The Most Overrated Games that Aren't
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Mass effect 3, yes the ending was shit. I particularly dislike the Synthesis option (the other two at least feel like they belong in the series. Synthesis just come out of nowhere and feels too much like space magic) and hate how much they push it as the "best" but the rest of the game was pretty good. Not without flaws and it's not the best game ever but better than ME1 and 2. There are a lot of stories I like that have terrible endings. It doesn't erase the enjoyment I had getting there. Perhaps it's because I wasn't a die hard fan of the series on the first place so my expectations weren't set that high or because the "illusion of choice" doesn't bother me that much.
I've never understood how someone can like Morrowind without liking Skyrim. They're two iterations of the same general idea. Sure, you've got issues with combat and balance, but that's a recurring complaint through the series. Oblivion was along the same lines (probably more issues with that game compared to Morrowind and Skyrim admittedly).
So yeah, if someone doesn't like TES games generally, I can sort of get it. But all these obligatory "Morrowind was better!" comments you get every time Skyrim is mentioned, those just come across as pretentious to me.
So yeah, if someone doesn't like TES games generally, I can sort of get it. But all these obligatory "Morrowind was better!" comments you get every time Skyrim is mentioned, those just come across as pretentious to me.
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You can't play 4 player online splitscreen in COD. You can do it in private matches on lan but not online.Bob_McMillan said:
Did the developers feel guilty about selling me a military shooter game for my personal enjoyment?Gladion said:
I don't think so, since their next game is "Dead Island 2". Way to drive home their point. If hypocrisy is their point.
Well, at least every other game understands that NPCs aren't people. What's next, Dragon Age driving home the point that there aren't really dragons.
I never got the greatness of Bioshock's twist either. So we do whatever games tell us to do without thinking much about it. No shit! Hadn't really noticed while I spent two hours roaming around trying to find some rare herbs for that tertiary side quest in my favorite RPG.
And did Irrational Games, after that clever meta commentary on games, actually innovate mission design for BioShock Infinite...
Going to have to spoiler a bit of my inputEHKOS said:
Totally agree. I knew that there was something that was going to be tragic in the game, but I had no idea what or when it was going to happen. I got to that scene, and saw the pool of signatures, and was like "hey, look at all of those non-combatants," so I didn't bomb them. Then suddenly, I couldn't get out of bomb mode until all the signatures was gone, and I felt really cheated once I bombed them. They stopped being innocents, and became just a trigger for the next cutscene. It would have been completely different if I had killed a bunch of them while blasting everything up, but that's not how it went down. I haven't played the game since that scene.
I'm going to come right out and say Morrowind as my choice for this category. Yes, the gameplay is simplistic and the UI kind of a pain in the ass. The combat is floaty and generally unsatisfying, but the huge continent you are dropped in to explore is a rich and varied place and was the primary reason that I picked up Skyrim in the first place because you get to go back there. The storytelling is done primarily through text, despite the fact that they managed to get a few voices done for things like guards yelling at you for being a no good thief/murder-hobo. I frankly miss that about the TES games and I think they have gotten slightly worse for it. The conversation system seemed more conversation-y than my silent mage staring unblinkingly slightly to the right of someone while I choose what to say to them. The use of effectively hyper-linking certain conversation topics to make them available for use later was pretty cool at the time.
Morrowind was a very light hearted game at it's core, unlike it's successors. They gave us funny events like the Colovian mage falling from the sky leaving us with 3 scrolls that could lead us to a far flung death if we weren't careful or a few more gold for selling some scrolls made by a crazy person who thought jumping was the best method of travel. It gave us a pair of boots that gave you something like a 1000% speed increase but also made you 100% blind. As anyone who has played the game extensively will tell you, Mark and Recall were some very useful and neat spells, which sadly were removed in lieu of Fast Travel on a map screen.
Let's not forget spellcrafting while we are at it. Skyrim marked the death of spellcrafting, which was one of the most enjoyable things to do in both Morrowind and Oblivion. They gave us necromancy, shouts, and better spell balance in return but it got rid of one of the things that set the TES games apart from other RPGs.
The aesthetics alone were leaps and bounds more interesting than "Welcome to Scandinavia with Lizard and Cat People!" Guards were decked out in gold armor with blue and purple mixed in. The architecture was nothing like what we would see on our planet. They had land squids which they used as transportation around their continent. Now we have bland guards in armor that is either just iron or plastered with the emblem of their city, more traditional architecture for Earth inhabitants, and horses.
