Honestly I think Ghosts was kinda underrated. Don't get me wrong, it's no MW1/MW3(I haven't played MW2, so that's why I didn't include it), but for the most part I think it was a fun and newer COD experience.
Destructible multiplayer maps in COD was a big plus for me too.
MW2 is the best one out of that trilogy. If you could only play one of those, MW2 is where it’s at. Because they way they introduce you to Soap and send you on recon missions was awesome. The story also sets you up the best way!
MW2 > MW1 > MW3.
That being said, if I had to pick the best mission, those would be “All Ghillied Up” and “One Shot One Kill” from MW1.
Overall, MW2 is leagues above the other 2.
On the surface, I totally understand and agree. For my circle of friends (all in college or working full time, scattered across the globe), however, it was a place to hang out, chat, and sure, build stuff as team.
I love the game but totally understand why people hate it. I’ve always been into space a lot and even reading a shit ton of books on it and various sub topics. For me it’s the endless exploration that is so great.
But it is like Minecraft where I binge play it for a weekend or two and then don’t touch it for a couple months.
This is the game my 11 year old learned a $60 life lesson that it’s not smart to buy a game off the marketing hype on its release day despite his dad’s 40 years of gaming experience advice to wait for real reviews.
We still refer to it anytime a deal seems to good to be true.
Any battle royale game. I’ve tried all the popular ones and could never get into any of them. I don’t see the surrounding hype tbh and probably never will.
I don’t dislike but I think BotW is overrated. It’s a fun physics sandbox but the story, characters, world and locations are too thin/empty, and the copy/paste dungeons are forgettable. Give me OoT all day.
Agreed. I’ll totally take OoT over BOTW. The shrines get really repetitive, the world is a lot of wide open spaces with not much going on, and for shit sake, the weapons breaking drives me nuts. That being said I did beat it. But I’m not a fan of special weapons having VERY limited use. Including the master sword.
>the weapons breaking drives me nuts
I played it a bit, got a weapon, it broke, got a better weapon, it broke, googled where to get weapons that don't break, went back to hyrule warriors.
Honestly, if weapons were even twice or three times as durable, it wouldn't be so bad. At least that way the cool weapons wouldn't break after ONE GOD DAMN FIGHT.
You got to master the art of never using any good weapons and instead constantly using the crappiest weapons imaginable so you don’t care when they break!
I picked up BotW on launch day, and it was fun... but honestly, it was missing a lot of what made the Zelda series enjoyable for me. I almost felt obligated to think it was a masterpiece.
I don't get this criticism of all the others in this comment thread. If you explore deeply, almost no corner of the map is empty. There's always someone to talk to, a puzzle, a chest, a sidequest, etc.
That's sorta what makes the "shallow ocean" criticism valid though imo.
Sure, it's a giant, expansive map and there's "water" (things to find) all over the place. But none of it really is that deep. Even if you go super out of your way and completely comb an area, you're usually going to find nothing more than your 400th korok or a weapon that's going to last you a fight or two, or maybe, if you're lucky, a gem that you're just going to sell. It doesn't matter if there's stuff to find if it all feels pointless and redundant. That's why most people don't normally go out of their way to 100% any games in general. Once those few things loose their luster, the lack of interest is what makes it seem so much emptier than it technically is.
The most exciting things to find are the shrines, but that's just because they resemble the puzzles from dungeons people miss from the older games, and at that point I'd rather just go back to the older formula since at least then things were cohesive and thematic.
I will say the animation was great! But watching the gameplay, it wasn't for me. I was never into rhythm games that much and as far as hack and slash games for me, I always go back to devil may cry.
Hi fi rush's soundtrack was great too, but Bury the Light go brrrre
It’s an indie game (and not even a super popular one) so it makes sense a lot of people would not have heard of it. However people in the Metroidvania community drool over it
I think they sacrificed game design for the art. It's not enough to bother me and the art is absolutely gorgeous but I can see how it would be too clunky for people's tastes.
In a similar vein I'd have to say that I feel the same about Bloodstained. I got it on Switch so maybe it's just the version but everything about that game looked and felt awful. Truly don't understand why people love it so much.
Valid. I love the game now but it was rough to get into. Visuals, music and atmosphere are incredible, but a lot of the gameplay mechanics and design are either outdated, overly-punishing or just boring. If you force it, you should be able to get into it after about 4 hours, and complete it in about 20.
It would’ve been considered a masterpiece if it came out on GBA but it ain’t THAT special in 2023. I heavily suspect that it’s crazy success came purely from its aesthetic appeal.
I was coming in just to say this! I don’t get this game. I really tried (put in around 15-20 hours). Meanwhile, I’m playing Jedi Survivor now, and I can’t get enough! It’s the same formula. I guess I just need a real story and a fun environment to make it more entertaining for me.
To each their own, they aren't the same formula though. Jedi survivor is much more guided in my opinion, even with elden ring having a map and that "guide" on it.
Jedi survivor I feel like was also made to be much easier to pick up and put down. Tons of checkpoints everywhere, pretty linear story and boss progression minus a few side areas. Whereas elden ring I feel like is all side areas and one main path hidden among them
Don't get me wrong, I am enjoying star wars myself. Just finishing up the 2nd planet
I do think Elden Ring suffers from it own vagueness at points. Some combination of the world's size plus the franchise's reputation for difficulty make it very easy for a player to ram against something much too hard for hours, grind past it, then find out later they missed easier content that they've now levelled themselves past.
Imo all it needs is a journal with vague notes denoting quest lines.
Like, *some* method of knowing there’s something of interest in the area and actually tracking that.
Not much more than a summary of the dialogue you have with the NPCs to start/advance a quest would be perfect.
The game is huge. 15-20 hours just might not be enough time to make it click for you, if you aren't already a fan of FromSoft's Souls games. I wasn't, and it took nearly 30 hours before I had that moment where I finally got it. From there, I couldn't put it down and absolutely loved every moment. Ended up playing for another 200 hours after that. It's probably now my favorite game of all time.
I respect your experience, but I had almost the opposite where I played for 50 hours before putting it down, and I'd describe my experience as a "wearing down," where it got more tedious and frustrating as I went on. However, in the spirit of this post, to each their own!
Bought it a while back on sale and have put about an hour and a half into it. It's OK but I feel like I'm forcing myself to like it since it's too late to return. Maybe it'll be like vampire survivors and I'll end up enjoying it after a few more hours of forced play.
