Most underrated games of the 2010s?

[Kyrian007]

The varia suit issue didn't bother me either. It could be that Adam rightly judged that regenerating health paired with particularly ineffective enemies in that lava zone equaled there was very little threat there to face until the point at which he did authorize the varia suit's use. Or at least the writers made that correct judgment. That bit in the lava zone before she gets the varia suit was so easy to cruise through that the fact that Adam withheld the suit function from her didn't even occur to me as kind of a dick move until I saw all the blubbering about it online.

But there's absolutely no reason for Samus not to use the Varia function, or for Adam to withold it. Holding back on weapons? Sure. Holding back on a suit air-con? Not so much.

Thing is, it would be so easy to justify the sequence. Off the top of my head, either:

1) Have Samus's suit be damaged in a cutscene at the start of the section, temporarily disrupting the function. Have her push on regardless, and the function kick in at the same point it does in-game.

2) Have some kind of device or creature disrupt the function before Samus destroys it. In the case of the former, we already know that MB is working against the Federation, so it could foreshadow this.

The Varia function to me is like Samus's freakout with Ridley. Both could have worked, but both are botched.

The problem with both of those solutions is this... those are the same "de-powering" excuses they use at the beginning of EVERY Metroid game. Samus can only trip over her purse and break her suit so many times before you wonder why someone gave her the suit to begin with as clumsy as they portray her. Now did they come up with a "de-powering" that was good... no, they didn't handle it well. But I gave them at least some credit for at least realizing they needed to do something different.

 

[CaitSeith]

The varia suit issue didn't bother me either. It could be that Adam rightly judged that regenerating health paired with particularly ineffective enemies in that lava zone equaled there was very little threat there to face until the point at which he did authorize the varia suit's use. Or at least the writers made that correct judgment. That bit in the lava zone before she gets the varia suit was so easy to cruise through that the fact that Adam withheld the suit function from her didn't even occur to me as kind of a dick move until I saw all the blubbering about it online.

But there's absolutely no reason for Samus not to use the Varia function, or for Adam to withold it. Holding back on weapons? Sure. Holding back on a suit air-con? Not so much.

Thing is, it would be so easy to justify the sequence. Off the top of my head, either:

1) Have Samus's suit be damaged in a cutscene at the start of the section, temporarily disrupting the function. Have her push on regardless, and the function kick in at the same point it does in-game.

2) Have some kind of device or creature disrupt the function before Samus destroys it. In the case of the former, we already know that MB is working against the Federation, so it could foreshadow this.

The Varia function to me is like Samus's freakout with Ridley. Both could have worked, but both are botched.

The problem with both of those solutions is this... those are the same "de-powering" excuses they use at the beginning of EVERY Metroid game. Samus can only trip over her purse and break her suit so many times before you wonder why someone gave her the suit to begin with as clumsy as they portray her. Now did they come up with a "de-powering" that was good... no, they didn't handle it well. But I gave them at least some credit for at least realizing they needed to do something different.

Yeah. They could had gone more with Adam being portrayed more as a corrupt officer (whatever he was actually corrupt or just faking it in order to discover the schemes from the corrupt top brass) so the weird timing for authorizing Samus' functions had some congruent explanation, and his sacrifice being an act of redemption.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

snip

False. The Metroid Prime series and Metroid Fusion established the normal of how the Universe sees Samus and Samus as a character respectively. There is a difference between a blank slate and ignoring the lore. That's why I wasn't surprised that Samus acted submissive under Adam's command (the execution was disappointing tho).

I never played Prime but I played Fusion (beat it in like 2 days of straight playing lol) and she really didn't have anything remotely close to what they were going for with other M. Sure, she wasn't quite AS much of a blank slate but she still didn't really have as much of a personality. Think SotN Alucard in comparison to the various Belmonds of games before, he's "more" characterized but still pretty bare-bones. If someone came up with a whole new story about him you'd kinda have to go in with an idea of what he's like (hates dracula, likes his mom) but with not much if anything actually set in stone.

 

[Asita]

I don't think one can say that Other M is all about gameplay. It's heavily story-focused to the point where you can't skip cutscenes. For me though, the paradox of Other M is that while it doesn't have a good story, it's not the only Metroid game where that can be said to be the case. Metroid didn't have a story worthy of note until Fusion.

I didn't say that, I said that Metroid as a franchise wasn't about story at all right up to Other M yet people reacted to it's (obviously significant) story like it was besmirching and ruining something that wasn't actually there but which was entirely in their own heads/imagination.

I think that had to do with Samus suddenly acting wierd because that's what the writers decided for her. She can't turn on her Varia Suit because Daddy(Adam) didn't order her to(despite not working for him or even asking "Hey, I'm gonna turn on the AC, because it's hot in here") and she acts like she's imprinted on a space jellyfish because it imprinted on her, which is just fucking wierd. The whole thing about her having PTSD over Ridley, who she fights like once a week on average, was also a bit strange.