Do the newer games play better? Yeah, they certainly do. But they lost a lot of what made Morrowind so special while doing so.
Morrowind was a very light hearted game at it's core, unlike it's successors. They gave us funny events like the Colovian mage falling from the sky leaving us with 3 scrolls that could lead us to a far flung death if we weren't careful or a few more gold for selling some scrolls made by a crazy person who thought jumping was the best method of travel. It gave us a pair of boots that gave you something like a 1000% speed increase but also made you 100% blind. As anyone who has played the game extensively will tell you, Mark and Recall were some very useful and neat spells, which sadly were removed in lieu of Fast Travel on a map screen.
Let's not forget spellcrafting while we are at it. Skyrim marked the death of spellcrafting, which was one of the most enjoyable things to do in both Morrowind and Oblivion. They gave us necromancy, shouts, and better spell balance in return but it got rid of one of the things that set the TES games apart from other RPGs.
The aesthetics alone were leaps and bounds more interesting than "Welcome to Scandinavia with Lizard and Cat People!" Guards were decked out in gold armor with blue and purple mixed in. The architecture was nothing like what we would see on our planet. They had land squids which they used as transportation around their continent. Now we have bland guards in armor that is either just iron or plastered with the emblem of their city, more traditional architecture for Earth inhabitants, and horses.
Do the newer games play better? Yeah, they certainly do. But they lost a lot of what made Morrowind so special while doing so.
I probably have a bunch of new suggestions I could make but I don't want to make one for now because all the discussion of Spec Ops The Line makes me want to comment on that for now. I only ever played it through once...just once. But it was still one of the most important gaming experience I've ever had and a favourite game of mine.
I feel that Spec Ops The Line requires a few things from its player to actually really "get" it as a game. Which is why a lot of people don't.
For one...how you're introduced to it is important. I bought it because I'd basically read the equivalent of "get this game, its different to other shooters" which I think is one of the best ways to get introduced to it. Basically the best effect is if you go into it with no more than a hint that something might be off.
Second it requires you to understand that you chose to play the game. And you chose to continue playing it. A lot of the criticism I see about it is "what am I supposed to do? I bought the game, I'm just supposed to not play it? That's stupid." Which is the entire point of course. Its like a soldier being given orders. You bought the game and therefore you're going to play it. More generally its trying to call into question "why are you buying these types of games?" because it strips away the glory to let you see the ugly side where things DON'T go your way at the end and there isn't a happy ending to look forward to. MMS games are a never-ending stream of violence in a way that lets you be the "hero". But what if you take away the chance to be a hero? What happens to the player and the character if you take away the ability to be the hero of the story? Well, you end up with Spec Ops The Line, which is an endless stream of bad situations getting worse and worse, all in the service of "I've got to keep going because it'll all turn out alright in the end when I get the head bad guy, I'll achieve redemption for what I did that way".
Ok so I recognise its somewhat unrealistic to expect people to just stop playing a game they've paid for; but I think there are two other aspects to this that you can take away from it apart from the "just stop playing" thing. One is whether or not you recognise what is happening and where it is going and the other is the particular reason why you kept playing. If you identified what was happening and completed it out of a fascination of how far it would go then its not really criticising you as much as others I feel. But if you didn't and you just kept playing because "well I paid for this so I'm going to keep going" or "there must be an upturn in the story, there's got to be" then its asking you to start re-evaluating yourself.
At a late point in the game it asks you "Do you feel like a hero yet?" and I think the answer to that question is the line between those who hated it and those who loved it. The answer from both is almost certainly "No", but the "because" for a person who didn't connect with the game is "...because you're making me do all these horrible things to progress". Whilst the "because" for a person who did connect was "...because I'm not a hero, am I?"
It forces you to rationalise your actions. And it forces you to recognise the reasons for you choosing to go on in a way that people find uncomfortable.
I feel that Spec Ops The Line requires a few things from its player to actually really "get" it as a game. Which is why a lot of people don't.
For one...how you're introduced to it is important. I bought it because I'd basically read the equivalent of "get this game, its different to other shooters" which I think is one of the best ways to get introduced to it. Basically the best effect is if you go into it with no more than a hint that something might be off.
