Question What are some games you enjoy that are usually panned by players?

[neogunhero]

What are some games you enjoy that are usually panned by players?

Perhaps it’s a “so-bad-its-good” type of game, or this game scratches some particular itch in your brains dopamine receptors that most other people don’t get.

For me, Watch Dogs 2 is almost a guilty pleasure game. I know that it’s severely lacking in the story and character department, suffers from many horrible Ubisoft game design tropes, and overall feels like a mobile version of GTA.

But… what other game can you start a Gang vs. Police vs. FBI vs. Another Gang war and just sit back and take in the chaos? Watching the absolute mayhem and chaos ensue after calling a gang assassin to make a hit on a police officer, then sending more police to arrest that assassin, then watching as an endless amount of gang and cop cars pull up for a firefight never gets old to me. I love sitting in the direct middle of it, with bullets whizzing over Marcus’s head, sitting there oh so casually. There are many other great things about this game that aren’t universally loved by other players as much as I love them.

You know most players don’t enjoy this game as much as you do, but you don’t care because it’s fun to you. What games are like this for you?

 

[Brian Boru]

Main one for me is Far Cry Primal, which is generally far down any comparison list of FC titles, but is top-3 for me—with the only downsides being I can't beat Ull, one of the final 2 boss fights, and there's more melee combat than I like.

I think it's the lack of guns, rockets, explosives etc which gets it generally panned, since much of the general FC play I see on YT is run n gun & blow stuff up style. Makes sense that such an audience would be disappointed by Primal.

I've replayed Primal twice so far—quitting at final boss fights time, since the easy one is a boring time sink—and look forward to doing so again. It's a cool change of pace.

 

[neogunhero]

Main one for me is Far Cry Primal, which is generally far down any comparison list of FC titles, but is top-3 for me—with the only downsides being I can't beat Ull, one of the final 2 boss fights, and there's more melee combat than I like.

I think it's the lack of guns, rockets, explosives etc which gets it generally panned, since much of the general FC play I see on YT is run n gun & blow stuff up style. Makes sense that such an audience would be disappointed by Primal.

I've replayed Primal twice so far—quitting at final boss fights time, since the easy one is a boring time sink—and look forward to doing so again. It's a cool change of pace.

Primal has been on my back catalogue for years now. I’m definitely the run’n’gun kind of player when it comes to FC games. FC5 with NG+ is an amazing time if that’s your playstyle. I do enjoy the option to stealth in the FC games so I bet I’d really enjoy Primal!

 

[Brian Boru]

I do enjoy the option to stealth in the FC games so I bet I’d really enjoy Primal

Get thru the intro and maybe first couple of missions/quests—you should know by then if it's for you. If not, enjoy the world, they did a beautiful job with repurposing some of the FC4 map for it.

If it gets on your replay list, you might want the Wenja Mod or a mod from Nexus—I think I'll add the wingsuit for my next playthru

 

[mainer]

Gothic 3, Elex, and Elex 2, all from Piranha Bytes, and all frequently bashed in gaming forums, as well as disrespected by the gaming press.

They are 3 of my favorite open world RPGs, and I replay them frequently. The world building and exploration is fantastic & immersive, never knowing what or who you'll run into. The combat can be hectic and fast-paced, but you have to pick & choose your battles, especially at early levels, as you can be over-matched really quick. There's no hand-holding in these games, and you have to learn to survive by building your character and figuring things out on your own.

Gothic 1 & 2, as well as Risen 1-3 (all from PB) might fall into this category as well, though those games received a more positive reception overall.

 

[Brian Boru]

Command & Conquer Renegade is another one. Not on my replay list these days, but it was only the second shooter I replayed—first was Wolfenstein 3D a decade earlier—until Far Cry and Half Life 2 came out a couple of years later.

Renegade was generally mocked by the Doom-Quake-Duke Nukem crowd, because it was Westwood's first shooter and different from the norm. While not a GotY contender or close for sure, it had the huge plus for me of being set in the C&C universe, which was just good fun to play in.

