Games you felt were harshly judged...

[Pink Gregory]

Assassin's Creed 3. I seriously don't get where are the hate is coming from. Interesting setting and characters (some, at least), great gameplay and combat, it looks beautiful, there's so much to do (sidequests, mini-games, collectibles), the soundtrack is perfect, the writing is solid, the story is intriguing, the modern world missions are well done, shaun has some great banter, the free-running is at it's best and Haytham Kenyway's voice is reason enough for everyone to love the game.
I understand how it's not everyone's cup of tea (ha), but it's certainly better than 1 and revelations.

Yeah, better than 1 (I disagree!) and Revelations (I agree) and Brotherhood (I STRONGLY agree); but the thing is, sequels are really supposed to either expand on, continue or improve on the previous game(s). Thing is what I found about AssCreed 3 is that for everything it did that I did like, there seemed to be two things either changed for the worse or taken out, to my chagrin.

It made me say things like, "the free-running WORKED before, why change it? Just give me something fun to run around on!". I found the collectibles to be a little inconsequential, mainly because they were marked on the map from the start, didn't even have to buy a map (okay, buying a map for them was kind of bullshit too in the previous games). The instakill-combo thing in the combat bothered me a lot from Brotherhood onwards (though it does flow nicely), I never personally felt that AssCreed should be about the bodycount, should be more about evasion and escape, rather than killing.

The writing I actually liked, the little I heard/saw of it; but the pacing is just bloody weird around the start of the game, doesn't really take any time to establish any of the important things (like the protagonist). That and 'seeing the assassin symbol in a crystal ball' was cringe-inducing.

That being said there were many things I liked about it (yes, Haytham was one of them), but eventually the things I disliked outweighed the things I liked by so much that I decided to stop playing and trade it in. And that's without the glitches that probably aren't going to be fixed.

I 'unno, after LOVING 1 and 2 I feel like 3 was too many steps backwards; and evidently that's what quite a lot of other people thought, especially at the kind of budget that Ubisoft has. There's no denying that there's something there, though.

Then again, I really, really liked AC1, so that probably discounts my opinion by a few points.

 

[Callate]

I don't think Bioshock 2 was a bad game. It just wasn't as good a game as its predecessor. I certainly appreciated that they figured out the idea of having one button for plasmids and another for weapons, though. (Such an idea had already been around at least as long as Clive Barker's Undying, so I was a little surprised they didn't do it in the first Bioshock.)

It's already been mentioned, but I'll put in a plug for Saints Row 2, and to up the ante, the PC version of SR2. Yes, it was buggy when it first came out; yes, the menus were never really brought up to speed for PC interface. And it even had some weird issues with objects floating around in some of the cut scenes. None the less, one hell of a good time. And I'll be honest: I've played through SR2 and even made a second character, but after three attempts, I still haven't been able to force myself to slog through GTA IV.

Silent Hill 4: The Room. This game may get some retroactive appreciation for the mis-steps that have been made in giving the more recent sequels to teams overseas. I played the PC version, again, which was locked to a fairly low resolution in a shamelessly poor bit of porting. Still, the atmosphere was terrific, the scenery was beautiful, the plot was intriguing, and saddling another character with some of the risks made the whole thing more compelling. And the changes to first-person perspective really amplified the sense of claustrophobia.

 

[Animyr]

I'll again vote for Bioshock 2. Overall, I actually liked it better then the first game. sure, it lacked the narrative focus of the first game, but the gameplay was better and the third act was much stronger and pulled together a superior ending. Sure it wasn't necessary; it felt more like a full-length epilogue to the first game, but for what it was it was well done.

I also liked the 2009 Wolfenstein, so I felt kind of vindicated to see that Yahtzee change his mind on that, even if it was three years later.

I feel people's hatred of the endings leaks into their judgement of the game as a whole.

The ending falls so flat in the place where it mattered so much that everything before it, I think, suffers by association. Some stories have finales that make the individual chapters that preceded it more then the sum of their parts; ME3's ending did the opposite, I feel.

 

[PinkiePyro]

recently I would say Farcry 3

a lot of my friends have been like this game is crap has bad game-play erc

and I admit it's not "skyrim with guns" but its pretty damn close to that level of awesome
I say its more what dead island should of been

 

[blackdwarf]

The first AC. It's my favorite of the series because it felt focused and it was well written. unlike ACII and Brotherhood.
Sure it was repetitious, but at least all felt meaningful. Everything that happened is there to give flavor to your targets and Altair. And every mechanic is useful and has its place, unlike the the many useless junk you could do and never use in the other games.

 

[chuckey]

Look I'll be the first to say it but I think Sonic Unleashed was very unfairly judged. Sure, the Werehog sections kind of of took you out of the excitement and speed of the Day levels but they played very well. The fighting was solid and once you gain certain moves, you can pretty much breeze through them. The story was fairly good and the art and presentation were absolutely gorgeous. Both the night and day levels had their own charm and the controls were not buggy or lacking as some people saw.

