[redhotray]

Have you ever found a game that everybody raves about, but you were personally unenlightened by the whole experience when you finally got the opportunity to play it? If so, what game would it be for you...


For me, hands down, it would be Halo. When I played the game, I could appreciate some of why people were excited, people that is, who've not been blessed with quality PC first person shooter games, years beforehand. I played it, and essentially, it felt like playing Serious Sam, just continually shooting wave after wave of monsters, only with funkier graphics. You had a few vehicles, great, something different, except I found them more irritating than fun to control (ESPECIALLY - the last level!!!). The first half of Halo showed promise, I could almost see why people were ape shit about the whole thing, but just when I actually found myself enjoying it, the game flipped on itself, and just created mindless, montone shooting the rest of the way through. The levels were identical, it was as if I was fighting through the same room over and over!

The multiplayer aspect was ok, but again, nothing spectacular. Nothing I hadn't played before, and in some cases, better. You had variety, which is always the spice of life, but then, it felt just like picking up any FPS game off the shelf. Nowadays, it seems anyway, FPS multiplayer is identical (either Counterstrike clones, or the standard, deathmatch, team deathmatch, CTF options).

I guess when it came time for me to sit and down and play through Halo, I'd already been spoilt with games like Half Life, Thief the Dark Project and Deus Ex. The experience just felt lackluster to me, and never really inspired me or caught me by the throat. Yet I found every friggin magazine I picked up, marking out about it, like it was the second coming.

I wouldn't say Halo completely sucked, because it didn't. I just think for the amount of raving that was made about it, I was expecting something much more substansial than what I was actually presented. It's not a bad game by any stretch, it's an average at best FPS, in my opinion that is HUGELY overrated!!!

Apparently Halo 2 is out to work on the single player aspect, and the multiplayer side of things. I'll most likely give it a try, to see what Bungie have conjured up this time around, as I'm sure i'm not the only person who had this problem with the game.

On a side note, I'm overwhelmed that Halo has ONLY JUST been made available to buy on the Xbox Classics label (THAT'S TAKEN TWO YEARS!!!). Proof that it probably is, one of the best selling console games of all time, if not THE BEST!

It just...ain't really my thing.

[Draco2.5]

Repeating rooms suck....

[Ninja Dodo]

Yes. Quake and Doom... just didn't do anything for me.

Total Annihalation, maybe it was all supposed to be about the multiplay or something but I found the singleplayer exceptionally uninteresting.

Morrowind... wide but shallow. It's a fun game, but the characters and dialogues are uninteresting and the locations are a bit repetitive. The story doesn't grab me either.

Also Unreal 2. But I think that's more down to a certain magazine going nuts about it. If ever journalism was for sale...

half life, was a good game but it was'nt anything great. i still bout it and played it to the full extent but the way people were obsessed about it was absurd

[BacardiJim]

LBA2. It was touted as an adventure game.

[mrdunn]

You know, I agree with a lot of what you said about Halo, but for some reason, I was addicted to the single player part for a good month or two. I didn't like the levels with the Flood, but the Covenant were just fun to go after, especially the little dudes. I don't know why I found it so fun, maybe just the tactical aspect of taking cover and going after them when they're down, or just the cool physics engine, but I got lots of enjoyment out of it. I have to agree on the multiplayer though....meh.

[LeChimp]

Thank you, I think that the Halo singleplayer is horrible, I'm glad it's not just me.

[Zygomaticus]

I think StarCraft gets a little more credit than it merits. I didn't think it very special.

[Zack]

Originally Posted by LeChimp

Thank you, I think that the Halo singleplayer is horrible, I'm glad it's not just me.

I'm with you too, LeChimp, but this is mainly about the demo for the Single-player game. I tried it, and was not impressed at all. It just felt like a typical First-Person Shooter game, and didn't even look original.

Other than that, I can't think of any games that I've played and thought were overrated. I need to play some more of my games just to figure it out.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Most. Overated. Game. Ever.

Erkki Topless Tennis Adventure.

Man, was that the most lame experience ever for me. I can't believe I spent 69 cents on that thing. I mean, you don't even get to see Erkki take his top off until the very end while cheap pr0nographic music plays, after the final boss slider puzzle! And to make it worse the damn credits roll just as he was slowly doing his striptease so that I couldn't see everything. And then the stupid thing crashed!!! Couldn't get it to work after. The worse thing, there was NO PATCH!!!

I think it was a Cryo game.

[sillycanadian]

Originally Posted by Kode

I think StarCraft gets a little more credit than it merits. I didn't think it very special.

I agree with you there. It's a very good game, but it never really piqued my interest, always felt like something was lacking.

[custard]

HALO, Halflife, Splinter Cell, Knights of the old rebuplic.. yeh i'll stop now

[Everness]

Ive been really addicted to FPS like halo, and battlefield 1942 for some time, but nowadays I grow more and more sick and tired of all the cheap ripp offs, the bizarre imitations and all the general crap software houses are trying to sell as FPS these days. Got myself the game Soldner : Secret Wars the other day, and man, does it suck. Definitely my worst game in regard to this tread. Of what to think of Battlefield Vietnam? ever played it or read the forums on EA's homepage? that game is nothing more then a beautified gameshaped bug! took me year to get it to work, and then it lagged and glitched all over the place, another candidate for my personal worst game award.

