What is the most overrated video game franchise of all time?

[Mr Allen]

IMO it's a toss up between Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto or Halo, and I've played the first 3 Uncharted games on the PS3, and they all suck.

Thoughts? And no, I am NOT trolling here, these are my genuine opinions.

 

[tree]

If there is going to be discussion of video games,
and the discussion is supposed to focus on the undesirability
of particular games, how about detailing the features of them
that take them out of the category of super-fun games?

For instance, a game might be a big fail if>

Examples:
It lacks substance. (It's just a simple linear experience.)
Looks good but lacks playability.
It's more like a movie than a game.
Too much talk, not enough action.
Just a rehash of gameplay style you've seen so many times.

etc.
Detailing specific points would enhance the discussion.

 

[Iamnotarabot]

Realy hard to talk about an entire franchise, since , a franchise is successful thanks to a few games and then when a franchise just capitalize on its name and do average at this point you get overrated games^^'.

 

[Mr Allen]

If there is going to be discussion of video games,
and the discussion is supposed to focus on the undesirability
of particular games, how about detailing the features of them
that take them out of the category of super-fun games?

For instance, a game might be a big fail if>

Examples:
It lacks substance. (It's just a simple linear experience.)
Looks good but lacks playability.
It's more like a movie than a game.
Too much talk, not enough action.
Just a rehash of gameplay style you've seen so many times.

etc.
Detailing specific points would enhance the discussion.

16 years ago I played the original Halo on the original Xbox, tried a multiplayer match against my Brother, didn't like it because I found the split screen confusing, didn't know which was me, the top or the bottom.

I've played Grand Theft Auto style "Open World" games such as Sleeping Dogs, and I can't control the driving bits, just like a real car.

Call of Duty? Pfft, too generic, seen it all before shooters set during the War, it's been literally done to death since the year Dot.

 

[pjcnet]

They put a lot of work into each release of Grand Theft Auto (GTA) with an excellent single player campaign on each one, especially since GTA III when it went full 3D instead of a top down view. The 3D graphics engine is still very good on GTA V even today with barely any noticeable popup and custom modded GTA V multiplayer has taken over Arma 3 for serious online role players and it's in my opinion considerably superior, the 3D engine is much better and it's a lot better optimised, the only thing that GTA V lacks is Arma 3 is somewhat more realistic to real life, but that is more about personal taste, it is a game after all. GTA V on the last gen consoles, E.g. The Xbox 360 and PS3 was an incredible achievement on such low spec hardware and surprisingly it still looked pretty good, consoles are often finally used close to their full potential only when they're at the end of their life cycle. They also don't release too many so each time it's something special. GTA VI is bound to be a best seller and if it comes with an even better 3D engine along with a similarly good quality campaign and multiplayer, then it deserves to do well. It does fall down in one way however, please see the last paragraph marked **.

I would say Call of Duty is very overrated because there's a release every year, but each release is virtually just more of the same with a different theme, different maps and a much too short single player campaign, although many people play it like a sport and are addicted to it. My personal hate is how as a new player who is learning, you also start with very inferior weapons Etc., it's ridiculously non newbie friendly to make the game much easier for experienced players and put them directly against newbies who have barely any hope of doing well. Also please see the last paragraph marked **.

Assassins Creed used to be good, but the franchise has now become boring and overrated with more of the same each time.

The Arma franchise is in my opinion overrated, the latest version only ever had in my opinion very average graphics with poor optimisation and a lot of glitches despite loads of hype constantly stating how brilliant it was. Also loading times were awful, it was slow even on a SSD, so it would be utterly dire on a traditional hard drive.

Even though EA Sports release some great games, most are rereleased each year as another full priced release with minimal improvements each time. Each release is more of an upgraded patch / expansion than a new game, yet people who own the previous version still have to pay full price for it every single year and with sports like football (AKA. soccer in the USA) players change often and if you don't keep repurchasing the latest version of the game it will soon be out of date, this is used to their full advantage when they could easily bring out patch updates if they wanted to. In my opinion they should allow existing owners to pay less for an upgrade each year, because they don't these games are in my opinion overrated, but many would still be a good purchase for a first time buyer if you enjoy sports games.

