Games that Disappointed You

Having recently played Persona 5 Strikers and a couple hours in being quite disappointed by it compared to previous entries, it made me wonder. Are there or have their been any games you have played that have disappointed you that have left a mark in some way or just disappointed you in general?

The Witcher 3. The first two games took about 60 hours to complete and they were subpar. I expected it to be worth it because TW3 was the #1 game on here (not anymore, yay!) and it’s been hyped elsewhere. I got sucked into the gaming loop and combined with denial about its lack of quality + sunk-cost stuff i spent a 100 hours on it. And it’s just utterly mediocre.

The famous “bloody baron” quest was especially disappointing. It’s just a complete mess with random shit happening without any form of logic. I would call it “Nolanesque” - people confusing complexity with quality.

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My feelings on the third entry are no surprise to anyone, but I can see where you are coming from. While the story is interesting, it can seem a bit loose and drawn out, taking quite a bit to get to anything that is actually important.

I also have to say I love most of Nolan’s work but haven’t seen his recent projects in the last few years so I can’t tell if he has just gone for more style over substance or what.

Most recently, Sunset Overdrive and The Medium.

Sunset Overdrive: It’s not a bad game by any stretch, and there is quite a lot about it that is ample fun. But I have a high regard for most Insomniac games, usually thoroughly enjoying my time playing them. Sunset Overdrive fell flat in comparison because while it is mechanically fun to play, it is a very repetitive open world game that aims to be something like Saints Row III or IV without as thoughtful an execution. It also lacks a compelling enough story to justify the repetition. Thus, in comparison to most Insomniac games, it’s the first that I didn’t want to immediately replay upon completion.

The Medium: I will delve into this more when I put my final thoughts about the game down on paper. Essentially The Medium strives to mimic aspects of the Silent Hill series, but fumbles the execution in most respects. Bloober Team often shows a lack of respect for the player in their design and execution. They don’t trust the player to navigate the world effectively on their own (something Silent Hill fully expects) and implements what I consider very poor design choices to resolve problems that I don’t really exist. It leaves the player feeling like they have very little agency, which is not ideal for a video game. On the flip side The Medium does a poor job communicating certain types of information which often breaks the players immersion. I find the game disappointing in many respects as a result. Perhaps it’s my fault for having high hopes for what I thought was a Silent Hill-like.

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Dragon Age: Inquisition (VGA’s GOTY 2014, Best RPG 2014). I’ve really thought this would be a good one after the mediocre Dragon Age 2 and I really would like to complain about certain quests but the thing is I can not even name these. All I am remembering is this one quest in which I’ve found the ashes of a missing man to give it back to his grieving wife and she answers " Thank you". Quest completed. There are hundreds of these really cheap MMO-like quests which didn’ do anything for me and in combination with the boring story, crafting( why would you go outside to find something awesome in one of the thousands chests when you can craft all the weapons at home?) and the dragons ( they have different colours but it’s the same dragon over and over again) this was definitely a disappointment.

Medieval 2: Total War. It’s the best rated Total War game on Grouvee and I’ve found it really exhausting due its miserable diplomatic system. I’ve read something about an error in the vanilla version of the game after my playthrough and I wouldn’t be suprised if this is true. Everytime you do something to improve your standing the game thinks of the opposite which means that I was in war with basically everyone the whole game (first I assumed that’s normal because I was playing the french). Managed to play a sucessful campaign but this was definitely my worst Total War experience.

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I got Double Dragon Neon last year because I like River City Girls. I didn’t care for it much at first

Maybe I should try it again at some point

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Kingdom Hearts 3. I had a lot of fun with Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2, and I was looking forward to more of it but the game felt like a waste. Things I hoped to happen didn´t and it felt messy and rushed despite the long wait time.

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I haven’t played the third one and at this point who knows, but with games that hold that much hype, I feel it can go one of two ways. It looked great when I saw actual gameplay footage, but that never sold me on actually getting it. While I’ve played the original mainlines titles on PS2, I still have the PS4 collection, untouched on my shelf. It just takes so much to get back involved if that makes sense, and with the third one not being as great as we were expecting, it doesn’t make me want to delve back in.

What didn’t you like about it? I’ve played all of the Double Dragon games in the series and while it isn’t the most serious or tightly wound game control and plot wise, I found it to be fun. If you want a good game in the series, surprisingly the GBA version is awesome. Double Dragon Advance is so much fun to play. I honestly think I will replay it soon now, after talking about it.

