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Games that Suck - UNpopular games that you loved, for some unholy reason

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Posts

  • UncleSporkyUncleSporky Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    I know.

    UncleSporky on
    Switch Friend Code: SW - 5443 - 2358 - 9118 || 3DS Friend Code: 0989 - 1731 - 9504 || NNID: unclesporky
  • NorayNoray Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    BladeX wrote: »
    People talking about Quest 64 a few pages back, yeaaaah

    Man, I loved that game when I played it, I don't know why. I don't remember it being too hard though. I think I just really liked the Elements system, and the battle radius system it had. I kind of want to play it again now

    Also, Castlevania Lament of Innocence was a lot of fun to me. I liked the story, and action was passing, but the whole orb + subweapon scheme was really cool to mess with. Also, Joachim mode

    Oh man, I didn't mind Castlevania: Lament of Backtracking at all. I remember Gabe and Tycho gave it some shit but I liked it and felt it did Castlevania in 3D fairly well.

    I liked it as well, but it had terrible level design. Like it was all identical corridors and zero exploration/platforming, so it wasn't really a Castlevania game. But I loved the story and the music, and the combat kept it fun.

    Also this voice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNJTzFecXTE

    Noray on
  • japhjaph Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Tommy LaSorda Baseball for the Megadrive/Genesis was pretty craptacularly awesome. Played it to death.

    Great Golf on the Master System.

    and bow down before:

    588036_87373_front.jpg

    japh on
  • zacharychaoszacharychaos Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Loved invisible war. Got far more amusement than I should have done out of Loki, a terribly rated d3 clone. Enjoyed Dark Sector a lot. Actually the reviews of dark sector in general baffle me, as I'm not quite sure how it conspired to get such terrible reviews. Oh well.

    As far as preferring the wrong games in series goes, I enjoyed FF8 the most and hated 6. I prefer TR legend to any of the preceding games. Deus Ex one was boringggg 2 was better harharhahar. Uhhh. Yeah.
    Hell yes Final Fantasy VIII! I liked how Squall/Leon was EASILY the most badass FF character in Kingdom Hearts. I mean all Cloud every did was pout about Sephiroth and fate.

    zacharychaos on
  • MongerMonger I got the ham stink. Dallas, TXRegistered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Schadenfreude (German)

    n: satisfaction or pleasure felt at the misfortune of others.

    pacman2_snes.jpg

    Pac Man 2: The New Adventures, otherwise known as Schadenfreude the Game, is a totally overlooked work of brilliance. Reviews were generally positive, but few even bothered to review this game. PM2 rarely gets the recognition it deserves on lists of "top obscure games" or the like. Really.

    I rented it once when I was 8 and was hooked. I found the Genesis version and a Nomad at a garage sale (score!) a few years later, and probably chewed through 45 double-A batteries playing this game.

    So awesome. Screenshots look like a platformer, but its more like a combination of Super Mario, Lemmings and The Sims.

    This game is just dripping with personality. Which is good, when the only thing you can do is point for Pac Man and hit things/people with a slingshot.
    Oh shit! I remember renting this once as a kid. That game was weird.

    And internet culture has failed for not letting me know Kirk Cameron starred in an FMV game. This kind of thing should be common fucking knowledge and referenced/ridiculed at every opportunity.

    Monger on
  • TaminTamin Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Oddly, I think I did know that, but I have no idea how or why.

    Tamin on
  • RainbowDespairRainbowDespair Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    My dirty little secret:

    One of the games I'm most looking forward to replaying on the Wii VC when it shows up is
    the N64 Castlevania.

    RainbowDespair on
  • AresProphetAresProphet Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    One of precisely four RPGs on the N64:

    aidyn_chronicles___the_first_mag_am%C3%A9rique.jpg

    Let's get the bad out of the way first: the sound is awful, from the music to the sound effects it's all poorly done and also sounds like someone has a bunch of towels wrapped around your speakers. The graphics are hideous, low-poly models with low-res textures and ugly art direction. The story is pretty bland at first but it does get interesting, sadly enough it does so in custcenes that are far too drawn out, horribly directed, and suffer from the other technical problems. There are game-crashing bugs (on a console!). The writing alternates between pretty solid and forgettably generic, though it's only hilariously bad on a few occasions. Some of the characters you'll never even use because they're just that boring, and the way the levelling system works precludes you from wanting to put new people into your party.

