Gaming’s Biggest Disappointments of 2012

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I know you guys are going to have something to say about Wired's picks of the biggest gaming disappointments of 2012.

This year, the things that disappointed the Wired staff weren't just bad games — they included inelegant aspects of good games that dragged down the experience, questionable choices by game publishers that caused excellent games to get overlooked or damaged, and shaky launches of new gaming hardware that are either opening-night jitters or a sign the whole production's going to go under.
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My biggest gaming disappointment is the continued trend towards bland mobile games.
 
I LIKE SITES WHERE EACH ITEM IN A LIST IS A WHOOOOLE PAGE OF ADS AND A BIT OF CONTENT.
 
The migration toward simplified gaming (i'e tablet, android, iphone) gaming definitely, the catering to run and gun fps (BF3 Black Ops etc) and lack of twitch fps.
 
I have to agree with the Vita thing.

Which makes me sad. The Vita really is an excellent device. It's everything you could really want from a handheld console. Great hardware, great controls, beautiful screen, great build quality, etc...it's just that as they said...there are no games.

Honestly bought a Vita when it was released to play Uncharted (which was awesome and a great addition to the franchise). Only problem was that after I beat it it just ended up sitting there...there just wasn't anything else to play. Ended up selling it and still haven't found a reason to get another one...

I really wish someone could hack it...if I can't get good Vita games I'd still love to have it as a emulator or something.
 
JoeUser said:
I have to agree with the Vita thing.

I really wish someone could hack it...if I can't get good Vita games I'd still love to have it as a emulator or something.
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At that point thought, just use emulators on android. I'm not in tune with the Vita scene, but I bet the prevalence of relatively powerful smartphones is something that's preventing a big hacking push.
 
I would definitely agree with the Steel Battalion game being a let down. Hell, I'd put it at the front of the list it was such shit.

I don't own a Vita, and nothing they've released has changed my mind. A friend of mine got one from his wife for his birthday and he left it in a drawer for 5 months. Still, I have a tendancy to not say much about it because I've never played one.

I do think their complaints about the Wii U are exagerrated. Not to say there are parts to the software that can't be improved, but they're really not nearly as big of a problem as they're stating.
 
Pretty much everything on that list is a no duh except for Zynga. Zynga games are a lot of fun to play and I think Wired just threw it in there to please so-called hardcore "pretend playing games is a profession" people would nod in agreement like a buncha bobble heads.
 
2012 - Going to count SWTOR since even though it released in 2011 it went to shit by the start of the year.

My biggest has to be Guild Wars 2. Most overhyped POS.

Then probably Diablo 3
 
SkribbelKat said:
Pretty much everything on that list is a no duh except for Zynga. Zynga games are a lot of fun to play and I think Wired just threw it in there to please so-called hardcore "pretend playing games is a profession" people would nod in agreement like a buncha bobble heads.
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:rolleyes:

Zynga is a shitty company that just rips off other games.
It will be a sweet day when that company folds.
 
face2palm said:
:rolleyes:

Zynga is a shitty company that just rips off other games.
It will be a sweet day when that company folds.
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I like most of the games they've published because they don't go for the niche market games that appeal to a bunch of people who want to spend their day playing pretend kill stuff. There's nothing wrong with games like that, but Zynga makes it easy to get more mainstream stuff which might sometimes be an unorigional idea, but at least is enjoyable to play.
 
roaf85 said:
2012 - Going to count SWTOR since even though it released in 2011 it went to shit by the start of the year.

My biggest has to be Guild Wars 2. Most over hyped POS.

Then probably Diablo 3
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THIS +1. I was so excited for GW2 when it was announced. I remember checking video sites daily for closed beta leaks. Once I actually got to play it I was so quickly disappointed.

Diablo 3 kept me engaged for aproximately 100 hours only because I had some RL friends who would play it with me constantly. I think I was in denial as one day I realized how bad the story and how lazy the developers when it came to replayability. I will never buy, play or touch a game that Jay Wilson has involvement in.
 