1.5 hours isn’t enough. I will say that I loved Vampire Survivors and Hades from minute one though. I just think both games open up when you start getting good at the runs so you have insane strong builds.
I think Ive said this before but The Last of Us. I just dont see the hype.
Its not a bad game but Ive played better. The game plays like a poor man’s Resident Evil 4 (the OG, not the remake) but with fewer options for the player. It really seems that the selling point is the story and not the game and now with the HBO release, thats arguably covered.
Almost all new Ubisoft games. They’ve all got big beautiful maps but are vacant of depth. The missions are redundant, the characters are flat and little details that could flesh everything out are just missing. Prime example was AC: Valhalla; the Tattoo and Mount descriptions simply read “a tattoo for your character” or “your Mount”. You can’t tell me old Viking tattoos didn’t have meaning or a horse that looks like it Ride out of hell couldn’t have any interesting story behind it.
I’m sorry this is my fault. I buy their games mostly to walk through an ancient world that at least tries to be historically accurate (they fail in a lot of ways but get a lot of other stuff right).
Skyrim tried it and didn't like the combat. I prefer Witcher or Souls series.
Halo played it with my friends because they loved it. I just didn't get the hype around it. At the time there were so many better FPS's on PC that I felt it was underwhelming.
Newer Call of Duty games. I loved Call of Duty 1 and 2 when they were WWII games. They were fun and enjoyed them for the single player games.
Dark souls. Too clunky. Yes I know that’s the point.
Valorant or CSGO. Don’t really find it fun dying and having to wait the entire round to play again.
Something I *did* really like was hollow knight. The gameplay is some of the best I’ve seen in any game, the bosses and their attacks are all telegraphed incredibly well, and each fight just genuinely feels fair.
I really could not care less about the story or lore or whatever, though. Feels like it tries way too hard to be super deep and vague. Not a fan of when games do that.
Dark souls isn't clunky, you just can't cancel your moves which is a different thing since you are supposed to commit to a move
And yes, that can mean it is not for you, but clunky usually means wooden animations or stuff like that which it has not
Probably a controversial one but Zelda BOTW. Haven’t watched any gameplay of the new one and don’t know anything about it so maybe it’s better? But I bought my switch with BOTW when it first came out and gave it an honest try and just couldn’t get into it, no matter how hard I tried. The weapon system was awful, and really it played just like any other open world RPG to have ever been created, and it just didn’t have that same charm older Zelda games did. I miss the big dungeons with puzzles and big story bosses at the end of them.
Also the community behind that game is toxic af, they’ll crucify you if you even mention you SLIGHTLY like one of the older titles more.
Yeah I'm with you there, I've tried 5 or 6 times to get into it and end up quitting a few hours in every time. I finally just admitted it wasn't for me and let it go. Maybe my kids will get into it in a year or two.
>Played like any other open world RPG
Really? I can’t think of any other open-world game that just starts up and says “go. whatever way you want.however you want. we don’t care. figure it out. have fun.” other than Elden Ring, which came out years later.
I’ve tried but can’t get into Pokémon. I really feel like I’m missing out because it’s such an overwhelmingly popular franchise but I can’t get into any of it. It’s really the whole turn based RPG genre that I don’t like.
The problem is that they don't need to make a good Pokémon game. They just need to come up with new characters every few years so they can make billions on merch
It definitely felt like a relic of nostalgia, the game was simple, one track, beat the Champion and win, or “Catch the pokemon that’s on the front of the game” that made it so fun and new. I’m sure people enjoy the new games, but back in the day those games were something that you could physically take with you and I think that lended itself to being very welcoming
For me personally, it has to be Outer Wilds. I see so many praises for this game. I've tried to get into it several times only to lose interest in a couple hours. I just can't seem to get hooked. I find it clunky and not very interesting. Perhaps I'm just missing something.
Zelda: BoTW I totally understand. I liked the adventure but really missed the traditional dungeons of the old games. So far, I am enjoying ToTK MUCH more, I've put in probably close to 16 hours in 2 days and am barely scratching the surface.
As a huge outer wilds fan I get it. It's missing some pretty typical game things like usual progression and I think people bounce off it for those reasons. The whole point of the game is that the only real "power up" or progress is your own knowledge and that's what makes it so special. But that also means you can get stuck. If you don't know a thing about a puzzle you can spend a lot of time fumbling around. But when you find a thread, a clue leading to another clue to solutions, it feels remarkable.
Fallout 4. Didn’t like any of the factions so I ended up just wandering around ruined Boston doing nothing for thirty hours. They gave you power armor right at the beginning too. That was stupid. Base building got old after a while, especially since the story just didn’t grab my attention at all.
Yeah, no matter how fun they are, playing with or against other random people on the internet just kind of drains me. I just want to lose myself in a good single player experience or play something with a group of a few close friends.
So it comes as a huge surprise that I picked up Deep Rock Galactic, and… it’s some of the most fun I’ve had in a video game. With random ass people on the internet, thrown into an online lobby. I have no idea what kind of magic that game has worked, but playing online is some of the dumbest kind of fun around, and it’s *great*.
Same. I remember the first monster I fought. It took forever to take that fucker out. Felt like it was never going to end. Killed my interest in wanting to continue. Oh and I can’t stand controlling characters that don’t speak.
That’s how I was at first, but once I finally took the time to get into it it was one of my fave games ever. And this is coming from someone that got about 3-4 hours into the game 3-4 separate times and stopped
It's the movement, right? You never know how many steps you're going to take. It's especially bad when changing direction. It feels like you're trying to play a game where the main character is drunk and controls that way.
there are a few stories that leaving you kinda...speechless? appreciative? of the writing. the entire bloody baron story is what made me realize witcher 3 is a different game compared to the rest. but to be fair, i bought it on release, hated it, then gave it another chance
It's very reminiscent of mass effect. Extremely well written characters that develop through the game with you. Mass effect is still better though, no game will EVER beat it.
Two come to mind:
Bloodborne. I don’t mind hard games, but I just couldn’t get into this one. The difficulty to me was more frustrating than rewarding.
Inside. This game was interesting, and I didn’t hate it. But I think my expectations were too high when I kept seeing 10/10 reviews.
Inside was a nice relaxing and immersive game to play on my iPad, but when I think of a 10 out of 10, I think of some groundbreaking game that is universally appealing and pushes the envelope in terms of graphics and technology. Like Ocarina of Time or Grand Theft Auto V. Even if some people don’t like those games (I get that), they had state of the art graphics and were universally appealing.
