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Discussion TOTK Memorial Award for Games That Also Lived Up to the Hype

ngpdrew

ngpdrew

From the Rafters
Moderator
Pronouns
He/Him
After many, many, maaaaany months of buildup, Tears of the Kingdom came out last week and seemingly lived up to the lofty expectations of players here and elsewhere. Speaking for myself, I'm awe struck by what the developers accomplished with this game, fixing a number of issues with Breath of the Wild while also vastly expanding the scope of the world. It's pretty astonishing!

Thus, this thread: It's pretty common to talk about games that didn't ultimately meet expectations, so let's gear the conversation towards those that did. What are some games you would award the Tears of the Kingdom Memorial Award for Games That Also Lived Up to the Hype (TOTKMAGTALUTTH). These can be games that lived up to your personal expectations or generally lived up to the expectations of the industry writ large.

As the founder of TOTKMAGTALUTTH, I'll start:
  • Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: Calling anything "Ultimate" is a pretty gutsy decision, and yet! SSBU promised the moon and delivered a couple of planets alongside it, declaring "EVERYONE IS HERE" while also inviting surprising challengers such as Banjo and Joker to join the fray. Unlike TOTK, Ultimate had a furious yearlong campaign and still managed to satisfy when it arrived just before Christmas.
  • Metal Gear Solid 4 - This is a personal pick, of course, because this is a pretty divisive game among those who have long dreamed of finding love on the battlefield. For me, though, MGS4 was a fantastic conclusion to one of the industry's most storied franchises (literally?). In particular, the final encounter against
    Revolver Ocelot
    raised every hair on my body, and I look like Mike Myers with my shirt off.
  • Uncharted 2 - After I finished MGS4, I really wasn't sure what to do with my PS3. Like any good steward of the era, I went to my local Blockbuster and rented Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. Despite not really hearing much about it (likely due to the fact that it was on the P-S-Triple), I was low key blown away. Accordingly, the sequel soared to the top of my wishlist, and at the next E3 Naughty Dog showed off an incredible gameplay trailer that looked straight out of a Hollywood action movie. When the game released that fall, it was totally that: An interactive movie! And it had trains! I really like trains.
  • Pokemon Gold and Silver - Pokemon Red and Blue sent tidal waves through my childhood, as they did to many others, so expectations for the sequels were deservedly out of control. New monsters? A new region? There was so much potential, and Gold and Silver delivered on most of it. Even though the included Kanto region is pretty barebones in hindsight, it is still a remarkable feat and a testament to how massive these games were despite being developed in the shadow of a certified phenomenon.

These are the games that come to mind for me. What would you personally award with the TOTKMAGTALUTTH?
 
Super Mario Galaxy was probably one of my most anticipated games ever that totally lived up to the hype. 3D Mario was in kind of a weird spot with only two prior games -- the revolutionary 64 and the... less revolutionary (but still fun) Sunshine. And it ended up being a masterpiece.
 
Super Mario Bros. 3
Final Fantasy VI
Final Fantasy VII
Pokémon Gold & Silver
Super Mario Galaxy
Persona 5
Mega Man X
 
0
Elden Ring, Resident Evil 4 Remake, Red Dead Redemption 2, Spider-Man PS4, Kirby and the Forgotten Land
 
0
Personal (excessively high) expectations only:

Seconding
  • Pokémon Gold/Silver
  • SSBU
Adding to the list
  • Bloodborne
  • Metroid Dread
 
Metroid Dread. Absolutely impossible hype. 20 year sequel. Recovering the "Dread" title after the rumours. And it is really good. Perhaps the best 2D Metroid, the best one to control for sure.

RE4Make. One of the best games of all time. One that you can go and play RIGHT NOW and is still excellent. And they somehow made a remake that feels both like RE4 and like a PS5 game. I couldn't believe it.

MGS2: It's The Best One.
 
Devil May Cry 5. I won't dare go into the entire discourse surrounding Ninja Theory's reboot attempt. But to say the least, fans of the classic series were at their lowest. And it wasn't until a Special Edition for DMC4 came out some 7 years after the original release on PS360 did we have just a glimmer of hope.

...Then after so many whispers and rumors, some VAs letting things slip more than they should've, it FINALLY was unveiled at MS's E3 back in 2018. And it looked amazing! Exactly the type of "return to form" we wanted and needed to see!

If REmake 2 was the true start of Capcom's "return tour", then DMC5 would definitely be what I consider to be the next step.

Bring on that Dragon's Dogma 2, next, Itsuno. I'll be there Day 1!
 
For me personally:
Final Fantasy XII: This one had crazy amounts of hype leading up to its Japanese launch. And it returned that hyped with quality, as everyone expected it blew FF10 out of water.

Pokémon Ruby & Sapphire: Perhaps the most hyped Pokémon release ever as it saved us from dated pixel look and introduced craploads of new features. It definitely lived up to its insane hype and even more.

