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What are some of the most polished games you've ever played?

EggmaniMN

EggmaniMN

Banned
May 17, 2020
3,465
From Software is the absolute last developer anyone should name anything from for polish. They're one of the jankiest developers in gaming history going all the way back to their very first game and that has absolutely not changed in their newer titles. That's some unbelievably rose tinted wall sized blinders if you're going to try to name anything they've done here. And even then, the most polished game they've probably ever made is something like Ninja Blade or Chromehounds and that's like...not particularly great.

Sonic Mania Plus is an extremely polished game. Just excellent all around.
 
Servbot24

Servbot24

The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
43,060
Shout out to God of War (new one). Production value is crazy.

Also Metroid Prime for having the best opening menu sequence ever :P
 
trashbandit

trashbandit

Member
Dec 19, 2019
3,910
Adrifi said:
Dark Souls. I still think it's the GOAT in terms of game design and polish, it's like pretty much everything just makes sense and works, although it's not flawless.
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Dark Souls is a lot of things, but it certainly is not a polished experience. The first few hours are pretty well honed as far as pacing and design goes, but the rest has a ton of rough edges.
 
Nephilim

Nephilim

Member
Oct 28, 2017
5,275
TloU2
RDR2
Smash Bros Ultimate
Diablo 3
Metroid Prime
FZero GX
Hades
Super Mario Galaxy 1+2
Nex Machina
God of War 2018

and many other games.
 

Deleted member 46493

User requested account closure
Banned
Aug 7, 2018
5,231
MGSV. It runs so well with no bugs (in my experience). Heard it runs fine on PS360, which is wild.

Death Stranding seems polished so far.

trashbandit said:
Dark Souls is a lot of things, but it certainly is not a polished experience. The first few hours are pretty well honed as far as pacing and design goes, but the rest has a ton of rough edges.
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I thought polished meant no bugs, issues, or frame rate drops. Souls games, though I love them, are famous for janky enemies, AI that falls to its death all the time, weird rag doll physics, and used to have frame rate issues.
 
Damaniel

Damaniel

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
6,535
Portland, OR
Blizzard's pre-Activision output is the gold standard for polish in the PC world. That quality has progressively gotten lower over the years though.
 
AIan

AIan

Member
Oct 20, 2019
4,843
God of War (2018) is very polished. For such an ambitious game that's impressive.
 
KORNdog

KORNdog

Banned
Oct 30, 2017
8,001
Last of us part 2 and uncharted 4/lost legacy are obvious ones. Just not exactly surprising given its naughty dog...

But horizon zero dawn was a massive surprise. I really wasn't expecting that to be so polished for their first open world attempt. Not a single bug or hitched animation or anything. It was just perfect start to end for me.
 
nded

nded

Member
Nov 14, 2017
10,559
Titanfall 2. Excellent balance of visuals and performance and some of the best controls I've ever had the pleasure of using.
 

lost7

Member
Feb 20, 2018
2,750
Nintendo games are generally incredibly polished. Also, anything from ND
 
joffocakes

joffocakes

Member
Nov 15, 2017
1,375
Mortal Kombat 11. The attention to detail in the stage and character designs, animations, unique intros, win poses etc is way far ahead of the rest of the genre. I don't really enjoy playing it very much but it is an incredible package.
 

Deleted member 49319

Account closed at user request
Banned
Nov 4, 2018
3,672
Dragon Quest XI.
Its original JP release runs pretty perfectly at launch and didn't need a single patch... until XI S came out.
 
Lobster Roll

Lobster Roll

signature-less, now and forever
Member
Sep 24, 2019
34,313
The mechanics and player control in Celeste are absolutely perfect in my opinion. Everything works, and literally every single failure is owned by the player.
 
FireCloud

FireCloud

Member
Dec 26, 2017
1,251
AstroBot... Team Asobi's output has been top notch in terms of art, music, performance, and most importantly, fun.
 

Bait02

Member
Jan 5, 2019
645
Retro Studios games, back when they still made games, those were absolutely polished.
 
Mercador

Mercador

Member
Nov 18, 2017
2,840
Quebec City
I don't like the price but I have to say that Nintendo first party title are generally polished at another level than the rest.
 

Bait02

Member
Jan 5, 2019
645
Recent Example...Outer Wilds...I believe a lot of work went into to fine tune every element cohesively. The game is like a clockwork.
 
Swearing.circle

Swearing.circle

Member
Mar 19, 2020
1,724
Metal gear solid series. 4 had some frame rate issues but the rest of them run superbly. MGS2 in particular is buttery smooth.
 
Richter1887

Richter1887

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
39,146
Resident Evil 1 remake
Resident Evil 2 OG
Resident Evil 3 OG
Metal Gear Solid
13 Sentinels
Odin Sphere Leifthrasir
Resident Evil 4
Most new Naughty Dogs games
God of War series
Resident Evil 7
Ridge Racer PSP
 
Morrigan

Morrigan

Spear of the Metal Church
Member
Oct 24, 2017
34,308
Hollow Knight, The Last of Us Part II, Horizon Zero Dawn and Sekiro come to mind.

Also, surprisingly, Salt & Sanctuary. For a game made by 2 people, it's insane how polished it is (same with Hollow Knight, really).
 
SirNinja

SirNinja

One Winged Slayer
Member
Nov 17, 2017
8,218
Las Cruces, New Mexico, United States
Dancrane212 said:
uqMDtFp.jpeg

INSIDE.

There was like maybe one texture that you could see an odd effect on as it passed by on screen.

That's it.
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Came in here to say this. It's a three-hour game that took six years to make, and it's polished to an absolutely blinding sheen.


Speaking of textures, it's absolutely remarkable how little there actually are. Someone once exported and posted a "map" of the entire game; when someone asked him if he could do a version with textures, he basically said "...this is that version". The incredible lighting effects do a TON of heavy lifting in this game.
 
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