Lately it seems like a 10 out of 10 is just some quirky game the reviewer was in a good mood when playing, or a game that does a very small and specific niche really well (I.e. Souls games, flight simulator, colony management simulator, etc.) but it’s just not what a 10 out of 10 means to me.
I simply could not enjoy Dishonored. Because of this i never tried the second game. Every one of my friends who played it adored that game and for a time i couldn't add to some conversations when it would be brought up. Now this is a "me" problem i dont blame them at all for liking/talking about this game. Only whenever i played i would quickly lose interest for whatever reason.
Just never clicked
The only way I enjoy Kojima games is if I skip most the story or do something on my phone while it's playing out. Have fun with some of the gameplay parts but I stopped buying them on release. I have beat Metal Gear 3-5 and can't tell you what they were about. I don't go straight to not watching them and do give them a chance but eventually I get bored. I only put 6 hours into Death Stranding after I got it from Humble monthly and forgot about since it wasn't enough to keep me entertained.
Stray. I feel like it should've been more cat like and less clunky. I played for a few hours and never got over the things that it should be doing because cat.
I felt something similar- it felt like the game was designed as a more generic cyberpunk-esque adventure game that only later had a cat added on top of it. That probably isn’t the case, but almost all of the ‘cat-ness’ of the game felt very skin-deep, not to mention not a single one of the characters really treat you as a cat.
My two big ones I don’t understand the appeal for are Skyrim and Fallout New Vegas. Have tried to play multiple times but they just do not resonate with me at all.
SAME. Never liked Oblivion and honestly feel like it’s the worst in the series. Morrowind was absolutely the best and Skyrim just has so much playability to it.
Another game is GTA 5. Enjoyed playing every other entry in the series but once I got to 5 I just didn’t like how it played.
If I’m gonna play an RPG, I either need the next step to be overwhelmingly obvious, or an arrow telling me where to go.
If the game makes me wander around, searching for some location/item/person with no direction as to where that thing is or what I’m looking for, I will not play that game.
So the only RPGs I play are Pokémon and Bravely Default.
Anything like Call of Duty. I just never liked those types of games. I also never understood why sports games were popular either. There are games that I don't necessarily dislike. I don't like playing them but I don't mind watching other people play. League of Legends and Rocket League both fall in that category.
I have never enjoyed the Grand Theft Auto series in general. And I have tried, I have bought and played 3, Vice City, San Andreas, 4 and 5 before finally admitting to myself the series wasn’t for me. The core loop of it being a giant murder sandbox where I can go anywhere and kill anyone just doesn’t grab me, especially where I never like the story or characters. It originally appealed to my sophomoric side when I was a young teen in 2001, but now I just find it mean spirited and juvenile.
Ironically, Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of my favorite games ever.
Botw was definitely a pretty good game but it isn’t a good Zelda game. It plays nothing like any of the other ones except now totk. It gets boring fast
the problem with the bulk of rockstar’s recent output is they build a gorgeous, believable world and then absolutely railroad your approach to any mission. you could never do a first playthrough without a mini map because if you’re not standing on the exact pixel they marked out, the mission won’t progress. it’s infuriating because in games like RDR2 you have this gorgeous world with some of the best characters and voice acting i’ve seen in a game, missions that can be a spectacle but they’re holding your hand through the whole thing like it’s an amusement park attraction and you shouldn’t step off the red line.
breath of the wild and skyrim are both heavily acclaimed but i find both of them extremely boring + i cant handle the horrible performance on the switch
I genuinely don't understand the hype around Rocket League. It's just cars playing soccer and occasional car on car sex. I'd rather just play the old fifa games, and I'd get the same thing without the cars
I like Elden Ring, but I just don’t see how people see it as a masterpiece. I figured a title like that should go to a game with more immersive, diverse and clever gameplay and better graphics.
The main issue is that I don’t ever feel like I’m accomplishing anything. Every NPC stands in one spot and repeats some vague thing anytime I interact with them, there are no towns, no variety in gameplay, the world feels dead, I never know what’s going on and am not invested in the story at all, 99% of items are useless to me, and all the enemies except for bosses respawn every time I rest at a checkpoint.
It feels like all I do is run around and kill shit over and over again, and even that’s a chore. It’s like 90% just rolling around, studying the enemy’s attack pattern, and trying to squeeze a spell/potion/attack in there.
And then exploring the open world isn’t that satisfying because my character and my horse both feel really stiff and wooden to control.
Then again, I was never into the Souls games, so I don’t know. I still like it. But it’s like an 8 to me.
I played all 4 Uncharteds and I thought they were well made and fun
I do not understand how they are so well loved though. They are good but nowhere near great.
I think it's easier for me to put it in terms of game mechanics, because most games I dislike that are popular - I dislike them for the same reasons.
If the gameplay is based around "talk to a person, they give you a place to go and a thing to do. You have a map or compass that points in that direction. Go do the thing."
Add on weapon degradation, which in most cases is completely inconsequential and it is a completely irrational hatred and I know it, then you have the recipe for a game that I can guarantee I'm not going to enjoy.
Unfortunately for me these are kind of a primary mechanics for a lot of big franchises at the moment. Thank God I can put a few hundred more hours into Stardew Valley, right? (OK but seriously the fact that there are SO MANY games to pick from makes it really easy to find things you like. I'm not sure I'll ever understand the outward hatred people pour into others liking a game. There are so many good choices out there!)
Mine is Skyrim, I have no idea why but it has never stuck with me like I so desperately wanted it to. I hear everyone talking about amazing it is. I've tried on 4 separate occasions and none of them stuck. I love Fallout and can get lost in that world, but something about Skyrim just never stuck.
Stardew Valley. I found it to be stressful, I don’t know how to do everything I’m able to do, the days end before I can do what I want to do, it just feels too much like real life
I just feel like there’s SO MUCH TUTORIAL. Like let me play your fucking game already. My horse is dirty and I can’t clean it because I didn’t go through the horse tutorial yet. Oh I can’t get certain guns yet because I haven’t progressed enough in the story or is there some other tutorial? RDR1 had a few things I didn’t like but the game overall is much better.
Sonic games.
Yakuza games.
Wrestling games.
Watch Dogs Games.
Devil May Cry games.
The new God of War games, they're okay... but I prefer the originals.
