Speaking of over/under ratedness, FFVIII has the most underrated OST in the series IMO Oh yeah, I'm gonna piss some people off today, to get rid of all this inherent felling of anger I have today. For today, I decided I'd write my third top 10, and on a frequently discussed topic. Everyone has those games that they dislike but others like and they truly don't know. Sometimes they feel left out. Thing is, although this is a common topic, I see a lot of people who write these lists to flame fellow gamers or don't present reasonable arguments. Today, I'm going to write my 10 best examples of overrated games, franchises and genres of gaming. I'm not here to make enemies with anybody, I just want to voice the games which I think get maybe a bit too much attention or praise from the gaming critics and game reviewers. I hope you can understand my side of the story on all of these and enjoy reading. Honorary mention for SP: Disgaea SUUUUUUUUUUUUCKS! DEPLOY FLAME SHIELD!!!!! #10: AND Earthbound & Mario 64 At #10 is a tie between two games which I've long thought deserved to be taken down a notch. I would like to state here that I DO IN FACT LIKE THESE GAMES! Earthbound has a unique charm to it and Mario 64 was a very important game in gaming in general. HOWEVER, I do believe that both of these games receive way too much praise, and for similar reasons: Neither game is the best in their respective franchise, and both are consistently put at the top of many top XXX games of all time list among gamers, which I don't understand. I'll explain Earthbound first, because that game is commonly considered underrated by gamers. But you know what? There is a cult following for the series and nearly everyone I've talked to about the game says the game is just AMAZING. My experience with Earthbound is this: it's unique in setting and has some nice comedy and characters, but it's neither particularly fun to play nor has it aged very well. The style of gameplay is very vintage, and the scrolling lifebar scrolls too fast early on to make it seem very useful. The game, for my experience, is frustratingly difficult at the beginning of the game, and yet too easy later on. There isn't enough balance to it. The thing that pisses me off most though, and I think nearly everyone among us hates: when you get a new character, they start at level 1, so you gotta go back and pointlessly grind them up so that they can MAYBE stand up to your other characters. Thus, by the end of the game, you might have a Ness with over 700 HP and a Paula with around 300. Now, that is based on the unbalanced growths, but STILL! Too much of a divide if you ask me. I can't say I hate Earthbound, but considering the crew of people stating how awesome it is, I simply can never put myself to joining them. I guess it may have to do with the fact that until just today (i'm dead serious), I've NEVER owned a Super Nintendo and missed out on a large amount of the gaming era. It may very well have to do with the fact I played it on a ROM which isn't nearly as genuine, yet its sequel is one of my favorite games of all time and it's Japan only. Oh well. Mario 64 has a different position in the gaming world, because it's got a gigantic fanbase and sales figure. quite personally, I found the game to be very overrated from the day I first played it. It may have to do with the fact that I couldn't beat the first king bob-omb, but even after I figured that out, I just never found it to be quite as good as everyone said it was. I find the game to be surpassed by its sequels, Sunshine and Galaxy. I understand how big a deal it is, and if I wrote my top 100 games, it would probably make it on the list, but at the same time, I just never got as into it as I wished. It doesn't have much of a replayability value for me, and that has a bit to do with part of the initial charm of the game was finding the locations of every star in the game and tipping your hat to the developers for coming up with an imaginative location to hide the star, and hitting yourself for not thinking of that. Once you know how everything is done, it's just not that much fun to do. I've played through the game twice, and the second time, I just didn't feel the urge to go beyond the 90 stars I got and just ended it there, incomplete. It's a fun and inventive game, but it just isn't quite up to the standard I wish it was. It's not the best game, it's not the best n64 game, it's not the best 3d platformer, it's not the best Mario game, and it's not the best Mario game on the Nintendo 64. There, I've already made enemies with the writers of the two most famous top 100s. But don't worry, I enjoy both of these games, so it's just a matter of not liking them ENOUGH :P #9: Pretty Much Every Fighting Game Yes. I don't like Marvel Vs. Capcom. But my problem is a similar problem I have with so many fighting games that I'm gonna put most of them up. I really kinda wish I didn't have a problem with them, but I just think so many fighting game series share a common complaint with me. First of all, the way I see it, there isn't a whole lot that seperates Tekken from DOA from Virtua Fighter. They all are just move around, defend, mash combos, repeat, and they all look like similar concepts with different