Games You Love That You Thought Would Be Even Better

[gunswordfist]

Self-explanatory. My list are games that I don't consider disappointments at all but:

Castlevania Symphony Of The Night- Playing the demo on XBLA was my first exposure to the game. Man did that set my imagination on fire. I used to try and get as far as possible within the 15 minute time limit. The castle was so mesmerizing to me. I used to play the demo so much that my brother decided to just buy the damn game for me for one of my birthday. I guess that sense of mystery of trying to find out as much possible about what was behind those castle walls set my expectations through the roof. I know this makes no sense at all but I have yet to play a game as good as I thought SOTN. And that's saying a lot since it's my 2nd favorite Metroidvania, one of my favorite games period and my only complain is that there's no extra difficulties.

Devil May Cry 3- The trailer singlehandedly restored my faith in the series. Of course DMC3 is my 4th favorite game but it's another game that I thought would be better than anything I've ever played. It's unexplanable what I expected it to be.

[Foggle]

Borderlands - The released game is a solid 9/10 from me (and the DLC is even better), but the promises made before release and gameplay previews made it seem like it'd be damn near perfect.

Sonic Generations - To be fair, I knew the entire stage list before it came out, but it would have been ten times better had they nixed the challenges entirely in favor of more levels.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Yeah, I have to admit, while I love Sonic Generations, I'm not a fan of the challenges. Most of them focus on things that deviate from what actually makes Sonic fun to play, and I'm really only doing them for the sake of completion. I really have no motivation to get better in them, either, as they are just plain boring to play through. I still think that the game is great thanks to its extremely well-crafted, re-imagined levels from previous games, but I'd rather have more zones and no challenges at all. Even so, while there are only 9 zones to play through and 2 acts for each, I do feel that the game makes up for it by giving each and every act tons of replay value on their own, just in terms of trying to discover all of the alternate paths and trying to net yourself the best speed-runs possible.

Some other games that I like but expected to be better:

Batman: Arkham Asylum- Its a good game, but after all of the hype that it got, I found that the game doesn't really do any one single element excessively well, and its a bit repetitive when it mainly just boils down to switching between action segments and stealth segments. The story is also kind of bland by Batman standards, but its OK for an action game, I suppose. I still like the game, but I can't help but feel that it got a little bit overrated as it didn't turn out to be as great as I thought it would after all of the praise that I heard it get.

Ninja Gaiden II- Its no secret that I like this game, but I must admit that I was initially quite disappointed in it. I was expecting something that would totally deliver on everything great that Ninja Gaiden Black did, and while I got that in the improved combat system, I felt that NG2 took a step back in just about everything else. The levels were more linear and there wasn't any room for open exploration anymore. The enemy AI wasn't quite as strong since it was more about having a large quantity of enemies rather than having fewer but tougher enemies that blocked and attacked you more. The boss fights were the biggest disappointment, as many of them were nonsensical and had hard to read patterns, and for the most part a lot of them were just plain not fun to play through in contrast to the first game. Overall, I still think that its a great game, but I expected so much more from it.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Pokemon - This isn't really a game or something I love (yet it easily could be), but I thought those Rumble games would have been better had they made them into actual beat em ups with different abilities and stats and some platforming. As they are they're too mindless.

Legend Of Zelda: Wind Waker - Remove the Triforce Hunt and add in more dungeons.

Sonic Generations - Challenge Mode. This needs to be in every Sonic game from now until the end of time.

Every Sonic game since '06 - Put the freaking spindash back in. I sorely missed this in Colors especially. They even took this out of Colors DS and Generations 3DS and they're 2D... WHY?

Wario Land 4 - It needs at least one more world, the game feels slightly too short every time I play through it.

Mario Kart Double Dash - Make the game a bit faster, put in some retro courses, and replace the awful Blue Shell with the MK64 Blue Shell. That's all I would change.

Streets Or Rage 3 - I would leave the story alone and make Koshiro redo the soundtrack.

Mega Man 10 - Put this back in the oven and not release it for another year after extensive reworking.

New Super Mario Bros Wii - Include the multiplayer modes from the inferior DS game.

Klonoa Wii - Should have included a remade Klonoa 2 in the package to double the length and it would have most likely done way better.

Sonic CD - Some kind of indicator to where the machines in the past are would be excellent.

Contra Shattered Soldier - More than 6 levels should have been put in and you shouldn't need to unlock the last two by being good at the game. That's just being cheap in adding replay value.

Mega Man X3 - Remove the whole mech and chip thing. It overcomplicates the game, especially when they're not needed for anything except 100% and some hidden ?(and awesome) upgrades that makes the irrelevant anyway. Also, tone down the bosses. They hit too hard

Every Fire Emblem game in creation - A freaking RESTART MAP option.

