Area's within a game not living up to the hype.

[Zhukov]

That one level in Thief: Deadly Shadows. It takes place in an old asylum. I think it was called 'Robbing the Cradle' or something similar.

It was supposed to be incredibly scary.

It really wasn't. I liked the way the lights would flicker when the monsters got close, but otherwise, meh.

YOU ARE NOT HUMAN.
I HATE YOU AND HOPE YOUR CATS GET FAT.


This is one of the first times I think I've seen someone who was unaffected by that level.

Eh, I dunno. It had potential. Reading the descriptions of the various inmates was pretty creepy. A cannibal who always carries around a knife and fork, a lady cradling the cremated remains of her stillborn kid, a guy wearing a blank mask who only answers to "King Nobody". Good stuff. But it never really seemed to become relevant. I can't remember if I ever even saw any of them.

Also, the monsters were kind of low rent. They did this visual "stuttering" effect, but I couldn't tell if they were supposed to be spazzing out for extra creepiness or if their animations were glitching. Either way, it made them kind of comical.

 

[ImperialSunlight]

Arah and Orr in general in Guild Wars 2 felt massively underwhelming in every aspect, especially the boss. Very bland, too many risen, and hard to survive without a zerg.

 

[Legion]

The Wilhelm fight in Borderlands 2. Throughout the whole first quater of the game you have all these audio logs and people telling you how impossible it is to beat the mighty Wilhelm. You're told the previous 4 vault hunters were beaten while fighting him together, that he could derail trains by himself, that he was Hyperions most badass soldier ever to come out of Hyperion's walls...and then I killed him in less then a minute using my ability once and a corrosive pistol. Seriously, that fight was so lackluster, I was going through the whole game solo as Zer0 and all the other missions were harder than that boss fight. I SHOULD HAVE LOST, it was open terrain with little place to hide, my ability wasn't overly leveled yet, I had a sniper rifle an SMG and a pistol and ended up only using the pistol which did hundreds of points less then the other two weapons.

There is also the final boss fight against the Warrior, but that was more because I found out that if I just stood at the entrance none of the Warrior's attacks could hit me (same goes for the Rakk and Chrisalids). So yeah, at least if I wanted a challenge with the end boss I could get one by not abusing the attack range and stupidity of the end boss, Wilhelm was just the biggest fucking pushover.

... That was the entire point, I thought that was well known by now?

Jack wanted you to beat him. Because by doing so you took his core, that let Jack activate his trap. Them building him up to be scary and you slaughtering him was entirely intentional.

So when you beat him you felt that you had a chance after all, but then you get that taken away from you.

I am not saying they did it well, or that I disagree that he was too easy, but the whole "he is so tough" but not being difficult was an intentional design choice.

 

[Amethyst Wind]

The amusement park (name escapes me) in FFXIII. I was expecting a Golden Saucer-esque land of happy funtime minigames. Not a single path breaking up long, boring cutscenes.

 

[Assassin Xaero]

They did patch it to where he has more health now, but still rather easy (just takes a while longer). Prepatch you pretty much sneezed and he fell over.

I don't often hook my Xbox up to the internet, and I've already played through Borderlands 2 twice, probably won't be getting that patch anytime soon. And while I do like Gearbox, it's kind of fucking annoying that they had to put out a patch to make an enemy that they spent a good amount of time hyping up harder, and add to the fact that they're too scared that the game will get overly difficult/really easy if they raise the level cap by 10-19 points is just a cop out. The willingly put in that Terramorphus boss as a near impossible enemey (If you don't use the Gunzerker cheat) to be all like, "Hey guys look at this boss he's pretty tough and he's level 52" and yet they want players to not feel tough themselves/find the game too difficult. Add to the fact that single player is significantly more difficult playing as any other class other than the Commando just kind of makes me a little annoyed at Gearbox for seemingly flipping a coin, but choosing both sides.

