This is a new blog segment where once a month I take some questions and answer them mailbag style on whatever topic people are interested in. Thanks to everyone on Twitter and Facebook for sending in questions!
“Do you have any games that got you hooked on a genre that you previously thought wasn’t for you?” – @TheGamingNook1 on Twitter
What an interesting question! The more I thought about this, the more games I kept coming up with.
The biggest one was Baldur’s Gate 3 from last year. The pure number of options in a CRPG and the slow pacing always felt a bit overwhelming to me. I enjoyed Disco Elysium a few years back, but that doesn’t really have combat, so it didn’t sell me on the genre as a whole. I also vastly prefer being able to play on console over a PC, and it never felt like a CRPG would function well on console with all the options it has. While Baldur’s Gate 3 didn’t absolutely blow me away with its combat, I enjoyed the freedom it provided well enough. And obviously, I loved the characters and the story. Baldur’s Gate 3 showed me that these games can function well on a controller if done right, and that while I’m no ace at the combat, I can get through it to get to the story and characters if they are good enough. This genre is huge, so I’m excited to try all these games from the past decade or so that I’ve missed whenever I find the time.
I don’t think anything else was quite as monumental, but here are some other games that at least opened my mind a bit to new genres.
–Resident Evil: Biohazard is one I played a few years ago that I never thought I’d be able to get through. While I’ve enjoyed third-person survival horror for a long time, first-person games always felt like a bit too much for me. The first time I booted this game up was an epic failure. Just walking into the house five minutes into the game, I was so on edge for jump scares, I just turned the game off and decided against playing it anymore (I downloaded it off Game Pass, so I hadn’t actually purchased it). Months later, I tried it again and ended up really enjoying the game after I got used to it. I then bought Resident Evil: Village a few years ago and had a lot of fun with that, too. Most games in this genre are third-person, but it’s nice to know I don’t have to shut out the few first-person games that are out there.
-One from a little further into the past is Elite Beat Agents. I absolutely loved Guitar Hero all through my college years. The idea of a rhythm game without an instrument seemed absurd to me after playing that game. Eventually, I broke down and bought it since the game was very well reviewed, and I was so glad I did. The game uses the Nintendo DS stylus masterfully in a way that really engages you with the music. I don’t really enjoy standard button pressing rhythm games (unless it’s a mini-game like in Yakuza), but Elite Beat Agents made me realize I could still enjoy the genre without a fake instrument. I would also totally buy a stand-alone Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth style piano game at a lower price point.
-Sticking with the rhythm games, I’ll also point to Hi-Fi Rush from last year. After trying Metal: Hellsinger the year before and feeling way out of my depth, I had decided at the time that rhythm games mixed with action would not work for me. Hi-Fi Rush is so smartly designed with both audio and visual cues that I was able to beat the game on hard and had a fantastic time with it. The game opened me back up to a genre I had just closed myself off to.
-The last one I can think of is Tinykin. Pikmin games kind of feel like their own genre. And they just never seemed like something that would work for me. I tried out Tinykin, which is a game obviously inspired by Pikmin, and I absolutely loved it. I ended up buying Pikmin 4 because of Tinykin last year and also loved that. If you have a Pikmin game or a Pikmin clone, I am absolutely here for it now.
This question also encapsulates why I am such a huge believer in Game Pass. Three of the games on this list are games I really only played because of Game Pass. It is scary to take a jump into a genre you don’t think you vibe with if you also have to shell out your hard earned cash for it. Game Pass has let me take risks so many different times and opened me up to a lot of games I would not have wanted to spend money on otherwise. This is why Game Pass is currently one of my favorite things in all of video games.
“Favorite childhood games?”– @buffalohugz on Twitter
My first real game was Super Mario World, which is a fantastic way to enter the world of video games. 2D platformers remain one of my favorite genres to this day.
The other big one was Turtles in Time. I probably cleared that game fifty times growing up. Playing Shredder’s Revenge a few years ago felt a bit like being transported into the past. As a kid, that game went in the Super Nintendo every time someone came over.
I’ll also give you one weird one. I’m not sure if it was a “favorite,” but I did enjoy Vegas Stakes when growing up. It was a casino game where you tried to amass a fortune via blackjack, slots, etc. The twist was that as you played, there would be random encounters with other casino patrons that could either end well or poorly for you, depending on what actions you took. It all comes together really well. And since I hadn’t tasted the thrill of real life gambling with money yet, betting fake money was also incredibly intense for me.
“What’s one game that you’ve tried hard to like, but just can’t”– kencrudix on Twitter
There are so many classic games that I just didn’t vibe with or fell off on to some extent. The tricky part of the question here is “tried hard to like.” Over the years, I’ve learned that if I’m not enjoying a game, pushing harder to like it isn’t going to improve things for me. It generally just makes things worse. If I don’t like something, I’d rather drop it early and try it from the beginning again down the line. That is exactly what I did with the aforementioned Resident Evil: Biohazard. That is also something I plan on trying with Death Stranding at some point.
The closest thing I can think of is Act 3 of Baldur’s Gate 3. As much as I still say it is an incredible game, I just can not get through that act at all. I have now flamed out on it twice, and I think I have given it a genuine effort. After failing the first time around on my PC, I decided that I might enjoy it more playing it on console. I bought the PS5 version six months later, was having a blast, then once again bowed out on Act 3. I really tried, and I just can’t do it for a variety of reasons. I find the city annoying to navigate, it takes patience to find all the content, and the game just seems to throw one lose-lose decision after another at me, which gets kind of frustrating after a while. Maybe one day I will try again, but this time, it will be many years down the line.
“What’s your favorite genres in gaming? Which ones do you avoid?”– @gamersthumb on Twitter
In general, if a game is open-world, I’m probably going to try it. I also love most RPGs, so open-world RPGs tend to be my ideal games. Cyberpunk 2077 feels like everything I have ever wanted in a video game if that gives you an idea of my tastes (I will take sci-fi settings over fantasy ten out of ten times). I also love roguelites. I fall off on a lot of them fast, but it seems like every year, at least one makes it into my top 5 games. When I start to realize that a roguelite is hitting the right notes for me, it is always a super exciting feeling. Most of those games are indie games without much hype, so it always feels like discovering a hidden gem.
While I have opened myself up to a lot of genres in the past several years with game pass, there are still plenty that I just don’t click with. Survival games always feel annoying and cumbersome to me. I tried Palworld this year to give the genre one more go and flamed out fast.
I can like fighting games, but getting good at them always feels like too much work. I’d much rather be able to get good at a game by playing it and naturally improving over having to actually practice.
Finally, as much as I love open world RPGs, MMOs also always feel like too much work. I am very much a guy who likes to experience new things with games, so any game that is designed to suck you in for years just doesn’t work for me.
“How do you feel about mods or fan DLC for games like Starfield or Skyrim or Fallout? Would any of those make a game worth a replay on your end?”- Joe on Facebook
Since I mostly game on consoles, I rarely get to experience mods. I like the idea of mods that add quality of life type updates, but I just don’t really care about anything fan made when it comes to story content. I know some of these can be really well done, but it still isn’t “canon,” and they always feel a little weird to me.
Also, as stated in the other question, I’m not a guy who likes to replay games or really stick with any one game for too long. By the time quality fan mods come out, I am usually long done with that game, with no intention of picking it back up. But I recognize that I am an outlier there.
Thank you to all who sent in questions. I had a lot of fun with this and will definitely be making this a monthly segment going forward.
Big Nerd Gaming 
Leave a comment