Secret best games ever that nobody (or very few others) has played?

[Deleted member 7462]

This is a fantastic Punch-Out!! clone. It's really, really good, actually, and deserved more love.

This is a fun behind-view shmup. It's good Starfox-lite.

This is actually a very good golf sim! It's got swing mechanics that feel really good, and the putting mechanics are excellent.

This is one of the two best Nintendo games ever made. Yes, I'm serious.

I really love the Virtual Boy. Well, not the hardware; it sucked. The games, though...love a number of 'em.

 

[xir]

also Counterfeit Monkey, a literal text adventure
-
Counterfeit Monkey is a classic. My old post:

tldr at the boilerplate: Emily Short is a great game creator and her latest work, Counterfeit Monkey is fantastic, while espousing some core game mechanics you wouldn't expect in a... Also: Metroidvania Zork.

The easy answer: It's a text adventure.

Now, like how Scott McCloud would have you call comic books, graphic novels, most would have you call text adventures the more erudite Interactive Fiction. What's funny about Counterfeit Monkey is that it is quite literally a text adventure.

i can edit posts from years ago? 2017

You awake confused, conjoined, configured as a living portmanteau called Alexandra. You are Andra. The other person running the internal monologue is Alex. What? The crazy is dripped, and it works with a very strict internal logic that's not unwilling to be just general logic. Even here, with text adventures having a traditional with the second person as the narrative toure de force, we get a little extra. Amnesia is played out, but having your character's brain be a timeshare allows for a lot of great conceits to play out, bolstered by a great verb REMEMBER that allows you to recall Alex and Andra's specific memories about things you come across. In media res is good and all, but if you put me in someone shoes, let me know a bit.

(I will know spoil the first real puzzle of the game. It made me audibly squeal with pleasure, as I ignored the tutorial messages that would have made my manipulate my environment without a payoff.)

So, as a groggy not-quite-entirely amnesiac, you find the streets of Atlantis empty. There's a holiday. Maybe gerunds are being celebrated? The streets are empty, you need to recover your (Andra's) stuff, as well as Alex's backpack, squirreled away in an art cinema.

There's a gate, a padlock that needs a numerical code. You are by a museum, which has an ancient codex in the window. But really, it's more of just a codex. The idea of ancientness isn't really applied to it. That will important later on. On your person is a simple letter remover.

What the hell is a letter remover? Well, examining it and futzing about, and that big old X on the codex inspires some thought.

> USE X-REMOVER ON CODEX

Hot damn, we have ourselves a code. The door is open, and we proceed.

The base "weapon" of the game is the letter remover, but we are given to the perverted art projects of serial palindrome enthusiasts, homonym paddles (a toolbox screwdriver becomes a refreshing adult beverage) as well umlaut punchers, and the amazing anagram gun.

Your letter remover itself is upgraded throughout the game to make abstracts and living things. Gels and pastes, inserters, British spellings, and the Basque language all come up with satiric bits that makes the parts of speech more lively than any English teacher could wish.

Did I mention this game has multiple solutions? More spoilers. You need fuel. i was able to spare removing the N's from my funnel (leading to the anagram gun making a delightful elf nun later on.) Hard mode adds adjectives to a lot of items, giving even more replay, making that pear into a prickly pear, not so easy to make into an ear. You know, to scare the young american at the hostel who likes those Eli Roth films?

Did I mention this game has achievements? Again, spoilers. There's a cinema, with a projector. I have a letter. Later, I can make abstracts, remove the t's and have a leer. Nasty thing. I take it to the art project that reflects words spellings, and get a reel; a fishing reel. I take the reel to the licensed bartender who has that homonym paddle, she hits it and I know have a film reel. I watch it. I get an achievement.

Adventure games were always filled with great little moments off the beaten track that would reward you with their content. Achievements may be dumb, but the acknowledgment works with the faint metroid feel I get from the abilities and areas I uncover.

Ok, that's enough, but the plot is also fun and highly allegoric (I love that stuff) there's only a few real speedbumps, and with the nouns being the thing, the guess the verb stigma of interactive fiction is slight.

A great game, and a great text adventure.

