Mine is the Army Men series. Objectively mediocre games at best but the concept of toy soldiers fighting over our yards and rooms has always been cool to me
Hell yeah, the Army Men games are so dope. Terribly clunky, combat leaves much to be desired, mediocre map layouts but goddamn do I still find them fun. Specifically Sarge’s Heroes, would love a switch port.
I played a toooon of Sarge’s Heroes 2 on PS2. My next favourites are RTS and PS1 Air Attack
Air Attack rips 🤙
Dynasty Warriors, They are my “Dumb fun” game. I usually just turn off my brain and “grind” even though I usually call out every game for grinding or unnecessary combat.
But something about that series makes me pick up every one and waste tens of hours just killing the same-ish soldiers over and over.
Lu Bu has entered the battlefield!
Same here. And if they come out with another one I’ll grab it. Although I didn’t play 9 because of bad reviews.
But I did recently replay DW8 Empires yet again. Love it!
I picked up a copy of Romance of the Three Kingdoms to read finally.
I recently started 9… and it’s… Yeah It deserved most of the somewhat negative reviews, but it’s still a DW game. I honestly think they should have called it something like Empires. As an open world game it’s interesting and unique but it is a little too open for “DW”. IT feels like a half step in the wrong direction but if they continued on and made “Dynasty Warriors 10 World” with that system and improved it, it could be something pretty unique. Just not as the main line series.
If you haven’t read Romance of the Three Kingdoms you’re in for a treat, I really enjoyed those books quite a bit, especially after being such a fan of the series. Getting more of the back story is great, and the characters are way more interesting.
As someone who invested an embarrassing amount of time into each mainline game since 3, 9 was awful. I think there may have been a decent (musou) game under there, but even several years and patches later it’s rough. The battlefields are empty. The traversal is buggy. The upgrade system is grindy in the least fun way. I don’t want to mine metal in a DW game…
The best musou games in the last 5-10 years have been spinoffs like Hyrule and Fire Emblem. I don’t have much faith in Koei Tecmo releasing a DW game that captures the essence of 3-5 in a modern way.
Guild Wars 1. Unlike other MMOs it is entirely separately instances in combat, the level cap was very low, it had a focus on narrative storytelling, and a max parysizr of up to 8(depending on area of the game). It also came from the era where subscriptions were the model for MMOs and it didn’t require (or even have) subs. You just bought the game and you got to play. There were multiple campaigns (basically separategames worlds with different proffestions and skills) that you could cross between with any of your characters assuming you owned that campaign. Very different game from gw2.
Still one of the best MMOs in my opinion. At the time, the landscapes were beautiful, especially in Old Ascalon (sp?)
I played Guild Wars starting from the beta and loved it. I was super excited for the sequel - even bought the collector’s edition - but didn’t end up playing it that much.
Mine is Alpha Protocol. While it has some minor cult status its really Obsidians least known modern title.
Its clunky and ugly, but one of the best espionage RPGs with tons of meaningful choices and really unbalanced combat (looking at you pistol head shot god). I would kill for a sequel.
Game had a great pistol.
I played the hell out of this video game called Axis and Allies that I found for like $5 in cheap games section of Office Max around 2008. I’ve never heard anyone talk about it or share my experience. I’m sure it wouldn’t hold up if I played it today but back in '08 I was a pro.
Axis and Allies was a board game too I think?
It was actually a board first, and there have been a number of electronic versions throughout the years. I had one such adaptation on CD growing up in the late 90s, but I’m not sure it would be the same one you played.
Cool game, though. I sunk lots of hours into it.
Not unpopular back in the day but it sure is now – Battlefield 1943. I play on xbox all the time, the servers are still online and you can still find full lobbies. I’ve been playing it on and off for a decade. Its just chaotic low-stress fun.
Amazing that the servers are still online. I just checked and the game is included with Gamepass as well. Maybe I’ll try it out again some time, those maps where great.
I forget which achievement it was but it was bugged keeping me from getting all of them. Curse you 1943! Still, an amazing re-visiting of the OG map/game. ❤️
Dragon Age 2. Lot’s of people think it’s the weakest game in the Dragon Age series and there is a lot to not like: dungeons and outdoor areas are largely the same recycled maps with different layouts, story was a bit lackluster compared to the previous title, party controls were a step down from Dragon Age Origins. I still enjoy it for the party dynamics and the main character dialogue wheel had more varied option that didn’t along with previous Bioware titles that had the good, neutral, and evil/jerk responses.
