I guess there are a few games that I just don't really enjoy despite there being many reasons why I should.

The GTA series is one. I finished 3, thought it was a very good game but didn't even nearly finish VC or SA. With GTA4, I appreciate what Rockstar did with the game and how many different elements they did really well but it just doesn't grab me. I don't have enough fun when playing it.

I love platformers but don't like the Ratchet and Clank series at all. There's far too much emphasis on weapons and I hate collecting all the bolts. And the platforming sections are much too easy in comparison to the shooting.

Most RPGs. I love epic music and epic stories but I just can't get into RPGs. Well except for one I'm really enjoying Valkyria Chronicles at the moment, I love the presentation with the book, the artistic design and the story, character design and voice acting are all great. And I like the gameplay which usually isn't the case with RPGs. I find turn-based battles boring and repetitive and despise random battles. I've played a good bit of Mother 3 on my PSP though and I like the battle system there, with extra attacks possible if you time button presses to the beat of the battle music (which is different for each enemy). At least you're interacting beyond selecting an action, watching the character do it and then waiting for your next turn.

ICO. I loved Shadow of the Colossus but just couldn't get into ICO. I think it was dragging Yorda about the entire time... not my idea of a good time.

Okami. Love the art style and gameplay but I found it a bit slow and stopped playing after a while. I hope I'll get back into it at some point.

Kingdom Hearts... I mean who doesn't like Disney? I thought the music was amazing but found the battle system and jumping very annoying and unwieldy. Also bosses took far too long to beat. Got to the 3rd/4th world and stopped playing.

Devil May Cry... basically I hate Dante.

Ninja Gaiden Sigma... thinking about that game makes me so pissed off. And it wasn't the difficulty. There were so many design decisions which ticked me off to the point that I stopped playing. Ridiculous story for one (in a interesting ancient Japanese setting one minute and then on a modern seeming aircraft the next), a very unintuitively designed town, a stupid unnecessary animation every time to go through a door, very detailed but barren feeling environments... I'll stop my rant there.

GTA4, was very excited when it came out, played it for a while, but never finished it. Not just for the reasons Yathzee gave in his review, but also because I realised that it's just like the previous GTA's, only with a stupid serious tone, an annoying Sims like friend-system (wich sometimes réally got me out of fun bits) and most of the fun but ridiculous, wich didn't fit with the new serious tone, cut out. Major dissapointment.
I also never finished Ninja Gaiden 2, but that's more out of fear. Saw my brother fighting the last boss, after that I never touched the game again.
Oblivion also was a dissapointment. Although I liked the story, the enviroments and graphics in general and the character development, the scary characters (soulless zombies I tell you!) and wierd "hit this untill it dies" combat made the game "meeh" for me.
I didn't get into Starcraft as well. The story was awesome, but the previously mentioned path finding annoyed me, and o don't get me started over the multiplayer...it just felt like exploiting.

PS: I also share all the criticisms about JRPG's, but I don't think I should enjoy them ;)

Fallout 3. I just can't get into it. I even know it's a good game while playing it.

I have never got into a FF game, though I do like the Tactics spin off series
I don't understand the hoo-rah over half life 2 and its episodes, they try to be two games at once with all the puzzles and stuff, which are quite fun but agonisingly simple and all the gunfights are thoughtless exchanges on different from any other ten-a-penny FPS
And I enjoyed fallout before it decided to die on me, now it's just an tentatle bunch of quick saves encase it breaks on me

the witcher, fallout 1&2 baldurs gate 1&2.
they never moved me to keep playing
I know some of you love some of these games but I don't care for them.

There are a lot of games, but the most recent one I can think of is Spore.

I can't remember a game I looked forward to as much as this. And did I try to like it. I really tried. But in the end it just didn't compel me. I realize now why Will Wright only spent a few minutes on each stage during his gameplay demos. Because that's about how long it takes before the fun wears off.

Fallout 3. I gave up for two hours, I just couldn't get into it at all.

Oh, and Prince of Persia was quite possibly the least enjoyable game for me. Ever. Fuck that game. And the weird thing is... I loved Assassian's Creed.

The_Deleted:
GTA IV. I'm a massive GTA fanboy and have loved it since III (the top down games left me cold) but as much as I wanted to love IV I could not shake the feeling that it was all, well, fur coat and no knickers.

Wo wo wo! Thats ment to mean bad?

But anyway, for me, it has to be Oblivion. There where certain moments I liked, like the Assassins Guild, but their where aspects of the game that just broke the experience for me.

The characters looked really, really wierd, with their wide eyes and the way they'd smile while talking about their sons death. Its also strange how everyone was so ordered and nice. It like was like something out of a sci-fi film, where everyone has had their brain wiped, or been replaced with robots.

