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Recommend on: Obscure Games
MundaneSoul
fight fighterDaehan MingukRegistered User regular
fight fighterDaehan MingukRegistered User regular
I've been getting into offbeat/unknown/underrated PS2 games lately, since I can take a chance on them for dirt cheap. God Hand is far and away my favorite pick up so far (and I got it for 11 bucks), but I thought I'd reach out to the collective PA hive-mind and see if I can dredge up some delicious black box goodness.
I've been looking at games like Freedom Fighters, Gladius, Yakuza, or Radiata Stories, and I'm pretty much open to any genre.
Hit me!
EDIT: 1/21
Changed the title to include discussion of ALL your favorite obscure games. I'll still take recommendations on your favorite obscure/underrated PS2 games, though.
I've been looking at games like Freedom Fighters, Gladius, Yakuza, or Radiata Stories, and I'm pretty much open to any genre.
Hit me!
EDIT: 1/21
Changed the title to include discussion of ALL your favorite obscure games. I'll still take recommendations on your favorite obscure/underrated PS2 games, though.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ObsCure_II
If you like shmups, you could do well to pick up a copy of Raiden III.
Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
Persona 3 and 4
Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne
Breath of Fire Dragon Quarter
Odin Sphere
Any of the Shadow Hearts games
Shadow of Destiny
All of these are JRPGs, except the last which is more of an adventure title.
Fight Night took the the bulk of the controls from it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZJTWz20lAg
Combat system wasn't as good as the first game but had a more cohesive plot, and more customization.
Also R-type final was preaty damn awsome. Also Sky gunners was a blast nice celshadded arcady flight sim type game. The lock on system takes some getting used to though since the camera focuses on your target instead of where your going.
Also, you get to stretch women who have breasts that are roughly five times the size of the rest of their bodies.
Everyone needs to experience this at least once. (The game, not stretching gigantic breasts.)(Well, maybe the breasts too, if that floats your boat.)
http://www.racketboy.com/retro/sony/ps2/2008/11/the-best-undiscovered-playstation-2-ps2-games.html
However, I'm going to recommend a title none of you have probably played.
Gregory Horror Show:
It is basically a survival horror for children, crossed with a point and click, where everyone has giant square heads.
It is a strategy game with both turn based and real-time elements. The turned based elements occur on the map where you move your troops around and decided where to go and what terrain to fight on. The real-time part happens when you actually fight, you decide when to fire and what to aim at. And also if your troops are out in front or in cover behind.
Oh and did I mention your squad is made up of giant walking tanks? Oh yeah, huge mechs that can be customized.
Ico - sort of like a beautiful puzzle/adventure game
Odin Sphere - a beautiful, creative, sort of actiony RPG
Gitaroo Man- a music-rhythm game in which your character defeats enemies with the power of rock; really unique style and crazy yet catchy music
Gradius V - the perfect Gradius shmup. Beautiful, the perfect length, tough and challenging yet completely fair. One of if not the best shmup on the PS2
RType Final - one of the best RType shmups; while it suffers from occasional slowdown, the level design and number of ships and weapons and enemies provides tons of variety and replay value
Contra Shattered Soldier - also a hard-as-nails 2D shooter in the traditional Contra vein, this game looks and runs great and has slick 2.5D presentation. Great for contra / action fans.
Alien Hominid - Another 2D shooter, Alien Hominid pays homage to the classic 2D shooters, such as Metal Slug and Contra. Whacky and humorous 2D style and excellent music, this game has a great sense of humor and great controls, lots of variety, insane enemies and creative levels.
King of Fighters XI - The newest edition of the long-standing King of Fighters series, this is considered one of the best iterations of the game since perhaps 2002 or even '98. Beautiful presentation, tons of characters, and a slick battle system including free-switching 3v3 battles.
Guilty Gear Accent Core - Another slick 2D fighting game, the latest edition of GGXX on the PS2, this is one of the most fast-paced and insane 2D fighting games ever. With insane and unique character design and presentation, it also provides a tremendous variety of moves (and combos) across all kinds of different play styles. To top off its extremely deep fighting gameplay, it is also very well balanced
PsiOps: The Mindgate Conspiracy - a really cool 3D action game in which you have a variety of psychic powers. This game is everything that Star Wars Force Unleashed was trying to be, except, about a thousand times better and more fun.
Klonoa 2 - a lighthearted yet extremely addicting 2.5D platformer
The Red Star - kind of like a strategic top down arcade style beat'emup/shooter
Castle of Shikigami 2 - one of the best Bullet-Hell type shmups on the PS2; this game has tons of characters each with their own unique abilities and Special attacks. Take on lots of crazy/insane levels and enemies as you dodge hundreds of bullets that fill the screen in beautiful fireworks displays. Play with the cutscenes on for extra hilarity; then turn them off
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Killer7 (gamecube version [version I played] is supposedly better, but I'm sure this one's fine too)
Okami (another Clover game, and my personal favorite)
Steambot Chronicles (weird sandbox-style steampunk, mecha, dating-sim, jrpg)
Shin Megami Tensei Devil Summoner Raidou Kuzunoha vs the Soulless Army (yes, that's the whole title)
Katamari Damacy (super weird but kind of well known)
R-Type Final (one of the best shmups I've ever played)
Edit: Oh man, I didn't notice your avatar, MundaneSoul. I love Buckethead, I've seen him 4 times live, never gets old.
Huh. Not only have I never heard of the game (it never was released in Ameriland), I've never heard of the Japanese CGI series it's based on... and Wiki claims it's been running constantly since 1999.
Edit: How could I forget Gitaroo Man? Wonderful stuff.
