At the moment we’re running our end-of-year awards voting for the best games of the year (be sure to vote if you haven’t yet!)
But let’s also talk about those games that you were so keen on, but disappointed. Games that on paper or in videos sounded like the best thing ever, and then underdelivered.
They don’t even need to be bad games – it can be possible to be disappointed by a good game that just wasn’t great.
So, get to discussing!
This one is easy for me: Kingdoms of Amalur. The game had one of my favourite fantasy authors, the creator of Morrowind and one of my favourite comic artists working on it, and it still managed to only be good. Not mind-blowing (like I expected that combo to deliver), just good.
Skyward Sword. I was disappointed because I expected it to be a game, instead of a 40 hour long cutscene that yelled at me all the time.
Haha, I wasn't a huge fan of Skyward Sword either. Not so much for the cut scenes, but I found the motion controls greatly irritating. A button press would have worked just as well.
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time? The ending was terrible, IMO…in that I felt it was a ripoff of Star Wars Episode 6…
Mario Tennis Open. I think you and I have the same opinion Matt :p
Ninja Gaiden 3 and Driver 3 are about tied for my biggest disappointments.
I agree about the controls. Ruined the game for me :/
Xenoblade Chronicles. Was hyped by everyone as the bestest JRPG ever, so I had to pick it up. Too bad it sucked. I'll take any RPG I own on my PS3 over that, thanks.
Also MGS4. Series should've ended after MGS3 instead of trying to wrap the story all up. The only thing good about the game is the gameplay, which is the smallest factor of MGS games 😛
Don't ask me to elaborate on these opinions because I won't do it! /too lazy
Yeah I'll agree with that, terrible decision.
Too many fighting games to count have let down over the years (Weaponlord is one that really sticks in my mind for some reason). God of War too. i know there are a ton of GoW fans, but it never clicked with me.
I didn't like the first one and tried (really) to like the second after all the positive reviews. I just couldn't get into it.
_Barbarian_ for Amiga.
Speaking of fighting games, Dead or Alive 5 was a bit of a disappointment for me. It's by far my most played fighting game this gen (my wife loves it too), and I do believe it's a great game, but on a purely aesthetic level, I'm not sure the decision to make the characters look more human is a good one.
Part of the quirky charm of DoA games was always how over-the-top sexy it was, and it was fun because the characters looked like porcelin dolls. It was funny and charming. Turning those dolls into humans gives the game a serious note that I'm not such a fan of.
Especially since the bikini costumes means it's still over the top sexy. To the point where it's almost creepy.
I'm glad someone else agrees with me with Xenoblade. That game was good, but nothing that we haven't seen done better on the HD consoles.
The Last Story was also a disappointment, but that's because that game is legitimately bad.
Pandora's Tower, however, is ace. Pity the Americans missed that one 🙁
Holy crap yes. "Hey let's make a minigame of a single player game so people focus on the multiplayer, and then make the multiplayer a minigame too! $70!"
The online for that game is already dead. That game has no value as a result.
Seriously? :O That's my favourite Zelda game! 🙁
Absolutely. At times it felt like I was playing an interminable WarioWare thing. Every few seconds I had to change the way I was holding the controller and figure out what totally unnecessary thing it wanted me to do next. Nothing breaks immersion like a series of unintelligible prompts.
Oh that is awesome! For the longest time I've been saying that Skyward Sword at times felt like a minigame compilation masquading as a Zelda title, and of course that opinion got shot down on a certain fansite.
Glad to see someone else had a similar experience 😀
Chalk up another sad face for Skyward Sword. While I actually stuck around to collect all the hearts and finish most sidequests, I think that was mostly the obligatory Zelda hype. Looking back, I had issues with the controls and the supposedly expansive world was even more barren than Wind Waker. Hooray for flying around with awkward controls to reach a near-empty island and grab a chest containing an item of probably little consequence. Having to visit each area multiple times seemed to really drag things out as well.
That's another good point – what is up with Nintendo and a complete lack of understanding about what an open-world should look like? It's like every developer on the Ocarina of Time team has left the company.
Perhaps Nintendo could poach a couple of Monolith employees to bring their Xenoblade expertise to the next Zelda game?
Ever? Probably Robocop for the NES just because I was really excited by it and it stunk. 😛 This year? Probably Game of Thrones, which had an excellent story but was a very poor game.
Don't rub it in, I still want that game so much D: