Underrated Games | Shoulda Been Classics | Your forgotten gems

[Loonyyy]

Battlezone 2. I think I've only ever come across one other person who'd played it.

Was an FPS/RPG hybrid, where you flew around in what amounted to landspeeders. There was base building, sort of along the lines of Starcraft, you had to build power, mine scrap, and build more advanced buildings, gear, and eventually an army to crush the enemy. The campaign was a lot of fun too. The controls really had a nice sense of speed in a lot of the ships.

I could definitely do with seeing another of those.

 

[M0rp43vs]

-Mercenaries
This is still my favorite sandbox game. You have a bunch of factions you have to do missions for so one mission you'll be hired by the US to do something bad against the Chinese, then next mission you're hired by the Chinese to do something bad to the US. You want to complete missions without the other faction knowing it was you so they don't get mad at you. The game is more of a puzzle game in the sense that there's always a way to do a mission without the faction knowing it was you. Yeah, you can take the easy route and just pay them off to forgive you, but it was a blast trying to find a way to complete missions without them knowing. The key features that make Mercenaries unique were the airstrikes (which can be used very strategically) and vehicle disguise system (get in a Chinese vehicle and you're disguised as the Chinese). Mercenaries made me realize how shitty the GTA games are due to the plethora of options to complete each mission.

Huh, mostly what I did in that game was max out the Russian faction until they had no missions (because they were in charge of weapon drops and always be nice to your suppliers), then somehow always end up alienating the Chinese but then getting back into their good books by air striking North Koreans at their faction borders (friendly fire casualties be damned).

But this is my answer too. The game hands the player so much raw power with the airstrikes that I struggle to think of any game that tops it in player firepower. Having 3 selectable player characters, especially in an open world sandbox, is a very nice touch even though the main difference between them is about one super airstrike. Completing missions gives you info on the location of enemy commanders (based on the suits of a deck of card) that are fun little diversions while travelling and the fact that bringing them back alive more than triples the payout is a good incentive to do more than just carpet bomb the general area.

It's just some really good, explosive cathartic fun and I do recommend it if you can stomach the now ancient graphics.

 

[sky pies]

Battlezone 2. I think I've only ever come across one other person who'd played it.

Was an FPS/RPG hybrid, where you flew around in what amounted to landspeeders. There was base building, sort of along the lines of Starcraft, you had to build power, mine scrap, and build more advanced buildings, gear, and eventually an army to crush the enemy. The campaign was a lot of fun too. The controls really had a nice sense of speed in a lot of the ships.

I could definitely do with seeing another of those.

Someone tried to get me into that game but I couldn't ever actually get to play more than a few minutes of it. I think they gave me an extremely dodgy disc or something.

That reminds, however, of Ground Control, an amazing early 3D RTS game that to this day is utterly entertaining for me.

 

[Rip Van Rabbit]

[HEADING=3]Second Sight[/HEADING]

The controls were wonky and they took some getting used to, but the story is the glue that holds it all together.
The intrigue was laid on thick, the clever puzzles with your powers allowed you tackle a scenario from various angles.
But but but ... the twists, turns, trials & tribulations! Oh my! :O

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

-Mercenaries
This is still my favorite sandbox game. You have a bunch of factions you have to do missions for so one mission you'll be hired by the US to do something bad against the Chinese, then next mission you're hired by the Chinese to do something bad to the US. You want to complete missions without the other faction knowing it was you so they don't get mad at you. The game is more of a puzzle game in the sense that there's always a way to do a mission without the faction knowing it was you. Yeah, you can take the easy route and just pay them off to forgive you, but it was a blast trying to find a way to complete missions without them knowing. The key features that make Mercenaries unique were the airstrikes (which can be used very strategically) and vehicle disguise system (get in a Chinese vehicle and you're disguised as the Chinese). Mercenaries made me realize how shitty the GTA games are due to the plethora of options to complete each mission.

Huh, mostly what I did in that game was max out the Russian faction until they had no missions (because they were in charge of weapon drops and always be nice to your suppliers), then somehow always end up alienating the Chinese but then getting back into their good books by air striking North Koreans at their faction borders (friendly fire casualties be damned).

I found a way to do every mission without the faction knowing it was me. It was a bunch of fun trying to figure how to accomplish it on several missions. The only mission I felt was poorly designed was the final one. Most sandbox games every mission is basically go to Point B and kill a bunch of enemies we spawned there with subpar shooting mechanics. Mercenaries' missions were even designed in a standalone fashion; basically the missions (and area of each mission) was designed separate then put on a blank canvas to make the sandbox whereas most sandbox games are developed where the sandbox is created first and then populated with missions. Care was taken to stuff like enemy placement and whatnot that most sandbox games ignore.

