Great Obscure Games

[EzraPound]

Anything you can find on common editorial lists of the greatest games ever--Deus Ex, Planescape: Torment, X-COM, etc.--is not obscure, since while they may not have sold well downloads would have retrospectively elevated their notability.

My vote goes with True Love '95--a hentai game, but also the best in the genre, and if you distilled its gameplay and recontextualized it in a commercial release (say, for DS or 3DS) it would likely sell gangbusters. Even on GameFAQs, its user score is 9.1--compare that to the fives and sixes often given to hentai games--which says a lot.

It isn't that obscure, but King's Bounty--the forerunner to the Heroes of Might and Magic series--is, in my opinion, superior to almost any JRPG of the period, and as addictive as Civilization or Pirates!. Shadow Warrior--which was developed by 3D Realms after Duke Nukem 3D, but never really caught on commercially--may deserve a nod here, too, if only for its vibrant level design, which takes you everywhere from downtown Tokyo to floating sky islands to martial arts dojos populated with anime babes.

2001, Anachronox was pretty good CRPG final Fantasy in a Space setting

I'll second that--Anachronox is a great take on JRPGs, done with Tom Hall's signature humour and developed using the (then dated) Q2 engine.

Space Station: Silicon Valley is one of my favorite N64 games. You're a processor chip that takes over the bodies of robotic animals. Each type of animal has their own stats and special abilities. It has a quirky sense of humor and was actually made by the same people who later made Grand Theft Auto III.

This one's fantastic, too--in my opinion, as good as Ocarina of Time, and like Body Harvest the fact you commandeer different animals in a 3D environment hints at the character of GTA III, which DMA Design would later develop.

 

[Nouw]

Defining obscure is hard.

Psychonauts, Shadow of the Colossus...those AREN'T obscure. That much is certain.

But I gotta mention Lock's Quest for the DS. The biggest publicity that ever saw is a newspost in Penny Arcade.

I know I played it! Fantastic game it is.

I have to say Aliens Versus Predator 2, hardly anyone knows about it now or ever.

 

[ado01]

The Void:
You play a recently deceased individual that has entered The Void.
The Void used to be filled with colour but the Brothers and sisters squandered it, colour doesn't like to be wasted.
You're givven one of the sisters hearts, a method through which to harvest, and bestow colour, and you must try to pass as a brother in order to avoid your destruction.
This game is very fucking pretty, fairly simple, but remarkebly hard to play as you must keep at least one of your heats filled with colour lest you simply fade away.

Seconding The Void. I still don't think I really understand what the Void was all about; my best interpretation of it is a metaphor for the creative process. But I'm also nominating Pathologic despite all of its horribleness. Though I think The Void was fucking beautiful and had much MUCH better gameplay, the story of Pathologic affected me a lot more.

 

[Thaluikhain]

More or less anything by Spiderweb. Great games, fantasy RPGs that are suprisingly not Tolkienesque, and great worldbuilding and story.

Though, the Geneforge games you could argue were science-fictiony rather than fantasy...magic in that world was all about genetic engineering, which is usually seen as a sci-fi concept.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

Sanitarium - It's a point-and-click adventure game released in 1998 I think. I haven't heard much from this game even in gaming forums.
It's a psychollogical thriller, from Wikipedia :

Sanitarium tells the story of Max Laughton, a man who suffers from amnesia after getting in an car accident and awakening in an asylum. As the story progresses, Max frantically tries to unveil the details of his institutionalization and the search for his own identity.

I think it's a teriffic game, the story is great, the way it's told and how it gets deeper and wackier but always being somehow connected to the character's past.

You are like the only other person that I'm aware of that's played that game. I remember playing it though, it was really weird, but I remember playing the hell out of that game.

I wish I still have it.

 

[A Weary Exile]

Mystical Ninja. Incredibly funny and original, although I must admit the platforming and combat sucked hard. It pokes a lot of fun at anime, the main character can even go "Super Saiyan".

 

[Raykuza]

Everyday Shooter and echochrome on PSN.

 

[XX Y XY]

Judging by the games listed in the original post... I'm going to go out on a limb and say the perfect game for you is Star Control 2 for the 3DO. Now available online at sc2.sourceforge.net/ Now more commonly known as Ur-Quan Masters. Trust me, no fan of the space sim genre should go without playing this hidden gem of a game. Though I admit the learning curve can be a bit steep. But that is how I prefer it. My personal pick for best obscure game ever. XP

 

[RicoGrey]

Terra Nova, and Nox. Neither game sold well, both games I enjoyed greatly.

 

[Telumektar]

snipidipity

You are like the only other person that I'm aware of that's played that game. I remember playing it though, it was really weird, but I remember playing the hell out of that game.

I wish I still have it.

Haha, nice to know there are more of us.
I remember playing that game when I was like 11/12 in 99' or 2000. I used to play at my best friend's house, we would spend hours trying to decypher everything, for our young minds it was pretty tough and quite weird (a bit frightening too).
The game is divided in three or four major acts and I think it booted and ran from the CDs, so back in the day you needed three CDs to boot those different parts. I remeber that the first time we played it, after beating the first chapter (which took us a whie) we had to replace one CD for the another, we then discovered that the damn thing was corrupted and, as a result, we had to wait for months until we got our hands on another copy (mind that downloading it wasn't even an option).

