every game I played was revolutionary and completely ground-breaking in every way or whatever. I think that polish can serve as a substitute for creativity because maybe you like shooters so you just want a well-built and straightforward shooter and maybe you like RPGs and you just want to kick back with Final Fantasy 9 or something. There is definitely a difference between something like Army of Two, which is just a complete and grotesque mess of a half-assed derivative third-person shooter and something like Uncharted which is just as derivative but still fun and interesting. I think what we're really debating is the difference between not revolutionary and hackneyed and I guess we just disagree which side Final Fantasy 9 falls into.
but at least in 7 i didn't recall any drastically inconsistent visual styles (or do you mean comparing midgar to some random backwoods town?
Well the super-deformed models on the maps looked nothing like the models in the battles and neither really resembled the concept art that closely in terms of proportion and all that. Like during battles the backgrounds suck and the models are okay but it's vice-versa during exploration. Also the very concept of pre-rendered cutscenes that are so different from the gameplay graphics is kind of off-putting and it kind of looked stupid in the first place. And then there are some pre-rendered scenes that are backgrounds only and the character is still a chibi model and then other scenes where everything is pre-rendered.
Like when you look at the graphics now it's just weird and the game seems schizophrenic because it can't seem to decide exactly how it wants to look. There was still quite a bit of that in FF9, but at least the designs were consistent between environments and battles and movies and all that, and the exploration models were the same as the battle models etc. The difference is significant because FF9 seemed like it was trying to achieve a singular aesthetic while FF7 didn't.
And really to explode the discussion I think that's one of the reasons classic games look so appealing. There is the factor that cartoons (sprites) never really look worse because of technology, but additionally you can consider that when everything is sprited, everything always looks consistent all the time. The consistency in terms of how the game world is presented to you goes a long way towards whether a game is generally considered to look good or not.
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Final Fantasy VII is good when you don't view it as something that "changed and shaped" the genre. You over-qualify and claim how so many others tried to follow it -- how about we point out why those games are sucky, because they're just trying to reuse something that was already used.
FF7 - 9 weren't bad. 8 was very different and awesome in it's own little way -- I don't like it as a Final Fantasy, but just as its own thing. I liked a lot of games in this thread -- especially Chrono Cross. It was a little overhyped and could get extremely confusing at times, but overall, I don't think anyone could have executed it better.
And now to contribute:
Wii Play. Despite everyone saying how awesome this game is, I played it once. I got bored quickly and realized it was the biggest waste of money ever. It has a few minigames that are fun one time around. They'd be fun if some of them were incorporated into something like Mario Party. But instead, it feels like they put a bunch of "sample applications" or technical demos that you'd find in an SDK to show off it's power, and then released it as a game.
--Terin
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alright, now i know what you're talking about. i'd forgotten how much the models varied between battles and the overworld and the cutscenes. buuuut do you really still play ff9 and listen to vivi wax philosophically about what it is/....to be a human... and then go get in some random battles and fight a boss maybe and have kuja fly over on a dragon going MUAHAHHA..my plans... and think "man this is a really enjoyable experience for me"? like it seemed so poorly done that i'm actually kind of surprised that there's anyone who legitimately still thinks it's a good game! i'd never played it at all before like a month or so ago but the consensus always seemed to be that it was kind of a fuck up.
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I haven't played FF9 since it's release so I don't feel qualified to defend it but...
the tone wasn't as serious, but without that the story sort of lost some of its gravity and impact, as well, i would say.
This was basically the whole point of the game. It wasn't supposed to be serious and they were going for a completely different appeal than the previous Final Fantasy games which focused on more modern aspects of visual design. FF9 is best compared to the other games in the series as The Hobbit is compared to Lord of the Rings. LotR is filled with paragraphs of lore, mythos, and unnecessary details while The Hobbit was just a straight up adventure story.
The details of the quest in FF9 weren't important it was the journey to the end. While one could argue that this is merely pandering to low standards, for a game released in 2000 it had a number of things going for it. They didn't want the player feeling too connected to anyone character because they themselves weren't wholly important, their quest was. Zidane changed from a Robin Hood type thief to a disillusioned adventurer (there was a reason behind him taking up Vivi as a little brother) and Vivi was supposed to be a tragic hero (hence him being created for destruction, 3 year or so life span etc.). I thought the relationship between Steiner and Beatrix was played out well (Steiner was supposed to be a lawful knight who was too naive to realize that his own leader was being controlled) and the battle with Bahamut at the beginning of Disc 3 was especially well played out. Kuja does begin as a typical monologueing villain (you probably aren't that far yet) but once he figures out his true purpose his mentality is completely shattered and he goes insane; a symbolic foil of Vivi's character that's ironic because Kuja led to Vivi's creation.
Had FF9 been made today there probably would have been a much better translation (as the game was rushed... I'm pretty sure this was common knowledge even back then) and there would have been more attention paid to the individual characters but I think they threw in Quina and Amarant to balance out the rather melee centric party design. Leveling up Quina was a pain but she and Freya had some of the better abilities in the game.
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halo cockfucking 2
what a horrible piece of shit that was (except from the earth levels)
Yeah I'm gonna agree here. I'm a Halo fan but 2 was really pretty shit. Multiplayer was decent but the single player was awful most of the way through and was nowhere near as good as the first.
On the subject of GTA I also find Vice City pretty overrated, I like all the other GTA games but I really didn't like Vice City for some reason (probably overplayed it).
