As a new member, I was wondering if you guys can think of any games that have been overrated in the press or by people in general. I, for one, can sum up a short list:
1) Half-Life: I was bored with it back then, and I still am when I start it up now. I mean, what does it have that System Shock or Quake didn't have? It looks pretty awful too, even with the new Source engine. I really don't get that many people call this one of the best games ever. To earn such a title it would have to be so good I couldn't stop playing it even 10 years later. The only games I know of that have this with me, are Diablo 2 Lod, STarcraft BW, Gothic 2 and the Baldur's Gate series.
2) Sacrifice and Citizen's Giant: Kabuto (or sth): two different genre games with sort of the same look, from the same gaming era. They were praised in the media but sold pretty poorly. I thought they were absolute crap, I agree with everyone who didn't buy them, and strongly disagree with the suspiciously high number of positive reviews on them.
3) platform games like Metroid, Cave Story, etc.
Some of these like the Mario or Sonic games were fun.. IN 1989! I reallyy don't see how a 2D side-scroller with frustrating gameplay elements can be fun in 2011.

Any comments or similar lists?

Daikatana.

Halo.

The end.

WoW.
Let's face it. If it wasn't a mmo it would stink. You put up with things in a mmo that would have made you not touch it with a ten foot pole if it was single or multiplayer.

Bioshock.

I know I'll get flak for that but while it wasn't necessarily a bad game it wasn't anything special or, well, good in my book. Totally personal opinion.

totaly agree

I won't bother talking about the obvious ones like Halo. There's no point.

So let's talk about Half-Life instead. I can respect its influence and what it accomplished, but it's goddamn boring. I had to force myself to finish it, and I only liked it less as it wore on and on. The last level, in particular, is one of the most atrocious failures of level design I've ever seen.

I played the game when it first came out, so it's not as if I'm missing the historical context. I just hated it.

I actually like Shadow of the Colossus. It's a good game - not a great one - with inventive boss fights and an enjoyable understated story. It is not some sort of silver bullet to slay all doubt of the artistic merit of video games. I liked Ico better, both as a game and as an emotional experience.

I can make similar comments about Braid. The game is intelligently designed and reasonably enjoyable, but the only emotional reaction it got out of me was sardonic amusement. The game is so utterly pretentious that I actually laughed out loud at parts of the story. Much of it reads like an emo teenager's diary.

The pretentiousness of Braid got to me too. When I first heard about its gameplay I was thrilled, but the storyline was a deal breaker.

Considered your forced to have teammates who act like morons, don't listen to your instructions and get crushed by screen doors (so can you for that matter), that's a huge detriment that takes away most of the fun. I've played it back when it came out and last year and to me it gets worse everytime you play it. I thought it was an 8/10 when I first played it, but it's now a 5.5/10 as I get exposed to more and more flaws (probably due to the fact I used GOD mode the first time around which hides flaws) Multiplayer was/is fun though.

Daikatana was never overrated. Just overhyped. It was blasted by critics for the most part.

Daikatana - the game that introduced us to Stevie Case and her rack, but not much else. I do still own the disc though when I give it another chance every few years.

I would probably say Braid as well because I don't see anything in it at all. It's just a kind of fun puzzle platformer with some time travel quirks. I love platformers but I found impossible to like and wasn't engaged by it anyway.

Other than that? Goldeneye (n64), Ocarina of Time and Final Fantasy 7. All for the same reason, the games have aged pretty terribly. They are not good games by today's standards. Outdated controls, design and dull, uninteresting plots. Sure, we need to acknowledge the fact that these games were revolutionary and somewhat innovative at the time but that merit in itself doesn't mean that they are still fun experiences. Pong may have been one the first video games but that does not make it any more fun for me.

I don't know though really, I seem to feel that way about almost any shooter I play on a console. They feel so much older and outdated than most things released on the PC in the same year.

- Mass Effect.
- FFVII.
- StarCraft.
- CoDs.
- BioShock.
And from some older stuff, The Settlers 2.

I've not played many Final Fantasy games but I'm pretty sure that the gap of quality between the nearly flawless Final Fantasy Tactics and Final Fantasy VII is pretty huge.

I wouldn't know, i only had VII, the only thing left is the cardboard box. Arguably the best thing about that movi... game.

I meant that I couldn't image Final Fantasy VII being one of the best as it isn't on the same tier as Tactics (which I would so recommend, I'm not a big Final Fantasy fan at all but that's one of my favourite games). It was more directed at GameRager really.

Probably Greece. Boy was I annoyed when I got to the gate to use the symbols only to be one piece short though. Never told me I was missing a piece so I had no idea where it could be.

I did use save anywhere to help minimize it but it didn't stop superfly from walking right over the edge of a narrow walkway when I wasn't looking and into the nitro glycerin in the cryo lab (ep1). The weird part is that he was fine down there instead of dying. I took the plunge desperate to try and find him with God mode and he was just walking around down there like it was no big deal. Had to restart obviously. Also trying to get them all into an elevator and through a garage door before it closed was harder than it should have been. Or there was the boss section at the end of the first episode where superfly refused to listen to me and always walk into the electrified field, Finally, he luckily stood in a safe section and stayed there for once.

I see where it has potential, but it just shoots itself in the foot a lot. Believe me, I was very tolerant and gave this game several chances. I want to like it. I do like parts of it. Hell it'll probably get installed again at some point. But the 5.5/10 stands. That rating could be worse you know.