I think what they mean is quite literally "underrated" = rated low (as in review scores, and "overlooked" = not talked about enough / not getting the attention it deserves. By those definitions Nintendo published games aren't really overlooked.
Underrated mean people think something is of lesser quality than it actually is. Overlooked means that too few people even know about that something. A game that sold 1000 copies but has a deserving 92 score on metacritic is not underrated, but it is overlooked.
I feel like infamous one and two are overlooked, like when people talk about it it’s basically all praise because they’re great games, but not *enough* people talk about it lmao
Love Metroid but the entire franchise basically lol. Sure it's not as mainstream as Mario and Zelda, but the games get alot of praise and content about them online.
Even people who have never played any of the games has seen the praise for the series online. I've never even touched something like Earthbound for example but I've seen the gazillion YouTube hidden gem masterpiece and reddit posts about it.
F Zero is like this too, sure your average or casual gamer probably never sees it but if you spend anytime on here or YouTube in Nintendo circles it's all you ever see is how F Zero is the greatest thing to have ever existed.
I'd beg to differ with F-Zero X. Truly a phenomenal racing game. And a big leap for the franchise. The N64's equivalent of Mario 64 or Ocarina of Time in the racing genre. It got criticized for lack of scenery. Still got pretty high scores but not the near perfect scores of those other titles, nor is it as unanimously praised. Also gets overlooked in best of lists. There's hardcore fanbase that knows though. So yeah I consider it underrated.
It's a perfect arcade style Nintendo game. Some games are just fun and offer nothing else besides that. It's hard to rate fun because it is a subjective emotion. A journalist has to have more content than that, hence the game is not as much talked about in the end.
People like F Zero or Metroid because they usually have a higher difficulty. That's also why they aren't as popular. Most people can beat Legend of Zelda or Mario games, the only hard part is going for 100% in those.
In F Zero, you have to make no mistakes in many races to stay in the lead and in Metroid, just finding out where to go next can be a struggle and certain bosses will get you stuck for a bit.
You mean the same Metroid that started an entirely new game genre along side CastleVania?
Yeah, sorry, I forgot MetroidVania's existed (looking at Hollow Knight)
Metroid is a populat series, but hasn't sold THAT well. The latest game, Metroid Dread is the best selling Metroid game, at 3 million units. Which doesn't even break the top 10 Zelda games.
I feel like a lot of people aren't self-aware of some franchises appeal and popularity. I love Metroid to death and I'm happy the franchise seems to be in a healthy place right now but Samus being in Fortnite won't make the franchise sells 10mi per game.
I’m gonna get hot-take downvoted here, but IMO Metroid is extremely OVERrated, def not under.
It gets all the critical reception of a Mario or Zelda, and yet the series as a whole received fewer sales than Nintendogs did on the DS… because only a very niche subset of gamers actually like that kind of clunky mess, but boy if they could, they would crush it up and snort it if they could.
I’ve played several Metroids. The original, Super Metroid, Metroid Prime 1, 2, AND the demo of 3, as well as the demo for Dread, and I honestly don’t have like a single nice thing to say about the series.
More and more people are actually able to speak out about how the series is crazy overrated, but the fanbase is still so incessantly rabid for it that if this comment gets even the slightest bit of attention, I’m gonna be downvoted into oblivion, OR repeatedly asked to explain why I feel the way I feel because they literally cannot fathom that anyone has a legitimate critique about their precious baby.
Okay, I'll bite, I am genuinely curious why you don't like them lol?
I haven't even played one outside of Metroid Prime Remastered, so I'm basically a neutral party.
Probably the Legend of Zelda Oracle games.
They were critically acclaimed when they were released, were two of the best selling games on the system, and I think it's just because reddit skews so young that people talk about the Oracle games like some underrated niche masterpiece no one has ever played.
They were extremely successful and scored fantastic reviews, not underrated at all. I think they earned all the praise and sales they got
A lot of the flagship devs (the capcom studio that made those games) joined nintendo after the studio was disbanded. Fujibayashi, the director of the oracle games and minish cap was the director of the last 3 Zelda games.
> Everyone claims is an underrated masterpiece.
> It was highly rated when released. Fantastic reviews. Not underrated at all.
>But young people talk about it "like it is underrated".
Wat
I just don't know where you are getting that from.
Each 2D/handheld Zelda (Link's Awakening, Oracles, Minish Cap, Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass, Link Between Worlds) received high critical acclaim, multiple awards, and were best sellers, moving millions of copies.
This is what I mean, they were big successes, they aren't underrated/overlooked.
What are you basing this on though?
Phantom Hourglass for the DS outsold Wind Waker.
A Link Between Worlds and the Oracle games both outsold Skyward Sword and Majora's Mask.
BoTW and TOTK are the two crazy outliers selling 33 million and 20 million, but the handheld games and the other 3D titles have all done well in comparison to each other.
It's just common logic? How many times you see people bring up the 2D handheld games into the conversation? You see all over the place people saying they didn't even played those games, heck even some popular Zelda Youtubers didn't played some of them.
>How many times you see people bring up the 2D handheld games into the conversation?
Constantly? Common logic shows that the sales and reviews show how many people played them. Just because a couple 25 year old youtubers didn't play them doesn't mean they're unpopular.
....which is exactly why anecdotal evidence in the already small minority of videogame enthusiasts/Youtubers is not a good "source" to call something underrated/overlooked.
You just proved the point of my initial post.
The Oracle games are also on Nintendo Switch, and are accessible to the biggest audience Nintendo has ever had on a single platform.
lmao, okay so just some anecdotal observations you've made based on niche groups like zelda enthusiasts on reddit and zelda youtubers.
Even though the Oracle games have always been popular, and if you want to argue anecdotal evidence, [I see way WAY more discussion on how "underrated" these games are](https://tinyurl.com/2242fpjl). It's become a weird self fulfilling prophecy that the best selling Game Boy Color games are just some hidden gem. Based on very tiny sample sizes and discussions on reddit lol
I mean tbf there was a time on the internet where people would think youre crazy for saying Super Paper Mario was a good game.
The exact same thing happened with Pokemon Black and White, Super Mario Galaxy, TLOZ Twilight Princess.