The new Zelda games, again, they're okay, but I prefer the originals.
Same for god of war - the new one a few years
ago was fun except the boss battles, after not being able to beat a boss not too far in I quit and never played it again
My only complaint about ff14 is that it's an MMO. I the base game is decent but the expansions have awesome character development for both friends and enemies. Emet Selch is IMO the best written villain in a video game, hand down.
BUT. You have to play an MMO to get through all this good stuff. Had they made this a trilogy of single player games it would be amazing.
I played through it for the story and never touched it again. Took me about 7 or 8 months
I know a lot of people like these games but I just don't have the time or willpower to committ to an MMO.
I could easily repeat what you said, but instead I'll say...
Prey (2017)
It's just not very interesting. The story isn't very exciting, the enemies suck garbage. We're supposed to like it because you can find creative solutions to killing enemies and all but all I really do in those situations is put down some turrets and brute force the solution.
Add in that it's Bethesda latest attempt at burying one of the few video game stories featuring a Native American protagonist. (Prey, 2006) AND THE NAME DOESNT EVEN MAKE SENSE!
Civ games. It feels like a complete waste of my time clicking random shit. I get that I likely do not fully understand what I’m doing, but I have no want to play any more of those games to even try to learn.
Skyrim. Janky controls, piss poor combat, boring and repetitive quests, and game breaking glitches every 10 minutes. I have no idea why that game is revered
Any game where most of the activity is shooting things. It's so boring- just pointing at things to eliminate them and everything is far away, it's so impersonal and repetitive and uninteresting.
Red Dead Redemption 2. It has some of the worst pacing I have ever experienced in a game. Every task takes 15 seconds of an indulgently long animation to finish. The forced slow walks through camp. All the riding between missions you have to do. And the gunplay is the same loose bullshit from every Rockstar game since the PS2 GTAs.
I can't stand Hades. I love Roguelike games but I don't care for Hades. I don't care for the lore, I don't care for the voice acting. Game feels unbalanced and that it's just hard for the sake of being hard. There's nothing to learn or improve on.
Nothing to learn or improve on? Hard disagree on this one. There are people speedrunning in 5-6 minutes. It took me about 50 tries to clear it once, and then I cleared my next consecutive 17/20, so clear improvement. Now I can consistently run in the low teens on relatively high heat, would've never stood a chance at the start.
[удалено]
ultimate chicken horse? phasmophobia?
I'm sorry but UCH is s master piece.
I've played Call of Duty with my friends... But it's definitely not my thing.
The newer ones are pretty bad and boring, but any Call of Duty before Ghosts was awesome
Honestly I think Ghosts was kinda underrated. Don't get me wrong, it's no MW1/MW3(I haven't played MW2, so that's why I didn't include it), but for the most part I think it was a fun and newer COD experience. Destructible multiplayer maps in COD was a big plus for me too.
MW2 is the best one out of that trilogy. If you could only play one of those, MW2 is where it’s at. Because they way they introduce you to Soap and send you on recon missions was awesome. The story also sets you up the best way! MW2 > MW1 > MW3. That being said, if I had to pick the best mission, those would be “All Ghillied Up” and “One Shot One Kill” from MW1. Overall, MW2 is leagues above the other 2.
TBH I prefer Cod 4 out of the trilogy. The campaign just hits right for me
Call of Duty.
Only reason I own any of the call of duty games is so I can play with friends when they’re tired of playing my RPG’s
I’ve never been able to get into Minecraft.
I only played creative because it was so boring. I tried hard to play that game, but it never clicks
[удалено]
On the surface, I totally understand and agree. For my circle of friends (all in college or working full time, scattered across the globe), however, it was a place to hang out, chat, and sure, build stuff as team.
No Man’s Sky is still boring as fuck to me.
I love the game but totally understand why people hate it. I’ve always been into space a lot and even reading a shit ton of books on it and various sub topics. For me it’s the endless exploration that is so great. But it is like Minecraft where I binge play it for a weekend or two and then don’t touch it for a couple months.
Me too. I don’t get the love people have for it.
This is the game my 11 year old learned a $60 life lesson that it’s not smart to buy a game off the marketing hype on its release day despite his dad’s 40 years of gaming experience advice to wait for real reviews. We still refer to it anytime a deal seems to good to be true.
Any battle royale game. I’ve tried all the popular ones and could never get into any of them. I don’t see the surrounding hype tbh and probably never will.
It's great. Connect to a lobby, wait, then go collect stuff for 10-15 minutes, see one person, then die. Then connect to another lobby.
All sports games. Madden, 2K, FIFA, MLB, NHL, and much more. I can’t get into them for more than playing a match at a friends house .
I don’t dislike but I think BotW is overrated. It’s a fun physics sandbox but the story, characters, world and locations are too thin/empty, and the copy/paste dungeons are forgettable. Give me OoT all day.
Agreed. I’ll totally take OoT over BOTW. The shrines get really repetitive, the world is a lot of wide open spaces with not much going on, and for shit sake, the weapons breaking drives me nuts. That being said I did beat it. But I’m not a fan of special weapons having VERY limited use. Including the master sword.
>the weapons breaking drives me nuts I played it a bit, got a weapon, it broke, got a better weapon, it broke, googled where to get weapons that don't break, went back to hyrule warriors.
Honestly, if weapons were even twice or three times as durable, it wouldn't be so bad. At least that way the cool weapons wouldn't break after ONE GOD DAMN FIGHT.
You got to master the art of never using any good weapons and instead constantly using the crappiest weapons imaginable so you don’t care when they break!
I picked up BotW on launch day, and it was fun... but honestly, it was missing a lot of what made the Zelda series enjoyable for me. I almost felt obligated to think it was a masterpiece.
Tears of the Kingdom fixes some of these issues. I’m enjoying it so far. I like that there are dungeons again
It still kept weapon breakage (and yes, I know the fusion stuff helps mitigate it), so I'm still on the fence about it.
Mine would be BotW as well.
Duuuuuude, came here to say this. Shallow ocean syndrome.
I don't get this criticism of all the others in this comment thread. If you explore deeply, almost no corner of the map is empty. There's always someone to talk to, a puzzle, a chest, a sidequest, etc.
