I REALLY Want to Like You!

[Terramax]

Simple enough guy, tell everyone about games you really WANTED to like, maybe even to the point of forcing yourself to play again and a gain, and tried to convince yourself you liked, but came to the conclusion it was impossible to like, or get into the game.

For me, recently, I bought Virtual On for the Sega Dreamcast, and with a conventional pad, the game just feels unplayable.

Not only is 1 analog not enough to control movement and targeting, but the auto-targeting is just confusing, disorientating, and jerky to get used to, something I think even a twin analog would not help.

After a few days of forcing myself to play over and over, switching between 4 control styles, I eventually gave up.

Another game, years back, was 'The Longest Journey'. I'm quite a big adventure game fan, but this game was just horrendous, despite what good reviews said. Terrible dialog, a completely unlikeable main character, and static locations that just looked murky and horrible even 10 years ago.

So, what's yours, past or recently?

 

[Extra-Ordinary]

Mass Effect.
Be aware, I'm not saying it's bad, I'm just saying it doesn't click with me. Which is weird, because I like it's level of open-worldness, I love sci-fi, I hear it has a great story and I'm a sucker for good stories and I enjoy all those things in other games but in Mass Effect, with all those things thrown into one place, I don't know, I think there's something I'm not getting. I have tried twice to get through the first one and I just couldn't. I hear the second one is an improvement in every way but I need to start from the beginnings of franchises. Don't ask me why, I just do. Maybe I should go back and try again... AGAIN.
Heck, I got through Devil May Cry 2 with BOTH characters (another thing I HAD to do) just to get to the new DMC, I'm sure I could slog through Mass Effect.

 

[AgentLampshade]

Assassins Creed III. I'm a big fan of the franchise and even cared about Desmond's story to a degree (they provided a nice break from the constant go-to-mission, do-mission, repeat strategy of the main games) but I can't bring myself to like ACIII. The reasons why are obvious and I recall thinking "how long until the end of the game?" Not very long after starting Connor's story.

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

I really wanted to enjoy Dark Souls. The environments and enemy design looked pretty cool and the boss battles look like something out of Monster Hunter (in a good way). The one thing that just kept putting me off is the lack of a story and the lack of any form of motivation to what I'm meant to be doing.

I'm not saying that having a minimalist plot is a bad thing. Hell, some of my favourite games like Doom, Monster Hunter and Team Fortress 2 practically give you one paragraph of text as to why you're doing anything but they still at least give you some form of motivation. In Doom you're killing the demons because they want to take over Earth, In Monster Hunter you fight the monsters because they are ravaging towns and to make better equipment, In TF2 you have mission objectives and you fight a rival team who wants to do the same objectives but for different reasons.

With Dark Souls I just wander around aimlessly until something happens and even then, I don't know why.

 

[xefaros]

I really wanted to enjoy Dark Souls. The environments and enemy design looked pretty cool and the boss battles look like something out of Monster Hunter (in a good way). The one thing that just kept putting me off is the lack of a story and the lack of any form of motivation to what I'm meant to be doing.

I'm not saying that having a minimalist plot is a bad thing. Hell, some of my favourite games like Doom, Monster Hunter and Team Fortress 2 practically give you one paragraph of text as to why you're doing anything but they still at least give you some form of motivation. In Doom you're killing the demons because they want to take over Earth, In Monster Hunter you fight the monsters because they are ravaging towns and to make better equipment, In TF2 you have mission objectives and you fight a rival team who wants to do the same objectives but for different reasons.

With Dark Souls I just wander around aimlessly until something happens and even then, I don't know why.

Sadly the story is hard to find on Dark Souls not that there isnt one.I believe that was intentional so you can feel like you are the player and not someone put in someone else shoes.The story is told by the items and thats why the creator(miyazaki) suggested to take a item that gave no benefit and had no other link to the game aside from what you wanted to be.Like any equipment is yours you might feel that you own a part of the story

Spoiler: DS lore

That dude build up the wiki(not the site the content)

 

[Amethyst Wind]

Dragon Age: Origins.