2011 (games)

Assassins Creed Revelations
Crysis 2
Fable 3
LA Noire
SWTOR
Homefront
Dragon Age 2

Honorable Mention (niche games) - Socom 4 / Fear 3 / Dunegon Siege 3

2012

Guild Wars 2 (quasi flop of the century for how much social media was put out for the game)
Diablo 3
Syndicate
Final Fantasy XIII-2
I Am Alive
Resident Evil 6
Assassins Creed 3
 
World of Warcraft's newest expansion, Mists of Pandaria, should be on there: simplified the game too much, (every class is just a 3 button sequence with near invulnerability) added overly complicated cooking system, (seriously? I have to take up farming to level up my cooking, and then there are 8 different sides of cooking I have to level up?) made too many daily quests related to cooking system, too many side games, (plants vs zombies, pokemon, etc) lame raids, lame, scripted dungeons, too easy to get other professions to cap.

Simply put, it's just no fun anymore. I've been playing Star Trek Online more than WoW lately, and I've been playing WoW since it initial release. STO got better, up until the new rep system, now all that's left is leveling up new characters. Other games are just cookie cutter crap that's been done way too long. Where are the games that actually challenge the brain a little?
 
dgingeri said:
World of Warcraft's newest expansion, Mists of Pandaria, should be on there: simplified the game too much, (every class is just a 3 button sequence with near invulnerability) added overly complicated cooking system, (seriously? I have to take up farming to level up my cooking, and then there are 8 different sides of cooking I have to level up?) made too many daily quests related to cooking system, too many side games, (plants vs zombies, pokemon, etc) lame raids, lame, scripted dungeons, too easy to get other professions to cap.

Simply put, it's just no fun anymore. I've been playing Star Trek Online more than WoW lately, and I've been playing WoW since it initial release. STO got better, up until the new rep system, now all that's left is leveling up new characters. Other games are just cookie cutter crap that's been done way too long. Where are the games that actually challenge the brain a little?
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Maybe for a class like shadow priests. Just certain spells trigger now, which helps with rotation.

Pet battles are really fun. I was a skeptic for it at first, but now I find it awesome to do pet battles.

Simple put MOP is probably the best xpac to hit WoW since TBC and they are adding more content each week. New raids etc. HOF isn't a terrible raid that was just added.
 
Was the Star Wars Kinetic game actually pre-hyped as a "Star Wars Experience" type of game? Or did people just not think they'd go "Just Dance: Star Wars Edition" ?

I agree with Diablo 3 but for different reasons, the term "endgame" is just so poorly thrown about, you finish the game and you want... more game ok fine we'll give you more game just make it more difficult, or make you grind, or make you chase after that carrot and get "achievements" basically exactly what Diablo 2 did, ok so you can't kill other players, was that really that much of an issue for everyone? I don't think I killed anyone when I played Diablo 2 online, and when I played DIablo 1 online I fucking hated people who'd jump into a game and try to kill me. What did Diablo 3 in was two fold, the always connected bit but whatever that was a major game breaking moment, but the auction house which completely broke the game because the rarity of items showing up in the auction house dictated drop rates in your game. As someone mentioned in one of the many others "I hate Diablo 3" type of threads, they didn't make a game you could play singleplayer, they made a multiplayer game where you could choose not to have any other players in it, and they dropped the ball big time with that.
 
sfsuphysics said:
the term "endgame" is just so poorly thrown about, you finish the game and you want... more game ok fine we'll give you more game just make it more difficult, or make you grind, or make you chase after that carrot and get "achievements" basically exactly what Diablo 2 did, ok so you can't kill other players, was that really that much of an issue for everyone?
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D3 didn't disappoint me at all. But gaming press lately seems more obsessed with what games didn't deliver instead of what games did deliver. Crying about what's missing or absent (even if not promised) tends to stir up the overwhelming-ever-unhappy-about-friggin'-everything internet audience. The ME3 ending "debacle" is a perfect example of this tempest-teacup mentality too.
 
I pretty much agree with that list, actually. They got the Mass Effect 3 ending and Diablo 3 on there, those are the biggest ones in recent memory.
 
Guild Wars 2...big time. Why, you ask?

http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Meleaga...old-Arenanet-and-GW2-Out-For-Nexon-Investment

They actively manipulate the drop rates to affect the economy. It has been blatantly obvious with dye drops and with precursor drops. They want to push players to buy gems/gold from them and they will artificially push the market in order to do so.

Nexon bought part of NCSoft and then NCSoft hired someone formerly of Nexon as their "monetization manager"? That's not suspicious at all.

I have been trying to justify playing anymore because they are purposefully turning it into a treadmill for money.

Nexon apparently also wants to buy Steam. I hope Gabe tells them where they can stick it.
 
Saturn_V said:
D3 didn't disappoint me at all. But gaming press lately seems more obsessed with what games didn't deliver instead of what games did deliver. Crying about what's missing or absent (even if not promised) tends to stir up the overwhelming-ever-unhappy-about-friggin'-everything internet audience. The ME3 ending "debacle" is a perfect example of this tempest-teacup mentality too.
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The ME3 Ending is great example. Just played it again as I got some of the DLC and wanted to play those more naturally through the game. The ending sucked, I didn't think so originally. But it did. But what it did for 25-40 hours was let you continue to play a fantastic story and made you care so much about the characters, that the lack of closure especially with the crew, helped piss people off. The amount that they delivered should out weigh the star child ending.

Same thing with D3. Sure it's not something I am playing now. But it was a game I easily got 100+ hours out of and enjoyed it while doing so. Opposite end, Skyrim has 300+ hours of playability with one character, but I find myself annoyed and bored with it. Skyrim is/was a candidate.

Waaaaay more attention is given to the few targets missed then should be. Makes me want to go back in time when games like Black and White were praised for their accomplishments instead of trashed because Peter's dreams where higher than any development window would allow.
 
roaf85 said:
Maybe for a class like shadow priests. Just certain spells trigger now, which helps with rotation.

Pet battles are really fun. I was a skeptic for it at first, but now I find it awesome to do pet battles.

Simple put MOP is probably the best xpac to hit WoW since TBC and they are adding more content each week. New raids etc. HOF isn't a terrible raid that was just added.
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I'm sorry, but I have to disagree with you.

I leveled up my prot pally to 90, got him to 600 mining while he was still 85, and 600 smithing before he hit 87. Now, at 90, I have to go through all these rep increases to get the gear to do heroics. I can't just go to it. I hated the rep grind before, and I hate it now. It's just yawn fest all over. I tried leveling up my priest and mage, but I got bored before I even hit 86 on either. There's no variation, no alternate route. It's follow the script. I'm bored with that. I swapped over to my alliance druid, and it was much the same. I didn't even get through 4 quests with him.
 
Sadly I suspected that the Vita being what it is was going to happen as soon I heard that it would ship with mobile hardware. The problem with shipping with mobile hardware with the kind of uncompelling lineage of the PSP line is that smartphones and tablets are advancing at insane rates, it takes a whole lot of effort to keep up with new releases and such and with that quick advancement comes quick obsolescence. It's a year later and things there are tablets that have already leapfrogged the Vita. Next year you'll get cheap tablets near the Vita's pricepoint with about the same hardware power but with access to iOS or Google Play, and I doubt Sony can drop it to the ~120 dollar and below price point it needs to be at currently.
 
dgingeri said:
I'm sorry, but I have to disagree with you.

I leveled up my prot pally to 90, got him to 600 mining while he was still 85, and 600 smithing before he hit 87. Now, at 90, I have to go through all these rep increases to get the gear to do heroics. I can't just go to it. I hated the rep grind before, and I hate it now. It's just yawn fest all over. I tried leveling up my priest and mage, but I got bored before I even hit 86 on either. There's no variation, no alternate route. It's follow the script. I'm bored with that. I swapped over to my alliance druid, and it was much the same. I didn't even get through 4 quests with him.
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I only had to do I think like 4 instance runs in order to do heroics. I haven't crafted one piece of gear and am at ilvl 474, which is good enough to do MSV and I will start on HOF.

There is no script with gear. You have like 10 different ways to get it. you can do epic quest chains, the 2 world bosses, hell even PVP gear has a PVE stat that can be used in PVE. You can do instances etc.

Then when you do heroics you can still run the world bosses or get pvp gear or craft it and even do Raid Finder for better gear.

Sorry you are wrong.
 
Pretty good list there. I have to disagree with their D3 assessment though. The end game isn't the problem, the whole game is a pile of shit. I'm just now getting ready to play ME3, so I guess I'll see just how bad the ending is.
 