I concur with this. Ring of Red was a great game.
You go to amazon/ebay
You type in 'Tomba!'
You buy Tomba
You get this:
Yes it's a PS1 game...but it works on the PS2, so ha!
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Thing to note though, this game was only released in english in PAL countries. You won't find an american release for it even though it was translated and the show even came out on DVD here.
As for my obscure title, I'll recommend Chulip. It's a game about kissing people, turtles, ghosts, whatever the fuck. If it's not an inanimate object, it's up for some smooches. It's also a tough as nails adventure game that really wants you to die at every turn. It was a gamestop exclusive for a while for some reason but it shouldn't be too hard to find as nobody except me and maybe 4 other people ever bought it.
Anything that begins with the words "Shin Megami Tensei" is usually a good place to start.
More generally speaking, anything with the word "Atlus" on the front of the box can be assumed to be obscure as hell, and in most cases, awesome.
This website is fantastic. Thank you.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
With music by Blue Man Group. This cannot be overlooked, as the music is fucking phenomenal for a shmup. Fantastic game, but if you're looking for a more visceral twitch shooter, Gradius V is the way to go. They are two of the best shmups to come out of the last (or any) generation. In addition to this, Einhander by Square for the PS1. Another amazing game.
I don't think it was released on the PS2, but Ikaruga was fantastic as well, for a bullet hell/puzzle game. And yes, it's a puzzle game. Anyone saying otherwise was confused by the vertical scrolling, space ships and bullets.
Devil May Cry 3. Haven't played Blood Will Tell, but Onimusha is by far inferior to DMC.
That's a PS1 game!
Though it's got the obscurity factor, for sure.
Anyway:
The Red Star is better than almost anything you could be playing right now.
The Sword of Etheria (EU release of the game Oz, has PAL/NTSC selector, and multiple language dubbing!) has better brawling than The Red Star, though.
Global Defense Force (EU release of the game EDF 2) is better than anything you could be playing right now, aside from EDF 2017.
God Hand is not obscure on these forums, so we're not allowed to mention it in the "overlooked/obscure/underrated" threads.
Chulip is a good game if you like games about stalking people so that you can find the right time and place to kiss them.
It was made by former employees of the generally insane game studio Love-de-Lic. Former employees of Love-de-Lic have gone on to make such things as Tingle's Rupee Land, the bitgenerations games on the GBA, the Art Style games on Wiiware, and Rule of Rose. Fortunately(?) for you, of those games listed, the people who made Chulip have only worked on Rule of Rose.
I'm seeing this a lot, but I guess I don't understand why. What is so fantastic about it?
Definitely Devil May Cry 3. It's actually better than 4, unless you count graphics (but the PS3/360 game has a bit of an advantage, there).
A word of warning: No not get the original version of DMC3. There is a Special Edition that came out - that's the one you want. Why? Well, when DMC3 first came out in NA, here's what happened...
It is balls-crunchingly hard. Why? Well, the NA version of DMC3 kind of... changed up the difficulties, compared to the original JP version.
JP Hard Mode = NA Normal Mode
JP Normal Mode = NA Easy Mode
JP Easy Mode = a difficulty option we didn't get, because Capcom wanted to laugh and point there fingers while their game beat the bloody shit out of us. In fact, many reviewers actually docked points because - while fair - the game was absolutely unforgiving. It loved kicking your ass six ways from Sunday. But you love God Hand, so it's entirely possible you can handle DMC3 normal mode. If not...
Do not despair! All hope is not lost. A while after DMC 3 came out they released the Special Edition. This version has all sorts of new bells and whistles, but most importantly it makes the difficulty modes fall in line with their Japanese counterparts. Now when you start the game on Normal mode (it will still kick your ass) you'll feel a lot more capable of completing it, instead of giving up because you couldn't get past the miniboss in the second stage like... me.
I'm sure you could track down an individual copy of the Special Edition somewhere, but why go through all that effort? Capcom was kind enough to release the PS2 Trilogy for the low-low price of thirty bucks! You get DMC1, the classic original (still worth a play) and the Special Edition of DMC3!
There's also another game sandwiched between them, but let us not speak of that atrocity. That abomination. That aborted foetus of hellspawned offal.
Onimusha 3 is slower paced as it is less combo-centric and involves more puzzle solving and the like than DMC3. DMC3 is fast paced and tough as nails, very combo centric, and very deep and complex with its battle system.
Blood Will Tell's hook iirc is the story and boss battles. The gameplay was devised by the same team that did Shinobi (PS2) and Nightshade (PS2). That's about all I know about it. I personally was a huge fan of Shinobi and Nightshade,but I never got a chance to try out Blood Will Tell.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Ended up selling it.
The definitive hack'n'slash in my book.
Beat'd, on page 1. Did ya proud :^:
I stand corrected. :^: So now two people know that game exists.
Well, it's got good graphics (for a PS2 game) and nice presentation.
It's also a combination of a solid-feeling beat-em-up and a shooting game (navigating waves of bullets while shooting the core... not kidding). There's character customization (points you earn based on your performance in each level can be used between levels to buy new weapons/upgrades), well-designed levels and bosses, 3 different characters, 2 player simultaneous play, and yeah (YEAH!). It's a solid game that in spite of being obviously inspired by games like Contra and UN Squadron, injects enough of its own feel that it doesn't feel blandly derivative.
In short, it's a game that's just plain good, and isn't expensive.
*blink*
What.
Don't get me wrong, that's awesome. But how the hell did everyone manage to miss that fact?
Edit: Ah, Wikipedia is our friend. If by "music by Blue Man Group" you mean "one song from Blue Man Group," then yes.