Your top 5 underrated Playstaion games

[C=Style]

Since I've been playing PS1 games on my PSP, I've kinda come to a dead end as to what to try out as I'm only playing the games I knew and owned back when I had a Playstation. Now I know the PS1's library is about as big as it gets so it's pretty difficult trying to unearth some hidden gems when you don't know where to start.

So I ask any experienced PS1 gamer what are your Top 5 Underrated PS1 games, they don't have to be super obscure, just games you enjoyed that you felt didn't get enough attention at the time.

My top 5:

1) Rollcage: Stage II (better than any WipEout game ever, with one of the best soundtracks going)

2)Dino Crisis 2 (Better than any Resident Evil game ever (IMO lol), enjoyed the risky move Capcom made to break away from the stale Resi formula to make the game more arcadey to play and as a result it was a LOT of fun)

3) FF VIII (OK not so underrated but it certainly sits firmly in the shadow of FF VII, when this is in fact the greatest JRPG I've ever played, and I didn't really enjoy FF VII at all)

4) Destruction Derby Raw (Never understood what the fuss was with DD1 and 2 but the third game in the series actually made the game very fun and playable, never hear anything about the game nowadays, people only ever talk about DD2 but this was miles better)

5) Crash Team Racing (Every bit as fun as any Mario Kart game ever, didn't pick up the accolade it so deserved and infinitely better than Mario Kart 64. A true multiplayer gem of the PS1 library)

[Mootown]

1. The first game that always springs to mind for me is the Sony published Elemental Gearbolt - never got a UK release but the US artwork and packaging etc is lush (it was Working Designs)

It's basically Virtua Cop in Panzer Dragoon land with some of THE best music and an awesome atmoshphere too. It's a precision shooting game, not a go blasting crazy (your gun locks if you miss a target) and it also has some cool anime cut-scenes too. It's excellent.

2. I was a massive fan of Omega Boost and I feel a lot of people didn't really get it - it's a great on the rails into the screen shooter with some hilarious live-action cut-scenes. Polyphony digital of Gran Turismo fame made this in a bizarre move away from cars to giant robots.

I can only think of those 2 at the minute

[Team Alfie]

I sometimes consider Threads of Fate to be my favourite game of all-time.

It only took Konami and EA the best part of a decade to catch up with Namco's Libero Grande.

Jumping Flash! remains one of my favourite 3D platformers.

[OldSkoolCoolFool]

I can only think of 4 right now, but as Tony the tiger would say... They're greeeeeeat!

1. Rapid Racer, so fast and so smooth, it looked and played great and i loved it! Racing speedboats in the lava flow of an active volcano!? Who couldn't love that!

2. Jackie Chan Stuntmaster, without a doubt the best 3d double dragon type game EVER! In my opinion that is...

3. Heart Of Darkness, excellent 2d platformer reminds me very much of Another World and Flashback.

4. Tenchu, probably not really that much underrated but far better than that other overrated stealth game everybodyelse loved.

[ToxieDogg]

Nobody ever seems to remember Rapid Reload (aka 'Gunner's Heaven'), one of my favourite run & gun games EVER.

Alien Ressurection is a good FPS, much better than the dire movie.

The original PSOne Medal Of Honor games are the only good ones in the whole series, IMO.

Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee & Oddworld Abe's Exoddus are well worth a play.

Alundra is a fantastic action RPG, very similar to Secret Of Mana, and has a surprisingly dark and mature storyline Alundra 2 is....OK, but not as good as the first

Urban Chaos. Nothing to do with the more recent 'Urban Chaos: Crowd Control' and the nearest thing to a GTA3 style experience on the PSOne. Great storyline too.

[gmintyfresh]

Rage Racer - My favourite PS1 racer and my favourite Ridge game. Much darker and grown up than other games in the series the game boasts great tracks, cars, and challenge.

Darkstalkers - A great fighter that only got average reviews, the graphics and animation is superb and it plays like a dream. Very atmospheric too

Raystorm - The graphics have aged quite badly but this shooter is full of nice set pieces and is really fun to play.

Legacy of Kain - Cool RPG that doesn't have all the cliches of the genre, very unique.

Tomb Raider 2 - Ok the original is still the best but I liked the more action based formula of the sequel.

