Controversial Game Ratings & Rankings

[Linkachu]

Wasn't really sure how to word the subject, but I think everyone should understand the point.

Sometimes there's a game released that seems to "wow" a huge majority of people but leaves you feeling rather "meh" and disappointed. Other times there's something released that you absolutely adore and consider one of the best games ever but nobody seems to agree with you. Whichever way you choose to view it - what are some of the most controversial titles that stand out in your mind, and why?

(Note that we've had a "Games you loved that nobody played"-style thread before, and this isn't quite the same question. I'm more referring to games that are outright bashed by the larger populous, yet you still really love them for whatever reason.)


One of them is definitely New Super Mario Bros. (DS). Everywhere you look, this game is being praised for not only being one of the best DS games around, but also one of the best Mario games in general. A quote from IGN's latest "Top 25" DS games article stated, "Playing New Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo DS made us all feel young again, and the design was done so well that many fans have gone on record to declare it their favorite Mario platformer ever."

... and I just can't relate to that view at all. I've played every Mario platformer to date and own all of them minus 2 or 3, and NSMB didn't deeply strike my fancy or leave a strong lasting impression. I played all the way up to the final stage and just left it for dust collection - with about 56 extra lives in tow. Favourite Mario game ever...? Really, really not. I mean, I don't think it was a bad game by any means - it was a solid build. I just didn't find it all that fun, original, or anything the rave reviews say for it. It was a throwback to classic Mario, yeah, but that's about as far as it went for me. I still preferred Yoshi's Island DS.


I could speak on other games, but I'll leave it for now. Just, please, no arguments if someone bashes one of your favourite games or praises something you really didn't care for

 

[KoL]

I don't think it's a secret that the one game I feel fits the bill for this topic more than any is Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Briefly going onto the topic of another game, some considered Modern Warfare 2 to be the most highly anticipated release of this decade - I consider this statement to be completely untrue, since Brawl was hyped up and anticipated for YEARS before it was released, with teaser videos and trailers taunting all those waiting for it in a way that made it easily the most anticipated game release in a very long time. Considering how much it was hyped up, it should have come as no surprise that it wouldn't be able to meet expectations since the hype made it sound like it could cure cancer and make Melee look like nothing more than a lost memory in comparison, but...well, the shit hit the fan big time here...

What we expected was something absolutely phenomenal, and what we got was laggy controls to start with, something Sakurai was well aware of and tried to fix with Buffering, which only made the controls worse, atrocious character balance which meant you could essentially beat your opponent at the character select screen never mind in the actual match (yay Meta Knight,) reduced hitstun which means there are almost no true combos in the game, ridiculous shield mechanics that make the whole game bent heavily towards defensive play and camping, and the icing on the crap cake goes to the unplayable Wi-Fi mode, where the lag is so terrible the game may as well not have any online functionality at all - for all intents and purposes, it really doesn't have any anyway. To me, the best part of Brawl is the music - that alone rings alarm bells instantly in my mind.

I wouldn't particularly care about this if not for the mentality behind it - the vast majority of this epic failure was done deliberately by Sakurai to stop people playing Brawl competitively, as they did with Melee. Discounting the obvious stupidity of this, forcing people to play your game a certain way is wrong - if people want to play a game a certain way, they should be allowed to do so regardless of whether the creator approves or disapproves of it. Never mind that the fact that tripping made it into the final game shows he never hired any testers for the game, and there's no excuse for this either since I'd imagine every gamer out there would have killed to test Brawl before its release. Overall, the game is still fun, but the way it was made combined with the mentality behind it...Brawl deserved far better than this, and I hope very much that Sakurai has nothing to do with the creation of the fourth Smash game, lest we see another overrated mess that deserves to be plunged into the abyss for all eternity.

Brawl, fun? Definitely. Better than Melee? No chance in hell. Biggest disappointment for me since Final Fantasy X-2.

 

[Chadwyck]

I'm going to have to agree about the disappointment of Final Fantasy X-2. That's where the disappointment in the series started for me. I absolutely adored Final Fantasy X, and really all of the FF series as a whole. When I heard about a direct sequel to one of my favorite games in the series, I couldn't wait until it was released. I read reviews and watched trailers, thinking the whole time that it was going to be amazing. Then when I got my hands on it, everything just felt wrong. It felt like the entire thing was half-assed, it was essentially just a long stream of sidequests that created the basic plot, which if you weren't careful would progress much too quickly and you could easily find yourself outmatched.

All in all it was a severe disappointment. Then there's the issue of Final Fantasy XII, which was supposed to be amazing. It had a new battle system (speaking of which, I actually really liked the system from FFX) and it was going to be epic; or so everyone said. I remember buying Dragon Quest VIII just because it came with a playable demo of FFXII, and when I played the demo it was just weird. I remember thinking that it was going to be fixed before the actual release. I bought the game when it came out, and it was no better. I couldn't stand it, the bizarre mixture of realtime and turn based battle system was just frustrating. It made it so that an enemy could hit you from across the entire map as long as they started the attack while you were next to them. The only good things to come from that game, in my opinion, were Balthier and Gabranth.

