Tough Sell

[celerystalker]

Just wondering if anyone else runs into this scenario: you have friends who are into games, but certain games you recommend, no matter how awesome they are, you can't convince anyone to give them a shot.

I've had a few like that that people just won't give a shot for whatever reason, despite the fact that they are inexpensive (or they could borrow mine) and right in line with what they often enjoy. I was thinking it might be fun to toss out some games like that, no matter how common or obscure, so maybe we could pick up some ideas.

Three that I've recommended a lot that have gotten good response if and when people give them a run:

Legacy of the Wizard for NES: A Metroid-like adventure with multiple playable characters with different abilities. It was very obtuse in its time, but with modern experience in these styles of open-ended games, it holds up better than when it was new.

Air Fortress on NES: A combination of horizontal shooter and side-scrolling exploration, it has unique gravity physics for its time and more atmosphere than you can shake a stick at.

Scud for Saturn: Based on an awesome indie comic, people often note that it can be played either as a side-scroller or a light gun game. While this is true (including an awesome one player with 2 guns mode to really capture the Scud character), it can also be played as both at the same time, with the second player laying down cover fire for the first player in a run and gun. There are even 2 modes for this, one where the light gun kills enemies and another in which it freezes them. Frankly, it's awesome, and beating the game lets you play as Drywall (that will make sense to fans of the comic).

I'd love to hear about some other players' hard sells and give them a try.

[Aussie2B]

I wish I had refused to play Legacy of the Wizard, to be honest, haha.

Anyway, the two big ones for me are the Little Tail Bronx series and any otome game of any kind. They are just so widely rejected and for such shallow reasons. For the former, people look at Tail Concerto and Solatorobo and go "eww furries" or they assume that the only people who could find enjoyment in the games are those who are a part of the furry subculture. Which seems massively hypocritical to me considering tons of retro gamers appreciate Sonic, Rocket Knight Adventures, and countless other quality platformers with anthropomorphic characters, whether they have a particular affinity for those kinds of characters or not. So how is the Little Tail Bronx series any different? Then with otome games, considering most gamers I come across are male, nobody wants to give them a shot because they assume that there's no possible way for a straight male gamer to find any enjoyment in them. Meanwhile they're playing countless other games that have romance in their plots, and female gamers have been enjoying games with romance stories told from the male perspective for decades. So again, it's another case of gamers being closed-minded and hypocritical to me.

But their loss at the end of the day, right? I'll just keep giving all sorts of different kinds of games a shot myself.

[celerystalker]

I like Tail Concerto a lot. I bought that back when it first came out and really have liked it. I like Sky Gunner on PS2 for similar atmosphere, even if it's a different genre.

[ProjectCamaro]

Legacy of the Wizard for NES: A Metroid-like adventure with multiple playable characters with different abilities. It was very obtuse in its time, but with modern experience in these styles of open-ended games, it holds up better than when it was new.

I played this all the time as a kid and thought I was the only one, I actually just started playing it again. Never beat it as a kid so hopefully I will this time.

[Daria]

I can't get my husband to play anything older than "modern". It's frustrating. He's gladly play indie games on the PC, but similar looking console titles are "too old". Ugh.

[Tanooki]

Tough sell, pretty much any game that isn't a puzzle, animal crossing/sims, or mahjong to my wife because platformers (mostly due to bosses) are too hard for her. She has had a DS and a 3DS before but stuff like the New Super Mario Bros game and the DS Simpsons platformer(due to bosses) was too much. Yet long ago she was ok with the NES and PS1 that was in their house, now it's just too hard and a waste of time. If I can get her to do something though she seems to have fun, but like a lot of things gaming or not, it's pulling teeth with rusty pliers.

[YoshiM]

My girlfriend isn't overly big on video games, but that's due to her ex-husband being a d-bag and essentially making her watch rather than participate and pretty much ignoring her. She's made a couple baby-steps, playing a little Ms. Pac-Man here or some Burnout Revenge there (her 4 year old daughter beat her in a race and Mom is a car gal who likes speed).