The only other Bioware game I'd played was Mass Effect, which I thought was great. So I thought this'd give me a chance to overcome my general lack of interest in the western RPG. Of course by this time the game had millions and millions of DLC so I picked up the complete edition with it all on a second disc (which I later sold for a profit, go me).

Anywho, installed the DLC and then started playing the game. Instantly got bored. Gave up within 2 days having been through Ostagar twice and went and found Shale.

Sold the game.

A few months later I decided to try it again. Once more got the complete edition because Fuck You EA that's why.

Tried a different class this time, went for the most drunk, belligerent jackhole dwarf I could. Still no fun. Sold it for cost and then gave up. It sucked.

Want to know what game really got me into the Western RPG genre (though not medieval western RPGs)?

Fallout 3.

A first-persn game and I hate first-person view.

How's that feel BiowarEA?

 

[The Wykydtron]

I really wanted to enjoy Dark Souls. The environments and enemy design looked pretty cool and the boss battles look like something out of Monster Hunter (in a good way). The one thing that just kept putting me off is the lack of a story and the lack of any form of motivation to what I'm meant to be doing.

I'm not saying that having a minimalist plot is a bad thing. Hell, some of my favourite games like Doom, Monster Hunter and Team Fortress 2 practically give you one paragraph of text as to why you're doing anything but they still at least give you some form of motivation. In Doom you're killing the demons because they want to take over Earth, In Monster Hunter you fight the monsters because they are ravaging towns and to make better equipment, In TF2 you have mission objectives and you fight a rival team who wants to do the same objectives but for different reasons.

With Dark Souls I just wander around aimlessly until something happens and even then, I don't know why.

Sadly the story is hard to find on Dark Souls not that there isnt one.I believe that was intentional so you can feel like you are the player and not someone put in someone else shoes.The story is told by the items and thats why the creator(miyazaki) suggested to take a item that gave no benefit and had no other link to the game aside from what you wanted to be.Like any equipment is yours you might feel that you own a part of the story

Spoiler: DS lore

That dude build up the wiki(not the site the content)

Another point to Dark Souls, story wise anyway. The gameplay was solid. As a note, if 99% of people need to look up practically everything on the Wiki (or the DS lore videos) I can't help but feel the devs are doing it wrong... I'm all for subtle plot points in gameplay but damn give me SOMETHING concrete first. Anything.

Otherwise...MGS HD. Particularly MGS3. The controls were SO BAD! That boss fight with The Fear just make me ragequit the game entirely. You have to hold like two aim buttons, a fire button and hit a small, fast moving, INVISIBLE target. Fuck that.

MGS2 was just a trainwreck all round. Don't even get me started on that travesty of a "game"

 

[Shoggoth2588]

Final Fucking Fantasy XIII. It's absolutely beautiful to look at but the plot, characters and, fucking gameplay make it extremely frustrating for me. I'm not the greatest fan of the series, Hell I haven't even beaten all of the titles I've played but I don't outright hate any of the other titles (although XII pushes my buttons to no end).

3D Mario games. I like classic franchises and I love the New Super Mario titles but I've never been into 3D Mario games or indeed, 3D platformers in general. I didn't own Super Mario 64 until a year or two ago but it just can't keep my interest when compared to other, more fun games that I've grabbed more recently. Sunshine was fine when I started but once again: better games came up. Super Mario Galaxy gave me vertigo and made me dizzy so it's the bottom by default. I'm not too sour on the games or the style since I did have fun with Donkey Kong 64 and, Banjo-Kazooie though I couldn't beat the first and better games kept me from continuing the second...I should really hook my N64 back up...

 

[bojackx]

Dragon Age Origins comes to mind here. I bought the Ultimate Edition a couple of years ago but it just wasn't doing it for me. First time I tried it I got a couple of hours in, then a few months ago I gave it another shot and got barely 30 minutes into it. I can understand why people like it, but I just find it boring.

Also there's Call of Duty 4, which I swear to God I've attempted to play through about 4 times. I like COD multiplayer so I did go on that for a while, but every time I try to play a Call of Duty single player, it gets real boring real fast for me. It's a shame since COD4 is pretty well received, even amongst those who dislike later COD games.