    There's a lot that's bad about this game. Now let me tell you why this is awesome.

    It's a classic four-person turn-based RPG. It is incredibly well balanced unless you go powerlevel for a few days. For the first quarter of the game it's ruthlessly hard, forcing you to take advantage of every battle mechanic to come out on top of a fight, and use every trick in your spellbook to even the odds. If you think you can just rush your enemies and win, this game will kick you in the teeth. About half the fights are gimmes against low-level, weak, or single creatures. The other half are basically mini-boss battles. And the boss fights will take a few dozen tries the first time through unless you're levelling a lot.

    Let's talk about the fight mechanics, because this is where the game fucking shines. You encounter an enemy, you get tossed into a battlefield where you can move your character around within a ring. You can move, then attack or cast or use an item or whatever. You get turns based on dexterity, and heavy armor reduces your dexterity, so you'll want to plan everything around positioning your tank and using everyone else to take things out. Things that can affect your chance of success and/or damage dealt in any given action: time of day, aspect of your character vs. time of day, relative terrain height between you and your enemy, direction your enemy is facing (front, flaking, behind), aspect of your enemies, spell school of you and your enemies, stats, skills, buffs, debuffs, level, and there's more I'm forgetting.

    It fights like FF:Tactics, but without tiles. Also, less soul-crushingly hard without looking things up on the internet.

    I've never played an RPG where every monster I encountered was an entertaining, tactical fight that takes as much wits as it does numbers. This is the exception. Boss fights are pretty poorly balanced but everything else is doable with a well-rounded party and the proper approach.

    Levelling up is unique and interesting... for a while. The game gives you access to far too few spells early in the game, when all spells suck, and a bunch of ones you'll never use later in the game when a few are awesome (aka the FF6 dilemma). If you don't pick a role for each character early you'll end up with someone who isn't good at anything. Your thief wants these skills, your tank wants these skills, your caster wants this, and so on. Eventually you get your party running like a well-oiled machine and you're churning through 10-12 monster fights that feel rewarding when you're done every single time.

    I said the story starts generic, but for a while it gets downright creative and original. Some of the best storytelling in this world is done through books and scrolls and inscriptions that you find throughout the world. Eventually things just become an utter clusterfuck (right after Jundar) and the way it finishes is stunningly retarded, but for a solid fifteen or twenty hours of gameplay you'll forget that it looks and sounds like it was developed by epileptic bonobos.

    Also, the world is goddamn huge and you'll spend forever exploring it. The overworld is seamless, you "zone into" caves, dungeons, and a couple of towns but otherwise spend a lot of time running, camping (camp when the sun goes down! you don't want to try fighting at night without a couple Lunar aspect characters, or wolves will eat your face), finding random shit, and generally forgetting about the rougher parts.

    This game is awesome if you give it a chance, but you probably won't because the moment you load it up you're going to want to vomit from the graphics and framerate.

    AresProphet on
    ex9pxyqoxf6e.png
  • GunstarGunstar Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    One of precisely four RPGs on the N64:

    aidyn_chronicles___the_first_mag_am%C3%A9rique.jpg

    Let's get the bad out of the way first: the sound is awful, from the music to the sound effects it's all poorly done and also sounds like someone has a bunch of towels wrapped around your speakers. The graphics are hideous, low-poly models with low-res textures and ugly art direction. The story is pretty bland at first but it does get interesting, sadly enough it does so in custcenes that are far too drawn out, horribly directed, and suffer from the other technical problems. There are game-crashing bugs (on a console!). The writing alternates between pretty solid and forgettably generic, though it's only hilariously bad on a few occasions. Some of the characters you'll never even use because they're just that boring, and the way the levelling system works precludes you from wanting to put new people into your party.

    There's a lot that's bad about this game. Now let me tell you why this is awesome.

    It's a classic four-person turn-based RPG. It is incredibly well balanced unless you go powerlevel for a few days. For the first quarter of the game it's ruthlessly hard, forcing you to take advantage of every battle mechanic to come out on top of a fight, and use every trick in your spellbook to even the odds. If you think you can just rush your enemies and win, this game will kick you in the teeth. About half the fights are gimmes against low-level, weak, or single creatures. The other half are basically mini-boss battles. And the boss fights will take a few dozen tries the first time through unless you're levelling a lot.

