Ever happened to you?

You judged the game for a teaser trailer or some gameplay and thought it wasn't that great but decided to play it (them) anyways and then it(they) kicked your ass for how much you enjoyed it(them)?

What games were those?

How much did that(those) games surprised you?

A good OP goes first.

OT: It took me the longest time to get into the Souls series. The excessive rolling, oversized weapons, canned backstabs, magic, bare narrative, overblown difficulty, etc all turned me off for quite a while, but once I was able to get past that and take the games on their own merits I've really gotten into them.

The Last of Us

Uncharted :)

First Splinter Cell game, found it quite boring at first but then really got into the look and feel of the game. 

Uncharted 2. Hated the first and the 2nd was a bit slow in the begining.

DMC

After having played Wolf3d and a bit of Doom and Quake I had seen it all from fps's for years.

Picked up Far Cry 3 just because i could and i actually enjoyed it a lot.

That said, I tried some KZ, Battlefield and Cod and I still loathe fps. Nothing changed.

Euro Truck Simulator 2.

Uncharted series, WRC series, Tomb Raider (the reboot), for instance. With the latter, I still don't really like that they've made Tomb Raider a pure action title with some climbing rather than an exploration series with puzzles and platform elements, but it's a damn good action game in and on itself!
Uncharted was a pleasant surprise, especially the second one, since I was disappointed by every single IP that made it over to the PS3 by then (and afterwards), this new IP blew my mind, and in a genre that I don't generally like at that.
The WRC games became really good after a couple of installments, the first one was hopeless, the cars feel like driving a soaped cardboard box with air-brakes across a mirror surface strewn with various sprinkles, but especially the third one got the physics alright and the game itself grew a lot in scope, there really aren't many good rally games since the heyday of the Colin Mcrae series.

Phoenix Wright. Looked boring at first, but after playing the first two games, I have to admit that the series is exciting and packed with entertainment.


Also, Mutant Mudds was a game I was skeptical about. It's a platform indie game, and I wasn't sure if it would be as good as my friend said it was. After downloading the game on my 3ds(and finishing the first twenty levels), have to admit that it's one of the best indie games. It even has 20+ bonus levels as free DLC. Can't go wrong with that