Your Top5 Most Underrated Games List

[Wolf Kanno]

What is says up there. List me five games you consider to be criminally underrated and why.

[Lord Golbez]

FF7 - Debating whether to put this on properly rated or underrated, but I honestly think it's underrated if anythingm. Should be universally acclaimed as the best in the series and also certainly way better than shit like Ocarina of Time but isn't. Instead it commonly plays second fiddle to FF6, a vastly inferior game.

Brave Fencer Musashi - People laughed this off as a potential "Zelda killer" but it's actually better than most Zelda games and definitely way better than the contemporaneous one.

Secret of Mana - Yeah, it's generally well liked but not as well celebrated as it should be. For my money, this game was better than CT, but barely sees a fraction of the praise.

FF8 - Up there with FF7, but for some crazy reason widely hated?

The Guardian Legend - Why does no one even know this game exists? It was excellent!

[Slothy]

FF7

lol

[Fynn]

I too believe Ocarina of Time is the better Final Fantasy title.

[Lord Golbez]

I said "also." Yes, you could choose to read what I wrote as implying that OoT is an FF game, but it's not what I said.

And there was a reason for the comparison. They were contemporary games to each other. OoT typically got perfect scores (e.g. 100). FF7 was highly rated but typically got score in the 90s. FF7 was the best game of all time. OoT wasn't even the best game of its year or its console (or even a good game for that matter). Being overrated or underrated is a relative term. The relative acclaim vs quality for OoT and FF7 (among other games) justifies considering it underrated in my eyes.

[Slothy]

FF7 was the best game of all time.

Double lul.

[Lord Golbez]

Know what? Maybe I should start mocking your choices in these threads too. Oh wait, I forgot. You haven't given any.

[Slothy]

Look if FFVII is your favourite game ever? Good for you. I'm happy for you. But the best game of all time by any objective standard? Not in a million years. There are way too many flaws in that game. It basically falls apart after the first disc. The materia system and the lack of any significant differences between characters leaves them all playing very similarly, the translation is rough and that's probably being generous, and it is a pretty poorly written game past Midgar especially but definitely after disc 1.

And keep in mind I like FFVII. It's a rather charming thing to replay now and then despite its many flaws, but it isn't the best game of all time and it is sure as hell not underrated. It's gotten more praise than it deserved ever since it was released. Again, it's your favourite game? Cool. Good for you. Could not be happier for you. But still not underrated. It's literally one of the most popular games ever made and despite its problems had an undeniable impact on the genre and on Square's future after it.

[Lord Golbez]

No one said anything about objective standards. The very notion is preposterous. There is no "objective" greatest game of all time. The decision will always be subject to personal preferences and what factors a person believes should be weighted more highly.

[Spuuky]

Final Fantasy 7 is maybe like my 5th favorite game in the series. It's certainly much worse than Final Fantasy 6. But it is notoriously by far the most highly-regarded Final Fantasy game so I'm not sure how it could be on this list unless you think it's way better than merely by far the best FF game.

Anyway, my list:

1. Sleeping Dogs
2. Soul Blazer
3. Link's Awakening (do I have to remove this from the list now with the remake? I don't know if people recognize that it's great now)
4. ELEX
5. Dragon Quest 3

[Fynn]

Dragon Quest VI - of all the DQ games, I feel this one gets the most undeserved flak. FOr me, I just really loved it for being such a fun adventure with a very enjoyable cast.

Skyward Sword - ah, the black sheep of the franchise. Yes, it's linear and yes, it relies on the motion controls a lot, but I don't see those things as a problem. I love it for its interesting story, very nice visuals, and cool dungeons, including what may actually be my absolute favorite dungeon in the series.

Xenoblade Chronicles X - people wanted another Xenoblade Chronicles. This was not it. Instead, it's a pretty riveting tale that's much more hard sci fi than I expected, but still filled with all the Takahashi flair we Xeno fans have loved. Plus, the skells are just awesome.

Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter - probably the most experimental game on the list, I can see why there's such a visceral reaction against this game - I just wish more people could look past that initial shock and enjoy it for the truly unique and gripping experience that it is.

Final Fantasy Tactics Advance - overshadowed by its (admittedly equally good) older brother, FFTA is just an incredibly thoughtful story masquarading as a simple childish escapist fantasy.

[Wolf Kanno]

1. Final Fantasy III - I know I've been beating this drum a lot lately, but I really feel bad for how badly ignored FFIII gets from the Western community. It's not even like I feel it's top tier material myself, but I feel it was a solid effort that really grew beyond the awkward first entry and divisive second. It's not even like it's hated or divisive itself, it's just kind of ignored cause it took too long to be released outside of Japan.

2. Breath of Fire V: Dragon Quarter - I'll echo Fynn here and say this is easily the most underrated entry with many fans still blaming it for the series downturn when I honestly think it might be the team's most solid effort in terms of narrative and design. Though honestly, I almost want to say the whole BoF franchise cause it is really sad to see a franchise that used to be mentioned in the same breath as FF and DQ twenty years ago, now tends to have people look at you curiously because they've never heard of it. Capcom is to blame of course for not keeping up with the IP, but I feel even the fanbase itself has largely just disappeared as well.

3. SaGa franchise - Yes I'm going to lump the whole franchise together. While I'm not advocating for this as being one of the "greatest franchises of all time" spiel and lord knows it's experiencing a bit of a minor renaissance right now with four entries getting worldwide release in the last four years, but I feel the franchise still has a bad reputation clinging to it from a generation of players who hated it for not being like FF, and never giving the titles a fair shake. It's a really solid series for those willing to give it a real chance and has maintained a unique tone in a genre that tends to badly stay within certain safe zones.

4. Persona 2 Duology - I might as well just extend this to the first entry as well because it makes me sad how badly Atlus ignores the older Persona games in favor of their cash cow entries. I'm not even asking for like a remake or something, just some actual fucking recognition with the crossover entries. P5 Arena needs to have Joker cross paths with the Suou boys from P2 seeing as how they are both police officers. Still, I feel P2 is actually one of the really great MegaTen titles that tends to get overshadowed by the behemoth Social Link entries of the series and even some of the mainline ones. I'm still annoyed Atlus never bothered releasing the PSP version of Eternal Punishment outside of Japan, and I don't see why they couldn't release the duology for the Switch of all things as a digital release. I just miss Persona when it still retained it's punk roots I guess.

5. Front Mission series - Slightly cheating again, I just don't really know why SE didn't try to market this series better in the west because I really feel like there is an audience for it here that just never got tapped correctly. It really needs the Collection treatment and finally let fans experience FM2, 5, and Gun Hazard.

[Shaibana]

i am very bad at explaining why so i'm just going to give my list of 5

- Killzone (the first one)
this is a game that was huge (for me personally) in my childhood and after recently replaying it i found out that the game wasnt very populair at all and that hurt my feelings a bit. i agree the characters were pretty dull but i think the game was very pretty for its time.

- Days Gone
i think this game didnt get half the love it deserved, i really enjoyed biking through a zombie filled world.

- Tomb Raider Legend.
i'm not even sure how popular this one was but i hear alot that TR went bad after 3 and got good again with Square Enix's reboots (on which i strongly disagree, i dislike the remakes).
I've played Legend so many times that i knew it like the back of my hand.
After Angel of Darkness this new game was very refreshing and i feel they really listened to the gamers to not make the same mistakes again.

i'm going to leave it at these 3 because i cant i'm out of ideas. might come back later when i remember 2 more games

[Mercen-X]

I'm not sure. I used to know this. X-2? Vagrant Story? Rogue Galaxy? Arc the Lad End of Darkness..? Ephemeral Fantasia