I said any Call of Duty from the past decade as answer to the original comment, and I still think that is a solid candidate. However, another game I played recently that qualifies I think is Sleeping Dogs. Perfectly cromulent 7/10 GTA clone but ultimately not pulling up any trees.
This is a tough question because it’s like asking “What’s the most forgettable game you’ve ever played?” I can remember some of the best and worst games I’ve ever played, but mediocre games are explicitly not interesting.
That said, the first one that came to mind for me was Starshot: Space Circus Fever for N64. It’s just a very generic late-'90s collectathon platformer. It’s hard to be mad at it, because it’s not terrible or anything, there’s just no reason to play it. If you’ve got an N64, there’s Mario, Banjo, Rayman, even B- and C-tier stuff like Gex and Chameleon Twist. There’s hidden gems like Space Station Silicon Valley or Rocket: Robot on Wheels.
That last one is the only reason I played Starshot, I saw it clearanced at a used game store and was like “Oh yeah, I remember hearing this game was good,” but it turned out I was thinking of Rocket. That game actually is good, while Starshot is just fine.
It also makes people say things are mid to them. Honestly, rdr2 was that way for me because I hated the pseudo-rpg elements. But long after I put it away, I started playing actual RPGs. So I may give it another shot, but I have so many on my to-do list.
I like shooters, so I got the full bundle and I tried hard to like it.
None of the games gave me a lasting impression. The plot didn’t stick with me, the enemies were weird, the guns felt weak and flimsy, the rooms kept repeating in some sections and it got very boring. There were some fun bits with the vehicles, etc., but overall the experience was… pretty much average.
I was expecting something like the Half-Life series, but this wasn’t it.
Thank you! I felt like I was the only person on the planet to think that those games only hit the dizzying heights of “okay, fine at a push”. They’re perfectly serviceable and not much more.
I never had an Xbox, so really only grew up playing Halo Reach (I think) co-op when I’d go to a friend’s house. But I recently played through most of the halo games with a friend and I have to say, I agree. I can’t remember any particular moments or scenarios, no part of the story that stands out in my mind, etc. It was fun enough to run through most of them (though we did get tired of it, which is why I said “most of the games”), and I can certainly see why for when they came out, they received the attention they did but can’t say I think the reaction would be the same if it came out now or that it really holds up to the standards it seems to have set.
Halo was best when it was Halo:CE played 4v4 on two linked systems, with the teams on two screens in an undersized dorm room in 2002. Alternatively, two people playing through the entire game in co-op mode and finishing at 3 in the morning.
I kinda agree. It was fun playing with my SO but they’re pretty boring on their own. The multiplayer is fun, but the actual story mode just kinda exists.
It sells itself on cool aesthetics, but the moment you get past that you realise it’s just a very, very generic open world shooter with incredibly bland and boring shooting layered over an impressively faithful recreation of Shinjuku. And even the aesthetics wear thin very quickly, being largely just a whole lot of “Hey I know that anime” level stuff cribbed from Japanese culture. The game is mostly just running around a map collecting stuff.
I mean, that’s exactly what makes it so “mid” to my mind. It’s not an atrocious disaster like Gollum. It’s not appalling bad, or even moderately bad. It’s just mid. The shooting isn’t dreadful, just dull. The map, the movement, the exploration… None of it is exactly bad, but none of it left any kind of impression on me. Like you said, it scratches that “running around and collecting stuff” itch, the numbers go up, you unlock new powers, etc. But it all just kind of passes straight through you and at the end you’re left with “Well, that sure did kill a few hours.”
Horizon: Zero Dawn suffers from all the usual modern open world hallmarks, the map littered with things to collect, the towers, the grinding to level up abilities, etc, etc. But the story is an absolute banger, and even a lot of the random collectible junk is full of little moments of deeply moving storytelling. I remember collecting every single one of the vantage points because I absolutely needed to hear all of the short story you unlock by doing it. It has zero relevance to the plot, but it’s just a great piece of writing. In comparison Ghost Wire is just, sort of… There.
