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Obscure games

Discussion in 'Video Games' started by Dawn, Nov 8, 2019.

  1. Dawn

    Dawn La vie est drôle

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    There are hundreds of thousands - if not over a million by now - of video games out there, with more being released on a daily basis. So it is inevitable that in this sea of games, many will fall by the wayside. As big releases that can afford an advertising budget and have the brand name recognition to keep themselves in public eye dominate the mainstream media, many - if not the majority - of smaller games that do not have this will go mostly ignored...mostly.

    Of course, there are many people out there, and these games are not difficult to find if you look. Most simply choose not to look. But every game has at least one fan. Except perhaps Fallout 76, but that's neither here nor there for the purpose of this topic.

    Are there any video games that it seems like only you have played? Was it a good game that more people should play, or is it obscure for a good reason?
     
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  2. Neb

    Neb Cosmog Enthusiast

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    First is “All Our Asias.” It’s a walking simulator by Sean Han Tani, a Japanese American indie developer from Chicago. While the game is only a few hours long, the abstract electronic soundtrack and philosophical story make for an interesting experience. I wouldn’t recommend it unless you’re already a fan of the genre. Otherwise All Our Asias would semi dull.

    Mibibli’s Quest is yet another 2D platformer from an indie developer. What makes it worth playing is the responsive controls, catchy music, and surreal level design. If there was native controller support and a way to pause the game, I would recommend it to any fans of 2D platformers.
     
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  3. Gazi

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    I wish I could say that I'm familiar with really obscure games, but I think it's more like I'm super into games that people had heard about and hyped about when they first came out, but then fell by the wayside shortly afterwards. Games that are fairly new and were fairly hyped, but I don't see many people talking about (for all I know, everyone's talking about them, and I'm just not hearing it). So I guess they're more underrated games then anything, but I'm going to go ahead and share them anyways.
    Mostly I'm talking about Yooka Laylee and Deltarune (unpopular opinion here...I actually prefer Deltarune to Undertale, because so far it's shorter and while you can still screw up your desired gameplay pattern just as easily, the consequences won't be as severe (and you don't have to go to such extreme lengths to start the game over fresh)).
     
  4. Wizard

    Wizard Do you feel it? The moon's power!

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    I know that licensed games are normally sub-par, but Over the Hedge made for a decent beat-em-up on the PS2 and GC. Had a lot of fun with that one. Another one I love is a side-scrolling beat-em-up on the GBA: Batman Begins. Surprisingly, this one is also pretty fun and uses gadgets pretty well. Not gonna lie, I like the gameplay more than the Arkham games. One last title would be Pinobee for the GBA. It is pretty heavily inspired by the original Sonic titles and is a pretty decent platformer in its own right with multiple endings. Not a particularly notable game, but a fun time if you come across it.
     
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  5. RadEmpoleon

    RadEmpoleon certified EPIC Gamer™

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    Have any of you guys heard of a game called “The Legendary Starfy”? I don’t know how obscure it is, but I haven’t heard people talk about it that much. That game was my childhood. It had a cute little storyline, cute characters, decent music, and fun little mini games. I’d say it’s a pretty good game for casual players.
     
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  6. BZRich64

    BZRich64 The Mustachiod Machamp

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    One example that comes to mind is the old A Bug's Life game on PC. Its one of my favorite games from when I was a kid and while I haven't played it in years I think it would probably hold up fairly well in terms of gameplay (though probably not graphics). Bugs Bunny Trapped in Time is also a really good early 3D platformer that I have a lot of fond memories of and is probably still pretty good apart from the outdated graphics.
     
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  7. Vitis

    Vitis Banned

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    1,181,019 current gen games apparently at the time of this post so at least over 1 million.
    Had it on Playstation back in the day, but as far as holding up I'm going to say it wouldn't hold up, most old games don't. Those we remember fondly may get a pass due to nostalgia reasons, but especially those with newer versions of the game otherwise are basically unplayable. For instance a lot of folks have fond memories of Resident Evil 4, but when the HD remake came out a lot of that love went out the window complaining about the controls and how clunky it felt to play.