It isn't a "they are scared" issue or anything, it becomes a balance issue (provided you are talking about the level cap increase, if not, then just ignore the rest of this). You can easily make yourself overpowered with that many skill points (my mechromancer already slaughters most things alone, imagine if deathtrap also had all his skill points). Then balancing the enemies with that. If they make the enemies harder, unless you are overpowered, it will be too hard and not fun. If you blow through everything, it would be too easy and not fun. If the game isn't fun, it is worthless. Increasing the cap would probably technically be just a few changes to a line or two of code, but then everything it could affect makes it much harder, and they most likely want to keep the game as balanced/as fun as possible.

I had no issues getting through the single player with Zer0. Get his melee up and he destroys everything.

 

[sanquin]

Fear 2. I've heard so many people saying how scary it was. Some even thought it scarier than fear 1. Then I played it, though it was still 'scary', it was very underwhelming. The game mostly relied on jump scares, while fear 1 also had a scary atmosphere. And a lot of the supposedly scary things just...didn't do it for me.

Mass Effect 2's suicide mission boss as well. I bought it a bit later and people kept on telling me how great the boss fight at the end was. I played it, and I thought it was 'meh' at best. A huge enemy with a small hitbox (i always went for the eyes and such) moving about a lot, while all you do is hide behind a small wall. The rest of the mission was better, imo.

 

[BrotherRool]

Mass Effect 2's suicide mission boss as well. I bought it a bit later and people kept on telling me how great the boss fight at the end was. I played it, and I thought it was 'meh' at best. A huge enemy with a small hitbox (i always went for the eyes and such) moving about a lot, while all you do is hide behind a small wall. The rest of the mission was better, imo.

Who told you that the last boss fight was good? I wouldn't trust their opinion on much =D The combat was no fun and the actual boss was really laughable (something of a trope for the series though. Froggy saren wasn't particularly more dignified)

The amusement park (name escapes me) in FFXIII. I was expecting a Golden Saucer-esque land of happy funtime minigames. Not a single path breaking up long, boring cutscenes.

For some reason, this made me really want to play the game again. It definitely is a huge letdown and nothing like it should have been but it's the one time in the game they slow down and give you an inkling of what people are missing as they run away from everything

 

[AnthrSolidSnake]

Fear 2. I've heard so many people saying how scary it was. Some even thought it scarier than fear 1. Then I played it, though it was still 'scary', it was very underwhelming. The game mostly relied on jump scares, while fear 1 also had a scary atmosphere. And a lot of the supposedly scary things just...didn't do it for me.

Mass Effect 2's suicide mission boss as well. I bought it a bit later and people kept on telling me how great the boss fight at the end was. I played it, and I thought it was 'meh' at best. A huge enemy with a small hitbox (i always went for the eyes and such) moving about a lot, while all you do is hide behind a small wall. The rest of the mission was better, imo.

I always thought the expansions to F.E.A.R. were more scary than the original game. Sure, my first time playing F.E.A.R. was unnerving, but I never felt truly frightened. FEAR 2 was okay...I liked the parts in the elementary school, but anything else was just a pretty good FPS. FEAR 3 was a joke though...which leads me to my big disappointment...

 

[Shoggoth2588]

I liked how The Dunwhich Building featured a couple of hallucinations and that basement is...well it was a bit unnerving (or rather it would have been if I wasn't capable of turning invisible by crouching).

---

Legend of Zelda and you already know that I'm going to mention the Water Temple. It's a bit annoying switching boots in most iterations but even off of the 3DS it's a temple that never gave me the problems everybody else seems to have had. ya know what temple I really hated in that game though? Well none actually...I don't care for the Shadows temple and the Ice temple is a tease since it's made of 3 rooms.

In about 2 or 3 weeks I'll have Sonic the Hedgehog on the 360 and Shadow the Hedgehog so I'm close to living through the frustrations of many a Sonic fan!

