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Although I really enjoyed the water temple, and only the water temple. So, yeah, I'm probably just weird.

Yes, yes you are.
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lolplatypus: And regarding OoT, I think I've played enough, it should rather tell you that I think the game sucked. And as I mentioned, I'm fully aware that I'm quite alone with that opinion. Almost everyone else is completely in love with the game, so I guess it's probably a good game and I'm just weird. That said, it's still one of the worst games I've ever played and that's unlikely to change. Since I was actually looking forward to it, I'd say that counts as a major disappointment. Although I really enjoyed the water temple, and only the water temple. So, yeah, I'm probably just weird.
The interesting part is that I could fairly accurately pinpoint the flaws it had in my opinion and use them as solid groundwork in lengthy discussion. In other words, I'm probably as shocked that others like it as it's the other way around. Which is somewhat hilarious in it's own way.

I'd like to hear these flaws. Not because I necessarily disagree with you; OOT definitely wasn't a perfect game. But as an initial try at adapting the Zelda formula to 3D, I think it worked fairly decently. Would fixing your observed flaws have fundamentally altered the basic game?
Post edited August 19, 2009 by JamesGecko
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lolplatypus: And regarding OoT, I think I've played enough, it should rather tell you that I think the game sucked. And as I mentioned, I'm fully aware that I'm quite alone with that opinion. Almost everyone else is completely in love with the game, so I guess it's probably a good game and I'm just weird. That said, it's still one of the worst games I've ever played and that's unlikely to change. Since I was actually looking forward to it, I'd say that counts as a major disappointment. Although I really enjoyed the water temple, and only the water temple. So, yeah, I'm probably just weird.
The interesting part is that I could fairly accurately pinpoint the flaws it had in my opinion and use them as solid groundwork in lengthy discussion. In other words, I'm probably as shocked that others like it as it's the other way around. Which is somewhat hilarious in it's own way.
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JamesGecko: I'd like to hear these flaws. Not because I necessarily disagree with you; OOT definitely wasn't a perfect game. But as an initial try at adapting the Zelda formula to 3D, I think it worked fairly decently. Would fixing your observed flaws have fundamentally altered the basic game?
Me too.
I think the game was good, but it was no where near as cool as ALTTP. Yes, as a 3D translation, OOT was very good, in a world where everyone was hyped up about "lets turn everything into 3D!" a world where super mario successfully translated into Super Mario 64, but really, it did lose a lot in that translation, and I've been thankful they've decided to keep the mobile versions 2d. but it's still depressing that they have such a hard on focus for this 3D version, each one since OOT has been a little more depressing, I am actually quite pleased with the windwaker though, it was very refreshing to see that new system and new style, in a format that to me felt watered down since majoras mask.
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JudasIscariot: I follow a simple rule regarding some games:
If the amount of mods I have to hunt for, download, and install are equal or greater, in terms of hard drive space, than the hard drive footprint of the original game then I am quite certain the damn game sucks donkey privates.

Sounds like you should avoid ARMA then
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JamesGecko: I'd like to hear these flaws. Not because I necessarily disagree with you; OOT definitely wasn't a perfect game. But as an initial try at adapting the Zelda formula to 3D, I think it worked fairly decently. Would fixing your observed flaws have fundamentally altered the basic game?
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Weclock: Me too.
I think the game was good, but it was no where near as cool as ALTTP. Yes, as a 3D translation, OOT was very good, in a world where everyone was hyped up about "lets turn everything into 3D!" a world where super mario successfully translated into Super Mario 64, but really, it did lose a lot in that translation, and I've been thankful they've decided to keep the mobile versions 2d. but it's still depressing that they have such a hard on focus for this 3D version, each one since OOT has been a little more depressing, I am actually quite pleased with the windwaker though, it was very refreshing to see that new system and new style, in a format that to me felt watered down since majoras mask.

I have to agree that the transition to 3D was well done. The controls felt a bit shaky to me at times and controlling Epona was something I couldn't deal with at all, but generally the gameplay felt fairly adequate in 3D, which isn't necessarily a given. The graphics were nice, too, and since I played the game years later, I'd imagine it was just stunning to look at when it came out. So I would agree that it's very well made in these regards. However, immersion and/or atmosphere are usually what draws me into a game and for me it really fell short here. Suspending disbelief is one thing, but even in the most alien fantasy setting, some things just don't go over too well and I'd argue that OoT had tons of story and design decisions that fit this description all too well and at least for me broke any form of immersion whenever it got the chance. For example (some spoilers her ldo):
"LISTEN!"
