Do You Have Any Unpopular Gaming Opinions?

[Tanooki]

Maybe I am less good at them, but not by much as I'm not in practice on the originals either. The X series is just less approachable and fun to me due to the mega gimping involved until you backtrack hell a lot of stages for pieces of kit, hearts, and the rest. I dislike it a lot that you're not really a solid (special weapon excluded here) character than in the old series from the start. Not a fan of handicapping like they did, while in a thing like Metroid 3 or SOTN I'm fine with it because you can't tread too far without being murdered without leveling up and exploring. MMX is a blind straight forward basically platformer with imposed re-runs instead of being open. Hell even Nintendo knew that much in that screwy Kirby game on the GBA which went all over. It's not a hard formula to use and a mega man (x or not) done like that would be wise design choice I'd love to see, even if it were some pack of fanboys making someting like AM2R (that Metroid 2 remake) did. Make a huge mega man world like Metroid with differing zones obviously (like how Fusion was obvious) and each robot master has their cronies and a boss, along the way you grab more hearts, E tanks, weapon boosters, and so on and then ape the gear from most the robot masters. That would be epic.

[marurun]

What is this handicapping that MMX supposedly does? MMX 1 and 4 are not particularly difficult games.

[Forlorn Drifter]

I would have been upset with myself previously to say this, but as my tastes have changed, I think it stuck.

Fallout 4 is the best Fallout so far, of the Bethesda group. The first two games and tactics are their own thing, and I'm not much of CRPG guy.

Why? For one, the world actually looks decent now, and has some color. The gunplay actually feels good. The buildings have more realistic, non-labyrinth like set ups, which was a huge problem in 3 and NV. Same can be said of many areas. While skills are essentially gone, it doesn't really matter- in both of the previous games, you could train yourself into a hulking mastermind powerful in all skills pretty easily anyways. There's less pointless clutter, and some items are purely decorative and can't be interacted with, which IMO is a good thing. The UI looks better.

What issues it has with lore and similarity to the other games makes no difference to me. Dialogue not being as well done and story not being as strong is disappointing, but I'm okay with it? Honestly, I also like that choices are more straightforward, and the main story is how you most interact with factions. If I have any complaints to make, it probably has to be the same issue of it taking forever to get anywhere if you can't fast travel.

I recently started New Vegas again, and after hitting ~20 hrs, this whole thought process hits me. Vegas (and I assume 3 is similar, its just been so long since I've played it) just feel clunky nowadays, and their magic is quickly lost, IMO.

[pook99]

Probably but it's a popular comment to me. I strongly dislike almost hate the X series. I finished one, and don't like the others at all. It's just not well made in how gimped you are and how often you have to revisit whole stages to pick up this or that, it has no flow in its poor attempt to ape the Metroid/SOTN style. The story is fine and all they did the arc with but I detest the design of it almost entirely among the changes from the normal MM format.

This paragraph very nicely sums up my feelings on the x series, glad I am not alone in it.

As for MN9, the game received a grossly unfair amount of hate, some of it was justified due to all the kickstarter snafues, it had hype around it that could not possibly be met, people wanted MN9 to be as good as mega man was in their head and that is nearly impossible to achieve.

I played it a year or so after its release, went in with low expectations, and was pleasantly surprised. I enjoyed the way the dash mechanic was implemented, and generally enjoyed the stage and boss design. I think if it was released without all the hype it may have been better received. I also think it is worth a playthrough for any mega man fan, at this point it goes on sale for 5 dollars pretty frequently and I definitely feel it is worth that.

[Xeogred]

Couldn't disagree with Tanooki more, sounds like he needs to get better.

You could easily argue Mega Man 3 and beyond have some backtracking and collectibles. That isn't exclusive to the X series at all. Granted, I'll give him this, X3 and X5 are the bloated ones, X3 with chips you can use instead of the base armor pieces so there's double the capsules, then the Ride Armors, etc. And X5 just had some laughable design choices, I had to backtrack some levels three times over. Duff McWhalen anyone? To get the capsule in his level, you need HIS ability! Then you need complete sets of the two armors to get other items.

But as for the rest of the series, it seriously shouldn't take more than like 5 minutes to get through a Mega Man level. And in the X series you're stocking up on subtanks and whatnot in the process. It's a pretty funny thing to complain about since backtracking takes about as long as it does to blink in many instances. And you know about ESCAPE right? You can beat most of these games in an hour or two, that's not a huge commitment. I don't think it's trying to "ape Metroid/SOTN" at all, I don't see the comparison.

Zero 1 and the ZX games are the ones with half baked Metroidvania elements.

Only Mega Man games I have real issues with would be:

- Mega Man 1, just kind of rough all around and not one I've ever loved. Props for setting the blueprints though.
- Zero 1, this one has limited lives and some seriously bad game design choices with timed events and weirdness. Kind of expects you to learn how to 1CC it practically from the vibe I get... no thanks.
- Mega Man 7, you can only fire two buster shots now and the controls/physics along with the giant sprites are annoying. And why can we only select 4 bosses at a time now?