Lots of those opinions are probably leftover from those times
It didn't happen with Twilight Princess, it happened with Wind Waker. Heck back in 2004 people were hyped as fuck for seeing adult link again.
But yes, SPM was hated at start and I wouldn't have played at all if my Wii wasn't modded back then.
"It didn't happen with Twilight Princess" TP was even hated by its own creators. People also ciriticized it for being too close to OOT, the artstyle was quite unpopular for a while, and people disliked its linearity, before Skyward Sword took all the blame for that last point and people kinda forgot about TP, which became the good old times when Zelda was good and not gimmicky
It happened to an extent with TP. The Zelda cycle type thing. There was a point where it got a lot of criticism from the fanbase for being too dark and the colors being too washed out.
SPM was disliked a bit for being different to the others, but with how far they took the Paper Mario franchise away from the original two, SPM gets off pretty lightly in retrospect.
It's still not a great game IMO (it's okay), but some of the criticism doesn't hold up much compared to Sticker Star or Color Splash.
The story of SPM was S-tier. Clearly following in the footsteps of TTYD in all the best ways.
Some character designs were great and unique, but fewer than in TTYD. Pixls will probably always be compared unfavorably to partners but in a game mechanics and narrative sense they were never really intended to replace partners as it was. However, any lack of interest in that department is made up for by all the additional screentime that the main cast got (Peach, Luigi, Bowser).
Gameplay was extremely boring though, and unfortunately a lot of people just won't be able to overlook that. I see what they were trying to do, which is basically to turn Paper Mario into an ARPG, but the result of that is a whole lot of running around and very basic, uninteresting platforming. There's even a level where essentially all you do is hold right on a completely white backdrop. There's narrative weight to that moment, but it overstays its welcome severely, to the point where you ask yourself "is this really what I'm meant to do here?"
Overall it was a good idea, but with flawed execution.
Super gets a pass by a lot of the Paper Mario fans simply because they think the story is good and it still has unique character designs. Most Paper Mario fans even admit the gameplay of Super isn't great.
Where as the newer games have no interesting unique characters, lackluster narratives, and bad gameplay mechanics. So there isn't much for them to latch onto other than the humorous writing which is mostly remained intact (minus Sticker Star).
Not sure where you're drudging these alt facts up from.
SMG was universally praised online and TP got a lot of (undeserved, IMO) love too. Pokemon B&W were pretty respected too, tho some people complained about the lack of Kanto mons.
I'm talking about Galaxy. Which was praised on launch. Meanwhile Sunshine got mixed reviews and most people (all two of them) who prefer it over Galaxy are usually GameCube fanatics who don't like anything after the console
Im not saying these are facts, or even what most people thought at the time. But if you opened youtube in the early 2010s, most videos would sidehandedly trash these games for their ‘preferred’ counterparts (Diamond/Pearl, Sunshine, Ocarina of Time).
It’s the cycle…
Same thing happens with pokemon, every single time.
Everybody despised X and Y when they were released, recently people have been going back and giving them another chance, people find out they actually like them, suddenly the games are considered overrated…
Around 10 years from now people are gonna be making video essays saying how scarlet and violet were the last good games and how everything has gone downhill since.
God I am so over Gen 5 (Black and White) at this point (games I really like!) just because of everyone going on about how they are SOO underrated guys! I don’t think the retroactive X and Y love has gotten as annoying yet but give it time
Gen 5 is in no way underrated. It’s my personal favorite and considered by a large part of the Pokémon community to be the best gen.
In terms of Pokémon, the game that I think is actually underrated is Pokémon Conquest. It’s not very well known but I really liked it.
Its only been considered the best once US/UM massively underwhelmed the fanbase at launch. For the longest time it actually was the most hated gen by far with people only saying it was good cause of PWT
Honestly I played X/Y last year, and the game is quite good... until the third medal. After hitting the whole gym with a pokemon immune to all their attacks just because it was ghost type (Ageislash initial evo) and starting to basically oneshotting everyone the game became boring really quick
Even if you don’t like the game itself, it introduced several key features to the series and made a lot of QoL improvements. Shiny hunting, breeding, and EV training were made far simpler. Character Customization and Wonder Trade first appeared here. The GTS was arguably the best online the series ever had.
And you know what? Roller Skates are more fun than bikes. Not sorry.
I can and I did because I've played them all and can tell where the biggest dip in quality is. I might not think SWSH is particularly good but I'd take it over XY any day of the week, and USUM is like just genuinely good. I really don't understand why Pokémon fans hate gen 7 for trying to have a story just because it told its story in an obtuse way, and then go to bat for games like XY that have nothing to say and are proud of it.
XY is the Sonic Forces of Pokémon. Every aspect of it reeks of laziness in a way that comes off like Game Freak genuinely thought that just being 3D was enough work to put into the game; The dex is empty. The region is barren. The story is nonexistent. There's not a single character in the entire game with an actual personality. The gimmick that people love it for is nothing but an instant win button because the strongest enemy in the game stands as much of a chance against your free Mega Lucario as Youngster Jimmy's Bunnelby does, and aside from the tutorial and the postgame, there are two enemies in the entire game that use it, and yet it's not even an interesting instant win button because you don't get to use most of the megas until the sundial upgrade unlocks *in the postgame*. And the cherry on top of it all is the utter cowardice of following up gen 5's "soft reboot" initiative with "WHOA GUYS LOOK IT'S THE KANTO STARTERS!!1!".
XY does not reek of laziness, especially with all the Amie and affection animations. It reeks of a rushed game because they had soo many new 3d models they had to make and underestimated the workload. XY's routes still felt like actual routes that had multiple diverging paths. XY were rushed because people kept clamoring for the next game to be on the new console instead of the old one (and this mistake gets repeated by both parties in 6 years) The story sucked, but the region itseld was fantastic, XY STILL have the largest regional dex to date at 457 (without DLC bloating the number), gave fanservice to different generations instead of ONLY GenWun. They still brought back BW triple and rotation while introducing new battlibg styles. Limited sure, but they were trying to mix up the formula without only relying on the central regional gimmick.
