Most overrated games and franchises (no order)

[Transfurzz]

GTA: Uh-duh ? People like random violence. I like it either way.

You may call it just one gimmick after the other. And I agree with you on that point, GTA has barely changed since GTA3. What GTA truly offers is free roam. Thats its real strength.

All it really does is expand on that. If you noticed, that progressively the starting area your confined to for the GTA3 series have been getting larger. Quite a bit larger. Trust me a lot of people feel the same way as you do, but I enjoy GTA for its open-ended gameplay. Do whatever you want whenever you want. Its a lot like most RTS games, they gameplay wise have barely changed since their advent. The only real gameplay change so far is the population cap. The rest is just expanding on what RTS games do, massive battles. If there's anything changing gameplay wise in a genre, its usually more of the same thing. Refreshed and ready for the market. The only real gameplay change we've seen last decade ? Will Wright's Spore. And its not even out yet.

Violence ? GTA is actually barely more violent than most computer games I've seen. So I wouldn't worry. Whatever you do in it, including kill random peeps are all available in most games. Its the mature themes such as drugs, gangsters and swearing that I would look out for. And no matter how the critics try to place it, sex has always been the least of topics in the GTA series, hardly even a consideration. You might notice that even a few particular main characters, who get a lot of screentime, link drugs and sex as vice and disdain abusing either. With exception of Vice City, which showcased a mob town with you as a mobster. Probably why, its considered the best of the series despite its relatively small size. The sex jokes are pretty much what you would hear one guy say to the other. To be honest, the Godfather game is far more violent. It features intimidation and torture as a key game feature. Even the GTA dating system is bolt-on, what leads people to believe the game is sex-orientated ? It just is, most people have never seen a dev so open with views about sex. Pornography and certain 'aspects' of it are quite widely seen in the GTA world. Which as most people find hard to believe, quite very normal.

I would blame the lousy frame rate on the PS2. It doesn't even have a GPU. The GTA3 series runs just as well as San Andreas on any PC. The game hasn't changed much graphically, except for the detail on player models and car models. You may say it has a bad frametrate. But Rockstar has a proven track record of making fantastic ports with proper optimisation and better quality textures. Few have even come close to the quality of their ports. No framerate problems on those.

The GTA3 series are one of those titles which are take it or leave it. Its popularity with the adolscents just makes it obnoxious to be a GTA3 fan. Who appreciate it only for the violence. And I agree, it is gimmicky, but not so much as you think.

[MadeYouLook]

Final Fantasy 7

[PCJ]

Final Fantasy 7

Yes. I never understood what's so great about it.

[schultz]

Overrated, not overated. Rated just right. Really in the end, it all comes down to personal preference. It's obvious just from this thread and the varying opinions people have stated.

Either way, though, it can still be very interesting to see how people view the games they do not look.

[Spaceman Spiff]

I think the problem, IMO, is that "overrated" games are often times GOOD games actually, that maybe for whatever reason, receive a little (or alot) more attention than they really deserve.
And so people who aren't big fans resent their huge appeal and popularity, and I think out of anger or spite or frustration or whatever put the game down far more than it deserves and say its terrible or whatever as a backlash.

It's like with Halo. When Halo 2 came out, it was this gigantic global "gaming event". Even if you don't care for the series and feel there are many better FPS out there, you have people who say it "sucks" and is "terrible". Well, really, no it isn't in any justifiable way. But is it overrated?? Most would say yes.

I'm the first to admit that most of the games I find overrated are actually pretty good, but I feel they just get more attention than they probably deserve..

I just hate to see people exagerrate a game's negative points just as a backlash to the attention it gets. It's unfair.

[Username]

GTA: Uh-duh ? People like random violence. I like it either way.

You may call it just one gimmick after the other. And I agree with you on that point, GTA has barely changed since GTA3. What GTA truly offers is free roam. Thats its real strength.

