Favorite Lost Gems?

[Aerosol]

I have Ehrgeiz, but it's broke. The broke-in-half kind of broke but with more pieces.

what IS ehrgeiz?

[Eraysor]

It's a fighting game using FFVII-era Squaresoft characters.

[Andrew]

Why not call it FFVII Fight Club or something equally as tacky? Why bother making up some unpronouncable name?

[someone2040]

Bubsy.

Supposedly it got some hard critics on that the engine was a bit sloppy. But I absolutely loved it. Before we got it on the Mega Drive, there was some show on TV, which pitted two teams of schools against each other. They had these word games, then had to go into a maze and find letters and stuff. At the end of the show, the two teams played a game (Mario Kart, Bubsy, Racing Game) where they competed for the best score/time. But yeah, Bubsy is a forgotten classic for me, I love how he has amusing quotes at the start of the level. The first one being "What could possible go wrong?" - which of course, everything does go wrong.

[covox]

You're thinking of the show A*mazing.

And you're right about Bubsy, it's as memorable as it is difficult to win.

[SefirothDB]

What. The. Hell.

Someone remembered Team Buddies? Holy crap, I thought I was the only one who had played it. Precisely yesterday I was thinking it'd make a excellent XBLA-ish kind of game, for some awesome 16 player team battles online XD Lovely game, I must have spent weeks with it, might as well look for the CD and replay it.

And Klonoa. I got the first game after playing a demo, and it got me hooked into the series (well, the "main" series, for some reason I can't stand the GBA ones). Plus, saddest ending evar. I cried ;_; Also, anyone noticed how Klonoa and Sonic share some poses in official artworks?

Toonshock was a game staring Christopher Llyod as a Happy, Loveable cartoonist who got sucked into his own world during a freak storm (At least, I think that was it.). It was a modern day 'Who framed Roger Rabiit.".

Toonstruck. I remember that one, it ended like The Dig, didn't it? Excellent game, poor sales, went almost unnoticed. Oh, speaking of Lucasart games... ask me about Loom

I'm really fond of Parasite Eve. Both of them. Probably don't classify as gems, and are known to some extent in gaming circles... but S-E seem to ignore they own the IP, which saddens me. Got to play the first one on my cousin's house, picked it up because the name sounded familiar (had read a small preview on it on a mag), was blown away. Too bad the Liberate skill dissapeared in the sequel, it was like Aya's own limit break. But the sequel beared even more replay value than the first, AND a Gunblade :3

Then... Silent Bomber, for the PS1. Pure, unadultered arcade fun. You run, jump, set bombs (4 different kinds) and make them detonate at will. Simple and addictive, it also includes a arena versus mode where you can play as some bosses.

Demon's Crest, for the SNES? It's like Megaman meets Castlevania, starring the awesome Firebrand (aka Red Arremer) from Ghouls n' Ghosts fare. Hard as only Capcom games can be, some beautiful sprites (the dragon zombie at the beginning rocks) and a secret transformation/extra boss. It's too short, though.

That's what's on top of my mind, atm.

[ila]

Yeah the first Parasite Eve was great. To be honest, I wasn't too happy with the second's switch to "Resident Evil RPG" style though.

[Eraysor]

Then... Silent Bomber, for the PS1. Pure, unadultered arcade fun. You run, jump, set bombs (4 different kinds) and make them detonate at will. Simple and addictive, it also includes a arena versus mode where you can play as some bosses.

Sounds like you have very similar tastes to me. That game was so entertaining.

Another one I jsut remembered is Jade Cocoon for the PS1, most people cast it off as a Pokemon ripoff. It has the same core idea of capturing wild animals and using them to fight, but it had far better graphics than Pokemon (obviously) and its best feature allowed you to literally combine two of your monsters to make a brand new one. Not only did the new monster mix types and attacks, it even mixed their appearances, so you could make some awesome looking monsters.

[Andrew]

I played the demo for Jade Cocoon (about 7 years ago ) and I rather enjoyed it.

[BRPXQZME]

Dragon Warrior Monsters, in a similar vein to Pokemon.

[Aki-at]

As far as under rated games go by, I feel Battle Mania on the Mega Drive needs a mention. Ever since a friend gave it too me it quickly become a favourite of mine, though I'm sure its grown a cult following ever since it hit being a rom but its so hard to fan good fanart of it XD

Hagane: The Final Conflict was another really under rated game, it was like, the Super Nintendo's answer to the Shinobi series, faster! more weapons! more villians! cooler boss battles! really was an under rated gem, I suggest anyone who enjoyed the Shinobi series to try this one out.

Finally like to add the game GunGrave (no not its sequal, that was bad compared to the first) the games level design was so well done and it always supplied a fresh group of enemy to slaughter whilst keeping your beat count going, and the style of killing was awesome too, although due to its length (could be completed in 2 hours or so, depends if you skip the movies) it was thrown into obscurity. Still it is a favourite of mine on my PS2.

[DimensionWarped]

Little Ninja Brothers(NES), Super Ninja Boy(SNES), Revenge of Shinobi(GEN), and I don't even care to name more ninja games right now... so I'll skip over Legend of the Mystical Ninja Goemon(SNES) and a few others...

The Incredible Machine, the Even More Incredible Machine, the Incredible Machine 3, the Incredible Machine 4, and Reaction Engine (an unofficial sequel). 3 remains the only one that I have actually beaten all of the puzzles in though.

I might name some more later...

[SefirothDB]

Sounds like you have very similar tastes to me. That game was so entertaining.