I agree with maladroithim about FFIX as well, I went back and played the PSX Final Fantasy games and IX was definitely the most enjoyable after the dust has very much settled. I like all three for the record though.
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The details of the quest in FF9 weren't important it was the journey to the end. While one could argue that this is merely pandering to low standards, for a game released in 2000 it had a number of things going for it. They didn't want the player feeling too connected to anyone character because they themselves weren't wholly important, their quest was. Zidane changed from a Robin Hood type thief to a disillusioned adventurer (there was a reason behind him taking up Vivi as a little brother) and Vivi was supposed to be a tragic hero (hence him being created for destruction, 3 year or so life span etc.). I thought the relationship between Steiner and Beatrix was played out well (Steiner was supposed to be a lawful knight who was too naive to realize that his own leader was being controlled) and the battle with Bahamut at the beginning of Disc 3 was especially well played out. Kuja does begin as a typical monologueing villain (you probably aren't that far yet) but once he figures out his true purpose his mentality is completely shattered and he goes insane; a symbolic foil of Vivi's character that's ironic because Kuja led to Vivi's creation.
wellll part of the problem with this is, play the game again and you'll see that there isn't a single part of what you just mentioned that isn't horrendously done. you might as well break down star wars episode 3, honestly.
also, even if saying the excuse for not having good characters was that they wanted to avoid connection, because it was the overall quest that mattered, wasn't a really bad excuse for awful characters that in no way behave like normal humans, it's also sort of lame because after 25 hours and two out of four discs (as in, at least halfway through i imagine, given the series tendency to get shorter with each disc), the quest itself isn't especially significant, either. it's actually really meandering and disjointed, and in the two or three weeks since i've played the game, i've practically forgotten the entire storyline; that's how memorable it is. the goal is clearly for it to be sweeping and epic or whatever, but there's a pretty big lack of cohesion that has a pretty negative effect on the overall experience you get from the quest itself, imo!
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wasn't a really bad excuse for awful characters that in no way behave like normal humans,
But they're not normal humans and they don't live in a normal world. Vivi's basically a robot, he's not even supposed to react on a human level. Zidane isn't human either and everything he learned he picked up from Baku (who's an insane goofball as it is), Freya comes from a kingdom of loners and Quina is literally a civilized monster. Amarant is just a mercenary who only cares about cash and he's just a filler character and Eiko was only important during the Ifa Tree quest and should have stayed out of the party (but being the only summoner she had to replace Garnet for a while). Garnet's personality and overall quest changes about 3 or 4 times in the game and I daresay she's probably the most developed out of all of the Final Fantasy females (except maybe Terra). Steiner also has two or three major points in the game where he distinctively grows as a character.
I don't see this as awful (and when I use the word awful I attribute it to things that are really TRULY awful like Nippon Ichi's games which all recycle the same characters and graphics). I don't even want to call it JUST AVERAGE because there's actual story structure (beginning, middle, climax, end) which is more than I can say about most vidyas. I probably won't ever play any of the old Final Fantasy's again (or any RPG for that matter) so this could be the nostalgia glasses speaking but whatever I don't want this topic diverting into another Final Fantasy debate. I'm tired of the series as it is.
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good point, that was poor phrasing and i tacked it on as an edit but what i actually meant by "don't behave like normal humans" was "don't behave in any believable way, human or otherwise." hope that clarifies things! i don't really expect an anthropomorphic rat to act exactly like a human (although given societal structure, they would act very similar!), but i do expect it to not act like a hollow and contrived husk of a character.
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There's a reason I don't go back to play old games. I enjoyed it the first time around and I'm 100% positive my opinion would change if I went back.
Ahhhhhhhhh, ignorance is blizz.
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I tried playing FF9 a few years back. In terms of most aspects (dialogue, story, characters, battles etc) I have played better rm2k3 games. It's a really horrendous game with typically convulted story that doesn't actually make any sense when you try and think about it, and suffers from "and then we..." instead of trying to have a natural flow (and then is also featured heavily in FF7 and is it's worse aspect by far :( )
It follows the old traditions of FF games. Y know the ones where females are lifeless shadows and the manly(/monkily) theives and soldiers are in charge. Characters like Kuja seem to have only been created to keep the morbidly obesse fangirls happy, and as a non morbidly obesse fangirl I struggle to get him at all. He's totally dull and flat and "I am so insane lulz, I want the world!!!!11" and then the last boss... It's like square read what most people disliked about FF8 at that time (how Ultimecia basically doesn't exist and then magically appears and has no real purpose but to be a big badguy for a final boss, when the story could've and perhaps should've ended with Adel) and took it to more extremes by after kuja, inserting a RANDOM ENEMY for ONE FIGHT who serves NO ACTUAL PURPOSE in the plot, just tacked on the end as like an excuse for WACKEY DESIGN.
Man Marcus, garnet's character don't change. She goes from being generic tomboy anime princess to being mute to being generic tomboy anime princess with a DRAMATIC PAST (hint: generic tomboy anime princess. She is just there as a love interest, but has no character of her own(something of a problem within the whole FF series to be honest!). She is something of a sexist stereotype, created from watching one too many Disney films.
As games hold up, FF8 I find holds up extremely well by today's standards. FF7 not as much, but FF9 even less. By trying to be an update of outdated cliches, it's a very dated game. By trying to be lighthearted and comedic, it's just silly and doesn't lack any understanding of the situations the characters are put in. It's an emotionless game, and somewhat representative of the general japanese view to rpgs.
