Oh my God!! This was a thread about why Icarus didn't like Stranger and now it's a flame war about whether Abe is a good character or not and about whose idea is right and whose is wrong!! I'm sorry, but I have to laugh at this!
Cullen, I'm going to start by saying that just because people disagree with you doesn't mean that they are wrong and you are right. An opinion is an opinion, buddy, not a fact. I personally think that Abe is a more endearing and interesting character than Stranger (even though he's a very interesting and mysterious character as well), but that's just my opinion. I'm not going to get riled up if anyone disagrees with me and neither should you. In fact, I agree with used when he says that OWI has the right to experiment with new things. You can't always have the same thing all the time, otherwise it will start to become stale and over-used.
Now, with that off of my chest, I, personally, loved Stranger's Wrath because of its story and plus, I honestly feel like more people can relate to Stranger because of the fact that he felt like an outcast and tried to change himself in order to fit in. I also thought it was very challenging at times. Although I am more into the Abe games because of the puzzle-solving strategies found in them, I thought that Stranger's Wrath was nearly as good as the Abe games because of its story. I love Munch's Oddysee, but it's honestly the weakest in the Oddworld series because so many good things were cut out of it AND it was quite repetitive in some areas.