Topic: Games You Feel are Overrated

Obligatory Undertale post. Considering it's probably one of the games that I've seen called overrated the most. Especially during the year it was super hot. tsshh.

I swear I've seen a topic about this before. Anyway, pretty much any recent linear platformer. Especially the Mario and DKC ones. 2D platformers have just been so repetitive and boring lately, recycling the same basic formula and doing little more than adding new levels. The genre as a whole could really use a BotW-esque reinvention.

@Snaplocket Yeah. I think it was a great game too, but it was definitely one of those games that I consistently saw being called overrated. Not to say that that means much or that I agree with their sentiment.

@Krillin_ @NaviAndMii I can't speak definitively on Halo, because at the time I wasn't doing much if any gaming at all. Probably the last FPS I'd played prior to Halo was Goldeneye.

But what stands out as making Halo so great at the time to me was the combination of all of the following:

• Co-op campaign - there may have been other games of similar calibre in the same period that offered this, but none come to mind.
• The vehicles - again, I can't think of any other games of the same period and calibre that featured ground and air vehicles, some of which could be co-op piloted. Really gave the game an extra dimension.
• The presentation - the game looked great, sounded great, felt slick (for the time) and had a real feel of high production values. The integration of Cortana was really well done too.

When my little bro came home with his new Xbox and Halo, the combination of the above really gave the Xbox that 'brand new console' launch wow factor we always dream of but don't always get.

The First Halo game looked rather empty and uninteresting imho. The environment felt just unconvincing and boring. Halo 2 and 3 were a lot better, I expecially liked Halo 3 but Halo 1 was absolutely overrated as far as I'm concerned

@Bolt_Strike I like platformers a lot and 2D platformers are perfect as they have always been for me. Donkey Kong country returns is one of my favourite games ever and I can't wait to have Sonic Mania! Not to mention that there are already many variations that offer a decent variety. I'm not a big Zelda fan, I really like only Twilight princess, but imo even for Zelda would have been better to remaining more similar to the previous games. They had a more distinct feel and were a lot less repetitive

Not really seeing the variety in the genre. This is every 2D platformer ever:

Some trivial plot thing happens that sets the adventure. Protagonist then goes from level to level on a 2D plane jumping on enemies, collecting whatever currency there is in the game, and getting to the end of the level. As you go through the game you usually encounter the same types of environments, grassland, forest, beach, desert, volcano, ice level, sky. The game is divided into worlds and then at the end of each world is a boss. Defeat said boss and move onto the next world. Once you beat the final boss in the last world, the game ends. Not really a lot of variety going on there, the only variety between the IPs for the most part is what moves the protagonist can use, other than that they all may as well be the same game.

And then from game to game, there aren't a lot of changes either. The same moves, the same environments, the same game structure, the same characters over and over and over and over again. There's never really been a BotW style revitalization of any game in the genre, or anything close to it. In fact if you look at Mario, all of the big innovations and additions to the formula have come from the sandbox games, never the linear platformers. So there's definitely something off about the way developers are approaching the genre.

Well this thread peaked.

I actually do have two games that come to mind for this. Maybe ONLY two at this point.

-Vanquish. No matter what people tell me about this game or how it's great if you master it (only did one playthrough myself), you can't trick me. It's still a 3rd person cover shooter, and no amount of Platinum's sense of fun can change that. And just like Gears, all the fans of the game keep telling me it's awesome once you don't have to rely on using cover and master the game. What? The point of a 3rd person cover shooter...is to not use the cover? JUST MAKE A 3RD PERSON SHOOTER WITHOUT BORING COVER MECHANICS THEN, WHAT'S THE POINT?! I don't get it. But...the game's alright. It can be fun at points, especially the bosses. But Platinum's 500 (usually successful) attempts to make a crazier version of God of War will always be better and more interesting and fun to me than their one attempt to make a crazier Gears of War. I hope a big new IP comes out that ends with "of War" so Platinum can make a crazier version of that.

