Good series/games/movies that are hard to recommend because of specific reasons.

[RedDeadFred]

The Malazan Book of the Fallen.

It's unfortunate that the weakest book in the series is the first one, Gardens of the Moon. Erikson was still a new author at this point and the quality of his prose isn't all that great yet. He has a 10 year gap between writing the first and second book and presumably he'd practiced his craft a lot as the writing is noticeably better.

Gardens of the Moon also throws you into the world with no explanation whatsoever. There is very little exposition and the stuff we do get is often overheard in conversations we don't fully understand or through the thought process of a variety of unreliable narrators. Fans of the series love this, but it definitely pushes a lot of people away.

Finally, the book ends with something that could easily be perceived as a Deus ex Machina since you don't have the context provided by later books yet.

 

[BrawlMan]

High School of the Dead

Why?

Well...

Spoiler: Matrix Boobs NSFW

If you haven't seen that video and cannot, just read the title. That title is not a hyperbole...a sniper fires a bullet that her left boob dodges one way then the right boob dodges the other. The sniper also lays across a girl to fire the rifle as the shoulder strap gets stuck on her and the jiggle physics are on full display with every shot...

I enjoyed the series but Anime is....well....Anime. Awfully hard to recommend this series to people without looking like a giant perv as every episode is filled with upskirt and fan service. Basically, I can only recommend this to people I know will have no problem with it and understand that Anime is...well...Anime

I tried to like Highschool of the Dead, but I found it too boring. They were basically Romero style zombies with not that much effort. Most of the main cast I found annoying and I could tell who was gonna be part of the main group and constantly survive encounters killing all of the suspense. For the record, I read the manga before the anime came out, and the former is still on a hiatus, which only further proves my point.

God Hand has a steep learning curve, and you will die a lot on your first playthrough. The dynamic difficulty is a bit broken. Dodge or successfully do an attack raises the level meter and enemies get harder. I died 89 times on my first, but on my second play (New Game Plus) my deaths were cut in half. Once you know how the customization moves work, or getting down enemy patterns, the game becomes a lot more manageable. Though Hard mode is another story, as you will die even more on a new game in that difficulty.

Bayonetta 1 & 2 if you are sensitive to fan service, but it's not as bad as you see in the DOA games. The gameplay blows games like DmC Reboot, God of War and its clones out of the water. Bayonetta surpasses even DMC4 in terms of the amount of weapons, level design, and moves you can do. At least until DMC4: Special Edition which only beats Baynoetta in the amount of characters you can play as, but that does not add much to a game that is nearly ten years old now.

Kill La Kill is show that is hard to recommend because of the fan service and a slow start. Despite the all of the crazy awesomeness that happens early on, nothing plot relevant goes on until the 7th or 8th episode. It's all the more ironic as a spiritual successor to Gurren Laggan, KLK goes off with a more satisfying ending. Gurren Laggan had a great start, but got worse after the time skip, and the "fuck you audience" of an ending.


Ninja Scroll (the original movie, not the unrelated TV show) is hard if you are sensitive to gore, and main female character gets raped twice by two different villains. The rapes don't last or linger for very long, but it still be uncomfortable for any one. If you stick around though, you will find anime with beautiful and detailed art, animation, and kick-ass action that 90s anime had to offer. Not to mention there are genuine moments of heartwarming, tear-jerking, and nightmare fueling scenes. Some of the scarier scenes in Ninja Scroll could work as a horror movie. Give it at least one watch.

 

[Dalisclock]

Edit - I always find it hard to recommend anything by Tim Schafer, the early Lucas Arts stuff is great (although a little dated in delivery now) but his failure to deliver on crowd funding promises and his (personally annoying) soap box politics make suggesting he receive any sort of funding just galling. Having said that, I have always argue art should be separated from the person in terms of being judged and I sort of try to bear that out... it's hard.

