Your most disappointing game experiences

[Chalacachaca]

Mercenaries 2, I loved the first one and having the chance to blow up my own country? even better, and my own PMC would help me with that. Besides, I could only imagine dropping napalm bombs in the sabanas and the eastern plains, dodging bullets in the meridian moors, riding a tank in the metropolis of Caracas and the surrouding shanty town of El Cerro, and finally conducting guerilla warfare in the amazonan jungles.

Then the game came out, and my first gripe was my hometown. I've lived 24 years in Maracaibo and I haven't seen the first mountain and jungle around here, but for some reason that's what surrounds it in that game apparently. I didn't mind that.
Then I visit other parts of Venezuela, only to find out that it's the same landscape, mountains, jungle, mountains, jungle, montains, jungle...

Now its story is quite offensive, Solano (a guy clearly modelled after Manuel Rosales, a presidential candidate who opposed Chavez and lost) betrays the main character after rescuing a general called Carmona (who shares the name with a military leader who was agaisnt Chavez and was forced to flee the country back in 2002-2003).
The Venezuelan liberation army consist on guys with red berets... a predominant element in chavizmo, and they seem to embrace communism too.

Since I wasn't enjoying the game, I decided to read the story online and noticed that after you beat the game the developers thanked the bolivarian "revolution" with "A better world is neccesary"

I stopped playing after that, they may as well praise Bush for his "outstading crusade for keeping the world safe from weapons of mass destruction".

 

[arnoldthebird]

Dragon Age II was very mediocre, it was not necessarily bad...just disappointing because I expect more from BioWare, and ME3 better have a good story because I didn't enjoy the combat mechanics in the demo.

So yeah, I expected more and was ultimately disappointed, lost so much potential

 

[Thaius]

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within.

I'm actually returning to this now with the HD collection in hopes of actually beating it, and it is easily the most terrible sequel I have ever played. Sands of Time is a masterpiece, a truly great example of both fluid, well-realized gameplay and nuanced, well-written storytelling. Warrior Within decided to get hardcore and dark for absolutely no reason.

Not to say that's an inherently bad move. It's been done correctly plenty of times before (my personal best example is Jak II), but this is just poorly done. The "Persian rock" sound of the music has been replaced with generic grunge rock. Combat features graphic gore for no reason. The Prince himself is angry and violent for no apparent reason. The dialogue is littered with profanity, again for no reason. The character design is overtly sexual, also with no reason. Now this is all fine in a darker context, but the context isn't darker at all. The story isn't dealing with any mature themes, it's just trying to be all dark and trendy to no benefit (and thus to the detriment) of its overall mood and story. It's outright pretentiousness, though not in the form we usually use it in; pretentiousness is basically trying to be all deep without having actually earned it, and this tries to be all dark and mature without actually giving us any mature substance.

As I said, the worst sequel I've ever played.

 

[The Heik]

I know that this has already been stated, but I'd say Brink.

I was hoping for a game that put a twist on standard shooter combat by making more use of the environment. What I got was a samey shooter that had a glorified jump button. What a waste of money.

 

[targren]

Lost Odyssey - I loved the old-school style of Blue Dragon, so I jumped at their next game. Go figure, yet another crappy bishie Final Fantasy clone.

Skyrim - Nothing could have lived up to the hype. After years of experience with BethSoft games, I should have known better.

Braid - For all the wanking the game got, I expected more than the weak puzzle platformer that was delivered. The most fun aspect of it was the professional interest in how the rewind mechanics worked, rather than the game itself.

 

[Zeh Don]

Spore
Even 'Two Worlds' is better than this steaming pile of utter garbage.
The technology under the hood is mind bending; the game they made with it is disgusting. EA stripped out all of the advertised content with the intent of selling it back to us in expansion packs - ala The Sims/The Sims 2/The Sim 3. Unfortunately, the game was so badly received the first expansion pack failed to sell 100,000 copies - the original sold over 3 Million.
Could've been the best game ever made; it's now the greatest disappointment I've ever paid to experience. It's the game that made be hate EA.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

Spoiler: more quotes than I expected

2-TIE!- The first Ninja Turtles/Xmen Games. Im probably showing my age here, but I begged for a Nintendo just to play the Ninja Turtles game, and I begged for a Genesis for the Xmen game a few years later. Both times I was forced to grow up a little.

Not a hundred percent sure about TMNT (I think that was Ultra) but LJN was responsible for a lot of horrible NES games. I know your pain.