The developer, Spiders, seem to be experts at creating mediocre games with very small budgets, and again they didn’t quite have the money to take it all the way with greedfall, but they did make more than a mediocre game in my opinion. For me it was memorable enough unlike others mentioned in this thread.
Even though Greedfall is hardly a great game I think it has too much charm to really fit here. I found it too memorable to really be a “mediocre slop” contender.
I had to stop when the villians were monologuing right in the middle of a fight scene, in the most cliched way possible. And this was after some mid gameplay, with a clearly telegraphed rugpull plot point that seemed like it was going to be the centerpiece of the whole story.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
I’ve been frustrated with these Japanese games lately like FF and Yakuza because of the graphics. Japan likes to use an anime style on their character models, which I personally don’t think looks good but whatever. The issue I have is that you walk around in a yakuza or FF or resident evil game and half the characters and NPCs look very realistic and like real people, and the main characters and some NPCs look like anime characters, different bone structure and art style. It’s distracting. I frankly think you stick to anime style or realistic modern style, you can’t just swap between the styles at will within the one game.
Does final fantasy still have invisible enemies that just attack you and put you into battle mode? Cause I found that outdated and stopped playing the games, im done with turn based but especially done with games where you can’t even see the enemy till they just battle you
Pretty much every korean MMORPG released from 2006-2014, as they were desperately trying to be “World of Warcraft, but better”. Perfect World, Aion, ArcheAge, 4story, Granado Espada, etc etc etc, even when you have the better experience of playing on a private server with significantly less P2W (as in, nearly everyone gets most of the shop for free)
To me, personally, ArcheAge would be the best fit for “dead medium quality”. It boasts naval combat, which is meh; player run trade caravans, which probably only worked as intended in the first 2 months after launch; limits on gathering and crafting, which just forces free players to buy premium; graphics are the generic korean mmo variety, pretty but almost impossible to distinguish between games; music, enemies, dungeons and most gear exist
Eh, debatable. I’ve played it for roughly 2 years (2004-6) on private servers and even then I knew it wasn’t “the best” or “incredible” by any means, but it was light years ahead of Tibia (which was my first taste of MMORPGs, back when the starter island was a mess with too many players and not enough rats in the sewers for people to kill and level up) in every regard. Even with higher rates and an incredible teenage patience for braindead repetition, the grind got old really damn fast, not to mention that the game penalized fucking around (no stat resets, only on the 99 rebirth) and fucking up (1% xp penalty on death hit harder and harder the higher your level).
Played for a long time on EuphRO server (3x/3x/2x), my highest level character was 75 or something close to that. I think I gave up playing altogether around the time I got a super novice to level 50 on a different, higher rate server
I am biased because RO changed my life. I played on a 2x/2x server with like 3k people and it was incredible. I met so many awesome people to braindead farm with and WoE was so fun, I didn’t have a lot of close friends in real life but I had some incredible people in RO. Also as a young bi furry bitch Moonie gave me very confusing feelings. I might not be here today if not for RO, so I have some opinions on RO hahaha
Quick edit: I played from when it came out here until when it became F2P and I disagreed with that choice. I hate MTX shit.
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Mighty no 9.
First thing that came to my mind was Crysis 2. Absolute mid-tier FPS, which was unfortunately pretty disappointing coming off of the first game.
Definitely worth a look if you just want to run around and shoot shit.
I said any Call of Duty from the past decade as answer to the original comment, and I still think that is a solid candidate. However, another game I played recently that qualifies I think is Sleeping Dogs. Perfectly cromulent 7/10 GTA clone but ultimately not pulling up any trees.
Sleeping Dogs is easily my fav GTA-esque game and I weep that there‘s no successor, to each their own
Atlas Fallen. Having played it, all I can say is that it doesn’t elicit any heightened emotions from me.
This is a tough question because it’s like asking “What’s the most forgettable game you’ve ever played?” I can remember some of the best and worst games I’ve ever played, but mediocre games are explicitly not interesting.
