Games That, Against All Reason, You Need to Beat

[ECM]

This is kinda a weird, specialized, topic, so maybe I'm alone in this, but I have a few games that, though I don't much care for them, I keep trying to beat them, just because I have to!:

Light Crusader: I really can't stand this, all the worse because it's a Treasure game (their absolute worst, by far, I think), but I feel the masochistic need to actually finish it so I can say I beat all of their games. (I've been working on this feat of gaming fortitude since it came out...in 1995.)

Dragon Warrior: I hate this game w/ a burning passion (Dragon Quest didn't really start for me until 3, and that was on SNES). I even hated it when it was new-ish because it felt like a really stupid Ultima (and there's actually some truth/accuracy to that statement). I try, every five years or so, to push my way through the originator of the Dragon Quest series but, my God, this might be one of those games better left in the past.

Quackshot Starring Donald Duck: it isn't that this pseudo-sequel to Castle of Illusion is terrible, it's just kinda...meh. I always manage to get what (I think) is about halfway through then, invariably, something important comes up (like clipping my toe nails) so I put it down, forget about it, and never quite get back to it until I do...then I end up clipping my toe nails again. (Even worse, I have actually finished the utterly abysmal Fantasia on Genesis.)

I need to stress that it isn't difficulty that holds me back on any of these--it's the not liking them part.

Anyway, that's three to get the ball rolling. I have more, but let's hear it from the peanut gallery!

Note!: this is not for games you *want* to beat because they're fun or that you never got back to for whatever reason. This is for games that you want to beat *against all reason*.

[ECM]

I still have nightmares about Sword of Sodan, and I beat that on the first day I owned it...but I'm not getting back into that game, ever, even on a conversational level.

And no (re: DW): I'm pretty sure that most people (including whatever a core gamer is defined as today) haven't beaten this 'gem', nor have they even played it. I have played it repeatedly, but I just can't go the distance because it makes me want to claw the eyes from my face! (And, again, the bigger problem, at the time, was that it was so...simple compared to Ultima and The Bard's Tale et al--it felt like stepping into a time machine and traveling back in time, even when it was new.)

[ECM]

Yeah, the "popularized" bit only even goes for Japan. That game didn't popularize anything in NA save for the (brute marketing) fact that you could get a free subscription to Nintendo Power w/ it (or vice-versa).

Hell, if you liked RPGs, up until the SNES (and then only barely), you pretty much had to be a PC gamer of some sort.

[runinruder]

Nintendo did a great job marketing Dragon Warrior. Remember that strategy guide they made for it? I think it came with an issue of Nintendo Power. It showed most of the enemies, and back then they seemed pretty damn cool, golems and werewolves and axemen and dragons and wyverns and so on. I wanted to keep playing just to encounter these things--even though, for the tougher ones, I'd just end up running away from them when I eventually did see them. And the guide had cool drawings of the weapons and whatnot. The flame sword looked badass, so I was willing to save up for hours to buy it in the game--even though, of course, you never actually got to see any cool-looking flame sword in the game.

That strategy guide ruled. As for the game, uh, let's see what I remember. I remember the field and battle tunes because the game would go back and forth and back and forth between them a ZILLION TIMES as I leveled up for hours and hours and hours (as leveling up was like 98% of the "adventure"). I distinctly remember staying up until the wee hours of the morning doing nothing but walking around fields killing wyverns for experience points. I leveled up just enough to be able to beat the last guy and I've never, ever returned to the game for any reason, and I hope I never, ever will.

What else do I remember... didn't you have to beat a green dragon to rescue a princess or something? And use menu commands for EVERYTHING from talking to using stairs?

I remember thinking Ultima Exodus was so much deeper and cooler. But I was pretty young at the time, and Exodus was kicking my ass every which way, so I kind of embraced shallow, straightforward Dragon Warrior. And the cool guide helped me have fun with it. Thinking about my experiences with the game doesn't pain me or anything, but I wasn't even close to being nostalgic enough about it to keep it, and yeah, it's best left in the past.

[ECM]

Yeah, SEGA sorta tried the same 'trick' w/ Phantasy Star 2 and (gag) Sword of Vermillion[footnote:1]This was the first hint that Yu Suzuki should never have gotten into making console games--too bad Hayay Nakayama didn't get that memo.[/foornote], by packing in a cool-ish strat guide. Granted, you didn't get free copies w/ Sega Visions, which would have made SoV, at least, a lot more tolerable ;D

[Borsalio]

I kinda liked Sword of Vermillion...but then, I don't think I ever played it for more than about an hour at a time.

As for Dragon Warrior, I did beat the GBC version of it, so if that counts, then I'm good. If it doesn't, well, I'm not going back to the NES one.

[ECM]

I tended to play RPGs in one continuous motion for hours and hours on end as a kid, so I don't think, until I was, like, 30, did I ever just put one hour at a time into an RPG. That probably would have saved me a lot of pain, though. (Then again, if I had gone hour-to-hour, I probably never would have completed SoV.)

[elchevalier]

Suikoden III, i might beat it some day, some day....