More annoying than anything else, really, but this one has to make the list.
So you start the game as young Link and the big talking tree, that seems to be the chief of the village wants to talk to you. Apparently it's urgent. However, you can't go to the tree, because an obnoxious brat is blocking your way and demands that you have sword and shield to pass. See, as far as I'm concerned that boy gets a smack in the face and that's about it. Who gave that kid any form of authority. What would the Deku Tree say, if I couldn't find sword and shield? "well, it was fairly important and actually a matter of life and death, but if that eight year old boy demands that stuff, I guess there's nothing we can do about it."
Following the initial fiasco we get ourself into breaking pots for money, finding boomerangs, using bombs on cracks in walls, mostly standard stuff. Which is probably fine, something new would have been nice, but we have the whole 3D transition going on, so that's probably a valid reason to stick to gameplay mechanics that worked so far. I can't really say I had fun with that, but that's most likely my own fault.
Fast forward to warping into the future for the first time and meeting with the sages. The following conversation went something like this:
"See, Ganon rules over Hyrule now, which kind of sucks. Now all he needs is the Master Sword, then he will be completely unstoppable."
"Bummer."
"Fortunately the sword is sealed in stone and can only be released by the Hero of Time, which would be you, Link."
"Great, so if I just never release the sword, he'll never get his hands on it and we got that problem out of the way."
"True. Now go and release the sword."
"Excuse me?"
"Well you know, the Master Sword, the Hero of Time, we kinda have a game going on here."
"How about no? See, I have this handy ocarina and I could just jump back in time to a point where he was known as Ganondorf, some random weakling. And you guys witnessed his rise to power, with that knowledge it's a walk in the park to foil his plans in the past."
"You don't get it, do you? That's not how we do things around here. Now get the damn sword already!"
I get it, time traveling is a complicated beast. And I really don't need a good story to enjoy a game. I can enjoy games with stories that don't go much further than standard fantasy stuff. But this is borderline insulting.
Whatever, let's roll with it for now and get the hookshot along the way, which isn't much of a surprise, really. After a few hours of gameplay I'd describe as boring (again, if I'm not into that stuff, my bad), we dive into the water temple and I will say that I loved that part. Beautiful environment, engaging puzzles (as far as I remember, that is) and it's underwater, it doesn't get much better than that. Unfortunately I can't say the same about the miniboss. One of these "you are your own worst enemy scenarios", I admit I expected more of a puzzle than a fight, with an incredibly clever solution. As it turns out, I had to smash his skull with a blunt object.
Now it's possible that this was meant as an analogy to "rock beats scissors", but at this point I'm hesitating to give the game that much credit. If it is, though, I stand corrected and have to admit that's not bad at all.
Meanwhile I ran into design choices, that have been questionable imo. Like the first fairy upgrade on top that mountain, which is located right next to entrance area to the fire temple. Now maybe I'm just stupid, but if I'm told there's a cave on top of the mountain, and I find one cave on top of the mountain, I initially assume this is where I have to go. Which, as it turned out, wasn't the case. However, being on a timer before being burnt to a crisp didn't really help finding that out, since having not found anything in the overheated region, I assumed I just suck at the game. See, this is frustrating design in my book.
The same with the delivery quests, that eventually would lead to Biggoron's Sword from what I heard. If I have to deliver something to the laboratory at the lake on a timer, that's fine. If I get an autofail, when I whip out my ocarina and shortcut to the water temple, it isn't. Not only is there no reason, why this would happen, the game also punishes you for using a tool it gave to you in the first place.
I still made it to Gerudo Village, got stripped of all my stuff and incarcerated. The first attempt of escaping ended with me being discovered. So I changed my plan to sneaking up to the guards and whacking them in the head from behind on the second try. Which again ended with me being discovered. "Ah, a stealth mission!", I thought to myself, "I have to sneak around and constantly stay out of sight." Which resulted in multiple failures and me finally looking the whole thing up in a faq. Apparently I had to use my hookshot to stun these guys. See, this is a problem imo. It was brought to my attention, that the hookshot always had that effect in Zelda games, but it's nonetheless fairly counterintuitive, especially if you're relatively new to the series. That thing is a hook on a massive chain, seems like that would work out to mutilate rather then to stun. It probably makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, at least in the ruleset the game provides you with, but it doesn't make much sense under any other circumstance. And the game is full of that stuff, which acts as a constant reminder that you're playing, in fact, a game. Which is okay, I guess, if that's all you're looking for, but it completely lacks any immersive qualities. Even completely abstract puzzle games can get you into a rush, where you forget, that you're playing a game, because you're totally captured by it. An adventure game, that has the advantage of a storyline, should be even better at immersion and it's something I simply expect from that genre.
