Let this serve as a caution to gamers: never buy the hype. As game prices increase due to game development expenses rising, you don’t necessarily receive more for your money. These are the most disappointing games of the decade which let a lot of players down and fell far short of everyone’s expectations.
10) The Order: 1886 (2015)
‘The Order: 1886’ was a visually stunning game that showcased the full potential of the PlayStation 4, fans can agree on that. But regrettably, that was the only thing the game had to offer.
The game received heavy & reasonable criticism from Sony fans for its short duration, story, gameplay, replay value, and user involvement—to sum it up quickly, everything but the graphics.
The game’s potential was seriously damaged by its over-reliance on cutscenes and quick-time events that felt more like a movie than a video game. In addition, the game’s ending was a huge letdown for fans who paid full price for the game, leaving them on a cliffhanger with hints for a sequel that wasn’t really earned.
A lesson that everyone can learn from ‘The Order: 1886’ is that gameplay always comes first – before graphics, and that a game’s gameplay is its core.
9) Mass Effect Andromeda (2017)
If Mass Effect fans weren’t already furious enough over the conclusion of Mass Effect 3, Mass Effect: Andromanda was the final straw that broke the camel’s back as it was one of the biggest disappointments of 2017 for gaming.
Andromeda provides the strongest combat and gameplay of the entire series, however as soon as it came out, Andromeda was ridiculed for its poor character dialogue, facial animation, and some very funny glitches. Further exploration revealed a low-stakes plot, dull characters that couldn’t compete with the original heroes, and desolate planets. The franchise wouldn’t be completely destroyed by the poor sales and negative reception, but it was the first time that fans started to doubt the legendary gaming company, BioWare.
8) Battlefield 2042 (2021)
Battlefield was the only first-person shooter franchise to rival the popular Call of Duty series, However, Battlefield 2042 severely damaged the popular franchise.
Battlefield 2042 disappointed long-time franchise fans, particularly in light of the incredibly mediocre Battlefield: Hardline and Battlefield 5 entries that came out before it. Though it lacked a story, Battlefield 2042 promised a return to all that made the franchise great under the pretence of modern combat and massive 128-player battles. Despite considerable criticism of the beta and indications of troubled development, fans remained hopeful.
As a result of the disappointment and harsh reaction on Steam, the following instalment quickly dropped to one of the lowest-rated titles in the history of the site. Although fixes have been implemented to address some of the game’s bugs, the game nevertheless lost many devoted series fans.
7) Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League (2024)
‘Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League’, the most recent game from Rocksteady, the innovative studio that demonstrated how to correctly tackle licensed games with the ‘Batman: Arkham’ series, is among the worst games of 2024. It truly let DC fans and gamers down.
This game was a financial catastrophe at a time when Warner Bros. & DC was in dire need of a winner.
Warner Bros. acknowledged that ‘Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League’ had fallen short of promises after being resented and derided by players and DC fans for its dreadful mission design, microtransactions, battle pass, monotonous gameplay, and dull ending. Unexpectedly, Rocksteady co-founders departed the studio in 2022 to start a new one and the failure of ‘Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League’ cost Warner Bros. $200 million.
Yikes.
6) Marvel’s Avengers (2020)
The “Avengers Project” was teased by Marvel and Square-Enix in early 2017. When the first gameplay teaser was released, it revealed to fans a fast-paced, dynamic cooperative game that let players assume the roles of the beloved superheroes. Marvel fans were incredibly anticipating this and eager to see how it would turn out.
Even though many people were upset about the actors’ lack of similarities to the heroes from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, “Marvel’s Avengers” didn’t look bad either. There was a decline in live service, but how could anything go wrong with Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal in charge?
But fans were let down by the game’s mission design, goals, and rewards at launch, despite the heroes’ distinctive outfits and some respectable graphics. The game was removed from shopfronts in September 2023 when post-launch support added a few more heroes and content, which had little effect on the player numbers.
5) Cyberpunk 2077 (2020)
The launch of Cyberpunk 2077 was inexcusable and frankly unforgivable for fans who had been anticipating the game since 2013. Even though now (in 2024) with new patches correcting most of the issues that went wrong with the game at release, it still enters the list.