Yeah, I love the man's older work and even feel that Brutal Legend was a good game that could have been a great game if the 2nd act hadn't been rushed as all hell, but the whole Broken Age thing has put me off him somewhat and none of his other recent stuff has really done it for me.

I hope Pyschonauts 2 is a return to form and I will certainly put down good money for it if the reviews are positive, but I refuse to give the man any money for a promise. I generally avoid pre-orders anyway but TS in particular shows he can't handle crowdfunding/pre-orders.

 

[Schadrach]

Antichamber: The ending, while somewhat pretty, just sucks ass. Would still recommend playing though.


Payday 2: Unlocking weapons and weapon mods this slowly or even just the very fact of having to unlock them all just SUCKS.

Antichamber: Fantastic game, terrible ending. Would love to see MatPat play through it on GTLive, after seeing him do Please, Don't Touch Anything.

Payday 2: You have to unlock them all every infamy (equivalent to CoD prestige) as well (you don't have to buy them again, but you have to meet level requirements again). The thing is, it's not hard to get your level high enough to get access to most of them. Even moreso once you get your first silencer. Just do a few jewelry store or bank heists on the highest difficulty you can access, and do it quiet. If anyone finds this difficult, I can run you through the strategy, or even run you through the heist on deathwish a few times. Jewelry Store is easy to solo, Banks typically require two to do easily (only because of the emergency buttons being both in back and at the tellers, which means you need to be careful).

Well, not so much struggle to recommend, but generally give a big warning to - Azumanga Daioh.

'yeah, its basically peanuts but with these really funny Japanese high school girls, only there's this one teacher named Kimura who basically perves on them anytime he's on screen, and says inappropriate things around them, and they all find him really creepy and uncomfortable to be around, and me makes my skin crawl every-time he's on screen.'

I can top that. There's a fantastic slice of life manga about a teacher and a few of his students and coworkers. It's filled with a bunch of complicated love triangles to the point that one issue included a diagram of character relationships that is painful to look at. A fair bit of humor and more than a few touching moments.

Here's the thing:

1. The kids all have fucked up home lives. Several of the adults also have fucked up childhoods.

2. About half the love triangle bits involve *wildly* inappropriate pairings. Like one of the examples involves a grade school girl who has a crush on another grade school girl, who has a crush on her teacher who another teacher has a crush on that he is totally oblivious about.

3. It's manages to somehow get more pedo-y while simultaneously getting *less* creepy as time goes on.

I speak, of course, about Kodomo no Jikan. /thread

I think a good example from the first few chapters is when Aoki realizes that the reason the previous teacher left the position and went to a mental hospital is because Rin had bullied him that badly. As soon as he comes to that realization, he turns, and sees her standing there with her panties at her ankles (not showing anything because the school uniform has a skirt) and she just looks at him and says "If I scream really loud right now, what do you think will happen?"

Mind you, she ends up with a crush on him within a few chapters (and she is entirely the driving force behind that relationship, he basically goes from oblivious to disturbed to protective to finally giving in), and they do a big time skip in the last chapter just so they can hook up (they basically fast forward until she's legal). Also, her second cousin is her guardian, but explicitly hasn't adopted her because he's grooming her to eventually end up with him, because he largely views her as a replacement for her mother who he had a thing with at one point, rather than as her own person. There's a whole arc where the teacher moves in with them to try to straighten them out, and that gets...weird.

It's bizarre, it's tries very very hard (and succeeds) not to be lolicon hentai while tracing that edge too closely for a lot of people (they banned discussion of it as a work from TV Tropes, for example). But it's fantastic. I can't stress that it's a well written slice of life about some messed up but interesting people living with their assorted baggage enough.

 

[happyninja42]

The original 8mm film with Nicolas Cage. One of my favorite films of all time, for the emotional payoff it gives. It sends you down this very dirty and uncomfortable rabbit hole, and the whole time you are just wanting someone to DO SOMETHING! And when that finally happens, awh man, it's gloriously cathartic.

