Robio's Definitive List of Good Games That Don't Merit Discussion
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#1. Sküljagger: Revolt of the Westicans
It's all-out war as you fight savage Kiltish troops, battle wild Westican bladebacks, explore the ancient Lost City of Urnum, and bring the merciless Captain Skuljagger to his knees.
The 90s were not a kind time for pirates. We didn't like them back then. Remember that Gina Davis movie Cutthroat Island? That wasn't bad, but when you look at the reviews you'd think they recorded themselves wiping their butt with pages from the Bible and then debuted in omaha. Even aside from movies, there weren't any pirate TV shows. The brilliant cartoon Pirates of Dark Water got canceled after one and a half seasons. And even in literature, the only Pirates you saw were basically Fabio on the covers of romance novels. The one refuge for pirate fans was video games. We had Monkey Island and that was great. And then we had Skuljagger, that was basically okay.
Skuljagger was a fairly interesting game in that they created a pretty standard platformer with a pirate theme. The controls weren't anything special, but it was a really good looking game. The backgrounds in particular were very impressive. And really that should have been enough, but for reasons not really clear to anyone, the action still needed a gimmick. Collecting gems wasn't enough. So what do you do to make your pirate game really special? Bubble gum.
Despite making Roddy Piper proud, bubblegum was an odd choice. The story is basically you play a guy who's trying to overthrow an evil pirate had enslaved your people. And the swords just not enough for that. You need the power of bubblegum to help you float and become indestructible. Seriously, as much as I tried I could never really understand it. Perhaps there was a clue in the guide book that came along with the game. Of course, I didn't really want to read all 80 pages of it.
Yep, the most notable thing about Skuljagger is that it came with an 80 page manual, 70 pages of which were the background story. They literally threw in a novel with some illustrations in the box with the game. I'm not sure if that was to get more kids to read, but in an age where instruction manuals are dead and gone, I think this is worthy of some praise.
And at the end of the day if you can't have a legacy based on quality... You can never go wrong with offering quantity. So thank you Sküljagger. You might not have been the best game, but you definitely provided someone with bathroom reading. And that counts for something.
It's all-out war as you fight savage Kiltish troops, battle wild Westican bladebacks, explore the ancient Lost City of Urnum, and bring the merciless Captain Skuljagger to his knees.The 90s were not a kind time for pirates. We didn't like them back then. Remember that Gina Davis movie Cutthroat Island? That wasn't bad, but when you look at the reviews you'd think they recorded themselves wiping their butt with pages from the Bible and then debuted in omaha. Even aside from movies, there weren't any pirate TV shows. The brilliant cartoon Pirates of Dark Water got canceled after one and a half seasons. And even in literature, the only Pirates you saw were basically Fabio on the covers of romance novels. The one refuge for pirate fans was video games. We had Monkey Island and that was great. And then we had Skuljagger, that was basically okay.
Skuljagger was a fairly interesting game in that they created a pretty standard platformer with a pirate theme. The controls weren't anything special, but it was a really good looking game. The backgrounds in particular were very impressive. And really that should have been enough, but for reasons not really clear to anyone, the action still needed a gimmick. Collecting gems wasn't enough. So what do you do to make your pirate game really special? Bubble gum.
Despite making Roddy Piper proud, bubblegum was an odd choice. The story is basically you play a guy who's trying to overthrow an evil pirate had enslaved your people. And the swords just not enough for that. You need the power of bubblegum to help you float and become indestructible. Seriously, as much as I tried I could never really understand it. Perhaps there was a clue in the guide book that came along with the game. Of course, I didn't really want to read all 80 pages of it.
Yep, the most notable thing about Skuljagger is that it came with an 80 page manual, 70 pages of which were the background story. They literally threw in a novel with some illustrations in the box with the game. I'm not sure if that was to get more kids to read, but in an age where instruction manuals are dead and gone, I think this is worthy of some praise.