 

[AnthrSolidSnake]

F.E.A.R. 3, or stupidly named F3AR. The entire game. Complete disappointment. I loved the first two games, especially the expansions to the first F.E.A.R., so naturally I assumed 3 would hopefully be on par in quality, especially hearing how they were going to "go towards a more horror aspect", but when playing it all felt like a mediocre FPS. I enjoyed the Co-op aspect a little when playing with my brother, and the setups to the games levels had some great potential, but it was all. freaking. ruined. I traded in a couple of my games and spent the last bit of my money (had no job at the time) to get the game on release, and every time I look at that case I am filled with regret ;_;

 

[FFP2]

The amusement park (name escapes me) in FFXIII. I was expecting a Golden Saucer-esque land of happy funtime minigames. Not a single path breaking up long, boring cutscenes.

I think it's called Nautalus or something like that. Apparently it was supposed to be like the Golden Saucer but they had to cut a shit load of content from the game.

I actually kinda liked it. It was refreshing to just chase Chocolina in a stupidly colourful area instead of the characters being so serious all the time.

OT: Mine would be the Mount Rushmore spoof from Just Cause 2. I thought it would be this big awesome 007 kinda area and it ended up just being the hardest mission in any game that I've ever played.

 

[bug_of_war]

It isn't a "they are scared" issue or anything, it becomes a balance issue (provided you are talking about the level cap increase, if not, then just ignore the rest of this). You can easily make yourself overpowered with that many skill points (my mechromancer already slaughters most things alone, imagine if deathtrap also had all his skill points). Then balancing the enemies with that. If they make the enemies harder, unless you are overpowered, it will be too hard and not fun. If you blow through everything, it would be too easy and not fun. If the game isn't fun, it is worthless. Increasing the cap would probably technically be just a few changes to a line or two of code, but then everything it could affect makes it much harder, and they most likely want to keep the game as balanced/as fun as possible.

I had no issues getting through the single player with Zer0. Get his melee up and he destroys everything.

It wasn't so much as Zer0 not being good as it was his ability to deal with waves of enemies. Yes, his melee is quite strong, especially when you upgrade his ability to dash 5 meters with the melee attack, but unlike the Commando he has no tree which focuses on health and recovery and so you have to be damn sure you've got the right shield and the right play style. Zer0's flaws become apparant in missions like the whole cutting down Jack statues, when you get the mission you are roughly level 24 and haven't gotten enough skill points to be able to go into Deception every 10 seconds and a majority of the enemies require corrosive/electric weapons to take them down easily. I personally just found the Commando to have it easier in most missions as dropping the turret on one side and defending the other was so much easier than doing everything by yourself. It could be because my play style was more suited to the commando, but I have heard many people say the same thing about B2 single player.

I get that some classes could become overpowered/underpowered if the cap is increased, but there is that machine in game that lets you re-arrange your abillities for a small price so I don't see how it's a terrible thing. If players want a challenge they can re-arrange their skills so they aren't game breaking, and vice versa. I don't see the problem in enemies being too easy as most enemies alreay are too easy; Chrysalids die easy against melee (I seriously rack up $50,000 in 5 minutes on true vault hunter mode every time I feel like killing all of them in Caustic Cavern), same goes for the Rakk, Skags aren't a big deal, Spiderants are relatively easy, Psychos just run at you with shooting so no hard part in killing them, the repair drones (even the badass ones) get taken down quite easily, when a Goliath is with Marauders you can just shoot his helmet off and make them fight each other, the Varkids die in 1-2 melee shots so unless you let them they really never become adults. Really, the only enemies that proove challenging are the Threshers, Buzzards, and those Nomads that hold shields.

So yeah, when you have a system in game that allows players to change their skill points, a large amount of enemies that are easily beaten, and the end boss which practically requires a full team of people to kill (Terramorphus, not the Warrior), I honestly think that raising the cap shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Vern5]

Snip

Just for clarification, are you saying that the Dunwich building is not the creepiest place in Fallout 3 or that it was not the creepiest place in comparison to other things you've seen? Because it was pretty much designed to be creepy in comparison to the rest of Fallout 3's locations.