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Wow I loved Final Fantasy IX and recently played through it on my PSP(God I love this little handheld) and the only real things that changed my opinion about(No where near as my opinion of Final Fantasy VIII, Ive just started replaying that and it is an incredibly fucked up game, the junction system is SO bad but no as bad as the Draw system*Sigh*) is how slow the battle system is and how easy it is?
Final Fantasy VIII has the most annoying systems to use, the having to draw and to get any good stats for your characters, having to sacrifice using magic, have to get some good cards to actually be able to get the best weapons, although I liked the weapon system in this game is was kind of annoying getting the stuff needed for the later weapons so I would say it's the worst to replay of the three(VII, VIII, IX) but I have fond memories of it so nostalgia is gotten the best of me.
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Man Marcus, garnet's character don't change. She goes from being generic tomboy anime princess to being mute to being generic tomboy anime princess with a DRAMATIC PAST (hint: generic tomboy anime princess. She is just there as a love interest, but has no character of her own(something of a problem within the whole FF series to be honest!). She is something of a sexist stereotype, created from watching one too many Disney films.
actually she goes from generic anime tomboy princess who's tired of living behind castle walls to active adventurer who slowly realizes what her mother has become to depressed individual that realizes the person who took her outside the castle walls is a liar and a thief to a mute because she's traumatized by effects of her mother's war (this is what happens when you fight black waltz 3) and then finally when her mother dies in her arms she cuts her hair and takes an active stand against kuja MAYBE I AM MAKING THIS SHIT UP OR MY MIND IS STICKING IN NEXT-GEN GRAPHICS OR SOMETHING BUT HOW IS THIS NOT VISIBLE TO ANYONE WHO'S PLAYED THE GAME??
The royal figure who's tired of living behind castle walls is a pretty generic character archetype but it changes through the game based on events in the plot. This makes it bad? She becomes less submissive and more determined as a character based on the training Zidane gives her so suddenly she sucks? She becomes mentally scarred and physically defeated so losing all hope and being traumatized enough to not talk for nearly an entire disc suddenly makes her the shittiest female in video games? Seeing her mother die in her arms as she admits to every evil deed and then cutting her hair and taking on a flying fucking dragon god proves that she has a paper thin personality WHAT AM I MISSING HERE? This shit ain't Shakespeare but when you use a powerful and aggressive term like AWFUL I am mentally comparing it to Love Hina and generic shonen manga. That's awful. Maybe there's a ratings scale I'm missing here (utter shit, dog shit, shit, average (still shit), awful, dumb, okay, good, perfect (but not really) but I just can't call something THE WORST unless it is absolutely and truly garbage.
And I tell people this all the time that complain about Necron, he was an intentional homage to pre ff-5 final bosses like Zemus/Zeromus and Chaos that simply appear at the end of the game to provide a cool boss fight. He has absolutely nothing to do with the story (other than being a god as you don't kill him you just banish him and he vows to return FF9-II???) and simply existed as fanservice. Ultemicia was garbage because she was actually behind the entire plot but Necron was literally an esoteric god that was summoned because Kuja destroyed the crystal. He had nothing to do with the story, it was just a "chance" encounter.
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i cannot believe i am contemplating playing this game again just to defend it on the internet. this is a crafty ploy by someone to steal all my free time i know it!
i'm eradicating this topic from memory goodbye
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I thought IX's ending was god awful but the game itself was excellent and tastefully done. Dont get mad just cause its not Cloud and Squall: Bad Ass Mofo Adventure. I like the lighthearted take on it, and the way it paid homage to the old school. It shows how great Final Fantasy used to be before fucking JUNCTION and BLITZBALLZ showed up.
It was the only PS FF that I could actually get into the characters, unlike 7 and 8 where the shit was too serious and BOTH had a RESPECTIVE COMIC RELIEF character put in to make the game more chiche and less awkward.
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yeah you're right, the reason we don't like it is just because not..........enough............squall............
orrrr it could be that "old school" is just a nostalgic way to say dated and the reason people don't make games like they did in 1990 is because games fucking blew in 1990 and no one in their right mind would go back and play the original final fantasy and think "ahhh i wish they still made em like this."
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I dunno I just can't agree that Resident Evil 4 is overrated. I think it was kind of a simple game disguised as a really complicated one though and I could just tell the creators put so much work into balancing the game just right like even to the point where unbeknownst to us they probably did stuff like THIS CORRIDOR HAS TO BE 1 CM SHORTER. I also thought it blended all these different genres together really well and probably a better old-gen game to compare it to would be like River City Ransom or something because it was like epic battles against lots of dumb guys and collecting enough goodies so you can beat the slightly smarter and stronger dumb guys
but yeah I just thought it felt so natural the way the game played like almost to the point of being on the same level as MARIO JUMP - like sometimes I wonder if Japan is full of a bunch of dudes who just think all day about HOW COULD I USE A TURTLE SHELL AS A DEADLY WEAPON (and make it fun too)
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FF9 disc 1 and 2 are pretty cool but it loses all fun somewhere in cd3. I've played it about 4 times from cd1 to 3 and never made it past some point on cd3 because it is so boring then.
but cd1 absolutely rocks and cd2 is still pretty good IMHO.
