I’ll miss you, dragon age!
This happened for me with Destiny.
Borderlands.
Word.
Borderlands 2 had my best game memories beating Vermivorous the Invincible with 3 friends, me playing as Maya. First of all getting it to spawn is tense.
I so desperately want to like BL2 because it has Gaige, my favorite Vault Hunter of all time, but I can’t replay it because the story is so infuriating to me. It’s like the writers are punishing me for thinking the Vault Hunters from the first game were cool.
First time I’ve seen this take. BL2’s story is my favorite of the series, and the best feature of the game IMO. Then 3 happened…
I will miss those lighthearted adventures…
Destiny 2. It really only had a few banger DLCs, but those alongside, the beautiful gunplay, is what kept me on copium till The Final Shape. Dropped it after that.
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That is rough, Anarchy meta was so fun.
Final Fantasy has been dead for a while. XI was the first major warning that things were no longer the same as an MMO was the last thing I expected from a mainline entry. XII was okay but it got rid of the overworld map and kept an MMO style of gameplay that felt like a slog to get through. Everything after that has been a disappointment heralded by extremely long dev times.
Agreed in general, Square has turned to shit - but XI and XII were not where it happened, those games are great and XII in particular was peak Square. Part of the problem was Tetsuya Nomura and the slew of spinoff shovelware games with half-baked Kingdom Hearts style stories they started shitting out. The other part was a combo of their embrace of mobile gacha-style bullshit, and the apparent lack of skill and experience that go into their games as they shifted from maintaining their own engines and in-house tools in favor of joining the Unreal and Unity bandwagons.
But don’t worry, another “going back to their roots!” phase is just around the corner.
13-2 is still, even now, my personal favorite Final Fantasy.
I’m thrilled to learn that one person liked it. /s
I bought FFXVI and both VII remake games on PS5 because I was still holding out hope that they could reignite the magic of the previous games. I mostly enjoyed them, but they didn’t feel remotely like the Final Fantasy games of the past. XVI was more Game of Thrones than Final Fantasy, and the VII remake games were more XV/Kingdom Hearts than Final Fantasy.
I feel like the writing was on the wall as far back as X. There is very little variety in the combat, it’s very much a hallway like XIII, the “world map” is a list of locations in the order you visited them, and there are multiple long stretches where you can’t backtrack.
I’ve also tried playing Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey in the hopes that they would scratch that same itch, but I haven’t been able to bring myself to commit to finishing them. I haven’t played Fantasian, but I’ve heard mostly positive things about it.
It’s no wonder the VII remakes feel like KH since they are being done by Nomura.
Yeah, he’s unfortunately had way too much influence over the Final Fantasy series since Sakaguchi left. I also feel like Kitase has been creatively stuck making the same game over and over.
I didn’t get to finish Lost Odyssey due to my 360 red-ringing. It’s a shame too because the story was one of the saddest since FF IX. It really explores the idea that immortality isn’t all that great when everyone you know and love will eventually die and leave you with just memories, but then end up losing those memories too which ends up being half blessing and curse. The industrial setting a la FF VI was just gorgeous with one of Uematsu’s best ever scores going off in the background. The character designs were pretty great overall too with Jansen being one of my favorite JRPG characters because of his dry witty remarks no matter what the situation is.
Everything about the game hit just right and felt like it was a proper FF title in all but name. It hurt to know Mistwalker Studios barely did anything worthwhile after that for a long while until Fantasian.
You know, Lost Odyssey wasn’t on the radar for me but you may have put it on the map. Will have to look into it.
Oof, I was fortunate to never have a 360 RRoD, but I knew people who did. Were you ever able to get it repaired or exchanged through Microsoft’s extended warranty program?
I didn’t finish Lost Odyssey because I eventually lost interest. The premise was certainly interesting, the music was very good (Uematsu is a genius), the dialog was well done, and the gameplay was fun. What slowly drove me away was how depressing everything in the story was. It felt like every single story beat was trying to be devoid of any hope or joy.
