Best and Worst Demos

Was curious if you guys had any demos that stand out in your mind (ones you actually played via download or demo disc, not ones you saw during an E3 conference). Here are some topics to cover:

Demos that sold you on a game you weren't going to get otherwise.

Demos that made you change your mind about a game you were planning to get.

Demos that were just awesome because they were filled with content or just really good.

Demos that were bad because they were perhaps a bad representation of the game... or maybe they just stunk and you hated them.

Discuss!

Here is a few from me.

The first skate demo and the THPS2 demo stand out as a couple I spent crazy amounts of time with. I was sick of the TH level by the time the game came out. The skate demo was a revelation.

I thought the Darksiders demo was pretty cool. It's basically a whole dungeon. After playing it though, I felt I had my fill of Darksiders oddly enough. I did end up playing the game, but that was probably not the feeling they wanted the demo to give me initially.

The Lunar: Silver Star Story demo for PS1 that let you play through the White Dragon's Cave and whose save info was transferrable to the final game. Given for preordering Lunar.

Dragon Quest VIII demo. Good gameplay, but the final product was even better.

Conversely, the FFXII demo that came with Dragon Quest VIII. Kind of a bad demo of a game that turned out to be fantastic.

The Xenogears demo that came with Parasite Eve convinced me to get Xenogears.

The Metal Gear Rising demo made me buy the game because it gave me a feeling close to DMC3 once I got the parry system down mostly because of how great the boss fight was. Unfortunately the game was fairly big let down.

The Dark Cloud demo back on the PS2 was the bees knees. Was like half an hour of gameplay going through dungeons and upgrading your town. I did end up buying that game and playing the hell out of it as a kid too, I've still got the copy around here somewhere.

The Spec Ops: The Line demo is absymal. It was really silly of them to put it out seeing as it's a game you need to play right from the start to the finish to have any real idea of what it's actually about. The opening, which is where the demo takes place, comes across as absolute fucking shit without the right context. I remember going into college the day after playing the demo and laughing at how awful it was, little did I know just how ignorant I was at the time.

Demos that sold you on a game you weren't going to get otherwise.
The first one that comes to mind is Catherine. It just didn't appeal to me until I played the demo and realized the puzzles were a ton of fun and the story was pretty unique.

And then there's Skate. I never thought a skateboarding game could go for realism and still be fun. It's hard to go back to anything else after Skate

Demos that made you change your mind about a game you were planning to get.
I guess it's not really a demo, but I'd have to say the Playstation All-Stars beta

Demos that were just awesome because they were filled with content or just really good.
Deus Ex was awesome. There's practically a whole game's worth of content on that thing. I also played the hell out of the Star Wars Battlefront back in the day. It's just a fun game that lent itself well to a demo

And then there's The Stanley Parable demo. Best demo ever. It tells you everything you need to know about the game without spoiling any of it's secrets, and it has more emotions than an entire David Cage game.

MGS2 is the clear champion for best and worst. I put more hours into that than most games I've played. The full game was great, but that demo was so awesome. I'm convinced Kojima is on opiates. Oh, and I name it worst because of the full game. What a cock-tease.

Another great demo is everything that came with the launch PSone demo disc. If I remember correctly it had Wipeout, Jumping Flash, Ridge Racer, Destruction Derby and others. Whatever it had changed my gaming life.

I also clocked countless hours into the MGS2 demo. I rented ZOE just so I could play the demo. I don't think I even plazyed ZOE 1 I got so engrossed.

I mean, nothing was altered or changed it's just...remember when games used to just...start without holding your hand? MGS2 mothafuckas!

Rayman Origins was a game that absolutely sold me on the demo. I always loved the artstyle but they crafted such an awesome selection of levels for the demo. There was tons of content, it gave you a wide array of levels and it unlocked all of Rayman's abilities from the get go.

Agree with Kay though, games that have long or slow opening sections should NEVER demo those sections. And I too was sold on the Catherine demo.

I'm sure I've PLAYED many bad demos but none in particular stick out for me. I've probably already expunged them from my mind.

I don't really like playing demos too much. When I get the actual game, that part of the demo that I played really bores me and is a chore to get through. When I download a demo I typically play it for a few minutes and then find myself bored and delete it. It's hard for me to do knowing that it is such a waste of time.

Favorites would be MGS2, because I had been waiting so long for that game. It was great.

Worst would be the Brave Fencer Musashi game made for PS2. I saw bad reviews for it, and all I needed to do was play that crappy demo for 5 minutes to know it was nothing like the great game before it. What a shame, probably ruined any chance of a sequel.

Bret makes a good point, I feel the same thing when I play a demo section of a game a lot (because i like it). When I get to that bit in game I'm like "right, gonna BREEZE through this."

WHICH REMINDS ME: FEAR had a wonderful demo because they took different parts of different levels and pasted them together so I can't have that complaint about it. It was action packed, really fun, featured a couple of scares but wasn't just a section of the game persay. A really well done demo.

Editorial Comment: Every FEAR game after the first was shit.