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Discussion about Final Fantasy IX's writing
Well I don't know I wasn't really talking about the plot or the themes of Final Fantasy IX because generally in RPGs these are pretty silly (it's TRAGIC that people take RPG stories seriously because I 100% believe that the creators don't really or maybe they are just that truly inept who knows). I like it because of its scenarios and aesthetics and exciting boss battles and fun systems to make my numbers go up. Sometimes the reason why you're flying an exploding airship through the sky only for it to eventually crash are sometimes suspect but the scene itself is pretty cool. And yes it's a little convenient that the airship crashes in a swamp full of monsters, but it's fun to explore the swamp and kill the enemies there. Etc. When I play RPGs I usually just look the other way whenever inane bullshit creeps in during every cutscene because I sort of enjoy just actually playing them.
Anyway I thought of another grotesquely overrated game in my opinion!
Call of Duty 4
I tried to get into this because everyone likes it so much but holy crap I hated it. The single-player campaign was some sort of weird mix between Doom and Counter-Strike and it really just didn't do it for me. The multiplayer felt basically the same but with a levelling system that slowly doles out features and abilities that maybe it would have been nice to have access to in the first place (but yeah making numbers go up is fun). I guess I can see how some (most) people think its really great but when I was playing it I couldn't help but think about how I could have been playing more creative shooters with more interesting weapons and enemies. Maybe this is the Michael Bay blockbuster of shooters or something and since I don't really LOVE shooters then it's a pretty bad fit!
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Call of Duty 4
I tried to get into this because everyone likes it so much but holy crap I hated it. The single-player campaign was some sort of weird mix between Doom and Counter-Strike and it really just didn't do it for me. The multiplayer felt basically the same but with a levelling system that slowly doles out features and abilities that maybe it would have been nice to have access to in the first place (but yeah making numbers go up is fun). I guess I can see how some (most) people think its really great but when I was playing it I couldn't help but think about how I could have been playing more creative shooters with more interesting weapons and enemies. Maybe this is the Michael Bay blockbuster of shooters or something and since I don't really LOVE shooters then it's a pretty bad fit!
Totally true. The last FPS I was into was Unreal Tournament, but mostly because it was a game I played with friends. That's the only reason I've gotten into CoD4 -- friends. I can't stand to go through the normal playthrough and play it solely for multiplayer mode. The idea with it, I think, is just to take an existing system and the like, and build off of existing gameplay, but add other benefits for playing. So for multiplayer, I love the concept of having "accomplishments" you can achieve -- be it extreme accuracy with a specific SMG -- or using a helicopter to take out 5 enemies in a row. The different modes of play keep me pretty interested and refreshed with it -- but I guess this is the first big FPS I've really gotten into when it was "hot" still.
--Terin
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yeah you're right, the reason we don't like it is just because not..........enough............squall............
orrrr it could be that "old school" is just a nostalgic way to say dated and the reason people don't make games like they did in 1990 is because games fucking blew in 1990 and no one in their right mind would go back and play the original final fantasy and think "ahhh i wish they still made em like this."
hahaha are you kidding me?
If anything, I would say more games in 1990-era were better than most of the stuff they put out now. I still pop in a NES/SNES rom here or there and get so frustrated cause they CANT make great games like they used to. (Not saying all games now are bad, but you get my point)
My hey im nostalgically biased so I guess you wouldnt understand my point at all.
Ahh, I wish they still made games like this *plays FF1*
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okay, even i'm going to call you out on that one. FF1 is about as bare bones basic as it comes and i guarantee you that if a company OTHER than square released the exact same game today (same gameplay but with upgraded graphics) then it would be called the worst game ever.
video games today are universally better than games of the past. there is a lack of "twitch based" reflexive games but i attribute that to the death of the coin op as like... 60% of pre-ps1 games were arcade ports.
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Final Fantasy VIII has the most annoying systems to use, the having to draw and to get any good stats for your characters, having to sacrifice using magic, have to get some good cards to actually be able to get the best weapons, although I liked the weapon system in this game is was kind of annoying getting the stuff needed for the later weapons so I would say it's the worst to replay of the three(VII, VIII, IX) but I have fond memories of it so nostalgia is gotten the best of me.
You know, you don't need to draw all the time. In my opinion, grinding is always annoying. Constantly drawing magic from monsters is like grinding, except it's not done in the traditional sense. During my first playthrough, I barely used drawing at all. It was still doable.
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I said "fuck it" and got through the first disc of FF9 again. I hate you guys.
Headphonics: ruining memories since 2003.
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video games today are universally better than games of the past. there is a lack of "twitch based" reflexive games but i attribute that to the death of the coin op as like... 60% of pre-ps1 games were arcade ports.
And the death of the coin op was a sad day for all of us...
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I said "fuck it" and got through the first disc of FF9 again. I hate you guys.
Headphonics: ruining memories since 2003.
so how about them complex character dynamics???
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yeah, shut up buddy. any more games you want to ruin?
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okay, even i'm going to call you out on that one. FF1 is about as bare bones basic as it comes and i guarantee you that if a company OTHER than square released the exact same game today (same gameplay but with upgraded graphics) then it would be called the worst game ever.
video games today are universally better than games of the past. there is a lack of "twitch based" reflexive games but i attribute that to the death of the coin op as like... 60% of pre-ps1 games were arcade ports.
I wasnt SPECIFICALLY talking about FF1. I was just using that as an example since he brought it up. The were pleanty of good games back then, and im going to hold fast to that.