XYZZY

Say yoho

oh yeah get it here http://emshort.wordpress.com/2012/12...erfeit-monkey/

 

[Deleted member 18407]

NES Puzzle game with unique gameplay, wonderful character design and memorable music. I never see anyone talking about it, but it holds up today and I spent hours with it as a kid.

Click to shrink...

I'll second this game too. I got it for my birthday one year as a kid and it's still one of the best birthday presents I've ever received. Brilliant mix of puzzle and action gameplay that knows how to toy with player expectations. My neighbor's dad kept borrowing my copy back in the day. He was obsessed with it.

 

[Poimandres]

Prinny on PSP is one of the best G&G style games ever made. I really think it deserves a port to other platforms.

 

[Distantmantra]

FROM Software developed this title for Bandai Namco in between the first two Dark Souls games. I'm guessing it was mostly by the Another Century's Episode team, and it shows. Space based combat with some basic squad based setups with mobile suits and capital ships. It was never released outside Japan but if you're familiar with the Gundam Unicorn storyline you're good to go.

 

[Mushlikeahusky]

After seeing Deadpool 2 I got the high moon game on ps4. It's extremly fun writting and the combat is fun and satisfying. The upgrades are cool too and feels awesome to play .

 

[Twilight Suzuka]

Rusty's Real Deal Baseball

 

[ignata]

My answer for these types of threads is Every Extend Extra Extreme. It's probably the most overlooked Q game but it's easily my favorite. You could probably say this about a lot of games but it feels like if arcades were still around this is the type of game we'd be getting. Addictive gameplay with just the right amount of strategy and fun and ridiculously high scores. I wasn't able to play it for years as it was a 360 exclusive and I ended up selling mine, but it along with Panzer Dragoon Orta and Burnout Paradise are what pushed me over the edge to buy an Xbox One S as it is now backwards compatiable.

 

[Deleted member 7462]

also Counterfeit Monkey, a literal text adventure
-
Counterfeit Monkey is a classic. My old post:

tldr at the boilerplate: Emily Short is a great game creator and her latest work, Counterfeit Monkey is fantastic, while espousing some core game mechanics you wouldn't expect in a... Also: Metroidvania Zork.

The easy answer: It's a text adventure.

Now, like how Scott McCloud would have you call comic books, graphic novels, most would have you call text adventures the more erudite Interactive Fiction. What's funny about Counterfeit Monkey is that it is quite literally a text adventure.

i can edit posts from years ago? 2017

You awake confused, conjoined, configured as a living portmanteau called Alexandra. You are Andra. The other person running the internal monologue is Alex. What? The crazy is dripped, and it works with a very strict internal logic that's not unwilling to be just general logic. Even here, with text adventures having a traditional with the second person as the narrative toure de force, we get a little extra. Amnesia is played out, but having your character's brain be a timeshare allows for a lot of great conceits to play out, bolstered by a great verb REMEMBER that allows you to recall Alex and Andra's specific memories about things you come across. In media res is good and all, but if you put me in someone shoes, let me know a bit.

(I will know spoil the first real puzzle of the game. It made me audibly squeal with pleasure, as I ignored the tutorial messages that would have made my manipulate my environment without a payoff.)

So, as a groggy not-quite-entirely amnesiac, you find the streets of Atlantis empty. There's a holiday. Maybe gerunds are being celebrated? The streets are empty, you need to recover your (Andra's) stuff, as well as Alex's backpack, squirreled away in an art cinema.

There's a gate, a padlock that needs a numerical code. You are by a museum, which has an ancient codex in the window. But really, it's more of just a codex. The idea of ancientness isn't really applied to it. That will important later on. On your person is a simple letter remover.

What the hell is a letter remover? Well, examining it and futzing about, and that big old X on the codex inspires some thought.

> USE X-REMOVER ON CODEX

Hot damn, we have ourselves a code. The door is open, and we proceed.

The base "weapon" of the game is the letter remover, but we are given to the perverted art projects of serial palindrome enthusiasts, homonym paddles (a toolbox screwdriver becomes a refreshing adult beverage) as well umlaut punchers, and the amazing anagram gun.

