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Post by retr0gamer on Jul 25, 2024 7:22:12 GMT -5
Magical Pop'n - it seems to me that its fame is mostly because it's an okay Japanese import that is import friendly to non-japanese speakers. If it had been released in the west it would have been pretty much forgotten as a mid tier action game.
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jul 25, 2024 9:40:15 GMT -5
Was Okami obscure enough to be considered a hidden gem? Although on that note: Darksiders II - I do not get the love for this at all. I never played the first one or the third (which I think is supposed to be bad?), but everyone seemed to sing II's praises. I picked it up super cheap on Wii U when the real THQ was imploded and practically giving away their games to scrounge up some cash. It's okay for a Zelda clone, but I mainly thought it was bland. I really liked the dungeon design and tools made around those, semi-openness and most of the OST. The story is kinda cheesy and at times the worldbuilding feels like WoW but offline. Combat is solid though I don't have much to compare it to, played it on PC myself (Deathinitive Edition).
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Post by excelsior on Jul 25, 2024 11:21:36 GMT -5
Enslaved: mid tier PS360 action game with combat from a mediocre PS2 game and uncharted climbing. It's fine, has some great voice acting and a bat shit insane story and ending but it's mostly forgotten because of how forgettable it is. I just noticed I have this game on my shelf. I forgot I had it, forgot to ever play it and what's more, forgot to sell it when clearing out my 360 games. Definitely forgettable.
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Post by Snake on Jul 25, 2024 13:16:23 GMT -5
Shadow of Memories/Shadow of Destiny
Feels like a pretty forgotten PS2 game at this point in time, written and produced by Junko Kawano who went on to be a big part of developing Genso Suikoden IV and Suikoden Tactics, as well as Time Hollow. It's an interesting time travel murder mystery plot. Actually, I quite enjoyed it. Though getting the good ending might be a bit cumbersome when you're replaying the whole game and trying to figure out the right decisions. In that sense, I enjoy the game for it's plot, and less so much as an actual video game.
$20 ~ $40 seems to be the current asking price on ebay.
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Post by Apollo Chungus on Jul 25, 2024 16:09:37 GMT -5
God, I haven't played Enslaved in over a decade. That was deffo a game where I couldn't really understand the appeal for it once it was in my hands, which is a shame cuz I was looking forward to it (an action platformer based on Journey to the West but doing its own pretty post-apocalypse take sounded and does still sound pretty rad). Maybe it'd be a worth a revisit, to appreciate it for what it does rather than what I wanted it to be. I imagine its Uncharted-esque platforming and simple combat might even be a positive for some players, letting them enjoy the world and characters without getting hung up on mechanical complications.
I don't mean that snarkily either, I think there are plenty of games that can offer up too much friction against what a player's wanting out of a game. I wonder if that was part of the appeal for Her Story, that the most you had to worry about mechanically was taking notes of words and phrases that you could look up. No, the story's nothing special, but being asked to more actively engage with putting the pieces together and figure stuff out in a relatively straightforward manner could allow plenty of folks who aren't as dexterous to experience that story on their own terms. I thought it was a neat enough game for that reason.
To offset that positivity, another game that I've sometimes seen described as surprisingly good or underrated
The Simpsons Game - No. Just no. It's considered one of the better Simpsons games, but most of those are apparently trash so that's a low low bar to clear. Basically an average action platformer, where its main conceit is that the characters realize they're in a video game. Cue an endless torrent of self-referential gags in a game that never shuts the hell up about itself, where only three out of a hundred jokes are mildly amusing at best. Insufferably smug pile of bleh. If you must play a Simpsons game, go for the Konami brawler, Hit & Run or the GBA version of Road Rage.
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Post by JDarkside on Jul 25, 2024 16:26:21 GMT -5
Yeah, it's either Hit & Run or nothing. It has some issues, especially difficulty curves, but man the devs did their homework.
As for Her Story, I cant fully agree because I remember people in the know praising the story itself, and not just how its told, and I cannot agree with that. Rather than write an argument, though, I'll just point to Voidburger, who's basically the main Sam Barlow hater these days, especially in how he writes women. She's written a LOT of words on his games.
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Post by excelsior on Jul 26, 2024 11:03:04 GMT -5
The Simpsons game also had camera issues to my recollection. It's a shame because I really wanted to like it. Snake - one day I will give Shadow of Memories a try. It looks interesting.
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Post by Apollo Chungus on Jul 26, 2024 11:56:02 GMT -5
I'll be honest, I don't know if these are perhaps TOO famous to really count as hidden gems - maybe in relation to the other first-party games on their respective systems - but I'm tempted to suggest
Wario Land - The whole series, really. I've played nearly all of them and despite being perfectly fine platformers with some interesting ideas, I never gelled with them enough to truly enjoy them or overcome the annoying bits that prolly add character (having to obtain transformations to solve puzzles in 2/3, avoid the death ghost in 4) but I find only annoying. I respect how experimental the series was, changing its structure every game to see what they could pull off, and I suspect I'd really like them if they didn't have as much friction as they do.
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Post by Snake on Jul 26, 2024 13:37:15 GMT -5
Snake - one day I will give Shadow of Memories a try. It looks interesting. I definitely recommend trying it out at least once. Admittedly, I'm a sucker for groundhog day style stories. Especially when you're trying to figure out: who have you met that is always trying to kill you?!
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Post by Woody Alien 2 on Jul 28, 2024 15:37:13 GMT -5
Magical Pop'n - it seems to me that its fame is mostly because it's an okay Japanese import that is import friendly to non-japanese speakers. If it had been released in the west it would have been pretty much forgotten as a mid tier action game. Blame me too for this if you want, since I wrote a positive article for it on this very site. I may have praised it too much but my point still stands that it's quite well-made for a company without experience of other action games and that didn't make much of anything else, and the first stage is genuinely great in its progression and graphics. The whole of Japan may not have cared for it (but they like pachinko, so what do they know ![:P](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/tongue.png) ) but I still think it should've deserved more without being hailed as an all-time classic.
Oh and if it seemed that I was exaggerating about Reddit praising The Messenger as a masterpiece, think again: https://www.reddit.com/r/metroidvania/comments/1edpiob/the_messenger_is_amazing/
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Post by retr0gamer on Jul 29, 2024 5:18:49 GMT -5
Well I don't think it's bad, it's a decent enough platformer just nothing special a d not worth the money I paid for it!
I remember it being regarded as a hidden import gem very early, well before your article as I think super play in the UK was highlighting it as a good import friendly game.
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