---

My most recent disappointment was Rage. I played Borderlands already.

I feel like this sometimes only when I'm in Wellspring it feels more like Fallout.

---

Mass Effect 2.

Based on the feeling of glory and optimism I got from the end of Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2 was the first game in my 25+ years of gaming that I ever pre-ordered. As reward for my purchase, I got tight, brown corridors instead of sweeping alien vistas, mind-numbing planet probing instead of chaotic bouncing exploration, cover-based shooting instead of stat-based awesomeness, and ammunition limits instead of limitless firing potential. And one of the stupidest stories I've ever seen in a game. The "end boss" made me cringe.

Mass Effect set a pretty high bar for me, and Mass Effect 2 not only failed to clear it, but ran smack dab into the bar and gave itself a concussion instead.

I feel almost the same. I looked past the story and end boss somewhat because of the greater variety of alien squad mates but the probing? The ammo limit (which went against established lore!)? It wasn't as jarring a difference as Dragon Age Origins to 2 but it was still disturbing. Contemplating skipping ME3 after playing the demo

Lists seem popular here so lets try that out

Dragon Age 2: I was expecting something with a scale similar to Origins but was wrong there. What I got was a game about a guy and a city that played like a hack-n-slash with a level up and inventory system. The companion characters were almost all insufferable and, the NPCs almost always turned out to be bastards. The role playing was still there (ie: be a dick without getting evil points) but nothing was as big as some of the big decisions in Dragon Age: Origins

Spoiler: such as

no possessed child to kill in front of his mother and, no sexy with to bone so as to not die

.

Mass Effect 2: The planet exploration from the original was cut in favor of probing and, established lore was fractured so as to introduce an ammo system. It may not be called ammo but it's still a limit to the number of times I can fire my space pistol before I can't fire it anymore or have to switch out a clip. Also there's a disturbing lack of Liara if you don't buy DLC.

Dark Void: You play as Atton Rand wearing a jetpack. I hated his personality but that was forgivable considering how short the game was. I guess if it were longer there could have been more escort missions so maybe that was a blessing in disguise.

Resident Evil 5: I loved Resident Evil 2 and 3. I really liked the original Resident Evil as well. Resident Evil 5 could be broken before you set foot in the third level since you can re-play the levels you've beaten so as to get more money and buy better stuff. The inventory screen was dumb, the AI partner was an idiot and, they broke rule one by giving later-level enemies guns. It also seemed like you got to the industrial level and, subterranean Laboratory a bit too soon.

Final Fantasy XIII: As I've said before; if this game were a person it would be that one REALLY hot chick who you know doesn't eat on a daily basis and who you suspect is bulimic but DAMN is she hot! She's like...model hot [sub]tasteful but with you can tell there's some PG-13 fetish stuff going on there[/sub]. Where was I? Right, Final Fantasy XIII was beautiful but it didn't seem to want to be played. Other than walking down linear hallways the only character interaction was done to one character during fights or, with the character formation also during fights. The action looke kinetic and looked like it flowed well but you quickly realize you only need to tap one button to actually do anything and indeed, that's all you can do (or two buttons to change the formation or, the control stick to ride Shiva in a PG sort of way). Even the character progression was linear and depressing but you know how in Final Fantasy IV your characters level up and learn certain moves at certain levels no matter what? Well, Final Fantasy IV didn't have level caps. FFXIII will cap your character's level until you beat chapter A or beat boss B which can make things really frustrating if you can't figure out which paradigm to use or, if you use the 'right' paradigm and get unlucky one too many times.

 

[Justice4L]

5. Splinter Cell Conviction. Got rid of everything that was Splinter Cell and was left with Jason Bourne.

4. Dead Island. Who in there right mind thought this would be fun?

3. GTA 4. One of the most boring games I have ever played.

2. Fable III. I don't know what went through the developer's head but they completely ruined the franchise.

1. Skyrim. Not nearly as engaging as Oblivion and lacks the great quests its predecessor had.

 

[Gabbytrack]

I know this has been repeated a lot but I'm going to say it;

Final Fantasy XIII- I think the most memorable moment of this game was when my buddy came in (who has never seen a Final Fantasy) came into my room and said, "oh you watching a movie there bud" (I was fighting one of the big bosses right before you get to Pulse) I responded that I was playing the game and he brought to my attention that my controller wasn't even in my hand. I've read on this post similar complaints about FFXII, but at least with the Gambit system you could turn it off and make choices yourself. In FFXIII it's like the game hated me for wanting to play it. Aside from the horrible linear gameplay, and abysmal characters (seriously, Hope), what made me hate this game the most was the hype it got. There have been some Final Fantasys I did not enjoy as much as others but they had some redeeming qualities, like an interesting game mechanic (VIII), or a plethora of side-quests (XII), but XIII i turned off once I got to Pulse and never went back.