Second it requires you to understand that you chose to play the game. And you chose to continue playing it. A lot of the criticism I see about it is "what am I supposed to do? I bought the game, I'm just supposed to not play it? That's stupid." Which is the entire point of course. Its like a soldier being given orders. You bought the game and therefore you're going to play it. More generally its trying to call into question "why are you buying these types of games?" because it strips away the glory to let you see the ugly side where things DON'T go your way at the end and there isn't a happy ending to look forward to. MMS games are a never-ending stream of violence in a way that lets you be the "hero". But what if you take away the chance to be a hero? What happens to the player and the character if you take away the ability to be the hero of the story? Well, you end up with Spec Ops The Line, which is an endless stream of bad situations getting worse and worse, all in the service of "I've got to keep going because it'll all turn out alright in the end when I get the head bad guy, I'll achieve redemption for what I did that way".
Ok so I recognise its somewhat unrealistic to expect people to just stop playing a game they've paid for; but I think there are two other aspects to this that you can take away from it apart from the "just stop playing" thing. One is whether or not you recognise what is happening and where it is going and the other is the particular reason why you kept playing. If you identified what was happening and completed it out of a fascination of how far it would go then its not really criticising you as much as others I feel. But if you didn't and you just kept playing because "well I paid for this so I'm going to keep going" or "there must be an upturn in the story, there's got to be" then its asking you to start re-evaluating yourself.
At a late point in the game it asks you "Do you feel like a hero yet?" and I think the answer to that question is the line between those who hated it and those who loved it. The answer from both is almost certainly "No", but the "because" for a person who didn't connect with the game is "...because you're making me do all these horrible things to progress". Whilst the "because" for a person who did connect was "...because I'm not a hero, am I?"
It forces you to rationalise your actions. And it forces you to recognise the reasons for you choosing to go on in a way that people find uncomfortable.
Because the fanboys stopped being so ridiculously annoying about how the game is the best thing ever so now you can actually see the unpopular opinions that where there since the beginning.Arnoxthe1 said:Also agree with Skyrim.
It's really stupid too because when it first came out, almost EVERYONE was singing its praises. Talking about how great it was for RPing and how much it improved Oblivion's/Morrowind's combat and etc.
And then after a while, everyone just started to hate it.
The fact that the game forces you to use the quest markers is enough to make the game an infinitely worse RPG than Morrowind, meaning the game actually is overrated.
The Final Fantasy 13 series. I feel, as I always have, that they were good JRPGs but bad Final Fantasy games (much in the same way Fallout 3 and New Vegas were decent RPG shooters but bad Fallout games). They changed too much about the basic formula, to the point that 13 and 13-2 barely felt like Final Fantasy games and Lightning Returns was like the socially awkward love child of a JRPG and Majora's Mask. But I had fun with all of the 13 series (though less so with 13-2) and as much as people complain about the story being confusing or just simply bad, I never had trouble following the plot and was consistently interested. I will say, however, that Hope can suck it
Every goddamn game I have ever enjoyed is over/underrated to someone. I just ask that people don't beat me over the head with their opinions or try to pass them off as anything other than subjective.
That was not exactly what I was getting at and I'm also not quite sure why you say that the character was in the dark about what was going to happen. Sure, the three didn't know thatCasual Shinji said:
there were civilians there, but other than that, as I said, it was pretty clear from the get-go that what was about to happen would be a bad decision that gets no justification except a desperately ignorant "it has to be done." So what if it's soldiers you're about to burn alive? And the scene wasn't played for glory at any point in time, there was no satisfaction to be felt by killing this camp of enemy soldiers who were only half your enemies.
That really doesn't make any sense. They didn't sell you a military shooter game for your personal enjoyment, they sold you a military shooter game for your personal reflection.RubyT said:
Neither does your comparison to Dead Island 2. Spec Ops never claimed that it's inherently immoral to play violent video games. And even if it did, so what? The game is over and the point was driven home with the ending, not with an entirely different game that comes out 3 years later. By that logic, Steven Spielberg wouldn't have been allowed to make Schindler's List, because it makes no sense in context with E.T.
What's more, a person/developer must always, for the rest of their existence, keep saying the same one individual statement and never, ever say anything that could even in the slightest contradict that, because that will instantly refute every point they said before?
Oversimplification for the sake of being in the right, and you managed to try and counter three times in one post with stuff that has nothing to do with what was being said. Of course it's not wrong to kill fictional characters in a virtual environment, and Spec Ops never said it was (which, by the way, I did state in the post you quoted, you just skilllessly removed it to make your point). The game has no interest whatsoever in making people feel guilty about killing people (well, maybe a little, but it's certainly not the point of the game). It wants to make us feel stupid and possibly ashamed for feeling like a badass when killing ficional characters in a non-fictional scenario while we're in our safe home, craving that next fix of feeling like a great hero without actually doing anything.
