Games you didn't enjoy at all until a 2nd, 3rd, or later attempt?

[Kaeden]

I bought and played Red Dead Redemption 2 at launch. Got close to the end of chapter 2 and really was NOT enjoying it at all. I don't know if it was all the various control mechanics being introduced rather quickly or the very slow pace but I ditched the game and only came for a brief period to see what the online was like. After an hour there, yeah I was done once again. Almost uninstalled it on my Xbox because it's a rather large game but thought I'd give it time to cool off.

Fast forward to a few days back and a thread here had someone mention yet another glowing review of the game and mentioned, along with others, how it got a lot better from Chapter 3 on. So I decided it was time to revisit and see if I could finally get into the game.

I remembered the exact spot where I quit, trying to catch a kid on horse and for whatever reason previously I couldn't catch him. My stupid horse and crap riding skills had me running into everything and I failed it more than a couple times. This time though, for whatever reason, I nailed it on the first attempt. Maybe it was because I knew I'd fail again and just let whatever would happen, happen. Finished that mission, spent a ton of time in town doing various shit, talking with various people, watching a small film on flying in the sky and I'm finally hooked into this game after having done a good bit more. Oh and I didn't think I'd like fishing but I have to say, I think the mechanics of it work quite well.

Kinda hate it took me so long to just jump back in but I'm happy to see I might actually play it until the very end.

So that was my game and while there are others I imagine, this was the most recent. What was yours?

 

[Blade Wolf]

Hated Dragon's Dogma on PS3, Loved it on PS4.

Framerate matters.

 

[Deleted member 54320]

Dragons Dogma.

 

[Xenosaga]

I dropped the first Kingdom Hearts at Tarzan world because I wasn't really feeling the combat and the controls, especially the platforming was frustrating. About a year later I saw a trailer for Kingdom Hearts 2 and it looked so fun, so I decided to go back to play KH1 again in preparation for KH2. Once I got past the Tarzan world I started to enjoy the game, and by the time I finished the game I ended up liking the game despite my issue with platforming.

 

[adit]

tropico 5
gwent

 

[Kromeo]

Demons Souls I think I must have started and dropped about 4 times before I finally played it through to the end, I still think it's the worst Souls game but it did somewhat click eventually, at least enough to get me to play Dark Souls

 

[Mister X]

Demon's Souls and Dark Souls

...love it now

 

[Dr Pears]

Played MGS4 when it first came out. Never played a stealth game prior. Tried to play it like COD. Didn't like it because it was nothing like COD.

5 years later.

2013, decided to play all the top ps3 games i missed before ps4 comes out including retrying MGS4. Hated COD at that point. MGS4 finally clicked and became one of my fave ps3 games.

 

[tomd96]

I originally tried Dark Souls on PC in 2013 or 2014 and played less than an hour before giving up. It felt clunky, looked ugly (I'd recently built a new PC and was enjoying some very pretty games) and I just didn't think it was for me. I don't think I even reached the first boss.

I tried it again (very briefly) a year or so later and bounced off it again.

Last year, around Feb/March (and after having beaten Bloodborne in early 2017) I tried once more and it really clicked. I played through the entire Dark Souls trilogy through March and April last year, spending around 70 hours with each game and loving them all. So I'm definitely excited to see more of Sekiro this week, and I'm looking forward to playing Demon's Souls soon, which was one of a handful of still-exclusive-to-PS3 games that made me decide to buy a PS3 late last year.

 

[Deleted member 31873]

I didn't enjoy Skyrim until I played it in VR.

I didn't enjoy Tomb Raider 2013 until I got the PS4 version, which ran 60fps.

 

[0ptimusPayne]

Witcher 3 for me. Bought it digitally day one, couldn't get into the combat. Took me about 3/4 pick ups over 3 years to finish the story and enjoy all the crazy side quest. Excellent game

 

[Absent Uncle]

Path of Exile.
Didn't get past the 1st act until the 4th time I attempt it over the course of several years. Now I'm all in. Put over 200hrs into it in 3 weeks in December, and starting Friday I'll probably do something similar

 

[Rotobit]

I sucked real bad at MGS The Twin Snakes when I first got it, finding it kinda clunky and unforgiving control-wise, but after a few attempts I "got it" and MGS became one of my favorite franchises. I basically got a PS3 for MGS4.

I hated Persona 3's dungeon design, still do tbh, but I forced myself to play Persona 3 Portable on the easiest difficulty as the FeMC just to enjoy the story and it was fantastic. I also couldn't really enjoy Persona 4 until Golden introduced the Safe difficulty too. I just have zero patience for how those games handled dungeons and resource management (P5 was a lot better about it until the last dungeon, at least)

 

[Wez]

I generally don't have the time to cultivate stockholm syndrome with games I dont enjoy

 

[TheBrokenMan]

Bayonetta. I bought that game with the PS3 and hated it. I could never get Witch Time to trigger and I thought it was something that you could only get on higher difficulties or something.