Your letter remover itself is upgraded throughout the game to make abstracts and living things. Gels and pastes, inserters, British spellings, and the Basque language all come up with satiric bits that makes the parts of speech more lively than any English teacher could wish.

Did I mention this game has multiple solutions? More spoilers. You need fuel. i was able to spare removing the N's from my funnel (leading to the anagram gun making a delightful elf nun later on.) Hard mode adds adjectives to a lot of items, giving even more replay, making that pear into a prickly pear, not so easy to make into an ear. You know, to scare the young american at the hostel who likes those Eli Roth films?

Did I mention this game has achievements? Again, spoilers. There's a cinema, with a projector. I have a letter. Later, I can make abstracts, remove the t's and have a leer. Nasty thing. I take it to the art project that reflects words spellings, and get a reel; a fishing reel. I take the reel to the licensed bartender who has that homonym paddle, she hits it and I know have a film reel. I watch it. I get an achievement.

Adventure games were always filled with great little moments off the beaten track that would reward you with their content. Achievements may be dumb, but the acknowledgment works with the faint metroid feel I get from the abilities and areas I uncover.

Ok, that's enough, but the plot is also fun and highly allegoric (I love that stuff) there's only a few real speedbumps, and with the nouns being the thing, the guess the verb stigma of interactive fiction is slight.

A great game, and a great text adventure.

XYZZY

Say yoho

oh yeah get it here http://emshort.wordpress.com/2012/12...erfeit-monkey/

Click to shrink...

COUNTERFEIT MONKEY IS FUCKING GREAT

Emily Short is a fucking genius.

This is as close to a Thursday Next game as we'll ever get.

 

[Monorojo]

Sky gunner is a classic plagued by slowdown

 

[Twilight Suzuka]

Everyone I talk to has never heard of Zombie Army Trilogy. It's one of my favorites ever.

Click to shrink...

I'll vouch for this. Its one of my favorite TPS games after Resident Evil 4, 5, 6 and Vanquish. Its way more fun than I expected. Tons of content too.

 

[xir]

COUNTERFEIT MONKEY IS FUCKING GREAT

Emily Short is a fucking genius.

This is as close to a Thursday Next game as we'll ever get.

Click to shrink...

you sir/madam have taste. what is thursday next? the wikipedia is a wall of text

 

[Nairume]

Lufia 2 is a top three SNES RPG. You know it if you are into SNES RPG's, you don't if you aren't though.

Click to shrink...

Building off of this, Lufia 3 gets slept on a lot for not being Lufia 2-2, but it really is a hidden gem as far as Gameboy RPGs go. Despite dropping the Zelda-lite dungeon design for randomized dungeons, it still ends up being an otherwise incredibly comprehensive RPG experience for very aged hardware that manages to be just as sprawling and fun as its console peers.

 

[Conciliator]

i agree that Lufia 2 should be considered in like the patheon of great SNES jrpgs, and it usually isn't and idk why.

EDIT: one thing I'll say is I don't think the characters are nearly as memorable or iconic in Lufia 2 as like chars from FF6 and Chrono Trigger or what not. That could be part of it.

 

[Force_XXI]

Super Tennis is one of the goat vs games for 16-bit era

 

[Deleted member 7462]

you sir/madam have taste. what is thursday next? the wikipedia is a wall of text

Click to shrink...

Thursday Next, in brief, is a series of books about a woman with the power to enter the BookWorld, where stories are constructed and all of the characters from literature actually exist. In the BookWorld, she solves cases and works as enforcement.

The books play a whole lot with words and narrative tropes; for example, there is a mispeling vyrus that, when it touches words, warps them into representations of the mispeled word: a small terrier turns into a misty gray cloud when the mispeling vyrus turns "dog" into "fog."

The author, Jasper Fforde, is a master of wordplay and has lots of fun with spelling and grammar as part of his stories, and I always wondered what a Thursday Next adventure game would look like. Emily Short kinda gave me a glimpse of that with Counterfeit Monkey, I think.

 

[4859]

Not my favorite game of all time, but this sure as hell is a fantastic new IP and should be played by more people. Combines the best aspects of MonHun, Animal Crossing,and The Legend of Zelda.