[feilong80]

I would say Dragon Warrior was exactly this way, and I'd even add Final Fantasy I to the mix. Both were classic examples of games that really hinted at a big awesome genre, so I really really really wanted to like them, but ultimately I could never drag them across the finish line. And, yes, over the years I have restarted both of these games. And still not finished them.

I think I had a lot more fun with FF1 as a kid, though, due to the party system. I thoroughly enjoyed naming all the chars after my friends! Which, at the time, was freaking awesome and revolutionary!

[kog3100edw]

I dunno. Usually if a game is compelling enough for me to want to beat it, it won't be against all reason. If I have a game that there's just no good reason to keep playing it, I won't. And that is usually decided for me long before it gets to be a personal grudge/goal to conquer it. I just won't get into it enough to be THAT invested in finishing it.

Having said that, there is one game that I didn't find enjoyable and yet was compelled to keep hammering at it to at least try to get an achievement for getting past a certain point.... Bejeweled 2.

But I gave up. The game beat me. I hammered at this off and on for weeks and finally decided those were hours of un-enjoyment I'll never get back.

[runinruder]

Jul 11, 2011 13:52:34 GMT -5 kog3100edw said:

I dunno. Usually if a game is compelling enough for me to want to beat it, it won't be against all reason. If I have a game that there's just no good reason to keep playing it, I won't.

I wish I were as reasonable and logical as you are. I think I mentioned this in another thread, but once I start a game, I almost always feel compelled to "finish the job," even if it means enduring unspeakable pain along the way.

It's ridiculous how many games I've beaten that I really didn't like at all. And heaven forbid these things actually have optional quests or multiple endings or whatever, as then I feel obliged to put in extra hours for that stuff. Star Ocean 3, Drakengard 2, Grandia II, Devil Kings, R-Type Final, Xenogears... just a few examples of games I put HOURS of my life into only to chuck in disgust once I was done slogging my way through them.

I'm inclined to say that I play even the stuff I don't like thoroughly because I want to "get my money's worth" out of a game (as if subjecting myself to hours of boredom/horror will justify the cash I blew on the thing), but looking back, some of these suck-fests (like Grandia II) weren't even mine.

I've played through lots and lots of PC Engine games that weren't any good, but at least nowadays I can say in those cases that I do it for the sake of having high-quality coverage on my web site. But this other shit I've stuck with and beaten, well, there's no good explanation for it.

[kog3100edw]

Then you, runinruder, are EXACTLY who this thread is aimed at and I should keep my nose out of it!

I think part of my 'ruthlessness' in NOT playing through crap games comes from minimising getting ahold of them in the first place. Even before I had kids, and money wasn't very tight, I still did my homework on titles before I bought them. So my rejection rate is pretty low. I won't say I've NEVER gotten crap, but yeah, I can be pretty 'eff this' about bad games.

Except apparently Bejeweled 2. Which I DID do that to, but after a stupidly long time.

[runinruder]

Jul 11, 2011 17:11:59 GMT -5 kog3100edw said:

I think part of my 'ruthlessness' in NOT playing through crap games comes from minimising getting ahold of them in the first place. Even before I had kids, and money wasn't very tight, I still did my homework on titles before I bought them. So my rejection rate is pretty low. I won't say I've NEVER gotten crap, but yeah, I can be pretty 'eff this' about bad games.

Yeah, until the last few years I was a terrible "impulse" buyer, which probably had something to do with me ending up in so many "stuck playing through a bad game" situations. I've bought lots of games just because they seemed cool to me for some intangible/idiosyncratic reason. Or I'd do my homework, find out a game was awful, and go ahead and pick it up anyway because there was something about it that made me think it would appeal to me.

Thing is, in addition to all the pits of crap I've dug for myself, I've also found a lot of gems going on impulse or ignoring consensus. And there have been instances where a game was so amusingly horrible that it made for an entertaining and very memorable experience. Chances have paid off in a lot of different ways for me (in addition to getting me into lots of trouble).

Looking at the stuff I listed in my previous post, I think where I (and a lot of other people, probably) have very often found myself in a bad spot is when I end up with a horrible sequel to a game I loved. I loved Star Ocean 2 and Drakengard and Grandia. And I believed I had good reason to look into those other games I mentioned: Devil Kings because I generally dig Dynasty Warriors style brawlers, Xenogears because I enjoyed Final Fantasy VII and Parasite Eve.

I guess what I'm trying to say is being discreet can be really damn hard sometimes, even in the rare instances when I'm not throwing discretion to the wind like a fool.

[ECM]

It's really just the geek version of "why are you climbing that mountain/because it's there."

I do the same thing with training: there's no good reason (and, in fact, it can lead to all sorts of fun stuff like tendinitis) to train explicitly to do 10 one-armed push-ups except to say that, dammit, I did it!

[hero0flight]

I might lose cool points for saying this, but I could not ever beat Mega Man X4 on the PS1. The last boss is impossible! I get so close and then I die. It wasn't even fun for me after a while because I just had to defeat the boss, you know? I gave up a long time ago, but will give it a shot after thinking about it...maybe I can do it. lol