As I said to CS above, I'm not here to tell you you're wrong about not enjoying that game (it has more than enough flaws), but it's irritating when you're so smug about it, latching onto the simplest possible interpretation and then claiming the game is too simple.
Not quite sure out of where you pulled Bioshock in this aspect, but if you were actually thinking "what am I doing with my life" after two hours of mindless grinding and then continued to grind, then I can't really hold it against Bioshock for not being able to drive its point home to you, which wasn't just about video games in the first place.
And just for the sake of being on topic at least once in this thread: God of War 1-3. Yeah, QTEs, I know, but I didn't care. The games scratched an itch that was really bad after Devil May Cry 3.
And then they make Dead Island 2. Seems like there wasn't much personal reflection for them.Gladion said:
Then why did you say, and I quote, "You were supposed to feel guilty about buying a military shooter game for your personal enjoyment."
If it's not immoral, why am I supposed to feel guilty?
No. A correct analogy would be Spielberg, following Minority Report, making a movie about how great it would be to prevent crimes by weeding out criminal thoughts.
I'm sorry if the irony is lost on you.
Then skillfully point me to where in your original post you say that. Because I can't find it.
Uh-huh. So when you said, and again I quote, "You were supposed to feel guilty about buying a military shooter game for your personal enjoyment.", you actually meant something else entirely.
I never claimed the game was too simple. And I wasn't being smug about anything. You are actually the smug one.
Because the twist was kind of similar.
Where did I say I continued to grind?
You go around accusing me of misquoting, and here you are putting words in my mouth twice in one post.
I have to give you that point on Bioshock. You didn't say you continued to grind, you just said that you collected herbs for 2 hours in your favourite RPG and I simply assumed that you didn't significantly change your playstyle.RubyT said:
For the other stuff it's getting a bit convoluted, so I'll continue without these quotation blocks:
Recap: Spec Ops wasn't about making its players feel guilty for killing fictional characters. It was about making the players feel guilty/ashamed/whatever for indulging in the power fantasy for going to a non-fictional (albeit virtualized) war and winning it all by themselves while not actually risking anything.
So the reason is important: it isn't fictional killing that is being declared as immoral, but a fictionalized, trivialized mediation of a very current, very real situation, and utilizing it for personal enjoyment: Not personal enjoyment of virtual killing, but of being the self-imagined hero of the war on terror.
That's also why there's no point in dragging Dead Island into this, because while yes, Spec Ops is, in essence, anti-violence and Dead Island is very clearly pro-violence, the latter doesn't contradict the former's actual message: "using real war for fictional fun is bad".
And you still haven't told me why that would matter anyway. How would that diminish the point Spec Ops makes?
And when you say "other games understand that NPCs aren't people" then it's clear to me that you're criticizing the game for sillily being about violence against virtual people. You then add "what's next, Dragon Age saying dragons don't exist." If that's not a comment about the game's simplicity, what was that?
Huh, didn't know that. Its been a long time since I've played CoD with my friends, but most of my memories were of 4 way splitscreen in a buddy's house. It can do 2 way splitscreen right? AW I do know isnt.Dirty Hipsters said:
Never really understood what the problem with quest markers is. That's really stupid if it's the main reason why people give as to why Skyrim is overrated.BiH-Kira said:Because the fanboys stopped being so ridiculously annoying about how the game is the best thing ever so now you can actually see the unpopular opinions that where there since the beginning.Arnoxthe1 said:Also agree with Skyrim.
It's really stupid too because when it first came out, almost EVERYONE was singing its praises. Talking about how great it was for RPing and how much it improved Oblivion's/Morrowind's combat and etc.
And then after a while, everyone just started to hate it.
The fact that the game forces you to use the quest markers is enough to make the game an infinitely worse RPG than Morrowind, meaning the game actually is overrated.
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If I remember correctly CoD4 didn't do split screen online, CoDWaW did 2 player, MW2 didn't do online splitscreen, Black Ops 1 and MW3 both did 2 player online splitscreen, and I stopped playing the series at that point so I don't know about the others, but I highly doubt any of the later games increased the splitscreen player count considering most multiplayer games are cutting splitscreen entirely.Bob_McMillan said:
I'm going to go ahead and mention World of Warcraft.