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World in Conflict
The graphics are only holy-fuck-the-explosions-look-photo-realistic if you put the settings to high, but then a lot of computers can't play it. Compared to Bioshock, which still looks amazing in the low settings. The gameplay is tedious to learn and very annoying. I was just very underwhelmed by this game. I read a review about the tanks and airplanes being amazing and everything being one big, massive Lord of the Rings style war. But to me it was very small and not spectacular at all. Heck, Warcraft III is more spectacular. At least then the characters and such are larger on screen and make a bigger impact. The only good thing here was blowing up buildings, which doesn't happen a heck lot either.
Final Fantasy VII
I never got past 1/6th of this game I guess. One of the reasons is that the graphics IMO are horrid. I've seen RMXP games that look better. It's just so frustratingly pixelated. FFXI is, too, but it manages to capture a certain good atmosphere using blurring and special effects. The second is that it's just kind of boring. I'm not sure why. The characters just don't capture me. Maybe it's because I've read TOO many fanboyisms, to the point where I start disliking something even playing it. Regardless, the storyline WAS better than FFXII. But I still prefer FFXII over FFVII for having a better gameplay and graphics. I love the One Winged Angel song though. Small parts in the game like that do manage to capture me.
Aveyond I (& II)
I know this doesn't really count, because it's an indie game, but still. It's incredibly overhyped and has gotten a bazillion 10/10 reviews. So I get all excited about it, grab the game and start playing. W. T. F. The intro is horrid. It's staring at a corner of ice with two pixelated characters, with standard RMXP animations, and then a butterfly flying upwards through a very boring landscape. That's it. Then you're thrown into a town and have to do x chores (I hate games that start like this; it's so boring if you can't make a fun town that feels "alive" like this game fails to do). Yippee. FINALLY, a clown captures you! Oh, wait, you only read that you're captured. The sprites are just standing still next to eachother. A lot of bla-bla-bla later, you can finally fight things! Wow, the battle system is very repetitive, boring and old-school RPG-style. I've grown rather tired of turn-based battle systems over the years. But whatever. As a game this fails, but I have respect for Amanda for having succesfully brought an indie RMXP game onto the market.
BTW, I loved BioShock.
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I always want to tell myself "GAMES BACK THEN....SO MUCH BETTER..." but when I walk into my local used/vintage game shop, I can almost never find any old games I'm willing to buy. Even if they're only a couple of bucks, I already have all the games from, say, the NES and SNES eras that I want. And I really don't have that many of them. In fact, the only ones I'm lacking are games like Earthbound that are so expensive that I'd rather just emulate them. I think that there's a pretty equal number of games I have that are classics and games I have that are new, but fuck, I definitely can't say that the old ones were better when I don't think most of them are fun enough to buy. There are gems from the past just like there are gems now, but when you're presented with a wall of NES and SNES games like I see at that shop, you realize that the majority of them are really really shitty. I think the problem is that the only games from then that remain in our memory are the good ones. Today you can see the shit in the bargain bin, but unless you have a shop like the one I go to you don't see the bargain bin games of the past that no one bought, and when you think of classic games you only think of the good shit. You really have to have the crap games IN YOUR FACE in order to realize how many of them there were.
So like you are saying, yeah there were great games back then. But acting as if they are superior to now is insane, because both then and now we have a terrible ratio of good games to shit games, and that ratio hasn't changed AT ALL.
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I never got past 1/6th of this game I guess. One of the reasons is that the graphics IMO are horrid. I've seen RMXP games that look better. It's just so frustratingly pixelated
You must have played this like in the last couple of years then. I really dont think the graphics are horrid at all.
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^
Yea. I guess the graphics were excellent back in those days, but now to me it's worse than some older games. I guess I just don't like the style. ^^; I prefer pretty 2D graphics over blocky 3D graphics (that try to look good, not 3D graphics that are blocky on purpose and are good at it) any day.
@Velfarre: I agree. But somehow I do like older games more. Now they're amazing every now and then. Real "gems", as you said. But so far there has been no game that has been more enjoyable to me than Blood & Magic, Warcraft II or Redbeard (old Amiga game). Though I could be just nostalgic, I'm still playing these games, while I would never give Bioshock a second play through. I loved Bioshock but it doesn't hold the same value as the classics had. Maybe it's because the classics were new and raw. They hadn't been milked and improved and improved yet. Games nowadays are perfected all over, and with good reason. But somehow I'd like to see that raw feeling and originality back. Shadow fo the Colussus kind of had this, actually. I never completed the game because I just didn't feel like it, but atmosphere-wise it had the same raw feeling as old classics to me.
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The problem is that you are still talking about a few games instead of the time period as a whole. Do you realize how many BABILLIONS of clones there were back then, just like today? The games you're referring to are still the ones that survived time, but the ones that didn't still count under "older games". You're applying the attributes of the good games to an entire time period, when as a whole games are and were the same, with some ideas being rehashed like crazy and people selling out everywhere, just like today.
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Interesting... and here I considered FFIX to have the best characters in how they developed throughout the game and how they interacted with each other (compared to FFVII and FFVIII). I didn't feel like the story was the focal point of the game - but rather how this group of people journeyed together and the things they experienced.
In other RPGs the extent of characterization when it comes to relationships is Protagonist + X, Protagonist + Y, and rarely X + Y. In FFIX there are many relationships that don't involve Zidane that are brought out and developed: Eiko + Garnet, Steiner + Vivi, Steiner + Garnet, Steiner + Beatrix, Quina + Vivi, and so on. (I admit that Freya and Amarant are kind of tacked on, but I'll excuse them because it's clear that Square wanted to shove them in for the battle system). Looking back I feel that Steiner was the best developed character out of the whole bunch. His persona slowly changed throughout the journey (especially towards his feelings toward Zidane and to Beatrix and Brahne, but he stayed the same person in essence - a loyal man who truly believed in doing the right thing.)