And at the end of the day if you can't have a legacy based on quality... You can never go wrong with offering quantity. So thank you Sküljagger. You might not have been the best game, but you definitely provided someone with bathroom reading. And that counts for something.
Edited: Thu, 26 May 2022 02:59:19
#2. Anarchy Reigns
Set in the post-apocalyptic future, this is an over-the-top close combat fighting game, set in a massively open and fantastical world. Pick from an imaginative mix of human and cyborg characters and set out on a multiplayer challenge where anarchy reigns.
With a diverse range of multiplayer modes on offer, ANARCHY REIGNS pits players against each other in team co-op or last man standing battles.
Anarchy Reigns was Platinum Games attempt to bring back Jack Cayman, their main character from MadWorld. To avoid repeating the lack of success that MadWorld had, they happen to try a different approach. This time they were going to create a 3D brawler, a genre that I'm not sure anyone has had much success with. And even releasing at a budget price, they just couldn't get any interest in it. Part of that is deserved, because the single player is pretty awful. However, the multiplayer is actually pretty damn good. Sadly, you can't have a good multiplayer game without an audience.
In a post-Fortnite world, free-to-play battle royale games are pretty much a genre, and that's sort of what Platinum created. The multiplayer component is effectively a giant stage, with players selecting almost 20 different Fighters with random events occurring on the giant stage, ranging from missile attacks to a black hole opening up. You can play teams, you can go solo. If you check this game out you can easily see how it could have been changed to accommodate the modern Battle Royal world, and had that occurred this could have been a success.
The problem was the perceived "meat of the game"...the single-player mode. It was more or less crap every way you look at it. The story is terrible. You see the description at the top of this page? That's taken directly from Sega's promotional page and the box art. They knew mentioning the story would only make things worse (something about cyborgs and dead Japanese little girls). And as I mentioned before, the game was a 3D brawler, a genre that nobody seems to have gotten right or is it even interested in.
The ultimate takeaway is that less is probably more, though in 2012 releasing a game without a single player mode would have been suicide. Too bad. Because unfortunately that anchored down the multiplayer mode to be lost in obscurity. But hey we got Fortnight so....that's something...right?
Set in the post-apocalyptic future, this is an over-the-top close combat fighting game, set in a massively open and fantastical world. Pick from an imaginative mix of human and cyborg characters and set out on a multiplayer challenge where anarchy reigns.
With a diverse range of multiplayer modes on offer, ANARCHY REIGNS pits players against each other in team co-op or last man standing battles.
Anarchy Reigns was Platinum Games attempt to bring back Jack Cayman, their main character from MadWorld. To avoid repeating the lack of success that MadWorld had, they happen to try a different approach. This time they were going to create a 3D brawler, a genre that I'm not sure anyone has had much success with. And even releasing at a budget price, they just couldn't get any interest in it. Part of that is deserved, because the single player is pretty awful. However, the multiplayer is actually pretty damn good. Sadly, you can't have a good multiplayer game without an audience.
In a post-Fortnite world, free-to-play battle royale games are pretty much a genre, and that's sort of what Platinum created. The multiplayer component is effectively a giant stage, with players selecting almost 20 different Fighters with random events occurring on the giant stage, ranging from missile attacks to a black hole opening up. You can play teams, you can go solo. If you check this game out you can easily see how it could have been changed to accommodate the modern Battle Royal world, and had that occurred this could have been a success.
The problem was the perceived "meat of the game"...the single-player mode. It was more or less crap every way you look at it. The story is terrible. You see the description at the top of this page? That's taken directly from Sega's promotional page and the box art. They knew mentioning the story would only make things worse (something about cyborgs and dead Japanese little girls). And as I mentioned before, the game was a 3D brawler, a genre that nobody seems to have gotten right or is it even interested in.