 

[Zloth]

Watch Dog 2 is panned? That was a fun one! It had some silliness, like when your character steals cars, does a few million in damage, and seriously injures some people just to find a guy and lecture him on morality, but it's mostly great fun.

If that's counting, I suspect about half the games I've played would count. Let's see....

I loved The Last Remnant. That's a JRPG where you (eventually) control something like 18 characters at once, divided into four or five squads. When you give a squad a command, it's a general one like 'heal that squad' or 'attack with magic' and the squad figures out exactly how to do that. I liked that a lot but, for some people, it was like asking them to play with mittens on - no fine control at all. The lead character being a dork didn't help things, either. Neither did coming out on XBox first, because the console was only just barely able to run the game.

Get thru the intro and maybe first couple of missions/quests—you should know by then if it's for you. If not, enjoy the world, they did a beautiful job with repurposing some of the FC4 map for it.

If only I could get you to do that with Metal Gear Solid 5....

 

[Pifanjr]

Eador. Masters of the Broken World. It's a weird game and I understand the criticism. I don't even think I would be able to finish the game, as I think it can take well over 100 hours, probably more than 200 with the way I play. But I sunk over 70 hours in and really enjoyed it before I ran into a game-breaking bug.

I've even gone back to it once and sunk another 20 hours in it before getting bored with it.

 

[ZedClampet]

What are some games you enjoy that are usually panned by players?

Perhaps it’s a “so-bad-its-good” type of game, or this game scratches some particular itch in your brains dopamine receptors that most other people don’t get.

For me, Watch Dogs 2 is almost a guilty pleasure game. I know that it’s severely lacking in the story and character department, suffers from many horrible Ubisoft game design tropes, and overall feels like a mobile version of GTA.

But… what other game can you start a Gang vs. Police vs. FBI vs. Another Gang war and just sit back and take in the chaos? Watching the absolute mayhem and chaos ensue after calling a gang assassin to make a hit on a police officer, then sending more police to arrest that assassin, then watching as an endless amount of gang and cop cars pull up for a firefight never gets old to me. I love sitting in the direct middle of it, with bullets whizzing over Marcus’s head, sitting there oh so casually. There are many other great things about this game that aren’t universally loved by other players as much as I love them.

You know most players don’t enjoy this game as much as you do, but you don’t care because it’s fun to you. What games are like this for you?

I enjoy Watch Dogs 2 for the same reason. Of course, missions are trivial when everyone who would normally be after you is dead from the giant battle you started.

Sometimes you can do things that make me wince, like calling in a gang hit on a random woman sitting on a bench reading. I do it anyway lol

Another game people don't like that I absolutely love is Atlas. Just amazingly fun building out your ships and exploring the map, fighting pirates, etc. Of course, it's about 40 percent broken, but they actually are still working on it.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I dont have enough time to play games to waste any trying out games that have bad reviews or buzz around them, and its been a long time since I was a kid buying the cheapest game with my pocket money that had a cool looking box. I have plenty of games with good reviews that I didn't stick with for long though.

I guess I played Skyrim on the PS3 and liked it a lot. Apparently that was the worst version of that game. Also I liked Dark Souls 2 quite a bit, and that ones divisive.

 

[Brian Boru]

Eador. Masters of the Broken World. … game-breaking bug

Kudos to devs for putting the warning in the title.

 

[ipman]

What are some games you enjoy that are usually panned by players?

Perhaps it’s a “so-bad-its-good” type of game, or this game scratches some particular itch in your brains dopamine receptors that most other people don’t get.

For me, Watch Dogs 2 is almost a guilty pleasure game. I know that it’s severely lacking in the story and character department, suffers from many horrible Ubisoft game design tropes, and overall feels like a mobile version of GTA.