I just didn't feel that way about the characters of FFVII or VIII - and really, to me, these relationships have made FFIX my favourite FF in the series.
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The problem is that you are still talking about a few games instead of the time period as a whole. Do you realize how many BABILLIONS of clones there were back then, just like today? The games you're referring to are still the ones that survived time, but the ones that didn't still count under "older games". You're applying the attributes of the good games to an entire time period, when as a whole games are and were the same, with some ideas being rehashed like crazy and people selling out everywhere, just like today.
I meant to say that "the best" games of back then are better to me than the "best games" now. I wasn't talking about the overall quality of the games from that time. ;)
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I meant to say that "the best" games of back then are better to me than the "best games" now. I wasn't talking about the overall quality of the games from that time. ;)
I don't understand why the two have to be separated though. Why have the best games of then and now, when you could just go for THE BEST GAMES. There is absolutely no reason to make this distinction.
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I don't know if anyone said it but...
Super Smash Bros. Brawl.
What a waste of $50. It wasn't bad, but no where near as good as I expected. I kept hearing "OMG IT 'SGREAT" and stuff, so I got it, and... Well, I only played it like 4 times since I first got it. That was about 2 months ago... Yes, I have friends to play it with, but even then It's still just "Meh..." and the online I heard was pretty bad, so I didn't even want to try. Besides, I'd just get my ass whooped by some fat guy who lives in his moms basement who does nothing but beat the shit out of people in the game. Shit...
Then that sub-space shit(Which is why I wanted the game in the first place, well that and Lucas) turned out to be boring and extremely repetitive. Like, I was expecting a deep story, I don't know why, but I was, and all I got was just a collection of Nintendo characters going through boring Nintendo worlds, just trying to get rid of the villains. Although, I did like how they made the actual villains like Warrior, Bowser and Donkey Kong villains in the story.
Sure, it has all this replay value like stickers, trophies, CDs, unlockable characters, and all that shit that I don't care about. It's only the kind of stuff people with OCD would want to collect. Seriously, I'm not motivated at all to unlock Snake or Sonic(and I still can't get over WTF Sonic is Brawl for), or collect trophies.
Maybe it's because it's almost the same thing as Melee, which I thought was pretty mediocre too, but I just... I don't know. It's not THAT bad, there are worse games to play like Virtua Quest or Children of Mana, but it isn't as good as people say.
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I don't understand why the two have to be separated though. Why have the best games of then and now, when you could just go for THE BEST GAMES. There is absolutely no reason to make this distinction.
Because the topic was games being better in the past? If you look at the bad games-good games ratio from then compared to now, I guess it would be the same or so-so. But the best games back then are better than the ones released now, so the past wins for me. They have to be seperated because that's kind of the point? xP
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Oi. FF9 from the outset was a throw back to old FFs. Final Fantasy is a fantasy setting that happened long after a science fiction setting, originally. Every old FF was about the age after/at the end of a techno age. FF9 follows suit, with chibi characters to throw back to the chibi sprites in old FF. The job classes, another specific throwback that the previous three games were hazy about. All the story events lurk back to the FF staples; like pirates, airships, variety of species (there was always Lefian, elves, dwarfs, etc) and endless side-quests and dungeons.
They managed to spin it in an original way that really livened up all the above mentioned, so that it was almost above the "FF Cliche" by being overly cliche. I don't think FF9 was over-rated whatsoever; since it's like one of the least popular FF games.
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Because the topic was games being better in the past? If you look at the bad games-good games ratio from then compared to now, I guess it would be the same or so-so. But the best games back then are better than the ones released now, so the past wins for me. They have to be seperated because that's kind of the point? xP
actually the bad games to good games ratio was higher in the past because every faggot with an amiga could make a game and the consoles were dumping grounds for watered down pc ports and arcade games. there were also MORE consoles (people seem to forget that the snes+genesis were also competing against the jaguar, 3do, and 32x) and more games in general.
it's really surprising you think the best games of 1990 whatever are better than the current games but i just don't see that as true. games today are infinitely better then they ever were and with only 3 main consoles to worry about there's actually a push to create MORE original content then there ever was. XBLA, wii-ware, and playstation store are actually encouraging this.
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Because the topic was games being better in the past? If you look at the bad games-good games ratio from then compared to now, I guess it would be the same or so-so. But the best games back then are better than the ones released now, so the past wins for me. They have to be seperated because that's kind of the point? xP
if you look at the bad games: good games ratio for 90's games that are still being talked about in 2008 then yeah it's gonna be higher than good: bad for games being released today.
are you saying something like super mario bros is inherently better than stuff like GTAIV? that's just stupid. you might like it more cos you're wrapped up in nostalgia or nintendo's bullshit, but what the heck. stop acting like you are a 90's gaming scholar ya freakazoid. games being released today are so much more advanced and entertaining when compared to old ones on equal terms.
the shit no-one likes got left behind and everyone forgot about it and the good stuff was incorporated into the best of what we've got now. of course there is still a mass of faeces in the market, cos people are stupid! but if older games were actually better in some definable way (which is a stupid idea anyway), then games would still be that way.
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For me, forget even bothering with which time period is better: there is no reason to make the distinction. That is why I don't get the argument.