Super Mario Galaxy 2: We wanted Galaxy but better we got Galaxy but better. For me its the game of the generation, period.

Kingdom Hearts 2: we waited 4 years for this sequel but it was worth every second. A sequel improved the gameplay, looks the universe in every way. This was the part of "2006's crazy hyped quartet of games", along with FF12, Twilight Princess and Pokémon DP.
 
The ones I remember really anticipating as a kid that fitted this for me were-
Super Mario Bros 3
Super Mario World
Mega Man X

Then Ocarina of Time in the late 90s. FFXII in 2006. Then Skyrim in 2011. Monster Hunter 4 on 3DS. Then BOTW, Dragon Quest XIS? Switch has had tons.

Edit- added FFXII.
 
9-Volt said:
For me personally:
Final Fantasy XII: This one had crazy amounts of hype leading up to its Japanese launch. And it returned that hyped with quality, as everyone expected it blew FF10 out of water.

Pokémon Ruby & Sapphire: Perhaps the most hyped Pokémon release ever as it saved us from dated pixel look and introduced craploads of new features. It definitely lived up to its insane hype and even more.

Super Mario Galaxy 2: We wanted Galaxy but better we got Galaxy but better. For me its the game of the generation, period.

Kingdom Hearts 2: we waited 4 years for this sequel but it was worth every second. A sequel improved the gameplay, looks the universe in every way. This was the part of "2006's crazy hyped quartet of games", along with FF12, Twilight Princess and Pokémon DP.
Click to expand...
Ah FFXII is a good one, I know I’d forgotten something
 
GTA 4, GTA 5 and Bully all come to mind. I was extremely excited for all of these games and they not only met my high expectations set by Grand Theft Auto San Andreas in 2005, they completely crushed them.
 
0
In the last couple years:

Elden Ring
Metroid Dread

and the mother of all games that lived up to the hype….

Final Fantasy VII Remake
 
The only other game I can think of that I had astronomical levels of hype for that met or even exceeded them is Elden Ring. Possibly Skyrim, back in 2011? I can think of a lot of other games that I was very hyped for but with some reservations, so I'm not sure about those.
 
0
For me personally

Metroid Dread
Final Fantasy 7 Remake
Kingdom Hearts 2
Basically every mainline Zelda game
 
Phantom Thief said:
Elden Ring, Skyrim, RE4 remake, Metroid Dread, Persona 5
Click to expand...

MissingNo. said:
Personal (excessively high) expectations only:

Seconding
  • Pokémon Gold/Silver
  • SSBU
Adding to the list
  • Bloodborne
  • Metroid Dread
Click to expand...

Ozeiyo said:
Metroid Dread. Absolutely impossible hype. 20 year sequel. Recovering the "Dread" title after the rumours. And it is really good. Perhaps the best 2D Metroid, the best one to control for sure.

RE4Make. One of the best games of all time. One that you can go and play RIGHT NOW and is still excellent. And they somehow made a remake that feels both like RE4 and like a PS5 game. I couldn't believe it.

MGS2: It's The Best One.
Click to expand...

Sturmgeist said:
In the last couple years:

Elden Ring
Metroid Dread

and the mother of all games that lived up to the hype….

Final Fantasy VII Remake
Click to expand...
Dread is a good answer. I thought about including it because obviously a game called Dread coming out after endless speculation was exciting, but...my own personal biases against MercurySteam made me question it. I was still excited, but excited with a question mark for sure.
 
0
1190690-1457.jpg

Lived up to the hype, and then some. Mass Effect 2 isnt just the best Mass Effect game, or a great sequel, its one of the greatest games ever made. I spent all of 2009 thinking about this game from the time it was announced. At the time, ME1 was one of my favorite games ever made.

I can think of multiple other games as well, like….
SuperMarioOdyssey_-_NA_boxart.jpg

I salivated over Mario Odyssey throughout all of 2017. Botw was great, but THIS was the game i bought a switch for, and it ended up being a masterpiece
 
Okay, hear me out: Super Smash Brothers Brawl

Let me preface that this in no way takes away from SSBU's well deserved earning of this award, and my own ranking would still place Ultimate above Brawl of the games.

BUT, you timetravel to 2007-2008, you are waking up 20 minutes earlier than usual to use the family computer and visit smashdojo.com and see what the latest update was after the initial bombshell E3 trailer that revealed the series first Third Party Fighter, Solid Snake. Every bit of news straight from Sakurai('s translator) himself, leaving you salivating, unable to contain your hype as you vibrate on the way to school. New items, new stages, new fighters, new-WAIT WHAT THE FUCK SONIC IS NOW PLAYABLE????