    Let's talk about the fight mechanics, because this is where the game fucking shines. You encounter an enemy, you get tossed into a battlefield where you can move your character around within a ring. You can move, then attack or cast or use an item or whatever. You get turns based on dexterity, and heavy armor reduces your dexterity, so you'll want to plan everything around positioning your tank and using everyone else to take things out. Things that can affect your chance of success and/or damage dealt in any given action: time of day, aspect of your character vs. time of day, relative terrain height between you and your enemy, direction your enemy is facing (front, flaking, behind), aspect of your enemies, spell school of you and your enemies, stats, skills, buffs, debuffs, level, and there's more I'm forgetting.

    It fights like FF:Tactics, but without tiles. Also, less soul-crushingly hard without looking things up on the internet.

    I've never played an RPG where every monster I encountered was an entertaining, tactical fight that takes as much wits as it does numbers. This is the exception. Boss fights are pretty poorly balanced but everything else is doable with a well-rounded party and the proper approach.

    Levelling up is unique and interesting... for a while. The game gives you access to far too few spells early in the game, when all spells suck, and a bunch of ones you'll never use later in the game when a few are awesome (aka the FF6 dilemma). If you don't pick a role for each character early you'll end up with someone who isn't good at anything. Your thief wants these skills, your tank wants these skills, your caster wants this, and so on. Eventually you get your party running like a well-oiled machine and you're churning through 10-12 monster fights that feel rewarding when you're done every single time.

    I said the story starts generic, but for a while it gets downright creative and original. Some of the best storytelling in this world is done through books and scrolls and inscriptions that you find throughout the world. Eventually things just become an utter clusterfuck (right after Jundar) and the way it finishes is stunningly retarded, but for a solid fifteen or twenty hours of gameplay you'll forget that it looks and sounds like it was developed by epileptic bonobos.

    Also, the world is goddamn huge and you'll spend forever exploring it. The overworld is seamless, you "zone into" caves, dungeons, and a couple of towns but otherwise spend a lot of time running, camping (camp when the sun goes down! you don't want to try fighting at night without a couple Lunar aspect characters, or wolves will eat your face), finding random shit, and generally forgetting about the rougher parts.

    This game is awesome if you give it a chance, but you probably won't because the moment you load it up you're going to want to vomit from the graphics and framerate.

    this game just deleted me and my friends 60+ hour file. more specifically the memory pak. summer of 05 we played this and ogre battle 64 til our minds melted

    Gunstar on
    greencall.gifredfist.gif
    Xbox : gunst4r
  • firekiunfirekiun Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Final_Fantasy_Mystic_US_boxart.jpg

    I beat this game 3 times on my SNES, love this game so much. It is not until my second play through that I realize I can use heal to kill undead.

    This and Final Fantasy 4 and the only FF that I beat.

    firekiun on
    PSN ID : Kiunch

    I play Blazblue, Soul Calibur 4, Street Fighter 4 and soon Tekken 6... yeah... so add me if you want to play any of those.
  • BlackjackBlackjack Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    firekiun wrote: »
    Final_Fantasy_Mystic_US_boxart.jpg

    I beat this game 3 times on my SNES, love this game so much. It is not until my second play through that I realize I can use heal to kill undead.

    This and Final Fantasy 4 and the only FF that I beat.
    Mystic Quest is a great game. It also has excellent music.

    Blackjack on
    camo_sig2.png

    3DS: 1607-3034-6970
  • RustRust __BANNED USERS regular
    edited June 2009
    Blackjack wrote: »
    Mystic Quest is a great game. It also has excellent music.

    Black'd for "I can't wait to hear Blackjack's explanation for this one."

    Rust on
  • stlobusstlobus Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Rust wrote: »
    Blackjack wrote: »
    Mystic Quest is a great game. It also has excellent music.

    Black'd for "I can't wait to hear Blackjack's explanation for this one."

    Not to defend the game, as it's terrible and I own it no matter how hard I try to forget I do, but maybe he's basing it on the fact that the game starts with the player being directed to follow an old man and jump off a mountain. How many games start off that way?

    None since then that I can think of, and that's why every other game since Mystic Quest's release has been better than Mystic Quest, but it still has to count for something...

    stlobus on
    PSN/SEN: lobus Steam: stlobus XBox: St Lobus NNID: Lobus42
  • BlackjackBlackjack Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Rust wrote: »
    Blackjack wrote: »
    Mystic Quest is a great game. It also has excellent music.