 

[moretimethansense]

The Void:
You play a recently deceased individual that has entered The Void.
The Void used to be filled with colour but the Brothers and sisters squandered it, colour doesn't like to be wasted.
You're givven one of the sisters hearts, a method through which to harvest, and bestow colour, and you must try to pass as a brother in order to avoid your destruction.
This game is very fucking pretty, fairly simple, but remarkebly hard to play as you must keep at least one of your heats filled with colour lest you simply fade away.

Seconding The Void. I still don't think I really understand what the Void was all about; my best interpretation of it is a metaphor for the creative process. But I'm also nominating Pathologic despite all of its horribleness. Though I think The Void was fucking beautiful and had much MUCH better gameplay, the story of Pathologic affected me a lot more.

I have that too, unfortunately I can't play it since I genuinely can't figure out what it's asking me to do.
Damn shoddy translation, thouh I have heard there's a mod to help with that.

 

[moretimethansense]

Snip

Ouch, that sucks.
Another one that's (sorta) played it here, I got it, installed it, played through the first room then never touched it again.

Not because it was a bad game or anything, I just never thought to, I'll have to give it another try I distinctly remember thinking to myself "This game is right up my alley, I'm defo going on this later" never did though...
I wonder why?

 

[Jazoni89]

Well, every game on the Dreamcast except for maybe a dozen popular titles (such as Jet set radio, Shenmue, and Sonic Adventure) can be called obscure.

Blue stinger, and Record of Lodoss war are two good examples of good obscure games for the system.

Also, their's a metric fuck ton of obscure gems on the original Playstation as well. Titles such as Zero Divide (a bizarre, but good robot fighting game that was published by the the now dead UK developer Ocean), Crazy Ivan (a cool mech game where you fight tigers with rockets!?), and Loaded (a gruesome, and gory top down shooter).

Thumbs up for the guy who mentioned Baten Kaitos, it's one of my favourite games, and it's obscurity is downright criminal.

 

[Durananrananrananran]

Klonoa: Door to Phantomile on the PSX.

SERIOUSLY! NO ONE I KNOW HAS EVER HEARD OF THIS GREAT GAME!

Yes - great game.

It's hard to think whether a game is really obscure, or just good but not famous... from my collection, here goes:

Lomax (PSX) - like Rayman but with a Lemming. Psygnosis made the best 2D backgrounds and they are the reason this game is great
Discworld 2, Discworld Noir (PSX) - could be the last ever classic point and click games? I picked these up at a boot fair for less than £1 each, and was pleasantly surprised when I looked on ebay

And from the DOS days:
Boppin - block destoyer with cool animation
Tyrian 2 - PCified vertical shmup that lets you buy weapons at a shop between levels and play with a mouse.

These are probably not that obscure at all. It's pretty rare you come across something you've never heard of that amazes you...

 

[ten.to.ten]

Terranigma. I can't emphasize how much I love Terranigma.

Terranigma's a fantastic game, it's a real shame that it was only released in English in PAL territories, then again, I was so used to America getting all the good RPGs at the time that I was glad to at least have one exclusive.

Secret of Evermore. A Secret of Mana clone, to be sure, but it was still a great game, IMO.

This too, Secret of Evermore gets a lot of hate online because people falsely believe that Square decided to release it instead of an English language version of Seiken Densetsu 3, but I absolutely loved it and I even prefer it to Seiken Densetsu 3.

To contribute to the thread, I'll add Earthbound. It didn't sell particularly well and if it wasn't for Ness being featured in Smash Bros. almost no one who didn't get it when it first came out would have even heard of it.

 

[Avaloner]

Well alot of great games already named, Terranigma is just awesome, but secret of mana beats it just by an inch, secret of evermore is awesome, I'm kinda wondering why noone has yet mentioned Chrono Trigger, but I guess everyone is aware of that game allready.

A rather old school game for me and at a time rather obscure based on the cruel nature of a possible "machine" uprising is "I have no mouth and I must scream" that game is just woah.

Well than we got "Hammer of gods" I really liked that game, in its very basics you could say it was a mix between civilization and heros of might and magic.

Maybe two newer rpg "Gems" for me are septerra and Summoner, Summoner was awesome, bad luck that its sequel sucked so much, Septerras world just was great, loved the story, the fight between companions and the way the companions themself could go.

My Snes "obscure" as in "most overlooked" games are Front Mission-Gun Hazard,Metal Max 1 and 2, Robotrek and Soul Blazer.

 

[end_boss]

Jade Cocoon for the PSOne in 1998. Awesome JRPG.

Flashback from Delphine Software(dead) 1992.

I don't know if those are really obscure or not however.

I knew I'd forget something! Flashback and its spiritual predecessor, Out Of This World (aka Another World) are AMAZING games.

 

[redisforever]

Not sure how far back I can go but I'll assume that Xbox is fair game.

Voodoo Vince. Painfully Obscure Xbox Exclusive Platformer which I rank slightly above Beyond Good and Evil and slightly below Psychonauts in terms of "Xbox Platformers."

Ooh, yes. That's a good one. I love it. I doesn't work on the 360, but that's why I love my old xbox. Had a fantastic soundtrack.

Anyways, my game is The Last Express. Look it up, or I'll just end up praising it for 3 hours. The Collector's Edition is $10 now on DotEmu. Includes the soundtrack.

 

[Twad]

magic carpet 2 by bullfrog.
silpheed : superdogfigther (dos)
sea legends by Ocean

 

[lobster1077]

Deadly Premonition. It's just awesome, it's got an excellently bizarre plot and terrific dialogue. Not to mention it features Gabe Newell as a character.