 

[xefaros]

I really wanted to enjoy Dark Souls. The environments and enemy design looked pretty cool and the boss battles look like something out of Monster Hunter (in a good way). The one thing that just kept putting me off is the lack of a story and the lack of any form of motivation to what I'm meant to be doing.

I'm not saying that having a minimalist plot is a bad thing. Hell, some of my favourite games like Doom, Monster Hunter and Team Fortress 2 practically give you one paragraph of text as to why you're doing anything but they still at least give you some form of motivation. In Doom you're killing the demons because they want to take over Earth, In Monster Hunter you fight the monsters because they are ravaging towns and to make better equipment, In TF2 you have mission objectives and you fight a rival team who wants to do the same objectives but for different reasons.

With Dark Souls I just wander around aimlessly until something happens and even then, I don't know why.

Sadly the story is hard to find on Dark Souls not that there isnt one.I believe that was intentional so you can feel like you are the player and not someone put in someone else shoes.The story is told by the items and thats why the creator(miyazaki) suggested to take a item that gave no benefit and had no other link to the game aside from what you wanted to be.Like any equipment is yours you might feel that you own a part of the story

Spoiler: DS lore

That dude build up the wiki(not the site the content)

Another point to Dark Souls, story wise anyway. The gameplay was solid. As a note, if 99% of people need to look up practically everything on the Wiki (or the DS lore videos) I can't help but feel the devs are doing it wrong... I'm all for subtle plot points in gameplay but damn give me SOMETHING concrete first. Anything.

Otherwise...MGS HD. Particularly MGS3. The controls were SO BAD! That boss fight with The Fear just make me ragequit the game entirely. You have to hold like two aim buttons, a fire button and hit a small, fast moving, INVISIBLE target. Fuck that.

MGS2 was just a trainwreck all round. Don't even get me started on that travesty of a "game"

I aint gonna defend how the story is told but it ended up quite enjoyable once i found out item descriptions and tried to tie up some of the story thought the subtlety.And at the current game age i have seen enough cgi or cutscenes or QTE to enjoy the way the story isnt forced on you.It was a fresh air for me

Also i believe that the process of going to the wiki or finding things yourself was intentional design(a bit of wishfull thinking)

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Assassins Creed III. I'm a big fan of the franchise and even cared about Desmond's story to a degree (they provided a nice break from the constant go-to-mission, do-mission, repeat strategy of the main games) but I can't bring myself to like ACIII. The reasons why are obvious and I recall thinking "how long until the end of the game?" Not very long after starting Connor's story.

Seconded. Taken as individual elements there were a lot of things I really like about AC3. I loved the ship missions. I loved that they brought back the over-world a la AC1. I loved that, unlike AC1, the over-world had actual shit to do in it. I liked the updated free running animations. I liked that they were finally moving on to a new setting. I liked that the homestead had actual characters in it who you could interact with, which made the renovation stuff a lot less sterile in previous games. I liked that you weren't swamped in an overabundance of weapons, gadgets and armor like in AC:R. There were a hell of a lot of good ideas here, but put together they just didn't work. It was a buggy, unfocused mess with hardly any interesting characters to liven up the dull setting, and it ultimately felt like a chore.

EDIT: Also, I think the ending may just be the absolute worst example of storytelling that I have ever experienced across any medium.

 

[Chromatic Aberration]

The Witcher

A generally-well received WRPG, mature plot, developed world with a cool main-character, a more action-y approach to combat, a generally gritty atmosphere....It would have been the perfect game for me - and I really want to like it...yet I simply can't.
It has some really strong scenes and some really strong themes going for it and I'd go so far as to say that Gerald boozing with his friends and whining about his issues with women is one of the most simple, real and interesting scenes in an RPG I've seen up to date.

But the game itself is just so...boring. It's so drawn out, with all those large areas that are ultimately so dull and samey, the combat is awful and requires not a single tactical thought, the story is so slow going.....started the game twice - the first time I was bored already after the first act which was ultimately so predictable and boring and the second time I stopped playing at around chapter 4 where Gerald ended up at some Lake and I had to go through another boring, predictable area with no plot-relevance in sight....