[ShadowMan]

In no particular order:

Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain - One (if not) the best Legacy of Kain game with a brilliant story, engaging gameplay and one of the most interesting "heroes" of any game. Slated at the time for not being 3D (or so most reviews seemed to suggest) the game never got as much praise as it deserves.

Guilty Gear: Killed in reviews over here (or at least the ones I read) this game was a fun alternative to capcoms Street Fighter series that mixed an awesome soundtrack with slick (at the time) sprites and animations. Anyone that has played GGX will know what the gameplay is like, standard QCF special moves mixed with an interesting combo system.
The big downer on the PAL version is the conversion. Ignoring the standard crap (50hz blah) it also had personal win quotes (each different depending who you fought), story interludes when defeating Testament etc. Get a USA version if you can, it has all the cut stuff.
Not the best 2D fighter but fun enough and is worth a look.

Megaman X6: One of the least popular X games (next to X7) this game seems to be the brunt of a lot of hate but after putting serious time into the game it actually isn't anywhere near as bad as its made out to be.
The game has quite a few nice designs on enemies and features some truly enormous bosses (Rainy Turtleloid, High Max), it also has a cracking soundtrack and the same standard 2D platforming/blasting that you'd expect from a Megaman game. The one thing that brings the game down though is the Nightmare system which can lead to many, frequent frustrating segments that came close to ruining the game for me (the museum level has some near impossible wall, dash jump parts to contend with, Metal Shark has instant death corridors a plenty!) However deep down it is still a good and most of the time fun game to play through, if you have the patience that is!

Tombi: Another bright 2D platformer, this one being much less linear than most that had come before it. All of the levels are linked together and as you progress through the game you will take on missions which will then further the games plot and allow you to access new areas (most of the important missions will require you to find a new item and use it to overcome a previously impossible obstacle ala Symphony of the Night or Super Metroid).

Street Fighter EX+@: On the edge of underrated, it did OK in the reviews but never quite gets the recognition it deserves which is a shame as its a damn fun fighting game. Although it has blocky 3D graphics it is firmly a 2D fighter which features a cross section of popular SF veterans as well as a few all new fighters (my favs include C.Jack, Garuda and Skullomania), one of its new gameplay features is super cancelling which allows you to cancel one super move into the next (Such as Dhalsims Yoga Inferno>Yoga Legend>Yoga Drill). Its fast paced, has a great soundtrack and baring the bunch of shoto clones included it has the makings of a fun Street Fighter. The sequel fixed the shoto problem and included more unique characters but it is slower, has a smaller soundtrack and has less difficulty levels to choose from. Both are worth playing, but EX+@ is the better of the 2.

[Coopdevil]

Robotron X - A classic "updated" in 3D and staggeringly this actually works really well. Shame it was realised too early for the analogue sticks!

Pandemonium - 2.5D platformer, 3D graphics and funky camera angles but with classic left/right/jump playability. I really wish Konami had done a Castlevania in this style.

Super Drop Zone - Fab port of SNES version of Archer's classic.

[ShadowMan]

Pandemonium - 2.5D platformer, 3D graphics and funky camera angles but with classic left/right/jump playability. I really wish Konami had done a Castlevania in this style.

Might want to check out Dracula X chronicles for the PSP, the updated Dracula X is pretty much exactly what you just described.

[gmintyfresh]

Street Fighter EX+@: On the edge of underrated, it did OK in the reviews but never quite gets the recognition it deserves which is a shame as its a damn fun fighting game. Although it has blocky 3D graphics it is firmly a 2D fighter which features a cross section of popular SF veterans as well as a few all new fighters (my favs include C.Jack, Garuda and Skullomania), one of its new gameplay features is super cancelling which allows you to cancel one super move into the next (Such as Dhalsims Yoga Inferno>Yoga Legend>Yoga Drill). Its fast paced, has a great soundtrack and baring the bunch of shoto clones included it has the makings of a fun Street Fighter. The sequel fixed the shoto problem and included more unique characters but it is slower, has a smaller soundtrack and has less difficulty levels to choose from. Both are worth playing, but EX+@ is the better of the 2.

Ha yes great game I enjoyed this one a lot, didn't you get experience or unlockables for doing special moves in training or something?