characters. Not to mention some problems I have with the combo system. To get any good at some of these games, one has to learn a whole bunch of different button maneuvers to do a bunch of random crap. I guess I don't have enough skill at the games, or that I haven't played enough of them, but whenever I go to an arcade and play the Tekken machine or whatever they have, I win two fights just mashing the buttons because the combos don't input or anything, and I die the 3rd round. As for Marvel Vs. Capcom 2, I spent a couple weekends at various peoples houses and have played it in arcades once or twice, and I truly don't see the big deal. It's just not very fun for me to play. It may be that I haven't given it enough of a chance, but if games take time to get truly into, then the intro is pointless! I just don't see the big deal with the games. They aren't often very different from one another nor are they worth the incredible praise given to them. It's my opinion, and I have never actually played Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat nor Killer Instinct, so I can't put it any higher than #9. #8: Fire Emblem Games While I really liked Path of Radiance for the Gamecube, that was my first experience with the games and since then, I have discovered something with the Fire Emblem franchise: they are the Dynasty Warriors of RPGs, meaning that you're not gonna really find much difference in between games, gameplay and storywise. Get some problematic young adult, put them in charge of an army, learn of some princess, BAM! Big war starts, you lead a small army to kill hundreds of enemies, resetting if you let one die, and kill the mastermind behind it all. Seriously, I just summed up all the Fire Emblem games that I have previous association with, and that's 1, 6,7,8,9, and 10. At least with 9, there was some personal motivation, character development and new addons, plus 3d graphics and stuff! Each game has very recycled gameplay. Every turn is the same, and it often fails at what it ultimately is trying to do: be strategic. Often times, half of the units are next to unusable or broken, and if a unit can't kill a standard foe in one turn, they are pretty much weaklings. Also, theres the infamous "if you die, you die!" Basically, when a character drops to 0 hp, they are gone for good, unless they are important to the story, and even then they can't be used in battle. While this may be realistic and trying to aim for the player to be more thoughtful and strategic, it ultimately only leads to luck, trial and error, and in the end, frustration. Really, WHY? Just remove them from the fight and prevent them from getting any more exp for the chapter. How many people would reset from there? All in all, I just don't see Fire Emblem Games being really diverse or exceptional. Fire Emblem 9 (Path of Radiance) is a great game, but its more or less "cream of the crop" and the franchise in general is just overrated by its fans and reviewers alike. Also, Intelligent Systems, stop trying to compete with Final Fantasy in unnecessarily skimpy looking women! You're just begging for dirty artwork to surface throughout the internet. #7: Mario Kart Double Dash/Super Circuit/Wii Mario Kart 64 is my all time favorite racing game, bar none, and Mario Kart DS is a damn good one as well. Super Mario Kart...well, i've never played it but I've heard it's dated. Oh well, I'm not gonna pass judgement. Instead, i'm gonna discuss the other half of the series. Mario Kart Wii I have only about a few hours worth of experience, but I felt the need to categorize it with the other 2. First of all, the wheel is stupid. We all know that. Second, the graphics actually manage to be worse and choppier than Double Dash's, a game released on an earlier console! The motorcycles fail, and should only be specific carts to some, kinda like how Waluigi had one in MKDS. But worst of all, it wasn't fun to play. It was so unrefreshing, so dull, and just overall a poor experience. Mario Kart Double Dash was the best of these 3, and the one I have the most experience with. I'm glad it tried a new mechanism. It was a solid gaming experience, and was still fun on multiplayer. But what was so problematic about the game? Well, again, it just wasn't that fun to play. I never felt the same balance of characters found in the other games, and pretty much only chose Baby Mario and Baby Luigi so I could get the Chain Chomp special item, which worked like Bullet Bill. But the worst aspect of the game was playing it alone. Mario Kart DS had online and a number of interesting game modes, plus some of the best tracks of multiple games. Double Dash gave me no motivation to clear through the multiple Grand Prix (how the hell do you pluralize the word "Prix"?), and got dull after about 10 minutes. It was still fairly fun to play with a friend, but didn't have enough to hold me over. The one I wanna rip a new disc-hole in most is Super Circuit. HOW THE HELL DID THIS GAME GET SUCH HIGH REVIEWS? The game was a really weak experience, with (from my experience) weak controls, lackluster music and overall butchering of the game (MK64) that I loved. It was such a bland and frustrating game for me at the time, that it brings horrible memories to me. Now, I know it's the