 

[Thundergod1020]

Grand Theft Auto, Saints Row, and the like. Sure, you can slap people around with a giant purple dildo in SR3, but what then? I like it when a game gives me a REASON for going about the city I'm moving around in, like in Prototype, where you climb everything so that you can jump off and feel like Spiderman as you collect the things floating around the city. When the only thing keeping you playing is that you need to do the next mission, maybe you shouldn't be calling yourself a sandbox. And I swear to god, if that f*cking cousin of Niko's asks to go drinking ONE more time...

 

[Zhukov]

Does anyone else find that a lot of the posts in this thread come off as rather... mean spirited?

And now I've said that, I guess I can't ***** about that one game for fear of being a hypocrit.

Suffice to say, I think your favourite game is a worthless piece of shit and I resent you for liking it. So there.

 

[pearcinator]

Dragon Age: Origins.

The only other Bioware game I'd played was Mass Effect, which I thought was great. So I thought this'd give me a chance to overcome my general lack of interest in the western RPG. Of course by this time the game had millions and millions of DLC so I picked up the complete edition with it all on a second disc (which I later sold for a profit, go me).

Anywho, installed the DLC and then started playing the game. Instantly got bored. Gave up within 2 days having been through Ostagar twice and went and found Shale.

Sold the game.

A few months later I decided to try it again. Once more got the complete edition because Fuck You EA that's why.

Tried a different class this time, went for the most drunk, belligerent jackhole dwarf I could. Still no fun. Sold it for cost and then gave up. It sucked.

Want to know what game really got me into the Western RPG genre (though not medieval western RPGs)?

Fallout 3.

A first-persn game and I hate first-person view.

How's that feel BiowarEA?

You should maybe try KOTOR...although it has a similar combat system to Dragon Age...but it is my personal favourite RPG because the story is fantastic and I much prefer sci-fi to medieval (I still like medieval themed games but I like sci-fi more).

Even then that game took me a bit to get into...the first half hour or so was bad and I didn't really understand the controls. After that though I understood the controls and was so immersed in the world that I decided to put it down because I was hungry...I had played the game for 8 and a half hours straight (never have I done that before or since) and still hadn't even half-finished the tutorial planet (not because it was long but because I just kept finding stuff to do).

Give it a go and if you don't like the combat then thats the reason you don't like Dragon Age either...the combat is pretty strange but if you give it a chance it becomes fun.

 

[flarty]

Simple enough guy, tell everyone about games you really WANTED to like, maybe even to the point of forcing yourself to play again and a gain, and tried to convince yourself you liked, but came to the conclusion it was impossible to like, or get into the game.

For me, recently, I bought Virtual On for the Sega Dreamcast, and with a conventional pad, the game just feels unplayable.

Not only is 1 analog not enough to control movement and targeting, but the auto-targeting is just confusing, disorientating, and jerky to get used to, something I think even a twin analog would not help.

After a few days of forcing myself to play over and over, switching between 4 control styles, I eventually gave up.

Another game, years back, was 'The Longest Journey'. I'm quite a big adventure game fan, but this game was just horrendous, despite what good reviews said. Terrible dialog, a completely unlikeable main character, and static locations that just looked murky and horrible even 10 years ago.

So, what's yours, past or recently?

Fable, they just bore me.

 

[Tactical Pause]

For me it'd be The Witcher (first one). I hear nothing but great things about the franchise, and I really want to enjoy it, but it just can't hold my interest for some reason. I've currently logged 21 hours in it on three separate play-throughs (5 hours, 6 hours, 10 hours), but each time I slowly stop playing it, then find it increasingly difficult to go back. Then, six months later, I'll realize I have no idea what happened in the story, and try again from the start.

Trouble is, now that I've done the whole starting town three goddamn times I'm really not sure if I could even make it through that on another attempt.

 

[-Ezio-]

Killer 7

I've tried 3 separate times to get into it. i just cant. i dont see the appeal at all.

 

[Mr.Squishy]

Bioshock.
So much so that I actually finished it.
7 hours of fetch quests with an average story that is relied heavily on audio logs with two fucking terrible endings? And shit shooting mechanics to boot.

Yeah, been replaying Bioshock again recently in preparation of Bioshock Infinite, and it's still a pretty overrated game.