Also the main thrust of the gameplay (heres a huge world, go!) just didn't appeal to me. Linear games have never been a bad thing in my eyes. But when a game is too open world it just annoys me. I end up running out of things to do, or I want to complete everything and just don't have the time.

There isn't anythng really truelly bad about Oblivion its just...Muh. I get the feeling its a game someone else would enjoy. I just can't. I was missabley bored and annoyed.

FIFA 09, since I can't play a single Manager Mode without the game completly freezing. Incidently, this is the reason that I'm trading it in today. Sad really, I've been a loyal FIFA fan since 96.

Assasins creed.
the graphics were beautiful, the platforming was awesome, and the leap of faith was like something out of a free runner's wet dream.

yet despite all of this, I frickin hate that game. The plot really annoyed me, the quests all felt repetative, but even these hurdles I might have overcome had it not been for those stupid lepers. I have never been so frustrated by a digital character in my 15 years of gaming. WTF mate.

Battle field 2. I really like bf 1942 and all of it's mods, but in bf2, everybody hops into a tank and does nothing because he/she is afraid of lozing it. No phun whatsoever.

Star Wars: Republic Commando. Had everything in it; nice melee, details like a whiper to whipe the blood and rain from your visor, HUD integrated in the game itself. But I never EVER liked it the least bit.

blacksite. It's just the same bloody thing I've been playing over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. Not a SINGLE thing about that game was new, EVERYTHING was tried and tested.

But I don't feel that was the reason I didn't like it (allthough it might have contributed to it). I have no clue why I didn't like it, actualy. I just don't know.

Mass Effect. Even after finishing it 3 times, I still can't say I like it. I don't know why I play it, and allthough it's far from a boring or awkward experience to play it, it's just no fun. Again, no Idea why.

Serious Sam 2. One giant robot spider is fun. Three giant robot spiders are more fun. Five are too much. Ten is artificially lengthening gameplay. Fifteen is only something SS2 can pull off. Seriously...

Red Faction 2. Geo-Mod is awsome! Respawning enemy waves however, are not.

OK, next up, the other way around, just for the sake of it :P . Games I shouldn't enjoy but did.

Brigade E5: new jagged union. Seriously, it's buggy, has bad graphics and for a squad-based PTS (paused turn strategy, made it up myself), the reward of having an actual squad instead of just one man is way to low. Further more, it's so obviously ripped off from a TBS (which is jagged alliance 2), it's sad. Still, that must be the reason I at least played it until a bug finally brought me to a grinding halt, since I can think of nothing else.

Freelancer. It's basically EVE, but then with actual manual controls. Still, it's basically EVE.

Serious Sam. It doesn't look good, the story is cheesy, brought by simple text and very uninteresting, the 'wide' landscapes where nothing new by the time I played it, the enemies where but-ugly and dead-stupid, weapons doing their job but nothing more.... SO WHY DID I FINISHED THE WHOLE STORYLINE AND READ IT!

UFO aftermath, afterlight and aftershock. Not too good looking, using that god-awfull pause system, avoiding turn-based gameplay like it's some sort of AIDS. *sigh* ok, ok, just one more UFO to check out and then I'm going! And I'm not comming back! I mean it this time!

Crysis. Ok, so it has pretty graphics and nice (if somewhat scripted) physics? It's not fun! Ooooh sniper scoped laser targeted headshots from stealth mode.

Strange, I loved Left 4 Dead. and zombie games scare the f*** out of me. It was probably only because you're always with 3 other (not mutated, psychologically challenged, or masochist) people who can actually do something.

~edit~
But, to avoid a topic digression - agreed, the whole Final Fantasy franchise. I WANT to love it, just.. eh. FF VII is fun, perhaps XII as well, but, nothings' grabbed me.

halo 3, the whole game just feels... detached
in my opinion anyway

I dont quite understand the dissapointment people are having over Brawl.When it was revealed at E3 way back in 06 I was sure that SSBB will be the best game i probably will ever play, and wasnt proved wrong in June 2008 when i finally got it. Loads of great new characters, it's competitively nerfed enough to discourage the idiots at the MLG circuits from turning it into a video game for 'professionals' like they did with melee (sure, you see the odd competitive brawl game on youtube, but not nearly as many as SSBM had) and it's basically a lot of good fun to have with your mates. Subspace emissary was a flop, but I could have told you that it would be two years ago.

The biggest disspaointment for me had to have been Far Cry 2. The Campaign was innovative but failed to hold my interest right to the end, the Multiplayer was a laggy piece of crap and even though the Map editor was a pretty good idea, it seemed like the sort of thing a suicidally bored person would use just to kill some time before his friends came online so that he could whittle more of his social life and humanity away on WoW.

