Unexpectedly good games

[TheYellowCellPhone]

Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie (or something like that).

What I expected: A bland hack 'n' slash game where you play as Kong and you attack some dinosaurs.

What I got: A kickass survival FPS with freaky enemies, great level design, nice pacing, and cool scenery.

The moments where you play as Kong are confusing and stupid as all hell though.

 

[omicron1]

Minecraft.

Now before you all say "What!?", let me give some background. I jumped in at the very start of the Minecraft craze - mid 2009, before it was even buyable. There was a multiplayer creative mode but nothing else, and I wandered around a bit building houses and airplanes.

Then, I left.

A year later (before Minecraft hit ten thousand buyers, IIRC), I came back to find a very similar creative mode and this tantalizing "Survival mode" trapped behind a money-gate. Having no idea what it entailed, I agonized for quite a while over whether to actually buy the thing. Eventually caving and buying it, I proceeded to waste literally thousands of hours over the next four months.

 

[Daveeo]

Recently Crysis 2. Figured it'd be a boring re-hash of the previous titles. It turned out to actually have good gameplay and a decent story. As well as a decent gametime (8-10 hrs depending on player and difficulty).

This!

 

[Rooster893]

Soul Calibur 2.

Thought it was just gonna be a generic fighting game with nothing to impress me.

I was shamelessly addicted to it during middle school.

 

[MrGalactus]

Red Faction: Guerilla.

I was really surprised by how much fun I had in that game.

Me too. I remember being really skeptical at first too, thinking O LOOK A GTA CLONE ON MARS. Being a fan of the old ones I wasn't too sure about where they were going with it, but Geomod 2 was awesome, and the game turned out to be bloody great.

 

[Blondi3]

Red Faction: Guerilla.

I was really surprised by how much fun I had in that game.

Me too. I remember being really skeptical at first too, thinking O LOOK A GTA CLONE ON MARS. Being a fan of the old ones I wasn't too sure about where they were going with it, but Geomod 2 was awesome, and the game turned out to be bloody great.

Yeah, I only got it because it was on sale on steam. It was also pretty long for something that came off as a simple action game. There was a lot of freedom. If only more action games were like this.

 

[baddude1337]

Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie (or something like that).

What I expected: A bland hack 'n' slash game where you play as Kong and you attack some dinosaurs.

What I got: A kickass survival FPS with freaky enemies, great level design, nice pacing, and cool scenery.

The moments where you play as Kong are confusing and stupid as all hell though.

I was also surprised by how awesome the game was. Easy gamerscore though, I think that's why a lot of people got it.

 

[Vivace-Vivian]

Prince of Persia, the first one released on the PS3. I thought it would be garbage, but I loved the ending.

 

[The Wykydtron]

Crysis 2, i wasn't really expecting much but hey the campaign was probably the best one i've seen in an FPS since back when CoD was primarily singleplayer focused (CoD 2 ftw)

Also the multiplayer is fucking awesome, kudos to the devs for making the killstreak system so awesome, i just find it funny whenever the resident team sniper makes an awesome across the map shot and then has to trudge across the map to pick up the dogtag. It's a nice risk/reward system.

Although finishing the campaign in (almost) one sitting then trying out the multiplayer for the first time is practically suicide

Single Player Armour: Badass guy shugging off tank shells, bullets, alien bullets etc (maniacal laughter optional)
Multiplayer Armour: Lets you take about 5 extra shots before becoming worthless

It was a bit jarring to say the least XD

 

[RantingLombax]

Shadow of the Colossus.
I thought it was going to a Zelda-type game.
It was, but it offered way more that i expected.

 

[Tanis]

MSG: Zeonic Front


I thought "GREAT, another Gundam game with nothing but shooting and no plot'.

What I go was one of the BEST mecha games EVER.
It's like SOCOM/Rainbow 6 but with GUNDAMS during the One-Year War!

Much love.
<3

 

[Lord Beautiful]

The Motherfucking Kingdom Hearts Series

I expected a ham-handed, corny and thoroughly stupid experience. I expected long monologues about the power of friendship and visual and tonal inconsistency from the combination of Square and Disney properties.

The series is second only to the Chrono games in my top favorite JRPGs.

 

[Trolldor]

Alpha Protocol.
Everyone kept trashing it, criticis panned it, read a very casual review that basically said "T-hey're playing it wrong. Play it like Splinter Cell. It's biggest problems are it lacks polish."

And I did.
And I had a shitload of fun.
There were so many ways to approach the game just from a stealth perspective.

Edit: Also, second sight. Five dollar game that blew me away. Not worth a second playthrough now that I know the twist, which is unfortunate, because it was just plain epic.

 

[Zantos]

Darksiders: I picked it up preowned for £10 thinking "Meh, it looks ok, I can't afford any new games, this should tide me over." and it had managed to reduce me to a giggling psychopath by the end of the tutorial (at least i think that's a sign of it being good). I still love the way that all chests and doors are opened by various acts of violence.

 

[Azure Sky]

Dark Cloud

Rented it a long time ago on a whim, little did I know then I would spend the next 3 years tracking down a copy.

 

[SilkySkyKitten]

Sonic the Fighters (click here, those not in the know [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q-Zu-HQ0TU])

I had purchased "Sonic Gems Collection" for the Gamecube all hyped up to finally get a chance to play Sonic CD, a game I had been told numerous times was the best Sonic game ever made. Unfortunately, Sonic CD never lived up to that hype for me, so considering the collection had several other games on it (including Sonic the Fighters) I decided to just give them a go to make up for my lost money, and then possibly return the game the next day.
Little did I know I would stumble upon one of the most fun fighting/Sonic games I have ever played.

 

[Valdsator]

Medal of Honor: Airborne. I was watching G4TV and saw some gameplay, and I thought it looked pretty cool. The concept was interesting, and the battles looked fun. Little did I know that I would play through the demo at least 10 times, and through the full game 3 times (probably going to play it again soon).

Freaking.
Awesome.
Game.

It needs a sequel. ;_;

 

[Joseph Harrison]

Mount and Blade: Warband
I played the demo out of curiousity and after playing it for 1 hour i bought it have been hooked since then.