The ultimate takeaway is that less is probably more, though in 2012 releasing a game without a single player mode would have been suicide. Too bad. Because unfortunately that anchored down the multiplayer mode to be lost in obscurity. But hey we got Fortnight so....that's something...right?
Edited: Fri, 27 May 2022 12:44:46
#3. Deadly Creatures
Featuring a wide array of cinematic effects, action packed life-or-death battles, and graphics that will make your skin crawl, Deadly Creatures for Wii exposes you to the brutal realities of life in the desert. And you better be ready to defend yourself because you're about to take on this vast, dangerous world from the perspective of two deadly critters with a history of giving even the most stalwart people the creeps: the scorpion and the tarantula.
Deadly Creatures is a game with an interesting concept: play a game as a scorpion and tarantula that are just trying to survive in the desert. No guns, no magic, no story about saving the world. Just two arachnids trying to get by.
Since these are not anthropomorphized critters, there isn't much in the way of inner monologue or conversation here. However, the developers make them witnesses to a human story. While you go about trying to fight off other creatures, two thieves are digging up civil war gold in the background and often as your path lines closer to them you will hear them talk about what they're doing. Ultimately their story intertwines with the lives of the scorpion and tarantula.
How good the game is ultimately comes down to how long the player stays vested in the concept. A lot of the action does get repetitive. And because motion control features very heavily into the game, sometimes shit just doesn't work. Oh and if you're a purist when it comes to tarantula biology, the game will probably piss you off because a lot of her power-ups are web-based. I'll go ahead and let you figure out why that's a bad thing. But if you're curious enough to know how the story of the two thieves, George and Wade, turn out you might just be able to power through to the end.
Whether or not you actually enjoy the game, you have to give THQ credit for being fully committed. The graphics, when not in motion, are very impressive for the Wii. And they brought in top talent for the voice actors for the thieves, Billy Bob Thornton and Dennis Hopper. The game had a very niche premise, but they opened their wallets fully supported every aspect of development here.
...of course decisions like that may very well be why THQ is no longer in business.
Featuring a wide array of cinematic effects, action packed life-or-death battles, and graphics that will make your skin crawl, Deadly Creatures for Wii exposes you to the brutal realities of life in the desert. And you better be ready to defend yourself because you're about to take on this vast, dangerous world from the perspective of two deadly critters with a history of giving even the most stalwart people the creeps: the scorpion and the tarantula.Deadly Creatures is a game with an interesting concept: play a game as a scorpion and tarantula that are just trying to survive in the desert. No guns, no magic, no story about saving the world. Just two arachnids trying to get by.
Since these are not anthropomorphized critters, there isn't much in the way of inner monologue or conversation here. However, the developers make them witnesses to a human story. While you go about trying to fight off other creatures, two thieves are digging up civil war gold in the background and often as your path lines closer to them you will hear them talk about what they're doing. Ultimately their story intertwines with the lives of the scorpion and tarantula.
How good the game is ultimately comes down to how long the player stays vested in the concept. A lot of the action does get repetitive. And because motion control features very heavily into the game, sometimes shit just doesn't work. Oh and if you're a purist when it comes to tarantula biology, the game will probably piss you off because a lot of her power-ups are web-based. I'll go ahead and let you figure out why that's a bad thing. But if you're curious enough to know how the story of the two thieves, George and Wade, turn out you might just be able to power through to the end.
Whether or not you actually enjoy the game, you have to give THQ credit for being fully committed. The graphics, when not in motion, are very impressive for the Wii. And they brought in top talent for the voice actors for the thieves, Billy Bob Thornton and Dennis Hopper. The game had a very niche premise, but they opened their wallets fully supported every aspect of development here.
...of course decisions like that may very well be why THQ is no longer in business.
Edited: Mon, 30 May 2022 13:42:42
All these seem to be “excellent” choices for this thread.
Yeah, there's really no shortage of good candidates for this list. The real challenge is trying to remember games that are in no way memorable.