Click to shrink...

I get animal crossing, with the town building and collecting citizens with jobs and whatnot.

And zelda... sure it has dungeons (wish it had more).

But what does this take from monhun? And the beat of king in at that?

It has an irritating loot grind... but that's not what i woild consider the best of monster hunter. In particular it seems to be missing, well, the monsters. Unless you consider a monhun full of nothing but the itsy bitsies the best of monhun.

But yeah, it' pretty good.

 

[Weltall Zero]

Rocket Knight Adventures.

Superb platforming, catchy soundtrack, wonderful art style.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, nobody played RKA. Nobody. :D

CrossCode

I see so little people talking about this game.
Its amazing. Fantastic art and music. Great writing and characters. Superb gameplay.

Click to shrink...

It's been sitting at the very first spot of my wishlist for years; I'm just waiting for it to leave Early Access. The demo truly and completely blew me away.

It's kind of funny because I had a parallel experience to this: around the same time, I played the demo of another game in development that also blew me away; but, like Cross Code, nobody seemed to know or talk about the game. Years passed as I occassionally thought of the demo, until out of the blue the game was finally released, and it did get the recognition I thought it deserved. That game was Undertale. :)

 

[Scar]

Guardians crusade

 

[Terraforce]

I get animal crossing, with the town building and collecting citizens with jobs and whatnot.

And zelda... sure it has dungeons (wish it had more).

But what does this take from monhun? And the beat of king in at that?

It has an irritating loot grind... but that's not what i woild consider the best of monster hunter. In particular it seems to be missing, well, the monsters. Unless you consider a monhun full of nothing but the itsy bitsies the best of monhun.

But yeah, it' pretty good.

Click to shrink...

The loot collection system, and beating groups of monsters to collect supplies to upgrade your toolset is what I was referring to, yeah. Similar gameplay loop in that you can go out, defeat monsters, collect loot, then return to base to resupply and begin another hunt. Generally a very similar loop to what I associate with the MH series. Obviously not 1:1, but very similar.

 

[ASaiyan]

I'm just playing through the Remastered version of No Time To Explain, and holy shit, what a fantastic 2D platformer!

Every world has a different gimmick, and they all feel good and unique. Toughs as nails, too. The artstyle and humor have that Newgrounds flash feel that at this point could comfortably be called 'nostalgic'. The campaign may run a little short - but there's full Steam Workshop integration and tons of user-generated levels!

I'd never heard of this one before beyond the face in the TinyBuild logo. But I ended up getting a copy from a GiftBot giveaway. Do recommend!

 

[Waffle-Stomper]

His eyes... are also on the inside of his glasses..?

Click to shrink...

Yea lol, even in the tv show his eyes werent directly on his face. He takes his glasses off and his eyes with them :P

 

[Deleted member 11626]

Not so secret here, but Breakdown in original Xbox is fantastic. Very few people outside of enthusiasts seem to have played it in my experience

 

[Contact]

I don't see many people talk about it and I don't know if it was ever re-released, but it was one of my favorite games as a child. Really hard too as well.

 

[Datajoy]

Not sure how niche it is, but War of the Monsters is an awesome fighting game on PS2.

Destructible environments, cheesy but amazing monster designs, and pretty fun gameplay.. I loved this game as a kid. I was a Zorgulon player.

 

[4859]

The loot collection system, and beating groups of monsters to collect supplies to upgrade your toolset is what I was referring to, yeah. Similar gameplay loop in that you can go out, defeat monsters, collect loot, then return to base to resupply and begin another hunt. Generally a very similar loop to what I associate with the MH series. Obviously not 1:1, but very similar.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, yeah I totally see the loop.

But I just don't feel like the loop is worth shit. It's just progression gating.


The loop is probably the most replicated part of monhun, tons of studios make monhun loops, and they all fail at being decent monhuns... cause while they all focus on the loop... Monhun is about the action. Ain't nobody plays monhun for the tedious loop.

Don't get me wrong it can be addictive, but monhun is all about the fights, that's why it' lasted this long, and that's where all the clones fall short. None of them have the meat to make the loop worth it.