 

[M0rp43vs]

The only mission I felt was poorly designed was the final one. .

Aand suddenly I remembered why I never finished that game.

After a whole game where you're dependant on supply drops and airstrikes, the last mission strips away all that and leaves you with dealing with an army by yourself with the rather so-so shooting. What a last minute choke.

Also, perhaps faction balancing and disguising was too much for my child mind. I do remember that the horn removes your disguise. And since I cant remember it doing anything else, it was basically a "fuck everything up" button.

 

[JohnnyDelRay]

I know people are going to be a bit nonplussed about this, but I have to say I consider 2007's Crysis to be an all time classic computer game.

The first three quarters of Crysis was an absolutely mind-blowing, revolutionary experience. And not just because of the graphics, but the areas, open-ended approach and merging various skills into executing awesome takedowns. An all time fav.

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear was fantastic.

I'd also second this. Though I got into Rainbow Six franchise a little late, I really loved Raven Shield. Brutally hard though. I'm still wondering if R6 Siege will be anywhere as good as the Vegas games.

The first Dungeon Seige was a wonderful seamless adventure of epic proportions and real challenge.

Again, really with you on this. Dungeon Siege 1 and 2 were my favorite RPG's of the time. Then DS3 came out and was so shit, I played for a couple hours and never looked back.

My entry would be Quake IV. Such an incredible campaign, awesome first-person storytelling and some gruesome scenes that stayed with me for awhile. Why didn't it do that great? I don't know, but I'd hazard it's because Quake III brought it into the fast-paced arena deathmatch world with Unreal, and it just wasn't what people expected that led to disappointment. But it's still one of the best FPS I've ever played in all regards. Weapons, graphics, level design, story, pacing, and a few well-orchestrated scares not like the jump scares which were the norm at the time probably due to Doom 3.

Another entry of mine is Fallout: Tactics. I don't know why it's the least known in the series, but it's my favorite turn-based RPG. Superb gateway into the rest of the Fallout games, but it's the one reason I wish the series was still isometric.

 

[Tsun Tzu]

There are several...but here's my top pick.

Nox.

Top down ARPG in the vein of titles like Diablo with more of a focus on combat outside of simply mashing mouse buttons and three distinct campaigns that had a wonderful sense of parity where you met the same characters, but you were enemies or some other things happened (kinda like an alternate universe) to them.

I mean, c'mon. It was Westwood Studios.

Before they lost the game to EA, anyway, and they doled out their usual bullshit when they shuttered the servers and stopped supporting it.

Fuggin' loved this game as a kid.

 

[stormtrooper9091]

what the? None of the games listed in OP are "forgotten gems", all well known games, are you that much of a tryhard/hipster?

Now, keep scrolling down and there we see some really nice titles, like Outcast, yeah. Terrible tank controls (I hate those) but an amazingly interesting game, Caesar 3, and yes, Sacrifice. I always like hearing Colonel Campbell/Aldaris/Grandpa Max

 

[Loonyyy]

Battlezone 2. I think I've only ever come across one other person who'd played it.

Was an FPS/RPG hybrid, where you flew around in what amounted to landspeeders. There was base building, sort of along the lines of Starcraft, you had to build power, mine scrap, and build more advanced buildings, gear, and eventually an army to crush the enemy. The campaign was a lot of fun too. The controls really had a nice sense of speed in a lot of the ships.

I could definitely do with seeing another of those.

Someone tried to get me into that game but I couldn't ever actually get to play more than a few minutes of it. I think they gave me an extremely dodgy disc or something.

That reminds, however, of Ground Control, an amazing early 3D RTS game that to this day is utterly entertaining for me.

It launched with a looooot of bugs, and the multiplayer was non-functional. It was one of my first PC games, my Dad had a computer which was able to run games, and he and my brothers went shopping and picked up a couple of games. There was the Spiderman game (Not the movie one, this was the comic one released around the same time as the movie, which had a gamebreaking bug in the Venom chase), Battlezone 2 and some Shrek spelling thing (Oh god it was awful, but we needed one "educational" game).

It's very hand-holdy at first, but it gets interesting further along, until you're building bases all by yourself, and then the game amps it up by adding in tricky scenarios, like limited scrap, limited pools, or not having certain buildings, which makes things really interesting.

The gameplay on the shooting end is mostly circle strafing, the big change is controlling units and upgrading your vehicles, that gives you the real edge.

Unfortunately, the AI is pretty rubbish, and they'll follow the same pathing, large groups of units will clump and get stuck, and they all use the same sort of attack patterns.

Still, one of the best experiences I've had in gaming.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

The only mission I felt was poorly designed was the final one. .

Aand suddenly I remembered why I never finished that game.

