Mea Culpa: When Have You Been Wrong?
I'll admit it: at first I thought Batman: Arkham Asylum was going to be awful. The videos weren't doing it for me, and the preview press seemed like the typical smoke and mirrors that developers put up to obscure an average to mediocre game. The first reviews didn't do anything to change my mind, and even the demo felt a little underwhelming, although it did help me see what they were going for a little better. I mean, I'd love to stay completely objective until a game is in my hands, but realistically that's almost impossible, and for some reason Batman was rubbing me the wrong way. Still, the relentlessly positive word of mouth, a decent deal, and a jones for action/adventure helped me push aside the skepticism and pick it up last week.
I haven't finished it yet, and this isn't a review, but I can say whatever I thought about the game before I got it in my hands was just pigheaded and shortsighted. I'm not going to declare it game of the year right now, but I'm not taking it out of the running either. It probably won't appeal to everyone, and I still think Batman looks kind of doofy when he's just standing around in his cowl, but the game has exceeded nearly all of my expectations and reminded me that my instincts and cynicism aren't always on the mark. Sometimes hype isn't just hot air.
We can probably name loads of games that didn't live up to the image we'd built in our minds, but I'd like to know about the opposite. When have you assumed a game would be garbage only to end up loving it? Maybe you thought Gears of War looked like testosterone-fueled junk only to get roped into the co-op. Or perhaps you assumed Pokemon was just for kids until you just had to catch them all. Have you ever had to (gladly) swallow your gaming pride and admit that you were wrong?
Dawdle
Posted to Miscellany, Video Games on 30 August 2009
· Comments (11)
Other stuff like this: batman: arkham asylum, eidos, hype, question, rocksteady, wrong
FFX - Despite still disliking the main characters, it proved to be a very fun game (game-play wise).
Kingdom Hearts - I seem to remember disliking it at first. However I ended up loving it. Especially after the yaoi goodness of KH2.
I always try to keep an optimistic faith in games before I get them, so I can't recall any situation where I would have prejudice against a game and then found I would enjoy it.
The opposite has happened a few times, though, where I buy a game I feel hyped about, and then I get disappointed. FF XII was the biggest disappointment for me, because even though it was a great game (especially the beginning was pure greatness), it just didn't deliver on the story-part, since I play JRPGs for the stories and the worlds they provide. The characters just didn't come alive like in the earlier FFs.
I'm sad to say that Left 4 Dead is something that didn't grab me initially. I remember having a "meh?" level response when I checked it out at PAX last year, but it's easily one of my favorites now.
Far cry 2 - The trailers, the commercials and the pop up ads discouraged me from getting it. Plus the review were so so. But then, a friend of mine gave it to me and i had fun times actually! That and i like how the main characters' looks (yeah, I'm into bears...)
Call of duty 4 - "Oh boy, another call of duty. Sheesh like what new in there, more nazies? Japanese warrio...? OH MY GOD IT'S AWESOME!"
And finally,
WOW - At first, i thought it was a nerd trap. I didn't like how they deviate from the original games and how they portrait women (seriously, a metal bikini for paladins? Aren't they like nuns?). But then... well.. you know... it's like martinis, once you drink the first glass, you can't get enough of them.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine. I admit it, during the lead up to the game I manufactured a lot of false optimism because I work in a video game store and that's what we have to do. I really expected the game to be utter crap.
Then I played it.
I had to apologize to several co-workers, true story. That game made me believe in the movie license again.
Metal Gear Solid 4. I experienced a bit of it and realized a good deal of it was fairly competent filmmaking. I'm still not sure why there wasn't a DVD release, though. Most people still watch their movies on those.
Back in the day, just from looking at them and reading articles I thought games like Age Of Empires, Caesar, the Civ games and the like were going to be boring dull-fests. Then I got the original AOE as part of a multi-game bargain bundle of software at either Best Buy or Circuit City (I forget, it's been a few years). After I played the other games, I figured "what the heck?" and installed AOE. After I got the hang of it, I was hooked. And that's become my second favorite genre of PC games (RPG, is my fave, FYI)
I was surprised at how well I enjoyed Mirror's Edge after initially passing it off as another FPS type. The game still has looked the absolute best on my tv yet, and I was so into it that falling to my death from skyscraper heights really had an effect on me and I cringed everytime I heard that bone-crushing snap.
I remember way back in the day when magazines announced that Square and Disney were publishing a crossover game. My reactions were "what" and "how does that even" and a bit of "augh my brain hurts WHAT".
Then, while at Disneyworld I and my brother played a demo of the game. We agreed that, while still weird, the game seemed pretty good, and bought it soon after. I have enjoyed the series since.
Oblivion.
I played through the first 5 minutes, didn't even make it out of the dungeon and wrote it off as another "kill rats until you level up" mindless dungeon crawl. I'd never played any of the other Elder Scrolls games before, so I had no idea what they were like.
But then, after much goading from a friend to give it another go, I did. I got out of the sewers, and...it's like the fun switch was flipped on.
I put almost 300 hours into the 360 version and have put about 100 or so in the PC version (and counting).
I'm happy to say I was wrong, wrong, a thousand times wrong about that game.
Agreed with Nexus. I thought I'd never be able to get behind Kingdom Hearts simply because I do not care for classic Disney. So now I'm chomping at the bit for 358/2 Days, picked up a PSP 3000 for Birth by Sleep (among other games though - tbh the new MGS game sold it for me ;p ) In the end, I was pleasantly surprised by it all.