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What was your surprise hit this generation?

For me Borderlands 2


I rented Borderlands 1 and got bored with it. I rented Borderlands 2 and didn't even get past the opening before I stopped playing it.

Then one of my friends wanted me to play it with him. I got hooked. Played it for hundreds of hours. Love the humor. Love the gameplay.

Tiny Tina's Dragon Keep DLC was actually DLC that I found value in and I was glad I paid for it.
 
Dragon Age: Origins. I've never liked any game EA put out, and tend to not like WRPGs, but I kept hearing how awesome KotoR was, so I decided to give it a try. It's a really great game, and it doesn't have a lot of the issues I dislike with WRPGs in general (1st Person, no party members, meh Storyline). It's not perfect (the load times... wow...), but it's easily one of my favorite of this gen.
 
I usually read up a lot on games before I buy them, so I'm not completely surprised that much.

That said, I was unprepared for how awesome Mass Effect was going to be. Wasn't interested in the general aesthetic and unlike most, thought nearly all of Bioware's previous output was middling at best (including the Baldur's Gates, which just stole Forgotten Realms lore wholesale). Well, color me surprised playing my favorite new IP of the gen, and the first RPG I was wholly engrossed in since Secret of Mana for the SNES. I even liked ME3.

Recently, GTAIV was my worst game of the generation and I was thoroughly done with GTA, so I was cursing myself under my breath while buying GTAV because I knew I just fell for the baseless hype again. Surprised to find myself having a real blast with V though.

The most pleasant surprise in terms of 'it's probably okay, will check out because I have nothing better to do' must be The Walking Dead. Such a well written breath of fresh air in the AAA landscape.
 
Borderlands surprised me in every way imaginable.

Assassins Creed 2 is also up there. I didn't care much for the first one, but the 2nd one is one of the best games of this generation.
 
Probably Demons Souls for me, playing it right now, and its just so good. Had never heard about From Software before they released that.
 
Sleeping Dogs - After this game went through development hell and switched publishers / names / main characters / etc., I had very low expectations. My expectations were actually low before that because who wanted another True Crime game? Anyway, it ended up being probably my 2nd favorite open world game this generation, and I am shocked to see more people haven't mentioned it.

That's the only thing I really thought was going to be terrible, but ended up being great. Batman AA was close to that level, but the first thing I saw about it was a video of the combat and it looked good enough to at least be intrigued.
 
Read Dead Redemption for me. The kind of gamer who never ever got into open world games and couldnt care less for GTA. I was blown away, that game ... had soul.
 
The-Walking-Dead-farm.jpg


It's just too bad the controls are so bad on PC, and there's no controller support. Playing it on PS3 was beautiful, though.
 
Sleeping Dogs. I absolutely loved every minute of it and I certainly was not expecting it to be as good as I thought it was. The developer had no experience in the genre and the only thing in general they'd put out was entirely unappealing to me.

Tomb Raider was also a very pleasant surprise, but a new IP is always more of a surprise so to speak.
 
EXCITE TRUCK on the Wii...

Game looked like ass on the shelves... Boring cover, boring screenshots, boring concept.

Heard so many good things about the game here on NEOGAF, bought it, and I think it's the best racing game I have ever played.
 
Tatsunoko vs. Capcom and Street Fighter 4

Loved fighting games a kid, but never really got that into them. Never expected to either until these games came along. Dropped 200+ hours into each one.

Rune Factory 3

I always loved the laid back nature of Harvest Moon games as a kid, but certain aspects kept me at arms length... I sort of fell out of love with them in high school. Rune Factory 3 fixed everything and sucked me back in. The heavier focus on relationships, exploration, and growth were things I'd never known I wanted.

Roguelikes such as Shiren the Wanderer

I had never even touched the genre before this gen and now these types of games are some of my favorites. I adore randomly generated content.
 
I'll just say I never would have guessed I'd put 300+ hours into Monster Hunter after playing the terribad PSP game. Surprised the fuck out of me how addicted I was to MH3U for March/April.
 
Mileena said:
I'll just say I never would have guessed I'd put 300+ hours into Monster Hunter after playing the terribad PSP game. Surprised the fuck out of me how addicted I was to MH3U for March/April.
Click to expand...

Oh yeah! Same here. Except my first version was Tri on the Wii. I really didn't dig it at first, but I just kept going and eventually started loving it.
 
Lots of great answers in here.

Borderlands, Demon Souls, Portal, etc.

I'd go with Braid. I honestly think future generations will look back on it as a work of classic gaming art.
 
Rock Band 2. 3 is better in every conceivable way, but I had a lot of Rock Band parties with Rock Band 2, and it will always hold a special place in my gaming library.
 
Batman Arkham (both Asylum and City). Seriously, who thought a developer like RockSteady - not known for top tier games - would push out two of the best superhero games ever!?!? I still find myself pulling out either game and playing it for a few hours.
 