I think in time she'll play more. The Wii and Wii Sports (bowling) was a hit after I was able to get the kids to grasp the control concepts and convinced them to keep trying. The GF wasn't home but I'm sure once she tries and has a good time she'll convert to a degree.

Side note-my daughter, who is four years old, was not thrilled that she didn't win. She got a 100. She's not used to gaming competition. Her mom/my ex never played it with her so I told her to "tell Mommy you want to play Wii Bowling". I got her back to her house my kid did just that. Mommy gave a choice of swimming or Wii as I was leaving.

I received a text a couple hours later. My daughter bowled a 198......

[celerystalker]

My wife will play video board games with me. It started with Top Shop on Playstation, then moved on to Fortune Street and eventually Culdcept Saga. Like a lot of women, she also likes puzzle games, but we really found a sweet spot with Fortune Street and Culdcept. It really made me grin when I came home from work one day and she asked me to look over her Culdcept decks.

[JSoup]

My partner just won't play most point-and-click adventure games for more than a few minutes before being done with it. Recent progress on that front, he played through all of Grim Fangando and enjoyed all of it.

[Steven]

Brandish SNES. Many find its sudden 90 degree screen turns to be too jarring for comfort and ease of play.

However, I found ways around this, and loved this game. One of the most immersive methodical ARPGs I've ever played, personally.

[celerystalker]

My partner just won't play most point-and-click adventure games for more than a few minutes before being done with it. Recent progress on that front, he played through all of Grim Fangando and enjoyed all of it.

My friends give me a hard time because I prefer to play point and click games on console with a controller when possible. I grew up without a computer, so console ports were my only real experience outside of a couple of shareware games (the Hugo series) I played at a neighbor's. Maniac Mansion, Nightshade (the NES game), and Blazing Dragons were some of my favorites. I really like their FMV counterparts like D and Lunacy as well.

I did have fun with Brandish, though I'll admit to busting out the old Nintendo Power maps along the way. :embarrassed:

[MetalFRO]

My wife is super into Harvest Moon and Animal Crossing, but any kind of action/platformer game, no matter how simple, she completely refuses to play. Sonic the Hedgehog is real simple and easy to pick up, but in her mind, it's not fun to play for 30 seconds (or less) and die because you run into an enemy or land on a spike. The manual dexterity of it is something she has no interest in developing. I get being intimidated by shmups, FPS games, or expansive titles, but pick-up-and-play games should be at least marginally accessible. Years ago, we used to play Tekken together, and she started to play the original Spyro games, but whenever she ran into a hard platforming puzzle she couldn't IMMEDIATELY solve, she'd hand the controller over to me and make me do it. I quit solving the puzzles for her, and she quit playing. I did get her to do some Mario Kart with me the other day, but if it's not Harvest Moon or Animal Crossing on her 3DS, she just doesn't have much interest.

[Daria]

My wife will play video board games with me. It started with Top Shop on Playstation, then moved on to Fortune Street and eventually Culdcept Saga. Like a lot of women, she also likes puzzle games, but we really found a sweet spot with Fortune Street and Culdcept. It really made me grin when I came home from work one day and she asked me to look over her Culdcept decks.

I love Top Shop, such a fun quirky budget game. How is Fortune street?

[celerystalker]

I love Top Shop, such a fun quirky budget game. How is Fortune street?

Fortune Street is great. It's a bit like Top Shop, but instead of stocking items to make money, you invest in your property to make it more expensive. The more you own in a district, the more you can invest. The big wrinkle is that you can buy stocks in districts as well at the bank, which increase or decrease in value alongside that district's properties, so you can make money off of other peoples' investments. Loads of fun, and a little less random than Top Shop.

[xelement5x]

Fortune Street is also a lot like the board game mini-game in Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, if you've played that.