It was already way past its warranty so not much could’ve been done. Yeah the depressing story can be a bit much too but it also felt very real and relatable. We all have loved ones who’ve passed away and I swear that game made me feel that moment it happened all over again. There are glitters of light throughout the story though and that’s what made me keep going because it also does a pretty great job of emulating hope to the player. It’s been so many years since it came out but I’d be willing to pay top dollar for even a basic port of it on Steam.
I actually liked XVI and the VII remakes better than anything they have made since FF XII, but I suppose that isn’t a tremendous bar to reach. The SNES era of Final Fantasy is still my favorite.
Yeah I agree. The SNES era was definitely a golden time for the series, they just kept getting better with each entry and peaked with the masterpiece that was VI. IX will always be my favorite entry though.
IX is my favorite of the PS1 era for sure.
Good bye Mario Kart… we’ll always have not giving 1st place coins as an item in Wii.
Sonic Racing Crossworlds has been scratching the kart racer itch lately.
Ace Attorney (a.k.a. Phoenix Wright)
It peaked in the first trilogy. Each game built on what was good about the previous game while adding a new mechanism that flashed out another part of the game.
The second trilogy of games collapsed trying to follow it up. Both the writing and gameplay show the same issue. The games are trying to be a clean break with new characters and powers but the game designers were afraid that they might scare away fans of previous games, so the old characters and gameplay all come back to make an appearance. None of it works. The returning characters and gameplay are all very brief and shallow without the progression they got in their original games, but they take up so much space that the new characters and mechanics don’t have room to build up over the course of 4-5 cases in a game.
I am now trudging through the two prequel games. The game designers finally had the determination to make a clean break, but it seems that they lost the magic of the initial games. There are new characters and new gameplay. There is too much plot, not enough game. There is too much (bad) writing between player interactions and when they happen, the game is more hand holdy to make sure the player is given a bucket of clues about what to do next. And there is no reason to make the game easier, since there is a new easy mode that plays the game for a player if they ever get stuck.
Yeah, so often I want Capcom to process that Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney is my least favorite of the whole series, not because of the new protagonist, but because Phoenix is way too present in it.
I can start to see some indie games following through on the formula, which to me is a great evolution though. Very little has the creative inventiveness of the original trilogy though. So hard to alleviate from brain drain.
Honestly used to love Minecraft, still have a soft spot and will likely return to it at some point. All that said, MSoft has made me give up on Mojang and Minecraft. Mojang also just ignores pretty serious feedback about gameplay and don’t seem open to discussion with the community which always creates friction between mojang and the community.
If you enjoyed the survival aspects of Minecraft, maybe you’d enjoy Vintage Story? It overtook Minecraft for me in terms of block games I enjoy, since it feels a whole lot more rewarding getting better tools, weapons or armour in game.
But Minecraft’s ecosystem makes it super easy to run any version you like best. Play the Minecraft you loved and ignore the latest versions if you don’t like them. It’s basically just a game engine anyway, the actual game is all the mods you install.
Definitely a good point, Minecraft would have faded without the modding scene, especially performance mods which seem to be the backbone of any Java based playthrough. That’s also part of my problem, I don’t want to have to download mods to turn off the telemetry, chat reports, a button for their servers that are awful. I’d rather invest my time in an open source solution like minetest or other non MSoft options if I’m relying on mods to remove junk.
I’ve never been a big Minecraft fan, but has Hytale reawakened any of that passion in people?
Luanti (luanti.org) (née Minetest) exists!
The world size is much smaller, but as a play system and exploration thingy it is still quite fun. Also has several games (adventures), mods and gamemodes.
everything blizzard made.
Blizzard is a corpse being puppeted.
It’s just Activision. Has been for years.
Until you learn about Blizzard’s bro culture that has existed almost as long as the company that resulted in a female employee committing suicide because no one would take her sexual assault allegations seriously.
What “until”?
Blizzards artistic merit was killed by Activision, until you find out they have always had a female-abusive work environment.
What?
It’s another valid reason to boycott blizz… But you’re adding that factoid as if it counters mine? It’s also not relevant for why their IPs are souring. It’s another reason why they don’t deserve customers, even if the games were still good, but its not the reason their games are suffering in terms of quality.
What “until”?
It’s just Activision.