But, it's a movie about the porn industry, specifically the underground porn industry around snuff films (fake or not). As well as the sex industry in general, which, as presented in the film, is fucking skeezy as all hell. So it's very difficult to suggest to anyone, because of the subject matter. But damn, it's so good, at least to me anyway.

 

[Catnip1024]

High School of the Dead

Yeah, that would be an awesome series if it learnt to tone it down a bit. I remember trying to rewatch it at one point and just giving up, it was so overdone.

OT: Alpha Protocol. Not many people seem to like it, and I can kind of see why, it was full of bugs and glitches and depending how you played was borderline impossible or stupidly easy. But it was also incredible, and there's nothing that's quite replaced it's niche.

Alien vs. Ninja. One of my favourite films of all time, however a little bit on the barmy side. It's one of those where I might recommend it, but only to certain people.

 

[McElroy]

Undertale: The bullet hell combat is straight up annoying. And not in a nicely challenging and/or funny way. I mean, you can definitely get through it if you really want to but... FFS. I don't like it and I'm not the only one. It just makes the barrier to entry, gameplay wise, needlessly higher.

I think it's a tragedy and a travesty that people think this way. The shmup is a founding genre and it was popular before gaming or gamers even existed. Damn these spoiled brats for not enjoying it.

 

[Catnip1024]

Also, the band / guitarist "J". Because you try telling someone: "There's this band called J, you should look them up". Unless you know a song title, it's virtually impossible to find anything on youtube.

I hate it when bands / artists do that.

 

[BrawlMan]

I think we need some more games in here.


Far Cry 2: DON'T rush things. Take your time. Plan things out and realize that this game's AI is REALLY good at flanking you. Again, just take your time with everything. If you put in the time, you will love this game incredibly so.

Ninja Gaiden II: The Incendiary Shuriken Ninja. So fucking ridiculous, you literally have to spam invincibility frames just to get through them even half-way unscathed. BUT they can be beaten indeed. And even with those turds in the game, I'll STILL sing its praises because I have not yet seen its like for a depressingly long time... It's core combat is so slick and powerful and fast and smooth, and the rest of the enemies for the most part are a joy to destroy.

I could give FC 2 another chance, but the checkpoint system was just horrible. There is reason why I never bothered with any Far Cry games after Instincts (XBOX/360). That said, I would play 2 over 4 or Primal.

NG II was just a broken mess at launch. The difficulty was ungodly fair even on Normal. And then you had the whole game crash, if you got to a certain part of the game from downloading one of Tecmo's mission pack DLCs. The only way to get past the game crash was to either delete the mission packs, or go in to your 360's hard drive and input a button combination. It cause me quit and I said "Fuck this, I am playing something else!". If I do pick a Ninja Gaiden game ever again, it's either going to be the NES classics (not to fond of those either) I was always more of a Shinobi guy, if we're talking about classic ninja platformers., Ninja Gaiden Sigma I & II or maybe Razor's Edge.

 

[Arnoxthe1]

Antichamber: Fantastic game, terrible ending. Would love to see MatPat play through it on GTLive, after seeing him do Please, Don't Touch Anything.

Payday 2: You have to unlock them all every infamy (equivalent to CoD prestige) as well (you don't have to buy them again, but you have to meet level requirements again). The thing is, it's not hard to get your level high enough to get access to most of them. Even moreso once you get your first silencer. Just do a few jewelry store or bank heists on the highest difficulty you can access, and do it quiet. If anyone finds this difficult, I can run you through the strategy, or even run you through the heist on deathwish a few times. Jewelry Store is easy to solo, Banks typically require two to do easily (only because of the emergency buttons being both in back and at the tellers, which means you need to be careful).

Yeah, I seriously would have preferred a text ending that wrapped things up instead of what we had.

My brother is also a huge Payday 2 fan. And even he... Yeah, we both have it out for unlocking systems. lol But yes, thank you for offering to help me and stuff. Don't worry. I got my bro here to help. Although perhaps we should all add each other to our friends list. I dunno.