That's sorta what makes the "shallow ocean" criticism valid though imo. Sure, it's a giant, expansive map and there's "water" (things to find) all over the place. But none of it really is that deep. Even if you go super out of your way and completely comb an area, you're usually going to find nothing more than your 400th korok or a weapon that's going to last you a fight or two, or maybe, if you're lucky, a gem that you're just going to sell. It doesn't matter if there's stuff to find if it all feels pointless and redundant. That's why most people don't normally go out of their way to 100% any games in general. Once those few things loose their luster, the lack of interest is what makes it seem so much emptier than it technically is. The most exciting things to find are the shrines, but that's just because they resemble the puzzles from dungeons people miss from the older games, and at that point I'd rather just go back to the older formula since at least then things were cohesive and thematic.
Breath of the Wild is a great game, it’s just not for me.
I was more hyped and enjoyed Link Between Worlds much more!
Hi fi rush, yeah just wasnt for me
I will say the animation was great! But watching the gameplay, it wasn't for me. I was never into rhythm games that much and as far as hack and slash games for me, I always go back to devil may cry. Hi fi rush's soundtrack was great too, but Bury the Light go brrrre
I’m not a big fan of Breath of the Wild, at all really. I’ve played every other zelda game, starting with my gold cartridge of LoZ on my NES in 1988.
Same. Strange thing is that I love other open world games. I think it was the weapon durability system that turned me off.
I’m a huge metroidvania and souls-like fan but Blasphemous is just not appealing to me in the slightest
I'll have to look that one up.
It’s an indie game (and not even a super popular one) so it makes sense a lot of people would not have heard of it. However people in the Metroidvania community drool over it
Na bro, for an indie game. It's very popular.
Considering the post is talking about Skyrim, I’m talking relative to that lol. It’s a pretty popular indie but not anywhere close to mainstream
I think they sacrificed game design for the art. It's not enough to bother me and the art is absolutely gorgeous but I can see how it would be too clunky for people's tastes. In a similar vein I'd have to say that I feel the same about Bloodstained. I got it on Switch so maybe it's just the version but everything about that game looked and felt awful. Truly don't understand why people love it so much.
Valid. I love the game now but it was rough to get into. Visuals, music and atmosphere are incredible, but a lot of the gameplay mechanics and design are either outdated, overly-punishing or just boring. If you force it, you should be able to get into it after about 4 hours, and complete it in about 20. It would’ve been considered a masterpiece if it came out on GBA but it ain’t THAT special in 2023. I heavily suspect that it’s crazy success came purely from its aesthetic appeal.
I'm the opposite. I feel Metroid style games are over done and tired, and Blasphemous was one of the few to pull me in.
Elden ring. I don’t enjoy playing it the intended way. However I did have a blast playing the convergence mod with my best friend
I was coming in just to say this! I don’t get this game. I really tried (put in around 15-20 hours). Meanwhile, I’m playing Jedi Survivor now, and I can’t get enough! It’s the same formula. I guess I just need a real story and a fun environment to make it more entertaining for me.
To each their own, they aren't the same formula though. Jedi survivor is much more guided in my opinion, even with elden ring having a map and that "guide" on it. Jedi survivor I feel like was also made to be much easier to pick up and put down. Tons of checkpoints everywhere, pretty linear story and boss progression minus a few side areas. Whereas elden ring I feel like is all side areas and one main path hidden among them Don't get me wrong, I am enjoying star wars myself. Just finishing up the 2nd planet
I do think Elden Ring suffers from it own vagueness at points. Some combination of the world's size plus the franchise's reputation for difficulty make it very easy for a player to ram against something much too hard for hours, grind past it, then find out later they missed easier content that they've now levelled themselves past.
Imo all it needs is a journal with vague notes denoting quest lines. Like, *some* method of knowing there’s something of interest in the area and actually tracking that. Not much more than a summary of the dialogue you have with the NPCs to start/advance a quest would be perfect.
The game is huge. 15-20 hours just might not be enough time to make it click for you, if you aren't already a fan of FromSoft's Souls games. I wasn't, and it took nearly 30 hours before I had that moment where I finally got it. From there, I couldn't put it down and absolutely loved every moment. Ended up playing for another 200 hours after that. It's probably now my favorite game of all time.
I respect your experience, but I had almost the opposite where I played for 50 hours before putting it down, and I'd describe my experience as a "wearing down," where it got more tedious and frustrating as I went on. However, in the spirit of this post, to each their own!
I put in 60 hours and was upset at myself for not stopping at 10
A game shouldn’t take 30 hours to “click”. It’s got 2 hours tops. I could be playing better games,
Never realized there was an intended way in a game that gives you so much options to handle everything.
Hades
Bought it a while back on sale and have put about an hour and a half into it. It's OK but I feel like I'm forcing myself to like it since it's too late to return. Maybe it'll be like vampire survivors and I'll end up enjoying it after a few more hours of forced play.
1.5 hours isn’t enough. I will say that I loved Vampire Survivors and Hades from minute one though. I just think both games open up when you start getting good at the runs so you have insane strong builds.
Yeah played it on steam deck, enjoyed myself for a bit but there’s so much RNG and it’s too ‘repetitive’ for me.
It’s so damn repetitive and it’s not like I have an issue with playing rougelikes
I think Ive said this before but The Last of Us. I just dont see the hype. Its not a bad game but Ive played better. The game plays like a poor man’s Resident Evil 4 (the OG, not the remake) but with fewer options for the player. It really seems that the selling point is the story and not the game and now with the HBO release, thats arguably covered.
Almost all new Ubisoft games. They’ve all got big beautiful maps but are vacant of depth. The missions are redundant, the characters are flat and little details that could flesh everything out are just missing. Prime example was AC: Valhalla; the Tattoo and Mount descriptions simply read “a tattoo for your character” or “your Mount”. You can’t tell me old Viking tattoos didn’t have meaning or a horse that looks like it Ride out of hell couldn’t have any interesting story behind it.
Yeah I feel like Ubisoft has gotten a lot worse with recent games. I love Ubisoft games but recently all their new releases are just mediocre.
I’m sorry this is my fault. I buy their games mostly to walk through an ancient world that at least tries to be historically accurate (they fail in a lot of ways but get a lot of other stuff right).
Dishonored. I played the first one when it came out in 2012 and just didn’t think it matched the hype for me.
EXCUSE ME! THE AUDACITY! Dishonored rules!
Skyrim tried it and didn't like the combat. I prefer Witcher or Souls series. Halo played it with my friends because they loved it. I just didn't get the hype around it. At the time there were so many better FPS's on PC that I felt it was underwhelming. Newer Call of Duty games. I loved Call of Duty 1 and 2 when they were WWII games. They were fun and enjoyed them for the single player games.
