Games that were surprisingly enjoyable.

[Selka]

This is a quasi-direct response to the "Games that disappoint you" thread. After seeing so many people talk about how many games they've played that have been over-hyped and ended up sucking, lame, or just not that good, I felt like I should take the more optimistic attitude and start a topic about games that have been surprisingly good. These can be games that never got any hype but turned out to be really nice, games that got crappy reviews that you thought were awesome, games you had never heard of that you got for Christmas that were surprising entertaining, or games that were hyped and got amazing reviews but still surprised you with how good they were (i.e. Portal).

The best surprise game I've ever played was Shining Force, originally for the Sega Genesis. I downloaded it off of the Wii's virtual console about the same time I bought Metroid Prime 3, and I ended up playing it more and enjoyed it more than Metroid. The oldest tactical RPG I've ever played, and also one of the most enjoyable, it's a great example that more is not always better. The simplistic gameplay and mechanics lends itself for an emphasis on pure tactics, where choice of characters in the party and placement of said characters is more important than equipment and leveling up. This game is fun, and I highly recommend it if you have the $8.

Metroid Prime 3, even though I just compared it unfavorably to Shining Force, was still a surprise to me, especially after the cesspool of sin that was Metroid Prime 2. The first boss battle with Ridley, the first encounter with the Metroids, and the great controls made it a game far surpassing my sup-par expectations. Still not as good as the original, but great none-the-less.

Oddworld: Munch's Oddysse, Lost Kingdoms (well worth the $6 I bought it for), Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, Bioshock, Odin Sphere, and Golden Axe 3 are all games that have surprised me with their quality and fun.

 

[roo18]

I thought I'd hate TimeSplitters. Lots of people seemed to love it and I didn't get what was so great until I accually played it. I don't normally like playing first person shooters but this supprised me in a good way.

I liked the graphics and multiplayer, and I accually found the controls easy to use, when normally I can't get the right buttons.

 

[Lance Icarus]

Imagine my shock when I booted up Harvest Moon 64 for the first time thinking it was a farm simulator. Boy was I wrong! Still one of my favorite game series of all time.

Also, Tales of Symphonia. It's such a breath of fresh air for RPGs. You'll never find anything quite as hectic as a ToS boss battle against a summon, nor will you ever scream "Orange Gel! Orange Gel!" as loudly anywhere else.

 

[J-Val]

John Woo's Strangehold. It was getting a lot of shtick about having a bad plot and repetitive combat, but I found it really fun. In fact, it was even more fun on the higher difficulties, especially Hard Boiled.

 

[Final_Assassin_42]

Tony Hawk's Underground. The story mode was actually enjoyable that time.

 

[Lanowar]

Viewtiful Joe 1 and 2, cheap games did'nt expect much going in to 1 and was amazed how good it was and with 2 I was'nt expecting a decent game when compared to 1 and also got an enjoyable experience.

 

[Lance Icarus]

Tony Hawk's Underground. The story mode was actually enjoyable that time.

People don't give that game enough credit for it's story. The antagonist of that game was surprisingly good in that he was the a-hole friend who always kept jerking you around and made you wonder why you have been friends since grade school, someone we all know.

Very few games give you the total satisfaction of beating that punk ass who's totally posin' yo style.

Also, please shoot me if I use that last sentence again, anywhere.

 

[DragoonZx]

Also, Tales of Symphonia. It's such a breath of fresh air for RPGs. You'll never find anything quite as hectic as a ToS boss battle against a summon, nor will you ever scream "Orange Gel! Orange Gel!" as loudly anywhere else.

Agree competely, it was a great game, great story and FUN, something that most games these days fail to achieve. It was a shining beacon of light in the dull dreary swamp of Gamecube games.

Another winner in my eyes was .Hack//infection. At first I thought the idea was a bit far fetched but once you get past the idea of "Pretending" to be in an online game which at times was a little confusing it had everything a good game should, tis just a shame the sequels are so damn hard to get a hold of.

 

[mrblackett]

The first Wario Ware Inc on the GBA. I had no idea how good it was going to be. I still consider it to be one of the best games I've played.

 

[GrowlersAtSea]

War of the Monsters on the Playstation 2.

I saw it for cheap and thought 'Why not?' since it looked almost like the old King of the Monster games that older gamers would be familiar with. It actually turned out to be an extremely fun two player fighting game, set with five story tall monsters inside three dimensional cities. Climb up tall buildings, pick off the antenna at the top, impale the other play.

Not a very deep game, but with two players and two bots it was just a very fun game. A shame it didn't support more players.

 

[Enigmatic_Apple]

EARTH DEFENSE FORCE 2017.

Jesus.

It was the only CO OP game in Blockbuster besides "Marvel Ultimate Alliance."