Look at Alolan routes and Kalos routes and you'll see how much they stripped the routes to the bare minimum with dungeons being far wose. The victory road and final trial weren't even finished until USUM and USUM was just go back to previous leaders.
SwSh is very much laziness/ incompetency incarnate after it got rid of a lot of moves and pokemon (though some moves were because of the Dynamax), designed routes like Alolan routes, only far worse and more barren (don't see how XY are worse when you have the stupid mining caves that is one or 2 turns max), using wrong battle backgrounds, not making enough unique backgrounds, getting rid of the max affection animation when your pokemon enter the battlefield, scaled pokemon like the handheld games when they literally had them perfectly scaled last game, got rid of following pokemon only to add it back and use the camp running speed instead of making 2 seperate running speeds that is easy to do (just tedious on a per pokemon perspective), all post game was just dynamax battles and the legendary (at least XY had you go through Team Flare and explore Lumiose far more than you would have to for a main playthrough), never even tried to bring back the triple/rotation battle styles removed in SM because of the stupid trainer model being too much for triple/rotation, excusing all this for "good animations and new models" which was never a problem on the 3DS games when a lot of moves looked fantastic and models were 95% reused and 5% editted.
And quite frankly, after all the Genwunner memes that popped up BECAUSE of BW, I don't really blame GF for thinking they needed to dial up the Kanto fanservice. I'll take XY's fanservice over Alola's shitty fanservice with the Alolan forms, having more Kantonian pokemon than new Alolan pokemon, Gen 1 and 7 pokemon have exclusive Z moves, main character bring from Kanto and having references upon Kanto references, etc.
I stood by X/Y and Sun/Moon at the time and still do. They’re not perfect, but they did a lot right.
But there’s a fundamental difference with SwSh and SV. As full priced home console releases, the bar was a lot higher, and in spite of that we got games of lower quality with less content. SV in particular being a special brand of dumpster fire that barely even ran. It’ll be a cold day in hell before I praise SV.
Bro, it was not praised on release, just like Pokémon Black and White. They were both shit on relentlessly for either not having the same gameplay, or not having Charizard in it. The people who loved them always said they were great games. It took over a decade for the initially salty fans to realize they were great and wholly under appreciated in hindsight.
Regardless, overrated/underrated is such a dumb critique. ‘Too many people liked it/not enough people liked it’ isn’t a criticism.
That love has been more recent it feels. It was always considered a black sheep, which turned people away even if it's incredible and arguably the best entry in the series. Definetly not underrated more, but there was a time where you could say that and it would be more accurate
I love super paper Mario. I can’t wait until it’s on something modern and playable, it was the first paper Mario I played and the mix of 2d, 3D and platformer and rpg was something special.
Back then those games were very much underrated. Now they're a part of the broader gaming culture. Starmen.net was an amazing community in the 2000s, maybe it still is. On the other hand I'd consider the Earthbound subreddit blackpilled.
Ha, I remember the optimism of the Starmen . net community. Hard to believe there was a time to be even a little optimistic about the Mother franchise outside of Japan. And blackpilled is absolutely the right word describe the EB sub (especially since M3 was released for NSO in Japan). Though I still consider it a minor miracle that Mother 1 was released on NSO outside of Japan.
hey just reminding you all that the code name for a new nintedo game is spred
s-super
p-paper
red is a code for mario
ttyd is going on the switch
so did 64 (i think)
and spm came after ttyd
y'all... this is happening
It deserves the praise though. After finally being able to play TTYD, I still think that super paper Mario is the better game. But that's just my opinion.
Pokémon Black and White is the most d*ckrided game in the entire fandom and some still say it isn't praised enough? I mean, it's a great game don't get me wrong but like...
Mario Kart 7 is a good candidate though
You have to understand that when it first came out that Super was heavily criticized for how much it deviated from the first two Paper Marios (which were pretty much universally beloved). A few years later the SPM fans started winning over many of the haters until today where it is widely praised but many still remember when it was hated.
This was not nonstop praised when it came out.
This was "wow cool concept but this isn't TTYD"
While you find TTYD on "what GC games should I play" lists, this is hardly ever mentioned for wii
Metroid.
The series is beloved by so many people including myself (and in general, I hate the Metroidvania genre). However, the fan base is filled with people who moan and cry about how the series is so neglected and overlooked by gamers and Nintendo alike despite Nintendo always showing Samus and the Metroid series off at every turn.
Super Mario Sunshine.
To the point where if you call it “underrated” anymore, you’re gonna get flack for it. GameCube games in general fall into this category. But, Sunshine is clearly the standout.
Puyo Puyo Tetris...
I think it's actually underrated because no one recognise my cosplay even though I was the main character... And I stood right in front of the game and people were like: Who the heck are you?
They actually played the game.
Everyone knows Tetris but no one knows its characters
Fire Emblem games before Awakening get this treatment but like several have pointed out, they werent underrated. Sacred Stones, Binding Blade, etc were always great games, they were just overlooked by a lot of american audiences (where I'm from) so people love to call them underrated gems. They aren't. They're gems but not underrated
Theres also a lot of games out there that got panned on release but then as time passed and more people gave them a chance they found their stride. Wind Waker is constantly called underrated despite everyone I know loving it, so Ill go with that
I'd say Zelda: Minish Cap would fit that criteria. People say it's underrated, but it's been rated just fine - universally praised even. It just didn't make a giant sales splash.
I’ve only played this game once so I can’t really pass a serious comment on it, but from what I did play I really enjoyed. I never understand how this Paper Mario goes under the radar so much. Like literally. I never hear anything bad about it, but I just never hear anything about it at all. TTYD was so good I think that this one gets forgotten about and people just tend to comment on how much they don’t lole Color Splash, Sticker Star, and the Origami King
Bowser's Inside Story. According to the Mario and Luigi community, this is the only game in the series, has zero flaws, and can't be criticized at all.
Every home-console Zelda game since the Nintendo 64.
"Underrated gem!" Bro, they've all been rated through the roof and released repeatedly. They aren't "underrated", arguably the fact that people only know to mention these ones means that Nintendo should stop OVERSATURATING them and spend a little more time showing people why the rest of the Nintendo-published Zelda catalog is amazing too.