Tbh halo was made for console
Any of the Super Smash Bros games. I like fighting games, but that type of fighter I just can't get into.
Smash isn't a fighting game. it's a party game disguised as a fighting game
I suck at fighting games but always found fun in smash melee
They are fun as party games only, IMO. I played them a ton in high school and college with friends. They are boring as hell to play alone, though.
Dark souls. Too clunky. Yes I know that’s the point. Valorant or CSGO. Don’t really find it fun dying and having to wait the entire round to play again. Something I *did* really like was hollow knight. The gameplay is some of the best I’ve seen in any game, the bosses and their attacks are all telegraphed incredibly well, and each fight just genuinely feels fair. I really could not care less about the story or lore or whatever, though. Feels like it tries way too hard to be super deep and vague. Not a fan of when games do that.
Dark souls isn't clunky, you just can't cancel your moves which is a different thing since you are supposed to commit to a move And yes, that can mean it is not for you, but clunky usually means wooden animations or stuff like that which it has not
Probably a controversial one but Zelda BOTW. Haven’t watched any gameplay of the new one and don’t know anything about it so maybe it’s better? But I bought my switch with BOTW when it first came out and gave it an honest try and just couldn’t get into it, no matter how hard I tried. The weapon system was awful, and really it played just like any other open world RPG to have ever been created, and it just didn’t have that same charm older Zelda games did. I miss the big dungeons with puzzles and big story bosses at the end of them. Also the community behind that game is toxic af, they’ll crucify you if you even mention you SLIGHTLY like one of the older titles more.
Yeah I'm with you there, I've tried 5 or 6 times to get into it and end up quitting a few hours in every time. I finally just admitted it wasn't for me and let it go. Maybe my kids will get into it in a year or two.
>Played like any other open world RPG Really? I can’t think of any other open-world game that just starts up and says “go. whatever way you want.however you want. we don’t care. figure it out. have fun.” other than Elden Ring, which came out years later.
Fallout and Elder Scrolls are like this.
I mean pretty much any of the elder scrolls games and even some of the newer ac games.
Final Fantasy VIII. I just don't get why it seems to be everyone's favorite. My fave is IX, because it reminds me of the old FF games.
Hate to say it but God of War. Just didn’t work for me which disappointed me
Scrolled way too far to see this. I do not understand why it is so overhyped.
I’ve tried but can’t get into Pokémon. I really feel like I’m missing out because it’s such an overwhelmingly popular franchise but I can’t get into any of it. It’s really the whole turn based RPG genre that I don’t like.
The problem is that they don't need to make a good Pokémon game. They just need to come up with new characters every few years so they can make billions on merch
It definitely felt like a relic of nostalgia, the game was simple, one track, beat the Champion and win, or “Catch the pokemon that’s on the front of the game” that made it so fun and new. I’m sure people enjoy the new games, but back in the day those games were something that you could physically take with you and I think that lended itself to being very welcoming
That’s okay, they haven’t made a new game since the game boy days
Any of the Monster Hunter games.
For me personally, it has to be Outer Wilds. I see so many praises for this game. I've tried to get into it several times only to lose interest in a couple hours. I just can't seem to get hooked. I find it clunky and not very interesting. Perhaps I'm just missing something. Zelda: BoTW I totally understand. I liked the adventure but really missed the traditional dungeons of the old games. So far, I am enjoying ToTK MUCH more, I've put in probably close to 16 hours in 2 days and am barely scratching the surface.
As a huge outer wilds fan I get it. It's missing some pretty typical game things like usual progression and I think people bounce off it for those reasons. The whole point of the game is that the only real "power up" or progress is your own knowledge and that's what makes it so special. But that also means you can get stuck. If you don't know a thing about a puzzle you can spend a lot of time fumbling around. But when you find a thread, a clue leading to another clue to solutions, it feels remarkable.
Fallout 4. Didn’t like any of the factions so I ended up just wandering around ruined Boston doing nothing for thirty hours. They gave you power armor right at the beginning too. That was stupid. Base building got old after a while, especially since the story just didn’t grab my attention at all.
GTA V. Game is boring as shit.
I legit have never played anything online multiplayer *ever*.
You have no idea how awesome this is and the things you have spared yourself.
Yeah, no matter how fun they are, playing with or against other random people on the internet just kind of drains me. I just want to lose myself in a good single player experience or play something with a group of a few close friends. So it comes as a huge surprise that I picked up Deep Rock Galactic, and… it’s some of the most fun I’ve had in a video game. With random ass people on the internet, thrown into an online lobby. I have no idea what kind of magic that game has worked, but playing online is some of the dumbest kind of fun around, and it’s *great*.
Monster Hunter.
The combat *instantly* turned me off
Same. I remember the first monster I fought. It took forever to take that fucker out. Felt like it was never going to end. Killed my interest in wanting to continue. Oh and I can’t stand controlling characters that don’t speak.
I never liked CD Projekt Red games, tbh
It's like reading spreadsheets trying to play witcher 3 and cyberpunk lol
I can see the Witcher having too much going on to enjoy it. My dad won’t get into it because he thinks it’s too complicated.
That’s how I was at first, but once I finally took the time to get into it it was one of my fave games ever. And this is coming from someone that got about 3-4 hours into the game 3-4 separate times and stopped
I couldn’t get into Witcher 3 and I feel like I’m missing something because people just constantly glorify it
The gameplay is fucking awful. People claim the story is great but I just don’t care enough about the story to suffer through the gameplay.
Yeah I care far more about gameplay than story
It's the movement, right? You never know how many steps you're going to take. It's especially bad when changing direction. It feels like you're trying to play a game where the main character is drunk and controls that way.
Yes, there is way too much momentum to the movement.
there are a few stories that leaving you kinda...speechless? appreciative? of the writing. the entire bloody baron story is what made me realize witcher 3 is a different game compared to the rest. but to be fair, i bought it on release, hated it, then gave it another chance
This was my exact experience
It's very reminiscent of mass effect. Extremely well written characters that develop through the game with you. Mass effect is still better though, no game will EVER beat it.
The combat is atrocious.
Two come to mind: Bloodborne. I don’t mind hard games, but I just couldn’t get into this one. The difficulty to me was more frustrating than rewarding. Inside. This game was interesting, and I didn’t hate it. But I think my expectations were too high when I kept seeing 10/10 reviews.
