Does the term "Hidden Gem" even mean anything anymore?

[bjork]

it's on Steam and GOG

and archive ;)

 

[MajesticSiN]

No, it's basically just a buzzword now.

 

[Dr.Kisaragi]

Less common to talk about and mostly overlook good games

 

[Deleted member 560402]

Track 2 of Afterlife sounds like the overworld map from Dragon Quest

 

[job32]

Track 2 of Afterlife sounds like the overworld map from Dragon Quest

Sounds like LucasArts was ripe picking for their originality.

 

[Jeff]

Both A and B.

Hidden gems are more likely the one 3rd party or even a 1st party company that released a brand new game that never get previews and eventually be seen at stores but found out the artwork looks dumb and we never dare look at the back of the box to prove the game could be good, and mostly of all, marketing and publishing issues.

Publishing Issues
Sometimes the developers who can't find a good publisher to release the game and then found one who would keep publishing games that would lead to a bad game. Companies like LJN, Acclaim, THQ, Ubisoft, Activision or Limited Run would be the prime suspects of these publishers that these amazing developers would fall into and consumers would pass on these games thinking it will be bad or not sell well at all because of those publishers.

Marketing Issues
This would be the main issue. Whenever those hidden gems come out, a big major IP release like Mario, Sonic, Zelda, Kirby or whenever Rockstar pulls out a GTA game out of nowhere, would eventually steal the spotlight. Whenever a release date, the same day, same week, same month, those hidden gems will then be locked in the closet and be forgotten. Another part in marketing issue is whether the developers like Nintendo or Sega will release any of their IPs outside of Japan and the US division tries to market it either from TV or pages from a gaming magazine or comic book issues.

And sometimes, it's very rare to catch them on tv during commercials or seeing the ad of a game from a gaming magazine that would show very disturbing and disgusting images with or with no gameplay images at the corner. So we do not know what the game is about or how the marketing team does not know what consumers want. In which, the games we got to play due to those issues, are hidden gems. We just don't know what hidden gem we actually played because there's just too many major games that were marketed so much.

 

[Deleted member 560402]

Sounds like LucasArts was ripe picking for their originality.

other way around, actually. Dragon Quest was made in the late 80s. Afterlife was the mid 90s.

 

[job32]

other way around, actually. Dragon Quest was made in the late 80s. Afterlife was the mid 90s.

Ok, but along the simcity lines, they were probably picked apart.

 

[Humility]

I usually see that term on GOG game review posts.

 

[Deleted member 560402]

SCUMMVM is for LucasArts point n click adventure games as well as Sierra and Presto Studios ect.
DREAMM is for Outlaws, Mortimer, Afterlife, Rebel Assault 1 and 2, Dark Forces, and all the LucasArts point n click games and action games. Both are by ex LucasArts devs.

 

[NotReallyHere]

For some reason, LucasArts was always assaulted when going out of their "comfort zone" (really what people thought that was). I remember how there were many topics hating on "Pipe Dream" solely because it wasn't a Graphic Adventure.

Yet people seem to love Zombies Ate My Neighbors...

I remember things differently, where certain games seemed to get more praise than they maybe should have, just because they were published by Lucasfilm Games / LucasArts. And they had a lot of creative titles during their fledging days. A personal favorite of mine is BallBlazer, and Rescue on Fractalus is an all-timer, as well.

I still hum the BallBlazer theme on a regular basis. It will absolutely get stuck in your head

A damn shame those seem to be as lost in time as they are! There's a Famicom version of BallBlazer that is pretty good (and affordable!) but Fractalus is more or less locked to the Atari computers of the time. I keep hoping for some sort of "Lucasfilm Classics Collection" published by Nightdive or Digital Eclipse. Maybe someday...

Funny thing about Pipe Dream is, it wasn't even developed by Lucasfilm Games! They handled some of the PC publishing, but I think Bullet Proof Software had the console rights...? Regardless, I remember seeing that game everywhere, and remember it fondly as an exemplary title of the "Puzzle Craze" of the time.

Back on the "hidden gems" front, I'll toss out another title published-by-Lucasfilm-but-not-developed-by-them: Night Shift! It's a pretty original one, where you work the night shift (get it??) in a factory that is constantly cranking out Lucasfilm-branded toys... and also constantly breaking down. The screen scrolls vertically as you climb up and down the 'works to flip switches, press buttons, turn off alarms, hop on the exercise bike...