What was so amazing about Minecraft? It has dire graphics and I've never been able to get into it, yet it's been so highly rated. It maybe for some people, but a lot of people also hate it and I think it's oversold due to a lot of hype.

I've never really played Halo so I can't comment much about it, except to say that it is on the list of overrated games franchises on various websites.

Overall I would say Call of Duty is the most over-hyped and overrated, the only reason it really sells so incredibly well is because of people's competitive element like a sport and of course because it's so over hyped.

** One big thing that concerns me with many AA releases is they not only charge for the release, but they then charge extra for a deluxe version (basically to get the whole game without things removed, they're not really bonuses), then on top of that there's a season pass, then if that's still not enough some full price games even have micro transactions on top which I think is utterly disgraceful, this has gone too far and it's no wonder people want to pirate these games.

 

[Bolletje]

Assassins Creed, in my opinion, is not worth the hype. But that’s a very personal opinion - I just didn’t find the games that entertaining.

 

[Iamnotarabot]

If i can remember a real new franchise that was overhyped and then bashed by the players, i would say watchdogs ( well its just 2 games) , this is when things started to realy go wrong in gaming with the downgrading of the quality of games , i mean the gap between the trailers (that doesnt run on the console most of the time) and the actual game.

 

[Mr Allen]

Every Super Mario game except some of the older ones, each time Nintendo brings out a new console, they invariably bring out a "new" version of Super Mario, which apart from flashy new 3D graphics is basically the same game as before but they still charge 60 quid a pop for it.

Same with Pokemon on the handhelds, every new Pokemon "colour" is almost the exact same game as its predecessor apart from maybe a few new Pokemon.

 

[Iamnotarabot]

Yes this is true but that's why i have some difficulties with your question, because pokemon itself is a big franchise and the first games realy deserved their success , now you are right this is just a brand that uses a name to grab money.

I hope that a good pokemon game on switch will redeem the franchise^^

 

[pjcnet]

If i can remember a real new franchise that was overhyped and then bashed by the players, i would say watchdogs ( well its just 2 games) , this is when things started to realy go wrong in gaming with the downgrading of the quality of games , i mean the gap between the trailers (that doesnt run on the console most of the time) and the actual game.

I agree, I remember seeing a gameplay video and demo of the first Watchdogs about a year before release and the video looked absolutely incredible so there was masses of hype, but after the game was finally released after long delays the final game had considerably inferior graphics so many people rightfully felt very ripped off, then the actual game itself wasn't even that enjoyable, it soon got really frustrating, laborious and even quite boring after a while. Overall it was a huge disappointment after seeing the original fake gameplay video which was more what they hoped it would be, rather than what they could really achieve on current hardware at the time on the full version. Watchdogs 2 claimed to improve what had gone wrong on the previous version, but even though it was somewhat better it still wasn't brilliant in my opinion and I now hope they've given up on the franchise for good, it would certainly take a lot to get me interested in a Watchdogs 3 and I wouldn't trust any pre-release gameplay videos or even demos after this.

Update: Ubisoft may be hinting of a Watchdogs 3, well I won't be buying it, please see:

Ubisoft may be hinting that Watch Dogs 3 is on the way | PC Gamer

 

[Iamnotarabot]

Yeah it still did some money apparently

But realy, this is easier to find a specific game that was hyped thanks to the franchise name and was not good at the end( Bioshock 2,ME andromeda ) , than an entiere overhyped franchise...

Something i find more general would be about fighting game at the moment...they try to hype them with a lot of advertizing ( like the last dragon ball game.) But a few months later you heard that the game that you bought day one will have new dlc characters, then a new version of the game with all the dlc, then another definitive ultimate edition...then an unlimited ultra definitive edition...and so on...

I realy find that horrible because people that buy the game day one and actually care and support it just get milked over and over again if they want to enjoy the entire game. And people that realy dont care and buy the game years later get a full game with all dlc included for the price of a regular game...

