Board 8 > Games that just came out of nowhere for you?

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What are some games that you went into with average-ish (or even less) expectations that you ended up falling in love with?

Life is Strange and the Uncharted series for me. I went into both years after they were released thinking, "okay, let's see what this is about." LiS and Uncharted 2 are now all-time top 5 games for me.

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Borderlands - hadn't heard anything about it until the day it came out and figured I might as well try it

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Ys VIII. I had neve played an Ys game before, bought it in a sale and almost immediately regretted buying it because I thought it wasn't going to be that interesting anyway. Ended up being one of my favorite first playthroughs of a game in a loooong time, beat the game 100% and literally wasn't bored for 1 second.

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Crosscode.

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I can't think of any right now I didn't really already know other people loved, but I can think of a few I didn't expect to totally fall in love with the way I did. Outer Wilds, Dead Cells, and The Messenger are three recent ones I all adored and knew little about before playing.

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Zelda 2 was my first exposure to video games, it ended up being my gateway into gaming and one of my favorite games of all time.

I guess for something more recent, I didn't know anything about DDLC, Celeste, or Omori going into them and they all hit me incredibly hard.

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Hollow Knight

I was never into the genre, and I haven't like most of the acclaimed indie games I've tried. Got it for free with PS+ and decided to give it a shot with low expectations but it was pretty hecking great

Persona 5 to an extent. It was the first Persona game I played and I expected it to be good but didn't expected it to be one of my favorite games ever

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Ar Nosurge. It is average or bad in most of the ways reviews cite for its 6/10 or 7/10 scores, but god DAMN the highs were high.

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Stardew Valley is probably the best example. I didn't know it existed until somebody posted a topic on this board saying it had released that day and referenced Harvest Moon. I have a huge soft spot and nostalgia for Harvest Moon 64, so I immediately went to the Steam page, liked what I saw, and purchased it.

I'd say another example is Persona 3 (FES). All I knew about it was that it was an RPG and the baord was talking about it. I think I might've thought it was rare, so when I saw it at a GameStop, I bought it thinking it was a chance opportunity to purchase the game.

Let's also throw Final Fantasy IX out there. I remember going to a games store with my mom because my cousin had Ogre Battle 64 and I wanted it too. Either I didn't have my N64 at the time or they didn't have a copy of it. The guy recommended FFIX as something similar to Ogre Battle (but is it though?), so I played that as my first Final Fantasy and truly my first RPG in general.

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I'm playing Yakuza 0 at the moment and so far it fits this. I bought it for $5 thinking even if I didn't like it I wasn't out much, and I've spent a good 15-20 hours so far in the first two chapters just going around doing random shit and barely progressing the actual story.

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Overwatch

I was and still am a big COD fan, so I really wasn't feeling this more team-based strategy approach to FPS at first. I even played the beta and didn't dislike it per se, but it also didn't light my world on fire. I still took a chance and bought the full game and well now I think it's one of the best MP experiences of all time.

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I know this sounds weird, but Splatoon 2. I bought it after falling so in love with the soundtrack that I needed to hear the music in its original context. I don't play any shooters at all. I expected to struggle my way through single player and maybe fail a bit a multiplayer before getting what I needed and accepting that the game wasn't for me. What I got was one of the most engaging and fun multiplayer experiences that I've ever had, which became only the 4th game in my life which I played for >1000 hours.

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LiS is a good one, also Undertale. But TF2 is the epitome of this. I never even heard of it once before I got the Orange Box (was obviously super hyped for Portal, and was interested in HL2). Didn't stop playing for around 10 years.

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Going back to my childhood: Nintendo.com used to have a directory for every currently released N64 and Game Boy game, with screenshots and a short blurb for each. I was just clicking on random game names at different parts of the alphabet and eventually I came across Wario Land 2. I didn't know what it was, or that it was related to Mario at all (I don't think I questioned the similarity to his name). But what struck me was how nice the graphics looked. So colorful, so detailed, and so intriguing to me when up until that point I was only playing mainstream video games from series that I already knew. It ended up being the first game that I bought with my own money.

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Yakuza 0

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Nocturne. Bought it on a whim back in the day due to Dante being in it and it ended up being one of my favorite games of all time. That "Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry series" thing that's now a meme totally worked on me.

Ogre Battle 64 is another one where I plucked it from the bargain bin at Circuit City one day and ended up loving it.

Binding of Isaac. I only played it because it was a ps+ title when I first got a ps4, and after 100's of hours it became my favorite game of all time.

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Furi.