But… what other game can you start a Gang vs. Police vs. FBI vs. Another Gang war and just sit back and take in the chaos? Watching the absolute mayhem and chaos ensue after calling a gang assassin to make a hit on a police officer, then sending more police to arrest that assassin, then watching as an endless amount of gang and cop cars pull up for a firefight never gets old to me. I love sitting in the direct middle of it, with bullets whizzing over Marcus’s head, sitting there oh so casually. There are many other great things about this game that aren’t universally loved by other players as much as I love them.

You know most players don’t enjoy this game as much as you do, but you don’t care because it’s fun to you. What games are like this for you?

I do read Steam and Ubisoft forums(soon to be defunct) and there seem to be a number of reasons some games get panned.
1. the sequel in their opinion doesn't match up to or deviates from the original.
2. the game challenges their conditioning and is considered by them to be too progressive.
3. the mechanics, controls or some element of the game isn't to their liking at first and they don't give it enough time to engage, adapt and gain the skills. Whereas I notice a number of players stick with a game and take it to a new level. Shadow of War would be a good example.

So WD2 and WD's Legion got some negativity because of all three. Yes WD2 was Ubisofts answer to GTAV, but it had the added dimension of hacking. I actually played GTAV to get my driving skills up to a level where I could drive the cars in WD's games.
GTAV is a great driving game. WD's games are great for hacking and stealth. I liked being able to hack into a cctv network either internally in a building or externally, or using the flying drone. Marcus could sit on top of a building and carry out a whole mission using those means; turning on electrical traps, hacking cars, forklifts, etc and use them to either block areas off or take out enemies, or call a hit.

HZD gets some negativity for reason 2, but going beyond that it's a great open world game with so many ways it can be played. So many types of weapons, traps, armour, modifications, potions and skills.
I continually find new ways to take down the killer robots; luring them into traps, using corruption arrows and turning them against each other, yesterday I got Aloy to override one of those Behemoths, then just followed it as it took out numerous robots and looted the remains.

I thnk the missions are usually just a way of getting the player to engage in the game, gain some skills, try out the ranges of weapons, armours, etc and then it's> here's an open world sandbox, have fun.

GTAV, the WD's games and HZD are all great open world games

 

[Johnway]

Gravity rush on the ps vita. I love the game a lot but i wouldn't recommend the game as a must play. That said, i thik it was pretty well received on the ps3 and if the game were to be ported onto the PC with its sequel i would be interested.

 

[Slasken]

Something I love which a lot people hate, are RPGs with random encounters and turn based battles.

 

[neogunhero]

I do read Steam and Ubisoft forums(soon to be defunct) and there seem to be a number of reasons some games get panned.
1. the sequel in their opinion doesn't match up to or deviates from the original.
2. the game challenges their conditioning and is considered by them to be too progressive.
3. the mechanics, controls or some element of the game isn't to their liking at first and they don't give it enough time to engage, adapt and gain the skills. Whereas I notice a number of players stick with a game and take it to a new level. Shadow of War would be a good example.

So WD2 and WD's Legion got some negativity because of all three. Yes WD2 was Ubisofts answer to GTAV, but it had the added dimension of hacking. I actually played GTAV to get my driving skills up to a level where I could drive the cars in WD's games.
GTAV is a great driving game. WD's games are great for hacking and stealth. I liked being able to hack into a cctv network either internally in a building or externally, or using the flying drone. Marcus could sit on top of a building and carry out a whole mission using those means; turning on electrical traps, hacking cars, forklifts, etc and use them to either block areas off or take out enemies, or call a hit.

HZD gets some negativity for reason 2, but going beyond that it's a great open world game with so many ways it can be played. So many types of weapons, traps, armour, modifications, potions and skills.
I continually find new ways to take down the killer robots; luring them into traps, using corruption arrows and turning them against each other, yesterday I got Aloy to override one of those Behemoths, then just followed it as it took out numerous robots and looted the remains.

I thnk the missions are usually just a way of getting the player to engage in the game, gain some skills, try out the ranges of weapons, armours, etc and then it's> here's an open world sandbox, have fun.

