What Game Had the Most Wasted Potential

[bug_of_war]

Spore

Finally, an EA game that is probably the epitome of wasted potential has been put on this board!

Look, to each their own, but Mass Effect series was generally well received up until the last 10 minutes, after that people started to nit pick. As for DA2, yeah it could have been more, but in the long run it DIDN'T have a long run, it was cut short for development and what you got was a very rushed game, I think the game was damn good considering they had about a year to work on it.

Spore on the other hand...SO much development time, so many trailers and game play footage showing sea creature stage and the ability to keep your creatures as an aquatic species. Man, if ever there were a game that had so much potential that was never realised, it's Spore.

My own choice now: PAYDAY 2

PAYDAY: The Heist was such a good game. Large unique maps, scenarios never being quite the same, 3 weapon slots, extreme customization for load outs, leveling system giving you upgrades/weapons/abilities all the way up to level 145 (193 if you had the DLC).

And instead of continuing with that, Overkill decided to make a very bland sequel. The ideas were good, the execution was horrible, none of the new maps are any bigger than The Heist's smallest map, many maps are re-used, the supposed 30 missions was (and this is including the escape phases and multiple day missions) actually 20, on release the game was missing features that were given no time frame as to when they may appear, the leveling and money system are just completely fucked, the gun limit is set at 2, the armour slows you down so much that you end up taking just as much damage as if you were not wearing it.

That game, to me, is the most recent example of a game that had so much potential.

 

[Imre Csete]

I've expected Sleeping Dogs to have branching plotlines. I would have gladly given up on the silly "girlfriend" miniquests for that. Also it needed more Infernal Affairs and less The Killer at the end, but that's just me.

 

[TheRiddler]

Remember Remember Me (heh.)? I thought the memory control thing could have been really cool if it was an actual gameplay mechanic intead of just a story-based interactive cutscene. Yahtzee had an Extra Punctuation on his ideas once.

 

[Zetatrain]

Halo 4.

Here, 343 had a wonderful opportunity to tell a narrative about once enemies banding their forces (which still should've been hurting from the war) to fight off a common foe.
Instead, the Covenant turn bad again for some bullshit contrived reason just so the player could shoot some more grunts.
In a nice twist, though, the humans are the ones who release the super baddie instead of the elites once again blundering into it.

Well the Didact only has a hate boner for humanity so not exactly a common enemy there. Also they already did that kind of story in halo 3.

Technically, the Covenant no longer exists. The enemies you encounter in Halo 4 are a combination of former members that either still cling to their religion or are paid, and a colony of Elites that has been out of touch with current events for a few decades. The colony had sent a few warriors to fight for the Covenant when the Human-Covenant war broke out, but due to their isolation they aren't aware of things like the Covenant civil war and the Prophets' betrayal from halo 2.

Its also been over 4 years since halo 3 which is plenty of time for them to put together the fleet you see in Halo 4, which despite its size is nothing compared to the fleet the Covenant had before the end of the Human-Covenant war.

Not excusing the video game for not trying to convey some of this information (explained in novels before the release of halo 4), but just letting you know there is an explanation for the "Covenant" forces you fight in Halo 4.

 

[Drizzitdude]

Fable 2 onwards. Fable and the lost chapters were great games that easily could have been expanded on, but damn molyneux decided that instead of working off the great combat from the previous game and building upon it further that they should scrap it completely, make it 100x worse and focus on adding emotes so you could entertain...the NPC's? Everything I liked about fable 1 was gone in the sequel and it was almost heart wrenching to watch a company that made such a great rpg get so caught up in redundant things like npc interation and making your dog do some tricks that they forgot what made their previous game good.

 

[Hafnium]

Spore...
Man I was disappoint. Here I thought we could have some interesting evolution going on, but it ended up watered-down, creationist-friendly, bodypart-finding simulator (talking about a certain phase, never bothered to get to space phase).

Edit: Happy to see two others mentioning it.