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because the type of games you play now are sort of VERY, VERY DIFFERENT in complexity and gameplay than the type of shit you played 18 years ago? i don't see how you couldn't make a distinction between megaman and gta 4
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No what I mean is why do you have to say "I LIKE THE BEST GAMES FROM THEN MORE THAN THE BEST GAMES FROM NOW" when you can just say "I LIKE THE BEST GAMES"
Fuck, "I LIKE THE BEST GAMES" should be a pretty universal thing.
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it's really surprising you think the best games of 1990 whatever are better than the current games but i just don't see that as true. games today are infinitely better then they ever were and with only 3 main consoles to worry about there's actually a push to create MORE original content then there ever was. XBLA, wii-ware, and playstation store are actually encouraging this.
Idk, I wasn't talking about the games ratio. That was the other guy saying. I just kind of agreed for the heck of it.
Mario? Lol, no. I'm hardly a fanboy for any game whatsoever. I like Warcraft II more than games that are released in this age, but I'm not a Warcraft fanboy. 'Don't even play WoW, Warcraft I and only played some Warcraft III.
actually the bad games to good games ratio was higher in the past because every faggot with an amiga could make a game and the consoles were dumping grounds for watered down pc ports and arcade games.
Yea, and now we have a bazillion shitty RPGMaker, Game Maker, etc. etc. games.
I really don't know enough about games to make an actual comparison/arguement though. I was just disagreeing with whoever said that all games now are better than games back then.
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Yea, and now we have a bazillion shitty RPGMaker, Game Maker, etc. etc. games.
yeah except commercial games coming out from any smalltime developer for the nes and... amateur rpg maker games coming out on the internet aren't even remotely comparable!
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ugh......
sonic the hedgehog (360/PS3). Soooo over hyped, turned out to be dissapointing. Now I didnt HATE it, but compared to previous titles as well as secret rings, it was ass.
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Call of Duty 4
I tried to get into this because everyone likes it so much but holy crap I hated it. The single-player campaign was some sort of weird mix between Doom and Counter-Strike and it really just didn't do it for me. The multiplayer felt basically the same but with a levelling system that slowly doles out features and abilities that maybe it would have been nice to have access to in the first place (but yeah making numbers go up is fun). I guess I can see how some (most) people think its really great but when I was playing it I couldn't help but think about how I could have been playing more creative shooters with more interesting weapons and enemies. Maybe this is the Michael Bay blockbuster of shooters or something and since I don't really LOVE shooters then it's a pretty bad fit!
man find a friend who's beaten the game and play the epilogue at least. that is seriously one of the most ridiculous levels in any video game ever.
also i want to say that Final Fantasy XII is overrated but I've never actually played it because I could never get past the intro. I was honestly embarrassed to be playing the game even though I was in the room by myself.
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GTA4, it was so generic. The only thing it did great was with character ineraction in the city. The controls and all the systems sucked.
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Correct! You have selected D) All of the above
Even though they were financially successful during most of the 21st century, mankind eventually realized what a colossal mistake video games were as a creative venture and eventually had to create landfills on nearby planets and asteroids to dispose of all of the waste caused by the video game industry.
A common urban legend is that of the ghost of Ken Levine walking the surface of mars near 2KLANDFILL #78 trying to persuade passersby to complete complicated and unrewarding tasks. These rumors have NO TRUTH IN THEM WHATSOEVER and are NOT to be taken seriously. If contact with said ghosts occurs please report immediately to the social reprogramming clinic for immediate surgical care.
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holy shit hundley
A++ poster
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Halo 3, it's story sucked ass and the multiplayer was kind a dissapointment to me,
Plus anything over the first final fantasy is crap to me just because it's fan base bait.
I was told alot of good tihngs about crystal chronicles, my friend said it was really cool and the weapons were awesome and gameplay was original, so I tried it, and I beat it in somewhere around two hours excluding a bathroom break. I was so very pissed at how short it was, The only hard part of the game was the labrynth thing and that wasn't even very hard.
most of the sonic games get alot of hype and I think there crappy as hell. That's an opinion though on a non opinionated stand point most of them are good except for secre tof the rings or w/e.
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Another series I think is overrated(In my opinion) is the Zelda series, I just never saw why those games were so highly regarded, I just couldn't get into any of them.
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alright, now i know what you're talking about. i'd forgotten how much the models varied between battles and the overworld and the cutscenes. buuuut do you really still play ff9 and listen to vivi wax philosophically about what it is/....to be a human... and then go get in some random battles and fight a boss maybe and have kuja fly over on a dragon going MUAHAHHA..my plans... and think "man this is a really enjoyable experience for me"? like it seemed so poorly done that i'm actually kind of surprised that there's anyone who legitimately still thinks it's a good game! i'd never played it at all before like a month or so ago but the consensus always seemed to be that it was kind of a fuck up.
Yes, the games pretty solid. I enjoy it from time to time.
Overrated game for me?
Maybe Halo. Never got into it. But I don't know if it's overrated per se.
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Yes, the games pretty solid. I enjoy it from time to time.
Overrated game for me?
Maybe Halo. Never got into it. But I don't know if it's overrated per se.
Agreed. I will admit though, Halo 3 was awesome for a while and seemed to live up to it's hype for that time. It took me 2 weeks to realize that it is just like any other Halo game, its been done before but better. With that said, I still do play it occasionally due to the fact that there are lots of people still online and its pretty fun at most times(the new map pack sure as hell beat the previous one)
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Another series I think is overrated(In my opinion) is the Zelda series, I just never saw why those games were so highly regarded, I just couldn't get into any of them.