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I couldn’t get very far yet; maybe I would just need to get used to the fighting

I also noticed that the Lindas would often land on midair when knocked down, which seemed just a little sloppy

Hype is definitly a part, some content extends my expection and so has a more positive feeling attached even if it is not nessary good, and simelar there is stuff that isnt bad but from what i expected more making my association with it negative.
I actually got into KH3 pretty much unspoiled, like the last time I saw Trailers or whatever for KH3 was years before playing it.
The game play itself is okay, by simply not doing much different from the previous parts, my disapointment with the game mostly comes from the plot and what one can do on that level (like the gameplay is not more restrictive as it appears by its inconsequentionalness of it in plot level)

The hit detection needs work for sure but that has remained the case in most of the series. I think if they pull a page from the Streets of Rage series, the game would’ve handled better and the series would fare better overall.

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It seems from what you said that the game feels like it was made over a decade ago, with how gaming has changed since then. Just my assumption of course.

The Lost Crown: Midnight Horror. I was really looking forward to a return to Saxton, and then it turned out to be a halfhearted thing they’d slapped together. No chance to use any of the fun ghosthunting stuff, no real interactions with the characters from the first game or opportunities to look around the setting, anything interesting wasn’t followed up on. If they ever release Blackenrock, maybe I’ll look back on this one more fondly, but as it is–terrible.

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Close to The Sun. Point and click adventure set in a art deco world should be right up my ally, but the game was just SO bad. Terrible controls, terrible optimisation, so dark you could hardly see anything. Just a complete failure in almost every sense.

Also, Life is Strange. I found it incredibly pretentious and dull. All the dialogue sounded like it was written by a 60 year old who watched one teen movie from the 90’s and thought they knew how the “youths” talk. Didn’t much care for the actual gameplay either.

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This so much. I tried to play it so many times, making it to the third episode, and even going so far as collecting the photos while I played, but for how great it looked visually and how much I wanted to like Max and Chloe, I just couldn’t. There was always something nagging me and it was the dialogue for sure. It was cringe-worthy and not at all how normal people talk, especially teenagers (being a former teenager myself). I think this game is over-hyped for what we got and I will probably let the last 2 episodes go unplayed due to what I experienced thus far.

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It’s always games that get hyped. I tend to play a lot of games that I already have low expectations of, figuring they’ll be medicore. The result? I tend to like them!

Doing a quick review i’ve only had a few games that i’d describe as real disappointments in recent year or so:

Aladdin on Genesis. Massive hype, but never played it. Had been exploring disney games in recent years before i tackle on Kingdom Hearts series and been enjoying capcom platformers and the Illusion series. Game just struck me as a generic action platformer from that era. (It reminded me of The Pagemaster)

SOMA It’s just not that scary and my beef with it is it’s imo not the best concept since for me to take it seriously must make a good scientific explanation for it’s case (and boy does it not) For one thing it’s very hard for me to actually get into a game and Identify with a character who isn’t a silent protagonist. It seems this game gets really good reviews and hype, but it’s just an okay game imo. I was expecting the game to be truly terrifying and be like a dark mirror mindfuck. They also really dropped the ball for a much more crazy clever ending that could have made up for some of this imo.

Going back a bit further, Fortnite. Tons of hype. Was disappointed to find out that such a popular FPS game was not for me, someone who plays and archives just about any FPS they come across.

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I would say Aladdin, is one of the better Disney property games from around this time along with The Lion King, which may be a bit difficult but nothing crazy as is often mentioned by some who play it.

I really like the art style they went with though, which captures the movies as best as they could, although like The Lion King, the difficulty ramps up and does include a scrolling level, which is almost never a fun idea in reality.

I have never played Fortnite, but thought about it a few years ago when it was new and taking over the gaming landscape it seemed. At this point, it is what it is and I will never touch it. I’m also not in the target market it seems for the audience. I’m content with letting people enjoy what they like, but can definitely see the hype for this game and how it could lead to some disappointment.

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Twilight Princess was a huge letdown for me back in the day. I remember seeing the first footage at E3 2004 and having to wait nearly three more years for it. The wolf sections were boring, the world was kind of strange, like a riff off OoT’s world, and the game was slow slow slow. Boring items, boring levels… huge disappointment.

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I agree for the most part, except that the wolf sections never really bothered me much, what did bother me though was the lack of difficulty and magic items or abilities, felt like a step back in that regard considering the previous 3D Zeldas had such items or abilities.

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