Best Random Purchase?

I like buying bundle deals of games, or whenever a game becomes super cheap I tend to try and get it. Today, The Humble Bundle had a new special from a company that I never heard of before today, even though I'm pretty sure they are the company that was behind System Shock 2. But on that bundle had 2 FMV games, 7th Guest and The 11th hour. Both games I tried playing and I had a smile on my face the whole time.

So my question, what is you're best or favorite random purchase that you made?

Vagrant Story, turns out its the best game ever made.

Dear Esther. I saw it on sale on Steam for around $7. That year it ended up being my fourth favorite game of the year.

After browsing through my purchased collection I'd say it'd be either Lumines Puzzle Fusion or FFXII. As far as free stuff that came with PS+ I'd say Awesomenauts was the best surprise.

Syphon Filter back in the olden times.

I bought Persona 4 when my brother and I finally had enough money to get a PS2 (in early 2009, no less), and only because I liked the box. I didn't have the slightest clue what I was getting into.

Probably Descent, Koudelka, Dark Reign or Independence War. Maybe the original Age of Wonders? Hard to remember exactly how random some of those purchases long ago were, but I'm pretty sure I had never heard of the first four I listed before I picked them up.

I bought Spiderman for the N64 back in 2000 on a whim, just got my paycheck for my paper route and wanted a new game. Best spiderman game and have extremely fond memories of it (don't go back and play it...its rough and super short). This is the only game I can think of where I knew nothing about it and bought it, where there are other times I've heard people, friends, GB crew talk about a game (just talk about it) and I went and bought it because it sounded like my thing. I remember on the school bus the kids talking about Ocarina of Time (which I had never heard of) and I got my sister to drive me to the local game store to buy it after school because it sounded super cool, and its a fucking fantastic game. Another example would be Darksiders where Patrick was talking about it in early 2012 and I bought it after all the praise he was giving it, never heard of it until he started talking about it.

Bought TimeShift for the 360 out of a bargain bin. Boring game by default, but it had a glitch that let you set a real high move speed and jump height which made it a ton of fun.

Probably Disgaea on the PS2. I was fairly lukewarm on FF Tactics, but for some reason or another, I gave this game a shot. I immediately spent the next week playing the game 8+ hours a day. To this day, I own the game on PS2, PSP, and DS.

The first Wargame: European Escalation.

I looked at the pictures, said what the hell, and ended up loving it. Over three games now I've put hundreds of hours into the franchise.

Probably in those zany days of 1995, in which I said to myself "Hey, this 'Rise Of The Triad' thing looks fun."

Edit: Holy shit, that Humble Bundle is fantastic! Why must I be broke this week!?

I had a lot of fun with Timeshift!

I bought SMT Nocturne on a whim.

My mother picked up Goldeneye for me and my brother on a whim. I liked Bond movies. That's probably why she did it.

She also picked up WCW/NWO Revenge, for some reason. I wasn't even into wrestling at the time.

Those both turned out to be great choices. Although Revenge did end up making me get back into wrestling, so...

Most games I've picked up for myself have been games I'd already at least heard of and/or had been recommended to me. A couple times people gave me games I hadn't heard of, but I can't remember ever playing one and getting into it.

Remember Me. All I knew about it was people liked the music, it was put out to little fanfare and recieved middling reviews, and there was some weird make-your-own-combo system. I was expecting something along the lines of Singularity. A decent enough gimmicky experience, but largely forgettable.

Ended up loving everything about it.

I remember buying Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door on a whim, back when 50% of the games I got were bad.

Vagrant Story, Silent Hill, and Lufia II were all random purchases for me, and I love all three of those games.

I bought Persona 2 only because it was part of a bundle with P3P. I had a blast with the game, it one of those rare games that makes you forgive all of its flaws because of the great things it does. That game truly has heart.

Muramasa The Demon Blade for the Vita. I needed a Vita game round last December for travel purposes, ended up being my favorite thing I played last year

I picked up Persona 3 portable back in 2010. I'd never heard of it and was just looking for a new Jrpg to play. I obsessively played that game for 3 weeks straight.

The first need for speed underground back when it came out.

I bought Suikoden II because I heard vaguely good things about it on the internet and saw a magazine ad or two. Didn't expect much, but it turned out to be one of my favorite RPGs ever.

I grabbed Trapt out of a bargain bin to tide me over an especially boring weekend, it turned out pretty good and weird.

Zoomer the robot dog... even though he stopped working after about a month :(

Breath of Fire 3 when I was like 9.

My dad let me pick out a game to buy one time when I was 9. Ended up being both the best and worst random purchase. It was a double pack containing Lemmings 3D (worst piece of shit ever) and Kula World which is the best puzzle/platformer on the Playstation and possibly of all time.

I remember buying Gain Ground on Megadrive from a bargain bin many, many years ago and loving it as a coop game to play with friends.

Jet Set Radio. I bought it from an import shop in Paris a few day after its Japanese release. At the time I just thought the jacket was cool. It just became one of my favorite games and it still is even if I prefer Jet Set Radio Future now because no time constraint during the missions.