I think it's a tragedy and a travesty that people think this way. The shmup is a founding genre and it was popular before gaming or gamers even existed. Damn these spoiled brats for not enjoying it.

Hey, the shmup genre is a fine genre to be sure. I mean, I love me some Raptor: Call of the Shadows. But shmups, especially the hardcore japanese ones are not for everyone. And the way Undertale does it as well is annoying to me. Not enough of course for me to quit the game or even not recommend it. But just enough to be bad. I'm sorry, but people got Undertale to play an RPG, not a shmup.

I could give FC 2, but the checkpoint system was just horrible. There is reason why I never bothered with any Far Cry games after Instincts (XBOX/360). That said, I would play 2 over 4 or Primal.

NG II was just a broken mess at launch. The difficulty was ungodly fair even on Normal. And then you had the whole game crash if got to a certain part of the game from downloading one of Tecmo's mission pack DLCs. The only way to get past the game crash was to either delete the mission packs, or go in to your 360's hard drive and input a button combination. It cause me quit and I said "Fuck this, I am playing something else!". If I do pick a Ninja Gaiden game ever again, it's either going to be the NES classics (not to fond of those either) I was always more of a Shinobi guy, if we're talking about classic ninja platformers., Ninja Gaiden Sigma I & II or maybe Razor's Edge.

Are you talking about the guard checkpoints or the save system on the consoles?

Ohhhhhhh... c'mon now. It's HARDLY unfair. Again, the IS ninjas were bad but everything else is very doable. I love this quote from the head developer of it too. Basically, unlike in other games, the enemies in NG2 aren't there to give you a challenge or anything as much as they're there to actually kill you. Although to be fair, I was a really good Ninja Gaiden Black player before I came to NGII so that probably helped. lol

 

[BrawlMan]

Are you talking about the guard checkpoints or the save system on the consoles?

Both. One time I tried to get to a save spot only for some guys in a jeep ambush and killed me, forcing me to back track and nearly do everything again from scratch. Tedium and frustration was an understatement.

Ohhhhhhh... c'mon now. It's HARDLY unfair. Again, the IS ninjas were bad but everything else is very doable. I love this quote from the head developer of it too. Basically, unlike in other games, the enemies in NG2 aren't there to give you a challenge or anything as much as they're there to actually kill you. Although to be fair, I was a really good Ninja Gaiden Black player before I came to NGII so that probably helped. lol

Ninja Gaiden Sigma (never played the original nor Black) seemed a lot more fair in comparison. I played it at a buddys who owned a PS3. I remember Itigaki's statement, and he can go screw himself on that one. If you had fun with NG II, I shall not blame you. For the record, this is coming from a guy who did runs of Dante Must Die with little to no trouble on DMC1-4. But everyone has different skill levels and patience.

P.S - We gotta have more conversations later; this was fun.

 

[Hawki]

Doom 3: It's slow and not all that great if you babywalk it as the game intends you too. So just ignore that and blaze right into everything with a gun in your hands, only pausing when you need to. It sounds really counterintuitive, I know, but it makes it SO much more fast-paced and fun. It's incredible.

I've found that running and gunning usually means you die quickly in Doom 3.

I'd certainly reccomend Doom 3 though - it's personally my favorite Doom game. Those who love 1 & 2 might be put off (replace "might" with "are" in some cases), but I think it's a well done piece of sci-fi horror. Gets a spot in my top 10 FPS.

Exactly the same, even as a committed atheist I found the Amber Spyglass to just be almost bigoted in its repeated attacks on Christianity and the massive heavy handedness of it imagery and metaphors, a shame because book one was great.

Funnily enough, I feel book 1 to be the weakest so far (only about 50 pages into Amber Spyglass, so I can't comment on that yet). It's certainly the most subtle in its allusions, but unfortunately I have to spend all my time with Lyra. Also, as I mentioned earlier, Lyra's world is fairly interesting, but for me, a lot of that interest comes from how it's portrayed in contrast to our own world, rather than being interesting on its own merits.

