Shinobi’s Dissapointment
I have spent countless hours playing many various games, and as any gamer has their strong opinions that may lead to pitchforks and stakes. In this article, I am going to express just that, but give my reasons as to why I feel these titles got way more attention than they should have.
Note that I did very much enjoy these games or am not currently enjoying them, but there are some serious flaws that many people overlooked. Here are my current top 10 games that I feel are massively overrated.
10. Skyrim
I have always loved the Elder Scrolls series, in fact, my favorite one is Oblivion. Skyrim, despite my love for the game, is grossly overrated for the community.
Though the game has so much to offer in terms of content and great story plot, it suffers from generic side quests, sub-par characters, and the dragons got old. While I loved the exploration, I could not tell you any major side quest that stood out to me. If anything, as I explored the world what stood out to me the most were the random dungeons in hidden caves, the crypts, and even the townspeople.
I could not even tell you most of the names of the characters that can be used as companions, whereas in Oblivion at least everyone seemed to have personality. The dragons also started out very intimidating, but over time they felt overused and the magic was lost. The combat also felt the same as the previous entries, but less broken (we all remember maxing acrobatics) which is overall generic. I still loved Skyrim, I even took the time to 100 percent the game, but it is far from a perfect game.
9. Far Cry 5
I am a huge fan of the Far Cry series, in fact, I would argue that Far Cry 3 is a near-perfect game. Unfortunately, I actually did not enjoy the fifth game whatsoever. This will probably be more so opinion than any facts for my reasons for disliking, but for me, the franchise has always been about exploring unknown territories and overcoming regimes.
Fighting Vaas, Anton, even Pagan Min they all felt real, and fought for their own real reasons. Whether they wanted to torture the innocent and rule with an iron fist of insanity, they all had so much personality and gave you a real reason to liberate the people whether it involved you personally or not. In Far Cry 5, it all felt forced and more like a horror show. It felt so far from what the series is I can’t even begin to explain.
The Seeds were just glorified cultists hypnotizing people to rally to their cause. They of course took over Hope Country in hillbilly Montana, which felt to me like a bad horror movie. The game also suffered from way too many minigames, useless fashion, and just plain was not Far Cry at all.
8. Final Fantasy 7 (Original Game, Spoilers)
Final Fantasy is my ultimate favorite franchise, but 7 is way down on the list. This is due to the fact that the story had so many plot issues they are splitting the remakes and admitted to needing to fix the story due to poor translation.
I mean why is Rufus alive? The dude should be dust due to Diamond. Also, what are these clones of Sephiroth? Are they clones? There is no context at all. Why did Tifa keep quiet if she knew Cloud was impersonating Zack? They are literally like best friends.
What is Vincent? Is he a vampire? What on Earth is with the coffin. How did Cloud come back from Mako poisoning? In addition, Cloud is one of the lamest characters in the game. Literally in Crisis Core Zack, the real MVP goes to fight an army alone because Cloud passes out and is useless. He then goes on believing he is Zack and legitimately steals his girl who is also kind of useless. On top of all of this, it is also the most exploitable Final Fantasy game outside of 10 due to Materia combos on gear.
For example, you can totally throw quadra on KOTR and kill Emerald Weapon in what should be seconds but due to unskippable cutscenes, it takes a bit. Unlike my previous rant, I do still have some love for this game but it is far from being one of the best Final Fantasy games.
7. Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey
Our beloved franchise Assassin’s Creed has taken an odd turn, and I don’t know how to feel about it. While the newer games have a lot to offer, they certainly feel like they have strayed from the path.
The newer games also feel as if they conflict with the plot line a bit, but that’s not what I am basing my points on. Assassin’s Creed Odyssey felt like an unorganized mess. While the combat was great, and the atmosphere and environment downright beautiful, the game suffered from an overload of unorganized side content. It was also just overwhelming.
You had your side quests like any RPG generally offers, as well as collectibles, but then you ended up with this crazy hit list that never ended and a list of random cultists on top of that. This hitlist, which isn’t even a hit list like it was in Origin, featured a bunch of generals that you would kill, and then there would be a new one popping up. They would always get stronger and drop new gear, but honestly, it should have had an end. The Cultists at least had a limit and actual people, but they provided no real story to them and there were like 45 of them.
The only one that had a relevant plot was due to the fact that they were your brother/sister and the main villain. While side content is good, this game felt completely random as if the developers were like, here this sounds cool to let us throw it in the pot and see if it works. Origin actually felt organized and perfectly balanced in comparison which comes to show that there is a limit and that bigger and more is not necessarily better.
6. Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
Despite the odd turn, this franchise has taken as previously stated, I was actually excited for Valhalla due to loving Viking history. Sadly, the game just did not work (thanks Ubi) and the ending did not make any sense at all.