And then...release day. I have never played Smash Bros competitively, and playing without items boring ah hell (watching family guy meme go here); I have still sunk several hundred hours into Melee, but that is a drop in the bucket compared to the first entry that offered online matches. Was it just as trash in 2008 as it is in 2023? Yes; it is the series Achilles' Heel. But it was novel, it was new! You could play with friends and strangers on a whim! Who even cared about tripping when it was just funny to laugh at (as long as it didn't happen to you)? That honeymoon period of SSBB was extensive and though I certainly don't feel compelled to go back to it anytime soon unless I'm dicking around with Project M and custom fighter skins that potentially brick my Wii, it will forever hold fondness in my heart and I'm sure I'm not alone in that regard.
 
The Witcher III, the hype for that game was really high and honestly it matched it and more. Still my game of the 2010's.
 
0
This one is hard to quantify because most of my favorite video games I played without a ton of "hype," per se. Even TOTK I didn't really get excited about until the leaks started and people started chatting about its content (even if I only knew a few things in vague terms). A lot of my top games I discovered years after the fact or played as a kid without really a concept for "hype." Buuuuuuuuuuut...

ac4d1fc9824876ce756406f0525d50c57ded4b2a666f6dfe40a6ac5c3563fad9


Yeah, it's Smash Ultimate. Smash hype always gets to me in a way no other games does, the pre-release and speculation is always exciting even if the game ends up disappointing in some way. But Smash Ultimate delivered after Smash 4 was overall a bit of a let down. All veterans back. Tons of stages, music, and Spirits. Ridley. And of course, K. Rool (who I voted for!) AND Banjo-Kazooie, pretty much the ultimate reward for being a lifelong Rare fan. Other great characters were added, but I knew once K. Rool was announced this would be my favorite Smash game and I knew once Banjo was added it would be a contender for my all-time favorite game. I go back and forth on the top spot, but it's easily in my top 5 and I've put hundreds of hours into the game.

Hell, Joker's inclusion got me to dust off Persona 5 from my backlog and start it, which was also a game that sunk its teeth into me and rocketed its way into my top five, so while I wouldn't qualify it for the "hype" category, playing SSBU and P5 back to back was definitely an incredible experience.

TOTK might crack my top 10 at the current rate, honestly. It's just captivating in a way a game hasn't been for me in years... I guess those games being SSBU/P5 lol
 
Brofield said:
Okay, hear me out: Super Smash Brothers Brawl

Let me preface that this in no way takes away from SSBU's well deserved earning of this award, and my own ranking would still place Ultimate above Brawl of the games.

BUT, you timetravel to 2007-2008, you are waking up 20 minutes earlier than usual to use the family computer and visit smashdojo.com and see what the latest update was after the initial bombshell E3 trailer that revealed the series first Third Party Fighter, Solid Snake. Every bit of news straight from Sakurai('s translator) himself, leaving you salivating, unable to contain your hype as you vibrate on the way to school. New items, new stages, new fighters, new-WAIT WHAT THE FUCK SONIC IS NOW PLAYABLE????

And then...release day. I have never played Smash Bros competitively, and playing without items boring ah hell (watching family guy meme go here); I have still sunk several hundred hours into Melee, but that is a drop in the bucket compared to the first entry that offered online matches. Was it just as trash in 2008 as it is in 2023? Yes; it is the series Achilles' Heel. But it was novel, it was new! You could play with friends and strangers on a whim! Who even cared about tripping when it was just funny to laugh at (as long as it didn't happen to you)? That honeymoon period of SSBB was extensive and though I certainly don't feel compelled to go back to it anytime soon unless I'm dicking around with Project M and custom fighter skins that potentially brick my Wii, it will forever hold fondness in my heart and I'm sure I'm not alone in that regard.
Click to expand...
I actually agree with you. Brawl was an incredible moment in gaming as someone who isn't competitively inclined. It replaced Melee for me for a good number of years before it was replaced itself by the Wii U game.

Edit: My brother used to leave MS Word open on our family computer because he would stay up until Smash Dojo updated and type excited comments to me about the latest reveal. I'll never forget the day Sonic was announced!
 
Pretty much every amazing game in most long-running series. Fans might argue over which one is best, but top franchises are brimming with success stories.

GTA, MGS, Mario, Zelda, etc. they do it again, time after time.

There’s a lot more of these than discourse would have you believe as everyone’s too busy moaning all the time. :)
 
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While I think Metroid Dread is great, it didn't totally live up to the hype for me. I can't blame the game for that, though. It's simply that Metroid Fusion is a game I love so much (one I'd spent my whole life wishing for a sequel to, in fact), that anything short of a phenomenal follow-up would've inevitably disappointed me in at least some way. The music in particular is what I consider to be Dread's most significant failing. It's still an awesome game though, to be clear. Easily the best gameplay Metroid has ever had! Hoping Metroid 6 continues to iterate on the foundation laid by Samus Returns.