Come to think of it, why couldn't Asriel be the protagonist? All of book 2 tells us about what he's supposedly doing, but come on, let me see it. He's planning a rebellion against God while Lyra is watching movies. ;p

 

[Arnoxthe1]

Both. One time I tried to get to a save spot only for some guys in a jeep ambush and killed me, forcing me to back track and nearly do everything again from scratch. Tedium and frustration was an understatement.

Ninja Gaiden Sigma (never played the original nor Black) seemed a lot more fair in comparison. I played it at a buddys who owned a PS3. I remember Itigaki's statement, and he can go screw himself on that one. If you had fun with NG II, I shall not blame you. For the record, this is coming from a guy who did runs of Dante Must Die with little to no trouble on DMC1-4. But everyone has different skill levels and patience.

P.S - We got have more conversations later; this was fun.

Far Cry 2, more than any other FC game, (maybe besides the very first one) doesn't fuck around. Especially the console version since you can't just save anywhere you want to. (BTW, I used to play FC2 on console too for a while before I switched to the PC version since I don't play my 360 anymore.)

If you wanna be good at Far Cry 2; if you want to thrive in this bleak jungle of human amorality, there is one law you really really need to know. And that is the law of... Positioning and cover. I was once able to hold off WAVES of enemy soldiers in the city because I was nestled in a good spot and I checked my flanks constantly. And furthermore, I did this using only my machete and using their shitty rusted weapons too. You should add me sometime on Steam if you like and I'll stream it so you can watch.

Now, since you have the console version, you don't have the luxury of saving all the time. But what you DO have over the PC version is auto-aim. If you keep clicking the left trigger while slowly turning in a circle, your aim will sooner or later lock right onto an enemy even if you're crouching in the grass or in foliage and you can't see shit. This is incredibly useful and greatly helps to balance it out from not being able to save as you want.

Ninja Gaiden Sigma is just Black really except a little suckier and with a fresh coat of paint and a couple of things slapped on. The thing is though, Black is kind of a slower more defensive game than II is. More focused on 1-5 enemies on the screen at a time instead of the 6+ that NGII now expects you to deal with like a big boy along with the generally faster slicker gameplay. It's generally tougher but it's still fair. In fact, sometimes even MORE fair than NGB. Take Awakened Alma for example. In NGB, the only way to score a hit on her was literally if the game let you score a hit on her. That was it. The only thing you could do besides hope that you dodge her annoying ass attacks was to keep spamming Flying Swallow on her and pray that you would magically score a hit.

But nevertheless, I DO love Black! It's just, I consider Black and II two separate games in the end really and Black, to me, is just generally kinda easier and more methodical. Also, with the exception of the Dragon Sword, each enemy in Black had an optimal weapon to use against them. In II, this is much less true. Every weapon can stand on its own. Itagaki has pretty much said this himself.

PS: Thank you!

I've found that running and gunning usually means you die quickly in Doom 3.

Nope.

 

[ErrrorWayz]

Doom 3: It's slow and not all that great if you babywalk it as the game intends you too. So just ignore that and blaze right into everything with a gun in your hands, only pausing when you need to. It sounds really counterintuitive, I know, but it makes it SO much more fast-paced and fun. It's incredible.

I've found that running and gunning usually means you die quickly in Doom 3.

I'd certainly reccomend Doom 3 though - it's personally my favorite Doom game. Those who love 1 & 2 might be put off (replace "might" with "are" in some cases), but I think it's a well done piece of sci-fi horror. Gets a spot in my top 10 FPS.

Exactly the same, even as a committed atheist I found the Amber Spyglass to just be almost bigoted in its repeated attacks on Christianity and the massive heavy handedness of it imagery and metaphors, a shame because book one was great.