That said, the first one that came to mind for me was Starshot: Space Circus Fever for N64. It’s just a very generic late-'90s collectathon platformer. It’s hard to be mad at it, because it’s not terrible or anything, there’s just no reason to play it. If you’ve got an N64, there’s Mario, Banjo, Rayman, even B- and C-tier stuff like Gex and Chameleon Twist. There’s hidden gems like Space Station Silicon Valley or Rocket: Robot on Wheels.
That last one is the only reason I played Starshot, I saw it clearanced at a used game store and was like “Oh yeah, I remember hearing this game was good,” but it turned out I was thinking of Rocket. That game actually is good, while Starshot is just fine.
An N64 game I’ve never heard of before? Mark it on the calendar because that hasn’t happened in many a sparrow’s moon.
It also makes people say things are mid to them. Honestly, rdr2 was that way for me because I hated the pseudo-rpg elements. But long after I put it away, I started playing actual RPGs. So I may give it another shot, but I have so many on my to-do list.
Rogue Trooper
Avowed was very mid. I enjoyed it enough, but nothing about it was particularly brilliant or terrible.
2 that make fans go bananas.
Torchlight 2; Grim Dawn
Right in the middle of the middle part of the middle part of the middle pack.
Torchlight 2 is fun when you start out, but gets really repetitive quite fast. Good fit for a right in the middle
The Halo series.
I like shooters, so I got the full bundle and I tried hard to like it.
None of the games gave me a lasting impression. The plot didn’t stick with me, the enemies were weird, the guns felt weak and flimsy, the rooms kept repeating in some sections and it got very boring. There were some fun bits with the vehicles, etc., but overall the experience was… pretty much average.
I was expecting something like the Half-Life series, but this wasn’t it.
Thank you! I felt like I was the only person on the planet to think that those games only hit the dizzying heights of “okay, fine at a push”. They’re perfectly serviceable and not much more.
I never had an Xbox, so really only grew up playing Halo Reach (I think) co-op when I’d go to a friend’s house. But I recently played through most of the halo games with a friend and I have to say, I agree. I can’t remember any particular moments or scenarios, no part of the story that stands out in my mind, etc. It was fun enough to run through most of them (though we did get tired of it, which is why I said “most of the games”), and I can certainly see why for when they came out, they received the attention they did but can’t say I think the reaction would be the same if it came out now or that it really holds up to the standards it seems to have set.
Halo was best when it was Halo:CE played 4v4 on two linked systems, with the teams on two screens in an undersized dorm room in 2002. Alternatively, two people playing through the entire game in co-op mode and finishing at 3 in the morning.
Everything since then has been mid at best
I kinda agree. It was fun playing with my SO but they’re pretty boring on their own. The multiplayer is fun, but the actual story mode just kinda exists.
Ghost Wire: Tokyo.
It sells itself on cool aesthetics, but the moment you get past that you realise it’s just a very, very generic open world shooter with incredibly bland and boring shooting layered over an impressively faithful recreation of Shinjuku. And even the aesthetics wear thin very quickly, being largely just a whole lot of “Hey I know that anime” level stuff cribbed from Japanese culture. The game is mostly just running around a map collecting stuff.
Defo agree. But I will admit that the soundtrack is fire
i still enjoyed the crap out of it. Sometimes zoning out and just running around collecting stuff is just what I need.
I mean, that’s exactly what makes it so “mid” to my mind. It’s not an atrocious disaster like Gollum. It’s not appalling bad, or even moderately bad. It’s just mid. The shooting isn’t dreadful, just dull. The map, the movement, the exploration… None of it is exactly bad, but none of it left any kind of impression on me. Like you said, it scratches that “running around and collecting stuff” itch, the numbers go up, you unlock new powers, etc. But it all just kind of passes straight through you and at the end you’re left with “Well, that sure did kill a few hours.”
