RFGen's Top "Fool me once" games

Here's my fooled list. I had more so keeping it contained to 20 was actually a bit hard

20. Tetris (CD-i) - This was a game I used to think was pretty hard to mess up. But boy the CD-i proved me wrong. With horribly distracting FMV backgrounds and crazy load times in between levels (while it loads a new horrendous FMV background!) it’s the least playable version of Tetris I’ve ever played.
19. Tony Hawk's Project 8 - As someone who is both a long time Tony Hawk fan and someone who picked up a PS3 at launch I was so excited to dig into the latest Tony Hawk game. Gone was everything I loved about the series for a new Skate like approach. Unfortunately they didn’t even do a good Skate ripoff though and its extremely poorly controlled and the levels are also very uninteresting.
18. Demon Stone - Like most of us I grew up playing many bad games, and just learned to enjoy myself regardless or in some cases just didn’t realize they were bad. Demon Stone shook me out of that delusion hard. It was the first game I had ever pre-ordered I was so excited for it. The voice cast and the setting had me super hyped. Picked it up, raced home and finished it about 5-6 hours later and just thought to myself…...that was it. I paid $60 for that? It was my earliest memory of buyer’s remorse and thought me some valuable lessons about when to spend my money and excitement.
17. Bioshock - This game just has such a following I feel like a crazy person for not liking it. I’ve played it twice from start to finish wanting to like it, or at least understand why others do. Both times I went in with the best of intentions and came away disappointed and confused.
16. Bubble Bobble Part 2 - When I first started collecting seriously for the NES and found out that one of my favorite games of all time had a sequel I could not wait to get a copy and try it out. All they really needed to do was just create some new levels in the first game and I would have thought it was the best. Instead we got a sloppy controlling, weird level designed unmemorable soundtrack, mess of a game.
15. Silent Hill 4 - As someone who really only knew horror games from Resident Evil I was just starting to explore the rest of the genre. When I found the Silent Hill series I was eating them all up in order of release. Each one seemed better than the last and I couldn’t wait to see what was next. When I hit 4 though it was such a departure that it just killed my interest in the franchise almost completely. It is a very neat concept that is incredibly boring and frustrating to play.
14. Mirror’s Edge Catalyst - The original Mirror's Edge really grabbed me. It was the first game that I ever got a platinum trophy. Was pretty excited to here that it was getting a very unexpected new game in the series. Unfortunately they changed it so drastically that it didn't really reassemble the original anymore as they tried to cash in on current gaming trends and sacrificed the unique feel of the original.
13. Super Mario Sunshine - Not just a bad Mario game, but just a bad game
12. King of Fighters XIV - as a long time KoF fan I've seen the series go from highs to lows a couple times previously, but I don't think anything has been as drastic as how high I am on XIII and how low I am on XIV. One of the best playing most beautiful fighting games of all time was followed up with one of the ugliest games I've ever scene. XIV plays fine and I'm typically a gameplay>graphics kind of guy but even I have my limits.
11. Xenoblade Chronicles X - As someone who's followed the "Xeno" series from its inception this was the first and only time so far that a game from that series just didn't click with me. It feels like playing an MMO offline by yourself which is already a genre I don't care for at the best of times. Too much of a departure from what I love about the games.
10. Final Fantasy VIII - I truly got drawn into Final Fantasy with IX. Loved it so much I felt the need to dig into the past games. Each early title just kept surprising and delighting me….until I hit VIII. From the characters to the setting to the bizzare levelling and combat systems nothing about this game felt fun like the other 8 games I had played.
9. Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles - 3 friends and myself were so excited for this game that we all made sure we dishes out the cash to each have GBAs and Link cables when the game launched. It was a big investment, but we were sure that a Final Fantasy game couldn't disappoint. We played it all afternoon trying our best to have fun, but the game is literally designed around one player never having fun so it was hard. We never got back together for a second attempt.
8. Mega Man Legends - As a lifelong Mega Man fan I had always heard about how charming and wonderful the Legends games were. When I finally got around to playing it though it didn't come close to living up to the hype in any way. The story, systems and characters just seemed too bland and uninteresting across the board. It does have a cool aesthetic though.
7. Diablo 3 - For me this just didn’t have any of the atmosphere, character, or charm of the first two games I loved. And on top of all of that it was so very ugly.