Saw it at a GDQ a long time ago and thought it looked cool, picked it up in a Steam sale soon afterward and thereafter left it sitting in my library untouched for years. My understanding of the game was that it was just a short, straightforward, ultra-hard boss rush with no story to speak of, and I wasn't confident in my ability to finish it, so I was in no hurry.

Finally took the dive a couple weeks ago, beat it in a few hours, and it absolutely blew me away. Haven't stopped thinking about it since. Its gameplay is masterful all on its own - one of the best in the genre for sure - but there's also an awesome amount of philosophy and lore packed into the narrative, most of which isn't apparent until the game ends and you take a few minutes to sit back and put everything that was told to you over the course of the journey into a different context based on the new information you've gotten. And that's all with a script that, in its entirety, is probably shorter than a singular standard JRPG cutscene. Backed up by an incredible soundtrack, too, despite most of it being far outside my usual preferred genre.

Definite top-20 all-time for me, crowding top-15. I seriously can't believe it's not more widely known and appreciated - I would highly recommend it to anyone that figures they can handle the difficulty.

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Elliot Quest is a game that came absolutely out of nowhere for me, in that I bought it just because it was 10 cents marked down from $10 on the Switch eShop. Ended up being a very, very good Zelda 2-like that I did almost everything in.

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Trails of Cold Steel and Yakuza 0.

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I suppose Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney probably counts.

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Uncharted 2 definitely. It came free with my PS3. I had bought it for Resident Evil 5. Uncharted 2 became one of my favourite games of all time

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Persona 4. Around 10 years ago I decided to try it since B8 recommended the series so often. I was expecting it to be ok, not become a top 10 game.
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Valkyria Chronicles

Star Ocean 5.

Seriously. I knew it got horrible reviews, but I liked Star Ocean 4 the best, and that got pretty bad reviews too. I got a way better game than what the reviews said. I really enjoyed the plot about the little girl (who was actually done realistically where she doesn't actually fight, she just is AI controlled and will buff you)

Its not the best game and I enjoyed Star Ocean 4 more, but I felt it was better than Star Ocean 3 (yeah... very unpopular opinion)

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Planet Coaster

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SpoinkRulezz posted...

Ys VIII. I had neve played an Ys game before, bought it in a sale and almost immediately regretted buying it because I thought it wasn't going to be that interesting anyway. Ended up being one of my favorite first playthroughs of a game in a loooong time, beat the game 100% and literally wasn't bored for 1 second.

Man this is how Ys VIII happened for me too. I had no problem at all 100%ing the game with a smile on my face. Barely even touched a guide as well. Just a great game.

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The big ones for me are The House in Fata Morgana and Trails in the Sky.

Fata Morgana I played only a week or 2 after it first released in English mostly on a whim based on a tweet one of the translators put out. The only reason I'd even heard of it at all was because I was following the localization company for updates on Higurashi, and I was mostly familiar with the VN community and what VN's were supposed to be good, translated or not.

Trails in the Sky I knew had a few vocal fans but there's tons of RPG's that applies to and I wasn't really approaching the series with any significant expectations.
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Answer is always Outer Wilds

I figured I'd like it because I liked the gimmick and space exploration but didn't expect it to totally floor me like it did

I guess also MGS2 since I'd never played a game with that level of crazy story before

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Probably Ace Attorney for me. I completely avoided it for a few years because the concept sounded dumb and there was no way a game about a lawyer could be fun.

Persona comes in second for a lot of the same reasons.


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SpoinkRulezz posted...

Ys VIII. I had neve played an Ys game before, bought it in a sale and almost immediately regretted buying it because I thought it wasn't going to be that interesting anyway. Ended up being one of my favorite first playthroughs of a game in a loooong time, beat the game 100% and literally wasn't bored for 1 second.

This. Bought Ys VIII $40 "New" from Gamestop and only gave it a shot because it was already opened. Was completely blown away.

Tales of Berseria, Suikoden 1, Silent Hill 1, and Nier PS3 also come to mind.

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I don't think this is what you mean but Magic the Gathering. One of my exes taught me how to play. It's the kind of game that reprograms your brain and there are so many ways to engage with it except just playing.

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Shadow Tactics: Blade of the Shogun
Had never heard of it until it was free on Epic about 18 months ago, probs my fav stealth game. Recently picked up a steam key for about a quid, looking forward to replaying it!

I think I bought Guilty Gear X2 with a vague idea of what it was and no significant experience in 2D fighters previously. It went on to be probably my favorite series.

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foolm0r0n posted...