I had an empty backlog, was at home recovering from a surgery and it was the only unfinished game I had. I paid attention to the tutorial and before I knew it, it is the only Platinum games product which I hold the Platinum Trophy for.

 

[Kaeden]

Path of Exile.
Didn't get past the 1st act until the 4th time I attempt it over the course of several years. Now I'm all in. Put over 200hrs into it in 3 weeks in December, and starting Friday I'll probably do something similar

Click to shrink...

This is another one for me. Got an invite to the beta from a forum user on PoE's forums and just absolutely hated everything about it. Obviously it's nothing like the game today but it left a very bad impression. But a friend decided to try it a couple years back and I begrudgingly joined him. He quit after like 3 days... I never left. And I'll be right there with ya and the Era guild at launch at the end of the week.

 

[Deleted member 11124]

Resonance of Fate - Couldn't get past the tutorial the first two times, now I absolutely love it.

 

[Treasure Silvergun]

Xenoblade 1 for sure. It took me 4 years to go back to the game, but it clicked almost immediately the second time and it's now one of my favorite.

Demons's Souls is another game I dropped for a few weeks out of sheer frustration, returned to, persisted through, and finally learned to love.

 

[Saori]

Monster Hunter.. Well less one game specifically, but the franchise overall. I had MHTri for the Wii and I never even got to the first big Monster, several years later I got MH3U for my Wii U on launch, this time I got to the first urgent quest, but I still put the came down after that. Skipping forward a bit again going to the 3DS there was MH4U and my friend convinced me to give the demo a try and we got the hang of it together and now I was hooked. We had finished the Demo and went out to buy the game, well it was sold out everywhere so I bought it in the eShop...900 hours later it's in my Top 5 games overall and I'm loving the franchise now.

 

[Dewin]

Assassin's Creed and Dishonored

 

[Muntaner]

I am at the 6th with The Witcher 3, can't stick to it.

 

[GamingRobioto]

Resident Evil 4 and Final Fantasy X were the highest profile for me.

Each from my two favourite gaming series but the raging, immovable fanboy in me couldn't handle the changes to the formula these games brought in the respective series. But once I got over myself and gave these two games proper chances and judged them on their own merits, I fell in love with them. For both games there was a 3-6 month gap between launch and when I went back a played them with a level head.

They are now both in my top 5 games of all time. I learned a valuable lesson from these two games and i'm much, much more open minded about my favourite game series changing things up.

 

[ClivePwned]

it's rare I will revisit a game if it doesn't grab me at the start. These days, I'm incredibly ruthless with games, especially if they are a steam cheapie/PS+/GwG/Gamepass to the point where some games last barely 15 minutes before I quit, never to think of them again.

One of the rare exceptions to that rule is Just Cause 2. I bought it a few months after launch on PC and tried to get into it. It just seemed really all over the place in terms of where and when missions started (I was relatively ambivalent towards open world games at the time- today I love some of them).

Years later, I was given Just Cause 3 for Xmas when it was released and I started playing it and loved it. Then I moved countries and didn't have my PS4 with me, but I had an Xbox 1 and so I grabbed JC2 from a sale since it was backwards compatible. And then I got into it properly and really enjoyed it (I prefer 3- I didn't seem to have serious tech problems like some). Probably going to replay this later this year once I've beaten JC4 (it's next on my playlist).

 

[Kaeden]

I see a lot mentioning the Souls games and that's a series that hasn't clicked fully with me even though I own 1, 2 and 3. I love the gameplay and, for the most part, the world design. But the difficulty is just so punishing that I still don't have the patience to beat any of them. Maybe one day.

 

[Deleted member 42105]

Was totally not in the right mind set to play Persona 3 the first time.
Persona 3....oh baby. How I misjudged you.

 

[cyba89]

The first Darksiders.
Everyone raved how it is like Zelda which got me interested but all I got in the beginning was an average hack&slash with a try-hard protagonist in a average-looking modern-city environment.

Took me a second attempt to actually get to the Zelda-like dungeons and then I fell in love with the gameplay.

 

[StarPhlox]

Prey took me quite some time but eventually moved from the 'hate it' to 'love it' column

Due to running out of any other games to play I finally gave Stardew Valley a 3rd shot over this past weekend and now I'm actually having a nice time with it! I think that's a combo of both a different attitude going into it as well as listening to Blood, Sweat, and Pixels which definitely gave me a new lens through which to view the game.

 

[Ravio-li]

Sonic. My first impression with this franchise was Sonic generations and I just hated it. Controls felt awkward for both 3d and 2d sections. I assumed Sonic Generations is a good representation of the whole franchise and ignored all of it because of that.

Several times of uninstalling and reinstalling this game later it clicked and I saw the great level design and spectacle. Played through the whole thing with everything completed. I still think the current style of 3d sonic games has problems. Sonic Mania was instantly enjoyable and I even got a lot of fun out of Sonic Adventure 1 (played this last year for the first time), but Generations managed to be great despite its sub-par controls and movement.

 

[Doskoi Panda]

Prey, my favorite game

 

[Wahad]

Gears of War and then Mass Effect.