6. Kentucky Route Zero - I like to play things out of my comfort zone fairly often and can usually at the very least understand why something is great even if I don’t personally like it. This is one of those times that I really cannot comprehend people’s love for this game. It is so very boring and nonsensical and weird with no payoff for putting up with all of those things. I purchased it as part of the Annapurna collection and it was the only game in the whole package that was a total fail for me.
5. Sunset Overdrive - My general rule of thumb to purchase a console is that it has to have at least 3 pieces of software that interest me. This was one of my 3 to justify buying an Xbox One. On paper it seems very much up my alley with the silly style and comparisons to Tony Hawk games. But the humor NEVER landed for me and the movement felt kind of proto-Tony Hawk to me. Did not enjoy the shooting mechanics and unusual guns they had either. With this game not hitting the mark and one of my other 3 games getting cancelled it was the only time in my life I regretted purchasing a console and ended up selling it.
4. Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild - I’ve been a Zelda fan since Link to the Past sold me on the concept in a way that the NES titles weren’t able to. I’ve found a lot of joy in every release since then...until this one. It gutted ALL of the things I love most about Zelda games and replaced them with many of the things I dislike about modern, and specifically, open world games. The lack of story, dungeons and new items that open up traditional Zelda progression were instead replaced with breakable weapons, crafting systems, and seemingly endless exploring.
3. Resident Evil 4 - I discovered Resident Evil with 2 and was instantly in love. After playing the heck out it went back to 1 and on to 3 as soon as I was able. A friend got a Dreamcast and Code Veronica and with each and every title I was just so happy to be scared. When 4 came out I couldn't wait to dive in. What was there was SO different I didn’t know how I felt about it, but I wanted to keep going. The further I got the less it felt like what I wanted from a survival horror game and especially a RE game. The game had such an impact on the series and changed it so drastically that the whole thing pivoted away from me until very recently. Left a Wesker sized hole in my heart for over a decade all because of RE4.
2. World of Warcraft - right around 2000 in my small town we got a very niche video game shop. They specialized in anything our local Zellers (the ONLY place to buy new games where I grew up) wouldn’t stock. It was an incredibly formative store for me and started my love with RPGs and many other weird and obscure titles and cemented my love of Japanese developed games. It wasn’t around long in this form and to try and adapt it changed into kind of an internet cafe. This was my introduction to PC LAN gaming and re-introduced me to RTS games with the Warcraft games being far and away my favorites. Ate them up with or without friends to play with and spent what little money I had coming in to play since we didn’t have a good enough PC at home to play these kinds of games. When World of Warcraft was released it kind of broke my heart that it was not only VERY different, but that it cost a monthly subscription on top of the initial purchase. I went on with my life for a while until one of my co-workers just couldn’t stop talking about how much she loved WoW and how often she played it. She knew how much I was into gaming and I told her how much I enjoyed playing Warcraft before it was WoW. She was so convinced I would love the game that she spent her own money to buy me a brand new copy that came with a 2 (or maybe 4?) week trial and urged me to meet her guild and learn the game. I had a glimmer of hope and got excited about Warcraft for the first time in years. Went home that night, installed it and joined her and her friends for 5-6 hours getting introduced to the game and learning the basics. The next day when she met me at work and wanted to hear my thoughts I remember saying something like “it’s not really a game is it, it’s like a chat room with orcs and chores”. This game, with some help from FFXIX killed any and all interest I ever might have had in the MMORPG genre entirely.
1.Fire Emblem Awakening - I first discovered Fire Emblem when my wife bought me Path of Radiance as a gift when my son was still and infant. It was a great game to play with a small baby as I could leave turns running as needed and a few times even had him sleeping on my chest as I played. Some of my greatest gaming memories of all time are with Path of Radiance. Loved it so much I picked up the sequel on the Wii and went backwards to the GBA games I had missed and my love for tactics RPGs was born. When Awakening came out I was as excited as I've ever been for a new game in a series I love. Much like RE4 though they decided to change up the formula to make the game appeal to a larger audience. Most of the stuff I loved about FE had been gutted or drastically changed. And also like RE4 it became the best selling game in the series. This started a new path for the series that got further and further away from what drew me to it initially.