As far as what did end up living up to the hype: though I didn't play Bloodborne until late 2019 (I was a Souls-like noob, with my first actually having been Sekiro earlier that year), I was acutely aware of the overwhelming praise for it, and was excited to give it a shot.

Holy moly. What an intriguing, memorable, profound experience it ended up being. The game has so much going for it: a dark setting with an oppressive atmosphere, a powerful sense of loneliness and dread, thrilling combat that feels dangerous, yet encourages aggression, and the general feeling of fighting your way through a hellish landscape as you struggle to wrap your head around the progressively worsening, extradimensionally mystifying nature of Yharnam's plague. It begins with beasts and blood, but by the end, you're left with more questions than answers (in a good way). The Old Hunters is also among the best DLC ever, elevating the experience considerably.
TheSpaceBetween said:
Metroid Prime 4 (I've seen the future)
Click to expand...
TheSpaceBetween is the personification of the process.
 
Disco Elysium
The Last of Us Part 2
Cruelty Squad
Inscryption
Persona 5
Elden Ring
Unavowed
The Longest Journey
Planescape Torment
Divinity Original Sin 2
Return of the Obra Dinn
What Remains of Edith Finch
 
Haven’t been deeply involved in many hype cycles prior to this generation I think, and frankly nothing I’ve ever played has lived up to the hype more than Tears for me.

Best I can do would be:
  • Tears of the Kingdom
  • Breath of the Wild
  • …
  • Elden Ring - I’d sworn off From games prior to this for difficulty reasons, yet still the hype pulled me in and I was not disappointed.
  • Mass Effect 2
  • Bioshock
  • Mario Galaxy
  • World of Warcraft - I jumped on in late 2005 after the buzz. Expectations far far exceeded
  • Diablo VI - The Beta just ticked all the right boxes.

Really hoping Starfield sticks the landing. I wasn’t part of the hype for Skyrim, pretty sure I played it late, but damn did it have an impact. TOTKMAGTALUTTH for Tears. Diablo, and Starfield would make this an almost impossible year to beat.
 
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Tropical Freeze is mine. I obsessed over it to the point where I'm pretty sure I had seen almost every level before the game came out, and it still delivered. The only other game I ever got like that for was Galaxy 2, and while I love it now, I think I was a little underwhelmed at first when I actually played it due to not realizing I had already seen most of the game. Otherwise games kind of just "come out" for me, even ones I do follow during prerelease.

I prefer to know a lot about games before I commit to playing them, otherwise it gets hard to overcome choice paralysis, but I'm not very good about doing this and I think I have more instances where something I had no expectations for ended up being incredible.
Lugia667 said:
no one has mentioned Luigis Mansion 3 yet eh?
Click to expand...
Like this one. This had absolutely no right being as good as it was.
 
0
Mario Kart 8 for me, the first HD mario kart and made the Wii U have something special during the droughts. Playing the courses for the first time with the awesome soundtrack was an amazing experience.
 
0
I don't think a game announcement ever hit me as emotionally as Nier Automata. I was working when Square Enix announced the game at E3 2015. I just get a text from my brother "Platinum is making a new Nier".

I was so enraptured while playing the original Nier that I found myself screaming at the TV during certain plot twists and story beats. And I was obsessed with Platinum from their 360 output. Bayonetta, Vanquish, Metal Gear Rising.

The debut teaser fucked me up with just names and concept art.

Developed by PlatinumGames
Character Designer: Akihiko Yoshida
Composer: Keiichi Okabe
Director: Yoko Taro



And the final result lived up the hype and more. A phenomenal experience from start to finish.

Another game I got irrationally hyped for was Dragon Quest XI S. Despite growing up playing nothing but JRPGs I had never played a DQ game before. I was always happy to see it show up in Nintendo Directs up to launch, and I put a lot of time into the demo before release. Ended up putting 100 hours into the game and I'd probably rate it as my all-time favorite JRPG. DQ12 is easily one of my most anticipated games now.

 
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Beanstar40 said:
1190690-1457.jpg

Lived up to the hype, and then some. Mass Effect 2 isnt just the best Mass Effect game, or a great sequel, its one of the greatest games ever made. I spent all of 2009 thinking about this game from the time it was announced. At the time, ME1 was one of my favorite games ever made.

I can think of multiple other games as well, like….
SuperMarioOdyssey_-_NA_boxart.jpg

I salivated over Mario Odyssey throughout all of 2017. Botw was great, but THIS was the game i bought a switch for, and it ended up being a masterpiece
Click to expand...
Came here to post Mass Effect 2. The first game was the game that got me to buy an Xbox 360. I loved it, the world, the gameplay, and was really hyped for 2. Mass Effect 2 proceeded to be even better in almost every way. The set up, the characters, the finale, all in all it’s still one of my all time favorites, and potentially my overall favorite game not made by Nintendo.
 
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