All it really does is expand on that. If you noticed, that progressively the starting area your confined to for the GTA3 series have been getting larger. Quite a bit larger. Trust me a lot of people feel the same way as you do, but I enjoy GTA for its open-ended gameplay. Do whatever you want whenever you want. Its a lot like most RTS games, they gameplay wise have barely changed since their advent. The only real gameplay change so far is the population cap. The rest is just expanding on what RTS games do, massive battles. If there's anything changing gameplay wise in a genre, its usually more of the same thing. Refreshed and ready for the market. The only real gameplay change we've seen last decade ? Will Wright's Spore. And its not even out yet.

Violence ? GTA is actually barely more violent than most computer games I've seen. So I wouldn't worry. Whatever you do in it, including kill random peeps are all available in most games. Its the mature themes such as drugs, gangsters and swearing that I would look out for. And no matter how the critics try to place it, sex has always been the least of topics in the GTA series, hardly even a consideration. You might notice that even a few particular main characters, who get a lot of screentime, link drugs and sex as vice and disdain abusing either. With exception of Vice City, which showcased a mob town with you as a mobster. Probably why, its considered the best of the series despite its relatively small size. The sex jokes are pretty much what you would hear one guy say to the other. To be honest, the Godfather game is far more violent. It features intimidation and torture as a key game feature. Even the GTA dating system is bolt-on, what leads people to believe the game is sex-orientated ? It just is, most people have never seen a dev so open with views about sex. Pornography and certain 'aspects' of it are quite widely seen in the GTA world. Which as most people find hard to believe, quite very normal.

I would blame the lousy frame rate on the PS2. It doesn't even have a GPU. The GTA3 series runs just as well as San Andreas on any PC. The game hasn't changed much graphically, except for the detail on player models and car models. You may say it has a bad frametrate. But Rockstar has a proven track record of making fantastic ports with proper optimisation and better quality textures. Few have even come close to the quality of their ports. No framerate problems on those.

The GTA3 series are one of those titles which are take it or leave it. Its popularity with the adolscents just makes it obnoxious to be a GTA3 fan. Who appreciate it only for the violence. And I agree, it is gimmicky, but not so much as you think.

If your idea of freedom is running around a city, being unable to enter anything other than quest triggers, killing people, driving around, then you clearly don't understand something. Every other PC RPG can be consider free roaming. There were many games exactly like GTA. The only thing different is that you kill people instead of monsters, pick up missions instead of quests, and pick up new guns instead of swords.

The framerate and graphics always totally sucked even on PC. 40fps is NOT smooth by my opinion especially with garbage-like textures.

[Transfurzz]

If your idea of freedom is running around a city, being unable to enter anything other than quest triggers, killing people, driving around, then you clearly don't understand something. Every other PC RPG can be consider free roaming. There were many games exactly like GTA. The only thing different is that you kill people instead of monsters, pick up missions instead of quests, and pick up new guns instead of swords.

The framerate and graphics always totally sucked even on PC. 40fps is NOT smooth by my opinion especially with garbage-like textures.

Please let me hear your definition of free roam.

You can't really compare a third person shooter to an RPG. Whereas a RPG requires a lot more interaction with the enviroment. A third person shooter can get by easily in this aspect. All it needs is to have a believable and enjoyable enviroment. Interaction isn't a neccessity. An RPG has to have a solid quest structure, whereas a third person shooter only needs a linear albeit interesting storyline or goal to keep the action going. RPGs satsify those of us that crave for a totally new world and immersion. While third person shooters are there to just provide entertainment in the form of action. The scary thing about this ? Many RPGs are actually becoming nothing but third person shooters with an extremely linear storyline. Even worse, they take away the action and just implement a boring battle system. Unlike GTA, you get pent up in tiny areas with little to no content. Quests may be interesting but how far can you go till you hit that inevitable edge ? GTA requires a linear storyline to drive the player forward to new areas. While an RPG doing the same can fall well short of its expectations.

That in short, is actually a salute to Oblivion.

Thats just my two cents. Don't compare two genres with totally different aims.