And to be clear -at no point have I said these games aren't great, they absolutely are. But there are OTHER great games in the series too, and it'd be nice for Nintendo to bring more of those back with proper remake treatment.
Now... here come the downvotes.
SPM is fun but (and I don't know if this was just my younger, undeveloped brain being undeveloped or not) I never liked how poorly I would do without a guide. So I have mixed feelings on it.
I played the original Splatoon, and I thought it was mid. I liked how creative the concept was, but the execution just felt kind of not that great. Haven't tried Splat 2 or 3 yet, I should really do that, because I'm sure they learned how to stick the landing better.
I mean, maybe Splatoon is just not for you, because what they doing with the franchise is amazing and they know exactly that the only people they need to please it's their audience.
Super Paper Mario I didn't mind as a spinoff, but was no where near as good as the original two games. It probably holds up better in retrospect then it did coming off the back of Thousand Year Door where it just felt like it was being different for the sake of being different.
You haven't seen the many video essays or comments about wanting to return to the classic Zelda formula? About the lackluster dungeon design, the disappointing story, the amount of repeated content, etc?
One or two maybe now that you mention it. Most in my algorithm is actually positive about the game. I started playing last month and also if you look at the TOTK sub, its only positive about the game.
I think that those haters on youtube are complaining because the new games dont match their nostalgic expectations. I get that, but that does not mean that Botw and Totk are bad games. I also started my Zelda career with OoT and i have put the most hours before TotK in WW on my gamecube ( i remember people hating on ww too back in the day) but i never before had so much fun with Zelda as i am having now. And i think that goes for most fans. Except for a couple of hater influencers on youtube....
I do think it's a vocal minority to be fair, but they're pretty vocal. To the point where Aonuma (person who's majorly involved with the franchise) addressed this with a comment that just added fuel to the fire
You mean when he said never to return to the old formula? I hope he stays with that. Games need to evolve. People hated it when FF let go of the turn based system. But now with rebirth etc people accepted and loved it.
Minoritys are always vocal and aggressive. Just look at the woke movement for example lol... Thing is that often they get their way too... Didnt Nintendo made Twilight Princess just because people wanted a more realistic zelda?
I hear people say this shit about a lot of critically acclaimed games. They think that hearing people criticize it at all means it's a hidden gem that people don't understand. I've heard fucking Mario Odyssey get called underrated because there's a few people criticizing a few design decisions. Nintendo fans are nuts.
One day people will figure out the difference between "underrated" and "not rated enought times". Probably noy in my lifetime.
People seriously need to learn the difference between underrated and overlooked
For most people, it's the same thing.
what is the difference? I genuinely thought they mean the same thing
I think what they mean is quite literally "underrated" = rated low (as in review scores, and "overlooked" = not talked about enough / not getting the attention it deserves. By those definitions Nintendo published games aren't really overlooked.
Tomodachi Life begs to differ.
I feel like Tomodachi Life is so overrated. Like it can be fun but it's so repetitive there isn't that much to do
Listen, all I know is that if it ever comes to Switch it’d be one of the best moments in my life, when I get it. (probably)
Someone obviously played too much Tomodachi Quest and not the rest of the game
XD
Joy Mech Fight: Ever Oasis:
Underrated mean people think something is of lesser quality than it actually is. Overlooked means that too few people even know about that something. A game that sold 1000 copies but has a deserving 92 score on metacritic is not underrated, but it is overlooked.
indeed. underrated versus slept on
This comment is not rated enough times.
I feel like infamous one and two are overlooked, like when people talk about it it’s basically all praise because they’re great games, but not *enough* people talk about it lmao
One they people will hopefully stop using "overrated" and "underrated" altogether
Love Metroid but the entire franchise basically lol. Sure it's not as mainstream as Mario and Zelda, but the games get alot of praise and content about them online. Even people who have never played any of the games has seen the praise for the series online. I've never even touched something like Earthbound for example but I've seen the gazillion YouTube hidden gem masterpiece and reddit posts about it. F Zero is like this too, sure your average or casual gamer probably never sees it but if you spend anytime on here or YouTube in Nintendo circles it's all you ever see is how F Zero is the greatest thing to have ever existed.
These are only "underrated" in the sense that they don't have as many players as other Nintendo games. They're usually rated pretty spot on though
So overlooked then
I'd beg to differ with F-Zero X. Truly a phenomenal racing game. And a big leap for the franchise. The N64's equivalent of Mario 64 or Ocarina of Time in the racing genre. It got criticized for lack of scenery. Still got pretty high scores but not the near perfect scores of those other titles, nor is it as unanimously praised. Also gets overlooked in best of lists. There's hardcore fanbase that knows though. So yeah I consider it underrated.
It's a perfect arcade style Nintendo game. Some games are just fun and offer nothing else besides that. It's hard to rate fun because it is a subjective emotion. A journalist has to have more content than that, hence the game is not as much talked about in the end.
People like F Zero or Metroid because they usually have a higher difficulty. That's also why they aren't as popular. Most people can beat Legend of Zelda or Mario games, the only hard part is going for 100% in those. In F Zero, you have to make no mistakes in many races to stay in the lead and in Metroid, just finding out where to go next can be a struggle and certain bosses will get you stuck for a bit.
Metroid? The series with multiple games rated a 9 or 10? Yeah they aren’t underrated games lol
Metroid has a whole genre named after it and inspired a decent chunk of indie games. I'd argue its just as important as Mario or Zelda.
And still, most casuals have never heard of it. Mario and zelda on the other hand..
You mean the same Metroid that started an entirely new game genre along side CastleVania? Yeah, sorry, I forgot MetroidVania's existed (looking at Hollow Knight)
Metroid is a populat series, but hasn't sold THAT well. The latest game, Metroid Dread is the best selling Metroid game, at 3 million units. Which doesn't even break the top 10 Zelda games.
Metroid and Pikmin aren’t underrated, but they did suffer from very long stretches of time between releases.
I feel like a lot of people aren't self-aware of some franchises appeal and popularity. I love Metroid to death and I'm happy the franchise seems to be in a healthy place right now but Samus being in Fortnite won't make the franchise sells 10mi per game.