After a whole game where you're dependant on supply drops and airstrikes, the last mission strips away all that and leaves you with dealing with an army by yourself with the rather so-so shooting. What a last minute choke.

Yeah, I actually remember using a cheat code on the last section because I live captured all the previous target and I think live capturing the final guy was like impossible.

 

[Fox12]

Honestly? I think this is happening to Spec-Ops. That game garnered a ton of critical attention when it came out, but nobody seems to talk about it anymore. I think this is rather sad, since it's the best horror game since SH2.

 

[Hawk of Battle]

The only mission I felt was poorly designed was the final one. .

Aand suddenly I remembered why I never finished that game.

After a whole game where you're dependant on supply drops and airstrikes, the last mission strips away all that and leaves you with dealing with an army by yourself with the rather so-so shooting. What a last minute choke.

Yeah, I actually remember using a cheat code on the last section because I live captured all the previous target and I think live capturing the final guy was like impossible.

It's not, I did it. It took over an hour, but by the fucking GODS I did it!

 

[Gospelnut]

Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines

I've mentioned this game before. Brutally unforgiving Stealth/Squad WW2 RTS. You control a team of up to 6, normally only 4 or so. They all have abilities. (Sniper, explosives, CQC,etc) Normal objectives are blowing up something. If you got spotted, the number of guards on the map pretty much quadrupled, making completing the mission impossible. Normal chain of events was: Plan a route, kill and hide all the bodies, find a getaway vehicle, then blow things up and run as all the guards poured out to chase you. The 2nd game improved and perfected the model, but the first was the best IMO. It also spawned a few copycats (Desperados, Robin Hood The Legend of Sherwood, and a few more)

 

[Scarim Coral]

Gotcha Force.

Sure the sound effect made by the characters were terrible but other than that, the game was solid! Great gameplay, excellent graphic and etc.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

The only mission I felt was poorly designed was the final one. .

Aand suddenly I remembered why I never finished that game.

After a whole game where you're dependant on supply drops and airstrikes, the last mission strips away all that and leaves you with dealing with an army by yourself with the rather so-so shooting. What a last minute choke.

Yeah, I actually remember using a cheat code on the last section because I live captured all the previous target and I think live capturing the final guy was like impossible.

It's not, I did it. It took over an hour, but by the fucking GODS I did it!

Haha, nice. I probably could've done it but the way those checkpoints were setup in that last mission no way I was dedicating so much time to that.

 

[Godhead]

Star Wars: Republic Commando. I remember playing the demo on my family's computer and it was below minimum specs. There weren't any textures and the muzzle flare was a solid cone with large rectangles for the projectiles.

It was the most fun I had ever had playing a video game.

Spoiler: Never forget

 

[Nazulu]

I thought Metal Fatigue is unique and competent enough. An RTS where you can build little tanks, plains and other vehicles along with giant customisable robots that can be piloted with different experienced crews, and it has 3 layers of terrain you could fight on: land, sky and underground. And with 3 sides it had an interesting single player to boot. The multi-player options could use a lot more work though.

Here's a review if you're interested

 

[sky pies]

I thought Metal Fatigue is unique and competent enough. An RTS where you can build little tanks, plains and other vehicles along with giant customisable robots that can be piloted with different experienced crews, and it has 3 layers of terrain you could fight on: land, sky and underground. And with 3 sides it had an interesting single player to boot. The multi-player options could you use a lot more work though.

Interesting, aside from the 'giant customization robots' it looks a lot like 'Total Annihilation'.. TA was a great game series, a bit old fashioned by today's standards but really robust with lots of epic combat and strategy...

 

[Nazulu]

I thought Metal Fatigue is unique and competent enough. An RTS where you can build little tanks, plains and other vehicles along with giant customisable robots that can be piloted with different experienced crews, and it has 3 layers of terrain you could fight on: land, sky and underground. And with 3 sides it had an interesting single player to boot. The multi-player options could you use a lot more work though.

Interesting, aside from the 'giant customization robots' it looks a lot like 'Total Annihilation'.. TA was a great game series, a bit old fashioned by today's standards but really robust with lots of epic combat and strategy...

I love Total Annihilation. It was a big deal when it came out and I wasn't surprised at all to see that many other developers took inspiration from it.

Metal Fatigue was definitely inspired by TA but it does have it's own... feel to it, especially when you'll relying on the combots to do most of the damage. Actually, TA generally feels more fluent than most RTS games, even against new RTS games, but MF's strengths are with the combinations and aerial assaults with combots, and the alien technology I just remembered you could obtain. No other RTS really has anything like that.

Unfortunately, the fuck heads who rushed the game out before the developers could properly complete it didn't realise what they had and it became lost in history. Many want to see it come to GoG though, I keep voting that one up.