    The games I can think of off the top of my head would be Legend of Dragoon, Strange Brigade, Too Human and Ristar. Legend of Dragoon never got a sequel and has never been remade it was somewhat popular, but being old and only for a the original Playstation make it a game that people frequently have never heard of from my experience. Strange Brigade was fairly quietly released, but it's a more modern game being for current gen systems. It's similar to the Zombie Army Trilogy which both are put out by Rebellion except it has some light puzzles and is done in the style of old black and white adventure comedy made for the television and is set in the 1930s. More or less it's The Librarians in game form albeit a bit more old fashioned. Too Human was going to be a much larger game than it ended up being since what they promised was vastly too ambitious. The end result kind of just fizzled out, but I still enjoyed it enough to occupy my time. It's a discontinued game these days and the studio that made it doesn't exist anymore. I wouldn't call it a good game it's one of those simply games that doesn't require a lot of effort to play so I use it as a filler game when I don't know what I want to do and just want something mindless to occupy me while I think of something better. Ristar is one of those games that was just bad in concept and I'm pretty sure nobody actually played Ristar for more than a few levels before going back to Sonic. It was released in 1995 by Sega and was originally conceptualized in discussions in what later became Sonic. It was going to be a Sonic like game that featured a rabbit called feel and what was originally going to be sort of elastic ears became Ristar's 'signature' extendable arms. The initial reviews were favorable, but it got trampled since it lacked any sort of originality borrowing from multiple much better games so ultimately people would just play Sonic instead and forget Ristar existed, that said his game did actually get re-released in a collection at the very least so people had multiple opportunities to run into him. He's also the guy that waves the flag in 2012 Sonic All Star Racing so he's out there cameo-ing it up. (He also made a cameo in Shenmue and Shenmue II as a capsule toy)

    Edit: Forgot about Monday Night Combat, only available as a digital game, only available as a multiplayer game, delisted and completely unplayable now. It basically was Team Fortress and was a pretty good game IMO, but being multiplayer and unavailable it's completely unplayable these days even if you did get to keep the game if you had it downloaded before it got delisted.

    I'd be interested in knowing if anybody played Arm Joe, the video game based on the musical Les Miserables.
     
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    #7 Jan 2, 2020
    Last edited: Jan 2, 2020
  8. Jupjami

    Jupjami Thy friendly neighbourhood birb shaman

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    An obscure game developer I have seen is Yiotro. Their games are quite amazing - Antiyoy, Achikaps, and Bleentoro to name a few - but they're not well-known...
     
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  9. SyWry

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    Mid night club 3. I'm not really sure this is an obscure game, but I always loved it as a kid and it seemed no one had it either. I really like the racing elements as a kid because it was so free form unlike every other racing game that had a set track.
     
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  10. Kecleon

    Kecleon Mod Crew

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    I'm aware of quite a few good obscure games, but none so novel or unknown as Colorblind: An Eye For An Eye.

    Available on Android and iOS for free, it's a charming little platformer where you control a literal walking eyeball named Right Eye. When his girlfriend, Left Eye, is kidnapped by a bunch of pirates, the color literally drains from everything, and it's up to Right Eye to rescue Left Eye from the nasty pirates. The controls are fluid, the visuals are surprisingly lively, and the main gimmick of the game is very enjoyable. It calls for you to dunk yourself in a specific type of paint in order to make things visible and interactive, so you can leap on otherwise hidden platforms, and you can wash the paint away so you can avoid things like obstacles. It's frankly a very short game, but the difficulty curve is very smooth, and it's overall a pleasure to play. It easily earns my recommendation, and I think other people should talk about it and spread the word of this lovely little game.
     
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  11. Jeydis

    Jeydis Midnight Gourmand

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    A bit, mostly from my sprite art beginnings as the sprites from that game looked so lively and fun, saw them ripped a lot. The game looks really fun tbh.

    I love exploring obscure games, especially on PC, steam is full of duds but also full of treasures if you know where to look :D The playstation 1 and 2 eras also had lots of hidden gems.

    I started a topic a while back with a similar theme where I gave reviews of games I loved that others might not of heard of: Check it out for a couple more games that I could add here.

    Here are some of my favorite obscure picks:

    1- Threads of Fate
    One of the victims of the flood of RPGs in the PS1 era, it got lost in the shuffle a bit I am afraid. The story was charming, the mechanics where fun but the main thing that this game had that stood out from the rest was it's humor. There was plenty of slapstick moments, some great gags and just charming characters overall. If you are fan of RPGs, I recommend trying this out if you can find it.

    2- G-Darius
    In my top 10 lists of video game soundtracks rests this gem. The music is bizarre but hypnotizing, the graphics are trippy (you fight giant sea life robots from a spaceship) and the mechanics are super fun. The game plays like most side scrolling shoot-em-ups but with a twist, you can "Pokéball" capture enemies to help you out, this goes all the way up to mini-bosses if you can figure out how to get them. It's also 2 player friendly and has multiple end bosses and routes to go through. The Darius games are in general pretty popular but I rarely see anyone talk about this oddball in the family.

