Name and describe obscure games that you want people to play.

[PedroSteckecilo]

SaGa Frontier - an open-ended RPG before they were cool. Seven characters, seven seperate storylines that cross paths. Shame the only storyline I played through to the end was the mystic girl's plot. Can't spell her name right. Asseules or something...And combat was great because the more you used a type of weapon or magic, the more skills you learn. And let's not forget my favorite robot of all time, T260G. Heck, one of your characters was a superhero and could transform in battle as long as your team was only built of him and mechs or your other teammates were dead. Plus, you had the monster characters who absorbed an enemy of choice at the end of battle to get a skill and change into one of the in-game monsters, which actually affected their stats. And everyone gained stats after every victory.

Ah SaGa Frontier! Be warned however as this game is buggy and random as all hell! You gain skills pretty much at random, it's VERY hard sometimes and if you don't play the characters in the right order the game'll wreck you. That said, it's an underappreciated gem of the PS1 era.

Try SaGa Frontier 2 as well, it's bigger, more well produced and has an incredible story that unfolds through 2 perspectives, it's skills/leveling is also much less random than that in the first game but it is just as hard if not harder. Also the end boss is unbeatable as far as I have heard. Don't know of anyone who has ever beaten it.

 

[51gunner]

Dark Reign, another RTS of ~starcraft era. A great story lurking, VERY nice abilities available to you as a commander (Order: Search and Destroy, or Harass, and they'll go do it.) AI able to be made to work for you (I.E. you can tell your units to go seek repairs when below 50/25% health.

And flying sawblades (anti-infantry weapon), the longest-range artillery in any game I have seen, and some terrifying base defenses available.

 

[mark_n_b]

Dark Cloud 2

Really good cell shading in that game as well. But none better than my next recommendation:

Dragon's Lair. There is a piece of gaming history right there. Dragon's Lair II and Space Ace I think wrap up Cinematronics Laser disc offerings, you could probably ebay the PS2 release of Dragon's Lair (II as well) I think Space Ace is only to be located on the emulators tho'.

Too bad, these games were a revolutionary step in the arcade. I suggest anyone get them if you can (pretty cartoon ladies to rescue also, always a bonus)

 

[silentassasin47]

Rocket Robot on Wheels (N64) When I was a kid I used to play this game for hours and still pull it out time and again. You were a Robot in an amusment park that was taken over by an Evil Raccoon (no joke).

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

SaGa Frontier - an open-ended RPG before they were cool. Seven characters, seven seperate storylines that cross paths. Shame the only storyline I played through to the end was the mystic girl's plot. Can't spell her name right. Asseules or something...And combat was great because the more you used a type of weapon or magic, the more skills you learn. And let's not forget my favorite robot of all time, T260G. Heck, one of your characters was a superhero and could transform in battle as long as your team was only built of him and mechs or your other teammates were dead. Plus, you had the monster characters who absorbed an enemy of choice at the end of battle to get a skill and change into one of the in-game monsters, which actually affected their stats. And everyone gained stats after every victory.

Ah SaGa Frontier! Be warned however as this game is buggy and random as all hell! You gain skills pretty much at random, it's VERY hard sometimes and if you don't play the characters in the right order the game'll wreck you. That said, it's an underappreciated gem of the PS1 era.

Try SaGa Frontier 2 as well, it's bigger, more well produced and has an incredible story that unfolds through 2 perspectives, it's skills/leveling is also much less random than that in the first game but it is just as hard if not harder. Also the end boss is unbeatable as far as I have heard. Don't know of anyone who has ever beaten it.

Actually, I have both, while the story of 2 is better, and the watercolor art style is beautiful and timeless, it suffers from the lack of monster characters and the stupidity of weapon durability. Duel mode fights were epic, though.

 

[k3v1n]

Nobody remembers Jet Set Radio Future. I prefered this to Halo and Tony Hawk among the Xbox's release titles.

damn I used to love that game, my very first xbox title*sniff**sniff*..ok, what I was saying: I'd go for jailbreak it's..jailbreak(the kids game. jailbreak. you know..smn catches you, so you have t go to jail and smn might save you) well, that but with combines and rebels..and guns...really cool guns which are from one faction or another^^ really cool..shame almost nobody plays it

 

[almo]

Moonbase Commander.

Turnbased strategy game, 1-4 players. Single player shows you the ropes, but playing against the AI is really not worth it.

Multiplayer, it's pure gold. Aim/launch mechanics add some skill. Building an efficient base is a challenge. Definitely check this out. You can get legal copies from EBAY since it's been licenesed to small manufacturers that will sell you the disc for cheap.

