Bad games that got GOOD reviews

random_bars

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Vykrel said:
i feel most people here dont get the idea. its not "i suck at this game or i couldnt get into it, therefore it is bad".

i am terrible at Team Fortress 2, and i couldnt get into Fallout 3, but i know they arent bad.

on topic: i really hated Enemy Territory: Quake Wars. i bought it used, along with CoD2 and 3, because of the lack of games being released at that time. it was truly awful. it was confusing, very difficult to complete objectives, had terrible team AI, and the enemy AI was ridiculously overpowered. the game has about an 85% on both Metacritic and Gamerankings.

speaking of Call of Duty 3, that game was also piss-poor... easily one of the worst games i have ever played in my life. it is beyond me how it has over an 80% on MC and GR. i would give it a 5, at the MOST. but i gotta say. Treyarch showed a massive improvement in WaW and Black Ops. those are both genuinely good games. i suppose they just didnt give much effort into CoD3
Pretty much this. There are games which I didn't enjoy at first, but then tried a different approach and found them a million times more fun - but whenever people mention the game online, they played it the first way, and have all the same complaints I did before I realized I was doing it wrong. Similarly, there are games which I don't enjoy, but am fairly sure I'M playing wrong, because I see other people enjoying them and talking about the game mechanics to a depth I never even realized existed.

Essentially, people don't generally enjoy games unless they're good in some way. If there are people who enjoy a game you don't, it's unlikely that their brain is just wired up wrong, and more likely that they're either playing the game differently or are simply in a different mindset to you when playing.
 

floppylobster

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Rise of the Robots receive a highly controversial 90% score from Computer and Video Games magazine.

Play it and you will be on the floor laughing. (unless you paid for it)
Rise of the Robots[/youtube]

I worked for a game distributor at the time. The marketing manager had bought thousands of copies. He hyped it up for months. When it arrived we all gathered around to see it. He played it for about 5 minutes then walked off bored. There are two buttons, a jump, no special moves, and no way to jump over your opponent - and took about 8 minutes to complete the entire game. And this at a time when StreetFighter II was around. It retailed for around $120 and I felt so bad for the people who bought it.
 

ShotgunZombie

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OhJohnNo said:
Mr Shrike said:
Call of Duty 4 through 7.
Aww, and here I was thinking it was gonna be something earth-shattering like Portal or Ocarina of Time. But no, it's a game series that will not get you flamed - too many people on here share that exact opinion (except maybe about CoD 4...)
Wish granted! My choice goes to Portal 2, which at the moment holds an ungodly 95% on Metacritic. Now don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Portal 2 but I'm not entirely convinced that it's the holy grail of gaming that most think it is. Those exposition moments drag on forever.
My runner up is Assassin's Creed 2. Good gameplay, but god that ending, ugh...
 

CrimsonBlaze

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Pokemon Black & White (from the perspective of a long time fan).

It's not a "bad" game, but it certainly isn't the best (or not as good as people have made it to be). Pokemon have been in motion since Pokemon Stadium and could have had this feature since the GBA versions. The Experience system is different and adds a higher degree of difficulty (all good things), but forces you to move on to other areas instead of just one place to grind. The new Pokemon...you either hate them or love them and I'll leave it at that. Team Plasma (?) is essentially is essentially PETA (if PETA employed animals to do their bidding), and N is pretty bad as a villain (I actually felt sorry at how bad his character was). You don't get the titular legendary until the very, very end of the game, and the whole experience is simply not the best in the franchise.

Flame Shield...ON!
 

MattRooney06

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Not quite sure about the Escapist user's oppinon of Halo so i may be setting myself up for a royal flaming but pffft

yeah Halo.... always found it Dull, had bad controls, no originality and pretty bad level design

on top of that I allays found it cripplingly stupid that you were supposed to be this awesome, bad ass super soldier with near impenetrable power armor, but if you so much as got a burst of fire in your direction you had to run and hide T_T
 

Warforger

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R4ptur3 said:
only had 4 factions,
So did the original, it was just Orks, Space Marines,Chaos and Eldar.

R4ptur3 said:
and a quite short campaign.
Most RTS campaigns aren't that long since it's the only genre in which the multiplayer undisputed-ly shits on the singleplayer.

R4ptur3 said:
I have never understod it. DoW I was much better by miles. Myabe the expansions were better, but i just didnt want to waste money on them if they were similar to DoW II.
It's whether or not like you smaller battles with less units vs. bigger battles with more units. Personally I can't stand RTS's like DoW I or Starcraft anymore since I've gotten pretty used to RUSE, and so panic that my camera doesn't zoom out enough, then get bored with the lack of the recon system that RUSE has.

But yah, DoW II "innovative" in the same way Battlefield 3 is innovating i.e. by taking features of old games in this case Ground Control but in BF3's case older BF games along with Flashpoint games.
 

ComicsAreWeird

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mariofan1000 said:
Rise of the Robots got pretty good reviews (at least on the amiga) but was just kind of shit.
Aww, man. I bought that game on my Sega Mega Drive (Genesis)when i was a kid and i agree.It was kinda shitty (the graphics weren´t bad thought).
 