OT: I was never impressed with any of the scenery from Mass Effect, like the Citadel or any of the locations. I think its because I could see a cool skyline in the distance but had to live with the realization that I couldn't actually explore what was over that impressive-looking horizon, thus killing any sense of wonderment I might have had.

 

[unbreakable212]

Snip

Just for clarification, are you saying that the Dunwich building is not the creepiest place in Fallout 3 or that it was not the creepiest place in comparison to other things you've seen? Because it was pretty much designed to be creepy in comparison to the rest of Fallout 3's locations.

OT: I was never impressed with any of the scenery from Mass Effect, like the Citadel or any of the locations. I think its because I could see a cool skyline in the distance but had to live with the realization that I couldn't actually explore what was over that impressive-looking horizon, thus killing any sense of wonderment I might have had.

It wasn't as creepy compared to other things that I've played.

It was one of the more unsettling area's within the game, but I'd heard alot about it from people and it sounded like a building ripped straight out of a horror story/game. I think my expectations were a little high, but I still felt let down.

 

[Vern5]

Snip

Just for clarification, are you saying that the Dunwich building is not the creepiest place in Fallout 3 or that it was not the creepiest place in comparison to other things you've seen? Because it was pretty much designed to be creepy in comparison to the rest of Fallout 3's locations.

OT: I was never impressed with any of the scenery from Mass Effect, like the Citadel or any of the locations. I think its because I could see a cool skyline in the distance but had to live with the realization that I couldn't actually explore what was over that impressive-looking horizon, thus killing any sense of wonderment I might have had.

It wasn't as creepy compared to other things that I've played.

It was one of the more unsettling area's within the game, but I'd heard alot about it from people and it sounded like a building ripped straight out of a horror story/game. I think my expectations were a little high, but I still felt let down.

Okay that makes sense. Fallout 3 isn't designed with horror in mind, after all. Well, unless you play with the FWE mod, in which a pack of weak dogs could easily kill you if you aren't paying attention.

 

[Gitty101]

Ravenholm from Half-Life 2. I played it years after the initial release and you can't get far on the interwebs without hearing "we don't go to Ravenholm". My friends also kept saying how much of a super scary level it was. Bottom line, it wasn't.

Don't get me wrong, I loved the level - best in the game in my opinion, but it had been hyped up to be scarier than it actually was. I got a couple of jump-scares from poisonous headcrabs, but that was it. Still immensely enjoyed it though, that Priest guy was awesome.

 

[Scrustle]

The later areas in Darksiders 2. Before the game released the devs boasted how just the first overworld area was four times the size of the entire world in Darksiders 1, and it was. The second was about the same size too. After that the areas drastically decreased in size to the point where the later areas were literally just a path leading from the portal area to the main quest dungeon of the zone. In the first two zones there were loads of dungeons dotted around, with some only being part of optional side-quests.

I still love the game, it just feels like the devs only realised they had bitten off way more than they could chew half way through development. What they were able to create was great though.

 

[JohnnyDelRay]

Bioshock 1. Although I did find it mildly disturbing, and the story itself took me in like a young teen watching a stripper, it just didn't provide a scary atmosphere as people seemed to build it up to. Funny thing though, System Shock 2 had me trembling at certain moments almost unable to push forward. But maybe that's because of my age at the time, to be fair. Anyways, my verdict is still that SS2 is bigger on atmosphere, and Bioshock had better level design, but to SS2s credit these were pretty far apart. I found the enemies just as freaky in SS2.

 

[momijirabbit]

I heard that Bioshock was the HL2 of this gen, so I played the demo, What a terrible game. HL2 isn't much compared to the original but Bioshock was just bad. I couldn't get into it, atrocious controls and the world was kinda neat, but it wasn't as amazing as I was told it would be.