most forgotten game in the franchise, but it still scored 9s and 8s all around. I just don't particularly like any of these 3, and they are overrated, even if they aren't talked about as much as the other brilliant half of the series. I guess I'm strangely divided. *deploys second flame shield* #6: Every Zelda Game i've played (excluding Four Swords Adventures) This is limited to part of the franchise (I haven't played Zelda 2, the Oracles games or Minish Cap), but I think I need to nut this franchise a bit. Four Swords slips by for being so much damn fun with a friend (I must have spent nearly 15 minutes LMAO for every time I picked up my friend and threw him into a pit). But you know what? I don't particularly like Zelda games. it may just be I haven't given them enough chance, but come on... Let's address some of my common complaints with the games. As I stated in my "reasons why I can't finish a game" top 5 blog, I stated a complaint I have with Twilight Princess and OoT: Auto jumping ruins it for me. The idea of dungeons is that you're supposed to navigate treacherous areas of death and mystery, and having Link do all that for you kinda takes the skill out of the games. Not to mention, another previously stated argument, monsters. They are there, but what's the point of fighting them? Unless required to do so, killing enemies is pointless. I just don't truly enjoy these games, because I always feel there is something missing from them. Zelda games aren't BAD, but the games are often considered the best on their system, and again, I'm gonna have to disagree. No hard feelings. #5: Super Mario RPG Of all the Mario RPGs, this one is the weakest. There, I freaking said it. I have the worst experience of all the games with this one. Back in 5th grade, when I was discussing with my friend about Paper Mario (because I love the game), he mentioned something about emulators and a game with someone named Mallow, who I kept thinking was a Toad (as in, the mushroom guy, not the frog). For the next two years, I was wondering what the hell this game could be. I was desperately waiting for a sequel to PM or any Mario RPG really, and I kept wondering and wondering. Finally, I got a new computer in my household, and could browse the internet. I stumbled upon a website by the name of rpgclassics.net and found a guide to the very game I so wanted. It mentioned something about emulators and ROMs, so I downloaded the ZSNES emulator. I was confused how to work it, so I checked with my mother about it. In our search for a ROM (I was confused about the internet back them), we discovered that ROMs were technically illegal, and she forbid me from doing anything further. Fast-forward 4 years later. By now, I know computer basics, and am desperate to try this game that i've seen video after walkthrough after praise for some game called Legend of the Seven Stars. I finally redownload the emulator, and get Mario RPG. I played through it, but a discovery I made very early on was that it just wasn't THAT good. I kept pushing myself further, believing it would get better, and...BAM! In the Sunken Ship, my emulator develops a horrible glitch, that freezes the game any time I access my equipment menu. Since then, I don't trust ZSNES. By the time I knew I needed a new Emulator, it was too late. My computer harddrive had crashed. It wasn't until early this year, 2009, that I finally got the chance to truly play it, when it was up for the Virtual Console. But you know what? Same problem. It wasn't very fun. It didn't compare to the games of my childhood. Even Partners In Time felt more complete for me than Mario RPG. Again...It's not a bad game. But it's the most praised Mario RPG, yet IMO it's the honest to god weakest. First of all, they don't explain much about the timed button presses, and the gameplay was too dated. I'm weird when it comes to age of RPGs, because I can enjoy so many standard turn based RPGs and hate so many others. But Mario RPG just felt so average to me. I can't explain it too well, but for me...it never felt truly fun. It was something to pass by some time. I guess it may have to do with the standards set by the later games, but you know, I just have to say it's overrated. Come on, of all the ScrewAttack's top 20 SNES games, the highest rated Mario game is Mario RPG. It's all a matter of opinion, but I just don't see how that works out :P But I won't be a *****. If you like it, then that's your choice. As for me, I find it too forgettable. #4: Nearly every game in the racing/sports genre (Mario Kart games aren't the same as standard racing games so I put them in a seperate genre) You know what? I don't see any appeal in so many of these games. Let me give some great examples of some fun sports and racing games: Tecmo Super Bowl, Blades of Steel, Burnout, Wii Sports. What do they all have in common? They are trying to be GAMES and not simply simulators. Look at the games of yesteryear. They weren't trying to be flashy or boasting the NFL/NHL liscence, they tried to make the player enjoy playing that sport without having to round up a group of professional players. At their core, they are simple and fun. Wii Sports is not great, but it knows what to do and how to do it in order to be a simple fun