    Black'd for "I can't wait to hear Blackjack's explanation for this one."
    Uh...it's mindless fun?

    Blackjack on
    camo_sig2.png

    3DS: 1607-3034-6970
  • urahonkyurahonky Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Blackjack wrote: »
    firekiun wrote: »
    Final_Fantasy_Mystic_US_boxart.jpg

    I beat this game 3 times on my SNES, love this game so much. It is not until my second play through that I realize I can use heal to kill undead.

    This and Final Fantasy 4 and the only FF that I beat.
    Mystic Quest is a great game. It also has excellent music.

    Mystic Quest was fucking awesome. I don't get why people hate it.

    urahonky on
  • BlackjackBlackjack Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    urahonky wrote: »
    Blackjack wrote: »
    firekiun wrote: »
    Final_Fantasy_Mystic_US_boxart.jpg

    I beat this game 3 times on my SNES, love this game so much. It is not until my second play through that I realize I can use heal to kill undead.

    This and Final Fantasy 4 and the only FF that I beat.
    Mystic Quest is a great game. It also has excellent music.

    Mystic Quest was fucking awesome. I don't get why people hate it.
    :^:

    Not everything needs to be epic and contain mind numbing difficulty. Some things can just be fun.

    Blackjack on
    camo_sig2.png

    3DS: 1607-3034-6970
  • PaperLuigi44PaperLuigi44 My amazement is at maximum capacity. Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Monstertruckmadness.jpg

    I'll happily admit that this game was terrible. The trucks controlled the same (poorly), there was very limited weaponary (which didn't respawn until the next lap, meaning that the person in front could hog them all) and the weapons themselves? Hoo boy were they broken. Trust me, you'll never complain about a blue shell again after dealing with rockets and shields which send opponents flying ungodly distances (where there is no respawning, you just have to haul ass back to the track).

    So why do I like it? Because if you timed it right you could combine the nitrous weapon with the hover weapon to race at F-Zero speeds and pretty much win (stupid but cool) and it had a tag match where the loser turned into a chicken on wheels. Yes, you read that right.

    PaperLuigi44 on
  • eelektrikeelektrik Southern CaliforniaRegistered User regular
    edited June 2009
    One of the best multiplayer games I've ever played.
    15790-85444-MidtownMadness3Coverartpng-550x.jpg

    It still scored a respectable 80% average review score, but never achieved the popularity it deserved because it came out at the same time as the slightly higher reviewed Midnight Club 2. Where as Midnight Club 2 was made by Rockstar San Diego, formerly the maker of the original Midtown Madness 1 and 2, MM3 was actually made by DICE, and they did not disappoint.

    Admittedly MM3 had shitty singleplayer, but its multiplayer was phenomenal and was what I bought it for. I originally rented Midnight Club 2, tried it out, disliked it, went to rent MM3 but they didn't have it so I said fuck it and went and bought the game. I was playing it online every day for months, even participated in an organized league that some people I met on there threw together for fun. Good times were had.

    Now where is my god damned Midtown Madness 4?

    eelektrik on
    (She/Her)
  • ColtColt .45 ColoradoRegistered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Quest 64

    I know a lot of people who hated this game. Like...a lot of people. I fucking loved it and beat it twice.

    Colt on
    steam.pngxbl.pngpsn.png
  • LaCabraLaCabra MelbourneRegistered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Monstertruckmadness.jpg

    I'll happily admit that this game was terrible. The trucks controlled the same (poorly), there was very limited weaponary (which didn't respawn until the next lap, meaning that the person in front could hog them all) and the weapons themselves? Hoo boy were they broken. Trust me, you'll never complain about a blue shell again after dealing with rockets and shields which send opponents flying ungodly distances (where there is no respawning, you just have to haul ass back to the track).

    So why do I like it? Because if you timed it right you could combine the nitrous weapon with the hover weapon to race at F-Zero speeds and pretty much win (stupid but cool) and it had a tag match where the loser turned into a chicken on wheels. Yes, you read that right.
    I didn't know there was a 64, but I played the hell out of Monster Truck Madness for Windows 95 on my 486.

    Ran like shit but I didn't really know what I was missing.