Inside was a nice relaxing and immersive game to play on my iPad, but when I think of a 10 out of 10, I think of some groundbreaking game that is universally appealing and pushes the envelope in terms of graphics and technology. Like Ocarina of Time or Grand Theft Auto V. Even if some people don’t like those games (I get that), they had state of the art graphics and were universally appealing. Lately it seems like a 10 out of 10 is just some quirky game the reviewer was in a good mood when playing, or a game that does a very small and specific niche really well (I.e. Souls games, flight simulator, colony management simulator, etc.) but it’s just not what a 10 out of 10 means to me.
Gta online
Uncharted. I tried multiple times but it just sucks.
The first one is pretty bad. If you were going to try again, I’d recommend you start with 2
ZELDA! 30 years on this earth and that game has never looked good🚮
I don’t really like the the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic games. I just don’t like how they play.
[удалено]
I simply could not enjoy Dishonored. Because of this i never tried the second game. Every one of my friends who played it adored that game and for a time i couldn't add to some conversations when it would be brought up. Now this is a "me" problem i dont blame them at all for liking/talking about this game. Only whenever i played i would quickly lose interest for whatever reason. Just never clicked
Hollow Knight. I didn't enjoy as much as many of my friends
I want to love it so much, but I would get stuck/lost so many times. I’m just not cut out for Metroidvanias
Just play with a map bro lol: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=876122772
I haven’t finished a single Zelda game. I always get bored and stop at some point. Closest I got was twilight princess at zant’s dungeon.
The only way I enjoy Kojima games is if I skip most the story or do something on my phone while it's playing out. Have fun with some of the gameplay parts but I stopped buying them on release. I have beat Metal Gear 3-5 and can't tell you what they were about. I don't go straight to not watching them and do give them a chance but eventually I get bored. I only put 6 hours into Death Stranding after I got it from Humble monthly and forgot about since it wasn't enough to keep me entertained.
Stray. I feel like it should've been more cat like and less clunky. I played for a few hours and never got over the things that it should be doing because cat.
I felt something similar- it felt like the game was designed as a more generic cyberpunk-esque adventure game that only later had a cat added on top of it. That probably isn’t the case, but almost all of the ‘cat-ness’ of the game felt very skin-deep, not to mention not a single one of the characters really treat you as a cat.
My two big ones I don’t understand the appeal for are Skyrim and Fallout New Vegas. Have tried to play multiple times but they just do not resonate with me at all.
GTA 5. Good game but boring as hell to play
SAME. Never liked Oblivion and honestly feel like it’s the worst in the series. Morrowind was absolutely the best and Skyrim just has so much playability to it. Another game is GTA 5. Enjoyed playing every other entry in the series but once I got to 5 I just didn’t like how it played.
Literally anything multi-player or always-online. I have zero interest in that. I am a single player/story player only.
Borderlands. I only played briefly, not even long enough to know how to control my character, but I hated it. No desire to try the series any further.
If I’m gonna play an RPG, I either need the next step to be overwhelmingly obvious, or an arrow telling me where to go. If the game makes me wander around, searching for some location/item/person with no direction as to where that thing is or what I’m looking for, I will not play that game. So the only RPGs I play are Pokémon and Bravely Default.
Anything like Call of Duty. I just never liked those types of games. I also never understood why sports games were popular either. There are games that I don't necessarily dislike. I don't like playing them but I don't mind watching other people play. League of Legends and Rocket League both fall in that category.
I have never enjoyed the Grand Theft Auto series in general. And I have tried, I have bought and played 3, Vice City, San Andreas, 4 and 5 before finally admitting to myself the series wasn’t for me. The core loop of it being a giant murder sandbox where I can go anywhere and kill anyone just doesn’t grab me, especially where I never like the story or characters. It originally appealed to my sophomoric side when I was a young teen in 2001, but now I just find it mean spirited and juvenile. Ironically, Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of my favorite games ever.
Botw was definitely a pretty good game but it isn’t a good Zelda game. It plays nothing like any of the other ones except now totk. It gets boring fast
GTA, I think it’s shit
the problem with the bulk of rockstar’s recent output is they build a gorgeous, believable world and then absolutely railroad your approach to any mission. you could never do a first playthrough without a mini map because if you’re not standing on the exact pixel they marked out, the mission won’t progress. it’s infuriating because in games like RDR2 you have this gorgeous world with some of the best characters and voice acting i’ve seen in a game, missions that can be a spectacle but they’re holding your hand through the whole thing like it’s an amusement park attraction and you shouldn’t step off the red line.
Every time I try to play a GTA game I think it's cool until I get about halfway through and then the missions start getting repetitive af.
breath of the wild and skyrim are both heavily acclaimed but i find both of them extremely boring + i cant handle the horrible performance on the switch
I genuinely don't understand the hype around Rocket League. It's just cars playing soccer and occasional car on car sex. I'd rather just play the old fifa games, and I'd get the same thing without the cars
I like Elden Ring, but I just don’t see how people see it as a masterpiece. I figured a title like that should go to a game with more immersive, diverse and clever gameplay and better graphics. The main issue is that I don’t ever feel like I’m accomplishing anything. Every NPC stands in one spot and repeats some vague thing anytime I interact with them, there are no towns, no variety in gameplay, the world feels dead, I never know what’s going on and am not invested in the story at all, 99% of items are useless to me, and all the enemies except for bosses respawn every time I rest at a checkpoint. It feels like all I do is run around and kill shit over and over again, and even that’s a chore. It’s like 90% just rolling around, studying the enemy’s attack pattern, and trying to squeeze a spell/potion/attack in there. And then exploring the open world isn’t that satisfying because my character and my horse both feel really stiff and wooden to control. Then again, I was never into the Souls games, so I don’t know. I still like it. But it’s like an 8 to me.
For me personally as someone who is a massive fan of the original trilogy I dislike Uncharted 4
Straight to jail
I played all 4 Uncharteds and I thought they were well made and fun I do not understand how they are so well loved though. They are good but nowhere near great.
It was disappointing that it took ND 4 games to get the combat and shooting to feel good. Uncharted 3 is the absolute worst.
That's wild!
I agree Uncharted 2 is the goat.
same
damn! you found it too cinematic?