That's about it. I don't even know if I can count X7 and X8 here because I usually forget they even exist, they're so transparent and forgettable I can't even afford to care.

[Tanooki]

pook99 -- That's what I do most often anymore, go in with low or no expectations. I find it's best. If you go in assuming stuff, usually you end up disappointed a little or a lot. It's better to just know stuff or better yet know nothing too and just take it at as it is. I used to do that years ago, started by blinding myself to all news (all blackout which wasn't easy) about Ocarina of Time in the 90s, so when I played it, I had no idea about anything so I had nothing ruined and no expectations other than a 3D Zelda. I feel I won out over most who ate up all the exposure.


And no I don't need to get better, sure I could and tolerate it, but why force myself to play better at a design I don't like in the first place? That makes no sense as it's a wasted effort. I'm not even grumbling about the difficulty as much as the design of how it works, that's what I dislike most. I've never played X5 but I would agree that X3 had a lot more annoying bloat than X2 did. X2 was kind of tolerable but I don't like that design so I never bothered to finish it, but I played X3 notably less as I had all the MM anything games (even soccer) on SNES within the last decade.

I do agree MM1 is rough, it's why (even on difficult) I prefer MM2 a lot. I don't care for the Zero games either, though I only bothered with the first 2 before I backed off it. The bad designs you said of Zero 1 is really about why as Zero felt like you 1CC or you're screwed as it saved it all. Any game like that I consider a trap game whoever makes it, and when I see that I stop.

[casterofdreams]

I would have been upset with myself previously to say this, but as my tastes have changed, I think it stuck.

Fallout 4 is the best Fallout so far, of the Bethesda group. The first two games and tactics are their own thing, and I'm not much of CRPG guy.

Why? For one, the world actually looks decent now, and has some color. The gunplay actually feels good. The buildings have more realistic, non-labyrinth like set ups, which was a huge problem in 3 and NV. Same can be said of many areas. While skills are essentially gone, it doesn't really matter- in both of the previous games, you could train yourself into a hulking mastermind powerful in all skills pretty easily anyways. There's less pointless clutter, and some items are purely decorative and can't be interacted with, which IMO is a good thing. The UI looks better.

What issues it has with lore and similarity to the other games makes no difference to me. Dialogue not being as well done and story not being as strong is disappointing, but I'm okay with it? Honestly, I also like that choices are more straightforward, and the main story is how you most interact with factions. If I have any complaints to make, it probably has to be the same issue of it taking forever to get anywhere if you can't fast travel.

I recently started New Vegas again, and after hitting ~20 hrs, this whole thought process hits me. Vegas (and I assume 3 is similar, its just been so long since I've played it) just feel clunky nowadays, and their magic is quickly lost, IMO.

As much as I loved playing FO3 and NV, I too find it difficult to go back to them after playing FO4. Yes 4 has problems: story, handling of dialogue, whatever. But everything just feels so much better: gunplay, modding system, graphics. A gripe I have with the game however revolves around the DLC. Very weak compared to past entries.

[Gunstar Green]

Duff McWhalen anyone?

Even though I really enjoy X5 overall, and especially its climax, I'm not going to defend it because there's so much stupid in the game. This level is easily the worst and the fact that you absolutely, positively have to revisit it if you're going for 100% is ridiculous since it's not like you can just rush through the level.

Only Mega Man games I have real issues with would be:

- Mega Man 1, just kind of rough all around and not one I've ever loved. Props for setting the blueprints though.
- Zero 1, this one has limited lives and some seriously bad game design choices with timed events and weirdness. Kind of expects you to learn how to 1CC it practically from the vibe I get... no thanks.
- Mega Man 7, you can only fire two buster shots now and the controls/physics along with the giant sprites are annoying. And why can we only select 4 bosses at a time now?

That's about it. I don't even know if I can count X7 and X8 here because I usually forget they even exist, they're so transparent and forgettable I can't even afford to care.

I agree on Mega Man 1. I still like it, but it's very obviously a rough draft for the rest of the series and one of the most annoying games to revisit.

The thing with Zero 1 is if you actually go through the trouble of grinding up the cyber elves it becomes extremely easy, but grinding is very time consuming and not fun. It's got the same issue I have with X8 in that you have to both find your items and buy your items after finding them. Who thought that was a good idea? It's like Tanooki's issue with the X series turned up to 11. I suppose they thought it was a way for people to tailor the difficulty to their liking, and it does actually succeed at that, but it's ultimately just an inconvenient chore. Thankfully this improves as the sequels go on but it's unfortunate because I enjoy the story of the first game and its final boss encounter quite a bit. I don't really fault anyone who plays this one on the easy mode available in the DS collection just to cut out the BS.

7 does have a lot of bizarre design choices. I'm not sure if it's true but I've heard 7 was largely developed by the team that made the later Gameboy titles which would explain some eccentricities like the buster shots and the 4 bosses and even the item shop and sprite-to-screen ratio. It has way more in common with the Gameboy games than it does the NES ones.

[Xeogred]

Duff McWhalen anyone?

