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[iirate]

I have to say Earthbound. It is actually tied as my favorite game of all time (alongside Super Metroid), but the balance is really all over the place throughout.

 

[RadicalRad]

I'm struggling to see how this works.

They're possibly worth looking at, in the same way that people like to visit Chenobyl.

Actually Chernobyl is now a beautiful place. Man kind hasn't touched it since the incident so now its overgrown with wildlife.

I'd go with the Gothic games, (and Risen) not that the game play is bad, it's amazing but the combat always felt wonky the first time, until you realized how great it really was. (When you got over the steep learning curve.)

 

[B.K.]

Vagrant Story is a great game, but the weapon creation system and crate puzzles suck.

 

[Jintor]

not sure if posted, but the Phoenix Wright serie ain't certainly renowned for its stellar gameplay

PW is a series of visual novels - linear ones, at that - masquerading as games

Not that i care, it's a brilliant series

 

[Drinky Crow]

silent hill 2

 

[Anasui Kishibe]

PW is a series of visual novels - linear ones, at that - masquerading as games

Not that i care, it's a brilliant series

one of my favourites too, but certainly they being sold as videogames?

 

[blame space]

what kind of novels involve visual problem solving?

 

[Kujo]

Banjo: Nuts & Bolts, an okay game overall. Building stuff can be pretty good, but the gameplay in vehicles can be bland, repetitive and doesn't control that well

Why do people like or love games they consider to have bad gameplay.

Sometimes it's the sum of its parts I guess, people may forgive mediocre gameplay if other aspects are above average. Though I could never love a game that has bad gameplay, but like, perhaps

 

[Niblet]

why is this so hard to understand

different people want different things from interactive software. what one player thinks is "worthy" of interacting with is probably much different than what another thinks is "worthy" of interacting with; it's entirely dependent on the player and his or her preferences.

THIS IS MUCH DIFFERENT FROM ANY OTHER KIND OF MEDIUM DUE TO THE PARTICIPATORY ASPECT. hone your gaming preferences for yourself and quit arguing on the internet about which games are good and/or bad.

Right. I'm more interested in the abstract. Why do people like or love games they consider to have bad gameplay.

PW is a series of visual novels - linear ones, at that - masquerading as games

Not that i care, it's a brilliant series

I can see what you are getting at, but PW has game elements in it, as Blame Space is pointing out. A better example is Umineko.

 

[ChoklitReign]

Terrible combat but everything else is gold.

 

[Momo]

Vagrant Story is a great game, but the weapon creation system and crate puzzles suck.

You're like the only person I have ever heard say (saw post w/e) that :lol

 

[Shai-Tan]

legacy of kain/soul reaver. the gameplay is mediocre at best. boss battles and some puzzles are ok but most of the enjoyment from the series is the dialogue/story/characters

 

[Magnus]

I can begin to understand why people would answer RE or MGS or whatever, but really, you wouldn't think it was a good game if you truly thought the gameplay was bad, or you wouldn't have played.

One had bad controls, or one had a terrible gameplay-to-cutscene ratio, or whatever, but overall, the gameplay experience (the freedom, or the choices, or the novelty of certain things you could do with your character, etc.) was worthwhile to you, so you played.

 

[Axiom]

Games like RE and MGS have such fun narratives that I can easily see playing them through even if you don't like the mechanics of doing so.
Deadly Premonition is the foremost example of a game that is shoddy but beloved for what else it offers.

Watching a depressing movie isn't fun, but it can be rewarding and easy to appreciate.

People love Rocky Horror but it's not because the acting is first rate. Ed Wood movies are bad by any measure, but they can be fun to watch.

People easily accept that you can enjoy a passive experience even if it's admittedly bad, why not a participatory one?
Lots of people enjoy working out too, but physical stress isn't something you'd go to a theme park for.

 

[TheExodu5]

Final Fantasy VI.

My favorite game of all time, yet the battles are easy, and there is generally very little strategy involved beyond the obvious.

 

[Varna]

Took me a LOOOOONG time to get over the controls in this game but I thought for the most part it was worth it.

Was pretty easy if you were a survival horror fan. RE with magic powers basically. Loved the game. Story was a piece of shit though.