LiS is a good one, also Undertale. But TF2 is the epitome of this. I never even heard of it once before I got the Orange Box (was obviously super hyped for Portal, and was interested in HL2). Didn't stop playing for around 10 years.

If were talking Orange Box, then Portal. I was only in it for HL2 on a system that could handle it, and this Portal game was on it. The rest was history.

paperwarior posted...

I think I bought Guilty Gear X2 with a vague idea of what it was and no significant experience in 2D fighters previously. It went on to be probably my favorite series.

Oh yeah this too. When I got an original Xbox for Christmas it came with GGX2 for some reason. Had no idea what it was but it's now one of my favorite fighting game series

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Life is Strange
Trails in the Sky (I literally bought it because there was a screenshot of a fishing minigame; subsequently SC is clearly superior)
428 Shibuya Scramble
Final Fantasy X

Add: Tales of Berseria
CrossCode

I'm trying to think of non-Steam games that fit...

Oh! Fortune Street! Probably most played Wii game I own.

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Camden posted...

I'm playing Yakuza 0 at the moment and so far it fits this. I bought it for $5 thinking even if I didn't like it I wasn't out much, and I've spent a good 15-20 hours so far in the first two chapters just going around doing random shit and barely progressing the actual story.

I wouldn't yet put it on this list, but I've done the same completely. I think I have about thirty hours and only on chapter 4.

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Shadowrun for SNES and Genesis, for different reasons.

I rented Shadowrun for the Genesis strictly because the logo was cool, and then it was a straight up third person shooter/open world RPG for the fucking Sega Genesis and it was fucking incredible.

Then a year later or so I borrowed my neighbors SNES and rented the SNES version, thinking Id play one of my old favorite games again, and then BAM, its a totally different game, this one a third person shooter/open-world adventure game RPG, and its just as good but totally different.

Just an incredible pair of games that totally blindsided me.

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When I think about it, Chrono Trigger fits this well for me.

I legit did not know how popular it was at the time. I was a kid looking through an issue of Nintendo Power for RPGs and just happened to see Chrono Trigger among them, so I gave it a try. Little did I know, it became one of my favorite games ever.

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428 Shibuya Scramble probably, I played it on a whim but I still think about it all the time

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Enter the Gungeon
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Twewy, going in the impression I was getting was "here are a bunch of bad rejected FF ideas mashed together into a game"

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somehow i got roped into ddlc fully blind as soon as it released so

that was something

Trails in the Sky, back like 8-9 years ago when it was just a PSP title in NA. I had heard some good things about it but I never could have imagined that I was about to get a new favorite series in gaming - one of which possibly being my favorite game of all time - or the start of a near decade and counting of following the series.

13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim for a more recent one. It was all the super positive buzz that had gotten it on my radar, of course, but I still wasn't prepared for the experience I got. To be fair though, there was probably no way I could.

I suppose NieR too, back in the day.

Oh, .hack is probably a good one. Got interested in it because of the OST and ended up really enjoying it (particularly the G.U. games)

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Mega Mana posted...

I wouldn't yet put it on this list, but I've done the same completely. I think I have about thirty hours and only on chapter 4.

At this point the main story would have to be a boring mess for the duration of the game for me to categorize it differently. That, or if I'm required to spend any serious amount of time on the karaoke mini-game. Not my favorite rhythm implementation...

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Dark Souls.

I had seen videos and it looked like some slow plodding game. I finally bought it a few years late and bounced off it constantly within the first few hours. I finally sat down after like my third attempt at it with the mindset of "people love this game I must be missing something" and forced myself to play it for at least five hours

Fast forward some years and From Software is my favorite developer of all time

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Most recently, I picked up Omori simply because Honest Trailers did a video on it and I was curious. I had never even heard of it before. I thought it'd be a decent enough RPG, turned out it was exactly what the void in my soul needed and I will recommend it to everyone I can.

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this is kinda tough, because i (especially when i was younger) traditionally have been a cautious gamer. if i buy something, i'm usually already hyped through my own instincts or a friend's recommendation

games i was meh on at first, but semi-reluctantly bought and enjoyed way more than i expected:

Journey
Hollow Knight
Deep Rock Galactic
Dying Light
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor
Hotline Miami
Sleeping Dogs
SYNTHETIK
ECHO
Portal
Escape Velocity: Override
Saints Row: The Third
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath
PowerStone
Kung Fu Chaos
Spider-Man (2000)

a few haven't aged so well (saints row and stranger's wrath in particular) but i'm leaving them in

some others in the thread have great suggestions, but i personally was given the heads up on how great they were ahead of time

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