What is an unpopular game/series you enjoy anyway?
Mine is the Army Men series. Objectively mediocre games at best but the concept of toy soldiers fighting over our yards and rooms has always been cool to me
The most unpopular/niche game series I've really liked is the Princess Maker series. Japanese games which only received official English translations recently, niche genre (life raising sim), some silly fanservicey elements... but it reminded me of playing with dolls when I was younger, and in some ways the Sims series also.
Another series I liked which is much more well known but still has a small presence in the gaming consciousness is Star Fox. Character cameos in the Super Smash Bros series don't count.
I'm with you on Starfox! I think there's a lot of missed potential to try new things with that style of game. So much so that I've been working on a game in my spare time with similar mechanics and action, but with a greater focus on giving players different ways to approach combat.
I heard retro studios was working on their own take on Starfox. Hopefully they'll revive that after Metroid Prime.
Daaaaaamn, I found a copy of Princess Maker 2 on the internet all the way back in 2002 or so, only years later I found out about the original translation and failed attempt to release it in the USA. I personally love PM2 and should play 3 sometime properly.
The Princess Maker series are now officially available on Steam! Unfortunately the translation quality is quite poor and the unofficial DOS copy of 2 is much better in that regard, but it's nice to have access to multiple entries in the series now.