Games that were ridiculously difficult to get into?

[KapnKerfuffle]

Temple of Elemental Evil. First, I couldn't even play it because it had a bug that prevented you from looting bodies and i couldn't download the patch to fix it. It was a classic broken Troikia game (bless 'em). But it also follows the D&D 3.5 rules pretty faithfully and thus had quite a thick manual. Thank goodness I was in Iraq and had nothing better to do. Great game.

 

[DaMullet]

Gothic. Combat system was INSANELY tricky to get the hang of. But when you got it, damn did it feel good. It really felt challenging to do to any sort of fighting, but every second of it was really rewarding!

 

[dolgion]

Europa Universalis certainly, but even worse were the other games from its makers "Victoria" and "Hearts of Iron 2". OMG I tried and tried to learn how this shit works but it's just tooo complicated. You get like 200 options thrown in your face, and all the permutations that come along with it...and then you get totally different 200 options if you start with a different country. PAINFUL to learn!

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

I am finding Mass Effect 1 really hard to get into, I am not sure why. But I am taking my friends advice and blasting through it on easy so I can play the second one without feeling like a jerk.

 

[Grey_Focks]

The three TBS X-Com games take that cake. Good god did they have a learning curve to em, but I admit when I finally figured out what the hell I was supposed to be doing, they turned out to be downright amazing.

 

[Ranchcroutons]

Ill probably catch some flak for this but the original Mass Effect. Once I hit the Citadel I would always lose my momentum some reason and stop playing. Fortunately I did pick it back up and powered through to the rest of the awesome game.

 

[Super Toast]

I found Fallout 2 hard to enjoy, after having played Bethesda's offering first. Needless to say, I'm glad I stuck with it. RPing as Riki-Oh has never been so awesome.

 

[Diablo27]

Red Dead Redemption...actually I just plain didn't get into that.

 

[rockyoumonkeys]

It took me a couple tries to get into Dragon Age: Origins. Mostly because the "normal" difficulty ended up kicking my ass since I wasn't used to the combat mechanics.

GTAIV definitely wins this for me, since I've tried several times to get into it, and never got very far before giving up in annoyance at the crappy driving and constant babysitting. Man that game blows.

 

[Dragonborne88]

A game that was hard to get into? The "X" series and the Europa Universalis series.. Not X-Com, but X3: Terran Conflict and the others.

Most games I can get into after a bit of playing, but those two games beat me down with the learning curve. So much that as much as I want to get back into it, I can't. It's too daunting of a task. I think I did the tutorial for X3, then when the world opened I went "Durr..." and quit, and Europa I think I managed to take a town, saw it was going to take 50 years or so to "Claim" it, which is HOURS real time, and was like, "Nope" and quit.

 

[kidwithxboxlive]

-Flame shield start-
Halo : Reach.
Campaign was suicidaly boringm 3 levels in...
-Flame Shield end-

 

[Assassin Xaero]

Dragon Age Origins - first two hours were horrible, but then the last half of the game was complete torture.

Oblivion.
Final Fantasy VIII.

 

[ViciousMoon]

Since Drawf Fortress is already mentioned I'd have to say any roguelike, especially those still using ASCII graphics.

 

[Twad]

Dwarf Fortress.

Possibly the most complicated game to try and understand.
THe UI is a big problem. And the graphics (or lack of) dont help at all (i use MayGreen version)
But there are plenty of ressources around to help you.

And its pretty rewarding to finaly understand it. Very rewarding to murd-- serve nobles.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Kingdom Hearts 2

That whole first section with Roxas or whatever his name is was excruciatingly boring.

 

[Harry Mason]

Getting into Dragon Age: Origins was like breaking down a brick wall with my teeth.

But once I was in, I was hooked.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Games I tried to get into and horribly failed:

- Deus Ex
I'm sorry, but I just couldn't get past the badly aged graphics (and that's coming from someone who isn't a graphics whore), random combat mechanics (sometimes a headshot is a one-hit kill, sometimes it isn't, wtf?), random stealth (I'm in the shadows dammit!!) and horrible voice-acting. I'm hoping Human Revolutions will fix all that because the concept still draws me in.

- Europa Universalis 3
Just...too...complicated!!

- Victoria 2
Same as the above, only worse. I'd love to get into the grand-strategy genre, but it's so damn difficult!

- Dawn of War 2
I just kept getting paired against players that were way more experienced than I was. Kept getting my ass kicked, barely was able to learn anything.

- X3: Terran Conflict
Too vast, tutorial was rather lacking, and well I guess I'm just not made for that game. Shame because the concept was oh so appealing.

- Ninja Gaiden 2
I was sloooowly getting the hang of the insane amounts of combos available to you. Then I saw my little brother fight the last boss. Fuck that game...

- Street Fighter 4
It's too fast. Just...too fast.

- Most RTS games
I used to be so good at them, I was undefeatable in Age of Empires 2. Nowadays...I just can't micro-manage so quickly.

Games that were difficult to get into, but I managed anyway:

- Dwarf Fortress
Well that one speaks for itself, but now I've got a sprite-pack and a handy tutorial, and aaaaall's well.

- EVE Online
Overwhelming at first, but the tutorial and just taking it slow certainly helped. In the end I quit anyway because there was too much time involved in getting to the really cool stuff.

- Dragon Age Origins
I didn't expect to get my ass handed to me so hard by an RPG. Didn't help either that my character was uninteresting. After a few months I started over again with a cool character and the Easy setting, and it's very enjoyable now.

- Minecraft
It's not that it's difficult or anything, I had just kind of lost the child-like creativity I used to have while I still played with Lego's. And well, since Minecraft sorta plays like Lego's I had no idea what to do. But that's slowly changing now.

- Tropico 3
Been ages since I've played a game like that, and it took some time to figure out why my farms kept storing my friggin' bananas and not exporting them. But I managed and was very happy. Still no idea why my coffee farm suddenly stopped producing though.

- Rome: Total War
One of the few RTS's I managed to play succesfully outside of my younger years. The battles were not so damn fast with proper tactics, and the overworld map was easy enough to follow. Still, it's an RTS, so it took some time. Might get Shogun: Total War 2 now if I find the time and spare money.

Dwarf Fortress, certainly. Biggest learning curve I've seen.

I guess I could say EVE Online too.

EVE Online has gotten a very comprehensive tutorial. After doing it I was doing missions, killing pirates and whatnot within an hour or so.

Dwarf Fortress.

Possibly the most complicated game to try and understand.
THe UI is a big problem. And the graphics (or lack of) dont help at all (i use MayGreen version)
But there are plenty of ressources around to help you.

And its pretty rewarding to finaly understand it. Very rewarding to murd-- serve nobles.

It can be worse. Try playing Aurora [http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=47678.0]. If you thought Dwarf Fortress was insanely detailed....hehehe...yeeeeaaaaah...

 

[Aeshi]

Armored Core.

Sometimes I think I've spent more time tweaking my AC to be as deadly as possible than I have actually using it.