 

[Karram]

Bioshock
Mass Effect
MGS

 

[FieryBalrog]

I don't know if about good games with "bad" gameplay, but Metal Gear is, for me, the definitive "good" game with bad gameplay.

 

[Dahbomb]

A lot of people would say FF7: Crisis Core as well but I would just say it's a bad game.

I played that entire game (including the side missions) and still don't know why I did.

 

[Kittonwy]

bad gameplay = bad game

Well then in this case I'll take it back and say ME1 and ME2 are bad games.

 

[boiled goose]

Haha, what are you talking about?

Fine, I'll step back from simply laughing. What makes a good game is unique to everyone, just like any other entertainment medium. For some people, sure, gameplay is king. For others, music propels the medium to its climax. To each their own.

For people like me, I just play games and see what happens. I put nothing above anything else. I have no standardized list of what's important for any medium. You know why? One day you'll find that some game just clicks with you due to the environment or a character, but it'll be riddled with technical issues and gameplay issues. You'll cherish it for what it is. You'll love it, and then you'll become a hypocrite.

sure you can like games with bad gameplay for story or whatever reason, but it is not a good game. it is a bad game you like.

the title says good games with bad gameplay, which doesnt make sense

 

[sfried]

Psychonauts.

The collectathon was such a pain.

 

[Easy_D]

So in conclusion, ME1 has better RPG mechanics but ME2 has better combat mechanics. It is still up to debate which has better "game play" or which is the better game per se.

1 is the better RPG (Also soundtrack) and 2 is the better TPS. I'm hoping 3 takes everything that's good about the two games and smang them together.

I would be lying if I said I didn't like ME2's gameplay more than 1's, mainly because the shooting is better, the fact that your squad mates aren't idiots helps a lot too.

 

[Korigama]

GodHand: I haven't played it, but GAF recommends it. It was reviewed horribly by alot of gaming sites as well for it's "bad gameplay" yet it's loved by many for that very reason.

No one with an ounce of sense (or taste) would say God Hand has bad gameplay, so I'm not sure where this is coming from other than IGN; it wasn't "a lot" of gaming sites so much as one vocal outlet that took several years to acknowledge they were full of crap.

The fact that you haven't even played it yourself makes listing it here even more ridiculous.

 

[newelly87]

Oblivion.

 

[manipulate]

Has anyone said Pokemon? I haven't read the thread and it seems like a really obvious candidate....


The pokemon aren't individual/customisable enough, and the battle mechanics are brutal in every sense of the word. But jeez how the game sucks time away...

 

[danmaku]

Silent Hill games. The puzzles are stupid and sometimes annoying, combat is clunky and exploration is nothing more than walking around, keep pushing the action button and hoping to find an hotspot. I love the story and the atmosphere, and I played all the games in the series, but only once.

 

[peakish]

sure you can like games with bad gameplay for story or whatever reason, but it is not a good game. it is a bad game you like.

the title says good games with bad gameplay, which doesnt make sense

So now we're drawing arbitrary definitions between what makes a game good and bad, if you enjoy it?

Has anyone said Pokemon? I haven't read the thread and it seems like a really obvious candidate....

The pokemon aren't individual/customisable enough, and the battle mechanics are brutal in every sense of the word. But jeez how the game sucks time away...

Pokemon is all about the gameplay and collecting everything, no fluff. Can't really say I see where you're coming from.

Just thought of another example by the way: The Path.

 

[xKilltheMx]

Enslaved. Could be Uncharted 2. Full of great moments and neat touches. But ends up being close to Starfox Adventure's mix of collectathon and frustratingly drafty combat & camera work. Still somehow hypnotically untertaining...

Perfect example right here.

 

[mclem]

Anyone mentioned Lego Star Wars (and its ilk) yet? At the bare bones level, not actually very good games, but they're so damn charming I'm happy to forgive them their ills.

Peggle.

I think, deep down, I have to also concede: Katamari Damacy.

 

[JohnDoe8865]

AND a guilty pleasure of mine ....

 

[molekiller]

Heavy Rain. Great story with awful controls. As the weight of the game relies on the story 95%, I still consider it a great game (I wouldn't pay full prize for it though).

 

[NHale]

Bioshock. It's a great game with great ideas but the gameplay was lackluster and you can see how bad it is when you compare it to Bioshock 2.