GTAV, the WD's games and HZD are all great open world games

WD Legion could have been great but if feels like a major step backwards for the franchise in many ways. I loved exploring London and I love the operator/agent mechanics where every NPC is playable, though it does start to feel less exciting the more you do it. The hacking felt really great when you had a hacker character with extra abilities the others don’t have. You really had to form a small squad of your best operators you use the most and rotate them out for missions. That was all cool but some of the negatives outweighed the positives for me. Most notably the insane lack of side missions and mini games. WD2 was chock full of like 5 different kinds of races all with different levels, fun side activities and side missions that felt rewarding to complete. WDL has darts and juggling a soccer ball and a really lame Uber Eats simulator mode? I wish it was much better in those areas. I need to finish the main story some day.

 

[ipman]

WD Legion could have been great but if feels like a major step backwards for the franchise in many ways. I loved exploring London and I love the operator/agent mechanics where every NPC is playable, though it does start to feel less exciting the more you do it. The hacking felt really great when you had a hacker character with extra abilities the others don’t have. You really had to form a small squad of your best operators you use the most and rotate them out for missions. That was all cool but some of the negatives outweighed the positives for me. Most notably the insane lack of side missions and mini games. WD2 was chock full of like 5 different kinds of races all with different levels, fun side activities and side missions that felt rewarding to complete. WDL has darts and juggling a soccer ball and a really lame Uber Eats simulator mode? I wish it was much better in those areas. I need to finish the main story some day.

So are you panning Legion, not as good as prequel

Yes they put so much into that game. I watched a vid by the Dev team talking about how they spent a month in London; photographing and videoing different boroughs and getting an understanding of the different cultures and historic areas. Also they talked to a range of different people; Londoners, police, hackers, activists, etc.
They also talked about the Perceptually Realistic Behavior through Alibi Generation concept, which is a massive leap forward in that NPC's carry out their lives to a schedule, and how they can all become playable characters.
I again enjoyed carrying out missions in pure stealth, hijacking those drones with rockets and guns, or turning enemy drones against them. But the missions did lack something.
I got the feeling that exploring and recreating London and the NPC concept was so new and exciting that they forgot about other parts of the game. I'm not sure if a game like that can be modded but it would be great if they opened it up and let players expand it, make it better. The basics are there, London looks great.

 

[neogunhero]

So are you panning Legion, not as good as prequel

Yes they put so much into that game. I watched a vid by the Dev team talking about how they spent a month in London; photographing and videoing different boroughs and getting an understanding of the different cultures and historic areas. Also they talked to a range of different people; Londoners, police, hackers, activists, etc.
They also talked about the Perceptually Realistic Behavior through Alibi Generation concept, which is a massive leap forward in that NPC's carry out their lives to a schedule, and how they can all become playable characters.
I again enjoyed carrying out missions in pure stealth, hijacking those drones with rockets and guns, or turning enemy drones against them. But the missions did lack something.
I got the feeling that exploring and recreating London and the NPC concept was so new and exciting that they forgot about other parts of the game. I'm not sure if a game like that can be modded but it would be great if they opened it up and let players expand it, make it better. The basics are there, London looks great.

I am panning it but at the end of the day I still really enjoyed it and had lots of fun too I agree with you, it seems they spent most of their focusing creating the world. I wouldn’t be mad if they reused parts of their recreation of London for a new game, like how Far Cry Primal used parts of Far Cry 4’s map.

 

[Zloth]

Legion seemed a little better to me than 2, actually. 2 had a bunch of multiplayer stuff thrown in that I totally ignored.

 

[ipman]

I am panning it but at the end of the day I still really enjoyed it and had lots of fun too I agree with you, it seems they spent most of their focusing creating the world. I wouldn’t be mad if they reused parts of their recreation of London for a new game, like how Far Cry Primal used parts of Far Cry 4’s map.

I do wonder about some of the management decisions at Ubisoft. First they only sold Legion on Connect, which caused backlash on Steam and Connect forums.