Even though I really enjoy X5 overall, and especially its climax, I'm not going to defend it because there's so much stupid in the game. This level is easily the worst and the fact that you absolutely, positively have to revisit it if you're going for 100% is ridiculous since it's not like you can just rush through the level.

Yep and like I said... this is one of the few levels you have to do three times.
- once to simply beat it
- replay it again with Duff's ability so you can get the Falcon Armor armor piece...
- which is required for the Heart Piece in this stage and is before the armor capsule, so have fun replaying it a third time!

WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? /AVGN voice

And yeah the fact that it's a sluggish weird auto scrolling stage that takes forever is major salt in the wound.

I don't really fault anyone who plays this one on the easy mode available in the DS collection just to cut out the BS.

Haha, yeah that's exactly what I did earlier this summer. I agree the tone, story, characters and all that is cool... but I did some skimming around online and people were talking about having to grind for HOURS to get a life drop or two. I had a save with zero lives so I was pretty much literally stuck. Unless I wanted to grind and no thanks. Also doesn't help that this game barely has any actual level content, they recycle the desert and stuff like three times over. Really weird game. I beat it legit years ago and remember having to grind a ton for the Elves like you said, but this time after my first failed attempt, I just checked out the easy mode to cruise through it.

Didn't need the easy mode after that. I still think the Zero series' difficulty is exaggerated, but maybe some new players who weren't very experienced with the NES or X games got vocal about it or something. It's even kind of crazy how you can get double health bars and in Zero 1-3, with only three elements to worry about, it's so freaking easy to quickly figure out a bosses weakness.

On a side note, the Zero DS collection is really dang good for anyone else interested... having access to more buttons and being able to customize the controls was a game changer.

[marurun]

I like a lot of what was done with Fallout 4, but I don't actually enjoy playing it more than previous entries in the Bethesda Fallout series. Here are my thoughts, for anyone who gives a turd:

I think Fallout 3 is actually the most fun to just futz around with. I enjoy it the most. It has lots of issues and imperfections, but playing that game, especially heavily relying on VATS, is just tons of fun, despite all the flaws. The first-person shooting was never particularly satisfying, but the inclusion of VATS inspired me to play it a bit more like a more traditional role-playing game in many ways, except for the whole thrown grenades constantly ending up exploding at my own feet kind of problem (thank god for the VATS damage reduction). Yes, the story was nonsensical in places and there were lots of WTF moments in the writing and plotting, but I loved the atmosphere. The game FELT special, both in environments and mechanics. I did start to get annoyed with all the subway routes, though. The DLC was fun, too, if not nearly as good as the original game.

Mechanically speaking, New Vegas was the least fun to play for me. In trying to make the game more challenging, the devs sort of neutered VATS, which was my primary mode of combat, even as they improved some of the first-person shooting elements. New Vegas was frustrating for me because I loved the story and my personal decisions felt so much more important. I was much more easily engrossed in the events of the world and my own story, but I hated fighting Caesar's Legion or those weird wasp bug enemies because they could soak bullets and even explosives like anybody's business. It kind of ruined some of the story and world for my by having these under-dressed idiots taking damage like a steel tank. Also, the more coherent environments, which should have been more fun to explore, ended up becoming less coherent because of the enemy damage scaling issues. The DLC was a mixed bag. All had good stories, but some was frustrating, again because of the damage scaling, though one of them did sort of get around that with some neat tricks. Actually, I guess only one was really ruined by the damage scaling for me. The rest were so well-written and realized it almost didn't matter the mechanical problems. And one of the DLC is just some of the funniest game writing and voice work I've had the pleasure of listening to.

Fallout 4 has much better real-time gun play than either 3 or NV, but I don't enjoy VATS as much. Also, the procedural quests start to get SUPER annoying, almost as annoying as the crypt copypasta in Skyrim. I really dislike the story, and the world feels a lot less immersive to me as a result. Treating it like a first person shooter works a lot better than ever before, but treating it like an RPG with action bits works a lot less well. And while I love the ability to mod weapons, I dislike that many "unique" weapons are procedural now instead of some of the truly special weapons of games past. I do love how they changed power armor. Some of the settlement stuff is fun, but I wish the settlers would make some minor improvements on their own. I actually don't like building and maintaining settlements that much, and I sort of wish the game included some kind of auto-pilot mode where as long as you defend them periodically and keep them stocked with supplies they'll develop naturally along some pre-set lines. I think overall Fallout 4's general fun factor is between 3 and NV, but unlike NV, it doesn't have the same level of story, character, and atmosphere to pull me through the rough patches. NV had more rough patches, but the compelling writing kept pulling me along. I didn't want to miss important beats. Fallout 4 didn't have that. In fact, I think it has the worst writing and story realization of all the games, so when Fallout 4 gets rough there's not nearly as much immersion to pull me through. Fallout 4 is the only one of the 3 I didn't beat, and the only one I didn't bother picking up any DLC for.

I guess if you're looking more for action, Fallout 4 is going to be your pick, but if you want more RPG elements and more and better story and characters, Fallout 4 is actually the least of the 3. So play style and game preferences will make a huge difference in which game is best.