While Cyberpunk 2077’s gameplay, story, graphics, and world are all incredibly captivating and entertaining, with plenty of ways to lose yourself in the game, however, it’s numerous bugs and glitches disrupted players’ immersion and made it so frustrating and unenjoyable that players started requesting refunds from both physical stores and online retailers. In the end, Microsoft and Sony both consented to returns. Following a conversation with CD Projekt, Sony also pulled Cyberpunk 2077 off their online shop for almost six months whilst CD Projekt fixed issues and polished the game to Sony’s requirements.
The game’s release caused CD Projekt to lose a lot of fans’ respect, but fortunately CD Projekt apologised and made it right to fans with a roadmap that fixed many of the issues at release and since then, the game has improved since 2020 with the ‘Phantom Liberty’ expansion. Additionally, the universe of Cyberpunk 2077 has been brought to Netflix through the popular anime series “Cyberpunk: Edgerunners” by Studio Trigger, which was successful for both CD Projekt and Netflix in winning over the Cyberpunk community.
4) Star Wars: Battlefront I & II (2015-2017)
The multiplayer, gameplay, balancing, graphics, and numerous references to the Star Wars world that immerse you in a Star Wars fantasy were all praised highly for both Battlefront games in 2015 & 2017.
However, harsh criticism came for ‘Star Wars: Battlefront II’ when its microtransactions and advancement system overwhelmed these beneficial aspects. On the first day of release, ‘Star Wars: Battlefront I’ received criticism for its pricey season pass, but the sequel received a lot of negative feedback regarding the loot boxes in the game, which could provide players with significant gameplay benefits if they were bought with real money.
Shockingly in a attempt by EA’s community staff to defuse the controversy around the game on Reddit resulted in the most downvoted comment in the history of the site, with over 600,000 downvotes.
Needless to say, it was a bad time to be a Star Wars fan.
3) Anthem (2019)
It was time for the main BioWare team to create something unique after the mess of ‘Mass Effect: Andromeda’. The game was a live-service looter shooter that prioritised cooperative gameplay above the developer’s well-known single-player, narrative-driven style. ‘Anthem’ failed to live up to the expectations, despite the initial gameplay reveal’s dazzling appearance. The game’s development era was beset by problems, ranging from poor management to crunch.
The end result was a mess. While the gameplay, graphics, and flying around the world are really entertaining and engaging, the game’s poor characterisation and dialogue, mission design, repetitive objectives, performance problems, bugs, glitches, uninspired loot, and a lifeless endgame made it incredibly dull and boring. When BioWare released this following Mass Effect: Andromeda, fans were horrified and distraught losing faith in the well-known studio that dominated the gaming world in the 2000’s. Despite modifications and enhancements, EA finally turned down Anthem’s effort at an overhaul, and thus support was essentially over.
2) Starfield (2023)
If you felt that “Fallout 76” was a low moment for Bethesda at launch, ‘Starfield’ would make it so much worse.
Fans envisioned ‘Starfield’ as the game that would finally bring them the thrilling space adventure, and Bethseda stated that it would be the defining space game of our generation, combining freedom and exploration. Players got into the hype and fantasised of exploring a thousand worlds, each with its own secrets and distinctive features, despite their better judgement. In their dreams, they would fly around in their spaceships, run into odd spacecraft, visit every planet they could see, and make new friends or enemies.
So, what went wrong? While combat is decent, many fans felt that it was outmoded and uninspired. It turns out that what fans got were endless loading screens for almost everything you did in the game.
Players were generally discouraged by Bethesda’s approach to ‘Starfield’, believing that corporate concerns had eclipsed the company’s enthusiasm for making games for their devoted fan base, in addition to feeling they had learnt nothing from the failure of ‘Fallout 76.’
Here Are Some Honorable Mentions:
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Atomic Heart (2023)
Crispy critters…this game really sucked.