Ever oasis has that tedious loop as well, but it's adventure and world are worth it. For a good while anyways, I really burnt myself out obsessing over filling out every possible thing with the city and citizens, I probably should have just beat it sooner lol.

 

[Deleted member 7462]

Not so secret here, but Breakdown in original Xbox is fantastic. Very few people outside of enthusiasts seem to have played it in my experience

Click to shrink...

YEAH!

So many people are in here also mentioning awesome games that I didn't mention, but love!

I remember being so hyped for this when it came out, and then I got it and loved it, but no one else except for me and my friends played it (in between long bouts of Halo over LAN and Halo 2 over XBL).

I could just list a number of OG Xbox games here, too. Kung Fu Chaos, MVP 06: NCAA Baseball (the GOAT of baseball games, y'all), Gladius, GunValkyrie, etc., etc. These games are more known, maybe too known to be mentioned here, but no one really talks about them.

 

[Deleted member 33571]

Cubivore: Survival of the Fittest is maybe my favorite game of all time. It's deeply relaxing and strange and hits a certain sense of humor and overall aesthetic that's pretty much the best. It was co-developed by Intelligent Systems and Nintendo published it in Japan but I guess wanted to nothing to do with it after that, so Atlus picked up the NA localization and it's just wonderful. I'm pretty sure very few people have played it and I think it's only later presence in Nintendo's lineup is as a trophy in Brawl, so I don't expect it'll ever come back in anyway, but I super highly recommend it to anyone who loves the weirder GCN and PS2 games from the early 2000s.

Also, huge ups to Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime, mentioned earlier in the thread, one of my favorite DS games for sure; it kills me that neither of the sequels made it outside of Japan.

 

[Baron Von Beans]

The game that got me into gaming.

Click to shrink...

This was one of the first PC games I played. I wouldn't mind giving it another shot today. See if it takes me back 20+ years

 

[Guv_Bubbs]

Nobody I know talks about this game but It was a big deal to me as a kid. I went back and played them a few years ago and they're both still amazing!

TOMBI! / TOMBA!

A colorful and unique platformer from Whoopee Games and Tokuro Fujiwara, the creator of Mega Man.

 

[CGriffiths86]

Amplitude/ Frequency on PS2

 

[kubev]

Illbleed (Dreamcast)

Easily one of the most unique horror games in existence. The sixth level in particular is absolutely crazy. It's not exactly easy to pick up and play, but everyone should watch Game Informer's Super Replay of Illbleed to see just what the game has to offer.



Favorite excerpt from the trailer: "You'll vomit with excitement. You'll puke with pleasure. You'll shit with fear."

 

[Majora's Mask]

Click to shrink...

This. One of my favorite gamecube games. I'd be pleased if Nintendo ever decides to release the GC version on the Switch, let alone make a new entry.

To add another game: Shadowgate 64: Trials of the Four Towers. I absolutely adore this game and not many people played it as far as I know.

 

[nilbog]

Clash at Demonhead. A wildly addictive non-linear adventure game for the NES.



The Bonk series. Some of the best platforming times I've had.

 

[TheWorthyEdge]

Nex Machina

Click to shrink...

This and Prey. What a year last year was to make these games suffer...

 

[Barn]

UnapologeticallyBLK mentioned it in passing, but Gladius is my go-to response for this topic.

This was a strategy RPG with dual narratives available on every major platform that had you recruiting and customizing your own band of gladiators for fantasty-infused coliseum battles. You could recruit everything from people to yetis, and the battle system was just as fun as the party management. You could even battle your custom party against your friends, plus it had great production values and score, typical of the LucasArts we used to know. Something like this with today's graphical fidelity and online play would just be absolutely killer.

 

[Shpeshal Nick]

Record of Lodoss War - Dreamcast
Power Stone - Dreamcast
Maximo - PS2
Klonoa 2 - PS2
Sunset Overdirve - Xbox One
ZombiU - WiiU
Battle Chess - PC
Killzone Liberation - PSP

 

[Cloud-Hidden]

I think going through Rhythm Heaven Megamix blind for the first time, having never played a Rhythm Heaven game before, is one of the purest video game experiences in which a human being can indulge in this life.