    3- Subsurface Circular
    This game made the rounds a bit when it came out but I have not seen many people talk about it since. Subsurface is really well written and has a rather charming artstyle, though that might just be my bias for robot designs. The gameplay is very very simple, its just navigating through dialog menus really but the little details in everything make it very engaging. The game is quite short and makes for a great "palette cleanser" of sorts between big action games.

    There are many, many more but I don't want to flood the thread too much. Ill come back to this topic in the future though :P
     
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  12. Shadria

    Shadria Impish Illusionary Kitsune

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    One I've heard of, but never played personally.
    The White Chamber (not to be confused with the horror film, White Chamber) is a VERY early internet horror game. It was college project turned into a full game and released in early 2005. The team's old site is still up, offering free downloads to this game and a few other things the group has done before doing their own projects. As of this year, one of (if not possibly the only) the music creator(s) spoke up on their youtube channel, talking about how they were thinking of remixing the game's OST.
    It's a classic Point and Click type of horror game, with a few jumpscares here and there. There is full voice acting, and animated cutscenes as well, which is quite amazing for early 2000s internet games (especially being a college project game around the late 90s early 2000s). The art style is really reminiscent of the early 2000s as well, with that infamous "How to Draw Manga" sort of hair and faces.
    In this game you take the role of a girl with amnesia, seemingly lost in space, aboard a abandoned colony ship...
     
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  13. Kecleon

    Kecleon Mod Crew

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    Did you think I was done? Guess again!

    Solatorobo: Red the Hunter was a game that released on the Nintendo DS in the latter half of 2008. Made by CyberConnect2, the same people who developed the .hack games and the Naruto Ultimate Ninja games, this game is the second in their Little Tail Bronx series, which started with Tail Concerto on the PS1 all the way back in 1998. The game is set on an archipelago of floating islands known as the Shepherd Republic hovering over a sea of clouds, with the inhabitants of said islands being anthropomorphic cats and dogs of all sizes and shapes. The titular protagonist, Red Savarin, is a bounty hunter by trade alongside his sister, Chocolat Gelato. And when they happen upon a mysterious child and medallion aboard a pirate ship they were raiding, they end up on a whirlwind adventure spanning across every island in the archipelago and beyond.

    The main attraction of this game is easily its plot, with some of the most interesting characters I've seen and some very in-depth lore that really fleshes out the world of Solatorobo. The art is breathtakingly beautiful, especially for something on the DS, and between the character designs and the setting of the Shepherd Republic itself, this is definitely one of the more unique games on the system. The same can be said for the controls and combat in this game with Red piloting his own personal mecha, the Dahak, he spends most of his time riding in it except to solve certain puzzles. And as for the combat, Red doesn't simply punch or shoot his opponents like most people. Instead, he grabs and lifts his opponents, who are typically also piloting mechs or tanks, and throws them to deal damage. And while this is the only main method of attacking most of the time, and your A Button will be seeing a lot of action in this game, there's enough depth and strategy to it that it doesn't get too stale by the time you reach the end of the fairly meaty campaign.

    Overall, this was a game that passed by nearly everyone on its release, similarly to its spiritual predecessor, Tail Concerto, and it is a real treat of a game from beginning to end. And with the next game in this series coming soon to the Switch, Fuga: Melodies of Steel, there doesn't seem to be a better time than now to discover this wonderful hidden gem.
     
    #13 Aug 27, 2020
    Last edited: Aug 28, 2020
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  14. Infernostar

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    Ever Oasis (3DS): This game was criminally overlooked due to being shown at E3 the same year Nintendo prioritized Breath of the Wild, with it only getting a small segment. The game is beautiful, utilizing the 3ds' hardware well and standout Egyptian inspired art direction. Gameplay is a mix of strangely, Animal Crossing, Zelda, and a bit Monster Hunter, with exploring a vast desert, fighting monsters, solving puzzles in dungeons, and even running a safe oasis to protect the visitors from the evils that reside in the sand.
     
  15. Kecleon

    Kecleon Mod Crew

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    Dude! I played that one myself, and it made me so glad when both Tethu and Esna were made available as Spirits in SSBU, as well as having a couple of music tracks from the game. It had a beautifully designed world, charming character species, fun gameplay and combat mechanics, and it was shows how fun it is when I willingly choose to ignore the main campaign just so I can level up the facilities of everyone in the oasis.
     
  16. Katanaeyegaming

    Katanaeyegaming #FEARTHEWYVERN

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    Duel blades.

    An obscure 2d fighter it's one that if you're bored and need GBA games to play you should try it.
     

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