The Darkness

I was hyped before it released, but it totally exceeded my expectations. The combination of guns and Darkness powers was a blast to play around with. The story and voice acting was also great.
 
Mr-Joker said:
Sonic Colours, this game destroyed the Sonic cycle.
Click to expand...

I fell for the gaf hype and then when I played it on the ds it just felt like sonic rush with new powers. It's not a bad game, but I honestly don't get the praise it gets.
 
Zack & Wiki on the Wii - It looks like shovelware for children, but I thoroughly enjoyed playing after seeing Matt Cassamassina's campaign to get people buying it.
 
Demons Souls. A new game, and now my favorite of this generation. I remember thinking it looked interesting and different before its launch but I never expected to like it anywhere near as much as I did.
 
It sounds ridiculous to say now know, but Call of Duty was just a moderately popular shooter series before MW1 came along and turned into a sales monster
 
Stuntman Ignition - im just surprised it didnt get more fanfare. They probably should have called it Stuntman 2. Either way, best driving / racing of the gen for me.

Crackdown
 
Demon's Souls.

I saw a gameplay vid from TGS or something prior to the game's release, and replayed the shit out of that vid. This came at a time when I was no longer playing games as much as I used to, yet watching gameplay for DS was pretty damn exciting and I was so fucking eager to play it.

So, I imported the Asian version, which was my first time importing a game ever. It quickly became my game of the generation after a few hours of playing. Of course, Dark Souls came out and dethroned it.
 
call of duty 4.

that must sound like shit but I really did not have the game on the map back then. ww2 was so overdone and I did not like cod1 or 2 that much. then they introduced that mp with cod 4 and that was ... unbelieveable. i do not dare to hope that something can blow me away that much in the next gen.
 
does DS counts as "this generation"?

if that's the case... Phoenix Wright trilogy...

read about it in a magazine, and it sounded boring as fuck. Then a friend lend me the first game... and it's one of my favorite videogame series of all time.
 
Oh yeah... Another game is Nier.

Playing Nier right after FFXIII was a strange experience. I expected to absolutely love the latter and feel "meh" about the former, but the outcome was the exact opposite.

CoD4 was also a surprise, albeit to a lesser extent.

And Deadly Premonition if only for Agent York's brilliance lol
 
Demon's Souls: I didn't know anything (and I really do mean anything) about this game and bought it because I saw it at like 20 bucks and in another forum where I used to post they kept mentioning the damn game. This was in December of 2011. Played it. Didn't like it. But on March of this year I was thinking of selling it at like 5 dollars to someone but said, well if I'm gonna sell it might as well play it again and give it another go. 40 hours later and it's probably in my top 3 this generation.

Uncharted 2: Didn't new anything about Naughty Dogs because Jak and Daxter never caught my attention. My brother in law gave me this game and same as Demon's Souls played it and didn't like it. But like 5 months later I got laid off from work and had a bunch of spare time and said why not. Ended up loving it, now I'm eagerly waiting for Uncharted 4 and I still got to play Uncharted: Drake's Fortune and Uncharted Vita.
 
I was quite amazed by how good Sleeping Dogs ended up being. The fact that it was cancelled by Activision before Square Enix picked it up didn't exactly inspire much confidence in anyone. And it was a True Crime game as well, which was always kind of a low rent, GTA-wannabe of a franchise. Sleeping Dogs though, that really came together and then some. Hand to hand combat got pretty repetitive by the end, and the dating malarkey could have been left out entirely, but everything else was ace and I'm clamouring for a sequel now.

A more recent example would be GTA V. The perfect antidote to the permanently dour, unfun buzzkill that was IV. I was so cynical about the game all the way up to release, but caved in and bought it anyway. How wrong I was - so good. GOTG-contender good. It's restored my love and faith in the GTA series once more.
 
Valkyria chronicles surprised me how good it is and how it implemented the game mechancis while maintaining a strategic application and feel to what appeared to be at first blush, a turn based action game.

Valkyria chronicles 2 surprised me in how good it remained as a portable title being true to the original.

Valkyria chronicles 3 surprised me in how it was never localized outside of Japan.
 
Oddly enough, Uncharted 2.

I was not at all into gaming at the time it had come out, and I never played the first one. I had kind of heard side conversations about the name of the game, but they blew over my head for the most part. I was, however, greatly looking forward to Brutal Legend because... well, Jack Black and it seemed like it would be fun.

They released on the same day, and I happened to be in Gamestop to pick up my pre-order of Brutal Legend, and the dude sold me into getting Uncharted 2 as well. I had the extra scratch, so eh, got it.

You can kind of figure out how that all ended up. Still one of my favorite games this generation. Brutal Legend? Not so much.
 
Dark Souls Still playing it.Finished twice,just began a pyromancy build.More than 200 hours played.

Bayonetta Still playing it,i have finished the game countless times.It's awesome from the start to the ending credits

If i have to choose it's DS first then Bayonetta
 
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