 

[Ezra]

WOW and Minecraft come to mind.

 

[Iamnotarabot]

I am a vanilla player of wow and it was so awesome ! Ofc things change and now Wow looks like a dead game, especially because blizzard refuse to merge some servers etc, a friend ask me to try wow again and just playing completely alone for the first 20lv killed it...

Ofc before Wow , DAOC was already out and already provided an amazing MMORPG experience if not one of the best, but, WOW made it mainstream and put the MMO gendra in front, for years other compagnies tried to create another MMO that would kill wow and it never happened.

And minecraft also invented another gendra of gaming , i often come back to this game from time to time for a little session.

I find that pretty harsh to criticize games like that now^^' ofc they are older now but at their own time they changed gaming...


But I see what you mean, this is not because a game is successfull and has impact on the industry that this game is good, but , as a player I played WOW and Minecraft and I can tell you the success was deserved in my opinion ^^

What about league of legends then? thats one of the game i played the most recently and for the first time i wish i didnt play a game^^' so addictive and yet so empty ! That's what i would call an overrated game^^' You basically do the same thing over and over again.

But they managed to use the new streaming thing to create the hype for the game , thats now very common to use streaming for that !

 

[Ezra]

I have only played one game regularly for 2.5 years so there's so much I don't know about games and gaming. I just know when, after hearing so much about wow and minecraft, being very unimpressed when I checked them out.

 

[Iamnotarabot]

Yeah that seems normal then, To be fair I think that gaming is one of my specific interest ^^

But realy, when i played WOW at release as a teenager, it was amazing, no one knew how to play it , places were very crowded and it was realy easy to make online friends, traveling this new "world" ( when you dont have the required level its even funnier) , the first raids, the World bosses that you tried to take down with randoms players xD etc...

Wow was one of the first game that created troubles IRL for me^^' Looking back at it I even think I had some ASD behaviors with the game, for instance i couldnt go to school before i checked my mails in the game, and sometimes the servers were down so I had to wait xDDD and was late for class

In the other hand it made me do some sport since i had only 5 minute to reach school


Now the game is dead, places are empty ( well i guess one big city in a new extension is crowded but not like before i can tell you) , interractions with NPC are now reduced to the minimum, you dont even have trainers for your class...

But dark age of camelot was prior to Wow, and in some way deserved to have more succes, but internet wasnt good back then, so it was more an "elite" game , i mean for people who had the chance to have a good computer and good connection ! And a friend showed me this game it was realy amazing also ( but realy not good visually, thats why wow went for a cartoon look and it workded fine) , you had more freedom with your character and the PVP was better.

After I left wow,( My parents didnt want to pay anymore and they were right , plus I got kicked out of my guild for saying innapropriate things because you know... , i said that i coulnt play like before to my guild, and if i had some time to "waste" i would come back, but they didnt appreciate that I used this term so they kicked me out .)

I spend years trying to find another MMO and, no MMO felt like that realy...


The only thing i miss from the past is realy how gaming was

 

[pjcnet]

WOW and Minecraft come to mind.

Remember that World of Warcraft (WOW) was first released way back in November 2004 followed by numerous expansions. To make people realise how long ago that was in gaming, this was when the original Xbox and Playstation 2 were still the current gen consoles, so WOW was way ahead of it's time. It set a new standard in MMORPGs that many of MMOs copied for years after. Many people loved it or hated it, but even 13.5 years since it's initial release it still has a large following which is in my opinion an incredible achievement even though it is somewhat dated by some MMO standards today despite continuous improvements over the years. For this reason I don't think WOW should be classed as overrated even though it is obviously showing it's age now, although the latest expansions are in my opinion somewhat overrated.