They had good Discussion and Support forums for Legion on Connect and got a lot of good feedback from players. Then they deleted those forums and created a new format, which bombed. Now they are moving the Forums to Discord. And when they did sell Legion on Steam, it was £8.99 or something recently.(-30% for Steam)

But an interesting question about Legion was discussed. Do players need to feel like they can relate to one main character, or just a few?

Generally that's what we do. Aiden in WD1, moody out for revenge. Even Trevor the psycho, or Franklin in GTAV, Arthur in RD2 they all have a back story, motivation, character, etc.

Whereas in Legion all that is lost in 9 million playable characters. So again that was a decision, that while interesting as a concept didn't really help the franchise.

 

[ipman]

Legion seemed a little better to me than 2, actually. 2 had a bunch of multiplayer stuff thrown in that I totally ignored.

I think Legion had that as well, although I think there were many problems. I think Legion has potential if you want to just go out in the world and create chaos and anarchy.

I like flying around on a cargo drone, sniping and hacking drones, etc. Also like that car hack where I get multiple cop cars chasing my vehicle, turn around and drive towards them and they all swerve off the road.

The spy car can be fun as well with it's missiles and cloaking device.

[Mod edit: removed some mild political commentary.]

 

[Zloth]

But an interesting question about Legion was discussed. Do players need to feel like they can relate to one main character, or just a few?

If they did, the Civilization franchise would be in serious trouble!

Still, the Watchdog series is no strategy series. I could see people that do insist on relating (even a little) to major characters throwing a fit because the series dropped that.

 

[neogunhero]

I do wonder about some of the management decisions at Ubisoft. First they only sold Legion on Connect, which caused backlash on Steam and Connect forums.

They had good Discussion and Support forums for Legion on Connect and got a lot of good feedback from players. Then they deleted those forums and created a new format, which bombed. Now they are moving the Forums to Discord. And when they did sell Legion on Steam, it was £8.99 or something recently.(-30% for Steam)

But an interesting question about Legion was discussed. Do players need to feel like they can relate to one main character, or just a few?

Generally that's what we do. Aiden in WD1, moody out for revenge. Even Trevor the psycho, or Franklin in GTAV, Arthur in RD2 they all have a back story, motivation, character, etc.

Whereas in Legion all that is lost in 9 million playable characters. So again that was a decision, that while interesting as a concept didn't really help the franchise.

Different games require different amounts of relatability and likableness for the player. In games where you are controlling one character, especially the same character for the whole game, it can be very important to relate or at least like the character you are controlling. Whether it be through their personality, how they are connected to the plot, or even as simple as customizing the character you are playing as. An example of that last point would be Rocket League or Fall Guys, where you control a character (or car) with no backstory or dialogue lines or anything of that sort. Just a virtual avatar you are controlling on the screen. However, through personalizing and customizing the character you want, you feel a stronger likeness for the character.

In the case of Legion, you are able to customize whichever character you choose to play as. You can even read their backstories to see if they committed some heinous crime that you are totally against, therefore you make the decision not to include them into your gang.

While you aren’t actually relating to this person or their personality or their struggles and goals, at least you make the decision that they seem like a valuable addition to your team and you would like to have them on, then being able to customize their looks helps to slightly further than decision you made. It’s obviously way different than a very well written character in a story driven game that you can actually relate to.

This is a very interesting aspect of the game that I thoroughly enjoy. It is entirely up to you to decide who you get to play as. I think this technology can be repurposed and improved in a future Ubisoft game. This mechanic is too interesting to be tossed to the side.

 

[ipman]

Different games require different amounts of relatability and likableness for the player. In games where you are controlling one character, especially the same character for the whole game, it can be very important to relate or at least like the character you are controlling. Whether it be through their personality, how they are connected to the plot, or even as simple as customizing the character you are playing as. An example of that last point would be Rocket League or Fall Guys, where you control a character (or car) with no backstory or dialogue lines or anything of that sort. Just a virtual avatar you are controlling on the screen. However, through personalizing and customizing the character you want, you feel a stronger likeness for the character.