B2BigAl said:
Pretty good list there. I have to disagree with their D3 assessment though. The end game isn't the problem, the whole game is a pile of shit. I'm just now getting ready to play ME3, so I guess I'll see just how bad the ending is.
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I still put almost 100 hours into D3, which is a good 70 hours more than GW2. The problem with D3 despite it being the end game was plan and simple 12 years in the making and not better than D2 and I am going to say the talent system was better in D3

YEA I SAID IT!

The problem with D3 being inferior was the Act locations. In particular Act 2 and 4 in D2 just had better game play than D3.

The writing was better in D2 than D3. The characters and theme was better.

The drops were even better.

Everything about D2 was just better.
 
My biggest gaming disappointment was no Doom 4 at QuakeCon and the no Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm public beta.

Pretty dull gaming year, to be honest. RPG after RPG after RPG...
 
dgz said:
My biggest gaming disappointment was no Doom 4 at QuakeCon and the no Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm public beta.

Pretty dull gaming year, to be honest. RPG after RPG after RPG...
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Fuck that bro you had a good year if that was it.

There were probably the best RPGs to come out this year from Xenoblade to Last Story to the Witcher 2 games on consoles.
 
To be honest I have been digging out my old game CD or playing old ones from GOG (or old ones I have on Steam), seeing if they have mods for playing widescreen, better graphics, etc. and having a blast playing them again with ridiculous driver settings like 32x AA.

Tron 2.0 with Killer App mod
Mechwarrior 4
Age of Mythology
Fleet Ops (Star Trek Armada 2 major mod)
No One Lives Forever 2
Dungeon Keeper 2

I really have not seen anything this year that has grabbed me at all, except ME3, which I still enjoyed. EA gutted SWTOR so I stopped playing that a couple months ago.
 
Garbage list. No one ever cared about half the games.

I've never played any of the Diablos, but it seemed like everyone I knew was excited. Twelve years since the last one? Deserves to be way higher in the list.

WHERE IS CS:GO???? I WANT MY $15 BACK. Deleted it to free up precious SSD space.
 
ziddey said:
Garbage list. No one ever cared about half the games.

I've never played any of the Diablos, but it seemed like everyone I knew was excited. Twelve years since the last one? Deserves to be way higher in the list.

WHERE IS CS:GO???? I WANT MY $15 BACK. Deleted it to free up precious SSD space.
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I wouldn't say it is a garbage list. ME3/Diablo 3 and Resident Evil were probably the most criticized games in the last 5 years.

Hell even ME3 got press for a complaint with the BBB, albeit it was stupid. Resident Evil 6 got a Yahoo front page article and Diablo 3 server issues were the result of tons of youtube video frustrations.
 
dgingeri said:
World of Warcraft's newest expansion, Mists of Pandaria, should be on there: simplified the game too much, (every class is just a 3 button sequence with near invulnerability) added overly complicated cooking system, (seriously? I have to take up farming to level up my cooking, and then there are 8 different sides of cooking I have to level up?) made too many daily quests related to cooking system, too many side games, (plants vs zombies, pokemon, etc) lame raids, lame, scripted dungeons, too easy to get other professions to cap.

Simply put, it's just no fun anymore. I've been playing Star Trek Online more than WoW lately, and I've been playing WoW since it initial release. STO got better, up until the new rep system, now all that's left is leveling up new characters. Other games are just cookie cutter crap that's been done way too long. Where are the games that actually challenge the brain a little?
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Pandaria's fault is that Blizzard thinks that they can keep customers by creating endless amounts of dailies. Which of course isn't fun. The reason so many people left WoW was because content had huge gaps. Not because wanna log in everyday to do dailies for their professions. They're just burning people out in the game.

Their biggest issue is class balance. When hasn't that ever been an issue in WoW? Though it's certainly much worse then Cata. WOTLK seemed like the most balanced expansion so far. So far they're very slow to adjust things, and if they take too much time then changes will be harder to make, as players are too used to it.

Then there's CRZ a.k.a Cross Realm Zones. They lost a lot of players, and realms have shrunk so much. Their answer was CRZ, but that doesn't have put together RBGS or raids. Essentially forcing players to transfer and pay up $25. It's $35 if you wanna switch factions. For something that's just automated.
 
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