What games that were bad that you saw potential in?

[Ghost1800]

Brute Force

A squad based cooperative shooter where each player takes on a character with unique abilities. How you use those abilities to accomplish your mission is left up to you. Of course, it turned into a linear experience with seemingly endless weak drones and souped up bosses at the end of the level but the original idea was pretty nice.

 

[Kasawd]

I still love the game but Dungeons Lords was a pile of wasted potential.

It was desigend with reasonably complex, varied classes set against a gigantic world suffering from the oldest archetypes available for fantasy. The game itself however can and has been compared to a barrel of monkey puke.

 

[Ranorak]

Like I have been so lovely ninja's for;
Brutal Legend.

The game had potential if they sticked to the adventure-ish gameplay.

 

[Quiet Stranger]

The latest Golden Axe game, had so much potential but it was shit, no multiplayer CO-OP, only single player

 

[hansari]

Assassins Creed 1

Talk about shocking the player the moment the game starts. You think your playing medieval crusades but it turns out to be sci-fi that isn't too hard to believe. Such potential...

 

[Xeros]

GoldenEye: Rogue Agent. Now it wasn't that bad, but they definitely went about it the wrong way. The idea of a game where you play a Bond villain is just awesome, but they made him a... psychic? No, no no, I want the badass evil gadgets, not this telekinetic nonsense.

 

[Soxafloppin]

Superman Returns, I really want a fun superman game. The potential is unlimited. But They never make him playable in a game thats fun.

 

[Deadlock Radium]

Alone in the Dark has some good ideas. The control scheme for weapons was actually pretty good and the fire physics were awesome. It's they were all executed in the most horrible fashion.

I agree, Alone in the Dark had big potential, but there's so much horrible things in it. Some of it is summed up in the Alone in the Dark Unskippable [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/unskippable/758-Alone-in-the-Dark].

 

[Marter]

Many didn't like Mirror's Edge, but I thought it was great and had a really good potential to be great.

 

[oktalist]

Spore! Hyped up to the heavens and turned out to be a turd.

Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl. My second favourite game of all time; would've been first favourite if it had a better storyline. The bugs that remain after installing the patch are more than made up for by the gameplay and atmosphere (helps if you've read the book and/or film on which it was based beforehand).

Metro 2033, for a similar reason.

 

[Aerowaves]

The Force Unleashed. So much potential destroyed by a shitty plot, shoddy and uninventive gameplay, cruddy visuals, a retarded camera and the unmistakeable general whiff of Lucas about it. Also the lack of a duel mode on the 360.

 

[beefpelican]

Far Cry 2 would've been much better if you could move around the map quicker and the stealth aspect actually worked. Removing the glitches would've been nice too.

Agreed. Also, if reputation and "buddy history" had any effect on the game. Also, if I could use the hang glider for more than ten seconds without being shot out of the sky. I remember finding a hang glider, going all the way down the mountain it was on to shoot all the enemies below, and then climbing back up just so i could finally try flying one. It was worth it.

 

[philzibit]

Turning Point, a great idea that was poorly executed.

 

[The Fork of Truth]

I would say Evil Genius has the most wasted potential of any game I've played. Maybe if it had let you do things, it would have been good.

 

[Anticitizen_Two]

Left 4 Dead 2, Crysis, Far Cry 2

 

[Flying-Emu]

Left 4 Dead 2, Crysis, Far Cry 2

Why do you list L4D2, and not L4D1, when they're the exact same game?

 

[P.Tsunami]

There's also Mirror's Edge. It wasn't exactly bad, but it was kind of frustrating to see a game that could've been made awesome so easily end out so average. One way to make it better would've been a more open world. Mirror's Edge is a lot better once you know your way around and an open world would have made that very easy. Another way is to actually let you outside. For a parkour game I spent a hell of a lot of time indoors. One final way would be to make multiple ways to get to your target. It would remove some of the puzzle aspect, but would allow the game to flow much better.

These few changes would have made both games brilliant. The potential was there but the developers never fully used it.

This. Mirror's Edge wasn't terrible, but it's bad relative to the fact that it was so close to being a great game, but turned out mediocre. I'd be interested in seeing where a sequel goes, and I'll definitely buy it. The game disappointed me at times, but it was a very creative, interesting effort, and it's one of the less forgettable titles I've played lately.

 

[GonzoGamer]

There was TONS of potential for Brutal Legend, but all that RTS bullshit fucked it up.

I actually likes the RTS aspect of Brutal Legend, they just needed to tighten up the game world too so it could still be played as a regular sandbox game: RTS is a bit niche and mostly on the PC.

I have two picks: one is the new Bionic Commando, which should've just been more like Just Cause 2.

My main pick for this is No More Heroes. Everyone said this game was amazing and when I popped it in my wii, I thought that perhaps I was sold a beta test copy that accidentally got burned and packaged. Everything in that game just needed some more effort put into it. It could've been a great game if the minigames didn't revolve around pumping gas and collecting litter, if the sandbox was more interesting than my cat's, or if the action was featured a bit better.
As it was, it looked like the makers of the Yakuza games took acid and never came out of the trip... actually no, that game would've been interesting.

 

[Ddgafd]

The newer Crash Bandicoot games(after CTTR). The level design was fantastic IMO, but the gameplay was awful as hell, and the story was pretty meh as well.

 

[Lolth17]

Silent Hill: Homecoming.

I thought the controls/visuals were pretty nice, for the SH series, at least. The Schism monster was very cool. Now if they could just write a decent story around it that wasn't just a copy-and-paste plagerism of Silent Hill 2 with the names and person-who-is-really-dead-but-you-don't-know-it-yet's' gender changed.