For me it’s a couple
First is GTA. I played a LOT of Vice City and and San Andreas as a kid, but mostly because everyone else played them at the time and there wasn’t really many games quite like it where you could mess around and explore a massive city and find cool vehicles just by exploring. But by the time GTA 4 rolled around other open world games did things just as good and the edgey humor has starting to wear thin on me so I had moved on to things like Elder Scrolls by that time.
Another is Minecraft. Minecraft is the exact kind of game I should be in to, it looks so fun! But I just found the artstyle so damn ugly. It’s so rare for me to avoid something for aesthetic reasons, usually low poly art is charming but for some reason Minecrafts style just looks really unappealing to me. This is coming from someone who likes a lot of games people think are ugly.
Lastly are what I’ll call “grizzled white guy action games” Uncharted, Red Dead, The Last of Us. They just feel too much like they’re trying to be be a blockbuster for for guys that don’t want to be made fun of for liking games rather than games. I know that that probably isn’t the case, but they just seem too normal to me.
However I respect that these are all good series but they just aren’t for me. Are there any game series where this is true for you?
Don’t be afraid to say a series you know I like, I won’t be offended.
Sorry owl you’ve got lots to read but I thought of one which is kind of counter intuitive:
Animal Crossing: i loved the gamecube one and played the hell out if, I loved my neighbours, fishing and catching bugs. I even liked the pocket camp one on the phone and building a cosy campervan. You could collect new items easily with your dailies and the campervan was small enough that you could kit it out really well really easily. I especially loved the clothes and trying out new daily fits.
However when the switch one came out and it became this huge ‘build your dream island’ game, all the clothes became custom designed with shareable qr codes, or vying to attract the coolest rarest villagers to their island, and I looked at my poxy little island and cruddy designed tshirts and how little money and time I had to realise a vision (let alone have a vision) for the island, I quietly stopped playing. I still loved going to the museum though to see the animals. Does that count? Like, I understood and appreciated the elements of the series but when they came together in the switch version it became overwhelming. I liked it when it was my small island, with all the villagers I adored and tried my best to keep, even grumpy hopper the
and I didnt have to worry that it came off second best to anyone