 

[Chairman Miaow]

Fable III
I don't understand all the hate. It's an okay game at worst. I just think people hate on it because it doesn't live up to their wild expectations fueled by Molyneux's rampant enthusiasm. I personally had a good time with it, and thought it was decent.

Yeah, I quite enjoyed it too. I had a few graphical issues (screen tearing in points and drops in frames) but that seemed to be happening to quite a few people so I wasn't too fussed. I did however prefer Fable 2 over 3, but as a sequel I think it worked really well. Its certainly one of these game that liked to give nods back to the past games which I always like to see.

I get the feeling it's because it was just doing to 2 what 2 did to 1. Fable 1 by no means lived up to it's own hype, but it was interesting detailed and fun. 2 streamlined it, a lot. 3 Gutted just about everything interesting and unique.

 

[Nantucket_v1legacy]

The entire Nancy Drew franchise by HER INTERACTIVE.

Those games are genuinely damn good! Quite a few of their titles have some of the best puzzles I have ever played in an adventure game. Some have kept me stumped for hours which is what I look for in a puzzle game. I may get frustrated and yell but by the gods I get my moneys worth and my brain ticking.

 

[TaintedSaint]

Alpha Protocol, for sure Had a ton of fun with it. One of the most underrated games of all time.

 

[deathbydeath]

Mass Effect 3.

No, not because everything before the ending was perfect, it certainly wasn't.

No, I refuse to respond to your flamebait. Anyway, I feel like its flaws are glossed over too much by pretentious arthouse jackasses, but hey, I'm a cynic. I do what I want.

In proper response to the OP, I'd have to say Deus Ex 2. It's certainly a step back from the original, but it feels like more of a Deus Ex game than DX3, if I'm being honest. Also, it's not that bad, it just falls in the territory between mediocre and good.

 

[deathbydeath]

Alpha Protocol, for sure Had a ton of fun with it. One of the most underrated games of all time.

Also, this.

And KotOR 2, from where I was, that game is a step above KotOR 1 in pretty much every way that matters.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Mass Effect 3.

No, not because everything before the ending was perfect, it certainly wasn't.

No, I refuse to respond to your flamebait. Anyway, I feel like its flaws are glossed over too much by pretentious arthouse jackasses, but hey, I'm a cynic. I do what I want.

In proper response to the OP, I'd have to say Deus Ex 2. It's certainly a step back from the original, but it feels like more of a Deus Ex game than DX3, if I'm being honest. Also, it's not that bad, it just falls in the territory between mediocre and good.

What part of my post did you think was flame bait? The part where I said the game had other problems besides the ending, or the part where I said I still don't think it earned anywhere near the amount of scorn it received? Either way, I can assure you everything I wrote was my honest opinion.

 

[shrekfan246]

OT: Banjo Kazooie Nuts and Bolts. In all fairness it's not a Banjo Kazooie game, but when I played it, I thought it was fun, intuitive, underrated and satisfying.

It raises the question of why it was branded with the Banjo-Kazooie name in the first place. Gamers are a fickle bunch. People love lamenting the lack of "new IPs" lately, but let's be honest, how many people would've seen Bongo-Trombonie Nuts & Bolts or whatever for the Xbox 360 and gone "Hey, I gotta get me some of that!"

So it gets slapped with a recognizable franchise, and then ripped to hell and back because it has barely any actual ties to the franchise in the first place. If it had really tried to just be a spin-off, then Nuts & Bolts probably wouldn't have been destroyed like it was. But it not only actively insulted the previous games and the people who liked the previous games, it also placed itself directly into the line of fire for criticism by firmly entrenching itself as being "the next Banjo-Kazooie" after Banjo-Tooie. It even still had the skeletal structuring of a normal 3D platforming game in the overworlds and massive, empty levels.

It's the same criticism I level at Final Fantasy XIII: It may not be a bad game in itself, but it's a bad game for the franchise that it's named after. Whether that means you can simply call it a bad game or not depends on the person in question.

OT: Final Fantasy XII.

Vaan is pretty much a non-protagonist and the story probably would've been a lot stronger had it focused primarily on Balthier instead, but that didn't necessarily mean it was weaker than any other Final Fantasy game. Not when it was focusing on the other characters, at least...

The combat was a weird change of pace, switching to an actual real-time system that took place directly on the location maps instead of teleporting you away to a pocket dimension, and utilizing a similar tactics system that would later be used in Dragon Age: Origins, but I thought it worked rather well, actually. Mostly because the average encounters ended a lot quicker than in previous Final Fantasy games.

Characters had their own slightly predetermined archetypes for progression but the Skill leveling system meant that you could essentially train any of them however you wanted, though letting the CPU control any Mages early in the game is an exercise in frustration because they never have any MP left...