    LaCabra on
  • SeeksSeeks Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Schadenfreude (German)

    n: satisfaction or pleasure felt at the misfortune of others.

    pacman2_snes.jpg

    Pac Man 2: The New Adventures, otherwise known as Schadenfreude the Game, is a totally overlooked work of brilliance. Reviews were generally positive, but few even bothered to review this game. PM2 rarely gets the recognition it deserves on lists of "top obscure games" or the like. Really.

    I rented it once when I was 8 and was hooked. I found the Genesis version and a Nomad at a garage sale (score!) a few years later, and probably chewed through 45 double-A batteries playing this game.

    So awesome. Screenshots look like a platformer, but its more like a combination of Super Mario, Lemmings and The Sims.

    This game is just dripping with personality. Which is good, when the only thing you can do is point for Pac Man and hit things/people with a slingshot.


    I played the fucking shit out of this game. I still play it sometimes.

    Seeks on
    userbar.jpg
    desura_Userbar.png
  • Captain_BrianCaptain_Brian Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    nemesisbx.gif

    I could not stop playing this game.

    Captain_Brian on
    Captain_Brian-ashsig.jpg
  • a Ferreta Ferret 360 Dunk from Half Court Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    xenogears.jpg

    Don't see why this gets so much hate. This is one of the three games in which I've felt any sort of emotional attachment to. Lol amnesia aside. The walls of text on disk two never bothered me in the least. In fact, I defended the fact that there wasn't "that" much text for the longest time, until I replayed it recently.

    a Ferret on
    Battle.net Polite#1852 | 3DS 2681-0927-8518 | Steam
  • RizziRizzi Sydney, Australia.Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Wild_9_Coverart.png

    Wild 9. One of the best Ps1 platformers. You could slam enemies into shit. And hold them above meat-grinders and listen to them scream. Plus it was made by Shiny Entertainment! :D
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltmnDKuqom0

    250px-Tombi_cover_pal.jpg

    One of the best games to never get the recognition it deserves. It got pretty good reviews, people just didn't fuckin' buy it, it got a sequel that people didn't buy, then the developers went out of busines, dooming the franchise to obscurity. And it's really hard to find a copy of either.

    Rizzi on
  • PrincepeachPrincepeach Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Seeks wrote: »
    Schadenfreude (German)

    n: satisfaction or pleasure felt at the misfortune of others.

    pacman2_snes.jpg

    Pac Man 2: The New Adventures, otherwise known as Schadenfreude the Game, is a totally overlooked work of brilliance. Reviews were generally positive, but few even bothered to review this game. PM2 rarely gets the recognition it deserves on lists of "top obscure games" or the like. Really.

    I rented it once when I was 8 and was hooked. I found the Genesis version and a Nomad at a garage sale (score!) a few years later, and probably chewed through 45 double-A batteries playing this game.

    So awesome. Screenshots look like a platformer, but its more like a combination of Super Mario, Lemmings and The Sims.

    This game is just dripping with personality. Which is good, when the only thing you can do is point for Pac Man and hit things/people with a slingshot.


    I played the fucking shit out of this game. I still play it sometimes.

    It must've been a couple years ago I found myself on a different forum writing an absurd, impassioned defense of this game as probably THE game that that has the most fucked up credit recieved/credit deserved ratio ever. In a way it's like the prequel to Lifeline, only instead of yelling ineffectually at a helpless woman to get nothing done you're terrorizing one of gaming's most beloved icons with a slingshot so you can watch him get harassed by a crow/kicked by a cow/crushed by a boulder for the 300th time.

    As for my own addition to this thread:
    drakengard_front.jpg

    I've heard it referred to on these very boards as Square-Enix's conspiracy to break your square button, but I fucking love Drakengard all day every day. I have never ever played a game that made me feel so OPPRESSED. I can and have argued that the gameplay needed to be as monotonous and depressing as it is, because the world of Drakengard is a place where smiles don't exist, and even the best things that happen are made of shit and disappointment and everyone is always bored, angry and depressed (and later, repeatedly dead). Where pedophilia, child-murder and incest are all concepts that can be used to describe the "good" guys. Where each of the (four!) secret endings each leave our heroes in an even worse state than the last one, forcing you to wonder why you bothered and the whole thing is combined with "music" that is essentially a never-ending rage-scream done with instruments. When you play Drakengard, you're part of this world. This terrible, soul-sucking, horrifying world.