In the case of Legion, you are able to customize whichever character you choose to play as. You can even read their backstories to see if they committed some heinous crime that you are totally against, therefore you make the decision not to include them into your gang.

While you aren’t actually relating to this person or their personality or their struggles and goals, at least you make the decision that they seem like a valuable addition to your team and you would like to have them on, then being able to customize their looks helps to slightly further than decision you made. It’s obviously way different than a very well written character in a story driven game that you can actually relate to.

This is a very interesting aspect of the game that I thoroughly enjoy. It is entirely up to you to decide who you get to play as. I think this technology can be repurposed and improved in a future Ubisoft game. This mechanic is too interesting to be tossed to the side.

I wondered if this was again something inspired by GTAV where you could switch between the three main characters. I liked the missions in GTAV because as a player you choose how to run the heist, which team you would contract and you had to set up getaway cars, make plans etc.

But also the way you had to switch between players mid mission. I seem to remember one where Michael was being overwhelmed in an office and I had to switch to Franklin with a sniper rifle to help him out.

Many players were finding it hard to switch to that Legion concept and I just thought we needed time to adapt. But what made Aiden in WD1 so intense was his personal revenge story over the death of his neice.

I did feel that motivation element was lost a bit in WD2 and more in Legion. I mainly used to play with about four or five characters in Legion. Mainly depending on weapons, a Kelly gang member and an Albion, + a getaway driver for their skills.

It does allow you multiple possibilities on missions. I'd often send in say an Albion member, take out all the guards, then go outside and return with a different specialist.

Out of about 43 team members, nearly all mine were glamourously dressed women.

Yes I agree, but I'd slim the mechanic down a bit and combine it with a Nemesis style system.

 

[neogunhero]

I wondered if this was again something inspired by GTAV where you could switch between the three main characters. I liked the missions in GTAV because as a player you choose how to run the heist, which team you would contract and you had to set up getaway cars, make plans etc.

But also the way you had to switch between players mid mission. I seem to remember one where Michael was being overwhelmed in an office and I had to switch to Franklin with a sniper rifle to help him out.

Many players were finding it hard to switch to that Legion concept and I just thought we needed time to adapt. But what made Aiden in WD1 so intense was his personal revenge story over the death of his neice.

I did feel that motivation element was lost a bit in WD2 and more in Legion. I mainly used to play with about four or five characters in Legion. Mainly depending on weapons, a Kelly gang member and an Albion, + a getaway driver for their skills.

It does allow you multiple possibilities on missions. I'd often send in say an Albion member, take out all the guards, then go outside and return with a different specialist.

Out of about 43 team members, nearly all mine were glamourously dressed women.

Yes I agree, but I'd slim the mechanic down a bit and combine it with a Nemesis style system.

Legion’s play as anyone mechanic combined with a Shadow of War style nemesis system would make for an incredibly fun game if done correctly

 

[ipman]

Legion’s play as anyone mechanic combined with a Shadow of War style nemesis system would make for an incredibly fun game if done correctly

Actually the two systems are very similar; both generate characters with their own traits, skills, etc and both generate stories or missions. Both systems also take into account players actions which affects future interactions. In Legion if you take action against some operatives they become less recruitable.

I think Shadow of War also gets panned at times. Sometimes because of it's controls with many actions on the SPACE key(even my bodyguard comes when I use that key sometimes). Also some people start off thinking it's a combat game and keep getting killed, but really it's designed as a stealth game.

I'm not sure how much it relates to Tolkien's work but I imagine that causes problems. One person even complained recently about the Nemesis system, and the best reply> SofW is the Nemesis system.

I am addicted to it, play on Brutal and have Talion's movements and actions effortlessly fluid. It is brutal; Orc captains pulling off arms and heads, popping bombs down orcs throughts + Talion's brutal stealth attacks. But Talion is a gaming god.