The world was probably one of the best built in any Final Fantasy game. It followed in the footsteps of X slightly by not having an actual tangible World Map still, but the locations themselves were absolutely massive, with tons of secondary locations that were just there to explore, and paths that would lead to enemies or treasure, and the entire thing actually felt connected in a sort of Dark Souls manner of openness.

I could keep going, but eh.

 

[deathbydeath]

What part of my post did you think was flame bait? The part where I said the game had other problems besides the ending, or the part where I said I still don't think it earned anywhere near the amount of scorn it received? Either way, I can assure you everything I wrote was my honest opinion.

Mainly what you said about the ending was quite the impressive understatement, and I felt the overwhelming urge to rip into the game (for reasons other than the ending). Thus, I deemed it flamebait.

For the record, I'm perfectly fine with you enjoying it, but quality is an objective thing and not something ME3 has in abundance.

 

[chozo_hybrid]

Tales of Symphonia, second game, Dawn of a New World, or something like that (for the Wii)

I think it was mainly beaten for not being as good as the first one, but c'mon, who ever thought it would top that game?
The first one was bloody awesome and I think standing on it's own, the second game, it was a fun, interesting game. The only thing that was a lot better in the first one was the story otherwise I think they were pretty equal.

Really, try the annoying two main characters, especially Marta, constantly doing that whole "I love you" thing the whole game. The gameplay was okay, but I think it more or less got the treatment it deserved, if you're going to make a sequel to a much loved game, better put the extra effort in, and I don't think they did. The only thing that seemed to save the game were the cameos of the characters from the previous game.

My vote would go to Darksiders. People just seem to label it a Zelda knock off, mostly due to a few types of items in the game, but if we treat every game with a hookshot type item and a ranged thrown weapon that can lock on to several targets as a Zelda ripoff, then what chance to a lot of adventure/action titles have? By that logic, Batman Arkham Asylum/City were Zelda style ripoffs, they have a similar sense to progression with the gadgets used.

Darksiders at least chose a setting I hadn't seen done before in my experience, the end war and letting you play as one of the four horsemen!? Awesome. Was it perfect, no, but I found it to still be a solid game.

 

[Murrdox]

Zelda II: The Adventures of Link

Screw attack went on to call it one of the top disappointments/worst squeals in gaming. It's sad, especially since their argument was the same old:
1.It's too hard
2.It wasn't like the first one

Which is really the only complaints people have against it. The thing is neither are real grievances at all.

It's difficult
I admit, as a child I hated this game, and I could not beat it without a game genie. I could say the same about dozens of other "classics" though. Now, as an adult, i find the difficulty refreshing and very welcome considering how pants-on-head-retarded easy these games have gotten.

It was too different
SO? OoT wasn't like the first one either. The Zelda franchise has proven they can change things up quite a bit with the way you play these games, and no one ever complains. But knowing that now, how can we have the nerve to still wave the naughty finger at Zelda 2? It doesn't make any sense. OH NO, I am side scrolling in labyrinthine corridors fighting monsters while getting items to power up. This is just terrible because it's not an overhead view like the first game! In fact it was a lot like another franchise, one with flying jellyfish. And we all know how terrible that franchise is.

This . It was the second god damn game , and at the time ( Nes era) a lot of game were copy paste of others , so the only way to survive was to be different . I think they did good with zelda 2 honestly . I loved that game , and iv'e replayed that recently.

OT: Alpha protocol . That was an amazing game .

The Adventure of Link is one of my favorite Nintendo games of all freaking time. That game rocked. The dungeons were really well designed. The first ones were very simple... go down a hallway, pick up a key, go down an elevator, and bingo you're at the end Boss. The later dungeons were SUCH complicated mazes! And you had NO MINIMAP!

The game also introduced the idea of Link casting SPELLS to the game, which was wonderfully done. There were Spells to assist you in combat, as well as to get over obstacles. Some spells, such as "Jump" functioned as BOTH which is genius in its simplicity when you really think about it.

The roleplaying aspects were pretty shallow... talking to townspeople was tedious for the most part... but it still expanded the series over the original.

The end boss was SO incredibly difficult. This game, Metroid, and Battletoads I wish I could have bronzed on my shelf for old difficult Nintendo games that I've beaten. I wish I could add Contra, the original Zelda, and Castlevania to that list. Never could beat Contra without the 99 Life code. Never got around to beating Zelda even with the huge Nintendo Power poster telling you where all the secrets were, which I consider a cheat in and of itself. Castlevania was just too punishingly difficult. Battletoads was hard, but at least the controls were good. Simon in Castlevania was so slow and his jumps were so difficult to time I don't know how you were expected to dodge all the things you needed to in order to win.

TL;DR The Adventure of Link is epic and anyone who says it's not is a bad person.