game. Burnout is more of a simulator than the others, but it puts an emphasis on destruction and demolition, which is one of our childhood favorite enjoyments. There are two very distinct problems I have with just about every sports/racing game out there. As said before, so many of them no longer are about being games, but trying to simulate the experience of the game. Well you know what? It's a problem when in a video game I play about as well in a game of golf as I would in an actual game of golf. Come on, throw a fireball or something in the game! You can aim for some realism, just do something to separate the game from its real-life counterpart, and MAKE IT A GAME! The other distinct problem that I have with these games is they suffer from an extreme case of Mario Party Syndrome: Every year, at least 10 different one of these kinds of sports games hit store shelves. Each golf game and each football game makes minor changes from eachother, but are they really THAT different? Last year, I found a copy of Madden NFL '09 at $60 and Madden NFL 08 for $10! Not to mention you can get Madden NFL 2003 for like a buck now. And to be honest, Madden 2003 was actually a moderately fun game to experience, because it was simpler than the games of these days, and the training modes were a series of pretty interesting minigames. Racing games suffer from a similar "realism" idea. You know the most fun thing you can do in Midnight Club 2 is? Going into free mode and playing tag with a friend. Because you can't go ramping over a bridge in the actual game or else you'll lose the race. And unrealistic game modes would be too much fun, so the developers can't let that happen. Yet somehow, racing and sports "games" still manage to steal game of the month awards from far more deserving games. You know, I got just the solution: We have a strict organization system with these franchises. If you have an official license for, say the NFL, you make a game. Then the next year, the NBA gets a game, then the NHL, then FIFA, then the MLB, and so on. Hype will build up, you get more time to expand on the games, and EVERYONE IS ******* SATISFIED! #3: Grand Theft Auto 4 We all know this story. GTA 4 is considered the game of the year by many publications out there. WHY? I admit that it's the only game in the series I've played thus far, but...okay, here is my experience with GTA 4. I would go on, start somewhere, drive to an arms dealer, buy some guns, and go do something fun. You know, like the GAME WANTS YOU TO. I wreck my car, steal another one, and a cop comes up when I do so. I try to drive away, but I can't. In an effort to defend myself, I shoot the cop so I don't lose my stuff. Wanted level goes up. Now at this point, the cops want to kill me. I try to escape to somewhere I can hide, but in the process of driving there, I wreck my car due to the lousy car controls. Now, I've bombarded with an onslaught of cops who shoot at me till I die. I lose all my stuff and am too discouraged to play anymore. The whole concept of GTA isn't very apparent to me, and the story mode is very forgettable and boring. When you are lucky enough to get a party for a free mode game, the game gets interesting...although, as soon as someone gets a helicopter, it quickly becomes a douche-war. Really, those moments are the only time I truly have fun. With messed up driving controls, forgettable story and average multiplayer, I sold this game for 40$ at gamestop and haven't looked back since. I can see where the franchise got so popular, but it's not a good representation nor a good first impression for me. I think this video sums up GTA4 better than anything I could dare write. u Oney #2: Most First Person Shooters The only genre I think is more overrated than sports games is the first person shooter. AGAIN, I haven't played Duke Nukem, Bioshock, Quake or Wolfenstein, but of the ones I've played, I cannot see the big deal. Doom got boring within minutes. Call of Duty 5 got boring within minutes. Halo got boring within a few days. Medal of Honor was okay when I played through it, but after that I never felt an urge to play it again. First and foremost, just HOW many WWII first person shooters do we have? Seriously, no matter the answer, it's way too many. There's way too many games out there about ganking Nazis. Really, a number of war FPS's feel like they are trying to be war simulators to me. In my lifetime, there is only 1 FPS I can truly say I love, and that is Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon. No GRAW, no Rainbow 6, just the original for the PS2. Why? Because the story mode took place a few years into the future and it was absolutely fun cooperating with my father on all the missions to completing the objectives, as well as shooting him dead with an anti-tank bazooka. Sigh, what memories. I don't play FPS's much on PCs, and I know PC fanboys discovered the big loophole in this entry. But you know what? The first person shooter is among the most popular genres, Console or PC, and I just don't see the fun in so many of them. As much as I'm looking forward to Borderlands, that has something to do with the longtime RPG fan that I am and I wanna see how that works out. But until then, I will say that I just think the majority