I don't know about calling that weird, because that implies it diverges from an established normal, which it does not. You can say you dislike it, but you can't just call it wrong (or call her not Samus like some did) because then you're comparing her to your imagined version of her and not any actual existing version of her from any games.


The whole suit thing seems to just be a military thing where you need authorization to use the power, you can easily imply she had that authorization for all those other games before setting off. Again, you can say you don't like it but it's not just magically wrong because of that.

Eh...no. The Metroid games (particularly the early ones) didn't focus much on Samus's characterization, but the games established themselves at a time when games didn't really do that at all. Much of the storytelling was done in extra-game material, such as comics and even the manuals for the game. In the case of Metroid, Samus's expanded characterization is largely attributable to comics and manga. The one that codified her character, however, was probably the Magazine Z series, which showed her early life (her colony destroyed by Ridley and his space pirates when she was a small child, the Chozo finding and raising her, gifting her the power armor, etc) and tying in the major plot points (her fear and hatred of Ridley, Mother Brain being a Chozo creation that defected to the Space Pirates, Metroid being a bioengineered counter to contain the X parasite...). It's more or less considered Metroid's canon up to Zero Mission.

 

[Tireseas_v1legacy]

Mass Effect 3 (2012)

Okay, the "multiple endings" sucked, I'll give it that. But I see people talking about nothing but the endings whenever I look up the reviews. I feel the game does an amazing job up till the ending. The whole time, I felt the dread of the reapers taking over the galaxy, and felt the hopelessness of fighting a losing war. However, the companions were still fun to interact with (Garrus and Liara, ftw), and the sci-fi shooter gameplay was really fun.

I'm willing to stand by that. The game got a lot more grief than it deserved even with its original ending, (though I personally think the "synthesis" option should not have been in their because it doesn't fit with the game thematically), but the sheer dread that the Reapers entailed was powerful enough to give me nightmares years later flashing back to it. It feels very much like everything you're doing is futile against this unending eldrich monstrosity that are the reapers. All while gripping with Shepard's PTSD and the stress of the galaxy on her (yes, her) shoulders. It works and, if you remove the cop-out synthesis option at the end, ends with one last decision that essentially asks Shepard "who's lives are you willing to sacrifice to save the galaxy? [https://youtu.be/BnWAauhdmnw]"

Wow, a third EA-published game in a row on this list

The company has had quite a change since the beginning of the decade. What was once a sign that EA was ready to try fresh IP with Mass Effect, Mirror's Edge, Dante's Inferno, and Dragon Age has turned into something that is a weird mixture of depressing and awful. They still make quality games in and of themselves (Battlefront II is a quality game once you remove the loot boxes, Fallen Order remains good, and ME: Andromeda is fine, more below), but most are existing IP or are tied to relatively safe licences. It's rather disappointing they've almost completely abandoned original IPs.

I'm gonna say Borderlands 3 since it looks like everyone is mentioning aaa games. It seemed to mainly get passed off as just another borderlands game with borderlands writing and borderlands gameplay. But really, it just felt so much better then the other games, the weapons have much more character and being able to change fire modes on them is really neat, all the characters abilities feel more unique then they do in the other games, the shooting feels better, the driving feels better. The whole game just feels like the epitome of what borderlands can be and the writing is still good, its still entertaining, its still as blunt as hell, the new big bads are no handsome jack but they are fine as jerks to kill.

I look forward to it coming to steam so I can finally actually get it, I only played it at my friends house when I was visiting her and ended up spending way too much time playing it.

I'm not inclined to say it was one of the most underrated of the decade, but I do agree it's a fun game that definitely smooths out some of the harder edges of Borderlands 2/presequel gameplay in a "good enough" story that makes you want more rather than less. I feel Tiny Tina's crew were underutilized and there are a lot of stretches that really need vending machines and fast travel stations, but those are minor compared to a quality game.

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Here's mine: Mass Effect Andromeda. Yes, yes it shipped poorly and needed to be patched, but once it was it was fine. Not as good as ME3, but when you're essentially trying to create a whole new series off the back of existing IP, that's going to be the comparison. but setting that aside, once the game is patched, the game runs well, faces are properly expressive (if a lot of resting ***** face), and there's a nice combat cycle. The story works, although I feel a lot of potential was squandered with an unnecessary villain that was just "the collectors, but not the collectors" when there was the option of basic survival and getting everything up and running as a better potential path. As I mentioned before, the Netflix Lost in Space series would have made a much better plotline to what we got given its focused on basic survival of a group of colonists in a harsh and minimally surveyed system rather than "meet the new antagonists" that we got.

Still, there's a lot of seeding for a sequel and I'm hoping with the next generation, we'll get a Andromeda II that builds on the start of the first.