I’m a huge Dragon Age fan, and 2 is my absolute favorite. It gets a lot of (perfectly valid) criticism, but the ‘found family’ themes really resonated with me. And I love how it focuses on the people in this one city instead of having a big, save-the-entire-world narrative like most RPGs. It felt so personal.
Plus, snarky Hawke is one of the most fun protagonists I’ve ever played in a game. It really doesn’t deserve the bad reputation that it got.
DA1 and 2 Are absolutely my favorites of the series, I could barely make it through inquisition.
While they sell millions, typical „Ubisoft formula“ games are critically unpopular because they‘re dumbed down treasure hunts, and I enjoy them (in moderation) exactly because of that. Sometimes I just wanna turn my brain off and walk to map marker #312 while taking in the sights.
Does Diablo 3 count? It got panned at launch and I do understand why. The story was predictable and dumb. Making the whole game revolve around a damn auction house made it unsatisfying. But man, the game itself played so well - I loved smashing my way through a dungeon as fast as I could wiping whole screens at a time. And they did do “loot 2.0” with the expansion, which killed the auction house and made the gear you picked up actually worthwhile sometimes.
Diablo 4 feels kinda meh to me by comparison.
Ghost Recon: Wildlands. It’s your typical Ubisoft open world game, boring gameplay even on extreme difficulty but the world is so beautiful, and I love just driving around the map with no HUD.
I’ve been thinking about getting Breakpoint during the summer sale. I played a little bit of it a while back, but ended up refunding it for whatever reason. I’m craving it again though. I’ll probably get it and dive into it after finishing Final Fantasy 16.
The Predator DLC was awesome though. A buddy and I co-oped that on the highest difficulty and it took about a week of nightly playing to beat him.
Still the best representation of the Predator in gaming that I’ve seen.
lol the South American road trip simulator (jk, mostly)
boring gameplay even on extreme difficulty but the world is so beautiful, and I love just driving around the map with no HUD.
Hey, this is basically Skyrim and I’ve got 2k+ happy hours in that
Clash Royale. I think Supercell, a billion dollar company, simply assigned all their least competent personnel to that one dev team.
The core gameplay, unfortunately, is still sharp as fuck though. ~sigh
I quit that game years ago for my mental health. I was obsessed with it, but I remember spending over an hour every day trying to get x wins to get the daily chest. I miss playing it sometimes, but ultimately I think it’s bad for me lol
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Eternal Card Game - basically an online MTG clone. It’s always been small, and the userbase has been gradually shrinking since it started. I still think it’s a great game though.
Hey, this is awesome to see. I worked on Eternal back before launch.
I thought it was a great digital version of mtg.
Nice! Thanks for your contribution to the game I’ve spent a few thousand hours of my life playing :D
I love it too, but I still prefer MTG because it’s what my friends play.
I feel like I’m guilty of this within the Borderlands series – I love all the things about 2 that OG fans seemed to dislike, namely Anthony Burch’s writing and the weapons spread, and I actually think 3 is pretty respectable as a shooter; it’s a lot of fun to play, it’s just a weak sequel to 2. The things that fans seem to love about The Pre-Sequel (the ice and the butt slams and the new player characters) left me cold, and I think the first game pales in comparison to the second.
I loved 3. Granted, it was my first Borderlands game, but I thought it was a lot of fun.
Wow! You’ve articulated my thoughts about the series exactly…
i like a couple games that are not really obscure, but are far from the most popular MMOs or well received sequels:
- Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis
- Fallout 76
Fallout 76 is a mixed bag for me. I love a lot of the mechanics and it can be awesome for RP, but I just downright detest the monetization and lack/restrictions of features other survival games (and other fallout games) have.
yeah, to be fair though it’s their first try at an MMO. The general mechanics of MMOs are horrible, like what you’re saying. I actually never played any previous fallout games as I took a 20 year break from video games, other than halflife 2 (6 years late) and lot of 80s/90s games on emulation. I am considering actually playing fallout 3 and 4 sometime. Pretty much what I wanted was a halflife MMO, and 76 is like, sort of like that. I would prefer a more techy and desolate feel - i also en joy the campy nature and humor of the game, though. Halflife 1/2 was sort of disconcerting and horrifying.
Disc Space. A small 3v3 ultimate frisbee game built in the Unity engine. It’s silly and not realistic at all. But had just right amount of learning curve with a high ceiling. Had a little player surge during covid and promptly died. It is what actually led me to playing Rocket League