Snotnarok

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Yeah OP you beat me to it, Metroid Other M was awful and the fact that there's Metroid fans, no let me correct myself Metroid Fanboys that liked it, is really scary.

The bad: Stupid control scheme, story lifted from Fusion and made dumber, voice acting, forgettable characters, the Ridley Scene, the music, the STUPID RIDLEY SCENE

The Good: Well I got 34bucks when I sold it.
 

duchaked

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OhJohnNo said:
Mr Shrike said:
Call of Duty 4 through 7.
Aww, and here I was thinking it was gonna be something earth-shattering like Portal or Ocarina of Time. But no, it's a game series that will not get you flamed - too many people on here share that exact opinion (except maybe about CoD 4...)
LOL yeah...I can't say I'm going to argue FOR the CoD series, but I have to say CoD4 was pretty legit
 

Spawny0908

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opeth1989 said:
L.A Noir, everyone seems to like it, but i absolutely hated it. It got absolutely great reviews by alot of game reviewers, but for me personally, its one of the most dull games i have ever played.

The crime scenes were basically move till you feel your controller shake, and the interogations were awful. but this is just my opinion i guess.
I agree. I played it and finished it. Started a playthrough and for the life for me I didn't want to play it anymore and quit. Good game but it's so damn repetitive!
 

Starke

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Xavier323 said:
Starke said:
TraceurRyuk said:
Mass Effect 2: Admittedly I never played the first one. I imagine a major part of it is the story, which for the most part, I ignored.
Agreed. There's especially an issue in that ME2 doesn't even have a plot to speak of.
Um... It has a main character that encounters a conflict and through a series of events reaches a climax. Isn't that the definition of plot?
Only at the most abstract level. By that definition someone masturbating in the bathroom is a plot. Though even under that definition Mass Effect is dodgy at best.

For one thing there is no narrative climax. A plot is more than "random stuff happens, and then a goat giant terminator baby". A plot implies that there is some connective themes, elements, or just goddamn anthropomorphic rabbits, anything. Anything is precisely what we don't get here, every single mission is isolated off into it's own little sub-continuity streams with minimal regard for what has happened elsewhere.

If the only missions in the game were the tutorial mission, the first colony, recruiting Mordin, recruiting Grunt (maybe), the second colony, the collector ship, the derelict, and the endgame, and you might be able to convincingly claim the game has a plot, unfortunately, that represents about 12% of the game, and the remaining 88% has nothing to do with anything, and a bit more than half of the game is mandatory to progress the game triggers.

As a result, this isn't a plot. Hell, ignoring the endgame map, there isn't even a real gameplay climax. Each recruitment and loyalty mission has some combat challenge escalation as it progresses, but, honestly, the missions don't generate a sense of increasing stakes, or difficulty.

Ergo, no plot. No point. No hope. Goodnight.
 

the.gill123

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Bioshock 2, it got a 9.1 on IGN, I hate that site. Apparently if a game gets a 7 it means it's average, in what world is 7 average?
 

HerbertTheHamster

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Pretty much anything this site gives good reviews. DA2 instantly springs to mind

video game reviews are seriously the bottom of the journalism pit. It's more classy to review porn.
 

nightwolf667

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Xavier323 said:
Starke said:
TraceurRyuk said:
Mass Effect 2: Admittedly I never played the first one. I imagine a major part of it is the story, which for the most part, I ignored.
Agreed. There's especially an issue in that ME2 doesn't even have a plot to speak of.
Um... It has a main character that encounters a conflict and through a series of events reaches a climax. Isn't that the definition of plot?
No, oddly enough for a game it does not.

Exposition

The exposition introduces all of the main characters in the story. It shows how they relate to one another, what their goals and motivations are, and the kind of person they are. The audience may have questions about any of these things, which get settled , but if they do have them they are specific and well-focused questions. Most importantly, in the exposition the audience gets to know the main character, and the main character gets to know his goal and what is at stake if he fails to attain his goal.

This phase ends, and the next begins, with the introduction of conflict.
[edit] Rising Action

Rising Action is the second phase in Freytag's five-phase structure. It starts with the introduction of conflict.

'Conflict' in Freytag's discussion must not be confused with 'conflict' in Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch's critical apparatus to categorize plots into types, e.g. man vs. society. The difference is that an entire story can be discussed according to Quiller-Couch's mode of analysis, while Freytag is talking about the second act in a five-act play, at a time when all of the major characters have been introduced, their motives and allegiances have been made clear (at least for the most part), and they now begin to struggle against one another.

Generally, in this phase the protagonist understands his goal and begins to work toward it. Smaller problems thwart his initial success, and in this phase his progress is directed primarily against these secondary obstacles. This phase shows us how he overcomes these obstacles.