GTA 4, played it for about 40 hours with more online, thought this is fantastic. Then stopped playing it on the 3rd Island, storyline died and I got very bored, even though it was the same crap I'd been playing non-stop the first 2 islands. No where near a 10/10 game. Did the reviewers even play this?

Bioshock, I should like this game, but I couldn't get into it at all.

Gears of War, played through it on Cooperative. Got it for the PC, played a bit of single player, but couldn't finish it. It was fun and I've played games that were technically worse (and loved them) but it certainly wasn't a re-invention of the wheel, which most people thought it was.

To all those that mentioned L4D, i'm guessing you lack 3 RL friends and a teamspeak server to play it. Cause I'm unsure of how it is not fun.

And for the genius mentioning Serious Sam for it's bad storyline, I just gotta laugh. If that's what you expected out of the game then you deserve not to like it. I'll agree with you on Serious Sam 2 though, it wasn't a scratch on it's predecessor.

final fantasy 12. i am a big fan of the series but the new combat system left me feeling like i had little to no control. my favorite part of rpgs is the strategizing and this game just seemed chaotic and uncontrollable. i really wanted to like this game but the combat system alone made it boring beyond playability.

Fallout 3,
Age of Conan,
Call Of Duty 4,
Age Of Empires 3,
Empire Earth series.

I really tried to enjoy these games, especially Age Of Conan, but it wasnt ment to be.
Fallout 3 was a little more fun when i decided to kill everyone i in my way.

Elder Scrolls was my least favorite- I just could not stand how long it took to do anything. Grand Theft Auto San Andreas as well. If it takes me longer then 5 minutes to feel some sort of accomplishment I get bored. Guess I have video game A.D.D.

I registered here just to reply to this thread. This is happening alot these days. So far it's happened with God of War, Dead Space, and Beyond Good & Evil. There's nothing bad about the games but for some reason I'm also not totally enthralled with them.

Nazulu:
I gave Brawl a chance because I felt like I was expected too but with such a gameplay, I just couldn't get stuck into it! Sure it has more of this and that but it lacks in some very important areas. My favourite Nintendo game is Melee and I don't think thats going to change anytime soon.

Brawl to me is the perfect example of everything vs gameplay!

This

I really enjoyed the original, and really fell in love with melee, but this one it just trys to hard. Smash Bro's doesn't need a story line, it needs a mode where you can play with your mii, or more characters (you can't tell me viewtiful joe wouldn't be perfect for the game).

gamshobny:

Serious Sam. It doesn't look good, the story is cheesy, brought by simple text and very uninteresting, the 'wide' landscapes where nothing new by the time I played it, the enemies where but-ugly and dead-stupid, weapons doing their job but nothing more.... SO WHY DID I FINISHED THE WHOLE STORYLINE AND READ IT!

I finished this game quite recently. It's stupidly hard, even on easy but I had great fun. Just a mindless shooter whicch is exactly what I needed.

RedSwir1:
I registered here just to reply to this thread. This is happening alot these days. So far it's happened with God of War, Dead Space, and Beyond Good & Evil. There's nothing bad about the games but for some reason I'm also not totally enthralled with them.

Sounds like you need a break from gaming. Happens to everyone.

For everyone who had this problem with Fallout 3, try giving it another go. I found that I didn't get into the game until I was about 8 hours in. And now I'm hooked!

Try getting to Rivet City in the main quest and stay there for a while, talking to the people, learning the layout, maybe finding a few quests. It was there that I got hooked on the game.

And BTW dialogue is important in the game, much more so than Oblivion and I find it very fun. I'd recommend putting points into Speech and picking any speech related perks.

I found small guns are the most useful, repair is important, you'll use it a lot and a few other good ones are Science, Lockpick and maybe Sneak though it isn't all that useful unless you like to avoid combat.

One thing I dislike about the game is the lack of a quick-save button. It's quite frustrating as I always forget to save if on on a long hike in the wastelands. They could have easily had it as holding Start for 2 seconds or something similar. You can wait for an in-game hour but that's very annoying.

Fable 2....wasnt as amazing as i thought it was going to be and GTA4, which i never even thought about buying

SomeBritishDude:

The_Deleted:
GTA IV. I'm a massive GTA fanboy and have loved it since III (the top down games left me cold) but as much as I wanted to love IV I could not shake the feeling that it was all, well, fur coat and no knickers.

Wo wo wo! Thats ment to mean bad?

Well said, well said, my British friend.

There seems to be a common trend of FF indifference (agreed), MGS dislike (agreed, though 2 was good) and Oblivion indifference (it was very good, but just not as fun as Morrowind, then just to put the boot in, spoiled Morrowind with its lovely graphics and physics).