-Kirby's Epic Yarn. I'm not sure if other people have pointed this out but tbh...it's just another Yoshi game. It's not quite the same but after playing Wooly World, which is another Yoshi game...it was another Kirby's Epic Yarn, even in terms of gameplay. It's a fun game but I'm confused why it was somehow a better game than Wooly World. They're mostly the same game. There's not some consistent, massive difference in their gameplay, outside of maybe Yoshi's typical "carry 6 eggs" thing. But Wooly World was the 2nd game with yarn graphics so it isn't novel anymore, so it's ok to not love it. Well, ok, some people had problems with the lack of dying but I felt that was mostly a non-issue. I have no opinion on that. I never really got into the soundtrack either, which is rare for a Kirby game. Not sure why, think it might be the style of music or the compositions. The remixes of the classic Kirby songs are fantastic by comparison. My point is, I see very little difference in gameplay quality between these two games. Both are moderately fun platformers whose main appeal is the style and graphics, with similar gameplay mechanics, where the difficulty and annoyances come from 100% while the completing the game is super easy (that last one fits the main series for both too).

I'll agree here, it didn't live up to the hype.

@Bolt_Strike I think you possibly just don't like 2D platformers, as your criticisms could be applied to every single type of video game.

Racing: you just try to go as fast as you can around a track, trying to get to the end before everybody else. Then you do it again and again. Sometimes the tracks are slightly different.

FPS: you just run around shooting everybody, while trying not to get shot yourself. Get to the end, sometimes there's a boss. Then you do it again.

RPGs: You just go through a world, meeting people, fighting battles and levelling up. Then you fight a boss, and if you haven't levelled up enough, you go back and do some more battles before taking on the boss again. And repeat.

I could go on... Arguably, the 2D platformer has seen as least as much innovation as any other genre, from single-screen courses, to side scrollers, to exploration-based Metroidvanias, to auto runners, to plane-changers like LittleBigPlanet. Then you have variations of play formats, with shooting, brawling and RPG mechanics occasionally thrown in. Not saying you have to like any of them - I dislike racing games precisely for the reasons listed above - but I think you're confusing the repetition criticism with a simple lack of interest in the genre.

Oh, and now that I think of it, Paper Mario 64. There's nothing really wrong with PM64, people just need to stop pretending that old games that old aren't irrevocably flawed in many ways. I get tired of people talking about the first two Paper Marios as if 64 compares in and way to The Thousand Year Door simply because it has turn-based combat. No way, lol. PM64 has the same plot of every other Mario game not Paper with a few nice characters and distractions that utterly pale in comparison to the ones written for TTYD and Super Paper Mario.

@Krillin_ Nah, I like the genre, but I don't like most of the games in it. There is one example of a game that actually isn't repetitive and that's Kirby Planet Robobot. Not exactly a groundbreaking game, but the Robobot Armor is a pretty neat addition that expands on what Kirby can do in a meaningful way. But for the most part, we don't even get that much out of 2D platformers. Sure, other genres can be simplified like that, but those genres tend to have extra gameplay elements involved in at least some of their games. 2D platformers? That tends to be ALL they have to them.

@MarcelRguez Metroidvanias are a sort of hybrid genre and tend to have watered down platforming. I would label those as an evolutionary offshoot of 2D platformers, they do have roots in 2D platforming, but they're pretty much their own thing. Same thing with sandbox platformers, which are a 3D variant that focuses more on exploration (although they have more platforming elements than Metroidvanias).

As for runners, I'm not quite sure what you mean. You're talking about endless runners like Temple Run or Sonic Dash/Runners? Those aren't really all that different. They're pretty much 2D platformers with most of the control taken away and simplified platforming mechanics.

At any rate, there's never really been an evolution in traditional 2D platformers. The only platformers that have really evolved are the variants that have other gameplay elements. That's not to say that platforming can't evolve, as the sandbox platformers have shown some exciting improvements to the platforming elements (such as different progression systems, different styles of level design, and the ability to find different ways to reach a particular point), it just hasn't.