 

[EvanTheGamer]

Secret of Evermore?

People seem to only talk about Secret of Mana. While it too is an awesome game, I vastly preferred Evermore for its western ideas and quirkiness.

 

[Deleted member 11413]

Record of Lodoss War - Dreamcast
Power Stone - Dreamcast
Maximo - PS2
Klonoa 2 - PS2
Sunset Overdirve - Xbox One
ZombiU - WiiU
Battle Chess - PC
Killzone Liberation - PSP

Click to shrink...

These two are especially good picks. Klonoa as a series in general is incredibly underrated, but I don't think most people even know Klonoa got a sequel on the PS2, and it's easily the best pure platformer on the system. Maximo is a great action platformer as well, the ability system is genius. Apparently there was a third game in development but it was canceled :(

 

[Aminga]

His eyes... are also on the inside of his glasses..?

Click to shrink...

In case your not aware the game is based off a late night t.v. show that I grew up watching. Pretty funny it's probably on YouTube nowadays. And yes his eyeballs are detached from his actual head lol.

 

[Shpeshal Nick]

These two are especially good picks. Klonoa as a series in general is incredibly underrated, but I don't think most people even know Klonoa got a sequel on the PS2, and it's easily the best pure platformer on the system. Maximo is a great action platformer as well, the ability system is genius. Apparently there was a third game in development but it was canceled :(

Click to shrink...

I'd give anything for Maximo 3.

Don't give a baker's fuck who funds it. Sony, Nintendo, Microsoft, I just want SOMEONE to fund it. Hell, fund remasters to help fund a 3rd game. Just please give me more Maximo. The time is right.

 

[sketch_turntable]

Mine would be G.I. Joe on the NES. One of my fav NES games.

 

[brambles13]

I came to post Shining Force III

I think if more people had played it it would be widely considered one of the top SRPGs ever

Click to shrink...

It is the best SRPG ever with the English translations of the rest of the trilogy. Imo nothing even comes all that close. Sega/Camelot could make decent money doing a remake of the trilogy with a global release on all modern platforms. Fire Emblem shows the genre has potential to sell well.

My other answer is Dragon Force for Sega Saturn. Imo the greatest I have ever played and the most addictive. It is a strategy game from 1996 with beautiful graphics, fun gameplay that isn't too hard to get into, and great localization by Working Designs. The manual is also beautiful.

 

[johndoe8865]

Shadow of Rome

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_of_Rome

PS2/Xbox Era had a lot of underappreciated gems like this.

 

[wossname]

Galleon

Click to shrink...

Good shout. I played through this recently and while it's not perfect it does some interesting things with control and movement which it would have been good to see other games adopt and refine. It really nails the sweaty palms feeling of climbing up really high places.

I'll also echo mentions of Ninja Five-O, Gregory Horror Show, Silent Bomber and Kalimba. Everyone buy Kalimba, it's a great platformer with fun, original mechanics and great presentation.


My nomination for the thread would be TerRover, a now-delisted PS3 download-exclusive physics platformer (so good luck finding a copy now). It didn't review particularly well, mainly due to its very loose controls but once you get used to them it's great

 

[Deleted member 11413]

I'd give anything for Maximo 3.

Don't give a baker's fuck who funds it. Sony, Nintendo, Microsoft, I just want SOMEONE to fund it. Hell, fund remasters to help fund a 3rd game. Just please give me more Maximo. The time is right.

Click to shrink...

Have you seen the footage of the prototype of 3? It looked interesting but a little too close to Prince of Persia imo. Still, I'd rather that than nothing at all.

 

[0ptimusPayne]

Anybody else play Beyond Oasis on Sega genesis?? I fking loved that damn game growing up seriously.

 

[Deleted member 279]

Gotcha Force on gamecube

Super Robot Wars series

Legend of Legaia

Tomba

Ogre Battle series

 

[vjoez55]

EA old school gem a rip off to resident evil but a really good one imo.

Also:

Policenauts
Goemon 64
Headhunter Dreamcast
illusion of Gaia


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