Atomic Heart at first appeared to be a spiritual successor of the BioShock series from Irrational Games, but it never quite lived up to those high expectations. At a place called Facility 3826, players battle robotic and biomechanical experiments that have gone awry in an alternate reality game set in the 1950s Soviet Union. Although the concept is intriguing, the majority of players and reviewers concurred that it fell short of BioShock’s standards since the combat and progression systems were, in the end, disappointing in comparison to other games in the genre.
Furthermore, Major Sergey “P-3” Nechayev, the main character, wasn’t well welcomed because he frequently used profanity or cliched speech, which is usually at strange or inappropriate points in the narrative. The open-world sections in between the more concentrated dungeon-style stages also became tedious to many players. The persistently reoccurring foes, lacklustre boss battles, and items that didn’t always seem worth the effort to locate made the open world seem more like filler to extend the game’s overall playtime.
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Saints Row (2022)
Since many people view the Saints Row franchise as an alternative for the more serious Grand Theft Auto series, there was a noticeable buzz among devoted fans when a new game was revealed after a seven-year break. After the announcement, though, things didn’t exactly go as planned. Fans understandably criticised Volition’s overall decisions for the Saints Row revival, which many felt abandoned the more bizarre aesthetic of previous games in favour of a more generic cast of characters.
Saints Row was a major letdown in 2022 due to its antiquated gameplay mechanics, launch issues and errors, a dull plot, and humour that just fell short of the series’ reputation.
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Overwatch 2 (2023)
Oh Blizzard…
Many people thought that the original Blizzard’s ‘Overwatch’ in 2016 was already ideal in the way it was. Thus, ‘Overwatch 2’ must include new game styles and maps if it is to be a necessary step forward. Unfortunately no. The game is exactly the same, but there are a few minor adjustments, such as teams having five players instead of six, some character redesigns, and levels that take place at different hours of the day.
However, the criticism from the community fans who have been following the game’s lore and were thrilled to see a new campaign in the sequel being abandoned due to weak sales found Blizzard’s decision to cancel the Overwatch 2 PvE campaign to be one of the company’s lowest moments.
Blizzard had the opportunity to approach Overwatch 2 with a lot of new and original ideas while still being loyal to the original game, yet the outcome was a letdown and damaged the company’s standing with fans.
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Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III (2023)
The successful 2019 and 2022 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare reboots demonstrated Activision’s and Infinity Ward’s intention to transform and take a fresh approach to the well-known first-person shooter franchise by enhancing gameplay and creating new, exciting stories while adhering to the original plot.
However, fans of Call of Duty were greatly disappointed with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, which was initially slated to be DLC but eventually evolved into a full-fledged game as production went on. The game, which was mostly developed by Sledgehammer Games instead of Infinity Ward, was clearly poorly thought-out, rushed and pushed out to shelves to maintain the excitement of the earlier reboots.
Due to the fact that a significant portion of the campaign felt like filler and mainly relied on content from Warzone, as well as the fact that it was just four hours long, fans were generally disappointed. Many people also didn’t like the concept of Open Combat missions, which eliminated many of the tense, action-packed set pieces that have been a hallmark of Call of Duty campaigns.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III was dubbed the biggest letdown of 2023 and the most disappointing game in the series.
1) Destiny I & II (2014 & 2017)
Please assemble around the phone or laptop as we share the story of how these games hyped us up only to fail, spectacularly.
“I don’t even have time to explain why I don’t have time to explain.”
Exo Stranger/Elsie Bray
While both of game’s gameplay, graphics, and adherence to the Halo franchise’s heritage are commendable, The lengthy grind, unrewarding loot, post-campaign levelling chore, and meaningless plot which fans are still trying to grasp on the overall story with the sequel ‘Destiny 2’ are barely compensated for by the excellent shooting and efficient multiplayer, making ‘Destiny’ was one of the most frustrating games both in 2014 & 2017.
With pricey, soulless DLC that messes with level limitations and adds to the already grindy experience, Bungie and Activision only made things worse. Despite its many positive aspects and addictive nature, Destiny is still a significant disappointment compared to what many of us had hoped for in 2014.