15 Polished Turds That Never Lived up to the Hype
PocketEpiphany
Published
04/25/2021
in
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The video game industry, like most non-essential services, is largely built on hype. Great games and consoles may exist, but they often don't succeed unless there's a massive hype train pulling them through the finish line.
Naturally, this system leads to many games being overhyped. Maybe some aspect of the game was decent, but overall these titles are sold to us as being more than reality, and that gets annoying.
If you've ever been disappointed in a game, you're not alone. This list contains the most overhyped and underperforming video games of all time.
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1.
Cyberpunk 2077 No game embodies overhyped quite like Cyberpunk 2077. After 7 years of development, several delays, and extra hype from Keanu Reeves’ involvement, this game launched as a buggy, glitchy mess that bordered on unplayable. You know it's bad when console stores stop selling your game because it runs so poorly. -
2.
Star Wars: Battlefront II After enough fan outcry, Battlefront II became a pretty solid Star Wars multiplayer game. But it launched with tons of hype that all evaporated when players discovered just how bad the microtransactions were. When EA has to rework the entire game just to get players to put their pitchforks away, you know it’s pretty bad. -
3.
Star Fox Zero The best Nintendo games find new ways to use the hardware. But Star Fox Zero on the Wii U required you to master the worst controls. Between that and ripping off Star Fox 64 whenever possible, this title basically ended all hope for this franchise. -
4.
Mass Effect: Andromeda Mass Effect 3 was an ambitious and engaging game with a terrible ending that eventually sent Bioware back to the drawing board. Fans assumed Mass Effect: Andromeda would be a return to series greatness, but this was a glitchy mess that required so many patches the developer gave up on fixing it. -
5.
Halo 4 Caring about Halo’s story is a bit like actually reading Playboy for the articles. But Halo 4 managed to deliver both a bungled, lore-heavy story and multiplayer that feels like a hollow rip-off of Call of Duty. Whether you care about the story or about Team Slayer, this game fails on all fronts. -
6.
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II The first Force Unleashed game really blew our minds. It was a fun action/adventure game that furthered our knowledge of Star Wars mythology. But the sequel was a rushed and buggy mess that had nothing new to offer in terms of either gameplay or Star Wars lore. -
7.
Daikatana Daikatana may be the perfect embodiment of developer hubris. An infamous ad for the game promised that “John Romero’s about to make you his bitch.” When this much-delayed game finally launched, it offered disappointing graphics and gameplay to players expecting a worthy successor to Doom II. -
8.
Fable 3 Fable 3 is that rare sequel that drops every possible ball. Much of it is simplistic and derivative of earlier franchise titles. Meanwhile, the new material lacks any real innovation or polish. It was just a buggy Fable game that could impress no one who played the earlier games. -
9.
No Man’s Sky No Man’s Sky is another game that slowly became awesome after enough developer updates. But when it launched, players were very disappointed at the gulf between expectations and reality. In fact, for the first year or so after it launched, this game’s very name was a synonym for overhyped video game. -
10.
Harry Potter: Wizards Unite Us For a while, it looked like knock-off versions of Pokémon Go were going to be the future of mobile games. And fans were understandably hyped about becoming a wizard in Harry Potter: Wizards Unite Us. But the game nickel-and-dimed you to replenish your magic, all while forcing you to learn obnoxiously-complex skill trees. If not for J.K. Rowling’s Twitter account, this would be the worst thing to happen to the Harry Potter franchise. -
11.
Diablo 3 Given the immense fan love for Diablo 2, the sequel was never likely to make every player happy. But Diablo 3’s combat, art style, and character design all drove players away from the franchise, and there's no telling if they will come back for the eventual sequel. -
12.
Fallout 4 Sometimes a franchise is the victim of its own success. Whereas Fallout 3 was good and Fallout: New Vegas was great, Fallout 4 was little more than a dumb gun game with very little roleplaying. It’s not a proper shooter or a proper RPG, and all this game does well is disappoint you. -
13.
Duke Nukem Forever Duke Nukem Forever was an appropriate name because it took 14 years before being released. The final product is nothing but a cringefest of bad gameplay and awful map design that destroyed any hope of new Duke Nukem titles. -
14.
Aliens: Colonial Marines Aliens games have been largely hit-or-miss, but fans really had high hopes for Aliens: Colonial Marines. Too bad the final product launched with hideous graphics, disappointing AI, and multiplayer that makes you shout "game over, man” as you turn the power off. -
15.
Anthem Before it launched, fans thought Anthem could unseat titles like Destiny in the prestige shooter department. But this game was a hollow experience that didn’t really offer anything new. While the game got a little better after some updates, we can’t help but wish they took more time to fix it up before selling it to unsuspecting players.
- REPLAY GALLERY
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- 15 Polished Turds That Never Lived up to the Hype
Cyberpunk 2077 No game embodies overhyped quite like Cyberpunk 2077. After 7 years of development, several delays, and extra hype from Keanu Reeves’ involvement, this game launched as a buggy, glitchy mess that bordered on unplayable. You know it's bad when console stores stop selling your game because it runs so poorly.
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