I think if ever there is a game that merits discussion, it's Deadly Creatures. That this is the only game of your list so far that I've played makes me suspicious that the other games also merit discussion... 
Please feel free to discuss Deadly Creatures all you want. Just don't bring anyone else into it.
We're about the have a discussion?
I just want to come out and say that I am diametrically opposed to whatever point was being made prior to this post. I can not and will not have it.
This is gonna be hard to remember.
Er, Operation Winback?
Hybrid Heaven?
Er, Operation Winback?
Hybrid Heaven?
This blog reminded me of Mace Griffin: Bounty Hunter. It's was decently fun but totally forgettable FPS. I had to look at a list of original Xbox FPS games to find the name.
gamingeek said:This is gonna be hard to remember.
Er, Operation Winback?
Hybrid Heaven?
Yep, both of those. They did what they did well, yet forgettable.
What was the name of that GC and Xbox squad based game by IO interactive?
You assaulted an island off new York at the end.
You assaulted an island off new York at the end.
#4. Nostalgia
Set in the 19th century — “The Age of Adventure” — Nostalgia immerses gamers into a world filled with treacherous airship battles, elusive treasure hunts, and action-packed dungeon combat. Prepare to visit popular cities such as Tokyo, London, New York and Cairo as you embark on a quest in search of a world yet unknown...
Nostalgia is probably the game that most inspired this list. The game was made by developers who worked on the DS versions of Final Fantasy 3 and Final Fantasy 4. After they were done helping Square-Enix, clearly they felt they had learned everything they needed to in order to create their own jrpg. And in truth they probably did because Nostalgia is possibly the safest and most by-the-books jrpg ever created.
Do you want turn-based battles? You got them. Do you want a quest to find your missing father that spirals into a story with greater stakes? It's here. Do you want to explore dungeons with a variety of themes such as sewers, deserts, and jungles? Well then Nostalgia has what you're looking for.
The game unquestionably was meant to be a throwback to old school jrpgs. Even the name "Nostalgia" is a pretty unsubtle reminder of that. The main issue I think anyone would have with it, is that it didn't really need to exist. The DS was crawling with old school rpgs. So it ended up being a throwback to games that were released just a few months prior, as opposed to years earlier. It's definitely a great example of the old saying, "how can I miss you if you're never gone?"
All that said, the game does a good job of what it sets out to do. And to their credit, the developers even tried to add a couple novel ideas. They included airship battles which were kind of neat, although they were ultimately just a different take on the typical turn-based jrpg battle. And the alternative 19th century/steampunk setting things, though it would have been nicer if it were on a system that could handle 3D graphics instead of the DS.
Set in the 19th century — “The Age of Adventure” — Nostalgia immerses gamers into a world filled with treacherous airship battles, elusive treasure hunts, and action-packed dungeon combat. Prepare to visit popular cities such as Tokyo, London, New York and Cairo as you embark on a quest in search of a world yet unknown...
Nostalgia is probably the game that most inspired this list. The game was made by developers who worked on the DS versions of Final Fantasy 3 and Final Fantasy 4. After they were done helping Square-Enix, clearly they felt they had learned everything they needed to in order to create their own jrpg. And in truth they probably did because Nostalgia is possibly the safest and most by-the-books jrpg ever created.
Do you want turn-based battles? You got them. Do you want a quest to find your missing father that spirals into a story with greater stakes? It's here. Do you want to explore dungeons with a variety of themes such as sewers, deserts, and jungles? Well then Nostalgia has what you're looking for.
The game unquestionably was meant to be a throwback to old school jrpgs. Even the name "Nostalgia" is a pretty unsubtle reminder of that. The main issue I think anyone would have with it, is that it didn't really need to exist. The DS was crawling with old school rpgs. So it ended up being a throwback to games that were released just a few months prior, as opposed to years earlier. It's definitely a great example of the old saying, "how can I miss you if you're never gone?"