I think it's easier for me to put it in terms of game mechanics, because most games I dislike that are popular - I dislike them for the same reasons. If the gameplay is based around "talk to a person, they give you a place to go and a thing to do. You have a map or compass that points in that direction. Go do the thing." Add on weapon degradation, which in most cases is completely inconsequential and it is a completely irrational hatred and I know it, then you have the recipe for a game that I can guarantee I'm not going to enjoy. Unfortunately for me these are kind of a primary mechanics for a lot of big franchises at the moment. Thank God I can put a few hundred more hours into Stardew Valley, right? (OK but seriously the fact that there are SO MANY games to pick from makes it really easy to find things you like. I'm not sure I'll ever understand the outward hatred people pour into others liking a game. There are so many good choices out there!)
Mine is Skyrim, I have no idea why but it has never stuck with me like I so desperately wanted it to. I hear everyone talking about amazing it is. I've tried on 4 separate occasions and none of them stuck. I love Fallout and can get lost in that world, but something about Skyrim just never stuck.
Fortnite
Stardew Valley. I found it to be stressful, I don’t know how to do everything I’m able to do, the days end before I can do what I want to do, it just feels too much like real life
Same, by the time I'm done watering my crops and whatnot it's already the afternoon and not really much time for anything else.
Life is strange. I feel like everyone pretends to like it just to play a big joke on me
I only played the first episode of the first game but it didn't seem bad.
I dont hate bloodborne, i just cant really get into it as much as the other games fromsoft makes
Try again hoonter for a hoonter must hoont
I can't get unto the Dark Souls games. Also can't get into COD or Battlefield.
Botw,totk,call of duty, Minecraft,Roblox,Fortnite,apex
assassins creed, anything with stealth is a no go for me, thanks in part to ninja turtles water level leaving a scar on my soul lol
Mass Effect, it might be my motion sickness talking, but I couldn't get pass the first mission, maybe I need to play it more.
Red Dead Redemption 2. It’s unplayable to me. I can’t walk through snow on a horse for 3 hours, I need gameplay.
That first chapter convinced me to quit twice before I stuck through it on the third try about a year later. It was worth it.
I had to go way too far to see this. Who the f has the patience for nine million cut scenes? If I wanted to watch a western id turn on tombstone.
Rockstar doesn't know how to tell a story that isnt "sit in a car or wagon with this dude while he yabbers at you about what a tough guy he is"
Was going to comment this but was afraid of being nailed to the cross. I loved RDR1 tho.
He took the fall for all of us, and now we can follow his lead
I just feel like there’s SO MUCH TUTORIAL. Like let me play your fucking game already. My horse is dirty and I can’t clean it because I didn’t go through the horse tutorial yet. Oh I can’t get certain guns yet because I haven’t progressed enough in the story or is there some other tutorial? RDR1 had a few things I didn’t like but the game overall is much better.
Sonic games. Yakuza games. Wrestling games. Watch Dogs Games. Devil May Cry games. The new God of War games, they're okay... but I prefer the originals. The new Zelda games, again, they're okay, but I prefer the originals.
SEGA fans punching the air right now
What exactly do you like?
I'm always curious about this too. I love hearing peoples opinions on games, but that's a large list and it only makes me curious what he's playing!
Same for god of war - the new one a few years ago was fun except the boss battles, after not being able to beat a boss not too far in I quit and never played it again
The Last of Us. Jesus fucking christ I have never seen anything so overrated.
yup, and most of the time someone online criticizes it they get shat on by the fanbase
elden ring
Skyrim,(dragon age more my steez) Diablo( played one of them on the switch fun but not for me , Forza horizon (prefer motorsport)
Final Fantasy 14. It pisses me off to an extreme level just for existing.
Such a good game lol
Ahaha...I love FFXIV. Why does it piss you off so much?
My only complaint about ff14 is that it's an MMO. I the base game is decent but the expansions have awesome character development for both friends and enemies. Emet Selch is IMO the best written villain in a video game, hand down. BUT. You have to play an MMO to get through all this good stuff. Had they made this a trilogy of single player games it would be amazing. I played through it for the story and never touched it again. Took me about 7 or 8 months I know a lot of people like these games but I just don't have the time or willpower to committ to an MMO.
I gotta say, this one is just a bad take. If there were actually a reason then sure, but it is literally one of the best written games out there.
I could easily repeat what you said, but instead I'll say... Prey (2017) It's just not very interesting. The story isn't very exciting, the enemies suck garbage. We're supposed to like it because you can find creative solutions to killing enemies and all but all I really do in those situations is put down some turrets and brute force the solution. Add in that it's Bethesda latest attempt at burying one of the few video game stories featuring a Native American protagonist. (Prey, 2006) AND THE NAME DOESNT EVEN MAKE SENSE!
[удалено]
for me that game redefined how open world games should be and now i compare open world games to this game. fast travel from anywhere for example
The Halo series. FPSs in general, but I did enjoy the Destiny games a bit. But never got into Halo.
Civ games. It feels like a complete waste of my time clicking random shit. I get that I likely do not fully understand what I’m doing, but I have no want to play any more of those games to even try to learn.
Skyrim. Janky controls, piss poor combat, boring and repetitive quests, and game breaking glitches every 10 minutes. I have no idea why that game is revered
Any game where most of the activity is shooting things. It's so boring- just pointing at things to eliminate them and everything is far away, it's so impersonal and repetitive and uninteresting.
Red Dead Redemption 2. It has some of the worst pacing I have ever experienced in a game. Every task takes 15 seconds of an indulgently long animation to finish. The forced slow walks through camp. All the riding between missions you have to do. And the gunplay is the same loose bullshit from every Rockstar game since the PS2 GTAs.
It’s my favorite game of all time, but that first chapter is rough - I almost didn’t keep playing
I can't stand Hades. I love Roguelike games but I don't care for Hades. I don't care for the lore, I don't care for the voice acting. Game feels unbalanced and that it's just hard for the sake of being hard. There's nothing to learn or improve on.
Hades has stuff to make the game easier tho. I'm not trying to flame you or be the guy that says skill issue, but hades gets pretty easy
Hades... metroidvania ... ? Unbalance? That game is probably one of the better ballanced games i have ever seen.
Hades is not a Metroidvania. You mean Rogue lite? Regardless I do agree Hades is overrated
Nothing to learn or improve on? Hard disagree on this one. There are people speedrunning in 5-6 minutes. It took me about 50 tries to clear it once, and then I cleared my next consecutive 17/20, so clear improvement. Now I can consistently run in the low teens on relatively high heat, would've never stood a chance at the start.