Why don't you try upping the texture quality on something originally made for the PS2. A system that doesn't even have a GPU. 40 FPS ? Where have you been ? Its easy to run the game above that at 1024, a far higher resolution than what you see on your average TV. To be honest, I think Rockstar did a bang up job. In fact, lousy textures are definitely not their weakpoint. Tennis is probably the best looking game out for the 360 right now.

[Spaceman Spiff]

To be honest, I think Rockstar did a bang up job. In fact, lousy textures are definitely not their weakpoint. Tennis is probably the best looking game out for the 360 right now.

I don't know...I just played a demo of that boxing game (a "Fight Night" iteration, I'm pretty sure), and ....just....wow! I can honestly say standing 5 feet from the screen it looked like a real match. Actual REAL people.
I'm a pretty jaded, experienced gamer, but that really impressed me for actual, realtime gameplay.
Granted, it didn't have to render any huge outdoor enviornments or multiple characters or anything so I guess its no great technical achivement, but just watching the two boxers in the ring was damn impressive.
And I could really care less about boxing, too.

[Username]

Please let me hear your definition of free roam.

You can't really compare a third person shooter to an RPG. Whereas a RPG requires a lot more interaction with the enviroment. A third person shooter can get by easily in this aspect. All it needs is to have a believable and enjoyable enviroment. Interaction isn't a neccessity. An RPG has to have a solid quest structure, whereas a third person shooter only needs a linear albeit interesting storyline or goal to keep the action going. RPGs satsify those of us that crave for a totally new world and immersion. While third person shooters are there to just provide entertainment in the form of action. The scary thing about this ? Many RPGs are actually becoming nothing but third person shooters with an extremely linear storyline. Even worse, they take away the action and just implement a boring battle system. Unlike GTA, you get pent up in tiny areas with little to no content. Quests may be interesting but how far can you go till you hit that inevitable edge ? GTA requires a linear storyline to drive the player forward to new areas. While an RPG doing the same can fall well short of its expectations.

That in short, is actually a salute to Oblivion.

Thats just my two cents. Don't compare two genres with totally different aims.

Why don't you try upping the texture quality on something originally made for the PS2. A system that doesn't even have a GPU. 40 FPS ? Where have you been ? Its easy to run the game above that at 1024, a far higher resolution than what you see on your average TV. To be honest, I think Rockstar did a bang up job. In fact, lousy textures are definitely not their weakpoint. Tennis is probably the best looking game out for the 360 right now.

I've owned GTA3 when a 9800pro and 1GB was considered a hardcore gaming PC and GTA3 always looked and ran like crap. The fact you can run it at 1024 made the game look somehow worse.

Also, it appears your mixing up the concept of gameplay and content. I questioned the concept of "freedom" offered by GTA when it clearly has been in numerous forms throughout gaming.

[Gunslash]

GTA's very heavily advertised, but it's not voerrated...it lived up to its hype.
Same with EQ.

To me the most overrated are the Final Fagtasy series and Doom 3 (which was a good game, but not that great). Quake 4 is what Doom should of been quality wise.

[Transfurzz]

I've owned GTA3 when a 9800pro and 1GB was considered a hardcore gaming PC and GTA3 always looked and ran like crap. The fact you can run it at 1024 made the game look somehow worse.

Also, it appears your mixing up the concept of gameplay and content. I questioned the concept of "freedom" offered by GTA when it clearly has been in numerous forms throughout gaming.

Of course it looked like crap and ran like crap. You try upping the resolution on textures optimised to run on a PS2. The PS2 doesn't even have a GPU to begin with. Even the amazing looking Oblivion for the Xbox 360 suffers from downsized textures on the PC. This is why most PC gamers hate console ports with a burning hatred. At that time, a console port wasn't even a passing consideration. GTA3 was the best console port at that time, bar none.

I also have no idea why you find it ran so slow. I can run GTA3 with 2xAA and 8xAF on this rig and it ran 45 fps or more at any given time. This was back when Vice City for the PC was just released. Either that, or ATi's poor performance in OpenGL is showing.

Name me one other game that truly allows you to explore your world ? It would be limited to RPGs.