 

[Open Source]

Stonekeep
Quarantine
Sims

 

[Open Source]

Pokemon is all about the gameplay and collecting everything, no fluff. Can't really say I see where you're coming from.

Pokemon is compulsion gaming. In term of mechanics, it's as shallow as they come.

 

[ResidentDante]

At the time the controls in Resident Evil weren't that bad compared to many games, same goes for Metal Gear Solid for instance. However you can blame the later installments in the series for the clunky controls though, as they should have progressed them from the orginal.

 

[TChirath]

Can't believe I understand the OP's question.., but I do :lol

ALL these games I love, but I think the gameplay has serious flaws. So I guess I love either their designs, structures, story, or concepts, but not the gameplay

1. Alpha Protocol
2. Mass Effect 1
3. Oblivion
4. Matrix Path of Neo
5. Shenmue 2
6. Super Robot Wars Series

 

[soqquatto]

brutal legend

oh wait, a GOOD game.

 

[StarEye]

Every game with forced stealth levels. And every old-school adventure game that desperately tries to incorporate actiony bits as if they're too ashamed to call themselves an adventure game.

Dreamfall fits into both of these catagories.

 

[Gravijah]

Pokemon is compulsion gaming. In term of mechanics, it's as shallow as they come.

Oh man, this is good. Bravo, sir! Bravo!

 

[Rollo Lawson]

Pokemon is compulsion gaming. In term of mechanics, it's as shallow as they come.

not sure shallow is a good word for pokemon, being that there's practically an entire science dedicated to raising and training them

 

[Akainu]

I don't understand how a game can be good with bad gameplay...?

Ask Suda fans they always come up with something.

 

[Zenith]

Eternal Darkness is a prime candidate.

 

[kodt]

I'll second Mass Effect 1

why:

It had bad and clunky 3rd person shooter controls in an RPG game. It just didn't fit. It should have either been more streamlined like ME2 or more tactical like KOTOR. The inventory interface was also terrible (on consoles) but that isn't really a game-play issue I suppose.

I disliked Mass Effect 2 at first, but once I stopped looking at it as an RPG but as an action game it became one of my favorite games last year.

However, I still enjoyed Mass Effect because of the story, environments, and dialogue tree's. The game still offered a compelling experience despite the shitty combat.

Now that I am writing this out I am realizing that I enjoyed the fact that you could explore planets, and I guess the dialogue tree's are a part of gameplay. So I guess the only thing I didn't like was the combat. Maybe it isn't fair to say Mass Effect had bad gameplay, just bad combat.

 

[Chatin]

Kingdom Hearts I and II.

Not the handheld ones, though. Those aren't good games.

 

[Host Samurai]

Resident Evil never had bad or dated game play. It just has a steep learning curve. After the first few hours of getting use to it, it becomes natural. REmake and Resident Evil 2 are still some of the best games of all time and the controls are perfect.

 

[jmdajr]

It's funny how I can love Metal Gear so much even though its game play has always been kind of clunky. Same goes for Resident Evil. I just love the world and characters they create.

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

Kingdom Hearts I and II.

Not the handheld ones, though. Those aren't good games.

Birth By Sleep has great gameplay and it's a great game, so you're right, it doesn't fit this topic.

 

[Wichu]

Pokemon is compulsion gaming. In term of mechanics, it's as shallow as they come.

Well, in Street Fighter, you mash buttons to beat your opponent up. Not very complicated either, is it?

 

[Raziel]

Whoops, not sure if I still need to clarify the OP, but yes I didn't really mean gameplay that is outright bad, hence the the quotation marks around "bad" (although if someone thinks a game with outright bad gameplay is still worth playing, I'd be intrigued to hear those as well). I just meant games where gameplay is the weakest component (as I said in the OP, gameplay that is "weak" or "stiff"); games that you think are still worth playing (or love even) because some other feature or features are so good.

It's kinda getting away from the intended discussion of this thread but gameplay isn't as big a deal-breaker for me as it is for others. Story, characters, aesthetics, concept, style, and atmosphere can and often do make games worthwhile for me even with sub-par gameplay; I guess you have to feel the same for my request to "name a good game with bad gameplay" to not throw you.

Also: I love Resident Evil and GTA, San Andreas is in my top 5 of last gen.