Can I just put this out there and see what people think...

Zelda - it's just not that much fun. I have little/nothing against Nintendo, I've played every one of the main games since Ocarina of Time, but with every single one of them I've got most of the way through and thought "what's the point?"; completely lost interest. Has anybody else had this? They are supposed to be universally-acknowledged untouchable masterpieces, but if I have to face another bloody Water Temple I swear I'm going to grab the nearest green-tuniced elf and drown his fairy.

Too long, bland characters, excessively repetitive puzzles and not enough incentive to battle through it unless you're an RPG fan.

Please don't tell me I am alone in this.

RYjet911:
Fallout 3. I just can't get into it. I even know it's a good game while playing it.

The same thing happened to me... at first. But I kept playing because I knew I just had to force myself a little bit before getting into it. And now I love the game and on my second playthrough :D

One of the games I can't get into is Baldur's Gate 2. I restarted that game about 7 times and I still find it too hard and the interface not at all user friendly. Had the same problem with Morrowind, I love the atmosphere and everything, but it's just too difficult.. I mean, a damn rat can kill me in just two attacks...

And also Fable... I played until the guy grows up, but it's just not fun anymore if I'm not a bratty kid that can punch his own dad and get away with it...

I tried to enjoy Half-Life, but after the goodness that is Half-Life 2, I just couldn't play it. I might have another try sometime when I don't have games to play.

Edit: Forgot God of War. It seems like a great game, but, for some reason, I just don't like it. It's probably got something to do with the giant prick protagonist that is Kratos.

GTA - Any, I don't like them, sure they are well executed and pretty and actually pretty good still, I don't care for it... I actually find it boring they give me so dam freedom that after I kill half the town with a rocket launcher I don't feel like doing the missions because they seem too linear compared to the rest, trying to impose rules if you will.

Jerakal:
Halo, Gears of War, and other "Mindless" shooters.

After playing a FPS with a well-written engaging storyline (Half-Life series) I just feel like these games' writers aren't even trying.

The same writers did Marathon, which came out before Half Life, and was deeper and a lot more interesting than Halo's

Spore... It was fun but for some reason I never picked it up after the first day >>

Any of the Halo games, really even in multiplayer I was a little bored.
Guitar Hero World Tour, I thought it would be a challenge like GH3 good songs for drumming and singing, instead most of the songs were too easy on guitar and it felt like they were trying too hard to add challenge to the drums so I switched over to Rock Band 2.
Also what's the deal with that Beastie Boys song on guitar?

The problem with ultima games is their shitty real-time combat. Try out Ultima 3 for NES, that has turn based tactical combat. Gameplay wise, it's my favorite one.

Final Fantasy and Gears of War :/

Justanothernoob:
Spore... It was fun but for some reason I never picked it up after the first day >>

Had that too. Perhaps, it's because the depth of the game wasn't deep, or even shallow, but totaly non-existent. Indeed quite fun, but I would expect something like that from a Indie game developer, not the SIM-god himself.

So many dissapointing games. The biggest dissapointment was Fallout 3. As a self confessed fan boy who has no bad words to say about any of the fallout series (except brotherhood of steel of course, i'm not completely blinded by the franchise). I tried so hard to like it and spent hours upon hours trying to get into it. I completed the game twice and i feel i have wasted a large portion of my life. It's just not funny anymore. Its overly depressing, gloomy and i care for nobody in the game. I don't want to go on about how rubbish it is because i see what bethesda have done and go "Wow. Thats friggin' cool!" but i just don't enjoy it as much as i did the old ones and that is what most important right? Now i just have to figure out what to do with my metal lunchbox and all the other collectors edition crap. Do i sell it or do i keep a hold of it and display it as a lesson to me regarding how all things change and despite things being brilliant in their own right, sequels to old games will never replace the memories of teenage adolescence and laughing at the prospect of sleeping with hookers and super mutants?

There are other honorable mentions such as Bioshock. Another game which sounded brilliant and was on the whole very well constructed but i got bored once i realised you couldn't really die and all challenge vanished from the game. In addition to this the whole hacking thing made me want to throw myself off of something increibly high but thankfully i live in a place where the highest building resembles a pot plant and i wanted to die, not sprain my ankle which would of hurt but not really proved my point. GTA 4 was another one that could get in here but i found the multiplayer amazing and loved mafiya work to the point of obsession so the fact that the single player mode sucked wasn't such a problem.

EDIT: Just didn't like the flow. You know what i mean...

Oblivion.

It sounds mental, but I couldn't enjoy it like other people seemed to, shame really.