This won IGN's best game noone played, and with good reason.

 

[Isaac Dodgson]

Rez

More accurately, Rez HD seeing as it's been released on XBLA formated for HD... Awesomely TRONesque is the only way i can describe it

 

[almo]

Is Rez really obscure though? It's certainly awesome.

 

[K.B. Troopa]

Chibi-Robo. Not that the game's entirely unknown, but people forgot about it a couple of days before launch, which is a bit disappointing. It's one of those games that falls in the classic trap: it's not mainstream enough young gamers and it's "too childish" for older gamers...which is not exactly true, it's more mature than it looks, but I still can't imagine many of you adrenaline-pumped FPS nuts playing it. No offense.

I'd also like to say "Cave Story", even though it's also a pretty popular game. To those who HAVEN'T played it, it'll make you cum buckets.

 

[Fruhstuck]

Future Cop L.A.P.D = You, in a big robot, killing anyone you want to
AND THE ROBOT CAN TURN INTO A CAR TOOO!!!
It felt like you were playing as a genocidal transformer
Which was enough to countermand the terrible difficulty lol

Also:

Omega Boost = Zone Of The Enders, but good

 

[DeadMG]

I played Future Cop L.A.P.D. demo and it was fun.

 

[Rogue_Leader]

Fromt Mission 4

 

[Dr Pussymagnet]

You MUST play Skullmonkeys.

 

[Onomatopeia]

<a href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanity:_Aiken%27s_Artifact>Sanity: Aiken's Artifact

a third person action/RPG-hack'n'slash where the lead character was voiced by Ice-T. not a terribly innovative or noteworthy game it was still an enjoyable playthrough, at least at popcorn entertainment level.

I believe Home of the Underdogs has it available to download.

 

[Jonathan Hexley]

Dark Cloud 2

Action RPG where instead of leveling your characters (There's 2 of them), you level their weapons, evolving them up through a branching hierarchy of different models and powers. Even a fishing pole you get can be given points and upgraded.

Part of the game is to go around and collect materials, to go back to "towns" and use the materials to build them from he ground up. Advancing through the plot requires meeting certain building requirements, such as "build 4 trees, 2 houses, and an iron fence" or stuff along those lines.

Lastly, the game has a nifty invention system where you take pictures of different items to get "ideas" then combine those ideas into items.

I preferred the first one. The second was cool, and so damn easier, but the first one is just an unknown gem in RPG gaming.

And I would also like to mention Oddworld Stranger's Wrath. At least, I think it's pretty unknown. Sure it has a large fanbase, but I wouldn't describe it as out there and well-known.

Basically, Oddworld Stranger's Wrath has you play as Stranger, a bounty hunter who uses a crossbow to find and bag outlaws. What makes this game so original, is that you can play in First Person, or Second. Also, you have to hunt your ammo! Yeah, your ammo consists of creatures that live in the wild, including things like Fuzzles, which are little fuzzballs with an attitude who will just MURDER any outlaw who comes close to them, Stingbees, which are basically a chaingun, and Bolamites, spiders who wrap up any outlaw you shoot them at.
It's a pretty unknown gem in Xbox gaming, with beautiful graphics and a great storyline.
If you have an original Xbox, (It doesn't play on 360. D8 Sadness engulfs me with that fact.) I'd heartily recommend it.

 

[klakkat]

Obscure? Awesome? All right.

Master of Magic and the Master of Orion series. All are turn-based strategy games where you are a all-powerful wizard/despot who then proceeds to take over the worlds/galaxy. Story may not be a lot, but it's fun as hell, very detailed, and the AI is pretty good for its time, though master of magic AI has a tendency to spam soldiers at you...

Star Control 3. One of the coolest sci-fi games I've played. I don't even know how to categorize it past that, real-time strategy? Action adventure?

Planescape: Torment. I'm sure you've heard of this game, but have you PLAYED it? Do so. It's a D&D based RPG with much less focus on combat compared to Icewind and Baldur's gate, and more focus on story. The story is very well written.

X-Com: UFO Defense, Terror From the Deep, and Apocalypse. 3 of the best squad-combat games I've ever seen. The AI sometimes cheats pretty bad in the first two, so be prepared for some steep difficulty curves as the game advances (not too bad in UFO Defense). The first two are turn-based, Apocalypse can be real time or turn based, but once you try real time you'll never go back. All have some rather colorful foes, some pretty strong challenges, an interesting if a bit slowly-developed story, and some sweet gameplay. Also, you can buy them on Steam now, apparently, so "I can't find it" is no excuse.

 

[klakkat]

Did it. It was pretty cool, but got tedious after a bit, even the main quest.