Well, I think that the Zelda games are really good. I've not played them all, but the ones I have played were pretty good. I can see why you'd say they're overrated, though.
This may be a far stretch (or it may be something that everybody else in the world has figured out by now) but I think one reason is the fact that people are always touting "their" console as the best. The Zelda series has become virtually synonymous with Nintendo and has always been qualitatively high and accessible to a large audience, so it's not surprising people would exaggerate a little when praising it.
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Hey guys, heres another one to add to the ever growing list:
Haze
oh dear lord was that one hyped. I don't own a ps3, but my friend bought the game and i was there with him and a couple of my other buddies. So we played it and what happened? IT SUCKED! How did Ubisoft and Free Radical screw this one up?! The only good things i can say about the game are the visuals(Chritics are wrong when they say the graphics in this game are bad), guns, nectar-powers, and the mid-story side switch. Everything else is broken from the AI to your comrades who try to see who can be a better cave man. Honestly, this game makes me want to shoot Free Radical and Ubisoft. Unfortunantly Ubisoft made a crapload of good games and Free Radical created Golden Eye 64(i think) so one mistake(a very big and overhyped one at that) should not make them be hated. Its just one game......ONE ABYSMAL PIECE OF SHIT GAME! *cools down*
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Been playing me some Okami on the Wii recently. It's not floating my boat and I keep playing it, expecting it to blow me away at any second... but it doesn't. At least it LOOKS pretty... well almost, the graphics are nice, but there this stupid motion blur filter running the whole time, it just makes the game look like a giant PSP game!
Oh, while I'm here I might as well just say that Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are shit.
Aye, Darkjak, Haze is a lump of the smelliest shit! I don't have a PS3, so you'd think it wouldn't bother me, but it does! See, if Free Radical weren't busy wasting their time on this shit festival, we'd have TimeSplitters 4 by now! Fucking assholes!
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Another series I think is overrated(In my opinion) is the Zelda series, I just never saw why those games were so highly regarded, I just couldn't get into any of them.
I'd say it's just not your thing. For some people they're the perfect combo of action, story and puzzle solving while others just don't get into it.
I love Zelda but I don't like any of the Metroid games, for example. I wouldn't call them overrated though, just not my style.
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Breath of Fire V
I had such high hopes for this game, to have them shot down to earth. Blood dragon counter and sucky characters. ;.;
Suikoden IV
The worst of the series with 1-dimensional characters and terrible graphics at some points. And a story that sucked haaaard. And the Main Character looked like a chicken/duck when he ran.
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I'd say it's just not your thing. For some people they're the perfect combo of action, story and puzzle solving while others just don't get into it.
I love Zelda but I don't like any of the Metroid games, for example. I wouldn't call them overrated though, just not my style.
nah i think it's pretty overrated and i like those kinds of things. i haven't played twilight princess, but for everything else the action is repetitive and button-mashy, the story is either dumb or just hardly there, and the puzzles fluctuate between stupidly easy and frustratingly difficult, meaning that you rarely go through a dungeon (which tend to be too long imo) and just have it be a nice, balanced, challenging experience so much as it is really easy for a while before you hit some silly cockblock you spend thirty minutes trying to figure out. they're alright at designing dungeons, but the puzzles they throw into them really kind of drag them down a lot of the time i think! and also the boss fights are kind of fun but are all ultimately really simple too.
people pretty regularly refer to them as some of the BEST GAMES EVER and they're clearly not so i'd say that's enough to qualify them as overrated!
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Halo 1 was a great game. The multiplayer, while limited, was extremely well-balanced. It was a bit slower, allowing reflexes and skill to come into play.
Halo 2 and 3 were like the toddler-friendly versions of Halo. What a horrible travesty they were. Everything is faster, weapons are way off balance, and you can jump 50 feet in the air and basically float. All the "best" players jumped, all the time.
It just makes me wonder, why IS is so difficult to break into the game industry when so many developers are morons? That's a rhetorical question, btw.
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Breath of Fire V
I had such high hopes for this game, to have them shot down to earth. Blood dragon counter and sucky characters. ;.;
Man, how is it overhyped or overrated? BoF5 wasn't hyped at all, and it hasn't gotten such great reviews either. If anything, it's a really underrated game and one of the best PS2 RPG's but Capcom's only mistake was to name it Breath of Fire because all the fans expecting another traditional/generic JRPG were disappointed.
Suikoden IV
The worst of the series with 1-dimensional characters and terrible graphics at some points. And a story that sucked haaaard. And the Main Character looked like a chicken/duck when he ran.
Agreed, easily the worst Suikoden game and a really average RPG but again, it wasn't praised and it didn't really get good reviews (I think) so I don't really see how it's overhyped or overrated. Some diehard Suikoden fans might love it (I remember when RPG told me it's better than S3 but I think he changed his opinion since then) but I have mostly seen people whining about it.
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Yeah man Suikoden 4 got pretty bad reviews. It's still overrated though, because they all gave it 5 or 6/10 and imo it should've been more like a THREE because it's by a wide margin the single worst RPG I played that generation, so yeah.
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Hey, where I was hanging out at the time of release it was overhyped. Everyone was looking forward to it and saying it was gonna be the best thing since sliced cheese when WHAMMO! Sucksville.
As for BOFQ, I read a few articles that hyped it up as an innovative, new and improved, better than ever before Breath of Fire! And again, sucksville.