Awesome, hard to see people like that around <3 . Could you believe there's only one person of all my Trillian contacts that knows about Space Quest? They make me feel lonely ;-;

Jade Cocoon? I did play that one to the end, something hard because I kept focusing my monsters on looking good rather than being powerful, as I always tend to do with these kind of games. Even today at SMT I avoid ugly demons (good thing the cool ones I want are very powerful... go go Harlot! Babylon whore ftmfw). I barely remember the ending, as it's been >5 years since that, although I DO recall the final boss

changing field strenghts and weaknesses at will every friggen turn. And wasn't he your father or something?

Now a quick glance at my PS1 library has reminded me of Kagero Deception II. Gotta love the premise: you have no attacks at all, and will be chased by one or more enemies (of varying attributes) along sections of your castle. What do you do? You set traps. Then you lure the enemy into them. What is more, combos: there's 3 classes of traps (ceiling, wall and floor), plus room-specific already existing ones (like spiked floors). Say you have this knight after you, and you know which door he's going to come in. Well, prepare the room so the moment he enters, a oil-filled vase will fall on his head. With his field of vision temporarily blocked, he'll step right into the bear trap, carefully set so he gets caught in the trajectory of a fire arrow shot from the wall (which will ignite the oil and cause extra damage). Alternatively, you can lure the unsuspecting goodie into a moving wall, that will thrust him forward into your trusty bear trap... conveniently placed at the bottom of some stairs. All you have to do now is pressing triangle so the iron boulder falls from the ceiling and rolls down to hit your now helpless enemy.

Gah, I love games that stimulate my sadistic creativity :3

And how about Alundra? It was THE LTTP-esque game for me in the PS1 days. Clever dungeon designs, lovely characters, plenty of weapons and a good story to mix things up. I think I've replayed that one 5 or 6 times, yet always stopped before reaching the end for some reason. Dammit. I have the Desert of Death layout pretty much memorized at this point XD Don't bother with the sequel, it's horrible, disappointment total.

You like turn based strategy games? Go get XCom (UFO, Terror from the Deep or Apocalypse). For the PC. What drove me into this one was the investigation and resource managing parts of it, I mean, after shoting down alien ships and recovering the pieces you could research their technology and replicate it, then improve the designs to create the ultimate equipments and vehicles. Or capture living lifeforms for some interrogation (and later dissection, haha). Political relationships based on your performance would affect your funds and alien activity, if you did poorly in some areas the countries there could pact with aliens (meaning no more $ for you and heavy ufo activity there). Speaking of doing poorly, I sucked at lot in the tactical area (80% of the game, the actual battles) until I realized that a short team (no more than 4 units) + some tanks/coelacanths to attract the enemy fire (easily replaceable if they get destroyed, unlike human soldiers) was a more convenient approach for me.

PS: Color me surprised if more than 3 people here know about Space Quest without having to google it <.<

[Pseudo Da Hedgehog]

My lost gems is rodland on the Amiga and Panzer Bandit on the PS1, rodland had over the top cute characters rescuing their kidnapped Mom. You used rods to swing enimies over your head, and often there were weapons like bouncing bombs and such.

The bosses were funny, like a giant Elephant ballerina that would fly using its ears while constatntly dropping baby elephants on to your head.

Panzer Bandit was one of my favorites, it was a side scrolling adventure/fight-em-up and had a 3d enviroment with 2d sprites.

One of the games fighters was a ninja girl that had a robot wolf that helped her and another was a Nutty schoolgirl that could hardly control the giant robot she fought in..fun.

[Eminence]

Monkey Island Series.. and The Incredible Machine

[Aaron C-T]

"Unfortunately, it was 2D on the N64, in a time where 3D was end all be all of console games, so it didn't sell all that well."

... And it's not now? Unless I'm missing something both DS and PSP are using 3D gfx. Yes, I realize the DS has tons of 2D games, but you get my point.

Vectorman? Not exactly unkown but it was awesome. If only SEGA had some common sense we may have seen another great installment.. rather than a Halo-ish wannabe.

[tentril]

Ecco the Dolphin. It was loads of fun, but really hard.

[DimensionWarped]

I have Jade Cocoon 2... and that game is awful.

[pourcelaine]

Astal.

[Clwe]

Hmm...what about Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure on the Megadrive? I don't know how popular it was, but the graphics on the game were stunning (the multi-layered forest/jungle levels put most other games on the system to shame). Oh, and it also happened to be a fun game, too =P, albeit rather difficult.

Ecco The Dolphin also rocked, although I remember the sequel more fondly. That's probably because of the more varied puzzles/gameplay and the difficulty being toned down from impossible to...uh, pretty damn tough (but beatable).

If we're talking about the real old days (C64), then I would choose Powerdrift. It was quite simplistic (nudge left and right a few times, go up and down, make the odd jump or two), but it was a thrill to zoom along the twisty, undulating tracks. It seemed really fast back then...now it feels like driving through treacle. Eh, you can only go so far back...

[DimensionWarped]

If we are talking about C64, give me Mail Order Monsters and BC's quest for Tires.

[Eraysor]

I have Jade Cocoon 2... and that game is awful.

It certainly is. They totally broke it for the sequel.

And Sefiroth, the original Jade Cocoon definitely had an ending like that. You remember what I remember anyway...

How many people played Front Mission 3? It got nowhere in the UK, but I'm guessing it fared better in the US as you get the sequels on the PS2...

[rtsmarty]

Does Dynamite Headdy count?

[Aki-at]

Does Dynamite Headdy count?

Doesn't everyone already know how awesome that game is?

[Andrew]

I don't think it's awesome. Got rather bored with it, really. Granted, I didn't play it long, only for about half an hour