Much like every other entertainment medium in the planet, every video game save for a few exceptions I could probably count with my two hands, has a consensus attached to it - everyone either loves it, hates it, or something in between. That's because gamers usually expect something specific out of video games, and products either deliver or they don't. However, at the end of the day, we're all different, and sooner or later we're all bound to not follow the general consensus at some point, and video games are no exception.

I made this a roundtable so we can hopefully get some good discussions going, and be baffled at some of our fellow board members' choices. I'm sure some of you will be dumbfounded even at this OP.

So, post games everyone loves and you hate. Of course you can do any amount of games you want, and include descriptions only if you see fit. You can also add games you acknowledge to be well made games, but just aren't for you. Also, feel free to include games everyone hates and you love, I just didn't make that part of the main topic because it's not that common for that to happen. When games are generally considered horrible, it's usually because they're just not well made from a technical standpoint - no one can stand horrible cameras, textures, frame-rates or glitches abound. But if you can find an example of this, go ahead.

This should be good. Also, sorry if it's been done before. I don't remember if it has. Anyway, I'll start.

I Hate:

Kid Icarus

I hate this game. Granted I didn't play it in its entirety, I was fed up with it far before the final stretch of the game, but I completely disliked what I played of it. It stole the Metroid engine and made me go around in very generic looking stages attacking enemies with lame attacks. And constantly scrolling upwards (I know not the entire game is like this, but still) is so annoying in 2D a platforming game like this.

Animal Crossing

I had never played Animal Crossing until a few months ago. It didn't look like my type of game at all, so I steered clear. In what seemed like a call from destiny, a friend of mine recently let me borrow City Folk and said - here, you have to play it. You can't go on with your life until you play Animal Crossing. So I did. And, wow. What the hell do you do in this game? Seriously, though, I can see how people could get into this game. It's a good simulation game, and I can definitely see the Nintendo touch. I can feel it, almost. But the game bored me to no end. I put a couple hours into it and I never wanna see it again. Everyone says all Animal Crossing games are the same, so I feel I am entitled to say I hate the entire series.

Zelda II

I'm not completely alone on this one, I know, but it's still generally regarded as a good game. It's not a fun game at all. It's comprised of all these different "pieces" that ultimately don't add up at all. Towns, overworld with RPG-esque battles, experience points, AND side-scrolling gameplay? It never comes together, it's terrible. It doesn't help that it's extremely hard. But you know what's even harder? Finding a reason that justifies actually beating this game. Fuck it.

I hate the following more than the rest...

Gears of War

I should clarify before I begin, I haven't played the second one. And I don't want to. As for the first one, I played a substantial amount of the campaign and a bit of multiplayer, too. The multiplayer's alright, it's well designed, the problem is it has to work within the confines of the design of the game (of course), so... it sucks. First of all, the game is gray. I don't care what you have to say - it's gray. Yeah, it has some beautiful textures, but it's so unappealing to look at. I know people often complain about this in realistic HD games, but Gears is easily the worst offender in this aspect. So you already have a raised eyebrow from the minute you fire up the game, and then you start to play it. Your character moves like a tank (the "worse than Leon S. Kennedy" variety of tanks), the environments all look the same (of course) and are like 2x2. You have to take cover constantly and fire generic weapons at generic aliens. Yeah, it's a third person shooter which is kind of original, but it might as well have been an FPS, it's hard to tell the difference honestly. "Stop 'n' pop" doesn't make a shooting game more strategic - it makes it more boring.

And there's soon to be THREE of these games! Damn! Gears represents everything that's wrong with this generation of gaming (it only needs a 99 cent iOS game and we're golden), and people love it.

I'll post more games if they come to mind. Looking forward to your responses!

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@GelatinousEncore

Yeah, there were a ton of great licensed games in the NES/SNES generations. I mean, in fairness, you had a lot of crap, too. For every Rescue Rangers there was a Mickey's Mousecapade. But compared to today, when a great licensed game is as rare as a comet sighting, it was virtually a golden age for licensed games. I mean, even McKids was good. Freakin' McKids!

Call of Duty post 4. The series has not evolved at all and yet each iteration is more and more successful. It's something I cannot abide.