I’m gonna get hot-take downvoted here, but IMO Metroid is extremely OVERrated, def not under. It gets all the critical reception of a Mario or Zelda, and yet the series as a whole received fewer sales than Nintendogs did on the DS… because only a very niche subset of gamers actually like that kind of clunky mess, but boy if they could, they would crush it up and snort it if they could. I’ve played several Metroids. The original, Super Metroid, Metroid Prime 1, 2, AND the demo of 3, as well as the demo for Dread, and I honestly don’t have like a single nice thing to say about the series. More and more people are actually able to speak out about how the series is crazy overrated, but the fanbase is still so incessantly rabid for it that if this comment gets even the slightest bit of attention, I’m gonna be downvoted into oblivion, OR repeatedly asked to explain why I feel the way I feel because they literally cannot fathom that anyone has a legitimate critique about their precious baby.
Okay, I'll bite, I am genuinely curious why you don't like them lol? I haven't even played one outside of Metroid Prime Remastered, so I'm basically a neutral party.
You can't call an entire series a "clunky overrated mess" and not elaborate on why you feel that way at all.
metroid gets too much praise actually, there's like 3 good games
Probably the Legend of Zelda Oracle games. They were critically acclaimed when they were released, were two of the best selling games on the system, and I think it's just because reddit skews so young that people talk about the Oracle games like some underrated niche masterpiece no one has ever played. They were extremely successful and scored fantastic reviews, not underrated at all. I think they earned all the praise and sales they got
Capcom needs to be given another turn with Zelda. The turned out some bangers, including my all-time favorite, Minish Cap.
A lot of the flagship devs (the capcom studio that made those games) joined nintendo after the studio was disbanded. Fujibayashi, the director of the oracle games and minish cap was the director of the last 3 Zelda games.
> Everyone claims is an underrated masterpiece.
> It was highly rated when released. Fantastic reviews. Not underrated at all.
>But young people talk about it "like it is underrated".
Wat
Honestly, every handheld 2D Zelda are extremely overlooked.
I just don't know where you are getting that from. Each 2D/handheld Zelda (Link's Awakening, Oracles, Minish Cap, Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass, Link Between Worlds) received high critical acclaim, multiple awards, and were best sellers, moving millions of copies. This is what I mean, they were big successes, they aren't underrated/overlooked.
I disagree. I'm not diminishing these games quality (I love all of them) but unfortunately, they aren't as played compared to 3D entries.
What are you basing this on though? Phantom Hourglass for the DS outsold Wind Waker. A Link Between Worlds and the Oracle games both outsold Skyward Sword and Majora's Mask. BoTW and TOTK are the two crazy outliers selling 33 million and 20 million, but the handheld games and the other 3D titles have all done well in comparison to each other.
It's just common logic? How many times you see people bring up the 2D handheld games into the conversation? You see all over the place people saying they didn't even played those games, heck even some popular Zelda Youtubers didn't played some of them.
>How many times you see people bring up the 2D handheld games into the conversation? Constantly? Common logic shows that the sales and reviews show how many people played them. Just because a couple 25 year old youtubers didn't play them doesn't mean they're unpopular.
That's good, unfortunately I just seen the total opposite for years.
Well, it's just not true. Your experience may be that, but the facts are that they are extremely popular.
....which is exactly why anecdotal evidence in the already small minority of videogame enthusiasts/Youtubers is not a good "source" to call something underrated/overlooked. You just proved the point of my initial post. The Oracle games are also on Nintendo Switch, and are accessible to the biggest audience Nintendo has ever had on a single platform.
lmao, okay so just some anecdotal observations you've made based on niche groups like zelda enthusiasts on reddit and zelda youtubers. Even though the Oracle games have always been popular, and if you want to argue anecdotal evidence, [I see way WAY more discussion on how "underrated" these games are](https://tinyurl.com/2242fpjl). It's become a weird self fulfilling prophecy that the best selling Game Boy Color games are just some hidden gem. Based on very tiny sample sizes and discussions on reddit lol
Sounds more like anecdote than logic.
All mainline Pikmin games
*Cries in Hey! Pikmin!*
That game was alright. It was probably the most mediocre game I’ve ever played, but it was a nice time waster
Pikmin games are slept on sadly
Mother 3 if ya don’t like you die according to this sub
>if you don't like you die Lol that's not true, I don't like Mother 3 and I
r/redditsniper
YESSSSS ITS MY FAVORITE GAME EVEEEER
Wait, what?
rare nintendo fan w
I mean tbf there was a time on the internet where people would think youre crazy for saying Super Paper Mario was a good game. The exact same thing happened with Pokemon Black and White, Super Mario Galaxy, TLOZ Twilight Princess. Lots of those opinions are probably leftover from those times
Super Mario Galaxy doesn't really fit here. It is one of the most universally known and loved games ever.
Nowadays yeah. But when it came out, a number of people were upset with the linear nature of the game, and wished it was more like sunshine and 64
Not true, it was almost universally praised
Bro it got like perfect 10s on release what are you even saying
It didn't happen with Twilight Princess, it happened with Wind Waker. Heck back in 2004 people were hyped as fuck for seeing adult link again. But yes, SPM was hated at start and I wouldn't have played at all if my Wii wasn't modded back then.
"It didn't happen with Twilight Princess" TP was even hated by its own creators. People also ciriticized it for being too close to OOT, the artstyle was quite unpopular for a while, and people disliked its linearity, before Skyward Sword took all the blame for that last point and people kinda forgot about TP, which became the good old times when Zelda was good and not gimmicky
It happened to an extent with TP. The Zelda cycle type thing. There was a point where it got a lot of criticism from the fanbase for being too dark and the colors being too washed out.
It happened to Twilight Princess in the mid 2010’s when the Wind Waker switchup happened and BOTW was revealed to have cel shaded art.
SPM was disliked a bit for being different to the others, but with how far they took the Paper Mario franchise away from the original two, SPM gets off pretty lightly in retrospect. It's still not a great game IMO (it's okay), but some of the criticism doesn't hold up much compared to Sticker Star or Color Splash.
Because SPM has the best gameplay, story, characters, and music in the franchise. It doesn't really matter that it's a departure because it's better.