9 out of 10 posts here on the Escapist, and 99,9 of out 100 posts on the WoW forums themselves are threads about how aweful the game is, how stupid the lore is, how dumbed down it is and how vanilla was the best thing ever.
Well, I've played since vanilla, and as far as I'm concerned almost every big expension improved on most things.
*People tend to forget that in vanilla any class that had some healing spec, was suppose to heal and was bad at everything else.
*Paladin's in 40 man's were there for the 5 minute buffs they could cast, and when they were done casting them on each single person at a time, the first one was already expired.
*The only stat that mattered during vanilla raiding was Fire resistance.
*out of the 40 people, most just auto-attacked on the mobs while streaming videos.
*There were no rotations, you just spammed moves.
*The Flightpaths were not linked. Now, if you want to travel from A to D you just click on the location of D and you fly there, in vanilla, you had to travel from A- B, wait until you've landed, then travel from B-C wait again.
*There were no auction houses in the major cities except for Ironforge and Ogrimmar.
*Warlocks had to actually carry around 20+ Non-stackable Soul-shards.
*Hunters had to carry around Ammo.
*Weapon skills....
*Looking for a raid or instance group was mostly standing in a major city, shouting that you wanted to do said instance or raid, then, when you finally found that last member needed, you had to wait until everyone was back from being AFK, argue who goes to the summoning stone, warlock summon or wait until everyone traveled to the instance, and go afk again only to get no useful loot because the Paladin shoulders dropped and your group is horde.
The only thing I really miss is actual World PvP.
These days taking 2 other friends who are level 100 as well, go to a lower level zone and gank people is considered World PvP, instead of what it really is, ganking. While in vanilla, you had endless battles bewtween Southshore and Tarren mill.
9 out of 10 posts here on the Escapist, and 99,9 of out 100 posts on the WoW forums themselves are threads about how aweful the game is, how stupid the lore is, how dumbed down it is and how vanilla was the best thing ever.
Well, I've played since vanilla, and as far as I'm concerned almost every big expension improved on most things.
*People tend to forget that in vanilla any class that had some healing spec, was suppose to heal and was bad at everything else.
*Paladin's in 40 man's were there for the 5 minute buffs they could cast, and when they were done casting them on each single person at a time, the first one was already expired.
*The only stat that mattered during vanilla raiding was Fire resistance.
*out of the 40 people, most just auto-attacked on the mobs while streaming videos.
*There were no rotations, you just spammed moves.
*The Flightpaths were not linked. Now, if you want to travel from A to D you just click on the location of D and you fly there, in vanilla, you had to travel from A- B, wait until you've landed, then travel from B-C wait again.
*There were no auction houses in the major cities except for Ironforge and Ogrimmar.
*Warlocks had to actually carry around 20+ Non-stackable Soul-shards.
*Hunters had to carry around Ammo.
*Weapon skills....
*Looking for a raid or instance group was mostly standing in a major city, shouting that you wanted to do said instance or raid, then, when you finally found that last member needed, you had to wait until everyone was back from being AFK, argue who goes to the summoning stone, warlock summon or wait until everyone traveled to the instance, and go afk again only to get no useful loot because the Paladin shoulders dropped and your group is horde.
The only thing I really miss is actual World PvP.
These days taking 2 other friends who are level 100 as well, go to a lower level zone and gank people is considered World PvP, instead of what it really is, ganking. While in vanilla, you had endless battles bewtween Southshore and Tarren mill.
That's just a shorter way of explaining how much worse the lore, story, quests and world are in Skyrim than in Morrowind.jhoroz said:
here is how it was in Morrowind.
1. find quest giver
2. talk and read a long text where the quest giver explains the situation, explains what you need to do and in detail explains where you need to go
3. you then go on an adventure actually searching for that something because all you have is the detailed description
4. finish quest
Here is how Skyrim goes
1. find quest giver
2. "talk" with him and he doesn't really explain anything
3. follow quest marker
4. finish quest
The Morrowind style of questing forced the developer to make a memorable world, a world where each location is different and you can go by a description. Skyrim's world is dull and lifeless. Wherever you go, you find almost the same thing. All the caves are the same, all the dungeons are the same. The character have almost no backstory or story at all. The cities are almost non-existing. For the biggest city in Syrim to have less than 20 houses, that's just freaking ridiculous.