All that said, the game does a good job of what it sets out to do. And to their credit, the developers even tried to add a couple novel ideas. They included airship battles which were kind of neat, although they were ultimately just a different take on the typical turn-based jrpg battle. And the alternative 19th century/steampunk setting things, though it would have been nicer if it were on a system that could handle 3D graphics instead of the DS.
gamingeek said:What was the name of that GC and Xbox squad based game by IO interactive?
You assaulted an island off new York at the end.
Freedom Fighters.
gamingeek said:This is gonna be hard to remember.
Er, Operation Winback?
Hybrid Heaven?
I didn't play very much of Hybrid Heaven, so I just don't have enough of a frame of reference to right about it. But it did fall into that group of games that were always trying to incorporate just didn't really need them. And I've got two that are potentially going to make the list.
Although, one of them tends to be listed as a forgotten classic, pretty much because people incorrectly remember that steaming pile of crap as a good game.
#5. Sonic Spinball
Dr. Eggman (AKA Dr. Robotnik) is once again turning the animals of Mobius into robots using his monstrous contraption, the Veg-O-Fortress. Only Sonic can penetrate the Pinball Defense System to free the animals, retrieve the Chaos Emeralds, and put a stop to Dr. Eggman’s fiendish plans!
Sonic Spinball is quite literally a "filler" game. Sonic 3 wasn't going to be ready for the holiday season, and Sega needed something with the Sonic name on it for Sega kids to ask Santa for. The game exists because of a foreseen delay and good communication at Sega.
The idea certainly wasn't terrible and neither was the execution. But the fact is, even the very best console pinball games are rarely great. The Zen Pinball titles are mixed bag, but they certainly put out some good ones over the years. And if you want to go back to older games, Alien Crush is a notable exception that's worth checking out. But in an era without rumble/feedback pinball games couldn't emulate the experience, so they had to try bold or innovative ideas. And Sonic Spinball just didn't quite pull it off.
Collecting gems was kind of neat. However, none of the other ideas it brought to the table felt particularly interesting or novel. It was a very safe pinball game. Plus it's also very clunky. It doesn't quite have the smoothness that you'd expect from either a good pinball game or even a good Sonic game for that matter.
Gameplay aside, it actually does do a pretty good job of feeling like a Sonic game, so in that regards, the game is a success. And I suppose for Sonic fans of the time, they probably really enjoyed it. But Sega only returned to the concept one more time for the GBA, so it's a safe bet even they probably felt they had done as much as they could with the idea.
Dr. Eggman (AKA Dr. Robotnik) is once again turning the animals of Mobius into robots using his monstrous contraption, the Veg-O-Fortress. Only Sonic can penetrate the Pinball Defense System to free the animals, retrieve the Chaos Emeralds, and put a stop to Dr. Eggman’s fiendish plans!
Sonic Spinball is quite literally a "filler" game. Sonic 3 wasn't going to be ready for the holiday season, and Sega needed something with the Sonic name on it for Sega kids to ask Santa for. The game exists because of a foreseen delay and good communication at Sega.
The idea certainly wasn't terrible and neither was the execution. But the fact is, even the very best console pinball games are rarely great. The Zen Pinball titles are mixed bag, but they certainly put out some good ones over the years. And if you want to go back to older games, Alien Crush is a notable exception that's worth checking out. But in an era without rumble/feedback pinball games couldn't emulate the experience, so they had to try bold or innovative ideas. And Sonic Spinball just didn't quite pull it off.
Collecting gems was kind of neat. However, none of the other ideas it brought to the table felt particularly interesting or novel. It was a very safe pinball game. Plus it's also very clunky. It doesn't quite have the smoothness that you'd expect from either a good pinball game or even a good Sonic game for that matter.