Funnily enough, I feel book 1 to be the weakest so far (only about 50 pages into Amber Spyglass, so I can't comment on that yet). It's certainly the most subtle in its allusions, but unfortunately I have to spend all my time with Lyra. Also, as I mentioned earlier, Lyra's world is fairly interesting, but for me, a lot of that interest comes from how it's portrayed in contrast to our own world, rather than being interesting on its own merits.

Come to think of it, why couldn't Asriel be the protagonist? All of book 2 tells us about what he's supposedly doing, but come on, let me see it. He's planning a rebellion against God while Lyra is watching movies. ;p

OMG you are totally wrong how could you prefer something different????

I seem to remember the first book being more of a mystery for me, I liked the slow reveal. The second book seemed more "I know mental stuff is about to happen because..." Hope you enjoy the Amber Spyglass, I found myself skimming it to a degree at the end. Fully agree, not enough Asriel.

 

[Battenberg]

Resident Evil 4. It's my absolute favourite game of all time but I'm well aware the control scheme is a massive pain in the ass for a lot of people.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Cabin in the Woods.

Every time I try to sell it to people that I think would like it, it turns into a 15 minute explanation into why I can't tell them exactly what happens, but that they should totally still see it because it's awesome.

Then the next question is: "Is it scary?"

I always stumble upon it because I feel like no matter how I answer I will give it away.

I have the same problem trying to recommend that film. Every time they ask why, I just let out an exasperated sigh and tell them "no-one can be told what this film is, they have to see it for themselves." It basically picks up the whole genre, scrunches it into a ball, draws colourful squiggles all over it then throws it back at you. And now watching any future titles in that genre will never be the same.

For another addition, a film called Predestination. The name, cover and synopsis all points towards genericsville; time traveller dude from future (Ethan Hawke) tasked with finding the elusive culprit behind terrorist bomb attacks throughout the 70's to avoid a catastrophic attack and stop them for good...Ooh, will he find them in time? The edge of my seat has already fallen asleep!
Except it starts to become clear that the film is going for something else entirely by halfway through the second scene. Once you figure out that the information given to you was counter-productively a bit of a red herring, it gets its' hooks into you and never quite lets go. But I cannot even say anything without giving away the joy of the mystery unravelling. Except that it is a very unique film.

Maybe the film Lucy is best going in blind too. I had trouble trying to not explain that to friends also.

 

[happyninja42]

Maybe the film Lucy is best going in blind too. I had trouble trying to not explain that to friends also.

I would argue that the movie isn't good, and thus no amount of trying to explain it will help. xD But that's just me. That movie irked me on so many levels, I was bonking my head on the seat coushin in front of me at the theater.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Maybe the film Lucy is best going in blind too. I had trouble trying to not explain that to friends also.

I would argue that the movie isn't good, and thus no amount of trying to explain it will help. xD But that's just me. That movie irked me on so many levels, I was bonking my head on the seat coushin in front of me at the theater.

I agree it had some very stupid ideas as its' backbone, and Morgan Freeman should know better than to encourage them. But the spectacle of how bonkers it decides to go and commit to its' very stupid idea, is entertaining in its' own right. But yeah, definitely a flawed idea. Perhaps the redeeming quality for me was not knowing anything about the film going into it.

 

[sageoftruth]

Almost anything that's a deconstruction of something. Sadly, deconstructions can be pretty unremarkable to people who are unfamiliar with the content being deconstructed.

 

[Einspanner]

While 'X' is an amazing full season anime, the ending is so emotionally brutal and hopeless that it's hard to recommend unless you're into that kind of thing. If you are, then watching 'Old Yeller' on a loop is probably a quicker way to convince yourself that life is a futile and ugly exercise.

Maybe the film Lucy is best going in blind too. I had trouble trying to not explain that to friends also.

I would argue that the movie isn't good, and thus no amount of trying to explain it will help. xD But that's just me. That movie irked me on so many levels, I was bonking my head on the seat coushin in front of me at the theater.

If you knew absolutely nothing at all about science or medicine, except what you read from Deepak Chopra while you were squeezing one out, then I think it would have been just about "Okay".