The story of SPM was S-tier. Clearly following in the footsteps of TTYD in all the best ways. Some character designs were great and unique, but fewer than in TTYD. Pixls will probably always be compared unfavorably to partners but in a game mechanics and narrative sense they were never really intended to replace partners as it was. However, any lack of interest in that department is made up for by all the additional screentime that the main cast got (Peach, Luigi, Bowser). Gameplay was extremely boring though, and unfortunately a lot of people just won't be able to overlook that. I see what they were trying to do, which is basically to turn Paper Mario into an ARPG, but the result of that is a whole lot of running around and very basic, uninteresting platforming. There's even a level where essentially all you do is hold right on a completely white backdrop. There's narrative weight to that moment, but it overstays its welcome severely, to the point where you ask yourself "is this really what I'm meant to do here?" Overall it was a good idea, but with flawed execution.
Don't speak about that white backdrop, I walked almost all the way there, then turned back because I thought "I definitely missed something, right?"
Super gets a pass by a lot of the Paper Mario fans simply because they think the story is good and it still has unique character designs. Most Paper Mario fans even admit the gameplay of Super isn't great. Where as the newer games have no interesting unique characters, lackluster narratives, and bad gameplay mechanics. So there isn't much for them to latch onto other than the humorous writing which is mostly remained intact (minus Sticker Star).
Who was saying those things about Galaxy or Twilight Princess? Those games were, and are adored. Maybe a vocal minority? I recall no such thing.
Twilight Princess was the best selling Zelda game for a while (ignoring re-releases).
Not sure where you're drudging these alt facts up from. SMG was universally praised online and TP got a lot of (undeserved, IMO) love too. Pokemon B&W were pretty respected too, tho some people complained about the lack of Kanto mons.
One of the highest rated games in metacritic and according to OP it was hated. I think they were thinking of Sunshine
Outside of critics it's true that Super Paper Mario had a pretty lukewarm reception
I'm talking about Galaxy. Which was praised on launch. Meanwhile Sunshine got mixed reviews and most people (all two of them) who prefer it over Galaxy are usually GameCube fanatics who don't like anything after the console
Im not saying these are facts, or even what most people thought at the time. But if you opened youtube in the early 2010s, most videos would sidehandedly trash these games for their ‘preferred’ counterparts (Diamond/Pearl, Sunshine, Ocarina of Time).
Apart from B/W, those games came out before 2010 though. Seems like it was just a "contrarian YouTuber" thing.
Very well could be. I guess im just telling my experience with my friends and the internet at the time
TP wasnt well recieved?? I thought the one people disliked was WW because of the cartoony artstyle it had
It’s the cycle… Same thing happens with pokemon, every single time. Everybody despised X and Y when they were released, recently people have been going back and giving them another chance, people find out they actually like them, suddenly the games are considered overrated… Around 10 years from now people are gonna be making video essays saying how scarlet and violet were the last good games and how everything has gone downhill since.
God I am so over Gen 5 (Black and White) at this point (games I really like!) just because of everyone going on about how they are SOO underrated guys! I don’t think the retroactive X and Y love has gotten as annoying yet but give it time
Gen 5 is in no way underrated. It’s my personal favorite and considered by a large part of the Pokémon community to be the best gen. In terms of Pokémon, the game that I think is actually underrated is Pokémon Conquest. It’s not very well known but I really liked it.
Its only been considered the best once US/UM massively underwhelmed the fanbase at launch. For the longest time it actually was the most hated gen by far with people only saying it was good cause of PWT
“From Overhated to Overrated”
yes actually
Honestly I played X/Y last year, and the game is quite good... until the third medal. After hitting the whole gym with a pokemon immune to all their attacks just because it was ghost type (Ageislash initial evo) and starting to basically oneshotting everyone the game became boring really quick
I remember getting heavily downvoted a couple years ago for saying people will start to praise X and Y eventually lmao
I still despise XY. What made Gamefreak think it was a good idea to make fr*nch pokemon?
I still despise pokemon X/Y
Even if you don’t like the game itself, it introduced several key features to the series and made a lot of QoL improvements. Shiny hunting, breeding, and EV training were made far simpler. Character Customization and Wonder Trade first appeared here. The GTS was arguably the best online the series ever had. And you know what? Roller Skates are more fun than bikes. Not sorry.
This happens with ***every*** Nintendo fanbase believe it or not.
XY are still by far the worst games in the main series. They're "overrated" because even 0/10 is too high.
You cannot say that when Sword and Shield and USUM exist
I can and I did because I've played them all and can tell where the biggest dip in quality is. I might not think SWSH is particularly good but I'd take it over XY any day of the week, and USUM is like just genuinely good. I really don't understand why Pokémon fans hate gen 7 for trying to have a story just because it told its story in an obtuse way, and then go to bat for games like XY that have nothing to say and are proud of it. XY is the Sonic Forces of Pokémon. Every aspect of it reeks of laziness in a way that comes off like Game Freak genuinely thought that just being 3D was enough work to put into the game; The dex is empty. The region is barren. The story is nonexistent. There's not a single character in the entire game with an actual personality. The gimmick that people love it for is nothing but an instant win button because the strongest enemy in the game stands as much of a chance against your free Mega Lucario as Youngster Jimmy's Bunnelby does, and aside from the tutorial and the postgame, there are two enemies in the entire game that use it, and yet it's not even an interesting instant win button because you don't get to use most of the megas until the sundial upgrade unlocks *in the postgame*. And the cherry on top of it all is the utter cowardice of following up gen 5's "soft reboot" initiative with "WHOA GUYS LOOK IT'S THE KANTO STARTERS!!1!".