Now that XIII and XIV are coming out, I'm kind of worried about how the games will turn out, at least XIII because I don't plan on playing XIV because it's online, but it still worries me. Final Fantasy being my favorite series of all time, I hate to think that the newer games will cease to impress me. (In a side note, I wish that Square would have focused on only FFXIII so that more work could be done on KH3 which I am eagerly awaiting instead of splitting their efforts between two Final Fantasy titles at the same time)

 

[charmander91]

I agree with Chadwyck about X-2 I played though the first three levels of the game and I walked up to the playstation and turned it off and removed the game out of the system. Another game that I was disappointed in was WET it looked cool and Quentin Tarintino- y and it was but the game play is poor


Too add more to this post the thing I forgot to put in when I originally posted this I disagree with your thoughts on the new Super Mario Brothers for the DS, I like it and was impressed with the new features they added in like how you can have an extra fire plant on you or the turtle shell you can get. I also liked how it reminded me of the games I grew up on being Mario games on the SNES and N64.

 

[Blisk]

I somewhat agree on the Brawl. It was way too hyped up. The game might have also been better without all the publicity because they might of actually worked harder on it because of...i don't know...not rushing it? I assume they rushed it out to shelves just because so many would buy. I even bought it on the first day it came out. (I think) I still love it better than Melee though because of the new maps and graphics. I also love the new characters.

I also think that Kingdom Hearts is rated too good. I actually didn't enjoy playing it even though everyone else loved it. I was bored. Probably mainly because of the uber long loads and cut scenes. It took forever just to get off the bloody island! Also, I am not a too big fan of Disney, but these were the actual good movies from Disney that they featured in it. Everyone just thought too much of it I guess. I thought it sucked, but not most people. I literally am thinking of selling the paperweight to Gamestop for the 2 bucks I can get from it.

 

[Fumanshu]

Umm.. every shooter,sportsgame,racer game?
I mean in those genres nothing special has changed for the last 10 years, except for the graphics.
Halo 3 isnt really different from Halo 1.Sure they added dual wielding and vehicles but they dont really change the whole gameplay :/
Dont get me started on Madden, that thing shouldnt even be a video game.
If I was to buy a sports game, I would buy 1 of its type and keep it , and not buy overpriced graphical upgrades every year.

and you people remember Devil May Cry 2?
Like Devil May Cry was the ultimate thing on the PS2 actionwise, and then they put out Devil May Cry 2 which was...well a game people try to forget but cant. It was so bad Capcom made Devil May Cry 3 from scratch but still using DMC1 as a spiritual basis you could say~

 

[Yoshimitsu]

I agree with Chadwyck about X-2 I played though the first three levels of the game and I walked up to the playstation and turned it off and removed the game out of the system.

I like how you had to specify every action involved instead of just saying "I never played it again".

I'd disagree with everyone who has said FFX-2 was a poor game. Personally, I found it one of the most addictive of the games. The gameplay felt a lot like FF4 sped up, and some of the features (like the dressphere, sphere break, random singing interludes) were actually really fun to watch or play. The plot was solid (if slow to start) and the characters were likeable.

Technically still on topic there since it's about games you love that everyone else hated too.

 

[Trop003]

A lot of people everywhere would tell me that Super Mario Sunshine is the weakest 3D Mario game they've played, even the big guns rating the game gave it lower scores than normal for a Mario game. I just couldn't understand why they went on like that. I thought that it was an amazing addition. Never once did it feel like FLUDD was detracting from the gameplay whatsoever and I thought that the setting was way more unique than Super Mario Galaxy, or any other Mario game. I mean, in those you've got your standard ice level, lava level, grass level, etc. But SMS had a theme and pushed it as far as it would go.

Another complaint people had were the on-foot areas of Starfox: Assault, but I thought that it didn't detract too much from the overall experience of the single player Story and that it was just a blast to play in multiplayer.

 

[Rex]

Super Mario Galaxy was a universal success. I never really understood why. The land is filled with so many holes and obstacles that falling into a Black Hole occurs at least once every ten minutes. And what happened to Sunshine's voice actors? Bowser has been reduced to growls and roars, while Bowser Jr. does nothing but laugh, which gets really annoying, really quick. It has the storyline that has been reused in almost every Mario game, save the Princess from the Monster. And while Sunshine was able to do it with some flair, Galaxy is just another repeat of the original.

Star Fox: Assault, on the other hand, is hated by many. I loved it. Assault combines the on foot action of Adventures with the Landmaster and Arwing piloting of 64. It's nice to see all the old characters, as well as some new ones. The game took us away from Andross, which was a nice change. I loved the new enemies, even the Queen, which is somehow more annoying then Andross could even hope to be. And in the end, the only ones you can trust are your enemies, Star Wolf. I think Assault was a new take on the series, and a very successful one at that.

 

[**BeginwiththeEnd**]

For me, Mario Galaxy was unique in level design. And I was GLAD they didn't have voice-acting (First time I heard Bowser in SMS, I thought something crawled up his throat and died.) But the bosses were way too easy, the levels were too short, and the plot was forgetable. Only thing I found interesting that was plot- related was the backstory on Rosalina. Actualy got me alittle teary on the last chapter...

 

[charmander91]

[quote author=charmander91 link=topic=6976.msg125521#msg125521 date=1259790752]
I agree with Chadwyck about X-2 I played though the first three levels of the game and I walked up to the playstation and turned it off and removed the game out of the system.

I like how you had to specify every action involved instead of just saying "I never played it again".
[/quote]


Thanks I always do that when a crappy game disgraces my game systems or by crappy T.v shows/movies that disgrace my T.v