Wasn't I in for a surprise, it was one of the most fun weekends I had all year. It was so bad in so many ways but I couldn't get enough of it. Now I await anxiously for a sequel or anything. That game with a bigger budget would be fucking epic.

 

[Testing]

I have to agree with Shining Force. I played the remake for the GBA that my friends won in a Melee tournament. They thought it was a pretty terrible prize so I took it, expecting it to be a horrible game. I started it out, and lol'd a few times. But I got so in to that game. It was so beautiful. I'd have to say it had the best story of any game I've ever played. Every time the characters were in the main headquarters area, I'd hang on to every word they said.

P.S. My friends thought they got it bad. I won Larry the Cable Guy for PSP in a Melee tournament. I was crushed.

 

[Katana314]

GTA San Andreas. After all the hype about raping hookers, I never really realized that there was an unheard-of freeroaming jet-flying element to the game that no one seemed to talk about. Not to mention a soundtrack so good that much of it went into Guitar Hero.

I'd actually say often though, I'm not disappointed by games because if I haven't played it, I usually won't buy it. (except if I know the makers very well, as was the case with the orange box)

 

[Count_de_Monet]

Giants: Citizen Kabuto. It looks goofy, it is goofy, there are some technical missteps, and yet knowing all this every time I install it I feel compelled to beat it and even go back and play some of the levels over because they are so much fun.

Warcraft 3. Honestly, I expected it to be a complete piece of junk but I enjoyed the campaign (even if it was easy) and I think the hero system was a great addition.

Team Fortress 2. I still love the original more but this game is definitely fun (and populated unlike it's predecessor).

 

[Weimdog]

Power Stone 2.

My friend and I figured it was going to be a simple (and crappy) 3-d fighter with a few items for added button-mashing. We were really shocked when we found out how deep and thought out the item-creation system was (in a fighting game?!?!), we loved it. The levels were interesting and unique, from dungeons to flying ships, and the fighting system was a little 3-dimensional too: hunt for good items, hunt for 3 gems, or just beat them down. The game looked fantastic, and was very simple to pick up, with hours of item mixing and matching to create powerful arsenals for your next fight (Quintuple-homing-missle-launcher anyone?)

Also, another game I once rented for Playstation, but since haven't seen anywhere: "Energheiz"
It was a fighting game combined with an RPG 'half', and both I found very fun. I haven't seen a game try that before, and I didn't expect it to work so well.

 

[Nordstrom]

Flatout is not considered a great game but I love the physics. I get the impression that I can feel what each tire is doing. When a tire hooks a ditch, the whole car responds a way that I would expect if I were driving a real car.

I like how crashing affects the performance of the car in ways that are physically tangible. The damage is exaggerated differently than how a real car would behave after a crash. A real car would stop working altogether or have the wheels badly rubbing, making the car undrivable. In Flatout, they badly unbalance the wheels and badly loosen up the suspension. The wheels warble asymmetrically, the springs lose their damping, and the body leans. It's entertaining to see the back of the car bobbing uncontrollably like some old beaters that I've driven in the past. It's fun to try to get that old beater across the finish line ahead of the other aggressively stupid drivers in the race.

Flatout also takes me back to my teens when I was bombing around the farm in American built, rear wheel drive cars, powersliding in the mud.

 

[LordLocke]

Two Worlds.

The game's glitchy, moves at framerates that have been unacceptable since the N64, and has numerous instances of worthless or nonoperational skills and items. I remember all the griping the guy at Silicon Knights gave about the Unreal 3 engine, but 2/3 of what's wrong with the game is sloppy design and lack of playtesting, not anything engine-related.

Yet once you learned what was a waste of time, and figured out what you could do, and how the game's Upgrade and Alchemy systems worked... it was surprisingly fun. A game which at one point I swore "One more hour, and if this doesn't pick up..." turned into a game where I not only finished the playthrough but sought out most of it's nooks and crannies. There were some good ideas buried in there that managed to shine through after I'd stuck with it for a bit, no matter how hard the chimps that call themselves programmers as SK tried to ruin my experience. I'm not likely to play through it again, but it was good for the 25ish hours it took me to clear it the first time.

 

[KurtNiisan]

Bladestorm for PS3 is my recent one. Great combination of RPG levelling elements and 3rd person combat, set in medievil Franch during the Hundred Year war. Only thing I can complain about is the voice acting is dodgy with some of the characters. One thing I do love is taking Knight cavalry squads and running them smack-dab into the middle of an incomming squad of *INSERT ANYTHING HERE* and seeing them all fall over.

Instant Win ^^

 

[Frapple]

N3 is similar, meant to rent Bladestorm after enjoying N3 so much, great RPG/'What the hell genre is this'

I recently loaded up Pokemon Emerald on the GBA, remember playing Pokemon Yellow as a kid, still the same game, didn't expect it to be still good now I'm a..a..grown up.