 

[Idsertian]

Wait, really? Nobody? Ok, I'm gonna get jumped on for this I reckon, but here we go.

Syndicate.

Whoa whoa whoa! Hold up before you all bludgeon me to death with whatever comes to hand, I'm serious.

The game has an upgrade system similar to games that passed before it, such as the original Deus Ex. The ability to hack certain objects in the environment to assist you, as well as hacking enemies themselves, was a genius move and makes the otherwise run-of-the-mill combat quite interesting. Slap an execution mechanic in there, and it would be perfect.
But the short length, 7 hours if you're really dragging your heels, utterly hampered that game. Without the space to really explore its abilities, the hacking and upgrading are little more than gimmicks. The plot was ok, but with more time, it could have been amazing and the script itself wasn't even that bad.
Yes, it fell victim to EA. Yes, it wasn't anything like the original games, but that didn't necessarily have to be a bad thing. It could have been a great shooter, it could have been a rival even to Deus Ex, but sadly, it wasn't to be.

There was potential there, and it was wasted.

Ok, I'm done. Flame-shield, engage!

 

[Cerebrawl]

Fallout 3. Oblivion. Skyrim. Most things coming out of Bethesda really. Thank goodness for modders.

But my real answer is Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, it suffered greatly from time pressure and the second half of the game is a rushed linear mess, it could've been so much more. That people still play it and remember it fondly is mostly because the first half is so spectacularly good. I daresay if they'd had the leisure to do it right it would've been one for the ages, remembered as a storytelling rival of Torment, a contender for best RPG of all time. The real cincher is that the potential wasn't wasted for lack of talent, and direction like for example Fable, just finances and time pressure.

 

[Mikejames]

Rule of Rose actually had some really intelligent (albeit disturbing) mindsets behind it in my opinion. It's like Lord of the Flies taking place on a British air ship; going through a mix of nightmares and childish escapism.

But the terrible combat system really bogs it down. If they dropped it for more of a focus on puzzle solving and exploring the narrative it could have accomplished more of what it set out to do.

Silent Hill 4: The Room. That game is great in my opinion, really great. However I think if they changed a few of the lines it would be even better.

The Room actually has one of my favorite premises of the series, but the execution can be all over the place. If they gave the protagonist a personality, cut out the level recycling, and toned down the incessantness of the ghosts, then I think it'd have more of a chance to shine.

 

[Padwolf]

Silent Hill 4: The Room. That game is great in my opinion, really great. However I think if they changed a few of the lines it would be even better.

The Room actually has one of my favorite premises of the series, but the execution can be all over the place. If they gave the protagonist a personality, cut out the level recycling, and toned down the incessantness of the ghosts, then I think it'd have more of a chance to shine.

Hehe and if they cut out Henry asking "Hey, are you ok?" then it would have been a bit better! It's still one of my favourites too. I'm currently playing them all through again, can't wait to get to 4!

 

[SoranMBane]

Wait, really? Nobody? Ok, I'm gonna get jumped on for this I reckon, but here we go.

Syndicate.

Whoa whoa whoa! Hold up before you all bludgeon me to death with whatever comes to hand, I'm serious.

The game has an upgrade system similar to games that passed before it, such as the original Deus Ex. The ability to hack certain objects in the environment to assist you, as well as hacking enemies themselves, was a genius move and makes the otherwise run-of-the-mill combat quite interesting. Slap an execution mechanic in there, and it would be perfect.
But the short length, 7 hours if you're really dragging your heels, utterly hampered that game. Without the space to really explore its abilities, the hacking and upgrading are little more than gimmicks. The plot was ok, but with more time, it could have been amazing and the script itself wasn't even that bad.
Yes, it fell victim to EA. Yes, it wasn't anything like the original games, but that didn't necessarily have to be a bad thing. It could have been a great shooter, it could have been a rival even to Deus Ex, but sadly, it wasn't to be.

There was potential there, and it was wasted.

Ok, I'm done. Flame-shield, engage!