    Plus it has some of the coolest CG cutscenes ever put on a disc. Observe:

    Princepeach on
  • CherrnCherrn Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Drakengard exemplifies this thread. That game was horrible, yet so fucking awesome at the same time.

    I get the feeling that Demon's Souls is essentially Drakengard, except legitimately good. Without dragon riding, that is.

    Cherrn on
    All creature will die and all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai.
  • SeeksSeeks Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    I've got a number of 'em.


    Mace: The Dark Age
    macecover.jpg

    I can barely remember this game, but this is one of the two fighting games I had for the 64. I recall the fatalities being pretty difficult to pull off, and coming to enjoy the game eventually despite hating it originally.


    Killer Instinct: Gold
    Killer_Instinct_Gold.jpg

    This is the other fighting game I had for the 64, and I fucking loved it. I played it constantly. Imagine the awesomeness of the original KI, except with better graphics and combos that I could actually pull off. I remember the spark effects very vividly for some reason. I wish I still had a 64, or that they'd Virtual Console this thing.


    Final Fantasy VIII
    ffviii.jpg

    FF8 is one of my favorite JRPGs, no shit. It's FF7 > FF8/FF6 > FF4 in my eyes. I don't find Squall to be as much of an asshole as everyone else, I guess. I liked the story, the menu combat, the characters, the setting, everything. The only problem I have with this game is how all the fights eventually just turn into me watching summons for ten goddamn minutes halfway through the game.


    Ultima VIII / Ultima IX
    ultima8.gifultima_ix.jpg

    Both of these games, especially 9, are hated by Ultima fans. Sure, 8 was a bit boring and 9 was a bit rushed and not 100% faithful to a lot of the Ultima tropes, but I don't care. I like a lot of 8's "platforming," and when I bought 9, it seemed like one of the coolest PC games I'd ever played. Granted, I played 9 before I played 7, but if they put 9 on GOG, I'd buy it in an instant.

    Eight had the darker, more grim necromantic feel to it, which if you're in the mood for it, was very nice. Nine had decent combat, magic, story, etc. It also came with a bunch of cool shit in the box (cards, a map, a mural, two or three manuals, all heavily "flavored," etc.). I never had any problems with it, bug-wise.


    Turok 2
    turok2.jpg

    Except for first-party staples, I put more hours into Turok 2 than any other game on the N64. I'd memorized the cheat codes and would load up at the beginning of every game and just terrorize everything. Even today, I still think it has some of the coolest weapons you'll find in an FPS, and for some reason, killing things in that game was just so satisfying.

    A Xena-like chakram (sp?)? You got it. A shotgun with special slugs that bounced off of walls and shit, criss-crossing small rooms a dozen times? You bet your ass. A little brain-boring... bug... thing, that slowly killed your enemies? Oh yeah. A bow with explodey arrows, an electricity thing that would eventually kill things if you shot them enough (but was only intended to stun), a plasma rifle that I barely used... it had all these, and you got to shoot half-dinosaur-half-men with all this lovely shit. I'm sure I'm forgetting a decent number of things, too.

    I loved this goddamn game, just for the fun of playing it. I don't remember the plot, I don't remember many of the level designs, and I only remember a small handful of enemies. This entire game was the airport level from Goldeneye for me.

    Seeks on
    userbar.jpg
    desura_Userbar.png
  • urahonkyurahonky Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    KI: Gold is so much better than the SNES game. Also, Turok 2 is the best of the series by far.

    urahonky on
  • HalfmexHalfmex I mock your value system You also appear foolish in the eyes of othersRegistered User regular
    edited June 2009
    I enjoyed the original Turok far more than any of its sequels. Turok 2 had, if I recall, horrible level pacing and a lot of forced backtracking with few (if any) checkpoints. The weapons were better for the most part, I'll grant you, but quite a few got old quickly. T2 was a solid game though, I just didn't like it as much as I had hoped I would.

    Halfmex on
  • AxenAxen My avatar is Excalibur. Yes, the sword.Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    The more I replay FF VIII the more I end up liking it.

    I do find the music to be among the best in the series. Not a day goes by I don't find myself humming one song or another from that game.