Become one of the biggest ME fans since I played the first one... Finished all 3 on all three platforms, Andromeda only on Xbox. Owning digital and physical versions of all on all three platforms too.

 

[LaTasse]

The first Dishonored comes to mind. I don't why it didn't cliked with me the first time but I loved it on the second playthrough.

 

[forpush]

Monster Hunter.
First time I tried was in 2008 or so on the PSP, and I bounced off of it, put it away for a year or so and tried it again, and bounced off of it yet again. A couple years later and I tried out Tri on the wii, no luck, then I got a wii u and a friend lent me their copy at which point something finally clicked and I became utterly obsessed with the series, I'm now several thousand hours deep into 4u, Gen/GU and World and it's easily my favourite series of all time.

 

[Mistouze]

Well, I've already tried getting into BoF Dragon Quarter a few times in the past and it seems like I finally "got" what the combat was about in my last attempt yesterday.

EDIT : And yeah, like forpush it took me a few years to get Monster Hunter, I tried the demo on PS2, one of the games on PSP but I fell in love with the series thanks to MH3U on the 3DS/WiiU. Must have sank 300+ hours in it.

 

[justiceiro]

Myst. Every time I felt I knew more English, I revisited. Amazing how I keep getting stuck, but somehow came back.

BioShock was kinda the same, but the first attempt I didn't go through because my computer was struggling running the game.

 

[Tonypark]

Demon souls, 3 attemps and the rest was history.
Dragon's Dogma, 2 attemps and it was good but not THAT good.

 

[N7_Kovalski]

Skyrim

 

[secretanchitman]

Resident Evil 4 - tried on GCN, PS2 and finally clicked with me on the 360. Hell of a game!

 

[Lampa]

Bloodborne, probably. Couldn't get past Gascoigne when I first played it so I traded the game in. Bought it few months later again and finished it twice already.

One more game I "restarted" couple of times was MGS V. I think I finished it on my third try, but it didn't change my opinion on it. It's still extremely overrated, imo.

 

[Faenix1]

I wasnt entirely down with the first uncharted until a second attempt. Then I was hooked enough to get the platinum trophy. (Basically three playthroughs)

 

[Freddo]

I downloaded and tried the Freedom Fighters demo the same day it was released, and hated it. 2-3 years later I found the game in the bargin bin and decided to give it a try and absolutely loved it, even the part that was used for the demo.

 

[banter]

Monster Hunter. I tried initially with Monster Hunter Tri and couldn't get into it. I tried again with Monster Hunter Freedom Unite and couldn't get past the controls on PSP. But then, Monster Hunter 3U came out and I got it, everything clicked, and I've been an addict ever since. I've since gone back and played the other two with newfound enjoyment, and have played every one released stateside since. The series now probably has the most collective game hours from me... and that's saying something!

 

[RetroMG]

Took me three or four tries to get past the beginning of Persona 4. I kept getting bogged down in Yukiko's dungeon. I finally got past it, and now it's one of my all-time favorite RPGs.

 

[danowat]

Both Warframe and Path of Exile took me at least two goes to get into them.

 

[Domcorleone]

Persona 4
Dragon Quest XI
BotW
Destiny 2

 

[Mexen]

I feel like Pokemon will be it for me. I have a hunch I'll enjoy it now that I understand what it's all about. I want to like Pokemon you guys.

Hated Dragon's Dogma on PS3, Loved it on PS4.

Framerate matters.

Click to shrink...

Demon souls, 3 attemps and the rest was history.
Dragon's Dogma, 2 attemps and it was good but not THAT good.

Click to shrink...

Dragons Dogma.

Click to shrink...

I just started this game for the first time and it has started to click now. In the beginning, I kept saying to myself, "this is no Witcher."

 

[TheCobraTwister]

Demon's Souls, never made it past the first level then read an article saying it was the closest thing to Berserk in video game form said WTF went back and never looked back.

 

[Pakesaker]

Mass Effect. I bought the original on launch day and tried to get into it multiple times. It didn't click until I was getting hyped up for the release of Mass Effect 2. I played through the first game two times in the week before it released and fell in love with the series.

 

[Kaeden]

Demon's Souls, never made it past the first level then read an article saying it was the closest thing to Berserk in video game form said WTF went back and never looked back.

Click to shrink...

LOL. Just that one frame of mind needed to be tweaked and all of the sudden a light bulb went off? Berzerk (I know it's diff from what you're referring to)... now there's a game I haven't played in a very long time.

 

[bry]

I think RDR1
Started it multiple times never got too far past the intro.
Then around the time RDR2 launched I got hooked in and beat the main story mode.

 

[MrH]

Prey. I tend to skip side missions and just enjoy the main story but Prey wasn't having any of that, I was severely underpowered and died all the time near the end and I had to force myself to finish it. Normally I'd never replay a game, let alone one I hated but a lot of people convinced me to and I actually really enjoyed it, the side missions were quality over quantity and by exploring more I became much stronger and never really died which took away all the frustration.