Again, it's probably not a big deal, if you're looking for solid gameplay and not much more. I can't say I particularly enjoyed OoT's core gameplay, but I can see why others would. However, the game's tendency to break all immersion any chance it gets was the dealbreaker for me. And I'm not the guy who goes into movies to nitpick them apart, I'm actually fairly gullible when it comes to fiction, so if a fictional work gets me to the point, where I refuse to finish it because of that, something went horribly wrong. I can see why it would be regarded as a good game, it's probably not my cup of tea, fine, my loss. But I stand by my belief that it has the worst story in the history of everything and is severely lacking immersive qualities and based on that I'm as baffled about it's general reception as the majority of gamers is about my opinion about the game.
In the end it's probably a matter of taste and apparently mine is rather different. But with all the praise the game got and me having had a blast with Link's Awakening (which was brilliant imo), I had fairly high expectations and it was kind of disappointing to be so underwhelmed by the actual experience.
There's sadly been quite a few, but my memory is shot so I can only recall recent ones...
Madworld on Wii - Loved the art style to begin with but after a couple of hours it just looks lack-lustre and dull. About an hour after that I realised how limited and repetitive the gameplay was. Eventually got bored and never bothered finishing it.
Twilight Princess on Wii - Same fucking Zelda game as every one of them that came before it (that formula is getting very tired,) minus any kind of charm that might have existed in the franchise. Fuck you Nintendo, never again.
Colin McRae: Dirt on XBox 360 - Thanks Codemasters for taking a fantastic series and bending it over and sodomising it for the sake of appealing to a US audience. Controlled like shit too.
Okay, for all you fallout 3 haters, look away now.
I recently finished my 3rd playthrough of Fallout 3, clocking in at about 40 hours, and I will say right here and now it is the most fun I have ever had on my 360. Yes there are quite a few crashes and bugs. Far more, infact, than any mainstream release should have, particularly after i downloaded the pitt DLC. But I was able to look past that and found a great role-playing experience. Oh, and one more thing...I enjoyed it more than Fallout 1 or 2. I got most of the way through Fallout 1, and there is comparativly very little to do, and nowhere to explore. Yes there were some great moments, but fallout 1 ain't all that.
I declare the rest of this post Fallout 3 hater-safe.
On to the main chunk of the post, this may be more of a dissapointment in my ability to pay attention through extended gameplay sessions, but at some point through all the troika games, the main plot seems to have run away from me. Take arcanum, put 20-25 hours into that, suddenly I have no idea what is going on. I get that ****SPOILER ALERT**** the gnome at the beginning of the game was really a dwarf and his clan was bannished at the behest of the elves for giving technology to the humans, but that was actually a lie or something, and you are the re-incarnation of some god, but my question is what the hell does this have to do with anything? Why am I in the southwest corner of the world map looking for a cursed book? Why did I have to visit that dark-elf city? I love the game and the role-playing, but none of this makes any sense to me.
Again, I have the same problem with V:TM:B, I sneak aboard a ship, why? There is going to be a ressurection of one of the original vampires, how are my actions tied into this? I swear I cannot make heads or tails of the plot.
Admittedly, I had a similar problem with redemption, and it may just be you need to be more of a white wolf nerd to decipher the story, but still, I don't want to stop playing these games just because the plots have run away from me.
Having said that, biggest dissapointment in a game itself would have to be KOTOR 2. I loved playing as an evil character all the way through that game, but the ending made me want to huck the disc against a wall, break it into little pieces, incinerate it, freeze the remains then throw them off a cliff. I was so crushed, I could not believe how blank the ending was, I actually watched the ending again on youtube, just to see if there had been some kind of mistake, to see if there had been a bug or I had accidentally skipped the ending. I have to ask though, is the good ending any better? I recently picked up the PC version (I origionally had the XBOX version) and I am this close (this close being me holding up my thumb and forefinger in such a manner as to indicate a small distance) to installing it.
Other than that, Bioshock, what a big let down that was. What an utterly generic, pedestrian FPS attempting to masquerade as an RPG. I have nothing else to say about this game that was not said in the Zero Punctuatiomn review, except I would have phrased it in a much more emphatic way. As for the story, I had fun for a few hours, and then I realised, there was no story, I was just being dragged along by the promise of story and character development just around the corner, and it never materialised.
