Its actually quite easy to pick up, People that say its hard just suck at gaming :P

I have to say Mario is. I know I'll get shit for saying this, but let me clarify. I think every 3D mario has been OUTSTANDING. They have all been pretty darn innovative and haven't been released too often. When I say overrated I mean they shouldn't be 10/10s, at least not all of them. Mario 64 and argument could be made for it being one of the highest rated games of all time because of the MASSIVE transition to 3d. That was ground-breaking for platformers. Mario Sunshine and Galaxy however have added neat little nuances that kept things fresh, but have not been super magical for me, a person who didn't grow up with Mario. I think these reviewers today HAVE grown up with Mario and therefore have a certain nostalgia factor that inflates the scores. The longer a franchise has been around the more beloved they become and Mario is in a unique position of not having made a BAD game across 5 generations of main installments. Galaxy 1&2 and Sunshine deserve around 90 metas at most, but because of nostalgia by reviewers are inflated a couple extra points in most cases. When a reviewers says things like "It will frequently hug your inner child, evoke tears of joy and tug at the heart." it reaffirms this belief.
Again these are fantastic games and I LOVE platformers and this series (obviously) but taking the word in its most literal definition, I believe these games are OVERRATED which =/= bad or mediocre.

battlefield 3 (good multiplayer but no as good as past battlefield's and has one of the worst campaign's in any shooter i have played)
minecraft (i loved it at first but now i get very bored when i play it)
skyrim (good not but nowhere near GOTY)
half life 2 (great game but nowhere near the masterpiece everyone says it is)
the entire moba genre (just can't get into them)
every EA sports game (these are the best examples of copy paste games)
uncharted 2 (too scripted)
the entire god of war series (just not my type of game)
tetris (seriously people actually call this distraction one of the best games ever made)
angrybirds (does not deserve to have all of those none gaming products)
every crapcom fighting game (same problem with the moba genre and the rehash's turn me off alone)
games like forza and grand turismo (fun but kart racing is more my thing like mario kart or modnation)
halo 4 (while halo 4 is a good game and i am a fan of the franchise but it has no reason to exist other then for M$ to make money)

sorry double post 

8 years later Half Life 2 has not been surpassed yet.

And that is your opinion.  It use to be a big argument on what was better, Halo or Halflife.  They are both great but Valve fans make Half-life out to be the most amazing thing to ever grace video games. I probably shouldn't say it is over-rated because yes it is good but not as good as fans make it out to be.  You could probably say the same thing about some halo fans too.

this is as far as i read. i will not dignify something this absurd with a response

Nope, just more fun games to be spending my time on  

you are very wrong to insist. that was the beauty of these games. you could get into them within 5 minutes but spend a life time trying to master them

Zelda OoT, GTA IV, Half-Life, Oblivion (never played Skyrim)... too many. The worst examples I can think of are SotC (I'm very sorry but I was bored, and I gave the game a second chance recently) and InFamous (boring, ugly, repetitive to me). Never played CoD or any XB exclusive so I can't comment on those.