Gameplay aside, it actually does do a pretty good job of feeling like a Sonic game, so in that regards, the game is a success. And I suppose for Sonic fans of the time, they probably really enjoyed it. But Sega only returned to the concept one more time for the GBA, so it's a safe bet even they probably felt they had done as much as they could with the idea.
Great thread. May I suggest Dark Sector, started off as the first screen shot of a "next gen" game and ended up as a decent RE4 style game that came out and disappeared.
Dvader said:Great thread. May I suggest Dark Sector, started off as the first screen shot of a "next gen" game and ended up as a decent RE4 style game that came out and disappeared.
huh, I never heard of that game until now. Or I've completely forgotten about it.
#6. Shadows of the Damned
His name is Garcia Hotspur, hunter of demons, and his wrath will bring hell to its knees. From the creative genius of Suda 51 (No More Heroes) and Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil) comes an all-new psychologically twisted vision of hell unlike anything seen before. Shadows of the Damned combines visceral grindhouse-style action with dark, grotesque horror to create a mind-shattering adventure that has to been seen to be believed.
Hard to believe that a game made by Suda 51 and Mikami could be boring, but the result of their union, Shadows of the Damned, proved it could happen. There are a lot of cool elements and great ideas in the game. But for one reason or another the game was less than the sum of its parts.
The main character Garcia and his talking phallic gun (subtly named Johnson) are quite amusing, though after a while the crude one-liners kind of make him feel like Mexican Duke Nukem. The action is mostly good too. Mikami leaned on the RE4 controls. There wasn't anything real innovative with the combat, but when you're working with a set-up that good I guess why stray from it?
Maybe the thing that made Shadows of the Damned just "okay" is that everything felt too familiar. Very little felt new. And even if something did feel new, it wouldn't by the end. It's not a very long game, and by the half way mark the game starts to recycle everything and it makes for a very repetitive experience.
Both men ultimately went on to make better games. Suda's Lollipop Chainsaw would come out a year later and that feels like another attempt at the vibe that Shadows throws out, but is much more successful. And a few years Mikami gave us The Evil Within, and while not perfect, provides us with a concept that made for one of the best batshit crazy horror games of all time. Just a pity that when they intersected they couldn't do something just a bit better.
His name is Garcia Hotspur, hunter of demons, and his wrath will bring hell to its knees. From the creative genius of Suda 51 (No More Heroes) and Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil) comes an all-new psychologically twisted vision of hell unlike anything seen before. Shadows of the Damned combines visceral grindhouse-style action with dark, grotesque horror to create a mind-shattering adventure that has to been seen to be believed.
Hard to believe that a game made by Suda 51 and Mikami could be boring, but the result of their union, Shadows of the Damned, proved it could happen. There are a lot of cool elements and great ideas in the game. But for one reason or another the game was less than the sum of its parts.
The main character Garcia and his talking phallic gun (subtly named Johnson) are quite amusing, though after a while the crude one-liners kind of make him feel like Mexican Duke Nukem. The action is mostly good too. Mikami leaned on the RE4 controls. There wasn't anything real innovative with the combat, but when you're working with a set-up that good I guess why stray from it?
Maybe the thing that made Shadows of the Damned just "okay" is that everything felt too familiar. Very little felt new. And even if something did feel new, it wouldn't by the end. It's not a very long game, and by the half way mark the game starts to recycle everything and it makes for a very repetitive experience.
Both men ultimately went on to make better games. Suda's Lollipop Chainsaw would come out a year later and that feels like another attempt at the vibe that Shadows throws out, but is much more successful. And a few years Mikami gave us The Evil Within, and while not perfect, provides us with a concept that made for one of the best batshit crazy horror games of all time. Just a pity that when they intersected they couldn't do something just a bit better.
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*crickets*
For example, one of the movies discussed is Ronin (199
Film isn't the only medium to have such a level of product. God knows there are plenty of games that were good enough to play, but not good enough to ever play again or to even discusst. And starting with this blog I'm going to pay tribute to those games.