You think it’s all Activision’s fault until you learn that Blizzard was toxic from the get go. Blizzard products had issues before Activision bought them, they cut content for time, overworked & underpaid people, killed what could have been great games, all on their own.
Activism is just a corporate scapegoat for the mess Blizzard has always been. Separating Blizzard into its own company won’t fix any of its problems.
I didn’t say it was all Activisions fault. Blizzard had to be the kind of company that would join forces with Activision for the merger to happen. I’m well aware of the smaller details.
I’m saying the Blizzard that created the IPs people love, has long been dead (in that the people who made those things are no longer in positions to do so again).
What’s left, is “a corpse being puppeted by Activision” in that actiblizz is lead by the type of people and decision-making that Activision is a lot more known for.
It’s a really short way to express to people who still have nostalgia goggles for Blizzard, that the things that allowed them to make good things, are gone. Replaced by profit motivated suits that have no respect for art.
Blizzard doesn’t need saving. It’s a rotting corpse of a brand. Remove activision, and you still have just a rotting corpse.
I feel that slope is happening with Borderlands
Happening?
Dungeon keeper
Halo Infinite killed the franchise for me.
I still get my friends together to play Halo a couple times a year. But finishing Infinite was the first time I was no longer excited for the next installment.
Ever since Halo 2 dropped my best friend and I have co-opped each one in one sitting. Infinite is the first time in 2 decades that we couldn’t get through an installment. Open world was fun but empty, and they tried to have it cover for a plot. The entire 4-5-6 “trilogy” is more disjointed than the star wars sequels. Story was not compelling, no emotional pulls. Halo was legit top tier sci fi and infinite felt like it was written by a committee ina meeting room. Just sad.
Hmt I might say the story of 4 and 5 was halfway decent.
In a vacuum.
While not comparing it to Reach (or 3. But that hasnt stuck hard in my memory. CE was peak for me. I remember getting lost as a little kid in the hallways on the Pillar of Autmm on the way to the rescue capsules)The story for 4 was great. It’s the only aspect of 4 that gets praise (although I think the graphics are underrated AF, those cutscenes on 360 are unreal).
5 had a shit story, but it had phenomenal world building. Evil Cortana was actually a really cool villain (if you can get over them semi-resurrecting Cortana) and the Guardians should have been the new Halo. Also, the combat was awesome and they fixed the Prometheans to actually be fun to fight against.
BTW, I have a special affinity for the stand-alone stories. CE, ODST, and Reach are my top 3 in the series.
Pokémon is starting to get there I think.
Mass Effect is still on the ropes for me. Andromeda was okay. I’m personally a bit over all the open world games.
Pokopia is great, though it was made by the dragon quest builders team, not game freak.
Otherwise, can’t argue
I liked what I played of Pokopia, and I loved Pokemon Legends Arceus.
Other than those, the last time I really loved a Pokemon game was likely Black 2.
I’ve been enjoying some of the quality ROMhacks that have come out in recent years like Lazarus, Odyssey, Emerald Seaglass, and Scorched Silver. I also started casually playing Platinum Kaizo (a difficulty hack), but haven’t played it much at all.
But I’ve had a better time in Odyssey and Lazarus than I have had in a mainline game in a long time.
I’m sure some of it comes from the graphics being inspired by the GSC (Lazarus) or using RSE graphics (Odyssey) and those are the most nostalgic ones for me.
Infinite fusion is fantastic, even if it didn’t have the merge gimmick. My favorite pokemon game since b/w2
I might have liked Andromeda if they had enemy variety or likeable characters. Everyone knows Shepard but for the life of me I cannot remember the name of Andromeda’s protagonist or any of the team members for that matter. Absolutely forgettable in almost every way.
Ryder Peebee Drack Vetra Liam Jaal
I think that’s the squad. Then SAM, the AI.
Additionally I remember the Kett being the antagonist, and it was something generic like Archon? As the title. That might not be the right title — if it is, it’s because Genshin Impact solidified that term for me.
I just booted up the game. I put 96 hours into it. Don’t remember anything but the vague total recall style plot and that the guns/powers are mass effect. Imma play through it again.
Me with Halo and Halo: Infinite
Franchises are like bubble gum. If you try to make them last too much they lose all taste.