Talking to OisEucalypt over Twitter reminded me of this one:
The last level of Trine. Way to ruin an otherwise brilliant game.
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lolplatypus: I had fairly high expectations and it was kind of disappointing to be so underwhelmed by the actual experience.

this is a great review and actually made me laugh several times +1. i share your feeling.
The only zelda game i liked was the first one on the gameboy.
i was kind of fisappointed in the ending of spellforce.
****spoiler alert**** so you grind your way through the levels and the story is great at first. al lot of open questions that fall into place along the way.
So you play along , the last few levels hardly a story or quests en then you come to The soulforger. he's a pushover and then you are sitting in your chair ears against the speaker , face against the screen to not miss anything off the plot. (imagione warcraft 3 Frozen throne)
Evil sorcerer runs in , teleports to the past , the end. WTF???
Post edited August 19, 2009 by CyPhErIoN
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lolplatypus: if that eight year old boy demands that stuff, I guess there's nothing we can do about it."
I hate to nitpick here, but the "kids" in the forest are actually ageless, there's no telling his actual age.
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lolplatypus: "See, Ganon rules over Hyrule now, which kind of sucks. Now all he needs is the Master Sword, then he will be completely unstoppable."
"Bummer."
"Fortunately the sword is sealed in stone and can only be released by the Hero of Time, which would be you, Link."
"Great, so if I just never release the sword, he'll never get his hands on it and we got that problem out of the way."
"True. Now go and release the sword."
"Excuse me?"
"Well you know, the Master Sword, the Hero of Time, we kinda have a game going on here."
"How about no? "
the continuance here would be," the master sword cannot be touched by evil, Ganon has no hope of being able to use it, unless I unlock it and become his misguided pawn." the discontinuation of the description of items on that really ticks me off, I mean, what is the master sword if it doesn't banish evil?
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lolplatypus: we dive into the water temple and I will say that I loved that part. Beautiful environment, engaging puzzles (as far as I remember, that is) and it's underwater, it doesn't get much better than that. Unfortunately I can't say the same about the miniboss. One of these "you are your own worst enemy scenarios", I admit I expected more of a puzzle than a fight, with an incredibly clever solution. As it turns out, I had to smash his skull with a blunt object.
Now it's possible that this was meant as an analogy to "rock beats scissors", but at this point I'm hesitating to give the game that much credit. If it is, though, I stand corrected and have to admit that's not bad at all.
Yes, the water temple is my favorite, it is so hard, and that is what I like about it. the own clone thing was pretty stupid, and it's an idea that's been done to death, but it is most beloved example because this is the best execution, which is sad.
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lolplatypus: I still made it to Gerudo Village, got stripped of all my stuff and incarcerated.
this has been a fantasy of mine since I first played the game, I don't know why I found those blocky girls so hot as a young teen, but I did.
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lolplatypus: The first attempt of escaping ended with me being discovered. So I changed my plan to sneaking up to the guards and whacking them in the head from behind on the second try. Which again ended with me being discovered. "Ah, a stealth mission!", I thought to myself, "I have to sneak around and constantly stay out of sight." Which resulted in multiple failures and me finally looking the whole thing up in a faq. Apparently I had to use my hookshot to stun these guys. See, this is a problem imo. It was brought to my attention, that the hookshot always had that effect in Zelda games, but it's nonetheless fairly counterintuitive, especially if you're relatively new to the series. That thing is a hook on a massive chain, seems like that would work out to mutilate rather then to stun. It probably makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, at least in the ruleset the game provides you with, but it doesn't make much sense under any other circumstance. And the game is full of that stuff, which acts as a constant reminder that you're playing, in fact, a game. Which is okay, I guess, if that's all you're looking for, but it completely lacks any immersive qualities. Even completely abstract puzzle games can get you into a rush, where you forget, that you're playing a game, because you're totally captured by it. An adventure game, that has the advantage of a storyline, should be even better at immersion and it's something I simply expect from that genre.
As far as immersion goes, you're right, but to be honest this is what I expect from a Zelda game.
We need to classify you as your own sub-race of humans Weclock.
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lolplatypus: Tekken 3
The game was great, but after spending way too many hours in practice mode, not to have fun, but to work on kicking ass more proficiently, I thought to myself "dude, if you worked that determined on stuff like school, reading or learning languages or instruments, you could actually achieve something. instead of playing games." It was a actually a very sad realization.
