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Black & White - Most Overrated Game Ever?
Following on from our earlier story about GameSpy's 25 Most Overrated Games countdown, the Top 5 have been announced, and Lionhead's PC-based 'god game', Black & White, made it to the top spot, with GameSpy suggesting: "Sometimes... people want to love a game so badly that its reputation runs away with itself." Congratulations to an an anonymous reader for guessing right, before another commenter noticed screenshots for the Top 5 had already been uploaded, doh. Meanwhile, Penny Arcade chime in on the chart, commenting: "When you deny the profound effect of Donkey Kong Country's fully rendered sprites in 1994, making the system a bulwark against the 32-bit revolution, there is no educating you", and illustrating: "If a company that overhypes games does a feature on overhyped games, are they overhyping the game?"
I'm not sure I would call it the most overrated game ever, over dogged on game ever perhaps. I mean yeah it was a mess, and yeah it didn't even come close to what it was supposed to do as described by its creator, the missions were lame yada yada yada.
But despite all that, I did at least have fun with it. Teaching my giant cow to eat children and crap all over my worshipers homes was great fun. Rolling flaming boulders into my own villages entertained me for far longer than it should have I suppose.
Broken, definately, but at least it was fun.
On Wall Street they say "buy low, sell high" On the pad we say, "buy high, sell high" Isn't that somehow better?
Black & White may have had some issues, but I enjoyed it quite a bit. The only flaw I saw with it was that it should have come with 20+ levels instead of only (was it?) 5 levels.
The User Interface for the game had the best "feel" I've ever experienced in a 3D game. It was very easy to get around the world and manipulate the objects within it. It was also amazing how you could seamlessly scroll all the way out.
The "gestures" concept was also quite novel at the time.
It's a shame it did so poorly. I would have loved to see what they could have done with some further refinement to the GUI/3D Engine.
All they would have needed to do was design a few dozen levels and the game would have done so much better...
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There whole deal the FF7 was over rated because FFT, and FFX were better is just bizarre. I think they've forgotten to consider the time at which it was released.
It's easy to look back 5 years or whatever and say that FF7's graphics are mediocre, etc. But at the time it was released it broke new ground all over the place.
The argument that FF6 had a better story is valid, that's fine, but damn if you can't just rip on it for not comparing up to FFT, or FFX.
Also one of the contributer comments remarked that the story just wasn't as epic. How the hell wasn't it? A genetically engineered super-villain hell bent on destroying the world, and damn near succeeding isn't epic anymore? Ok, ok, sure in FF6 the world was actually nearly destroyed, but as for the other games, the epic level wasn't quite the same.
Was FF7 overrated when it released? Hell no. Is it overrated now? In my opinion no. Is it one of the most overrated games of all time? Not even close.
I loved Syndicate and Populous. I thought I was going to get something fantastic. I did. It was a fantastic piece of shit.
I found showstopping bug after showstopping bug. Complaints in the official forum were being deleted rather than addressed. I literally spent 24 hours trying to get the game to run for more than five minutes at a time, and once it finally did, I found a different bug that prevented me from completing the first scenario.
Add to that the sheer amount of repetitive handholding involved in play (feeding your people, training your beastie), and the obnoxious gesture system, and you have something I wouldn't play even if I was given a salary to do it.
I ultimately wrote to EA and asked for my money back. Wanna know the good part? They gave it to me.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
There are so many quotes in that piece that make me upset.
Lets start with Halo.
"Look, I'm glad so many people loved Halo. My beef's not with you."
So you are well aware of the overwhelming popularity of the game, yet you think it is "over rated." Apparently you and I differ greatly on our definition of overrated, as well as your role as a game reviewer. I don't give a crap what your personal opinion is of the game. Your job, as a "professional" reviewer, is to evaluate the game and make a judgment about what most gamers will think about the game. They go on to attach the other reviewers for giving Halo high marks. Well guess what, its STILL fucking popular! If its so overrated, then why can used game stores still charge 50 bucks for it? With the numbers it sold in, the used shelves should be filled with the worthless things if the game was so overrated. Get off your high horse and re-read your job description. Its a good game, its extremely popular, and so within the realm of game reviews, is by definition, deserving of high ratings, and certainly not overrated.
Mortal Kombat:
"The game was an instant hit... Fans persevered, but its popularity was driven more by infamy than quality. "
WTF are you talking about!? Now you are saying it was popular, but for the wrong reasons? People liked it, people played it, people continued to like and play it; where is the problem? Who frickin cares why it was popular... are you honestly going to sit there and type that people dropped countless quarters into Mortal Kombat machines because of "infamy"? Get a clue.
Again, dismount and join society.
Scott
I thought this whole countdown was pretty funny. Who better to complain about how games are overhyped than... those who do the hyping!
Let's think about this. GameSpy makes their money from advertising (among other things). Who advertises on their site? The game publishers! So is GameSpy going to publish that a brand new, multi-million dollar games sucks big ones? Nope! The advertisers would leave immediately.
GameSpy, including all the game magazines, can't be relied upon to deliver impartial news and reviews. It just can't happen. All those games are hyped for a reason. The trade press gets their money for doing the hyping.
Never ever trust one of those sites or magazines for impartial initial reviews. I have seen, however, after the game has been out for a while, some impartial reviews. This only happens after the wave of hype has passed. Then, and only then, will you see a game magazine or site say truthful things.
So, to GameSpy and other game press: Stop complaining about the hype, and stop being part of the problem!
Here.
Score: 91
"The final word: Black and White is one of the most unique -- and enjoyable -- strategy games we've seen this year."
Yeah, ok schmeg.
I currently have no clever signature witicism to add here.