    Axen on
    A Capellan's favorite sheath for any blade is your back.
  • DuffelDuffel jacobkosh Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    One of precisely four RPGs on the N64:

    *pic*

    Let's get the bad out of the way first: the sound is awful, from the music to the sound effects it's all poorly done and also sounds like someone has a bunch of towels wrapped around your speakers. The graphics are hideous, low-poly models with low-res textures and ugly art direction. The story is pretty bland at first but it does get interesting, sadly enough it does so in custcenes that are far too drawn out, horribly directed, and suffer from the other technical problems. There are game-crashing bugs (on a console!). The writing alternates between pretty solid and forgettably generic, though it's only hilariously bad on a few occasions. Some of the characters you'll never even use because they're just that boring, and the way the levelling system works precludes you from wanting to put new people into your party.

    There's a lot that's bad about this game. Now let me tell you why this is awesome.

    It's a classic four-person turn-based RPG. It is incredibly well balanced unless you go powerlevel for a few days. For the first quarter of the game it's ruthlessly hard, forcing you to take advantage of every battle mechanic to come out on top of a fight, and use every trick in your spellbook to even the odds. If you think you can just rush your enemies and win, this game will kick you in the teeth. About half the fights are gimmes against low-level, weak, or single creatures. The other half are basically mini-boss battles. And the boss fights will take a few dozen tries the first time through unless you're levelling a lot.

    Let's talk about the fight mechanics, because this is where the game fucking shines. You encounter an enemy, you get tossed into a battlefield where you can move your character around within a ring. You can move, then attack or cast or use an item or whatever. You get turns based on dexterity, and heavy armor reduces your dexterity, so you'll want to plan everything around positioning your tank and using everyone else to take things out. Things that can affect your chance of success and/or damage dealt in any given action: time of day, aspect of your character vs. time of day, relative terrain height between you and your enemy, direction your enemy is facing (front, flaking, behind), aspect of your enemies, spell school of you and your enemies, stats, skills, buffs, debuffs, level, and there's more I'm forgetting.

    It fights like FF:Tactics, but without tiles. Also, less soul-crushingly hard without looking things up on the internet.

    I've never played an RPG where every monster I encountered was an entertaining, tactical fight that takes as much wits as it does numbers. This is the exception. Boss fights are pretty poorly balanced but everything else is doable with a well-rounded party and the proper approach.

    Levelling up is unique and interesting... for a while. The game gives you access to far too few spells early in the game, when all spells suck, and a bunch of ones you'll never use later in the game when a few are awesome (aka the FF6 dilemma). If you don't pick a role for each character early you'll end up with someone who isn't good at anything. Your thief wants these skills, your tank wants these skills, your caster wants this, and so on. Eventually you get your party running like a well-oiled machine and you're churning through 10-12 monster fights that feel rewarding when you're done every single time.

    I said the story starts generic, but for a while it gets downright creative and original. Some of the best storytelling in this world is done through books and scrolls and inscriptions that you find throughout the world. Eventually things just become an utter clusterfuck (right after Jundar) and the way it finishes is stunningly retarded, but for a solid fifteen or twenty hours of gameplay you'll forget that it looks and sounds like it was developed by epileptic bonobos.

    Also, the world is goddamn huge and you'll spend forever exploring it. The overworld is seamless, you "zone into" caves, dungeons, and a couple of towns but otherwise spend a lot of time running, camping (camp when the sun goes down! you don't want to try fighting at night without a couple Lunar aspect characters, or wolves will eat your face), finding random shit, and generally forgetting about the rougher parts.

    This game is awesome if you give it a chance, but you probably won't because the moment you load it up you're going to want to vomit from the graphics and framerate.
    I never understood why the N64 had so few RPGs when the SNES was a kind of RPG Golden Age.

    Final Fantasy 4-6, Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3, Earthbound, Crono Trigger, Live A Live, a bunch of other shit I can't even think of right now.

    Granted, some of those only came out in Japan but still.

    And yeah, I always loved FF8 the most out of all the PS1 FF's, and still love a good game of Turok: Dinosaur Hunter.

    Duffel on
  • BartholamueBartholamue Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    I really liked the first Digimon World. Training your Digimon, couped with light RPG gameplay was perfect. I remember the only site that reviewed it was IGN, and they gave it a terrible score, but it was good for people who liked Digimon.

    Bartholamue on
    Steam- SteveBartz Xbox Live- SteveBartz PSN Name- SteveBartz
  • DragkoniasDragkonias That Guy Who Does Stuff You Know, There. Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    I really liked the first Digimon World. Training your Digimon, couped with light RPG gameplay was perfect. I remember the only site that reviewed it was IGN, and they gave it a terible score, but it was good for people who liked Digimon.