Put me in the Animal Crossing camp. I really just don't get that game.

And I wouldn't say I "hate" Wind Waker...but I've definitely disliked it more after every play through. That game can be fun at times but it does so many things that ruin the experience for me. I can understand why people like it for certain reasons, but those reasons can never outweigh the amount of things that annoy me in the game.

Earthbound. I know it's only beloved by a small group of hardcore fans, but I friggin can't stand that game. It's one of those games where, if you don't buy into the "charm," then it's kind of terrible. Anyway, I thought it was boring, uninteresting, and fairly tedious. Not a fan.

I'll throw Kid Icarus in there too. Perhaps it really is just aggravating because it's an NES game, but I think it's clunky and the store mechanic always kind of confused me. When I played it, I wound up just playing that first level over and over and over again until I knew exactly how to get through it with a lot of money.

Also, Call of Duty. Okay, I don't hate it, but it was one of those games I played for a couple months and have no desire to play ever again. I vastly prefer the slower, more methodical gameplay in Battlefield, where your character doesn't feel like he's running around on rocket boots. I would play Halo any day of the week over CoD. I just prefer a slower paced FPS in general. It's a huge reason I never got into Team Fortress 2.

To everyone who posted anything negative about Metroid in this thread: You are wrong!

Pokémon... although I wouldn't really classify it as being a series I hate. I've tried a few times getting into it and it just does nothing. Certain games I won't mind if the story is practically non-existent and while it isn't in Pokémon (at least I don't think it is...), there's something about it that just turns me off. I don't know if it's just that back then, Pokémon was almost made fun of and maybe that stuck with me. I should be able to enjoy it... but I just don't. It just feels boring and lacks the feel that other RPGs have I guess. Maybe it feels like it doesn't take itself too seriously? It's that same reason why I feel I've never been able to get into Earthbound.

@Shadowlink@TriforceBun

It sounds like you guys need to play Unreal Tournament.

Health-pickup based, great level design, bots, fully customizable level designs, unlimited weapons to carry, weapon pickup based, it goes on.

That is why I love Unreal.

Actually, now that I think about it, I think you guys are getting sick of "realistic/military " shooters in general, and so am I. We need more fast paced, arcade shooters. (like Goldeneye Wii, Unreal, Timesplitters, to name a few)

I am sick of a bunch of these "military" shooters that are coming out these days. I want more arcade, fast paced, shooting games- not this overdone, marine/white dude with gun vs. alien/nazi/taliban/etc.

I'm not sure if I hate any games. It's annoying that grey FPS have overtaken the industry, but whatever.

Games that people love that didn't do much for me though? Hmm. Oblivion. Ninja Gaiden Sigma. Chrono Cross. Tales of Symphonia (yeah I said it!) Probably a ton others, but I avoid most of what looks like it would bore me.

And after the 3rd retro game club, I am reminded that I never liked the original Ninja Gaiden either.

@Shadowlink
Hmm.... I do hate the influence Halo has had on the genre, for example most games will only let you carry 2 weapons these days, fuck that, I love the days of having like 15 guns at your disposal, this is why I like Resistance FoM and Wolfenstein a lot this gen. Plus I hate recharging health as well, I prefer the packs... except... you know, I don't mind the recharging shield in Halo, because at the time it was an original idea and it worked well with the fiction set up by the game. In fact, I don't hate Halo at all, the thing that annoys me is that every games has to use the same conventions and thus all become generic. When a game comes along that does something different, like Resistance, dude-bro gamers (99% of American gamers it seems) shit all over it then the publishers get scared and go back to the standard formula... like they did in Resistance 2, which was a lot more like Halo and CoD, and suffered for it.

So in conclusion, I think Halo is a great series, but I don't like most of the games that copy it and aren't as well thought out or designed. I'll also say this for Halo, when every other shooter on the market adopted the MoH style "iron sites" shooting mechanic, Bungie rejected it and kept doing their own thing. Bungie is a fucking great developer, don't hate them for being successful and influential!