No need for the flame shield with me; I agree wholeheartedly, if for slightly different reasons.

The script for this game was written by one Richard K. Morgan, who happens to be one of my personal favourite authors. A cyberpunk action RPG written by that man should have been one of the best things that ever happened, but instead it just ended up being an unfun, tedious, gimmicky slog of a generic modern FPS with some above-average dialog.

Mr. Morgan was also the guy they got to write Crysis 2, which is a game that I actually genuinely liked, but which still severely undersells this writer's talent. I'd really like to see what would happen if he wrote for a game that wasn't published be EA.

 

[Mikeyfell]

There's no contest. It's Mass Effect 3.
the first two games laid a groundwork for epic storytelling with player driven continuity hitherto unheard of in all of gaming.

What did we get? Generic structureless plot-hole-ridden garbage (With a shitty control system and broken AI)

Other games have fucked up or dropped the ball, but no game has squandered as much potential

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Arkham Origins could've been so much better than just a retread of Arkham City...

Rule of Rose actually had some really intelligent (albeit disturbing) mindsets behind it in my opinion. It's like Lord of the Flies taking place on a British air ship; going through a mix of nightmares and childish escapism.

But the terrible combat system really bogs it down. If they dropped it for more of a focus on puzzle solving and exploring the narrative it could have accomplished more of what it set out to do.

God I hate that game.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Mass Effect 3, hands down. Not only squandered the potential to become a gaming phenomenon that no series would match for quite a while (which they could easily have done by having branching unique endings that took all choices into account, even without bothering to have different experiences throughout (which would be the cherry on the cake)), but squandered inherited expectations from 2 other games. And any fucking idiot following the games could have told Bioware what they wanted in the third, and Bioware knew exactly what was wanted in the third, and they didn't do it. We got an ethereal little shit and fireworks instead.

 

[TheSYLOH]

Metro 2033
In my opinion that game was like a Modern Warfare game minus the triple-A polish.
Mechanics and ideas show up, are tutorialized and then disappear without another thought.

For example, take the living shadows. It demonstrates the supernatural nature of the setting, is atmospheric as hell and could have been worked into game play. Instead it insta kills you a couple of times and disappears forever.
The entire game is more or less something like this. Awesome idea no pay off.

This game just begs for a stalker style open world play style, that is sadly waaay out of budget for the developers.
I don't grudge them for their reach exceeding their grasp, but still its disappointing.

 

[Mikeyfell]

Halo 4.

Here, 343 had a wonderful opportunity to tell a narrative about once enemies banding their forces (which still should've been hurting from the war) to fight off a common foe.
Instead, the Covenant turn bad again for some bullshit contrived reason just so the player could shoot some more grunts.
In a nice twist, though, the humans are the ones who release the super baddie instead of the elites once again blundering into it.

Your problem with Halo 4 was the narrative?
4 was the first Halo game that had a well written story. It was also the first one that wasn't fun to play, but that's hardly 343's fault, it's hard to live up to Bungie quality.
To have a problem with Halo 4's writing, out of ALL the Halo games is weird. (no offense}

 

[Sarge034]

Dead Island, Brink, and Rage. Rage felt like 1/3 of a game, Brink was... Brink, and Dead Island needed a bit of polish. If I had to pick one I would have to go with Dead Island. I am still waiting for an open world console zombie game that has RPG elements, co-op, a good story, is in first person, and has fluid controls.

 

[Seracen]

Gonna go with Alpha Protocol on this one. One of Obsidian's first original IP's in years, and an espionage RPG.

Sad this is, I still like the game, for all it's faults, simply b/c I can SEE the missed potential. What was further salt on the wound was how shoddy the game was even after an additional 6 months of dev time.

Had they actually worked out more kinks in the story, and focused on a working gameplay experience, it could have been a great franchise. As it stands, we will never see something like it again, most likely.

Still, I don't know what I was expecting. As amazing as Obsidian is, they have a track record with buggy releases (though this was a worse offender than most).