Eye of the Beholder
I had fond memories of Might & Magic 3-5 (looks similar to a kid), always loved the screenshots of this one and haven't played it until a few years ago. It was not what I expected.
The Gamecube in general
I don't buy games that often and when I buy a console, it's usually a used one, so I'm starting out quite a bit into the console's lifespan in general. This was the first time I found no interesting games on my current system. And roughly half of the games I actually bought were kinda disappointing to begin with.
Deus Ex - Invisible War
After reading this thread, this probably isn't that surprising. However, I didn't play the first outing and I really liked IW at the beginning. Unfortunately the game gets worse with every minute.
The Rescue of Princess Blobette
It was a gift. Worst christmas ever.
Mass Effect
The first run was just a chore. However, this was with standard Shepard paragon-style and the game is kind of strange in that regard. Second run with a female renegade adept Shep was a blast. Well, there's still the Mako sections ....
Alone in the Dark - The New Nightmare
This one was actually surprisingly enjoyable and a good time has been had by all involved. Unfortunately the last part of the game switches from well executed survival horror to half-assed shooting sequence. One of the poorer design choice that could have been made.
The Legend of Zelda - Ocarina of Time
Only played Link's Awakening before and loved it. Since it's usually regarded as one of the weaker Zeldas, while OoT dominates Top 10 lists all around the world, needless to say, there was minor excitement involved. I'm obviously in the minority, so maybe I just have bad taste, but it turned out to be one of the worst games I've ever played. If we leave out games, that are actually broken and unplayable, and just focus on stuff like story and design, it easily falls all the way to the bottom.

Yeah you do have bad taste, LOL, just kidding, everyone on here is open to have their own opinion, it just seems that I disagree with almost everyone on this Thread about which games were terrible and which were not (except Neverwinter Nights, that game was a huge disappointment and has long been collecting dust on my self). Anyone else ever mention an older game to someone only have them look at you cross eyed? this happens almost every time I mention the games Realms of the Haunting to someone or System Shock 2.
My biggest gaming related disappointment:
Having a conversation with self proclaimed game experts whose gaming experience is actually very limited, usually to Halo and Madden 0 whatever and an action game here and there. I have nothing against casual players, but It can be annoying when they act like they know more than they do and spout misinformation and are sometimes very arrogant about it.
for example I had a guy argue with me once at Game Stop that Niko Bellic from GTA 4 was ITALIAN, who anyone whose played the game for 5 minutes can tell you is not the case. another example is when someone says that one franchise rips off another one, even though said franchise predates the one it is supposedly ripping off.
Quick-Time Events:
Quick-Time Events are not new and they are not innovative, they've existed for at least 20 yrs and there use to be entire games based entirely around them like Dragons Lair and Space Ace. although I'll admit that their use in more recent games like Indigo Prophecy/Farenheit, RE 4 and 5, GOW 1 and 2 have been better, I still don't like them very much and would much prefer to to watch story related cinematics than to play them. I also would not mind not hearing people tell me how innovative they've been over the last 7 to 8 years by reducing adventure games to a series of mini-games with a plot.
Post edited August 19, 2009 by Bmoyn715
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Bmoyn715: for example I had a guy argue with me once at Game Stop that Niko Bellic from GTA 4 was ITALIAN, who anyone whose played the game for 5 minutes can tell you is not the case. another example is when someone says that one franchise rips off another one, even though said franchise predates the one it is supposedly ripping off.

Yeah, because he totally wasn't Russian nor did he describe parts of his life in Mother Russia! Those freaky Italians...LOL. That guy needs to get his facts straight before stepping back into that Game Stop.
Did anyone here prefer Master Quest Version of OoT to the Original
when it came to Half-Life i actually preferred Opposing Force compared to the Main Game.
The length of the Resident evil Games is disappointing and the removal of the Grenade Hack for PAL Versions Only.
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Bmoyn715: My biggest gaming related disappointment:
Having a conversation with self proclaimed game experts whose gaming experience is actually very limited, usually to Halo and Madden 0 whatever and an action game here and there. I have nothing against casual players, but It can be annoying when they act like they know more than they do and spout misinformation and are sometimes very arrogant about it.

This reminds me of one time I was at some really small LAN place, some kid asked me what kind of games I liked. "First person shooters", I replied. He then proceeded to blather on about how "Shooters don't require any skill, all you do is point and click!"
I should mention that this kid had spent the last 10 minutes droning on about how Diablo II and especially its expansion were the greatest things to grace the earth. Don't get me wrong, I think DII's great, but almost all you do in that game is click!