The only non-obvious and at least controversial game that I can think of is Fallout 2. Not that I hated it, per se, but was dissapointed in a couple ways and ultimately dissuaded from continuing it. The difficulty levels are utterly fucking random from fight to fight. Like what's up with the impossible random battles? The choices for how to approach situations seemed mostly arbitrary. And what really did it for me was when people block doorways. It's one thing having to wait and some stupid nitwit of an npc to get out of the way But when I gave up was after getting locked in a basement because the room above it was too small to have my follower walk around in and he immediately would load right in the goddamn doorway! I could have killed him to get through, but it was ridiculous enough to where I said ta hell with it all.

Edit: and actually, WRPG's as a whole, I think are really overrated. They try to be adventure/action/ and/or shooters as well as RPGs which I feel comes out way too repetitive, bland, and stiff.

Oh I want to add one more vote to Twilight Princess. Blech. Probably wouldn't have been blech at all if
a) OoT had never existed
b) Wind Waker hadn't kicked its rear end years earlier in regards to gaming art masterpieces, and on a less powerful console to boot

@MightyOwned

Yes UT is all well and good for multi-player.But that's not really my issue. Even Halo has it's fun moments with local multi (assuming you aren't playing with my sniping camping dick of a brother).

It's the single player. Like you guessed, I need something drastically different from most the current crop on offer.

@Shadowlink
Have you played Wolfenstein (2009) or Singularity? Both of those games are a little more single player focused, and at least try to mix things up with cool weapons and powers. Raven is a pretty good developer and tries to make FPS games that are more in the 90s style, although they're pretty much rejected by the CoD crowd.

I loved Wolfenstein, it really scratched that old-school shooter itch for me, it even had hidden gold and treasures all over the place! I haven't played Singularity yet but I want to, here's a pretty positive review of it:

FEAR is another game that is single player focused.

Actually, FEAR 3 is coming out soon. Maybe check that out?

Also, you're all banned.

Especially Anand. I haven't actually read all of the replies in this thread, but he probably posted his racist anti-Metroid propaganda somewhere in it.

@deathly_hallows And you're double banned.

@Zero

*snigger*

Knew it.

warerare said:

I was really expecting to see Metal Gear Solid mentioned here and am glad that it hasn't been brought up yet. It is one of my most treasured game series and I love it.

I haven't enjoyed a main series Final Fantasy game apart from Final Fantasy X, although that was an awesome game.

Well I was going to read through the entire thread and then post but this made me quote and post. I dont like MGS, the whole series is just not my cup of tea. Boring and the story is what in the world awful. Me no like.

Also Modern warfare FPS including Call of Duty Modern Warfare. I like some FPS that are set in other time periods or SCI Fi FPS but ones that are set in modern times just dont excite me. FPS in general dont excite me much.

I'm really hoping that Skyward Sword is Nintendo's attempt at taking out all the shitty parts of WW and TP and making the greatest thing ever.

As for Halo....I'm a latecomer to Halo and came in at Halo 3, and I love the multiplayer. I like the balance of having two weapons at a time, I like the speed of the characters, and I like the "dance" that occurs in combat (grenades, meleeing, shooting). CoD just winds up frustrating me half the time because you die so quickly (even if killing a lot of enemies at once is very gratifying). I guess I prefer the more intimate nature of Halo games (with even one on one battles becoming slightly longer and epic).

I liked the first Halo. I liked the slower strategic pacing of the shootouts and the wonderful physics engine that allowed unpredictability to reign for years after it's release. They lost me in the sequels with all the dual wielding and regenative health garbage.

And yeah, CoD blows. Way too unbalanced. I can't wait for when the franchise is dead in five years.

I also agree with the OP on GoW. Yuck.

Shenmue - Excruciatingly clunky controls and a slower than a sloth pace. Ugh. I first played it about 10 years back with a lot of hype for it. Couldn't stand it. Then when I bought my Dreamcast recently I bought it as well just to see if there was something I missed. Nope. If it wasn't for Space Harrier being in it, I wouldn't find it fun at all.

Grand Theft Auto - It always shocks me that such a franchise that started out so mediocre could become the big franchise it is. I'm pretty much with TriforceBun on this.

Elder Scrolls - BORING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!