[remixor]

Originally Posted by redhotray

Halo=suck

I'm going to assume that you only played the game's campaign mode yourself (ie, without anyone else in cooperative mode). I don't know if you played it on PC or Xbox; for all I know, the PC version might not have cooperative mode. Anyway, playing the single-player missions cooperatively adds a whole new dimension that games like Half-Life, Thief, Deus Ex (while certainly having tighter missions) don't offer. It really is possible to get tons of replay out of the missions playing with a buddy, because so many different styles of play are possible when two guys are doing it together. One player can be the sniper while the other goes on a rampage, both players can sneak around the sides, etc., etc. When I'm at the house of a friend with an Xbox, we can still always load up Halo and bust out a few cooperative missions because it's just that much more fun.

As a side note, I think your Serious Sam comparison is kind of unwarranted. There is no subtlety to Serious Sam, it's just a ton of guys running at you. Granted, that can be a lot of fun, but it's not very similar to Halo. In Halo there are many cases in which hanging back and sniping is completely necessary (especially if you play the game in Legendary, which is the best way to play--I suppose if you play on the easiest mode almost any game could be treated like Serious Sam), and the overall gameplay is far more tactical than something like Serious Sam or Doom. You really have to concentrate to do well in Halo, which cannot be said for the games you liken it to. Granted, it's not Splinter Cell or Deus Ex in that regard--it's definitely an action game, but it's a very refined and polished one.

The main caveat to the single-player missions is their repetitiveness. This is an unfortunate side effect of Bungie having to switch development platforms and needing the game out by a certain time. It's kind of frustrating, but playing this game is such a solid experience in general that I don't let it get to me. If it means anything, I very much doubt Halo 2 will have these sorts of problems.

Also, how much multiplayer (regular multiplayer that is) have you played? That is clearly the strong point of the game. I feel like you're trying to judge the entire game based on one-third of its possible gameplay modes (there's single-player, cooperative, and multiplayer). This game has THE tightest multiplayer I've played in any FPS game, hands down. There are a gajillion and one different modes, and it's not like most FPS games in which everyone ends up playing the same mode. Every group of gamers I meet has their own favorite Halo multiplayer modes. Almost all of the modes have something to offer (excluding the silly ones like Rally Race or whatever). Not everyone just does CTF or deathmatch. The Halo multiplayer modes are great (and numerous) and you can even define your own modes, which is great. The replay value inherent to this game is incredible. Its phenominal sales I'm sure owe some debt to hype and snowballing reputation, but I know several people who bought an Xbox console on the strength of this game--not on the strength of the game's reputation, but by playing it at a friend's house and having a blast and wanting to own it themselves. Bungie has been one of those top-tier legendary studios for years, and Halo is just another reason why.

[Ariel Type]

Syberia
Serious Sam
Alone in the Dark
StarCraft

[wilco]

Halo. I agree with everything redohtray said and add that the story was unoriginal. Glad to know i'm not alone. Its not a very bad game, just a average one very overated. Never played the multiplayer.

Splinter Cell. I bought this one expecting too much, as I really liked metal gear solid and everyone was raving this game but just found it boring.

Devil May Cry. Great at the beginning, but it just goes downhill form there. Its a great experience, but I think its overated.

How dare you mention StarCraft! Its the best game ever!

[Sky Warrior Bob]

Nintendo's fighting games, Super Smash something or other. Sure, its a bit fun to fight as various mascots & Nintendo icons, but it isn't anything worth gushing over. I mean, some people I've talked too, act as if the game was the most fantastic thing to grace the earth.

Meh.

But then maybe this is because I'm not into fighting games in general. I mean, I kinda like Mortal Kombat, and even have a few games, but I was never that into the genere.

SWB

[Naveed]

Grand Theft Auto 3, most Overated Game Ever! I "Tried" to play this game many times and never found it interesting, then finally give up

Enjoyed Half-Life till Xen, it was fantastic.

[redhotray]

In reply to Remi...

I tried the game out with my buddy, on the co-operative side of things, which I did neglect to mention earlier, and as I said a in reply to Trep's thread, I think co-op in games, is an incredibly underutilized resource, so in that regard, Halo does get some points in my book. However, when playing co-op I didn't really notice that much difference in the game, aside from a few more enemies than usual. I guess I was looking for something a little different within the game, like maybe solving a few puzzles between the two of you, or a few new areas, where you could really have that sense of team spirit. Although it was fun for a blast, and a change of game...for me at least, it didn't really have a great sense of longevity. I am glad though, that you and your friends have had a lot of enjoyment out of it, I can see why people would find it fun, I was just underwhelmed by it all.

In regard to Multiplayer deathmatches, CTF, Team Deathmatch, assault, kart racing etc, I had the opportunity to play a lot of those mods on Quake for the PC. While this is a first for a console, it's something I'd had the chance to play earlier. I agree though, in terms of console first person shooters, much of what Halo delivered was cutting edge, and breaking ground. As I said before, I believe my problem with Halo was that I'd been spoilt by the PC FPS market, and the mods that were readily available with the internet at my disposal.


Also, Bob - I do agree with you about Super Smash Bro's Melee. I've played it a lot, won a lot of trophies, but the experience was INCREDIBLY repetitive!! My friends can't get into the multiplayer and they dislike it. I don't mind the game, but I think a lot of the hype surrounding it is a bit over the top!

[Kolzig]

Originally Posted by Ariel Type

Alone in the Dark

I'd like to hear your explanation why you say AitD is overrated?