Also Halo: ODST, it wasn't complete garbage I just thought it wasn't that great, although Firefight was fun.

 

[Rheinmetall]

Honorary mentions:
Final Fantasy 13: I played it for only 7-8 hours, mainly for the laughs and because I wanted to see with my own eyes how much Square Enix can ridicule a once great franchise and Square Soft's glorious past alike.

Metal Gear Solid 4: Huge disappointment for the same reasons as you: Minimal game-play, endless cut-scenes. Fail. I finished it out of respect for Hideo Kojima and the brilliant pieces of gaming that he has offered to us in the past.

5. Eternal Sonata - Xbox 360. One of the most boring games I have played in my entire life. I can't understand why people love this game. It has a catchy battle music theme, a melodramatic story, but that's pretty much all.

4. Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare - PS3 The real nightmare was the horrible controls, and the ridiculous process to find your way through endless corridors to simply fucking save your game's progress.

3. Final Fantasy 12 - PS2 The game that killed Final Fantasy for me. Pretentious story, unlikable characters, stupid battle system, and tedious XP points management.

2. Tomb Raider: Underworld - PS3 Bugs-festival. I'm not sure if this game was tested even once before it came out. Not to mention that it was an extremely dull game.

1. Alone In The Dark (2008)- PS2 This game traumatized me. I almost quit gaming altogether. I could simply not believe in what I was seeing. Hands down the worst game I have ever played. Broken from every aspect: Bad graphics, unresponsive controls, bugs infested, environment traps, unreasonable game-play, etc, etc. One must play this game simply to have an idea what a bad game really means. .Sorry, but I'm really upset to recall this tragic memory.

 

[Little2Raph]

I want to keep this as short as possible:

Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising

Thank you

Yeah, me too. The worst thing is that I thought I could forget about Dragon Rising if I bought Red River. . .and found an even more dissapointing game. I think the missing element was Bohemia Interactive - they worked on the original Operation Flashpoint as well as ArmA: Armed Assault but they make most of their money making actual simulation software for the military which I think is why those two games were awesome.

 

[Monkeyman O'Brien]

Legendary. I followed that game for so long, looked at every single scrap of news that came out for it. Loved everything that I saw.
End result was a absolutely garbage FPS with uninteresting everything, the main epic song they promoted was in the game for all of 30 seconds and the ending was a real slap in the face.
I actually felt insulted that it would not let me skip the credits. It remains the only game that actually made me feel insulted to see the damn credits.
I hope that everyone who worked on that game gets eaten by a fucking Kraken.

 

[MorsePacific]

This is strangely appropriate given that I just finished Fallout: New Vegas - Dead Money and thought it was atrocious.

Never ever combine enclosed areas based on the same texture with vision degrading mist, holograms that attack you on sight and can only be turned off one way, radios that make your head explode, and enemies.

So much back-tracking and so little reward. I don't need 35 gold bars. I have enough money. Where would I even sell them?

 

[Benpasko]

Skyrim was so disappointing to me. It's just really shallow, which is the opposite direction I wanted them to take it in. I was hoping for a return to complexity, and I got a 'streamlined gaming experience', where I can't make my own spells or level up my stats.

This is strangely appropriate given that I just finished Fallout: New Vegas - Dead Money and thought it was atrocious.

I actually had a lot of fun with Dead Money, I just didn't realize it at the time. I was literally yelling at my TV in anger for the whole thing, but in the end, I would do it all again. And the reward is the Holo-Rifle, and the stealth armor. I didn't even take any of the gold bars.

 

[HardRockSamurai]

I have two that stick out in my mind:

1. Buying Brutal Legend on Launch Day - I've been a huge fan of Tim Schafer's games for as long as I can remember, so when I heard about his first newest game, I was extremely eager to play it. Unfortunately, that game had to be Brutal Legend; apparently Schafer couldn't decide if he wanted to make a hack n' slash game or an RTS game, so what we ended up getting was a mediocre version of both. It's not entirely terrible (it's actually quite funny in some parts), but that didn't stop me from being disappointing; plus, it didn't help that the game I bought on launch day kept crashing on my console.