[ShadowMan]

Street Fighter EX+@: On the edge of underrated, it did OK in the reviews but never quite gets the recognition it deserves which is a shame as its a damn fun fighting game. Although it has blocky 3D graphics it is firmly a 2D fighter which features a cross section of popular SF veterans as well as a few all new fighters (my favs include C.Jack, Garuda and Skullomania), one of its new gameplay features is super cancelling which allows you to cancel one super move into the next (Such as Dhalsims Yoga Inferno>Yoga Legend>Yoga Drill). Its fast paced, has a great soundtrack and baring the bunch of shoto clones included it has the makings of a fun Street Fighter. The sequel fixed the shoto problem and included more unique characters but it is slower, has a smaller soundtrack and has less difficulty levels to choose from. Both are worth playing, but EX+@ is the better of the 2.

Ha yes great game I enjoyed this one a lot, didn't you get experience or unlockables for doing special moves in training or something?

Good point, my fav part of the game was the training mode which as well as teaching you the special moves it also taught the user combos and other useful moves. The challenges got progressivly harder, the top A rank tests were usually pretty tough (to me at least) multi hit combos>supermoves.
The EXP gained unlocked characters like Evil Ryu, Evil Hokuto, Cycloid Beta and Gamma as well as other versions of Akuma, Bison and Garuda that to this day I still have no idea what makes them any different to the normal versions!

[Smurph]

Swing: Head meltingly hard, slow paced, but great fun puzzler.

Vagrant Story: Probably my favourite game for the PS1, this is always overlooked for FFVII - FFIX. Different, but better, I feel.

N-Gen Racing: Brilliant jet plane racing game with a really fitting soundtrack.

Motor Toon Grand Prix 2: Mario Kart crossed with Gran Turismo is a perfect description. Handles like GT (its by Polyphony Digital) and has the weapons and fantastical courses of Mario Kart. For my money, better than both.

G-Darius: Never hear it mentioned much. Love this 3d shooter.

[GarryG]

1) I always though ‘S.C.A.R.S.’ was a bit of a hidden Gem. There were tons of CAR games for the PS1, and usually racing games aren’t my thing, but this one doesn’t pretend to be a racing-simulator, it’s a good old fashioned fun shooting game, with ‘cars’; well car-ish type vehicles anyway.

2) Not so much underrated as not seen, because it wasn’t released in the west, was ‘Umihara Kawase Shun’. It’s very addictive, but don’t expect to master it for a while. It’s a sort of swing-em-up, err but it’s good, honest! Probably not released here because our market was overwhelmingly 3D based. This is basically a 2D side on platformer.

3) I think ‘MediEvil’ deserver a bigger reception than it got. There’s some good game-play and a decent story in there. I think it may have been wrongly seen as a bit too cartoon’ish, hence childish, for some.

4) And of course ‘Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain’. Yes I’ll admit I’m bias as this is probably my all time favourite game series, but this was a good top down RPG/Action style game it it’s own right. I think this was overlooked because of the trend towards 3D gaming.

5) Ok, for my last one of Five I’ve chosen ‘D’, because someone really should and nobody else is very likely to mention it! You will probably love it or loath it, ether way it’s definitely an underrated game of note! (All Warp games are a bit like staring at a Train Wreck, you know you don’t want to and really shouldn’t, but you do anyway!)



Honourable mention has to go to the ‘Clock Tower’ series, which was almost criminally overshadowed by ‘Resident Evil’ and ‘Silent Hill’ games. Good story, good graphics, psychologically disturbing/scary. Everything a good Survival Horror game should be, have a look!

[gmintyfresh]

Good point, my fav part of the game was the training mode which as well as teaching you the special moves it also taught the user combos and other useful moves. The challenges got progressivly harder, the top A rank tests were usually pretty tough (to me at least) multi hit combos>supermoves.
The EXP gained unlocked characters like Evil Ryu, Evil Hokuto, Cycloid Beta and Gamma as well as other versions of Akuma, Bison and Garuda that to this day I still have no idea what makes them any different to the normal versions!

That's it yes I seem to remember Evil Ryu, I spent for more time playing the training game mode than the proper game itself - might have to dig this one out I have fond memories of it. Rival Schools was also good fun on the PS1

[Seadog74]

In no order..
Overboard- A fun one player game with plenty to do or a hectic multiplayer battle.
Colony Wars- 3d space shooter with a story showed what the playstation can do.
Klonoa- Gorgeous platformer from namco.
Tempest X3- Slick and trippy retro shooter.
Motorhead- Classy racer but nothing to do with the great band.