Thus, at the end of this phase and at the beginning of the next he is finally in a position to go up against his primary goal. this part begins after the exposition.It consists of a beginnings of a tension or complication that continues with the development of conflict between the characters.
[edit] Climax

The point of climax is the turning point of the story, where the main character makes the single big decision that defines the outcome of their story and who they are as a person. The dramatic phase that Freytag called the 'climax' is the third of the five phases, which occupies the middle of the story, and that contains the point of climax. Thus "the climax" may refer to the point of climax or to the third phase of the drama.

The beginning of this phase is marked by the protagonist finally having cleared away the preliminary barriers and being ready to engage with the adversary. Usually, entering this phase, both the protagonist and the antagonist have a plan to win against the other. Now for the first time we see them going against one another in direct, or nearly direct, conflict.

This struggle results with neither character completely winning, nor losing, against the other. Usually, each character's plan is partially successful, and partially foiled by their adversary. What is unique about this central struggle between the two characters is that the protagonist makes a decision which shows us his moral quality, and ultimately determines his fate. In a tragedy, the protagonist here makes a bad decision, which is his miscalculation and the appearance of his tragic flaw.
[edit] Falling action

Freytag called this phase "falling action" in the sense that the loose ends are being tied up. However, it is often the time of greatest overall tension in the play, because it is the phase in which everything goes most wrong.

In this phase, the villain has the upper hand. It seems that evil will triumph. The protagonist has never been further from accomplishing the goal. For Freytag, this is true both in tragedies and comedies, because both of these types of play classically show good winning over evil. The question is which side the protagonist has put himself on, and this may not be immediately clear to the audience.
[edit] Resolution

5th -In the final phase of Freytag's five phase structure, there is a final confrontation between the protagonist and antagonist, where one or the other decisively wins. This phase is the story of that confrontation, of what leads up to it, of why it happens the way it happens, what it means, and what its long-term consequences are.

The side portions of Mass Effect 2 have plots, the companion collection quests and the loyalty quests, but each plays out more like it's own short episode in a television series rather than part of the cohesive whole. There's a plot there,a beginning, middle, end, climax and denouement where they reflect on their actions and wind down. These are actually very good.

However, Shephard's story, the main plot of the game is virtually non-existent. To have a plot, or even a character arc, the character is required to end up in a place that is different from where they started. What was the point of stopping the Collectors? Yes, they were puppets of the Reapers and yes, they were creating a "Human Baby whatever". Why? Who cares. It doesn't actually matter. It's a mcguffin, but it means nothing to Shepherd's overall story. The Horizon mission the Collector's ship/the Derelict Reaper, and the Collector's Base. There's nothing connecting these threads together except the Illusive Man. These are events, not plot points.

A plot requires that a character have a journey, that they learn something, that they end up in a place at the end of the story that is different than where they began. I could argue that Shepherd's death at the hands of the Collectors at the beginning is meaningless, and it is. Shepherd gains nothing from it and learns nothing from it. We have Cerberus as a stand in for the Alliance, but there is literally difference between them. Shepherd could have been working for Alliance and it would have been the same game. Shepherd gains nothing and learns nothing (except for the shiny ship and the leather, but that's not plot or character growth now is it?). In fact, if one wiped out the events in the game that act as the main plot...we'd still have the exact same game.
 

Starke

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GeneralSeasick said:
Fallout 3. It takes an established series and for me completely throws huge chunks of the original plot out the window.
The plot, or the world building? I mean, my perception was always that it was this fan game, where "let's bring in the Enclave because they're awesome" and the GECK as some magical terraforming device were just tossed around in spite of the setting's established history. And the less said about Vault 87 the better...

I mean, I enjoyed Fallout 3, but, this is not the setting that had previously been laid out.
 

Tanis

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Aug 30, 2010
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Even though I sound like a 'hipster' for saying so...
FF7

Lame/stupid characters.
Poor story.
Bad (in a OMG, LOOSER!) villains.
Mediocre OST - the best songs are the ones 'covered' by The Black Mages
& 'LETS MAKE EVERYONE THE SAME' + broken-ness battle system.

Yeah, when it first came out I was confused as to WHY reviews loved it so much and as the years have gone by I only get MORE confused.
 

Waaghpowa

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Apr 13, 2010
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Pretty much any game that made it big on the Xbox 360, mostly exclusives but other multi plats like Bioshock 1+2 and Cod.
 

MGlBlaze

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After I really enjoyed Call of Duty 4, Call of Duty: Black Ops was game sludge. Forgettable characters and the same problem of enemies killing you far too easily on higher difficulty levels, but for all of the game's shortcomings, the biggest fault I found was the pacing. All the levels blend together under the massive wave-after-wave of guys to shoot. Call of Duty 4 had moments where you could look around, or just take in the atmosphere while taking a break from the usual shooting. I remember no such moments in Black Ops, which caused serious fatigue and make the game far less enjoyable for me than it already was.

Haven't played World at War though I might; I am still determined to not touch Modern Warfare 2 even with a barge pole long enough to stretch across the English Channel.
 

DSK-

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I'd have to say the likes of Dragon Age 2, Spore and a few others I can't think of at the moment.