2. Playing Skyrim on a PS3 - Don't get me wrong, I think Skyrim is fantastic game; if only I could play it. See, for some bizzare technical reason that's beyond me, Skyrim doesn't get along with PS3s. Sure, you can play it on a PS3, but, as many PS3 gamers know, it won't be long before you run into some of the worst lag you can experience. Outside of a gypsy curse, I can't think of any reason Skyrim wouldn't play nice with a PS3; Bethesda recently patched it, and while this solved some issues, it didn't take long for me to run into that game-crippling lag again. This problem will probably get fixed at some point, but for now, it's merely a damm shame.

 

[Necroid_Neko]

Venetica. I went into that game expecting some cheap, fun entertainment, but it was honestly much worse than my aleady-low expectations. It would have been about 5 hours long in total if not for the bloody awful side-quest mapping. It really wasn't worth it.

 

[Benpasko]

Oh yeah, Dead Island. So much Dead Island. Act I was incredible, but after that the game became garbage. NEVER PUT GUN ENEMIES IN A ZOMBIE GAME WITH NONREGENERATING HEALTH! It might just be because I was playing single player, but the game turned into an exercise in frustration, and trying to get lucky at Act II. No matter how well I was doing, there was always the chance of an Infected running up behind me and ruining everything.

 

[Malkavian]

Hmmm...

Dragon Age 2. Oh man... I loved Dragon Age: Origins to death, and while it had many flaws, the complete product was just so goddamn good, with great, vibrant characters, a well-composed, if not that challenging, storyline, and a great world and mythos I was really looking forward to see more of. Then DA2 happened, and... I can't even describe it. EVERYTHING was wrong. The story, by far the largest problems, was disjointed, horrible told and was made up of one-dimensional characters and fan fic-level dialogue. The gameplay was dumped down to a buttonmasher, we only ever saw the same 3 dungeons, and the aesthethics and design of the characters and world seemed to have gone from "low-ish medieval fantasy" to "LOL RULE OF COOL BROS!" It was a clear sign of what is happening to Bioware, and it was so staggeringly bad that it even made me see flaws in Mass Effect 2 I wasn't seeing before. Why, Bioware, WHY?!


Other dissapointing experiences have been DN: Forever(but we knew that would be bad), Dead Island(which I was very suspicious of), Final Fantasy 10, Painkiller: Overdose, Neverwinter Nights 2, and many others.

 

[dimensional]

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within.

I'm actually returning to this now with the HD collection in hopes of actually beating it, and it is easily the most terrible sequel I have ever played. Sands of Time is a masterpiece, a truly great example of both fluid, well-realized gameplay and nuanced, well-written storytelling. Warrior Within decided to get hardcore and dark for absolutely no reason.

This game was a massive disappointment to me as well but mainly because they somehow completely fucked up the gameplay I have tried it 5 times now and the last time I got quite far loaded my save back up and the game had me in a completely different section to where I saved and I was permanently set as the dark prince (so permanently losing life) so yeah I gave up then but I still play SOT on occasion.

Guitar Hero 2 really disappointed me as well it was glitzier and had more modes but the sound track paled in comparison to the first one it just felt like I was on a sinking ship while I was playing all the time trying to kid myself its better than the first until I could no longer maintain the charade.

Jak and Daxter 2 the first one was a fun platformer with a rubbish hidden ending the second one tried adding GTA3 into the mix and the fun dried up I finished it out of pigheaded determination but it was a big step back from the first except on the technical side.

Number one gaming disappointment though is easy for me because I still remember how excited I was for this game and how much I wanted to like it but it just proved impossible thanks to its tedious design and that was GTA3 I still remember after about 14 hours in I just thought why is this game not fun I loved the first 1 it should be brilliant in 3d but no I just couldnt push myself to continue and after trying on and off since its release I finally deleted my save about 2 years ago I just cant stand to look at the game anymore (so you can guess my opinion on games that try to ape GTA3s structure, thank god that legacy is fading).

 

[Thatrocketeer]

Kingdoms of Amalur. I could forgive the camera, the really slow talking, and the warcraft graphics and night elves, but the fact that they advertised this as an open world game, ala Skyrim, and I can't even move out of the first area whenever I wanted, that was where I drew the line and considered this the most disappointing game I've played.