Horizon: Zero Dawn suffers from all the usual modern open world hallmarks, the map littered with things to collect, the towers, the grinding to level up abilities, etc, etc. But the story is an absolute banger, and even a lot of the random collectible junk is full of little moments of deeply moving storytelling. I remember collecting every single one of the vantage points because I absolutely needed to hear all of the short story you unlock by doing it. It has zero relevance to the plot, but it’s just a great piece of writing. In comparison Ghost Wire is just, sort of… There.
Greedfall
The developer, Spiders, seem to be experts at creating mediocre games with very small budgets, and again they didn’t quite have the money to take it all the way with greedfall, but they did make more than a mediocre game in my opinion. For me it was memorable enough unlike others mentioned in this thread.
Even though Greedfall is hardly a great game I think it has too much charm to really fit here. I found it too memorable to really be a “mediocre slop” contender.
Square Enix games (FInal Fantasy, Neir Automata, Sleeping Dogs. Tomb Raiders)
They are all… good - certainly not bad games But nothing makes them… great
deleted by creator
For real - one of the best games, maybe all time. But Square Enix does churn out some meh games.
I had to stop when the villians were monologuing right in the middle of a fight scene, in the most cliched way possible. And this was after some mid gameplay, with a clearly telegraphed rugpull plot point that seemed like it was going to be the centerpiece of the whole story.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
I’ve been frustrated with these Japanese games lately like FF and Yakuza because of the graphics. Japan likes to use an anime style on their character models, which I personally don’t think looks good but whatever. The issue I have is that you walk around in a yakuza or FF or resident evil game and half the characters and NPCs look very realistic and like real people, and the main characters and some NPCs look like anime characters, different bone structure and art style. It’s distracting. I frankly think you stick to anime style or realistic modern style, you can’t just swap between the styles at will within the one game.
Does final fantasy still have invisible enemies that just attack you and put you into battle mode? Cause I found that outdated and stopped playing the games, im done with turn based but especially done with games where you can’t even see the enemy till they just battle you
I remember feeling this way about Die Hard: Vendetta for GC. Strong meh/10.
Die Hard: V for Vendetta would be a hell of a crossover.
Lmao, whoops. Too early in the morning.
Pretty much every korean MMORPG released from 2006-2014, as they were desperately trying to be “World of Warcraft, but better”. Perfect World, Aion, ArcheAge, 4story, Granado Espada, etc etc etc, even when you have the better experience of playing on a private server with significantly less P2W (as in, nearly everyone gets most of the shop for free)
To me, personally, ArcheAge would be the best fit for “dead medium quality”. It boasts naval combat, which is meh; player run trade caravans, which probably only worked as intended in the first 2 months after launch; limits on gathering and crafting, which just forces free players to buy premium; graphics are the generic korean mmo variety, pretty but almost impossible to distinguish between games; music, enemies, dungeons and most gear exist
Im sorry but perfect world got down flying before any other game and it was hella fun.
Ragnarok Online was the last incredible MMO.
Eh, debatable. I’ve played it for roughly 2 years (2004-6) on private servers and even then I knew it wasn’t “the best” or “incredible” by any means, but it was light years ahead of Tibia (which was my first taste of MMORPGs, back when the starter island was a mess with too many players and not enough rats in the sewers for people to kill and level up) in every regard. Even with higher rates and an incredible teenage patience for braindead repetition, the grind got old really damn fast, not to mention that the game penalized fucking around (no stat resets, only on the 99 rebirth) and fucking up (1% xp penalty on death hit harder and harder the higher your level).
Played for a long time on EuphRO server (3x/3x/2x), my highest level character was 75 or something close to that. I think I gave up playing altogether around the time I got a super novice to level 50 on a different, higher rate server
I am biased because RO changed my life. I played on a 2x/2x server with like 3k people and it was incredible. I met so many awesome people to braindead farm with and WoE was so fun, I didn’t have a lot of close friends in real life but I had some incredible people in RO. Also as a young bi furry bitch Moonie gave me very confusing feelings. I might not be here today if not for RO, so I have some opinions on RO hahaha
Quick edit: I played from when it came out here until when it became F2P and I disagreed with that choice. I hate MTX shit.
Ratopia
It’s like Oxygen not Included but worse