of FPS's I've played, and probably many more I haven't, are overrated. Again though, I may just not be skilled enough. So, what could my #1 most overrated game/series/genre be? Well, find out! #1: ...Nah, I'm just ******* with ya. I'd like to take this opportunity to say I DON'T think FFVII is overrated. It's all preference, but with as many problems as I stated in my very first blog, I thoroughly enjoyed this game. It was expansive and developmental, and very extravagant. I see FFVII top nearly every makeshift "most overrated" list, and really, even if it isn't my favorite, I know a lot of people who genuinely like this game, and I can agree with a lot of points that most of the games greatest fans say in their reviews. I'm willing to defend your opinion if you disagree, but hey: I like this game A LOT. #1: Oh dear god... If you know me well enough, you probably saw this coming. Super Smash Brothers Brawl is the single most overrated video game I have ever played. No question, no argument. And you know what? I've played Smash from the very beginning. Super Smash Bros. Melee is my absolute favorite fighting game of all time, and because Smash is such a close franchise of mine, as well as a fairly Nintendo-ified and different fighter, I decided to exclude Smash from my #9, because of just how big of a piece of my heart Melee is and how big a hole Brawl left in my heart. Let me just state: Brawl is NOT the worst game I've ever played. The musical remixes for the game are outstanding, the amount of collectibles is massive, and the game is still pretty fun if you have 4 people at a party. But you know what, lets address all my personal flaws with the game....Oh boy, where do I begin? Everything was spoiled by Masahiro Sakurai very early on. Sonic, the SSE...everything. Granted, I'm guilty of having checked the dojo or whatever daily, but even if I didn't, the game was so overhyped that everyone spoiled EVERY announcement made, spoilers covering it or not, that one would have to avoid the entire internet if they wished to avoid learning it all. Let's start with the 1P game modes. The most apparent addition is the SSE, a 10 hour story side-scrolling platformer/fighter that was supposed to expand upon Melee's adventure mode. It fell flat there. 10 hours took WAY too long, the game becomes incredibly boring and frustrating, especially at the Great Maze. There's no dialogue and everything is implied, leaving a bland story with little emotion. The SSE bombed. The Classic mode took a step backward, with the opposing fighters all being more fixed than they used to be. They took the lazy way out and only created 5 bland target tests rather than giving each character their own. The stage designer was a nice touch, but it really could have used more stage room, some fixing up and some more pieces. The characters could all be unlocked in the Subspace Emissary (SSE). Whatever happened to beating level 1 of Adventure with a 2 second marker left to get Luigi? Or beating 100 Man Melee to get Falco? For crying out loud, you leave your console on for 20 hours to get Mewtwo! Where did the creativity go? And for that matter, what happened to Mewtwo and Roy? They said they were gonna abolish clones and they STILL dropped the ball on that one, so the least they could have included the erased characters for nostalgia sakes. All this doesn't even come close to what they did to mess up the gameplay. First of all it's about half as fast-paced and interesting as Melee. Skillful combos are gone in favor of taking turns to see who can hit the other the most. So many of the characters are unbalanced, and that is made only more evident by their Final Smashes, a new mechanic nobody who plays smash professionally cares about (I hate these people too BTW). Sonic can get possibly 2 KOs with his on the same person, while you're lucky if you can get a hit with Ness'/Lucas' PK Starstorm. It's just unwholly slow, and...for god's sake, you can TRIP! Was there any point? IS THERE ANY WORTHWHILE JUSTIFICATION?! Brawl became boring and an incredible letdown within a couple months. I sold my game and got $30 back, surprised by the store clerk to hear they actually hadn't recieved very many trade-ins for the game (I then proceeded to spend the money on GTA4. Letdown to letdown, eh?). I then went back to Melee and discovered what truly went wrong. Brawl just didn't match up to its predecessor. I found myself just wondering...WHY? They had 8 years, and so much was left unpolished. The online was glitchy as hell, the 1p was nerfed to boredom, and they didn't do half of what they said they would. Collecting all the stickers, music tracks and trophies was now a tedious task and no longer an accomplishment. And yet Brawl is so often considered one of the best fighting/nintendo/wii/overall games out there. I feel so left out and alone, only glad to know that there are others who feel my pain. *sings FFVI opera* So there you have it, my list of the top 10 most overrated games/series/genres of all time. Again, I hope you enjoy and can sympathize. Give me some feedback and comment. It means something to me. I hope we haven't made enemies of one another (Disclaimer: I own none of the images, tracks or videos here) JK SP, never played it before.