Let’s hear about some games you maybe were told were not worth your time, or had bad reviews but you managed to love regardless.
I’ll go first. I’m not embarrased to admit that I played the shit out of Elder Scrolls Blades (the easily forgettable Skyrim-esque mobile game). I had to wait for it to release on Switch which had the benifit of the shitty timers being gone by then.
Once I started to think of it as a kind of advanced ‘Swords and Sandles’ type game I was hooked.
Spec Ops: The Line looked like yet another generic first person shooter, but it is full of surprises and gets deep in a way I never expected. Highly recommend it, and go in as spoiler-free as possible.
Blasphemous. I was told by some that it was a very shallow game with boring lore, and that it only succeeded cause it was marketed at a basically Platformer Dark Souls.
Not true. There is a lot of lore I find really interesting, the map is much larger than I originally thought, there are tons of secrets and hidden passages, and it’s pulled all the best parts from Metroid, Castlevania and Dark Souls and combined them into a very well polished game.
Currently going for a 100% completion run before 2 comes out.
Genshin Impact.
Listen. I understand that the entire thing was hyped up upon release. It was, after all, a gamechanger for mobile gacha games. We went from turn-based games to things like Honkai Star Rail and Tower of Fantasy and of course, Genshin Impact. Honkai Impact 3rd existed, but it wasn’t quite the same as these ones.
However. Despite the hype, there was a problem that made me reluctant to play it.
I really suck at gacha games. Every gacha game before then I would drop within what, 6 days? I love the characters, love the story, hate the game.
So imagine my surprise when I logged into my settings the other day and found out that oh, It’s now been over 500 days logged, lmao. I’ve taken breaks from it once in a while, but I haven’t quit it yet. What have I become?
Honestly I super agree, I got into Genshin so I could have something to play during the texas freeze and I’m glad it sucked me in during that time because it’s SUPER fun – the story isn’t remarkable all the time, but it’s cool getting a serialized narrative through the form of a game like that. I’m really glad I got into it, even if hoyoverse doesn’t seem interested in adding more endgame content at all
Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. It was a short game that was more story than game so I was hesitant that I wouldn’t like it. I played through it in vr and it became my favourite game to date.
To anyone who wants to play it, whether it’s flatscreen or vr, you must have a good pair of headphones to fully appreciate it.
SaGa (the series in general). Always heard it was the obtuse bastard child in the RPG family. The series has tried a lot of interesting things and while most games in the series are flawed, they are all really interesting in spite of themselves.
No man’s sky, plenty of people who told me it was a bad choice (and at the time it truly was) I love how the game is today though
Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky had poor reviews on IGN so I decided to give it a shot and it became one of my favorite games of all time.
Original DS one or the Switch reboot?
Original DS, only Red/Blue rescue team got a remake so far.
Explorers of Sky is the second in the series.
I really loved Singularity, but it was pretty much a flop.
Omg yes!
Looking at metacritic it’s rated better than I remember. But it was super under the radar at the time, and I don’t meet a lot of people that are familiar with it. It was a great story shooter.
It’s not a remarkable game, but watch dog legions was nowhere near as bad as the original reaction made it out to be. Better than 2 I think, I didn’t like The protagonist in 2
I got that game for free with my gpu and had a lot of fun playing a demented hacker grandma causing mischief.
couldn’t tell you what the story was about though
The Walking Dead Season 1. I knew it was good but I didn’t realize how good
Vampyr. On release a lot of people and reviews said it was clunky and not very good, it has a 72 on Opencritic and 55% of critics did not recommend it. It also got a lot of negative reviews from the community.
Well I think those people were high, it was one of my favorite games of that year! It’s not a perfect game by any means but it was a ton of fun. Great atmosphere, great gameplay, good story… I never really got the hate.
I know it’s a bit of a darling, but Persona 5. Thought it was too anime, but picked it up after my partner suggested that it might be fun. 300 hours later I 100% completed it, finished P4G and am starting P3Fes. Next stop: P2IS/EP
I thought “Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion” was a game trying a little too hard to be quirky, with an attention-grabbing title and little depth beyond one or two jokes.
That game… went places. Places I did not expect.
Elder Scrolls blade was such a fun game! On the note of playing a smaller game Motherload is a surprisingly fun flash game where you dig for resources on an alien planet. The game is easy to learn but difficult to master. You get to experiment with different upgrades to find the best build for your playstyle. The levels are procedurally generated so it’s my go-to fall back game once a blue moon. Enjoy!
Xgen Studios! I remember playing Stick RPG 2 so much back in the day. Might have been one of the first games I ever bought over the internet. I’m actually looking for something simple and quick to load right now so this is actually a great shout
Judging by the trailers I thought “INFRA” was going to be a short first person exploration puzzler type of deal. Take photos of damaged structures, explore abandoned buildings, marvel at the graphical excellence of 2020s gaming, that kinda thing. It had rave reviews, but I chose to go in blind in terms of story.
Turns out, it’s an over 30 hour puzzle adventure game with an ARG, pretty deep lore, comedy elements, horror elements, open exploration, collectibles, secret areas, easter eggs, etc. Most of it is pretty standard “walking simulator” gameplay, and part of the middle chapters can feel like a serious slog walking through tunnel after tunnel, but I found myself consistently surprised and even awed by the crazy environments the developers managed to create. The puzzles can also be seriously difficult at times, usually requiring some pretty good logical skills or even prior knowledge of how engineering and physics works. (although there is that one electrical wiring puzzle at the end of chapter 6/7 or whatever that has everybody stumped no matter their education level)
Real Civil Engineer (RCE) did a playthrough of the full game. What’s great is watching him point out all the times when the game correctly or incorrectly flags safety violations, as well as commenting on all the things that a safe engineer would never do.