Came with some pretty cool in-universe packaging and paperwork, too. Maybe not the best game - so not a true "gem" - but certainly a creative one, and pretty hidden, I think! That has to count for something, right??

 

[moon200218]

This is probably my biggest pet peeve when it comes to gaming in general (specially retro gaming): people throw this term around so reliably, yet it hardly means anything because they often use it to describe games that both:

A) Sold really well in their time and just aren't popular to talk about.

or...

B) Didn't sell well, but are very popular to talk about.

So, which is it? You can argue that a game like Sanctuary Wood's "Wolf" is a hidden gem because it's not talked about much, but it sold well enough to get a sequel. Does that count? At the same time, you can argue that Rogue Entertaiment's "Strife" represents the term because it sold horribly in its time, yet was apparently beloved by the few that got it.

I don't know... I'm aware that I'm overthinking this an awful lot, but I just can't continue taking this term seriously until it actually means something, anything. It's like a buzzword designed to inflate eBay prices more than anything now.

What do you think?

I think for a game to be a hidden gem, it has to have elements that are really cool and a pleasure to behold (to you), not just innovative, but due to being overshadowed, under-marketed, rough presentation or a very lacking early game most people either dont know about it, tried it or dropped it, or didnt get to the content that makes it a gem.

The games I now think i can call a hidden gem are not the games I have heard people label as hidden gem, but they are games that I tried, genuinely thought I was wasting my time playing it but pushed through anyway (for whatever diabolical reason) until there comes a point where I really start to like it and cant put down

 

[qw90700]

Well the meaning of "hidden gem" is a complex one.

I don't think a game you like but most of people would dislike and that's why it was not popular and couldn't sell well can be "hidden gem". Hidden gem gotta be a gem that would be popular and sell well but it couldn't get popular and sold well because it wasn't lucky. Only in that context I can say "this game is hidden gem" because if IDK game had a decent advertizing it would be liked by the most, it would get popular and sell well.

Why a game gets "hidden" despite it's a "gem"? Often because of popularity of other games + popularity of other genre games. Naturally it would be brain fart moment to call Japanese only games necessarily hidden gem because they are known in Japan and had their popularity and all but I don't think if the game was not known much by rest of the world it would be hidden gem.

Another thing is the wrong sense of "hidden gem" by new generation of people who never experienced the era. For example they may even call Test Drive games a hidden gem when it was perhaps way more popular than Need for Speed series back then. And I also heard kids refering Need for Speed Underground 2 as an hidden gem too because they are not talked about much. Still a game may not be the popular talk anymore but it is not the way why a game is hidden gem at all.

Due to the aspect "a not known much game lots of people would like if had given chance" aspect of hidden gem games it's impossible to decide which game would be hidden gem. So only after such a game is revealed and gained popularity that never had experienced popularity in its time like old paintings and whatnot only then a game can get a hidden gem status and thus when people talk about "good games on X platform" they would talk about this game as an hidden gem. But then the game gets "unhidden gem" lol.

Another aspect is the games that were especially not rated on popular video game magazines. Perhaps their names were on "upcoming" and "released" games list but they never had scores. Otherwise can't imagine a game being hidden gem when it was published on video game magazine with even 1 page review lol.

In these context, for example, NES is filled with hidden gems. For example Vice: Project Doom is a hidden gem that when people discover it their mind is blown and wish they played the game decades ago lol:

The game blends multiple genre into 1. You get top-down car action levels, sidescrolling shooter levels and rail shooter levels. Just WTF dude lol.

 

[Janunba88]

I think it's a term that shouldn't be applied to everything. There are games that receive this title that I dropped after a few hours, and others that are never mentioned (or rarely are) that I still play today. I like to discover things on my own and I rarely listen to what a "popular" (or unpopular, depending on your perspective) trends has to say, so terms like that don't mean much to me.

 

[job32]

SCUMMVM is for LucasArts point n click adventure games as well as Sierra and Presto Studios ect.
DREAMM is for Outlaws, Mortimer, Afterlife, Rebel Assault 1 and 2, Dark Forces, and all the LucasArts point n click games and action games. Both are by ex LucasArts devs.

Pity, DREAMM isn't android compatible yet.