PS: Many people might complain that WOW has a monthly subscription charge after paying for the game and expansions, no it's not great, but it is definitely much better than having so called "free to play" games where you are constantly nagged to spend real money in the cash shop to avoid awful grinding, to make the game a lot more convenient (E.g. by expanding your carry capacity) or worse to give you a direct game advantage (E.g. to buy exclusive better weapons, this is known as "pay to win"). When I played WOW about 8 years ago I was very impressed by their customer service, when I sent a support message they'd always be back to me within the hour and they'd talk to you in full role play to your character name in game, I felt like I was paying for a great service. There are now numerous unofficial WOW private "emulated" servers that are usually funded by optional donations, some of which may have perks for donating or even their own cash shop and they're usually modified so you for instance level up many times faster, while many have their own events and some are heavily modded. The legality of private servers for WOW without permission from Blizzard or similar private servers for any other MMO is however extremely questionable and it is in my opinion a type of piracy, especially if you haven't even purchased the game and any expansions that are used, even though many services have survived for years through what I suspect is a loop hole in the law that they're exploiting. I have personally never used a WOW private server and if you play WOW I recommend playing on the official servers while supporting the developer.

 

[Iamnotarabot]

You nailed it perfectly, couldnt say anything more about WOW and MMO in general

 

[Ezra]

I play lotro which is just about to have its 11th anniversary. It has expanded quite a bit to include just about all of Middle-Earth, but the graphics are about the same as in 2007. And I am still amazed with it. Like I can spend hours riding my horse across it. And all the detail and hidden places I'm still discovering.

 

[pjcnet]

I play lotro which is just about to have its 11th anniversary. It has expanded quite a bit to include just about all of Middle-Earth, but the graphics are about the same as in 2007. And I am still amazed with it. Like I can spend hours riding my horse across it. And all the detail and hidden places I'm still discovering.

I played LOTRO for about a year and I loved it even though graphically it is only average being an old game, it makes up for it in story, gameplay and a massive open world. Best of all the user base is very mature compared to most other MMOs and I became an officer in a kinship (a guild of members) for a while that they took extremely seriously with regularly meetings via Teamspeak (I found voice talking directly difficult however, I find non real time text conversions like forums the easiest and I can just about cope with live text chat after I had a lot of practice).

I did however end up spending a good few hundred pounds extra in the cash shop even as a VIP subscription paying member with a limited monthly cash shop budget included and you could always spend a lot more, that's by far the worst thing about LOTRO which has one of the worst and also greedy "free to play" models in my opinion with a lot of pay to win elements where you can even pay real money to add permanent stat attributes directly to a character that you won't find in game, then you have to pay all over again if you have multiple characters for absolutely everything and there's masses of different things. If you attempted to play for free you are ridiculously restricted with just about everything and you're at a huge disadvantage, you even have to pay real money to unlock quest packs after the first 2 areas, although theoretically you can earn just enough in game to unlock them if you are extremely careful and spend literally many hours very carefully grinding, E.g. kill 250 of one monster, literally 500 of another, Etc. Etc. On top of all this each new expansion was the cost of a full price game and it's a great shame they exploit players this way. I wish you could just pay for the game and then pay a monthly subscription for everything without any real money cash shop what-so-ever. Guild Wars 2 was even better where you paid for the game with no subscription what-so-ever along with only a strictly cosmetic real cash shop that truly isn't necessary, there was loads of free content added and events just like any subscription based MMO. I believe there is a paid expansion available now, but it's not taking the p**s like LOTRO.

I wouldn't consider any of the MMORPGs mentioned so far as greatly overrated however, although one of the worst gaming disasters of all time was the first release of Final Fantasy XIV, it was hyped to death, but after release it was so bad that Square Enix formally apologised and gave everyone months of free subscription while they tried to sort it out, but after a while they realised that due to the way it had been designed it was almost impossible to support and rectify all the issues, so they finally gave up, closed down the servers and after a long wait without any service they completely remade the game from scratch to Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn which they gave to all purchasers of the original game including myself for free. This in my opinion makes the original release one of the most overrated MMORPGs ever, well at least before it was released, but I still see Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn as overrated, I played for a month and couldn't really get into it, yet I've enjoyed many other Final Fantasy games even though some people consider it an overrated franchise in general.

 

[Mr Allen]

Final Fantasy 7, 8 and 9 sucked IMO, but of course they were loved up by hardcore Sony zealots who love all their exclusives.