I was curious as to which popular games everyone has played that they feel are generally over-rated.

I was recently playing A Link to the Past (GBA port) and it sort of inspired me to bring it up. I guess because it's one of the more highly acclaimed titles in the Zelda series.

Well, I think I first started playing ALttP a year or two ago, after it had been ported to the GameBoy Advance. I remember hearing about it back in the SNES era, but never really had the chance to play. It was okay at first, but for something be re-released as a modern title, I felt the graphics were just a bit out-dated. (which isn't necessarily a valid complaint, because it IS just a port) That aside, the biggest problem was the first major difficulty spike I encountered when entering the Dark World for the first time. It was basically a war-zone crammed full of powerful enemies. It wasn't so difficult that I couldn't eventually adapt, but for that particular moment in the game, it was a radical shift from one level to another.

The second difficulty spike came when I entered the Ice Palace. I was pretty familiar with the Dark World at that point, but the Ice Palace was taking it up a whole other notch. Between trying to keep my health up and constantly getting lost, I had to reset quite a bit. I even put the game down for months at a time due to all the discouragement. Well, after finally getting that out of the way, here comes another difficulty spike -- Ganon's almighty tower! By this time, I had managed to collect most of the upgrades in the game, but it really didn't help me much. I remember just barely managing to crawl out of there with a fraction of health left, after having gone through 4 whole Blue Potions. The worst part is having to constantly back-track after saving in the middle of the dungeon, considering how lengthy it is.

Don't get me wrong, though -- I do love a challenge. The only problem with ALttP is that there isn't enough gameplay balance between difficulty shifts. It seems like the game merely throws you into the next level and expects you to either intuitively fend for yourself, or die trying.

That aside, it seems like there are some issues with equipment balance, also. For example, although you can upgrade your sword's attack power, you can never upgrade the effect of Link's beam attack. After you venture into the Dark World, this is quite tedious as you often have to strike enemies in an excess of 5 - 10 times in order to finish them off. Other items in the inventory generally aren't that effective, either, unless the enemy has some kind of weakness to them. (such as with the Fire Rod, which comes in handy quite a bit) This often contributes to the sharp difficulty balance, as well.

As for the story, nothing new there. Of course, we are talking about an SNES classic... I wasn't expecting anything particularly innovative, or anything that I haven't already seen in later installments. But otherwise, no real complaints.

Regarding the bonus content in the GBA port, I thought some of it was pretty interesting, but too short-lived. Four Swords, for example, was really more of a mini-game that had to be completed several times over. After a while, the friend I was playing with gave up on me before I could manage to get everything unlocked! But I did think Four Swords was pretty fun in its own right. It did manage to spawn a few sequels, after all. (if you also count Minish Cap, which borrowed many of the game's elements)

So, that's my little ALttP rant. The game probably would have been more appealing had I been given the chance to play it back in the day, but as far as modern appeal is concerned, it could have benefitted from a few changes. But it's definitely not something I would deem worthy of "Best SNES Game Ever." I think that spot is more reserved by games like "Super Mario All-Stars," or "Kirby's Dream Land 3." Maybe even "Super Metroid" ... (which is actually another game I played way after the SNES era had ended)