Oh sure - I'm not saying Halo games are total trash or anything like that! I always used to enjoy going around to a mates' house for a Halo sesh (particularly co-op; with its expansive levels, vehicles & checkpoints) I never had an (OG) Xbox of my own but, of the games I played on it, it was probably my favourite

I just feel it gets a bit over-hyped for what it is:

• Master Chief, as a character, doesn't really capture my imagination
• I feel that Perfect Dark (and GoldenEye to be honest) had a much stronger & more memorable Campaigns
• I preferred GoldenEye/Perfect Dark's multiplayer (GE had better levels - PD had better game-modes + I really liked the introduction of bots and co-op Challenges)
• I also preferred GoldenEye/Perfect Dark's weapons (Golden Gun/FarSight etc.)
• Then I played the TimeSplitters series (made by GE/PD devs) and really liked how they took the GE/PD formula and twisted it in to something fresh and new - Halo always felt like more of a copycat than an innovation to me..

...and when I finally got a Halo game of my own on the Xbox 360 - Halo 3 - it left me feeling slightly underwhelmed. The multiplayer was decent - but I found the Campaign to be unforgivably short, unimaginative, un-memorable & lacking replayability - and this trend seemed to bleed in to other FPS's too. FPS Campaign's are enjoying a bit of a renaissance in recent times - there seems to be a demand for better single-player experiences in these games that companies are endeavoring to cater for - but I'm quite disappointed that, in 2017, I've still not played an FPS as well-rounded as Perfect Dark...

@gcunit Yep, @NaviAndMii and I are on the same page here. I too recognise your points, and understand why others might love Halo. The fools... 😉

I did not like at all the plot of Super Paper Mario. The first half of the game is very entertaining and looks nice, the best part of the game is the Bitlands stage, it is brilliant, but in the second half both the jokes and the graphics becomes incredibly boring and lazy. To be honest I don't even remember if there were jokes at all from that point on. And the plot seemed really out of place and uninteresting. I think Paper Mario 64 is the best one and I played it for the first time on Wii so it's not a nostalgia thing. It was even more pleasant to look honestly.

Paper Mario TTYD is to Paper Mario 64 what Twilight Princess is to Ocarina of Time.

Basically the same game, but bigger and edgier.

I have a couple of games I believe are overrated:

-The first two Paper Mario games are good games, but not the masterpieces the Internet makes them out to be
-I find Super Mario 64 boring and very outdated; it just isn't that fun
-Twilight Princess is simply unplayable for me due to the horrible beginning, and I cannot see how anyone can move past it
-The Genesis Sonic games, Sonic 1, 2, 3, and Knuckles, are pretty mediocre compared to platformers like Mario, not at all the absolute perfection Sonic fans say they are and want the series to be

Yea, what BotW did to dungeons was a travesty. Can you imagine BotW with "classic," full-scale dungeons? Even if it only had 4 or 5 of them? Would've made a great game nearly perfect, in my eyes. And it would have done A LOT to bring back the Zelda vibe (though that will never be fully accomplished without bringing back items).

@rallydefault Imagine in such a huge overworld how it would be to have only 4 or 5 main gameplay zones, how painful it would be trying to find them or how boring it would be if they made sure you found them easily, it would have been useless to have such a big overworld in the first place. Don't get me wrong I think that a traditional Zelda game would have been a better Zelda game than Breath of the wild, but since they decided to go for a big open overworld like that those changes became necessary.

@LuckyLand
Huh? "4 or 5 main gameplay zones"? Why would the dungeons be your only "main gameplay" zones? Did the vast overworld suddenly disappear?

I mean... yea, I'm really confused on that. Because as it is, you have 4 "dungeons" (not counting the castle) - do you consider them the only "main gameplay zones" currently?

@Nintendoer Can't comment on the others, but I completely agree on Sonic. They're wholly decent platformers, but nowhere near the best of the genre - even back when they were released. Today? I can play better platformers on my phone (there are actually some great mobile platform games). That said, I'm quite looking forward to Sonic Forces, and I will definitely read the reviews with interest for Mania too.