    I see I'm not the only one who loved that game. Yeah, evolving you digimon was great(I was downright giddy the first time I managed to make a Wargreymon in that game). Too bad the second one sucked. It was basically a super grindy dungeon crawl with horrible load times. Which was sad since it had a way better digimon selection and I was still a big fan back then.

    Dragkonias on
  • CoffeyCoffey Terre Haute, IndianaRegistered User regular
    edited June 2009
    There were a ton of original Nintendo games that I played the crap out of. When I go back and look at titles that I spent a ton of time on, like Phantom Fighter, I can't help but wonder "what the heck was I thinking?" I must have been pretty bored as a kid because those games, even with nostalgia, can no longer hold my attention.

    Ultimate Stuntman? Demon Sword?

    Yeah...

    Coffey on
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  • KupiKupi Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    I would like to test the following hypothesis:

    Those who enjoyed Quest 64 specialized in Earth and Water magic.

    Reason being: Quest's balance was completely out of whack. Earth magic eventually unlocks a spell that renders you invulnerable for several turns, and Water magic has all the healing spells and a melee-range attack that regenerates your MP. Combine the two, and Brian is an unstoppable death-machine by dint of the fact that he can't receive damage. Any extra damage that Fire or Wind spells could give you paled in comparison.

    Kupi on
    My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
  • BladeXBladeX Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Axen wrote: »
    The more I replay FF VIII the more I end up liking it.

    I do find the music to be among the best in the series. Not a day goes by I don't find myself humming one song or another from that game.

    If there's a song that can take me back to my younger days in an instant it's the Balamb Garden theme.

    BladeX on
  • BasilBasil Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Kupi wrote: »
    I would like to test the following hypothesis:

    Those who enjoyed Quest 64 specialized in Earth and Water magic.

    Reason being: Quest's balance was completely out of whack. Earth magic eventually unlocks a spell that renders you invulnerable for several turns, and Water magic has all the healing spells and a melee-range attack that regenerates your MP. Combine the two, and Brian is an unstoppable death-machine by dint of the fact that he can't receive damage. Any extra damage that Fire or Wind spells could give you paled in comparison.

    You may be right. I know I liked my earth magic.

    Basil on
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  • zacharychaoszacharychaos Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    It must've been a couple years ago I found myself on a different forum writing an absurd, impassioned defense of this game as probably THE game that that has the most fucked up credit recieved/credit deserved ratio ever. In a way it's like the prequel to Lifeline, only instead of yelling ineffectually at a helpless woman to get nothing done you're terrorizing one of gaming's most beloved icons with a slingshot so you can watch him get harassed by a crow/kicked by a cow/crushed by a boulder for the 300th time.

    That is awesome. But "terrorizing" is kind of a strong term, Pac Man had it coming ;)
    FF8 is one of my favorite JRPGs, no shit. It's FF7 > FF8/FF6 > FF4 in my eyes. I don't find Squall to be as much of an asshole as everyone else, I guess. I liked the story, the menu combat, the characters, the setting, everything. The only problem I have with this game is how all the fights eventually just turn into me watching summons for ten goddamn minutes halfway through the game.

    I never did get why people disliked the game until I heard that argument. It seems like FF8 had a compromise: There was the complex-but-rewarding Junction system, and the overpowered-as-shit summons. I mean, I never used summons after the first hour. But then I find out by making that argument I am a "fanboy snob".

    If you play that game again, don't ever power-level, draw new magic when you see it, and balance your character development using that magic. It really isn't that complicated, and you should never have to waste your time with summons. Plus it was the only game I know of where the card game was extremely valuable- you can change the cards into powerful magic, and get endgame spells on the first disc.

    zacharychaos on
  • DuffelDuffel jacobkosh Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Quest got pretty broken by the end of it. Drain magic basically meant you could chain powerful spells even without the immunity.

    EDIT: And yeah, I never used summons in FF8 either, not just because they made it too easy but also because I got sick of watching them over and over again. Summoners are my least favorite Job in the FF world so it wasn't much of a sacrifice.

    Duffel on
  • RockinXRockinX Registered User regular
    edited June 2009
    Spoony Experiment was doing a Let's Play of FF VIII but takes a lot of breaks. From what I saw there, the game is comedy gold because of how ridiculous the story is.

    RockinX on
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