Late to the Party

Ever picked up a game long after everyone else? Ever really enjoyed it, and wanted to discuss it sing about it to the rooftops, and felt you can't really because the opportunity for that passed months or years ago? Share it with the group.

My example, and the inspiration for this thread, is Kirby's Epic Yarn. It's beautiful. One of my favourite 2D platformers. I'd have loved to join in all the discussion about it, but can't, because it happened ages ago, on the old place.

Only pretty much every game I ever play XD It's rare I can justify getting a game on release so it's normally a few months-years before I get a chance to play it myself. Though when I do get it on release I tend to play it too fast and then still have nobody to talk to about it as they're all so far behind

Pokemon Black - I played it as Black 2 was released. Go figure.

Burnout Paradise on the 360. I picked it up for a few quid in Cash Generator late last year, loved it but was often told by mates and folk online that I'd have got so much more out of it had I played it at the time of release (some three years back).

The Internet originally swallowed this reply - so I'm even late to the Late to the Party thread.

Anyway, as I said a moment ago, the Virtual Console has helped with lots of these, mainly Mega Drive platformers, the Wario Land series and Final Fantasy VI. As for more modern games, I started Paper Mario: Sticker Star late thanks to wanting to beat Pokémon Black 2 first. I started The Last Story late... and then I finished with something incredibly witty. Of course, I don't remember it but you'd have been laughing. Lots.

Edited to include: oh, and, lots of GameCube games! Super Mario Sunshine, Wind Waker (the chance to discuss this has, of course, arisen recently, although I've since forgotten nearly everything about it!), Pokémon Colosseum, The Thousand Year Door...

I bought Ocarina of time sometime in the 2003-ish for the bargain price of ten quid & had no problems enjoying it.

Most games, tbh.

Pandora's Tower is a good example. And Skyward Sword.

Mass Effect. Didn't actually start the series at all until maybe 2 months before the release of ME3. It was a wild ride of discovery, excitement, love and then sudden, crushing, bitter disappointment at the ME3 ending.

That happens to me a bit these days, can't think of any examples except for RE6

Xenos_Helia wrote:

Mass Effect. Didn't actually start the series at all until maybe 2 months before the release of ME3. It was a wild ride of discovery, excitement, love and then sudden, crushing, bitter disappointment at the ME3 ending.

I was the same, I played ME3 just a couple of months ago, so I didn't get caught up in the anger at the ending.

Aye, I was also late to play Mass Effect. I played the first one when the second was out, really enjoyed the story of the first but hated the game-play. In my eyes 2 was a massive upgrade which I thoroughly enjoyed, and had a good ending to bridge onto 3.

I never played the third one however, I just never had the urge to buy it.

Balladeer wrote:

My example, and the inspiration for this thread, is Kirby's Epic Yarn. It's beautiful. One of my favourite 2D platformers. I'd have loved to join in all the discussion about it, but can't, because it happened ages ago, on the old place.

Your (eventual ) love for Epic Yarn makes this old codger smile, sincerely.

I do this with pretty much every game I play. Two of the biggest examples being Twilight Princess and Super Mario Galaxy. Though I owned the latter from launch, I typically find (as I found with that game) that I enjoy them much more at my own pace, usually months after the hype train has left the station and everyone else has moved on and forgotten about it.

I've finished it now, Stu. Look out for this week's music week, up soon!

Would it shock you to know that, for all I harp on about it, I've not (quite) finished it myself yet?

I've just bought Super Mario Galaxy!

Balladeer wrote:

I am very near the end. I do this a lot with games I really like; it not being quite finished gives me an excellent excuse to come back to it in future, without having to stoop to postgame filler.

beemoh:

To be fair, I haven't done those bloody wallpaper-winning minigames either. Tedious pieces of work.

The girlfriend's discovering SMG2, and the delights of the purple coin races.

In a mindless way, I didn't mind the hide and seek stages.

I was extremely late finishing Rayman Origins (finished it about three weeks ago, having started it at launch (and having previously made much progress)). What a game, though! I'd go so far as to call it my favourite platformer of all time.

I'm currently plodding through Tales of the Abyss on the 3DS, despite having got it at or near release. It has taken me far longer to get into it than it should have, even considering that several JRPGs have slow starts. I blame the overworld for being dull, the talking heads bits for being slow, and the dialogue for being more full of made-up words than A Nerd's Guide to Lord of the Rings. Oh, and nothing game-changing happening in the plot for the first ten hours or so.

i would say im late to the party with wii games (ive always they were overpriced), unless its been zelda or 1 of the 3 rpgs. I now have about 40 wii games on my hdd (naughty) including epic kirby but ive still not even played it, i reall yshould and maybe some o the others i own.

Balladeer wrote:

I'm currently plodding through Tales of the Abyss on the 3DS, despite having got it at or near release. It has taken me far longer to get into it than it should have, even considering that several JRPGs have slow starts. I blame the overworld for being dull, the talking heads bits for being slow, and the dialogue for being more full of made-up words than A Nerd's Guide to Lord of the Rings. Oh, and nothing game-changing happening in the plot for the first ten hours or so.

This makes me even less likely to take my copy for a spin.

I am enjoying it now, though!

I was a over a decade late to Shenmue and its sequel, but acquiring preowned copies last summer allowed me to finally experience how amazing they really are - timeless pieces of work.

Considering their massive budgets (the original Shenmue was in the tens of millions) these are also games that are a product of their time, hard to replicate. I've never visited such a painstakingly engrossing depiction of on-foot exploration of real cities in a videogame.

Stu_the_great wrote:

Balladeer wrote:

I'm currently plodding through Tales of the Abyss on the 3DS, despite having got it at or near release. It has taken me far longer to get into it than it should have, even considering that several JRPGs have slow starts. I blame the overworld for being dull, the talking heads bits for being slow, and the dialogue for being more full of made-up words than A Nerd's Guide to Lord of the Rings. Oh, and nothing game-changing happening in the plot for the first ten hours or so.

This makes me even less likely to take my copy for a spin.

I was disappointed with Tales of the Abyss too, and I'm a massive Tales fan. I have a feeling its love among the fans is mainly down to its story and characters - one of the best Tales (hah!) of the Tales games. But its dungeon design is forgettable dross, its game world repetitive and dull (yay for muted colours). Tales of Symphonia, Eternia and Graces all handily best it - highly recommended those games are!

i actually played kirby epic yarn a few days ago, im waiting to see what are top 5 games per genre list balla is doing to see what i should play or look out for on wii. what you took 10 years to play shenmue