Every 2D action Castlevania (except ReBirth and 4 which are perfect) - Give me proper jumping. I don't care if it makes them "easy" or not, it makes them fun and that's what matters.

[gunswordfist]

Streets Or Rage 3 - I would leave the story alone and make Koshiro redo the soundtrack.

Fuck that. Keep Bare Knuckle 3's story minus Mr. X pulling a World's Strongest with his brain and all the robots (including Dr. Zan) Well except Axel/Break, who is the only good robot enemy in the entire series.

[talonmalon333]

I decided to bump this cause I think it's a good topic, and I haven't posted in it yet.

Having said that, I have to say that I'm not one who usually has expectations when going into games. So rather than listing games I thought would be better, I'll list games that I think certainly had the potential to be more than what they were.


Resident Evil 5
I pick this game first because I think that, if anything, would be the one that I might've expected the most out of. And understandably so, you gotta admit. RE4 is a fine game that has aged gracefully. And I'll admit that I got a little high off this game immediately after its release, which was really a result of waiting half a decade to play it. But in the end, the level design just isn't up to par. And there's so much story that I just don't care one bit about in this game. Admittedly though, Wesker was seriously badass in this game, and was possibly better than ever. But there's a problem when the only really memorable parts of the game are cutscenes and QTEs involving Wesker, putting aside the multiplayer which was admittedly fun and truly what saved RE5.


Soul Calibur III
I'll be honest, I totally forgot about this series until this thread, when I decided to include it. It's this game that I blame for that. It just feels like a broken mess. I mean, I know there are some people that will argue the series began to lose its balance with SCII, but that game was far more polished than this. It's SCIII that caused me to begin to detach from the series. I bought SCIV, but I only played it a bit, messed around with the ability to create fighters, and then put it aside. It was an improvement for sure, but still not enough to reach the level of II... I haven't touched SCV, in fact I just had to check Wikipedia to make sure it's even out yet.


Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1
I haven't played part 2 yet, so this will only refer to the first half. Even still, everyone here knows the problems with it, so I'll be brief. If the developers made a better physics system that didn't make the controls feel so delayed, and if it didn't feel like such a lazy rehash, things would've been a lot nicer. As it is, 4: Episode 1 is an adequate experience, but nothing more, and I think many of you wouldn't even say that much. And while I really can't say much or argue the point, I hear that Episode 2 wasn't much better.


The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
I'd like to clear up a massive misconception. SS did not take 5 years to make. Sure, we had to wait that long, but development time was far shorter for varying reasons, mainly that they couldn't get a director, nor could they decide on some ideas (and honestly, I think they were stalling for a while). In fact, evidence points to development starting in late 2009, meaning they made the game in less than 2 years. That excuses many things that seem like lazy design choices (lack of enemy variety, bland title screen, disconnected overworld, fetchquest overload, etc.)... but, yeah, the fact is that they had 5 years, and if they used that time well, this could've been much better. And I know you guys loved MC, but I really don't think he was up to the task of directing a project like this.

[Spark Of Spirit]

To clear it up, episode II is MUCH better than episode I- what the first episode should have been... but its still not a proper Sonic 4.

If they would have called it Sonic Retro Adventure or something, it would have been received MUCH better.

[Eddy]

Alan Wake
Something about this game never quite clicked with me. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it, but it was lacking something. The ending was also a let down. I think I mostly blame that this game out not long after Deadly Premonition, another survival horror game with some Twin Peaks influences (albeit a lot more), and I didn't enjoy Alan Wake nearly as much as I enjoyed Deadly Premonition.

No More Heroes 2
Gameplay is improved over the first one and it's still a lot of fun but the characters aren't nearly as memorable as they were in the first NMH. I can only remember a handful of the bosses. That's why, between the two, I have to go with the first No More Heroes.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I almost wish Remedy and Swery would work on an open world survival horror together. Each thing one does bad, the other flawlessly executes.

[Rynnec]

Soul Calibur V - Easilly the best SC since II, but not quite as good (if that makes any sense). The combat is fast and fluid, and customization is the most solid it's ever been (hairstyle options and conflicting equipment aside). Had Namco not rushed this game out for EVO (and added in Zasalamel and Talim's style's, as well as the style's of past guest-fighters), it would have easilly surpassed II. Instead, it's hampered down by a lackluster story mode, lack of single-player conent (read: Weapon Master) lack of in-game character bios, tag-battle, and weapon-effects, no individual endings for Arcade mode (or hell, any ending at all), a very lackluster Arcade mode boss (you just fight Nightmare and that's it. No Elysium, no Inferno, no Night Terror, just Nightmare). Also, Patrokolus is a douche.