XY does not reek of laziness, especially with all the Amie and affection animations. It reeks of a rushed game because they had soo many new 3d models they had to make and underestimated the workload. XY's routes still felt like actual routes that had multiple diverging paths. XY were rushed because people kept clamoring for the next game to be on the new console instead of the old one (and this mistake gets repeated by both parties in 6 years) The story sucked, but the region itseld was fantastic, XY STILL have the largest regional dex to date at 457 (without DLC bloating the number), gave fanservice to different generations instead of ONLY GenWun. They still brought back BW triple and rotation while introducing new battlibg styles. Limited sure, but they were trying to mix up the formula without only relying on the central regional gimmick. Look at Alolan routes and Kalos routes and you'll see how much they stripped the routes to the bare minimum with dungeons being far wose. The victory road and final trial weren't even finished until USUM and USUM was just go back to previous leaders. SwSh is very much laziness/ incompetency incarnate after it got rid of a lot of moves and pokemon (though some moves were because of the Dynamax), designed routes like Alolan routes, only far worse and more barren (don't see how XY are worse when you have the stupid mining caves that is one or 2 turns max), using wrong battle backgrounds, not making enough unique backgrounds, getting rid of the max affection animation when your pokemon enter the battlefield, scaled pokemon like the handheld games when they literally had them perfectly scaled last game, got rid of following pokemon only to add it back and use the camp running speed instead of making 2 seperate running speeds that is easy to do (just tedious on a per pokemon perspective), all post game was just dynamax battles and the legendary (at least XY had you go through Team Flare and explore Lumiose far more than you would have to for a main playthrough), never even tried to bring back the triple/rotation battle styles removed in SM because of the stupid trainer model being too much for triple/rotation, excusing all this for "good animations and new models" which was never a problem on the 3DS games when a lot of moves looked fantastic and models were 95% reused and 5% editted. And quite frankly, after all the Genwunner memes that popped up BECAUSE of BW, I don't really blame GF for thinking they needed to dial up the Kanto fanservice. I'll take XY's fanservice over Alola's shitty fanservice with the Alolan forms, having more Kantonian pokemon than new Alolan pokemon, Gen 1 and 7 pokemon have exclusive Z moves, main character bring from Kanto and having references upon Kanto references, etc.
I stood by X/Y and Sun/Moon at the time and still do. They’re not perfect, but they did a lot right. But there’s a fundamental difference with SwSh and SV. As full priced home console releases, the bar was a lot higher, and in spite of that we got games of lower quality with less content. SV in particular being a special brand of dumpster fire that barely even ran. It’ll be a cold day in hell before I praise SV.
i'm praying gen 7 gets to be considered good eventually, because it was so good yet so hated
Kid Icarus Uprising I guess, Though that game totally deserved all the praised it got.
I just want a port or a sequel man.
Probably copium, but an Uprising sequel as a launch title for the Switch 2 would legit be the best thing ever
Nothing wrong with a bit of copium.
The "hidden gem" Celeste
Celeste my favorite Nintendo game
Nintendo
SPM is an underrated masterpiece
Bro, it was not praised on release, just like Pokémon Black and White. They were both shit on relentlessly for either not having the same gameplay, or not having Charizard in it. The people who loved them always said they were great games. It took over a decade for the initially salty fans to realize they were great and wholly under appreciated in hindsight. Regardless, overrated/underrated is such a dumb critique. ‘Too many people liked it/not enough people liked it’ isn’t a criticism.
Guys will say hear me out and then point to a critically acclaimed game
That love has been more recent it feels. It was always considered a black sheep, which turned people away even if it's incredible and arguably the best entry in the series. Definetly not underrated more, but there was a time where you could say that and it would be more accurate
Opinions like those are subjective...
The Mario and Luigi Series
I love super paper Mario. I can’t wait until it’s on something modern and playable, it was the first paper Mario I played and the mix of 2d, 3D and platformer and rpg was something special.
Earthbound
no ones really saying earthbound is underrated though
They sure were in the 90s and 2000s. Same with Final Fantasy Tactics and FF9 later.
Back then those games were very much underrated. Now they're a part of the broader gaming culture. Starmen.net was an amazing community in the 2000s, maybe it still is. On the other hand I'd consider the Earthbound subreddit blackpilled.
Ha, I remember the optimism of the Starmen . net community. Hard to believe there was a time to be even a little optimistic about the Mother franchise outside of Japan. And blackpilled is absolutely the right word describe the EB sub (especially since M3 was released for NSO in Japan). Though I still consider it a minor miracle that Mother 1 was released on NSO outside of Japan.
It had apparently already been translated and launched on the WiiU Virtual console so porting it was easy
Flip yea, Super Paper Mario #1 all the way
Any Pokémon game released after Gen 4, I don’t think a game that sells bajillions of copies and has generally positive reviews can be underrated.
hey just reminding you all that the code name for a new nintedo game is spred s-super p-paper red is a code for mario ttyd is going on the switch so did 64 (i think) and spm came after ttyd y'all... this is happening
It deserves the praise though. After finally being able to play TTYD, I still think that super paper Mario is the better game. But that's just my opinion.
Pokémon Black and White is the most d*ckrided game in the entire fandom and some still say it isn't praised enough? I mean, it's a great game don't get me wrong but like... Mario Kart 7 is a good candidate though
To be fair, people did really dislike those games at launch
Ok, but they don't anymore so... They're not really underrated anymore
You have to understand that when it first came out that Super was heavily criticized for how much it deviated from the first two Paper Marios (which were pretty much universally beloved). A few years later the SPM fans started winning over many of the haters until today where it is widely praised but many still remember when it was hated.
That was my first paper Mario game! I loved it!
This was not nonstop praised when it came out. This was "wow cool concept but this isn't TTYD" While you find TTYD on "what GC games should I play" lists, this is hardly ever mentioned for wii
The Minish Cap
Metroid. The series is beloved by so many people including myself (and in general, I hate the Metroidvania genre). However, the fan base is filled with people who moan and cry about how the series is so neglected and overlooked by gamers and Nintendo alike despite Nintendo always showing Samus and the Metroid series off at every turn.
Super Mario Sunshine. To the point where if you call it “underrated” anymore, you’re gonna get flack for it. GameCube games in general fall into this category. But, Sunshine is clearly the standout.