Once bought toilet paper at the market unsure if i needed it or not. Probably the best random purchase I made that day cause I was down to half a role after a big quesadilla meal.

I was in no way a gamer, just a dumb kid who liked games. Me and my mum went to a store for the first (and only) time to buy a game and I saw one with a cool cover.

It was Starcraft.

I was happy with my choice.

@theht Really? Remember Me? Myself and two friends had the EXACT same experience: we played a little over two hours are felt totally disinterested, never to play more. I'm glad you enjoyed it though.

I bought Psychonauts from a bargain bin in EB Games without knowing anything about it at all. Turns out it's fantastic.

Lords of shadow - Caught my attention due to it's cool box art, then when I checked out the contents of the box itself, it intrigued me even more. It ended up being one of my favorite games.

Prototype- Thought it was a zombie game, and it kinda was, only better.

oh and ,Mafia II

I'll say buying Bound by flame was good for me.

Digital Devil Saga 2. I bought it because the boxart looked rad and I was into JRPGs. Because of that one game, I ended up buying the first one, and then Nocturne. And then I started preordering the rest of the SMT games that will come later. Glad that I accidentally stumbled upon DDS2.

Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines. Had no interest in vampires or rpgs, I just wanted to play a source engine game, and that was not only the cheapest (10 euros), but pretty much the only option back then as my internet was way to slow to use steam and play css or hl2. It is still to this day one of my all time favorite games and the first rpg I played to completion.

Bioshock. I purchased it at a local game store for 35 dollars and it had only come out a few weeks or only maybe a month before that. I wasn't into following game news at the same time, so I really didn't know all that much about it. I think at that point in my life I was playing City of Heroes, Dynasty Warriors, and retro remakes on my GBA. I was a lapsed game enthusiast really. Well, my husband and I pick the game up off the shelf, he had heard good things about it, so we decide to buy it. Best 35 dollars I have spent in a long time. I actually think it may have gotten me back into games and following game news.

Demon's Souls. I knew very little about it besides it being a dark fantasy game and that had a very punishing difficulty. I imported the damn thing from the US for £52, which is very unlike me... It's almost as if the game was calling to me or something. Anywhoo, it's Demon's Souls, so... undoubtedly the best uninformed video game purchase of my life.

God of War 1.

It came bundled with the PS2 when I bought it, and I knew nothing about the game. It ended up being my favorite series of that generation...

In this day and age, I find it way harder to stumble across hidden gems like in the days of yore. Walking into a store, looking at some blurry screenshots and a blurb on the back of a box? Or even worse, just buying a game based on cool cover art? Not gonna happen if you value your money.

With that said, I'd agree with the other posters in the thread about stuff being included in indie bundles being the closest to this long lost phenomenon. I think I only ended up buying/playing Bastion once it had been included in a Humble Bundle, and that game is rad. Once you remove the barriers of cost/risk, stumbling across stuff is way easier. It's why I was able to rent Alpha Protocol from Goozex back when that was a thing, and I ended up REALLY digging Alpha Protocol.

I can think of way more random games I've bought that ended up being terrible.

Ghooooost Maaaaster!!

*edit: Actually, I have a much better example of "randomly chosen game that turned out to be awesome". When I first got my SNES, I foolishly bought a game that required a Super Scope (which I didn't have). My Dad took me back to Best Buy to return/exchange it, and my decision ended up being "Hmm... what to get, what to get... This 'Super Metroid' game looks like it could be fun, I'll give that a shot!"

Last one for me was Hard Reset/Speedrunners, bought both together after eyeing them for a while, love the feeling of both, especially Hard Reset's Theme, oldest one iirc was Total Annihilation back when I was a wee lad, I still hum The March Unto Death to this day randomly...

That first fire emblem game for GBA was a pretty random, uninformed purchase for a young me. And now I've gone as far as to play the japan-only stuff.

To get more recent, I bought blackguards on a whim and it seems pretty awesome thus far.

Final Fantasy X without a doubt. Had no idea what the game was, I only vaguely remembered a TV commercial and that it was exclusive for PS2. I just got my PS2 and already owned a GameCube. Figured I needed some exclusives. To this day, one of my favorite games.

Gotcha Force hands down. Such a great game that almost no one played. The music is amazing as well.

Yup, I liked Timeshift way more than Singularity, which was pretty damn similar. I still think Timeshift had some of the best looking rain of the last generation.

AC IV. I picked as a afterthought. It was the best next gen release day game by far.

Shenmue 2 for the Xbox and Total Annihilation for PC.

Damn good games, Delicious.

My man! I got that in a misc game bundle way back in the day without knowing about it either and then lost just daaaays to that game, it was so good.

I also picked up Carnivores Dinosaur Hunter 1 and 2 back when I was a kid, it was a game with dinosaurs and guns and I was like 13 or something so I saw the box and went "YES" and man those were some fun games. I'm not much into hunting games but that was was such a 'hunt or be hunted' type of experience, have to nail the t-rex in the eyeball to kill it in those games, it was crazy, I loved them.