Why is Desmond alive? Is he actually alive? Why is only Odin referred to as an Isu? How on Earth is Layla helping in the Grey? Why was the giant Animus turned into a myth and how was it filled with simulations that mimicked Valhalla? How is that relevant to anything? Also, Eivor changing sexes seems like tampering with history.
The game also just did not work. It suffered from crashes, endless glitches, and performance issues on all platforms. There were bugs that caused players to lose days’ worth of progress. It was a poor-quality title that could have been so much better due to the great gameplay and exploration. Not to mention, upgrading your camp was a huge bonus and fun.
5. Dark Souls 2
Dark Souls 2 was a game that you could tell Miyazaki hardly touched. What games love in their Souls games are unique challenging bosses, exploration, and ultimately to die.
The second game suffered from so much story-wise, the only aspects it had going for it was good PVP and DLC. The problem with the game is that it was riddled with half-assed bosses and way too many bosses. The atmosphere also felt incredibly boring and lackluster.
In any good Souls game, you usually have around 20 bosses give or take, and all of them are brutal and require some kind of strategy. Dark Souls 2 has over 30 bosses and most of them are easy and feel half-assed in design. It feels like they didn’t even try to put in effort for the game and just took a steaming pile of crappy bosses and threw them at the wall to see if they stick.
4. Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Legend of Zelda: BOTW surprised everyone with its major switch up to an open-world RPG. Wild the game is great and absolutely gorgeous, there are some major flaws in the game that I feel kept it from being anywhere near perfect. First and foremost the game had no direction.
Usually, in an open-world game, you have some kind of structure in terms of direction and leveling. For example, quests will usually lead you to areas that have enemies geared toward your level and progress as you progress. Witcher, Elderscrolls, Dragon Age, and even Dragons Dogma serve as great examples.
This particular game has no real level progression and tried to keep to its roots by having you as Link collect more hearts and stamina, and was primarily gear-based. Unfortunately due to the lack of structure and keeping to the roots, you can most certainly choose whatever path you want to take but may very much die on the way.
The enemies do get harder as you branch out and due to the poor weapon durability system, you need to try and bulk up on weapons early game that you think will help until you find better ones. This can prove to be overwhelming for fans that are used to more structure in their open-world RPGs or used to the linear Zelda games that came prior. Still a great story for fans who love the series.
3. The Last of Us
Last of Us had so much potential to be a great game for me. The game had great gameplay, and heartbreaking plot, and overall perfectly designed characters. This was all ruined for me due to the crap of an ending. Joel and Ellie went through so much hardship and character development together, and it all led up to what should have been a heartbreaking sacrifice at the end.
They should not have both walked away at the end, one of them most certainly survived as a cause and effect for technically dooming the world. Instead, they both walk away without and repercussions, only for Joel to die a half-assed death in the sequel. The ending actually killed the story for me, which kills me because I had so much love for the game and then it just ended like that.
2. Horizon Zero Dawn
Horizon Zero Dawn had so much potential but suffered from a lack of content, exploration incentive, redundant combat, and poor character consistency. This game got so much love but missed so much that could have made the game as great as people make it out to be. The side quests felt boring, which would not be a huge problem if the world was not lacking too.
There were so many cool enemies to fight, but not many hidden locations with loot to discover, only some collectibles here and there like artifacts. The combat felt insanely redundant, consisting of grappling, shooting your arrows, and occasionally hitting with a stick.
The developers should have added way more such as combos between the staff and bow, maybe some cool new hidden moves. Also what was up with Alloy? She’d go so far out of her way to help random villagers she never met but can’t give her basically dad help and acts like it’s not her problem? Your dialogue choices also never affected anything. If it weren’t for the actually interesting plot I probably would not have finished the game at all.
1. Outerworlds
I really can’t find a reason as to why this game became so popular. The concept was cool, but the overall story delivery and gameplay were crap. I mean what I did like was the plot concept and the fact that you could kill anyone in the game and it would bar your progression. I also enjoyed that you could play the game in various ways.
Sadly, the game just felt like a mess. First off, the game needed character classes to help organize and create limitations. You can literally dump your points into anything and still carry any weapon. For example, I created a rogue to try and stealth my way through the game but I didn’t even need to. I literally could pick up a flame thrower and maul through my enemies.
This brings me to my next point, the drop rate for weapons is overkill. Why on Earth does the game have a weapon modification option if you pick up something ten times stronger in the next two minutes. Which leads to my next point, why is the game stupidly easy? I mean not every game has to be insanely difficult but if I choose hard in difficulty it should not feel like easy mode. Lastly, the story was so rushed and short that I felt like the game should not have even been an action roleplaying game. This game did not deserve the scores it got at all.
Please Don’t Kill Me
These are the reasons I felt these titles were not as good as people claim. If you feel different, please share your thoughts!
Otherwise, don’t burn me at the stake!
Veteran gamer, tech nerd, comic addict, anime lover, and just your average introverted weeb.