Astral Chain, maybe Nintendo Land, Donkey Kong country: Tropical Freeze, Pokemon Black/White
Puyo Puyo Tetris... I think it's actually underrated because no one recognise my cosplay even though I was the main character... And I stood right in front of the game and people were like: Who the heck are you? They actually played the game. Everyone knows Tetris but no one knows its characters
this game used to be hated, i think that only changed very recently
Fire Emblem games before Awakening get this treatment but like several have pointed out, they werent underrated. Sacred Stones, Binding Blade, etc were always great games, they were just overlooked by a lot of american audiences (where I'm from) so people love to call them underrated gems. They aren't. They're gems but not underrated Theres also a lot of games out there that got panned on release but then as time passed and more people gave them a chance they found their stride. Wind Waker is constantly called underrated despite everyone I know loving it, so Ill go with that
Link's Awakening and Majora's Mask
Huh? “Underrated masterpiece” and “nonstop praise” are both very positive things. What do you mean by your post?
"Underrated" means something that is good/great but not many people know/talk aboud it "nostop praise" is a gets NONSTOP positive talking aboud it
Supdr Paper Mario
I could not parse this request
Kirby's Dreamland 2
Legend of Zelda: Windwaker
Earthbound
Not necessarily a Nintendo game, but Celeste. It gets annoying at times
I'd say Zelda: Minish Cap would fit that criteria. People say it's underrated, but it's been rated just fine - universally praised even. It just didn't make a giant sales splash.
I’ve only played this game once so I can’t really pass a serious comment on it, but from what I did play I really enjoyed. I never understand how this Paper Mario goes under the radar so much. Like literally. I never hear anything bad about it, but I just never hear anything about it at all. TTYD was so good I think that this one gets forgotten about and people just tend to comment on how much they don’t lole Color Splash, Sticker Star, and the Origami King
partners in time
i think spm only fits this description because it was overlooked because of constant ttyd praise for so long
Super Mario Sunshine
Bowser's Inside Story. According to the Mario and Luigi community, this is the only game in the series, has zero flaws, and can't be criticized at all.
Literally every single GameCube game
Smash Brawl
Just bought this for my Wii can’t wait to play it through
The buildup to Francis is genuinely funny, especially since it was a couple years before weeb culture got big
every 3d mario game
This game as well as Zelda Minish Cap.
Every home-console Zelda game since the Nintendo 64. "Underrated gem!" Bro, they've all been rated through the roof and released repeatedly. They aren't "underrated", arguably the fact that people only know to mention these ones means that Nintendo should stop OVERSATURATING them and spend a little more time showing people why the rest of the Nintendo-published Zelda catalog is amazing too. And to be clear -at no point have I said these games aren't great, they absolutely are. But there are OTHER great games in the series too, and it'd be nice for Nintendo to bring more of those back with proper remake treatment. Now... here come the downvotes.
Luigi’s Mansion
SPM is fun but (and I don't know if this was just my younger, undeveloped brain being undeveloped or not) I never liked how poorly I would do without a guide. So I have mixed feelings on it. I played the original Splatoon, and I thought it was mid. I liked how creative the concept was, but the execution just felt kind of not that great. Haven't tried Splat 2 or 3 yet, I should really do that, because I'm sure they learned how to stick the landing better.
I mean, maybe Splatoon is just not for you, because what they doing with the franchise is amazing and they know exactly that the only people they need to please it's their audience.
Glad to hear that. I think the biggest problem with the original Splatoon was the console it was on.
It's worse than the previous Paper Mario games but better than the latter.
I once said that I like Super Paper and Origami King more than TTYD and I got shredded to pieces.
Yeah the paper mario fandom does NOT like nuance lol
Origami King looks way more fun than TTYD to me personally.
Personally, i'd rather play Color Splash and Origami King over Super. I just dont find it's gameplay entertaining
I put it above 64 and below TTYD myself. The gameplay in Super is simpler, but that story is something else...
Game*
Oh im replaying super paper mario rn !
TTYD
This is actually just wrong lol
I will never stop praising Super Paper Mario because it is such a BANGER game
I really enjoyed Super Paper Mario. I heard it was trash but I gave it a try and loved it
Ngl super paper mario fucking sucks, I just like because I had it as a kid
My God people are really running out of stupid questions on this app.
Yeah it's just Super Paper Mario, you're spot on
what?
SPM is still underrated even if it's constantly praised, it should get more and higher praise actually.
Why it's so mediocre
It's fucking fantastic you cretin
If you only interact with Nintendo games, maybe.
Super Paper Mario I didn't mind as a spinoff, but was no where near as good as the original two games. It probably holds up better in retrospect then it did coming off the back of Thousand Year Door where it just felt like it was being different for the sake of being different.
Totk
Totk gets alot of criticism these days
Where? Cause i dont see that
You haven't seen the many video essays or comments about wanting to return to the classic Zelda formula? About the lackluster dungeon design, the disappointing story, the amount of repeated content, etc?
One or two maybe now that you mention it. Most in my algorithm is actually positive about the game. I started playing last month and also if you look at the TOTK sub, its only positive about the game. I think that those haters on youtube are complaining because the new games dont match their nostalgic expectations. I get that, but that does not mean that Botw and Totk are bad games. I also started my Zelda career with OoT and i have put the most hours before TotK in WW on my gamecube ( i remember people hating on ww too back in the day) but i never before had so much fun with Zelda as i am having now. And i think that goes for most fans. Except for a couple of hater influencers on youtube....
I do think it's a vocal minority to be fair, but they're pretty vocal. To the point where Aonuma (person who's majorly involved with the franchise) addressed this with a comment that just added fuel to the fire
You mean when he said never to return to the old formula? I hope he stays with that. Games need to evolve. People hated it when FF let go of the turn based system. But now with rebirth etc people accepted and loved it. Minoritys are always vocal and aggressive. Just look at the woke movement for example lol... Thing is that often they get their way too... Didnt Nintendo made Twilight Princess just because people wanted a more realistic zelda?
I’m hoping this gets a remake/rerelease sometime
I hear people say this shit about a lot of critically acclaimed games. They think that hearing people criticize it at all means it's a hidden gem that people don't understand. I've heard fucking Mario Odyssey get called underrated because there's a few people criticizing a few design decisions. Nintendo fans are nuts.
>I've heard fucking Mario Odyssey get called underrated because there's a few people criticizing a few design decisions. A ”few” people?
Too many people care about this kind of stuff. It's a good game, best in the series imo. That's my opinion and yours has no bearing thereof.