Top 10 BAD Games That Had SO MUCH Potential

Top 10 Bad Games that Had Great Potential

Oh, what could have been. Welcome to WatchMojo.com and today we will be counting down our picks for the Top 10 Bad Games that Had Great Potential.

For this list, we looked at some pretty embarrassing excuses for interactive entertainment that have been released over the years and ranked them based upon how good they could have been based on the subject matter, series reputation or team developing the project. These games are proof that we can’t jump to conclusions before the final product is in our hands.

#10: “Duke Nukem Forever” (2011)

This Duke Nukem adventure will forever be a letdown. With a development cycle spanning nearly two decades, Duke Nukem’s big return should have been an epic, explosive video game for all the ages, but that was ultimately not the case. Considering Duke’s impact upon the FPS genre in the 90’s, this should have been a return to form for the franchise, but sadly, the over-reliance of ‘old school’ gameplay design felt more outdated than refreshing. Furthermore, the constant shifts across different companies really harmed the game’s overall tone, with the final product feeling like an obvious case of having too many cooks in the kitchen. Ah well, maybe next time Duke.

#9: “Mighty No.9” (2016)

If you’re thinking: “hey you know, this Mighty No.9 thing-a-majig looks an awful lot like those Mega Man games”, you’d be 100% correct. Being created to serve as a spiritual successor to that franchise and having people who actually worked on the Mega-Man games on board, this project had all the right ingredients to a recipe for success. Add in the fact that crowd funding support from platforms such as ‘Kickstarter’ was absolutely huge, and this throwback to an older gaming age had no excuse to disappoint. Well, it did, with nearly everything from washed out graphics to boring gameplay making it less than stellar. Not so mighty after all, eh?

#8: “The Order: 1886” (2015)

Sony is known for creating tons of awesome franchises for its dedicated PlayStation fanbase and that trend continued at E3 2013 when they revealed ‘The Order:1886’ for their next gen console the PS4. The game was hyped up to show the graphical horsepower inside of the system and while it is without a doubt a stunning sight to behold, the developers kind of forgot to…make a good game to go with it. Most of the time, all the player is doing is watching long cutscenes, walking around or examining random objects (how fascinating). It’s a shame since the setting was interesting enough, but this unfortunately turned into a case of style over substance.

#7: “Too Human” (2008)

Initially planned for the original PlayStation, then moving over to the GameCube before finally being bought by Microsoft for the Xbox 360; Too Human may have built up too much hype over its lengthy development time. Developer ‘Sillicon Knights’ had previously proved themselves in the past on delivering quality games and on top of that, the premise for ‘Too Human’ seemed really, really awesome, offering a more sci-fi inspired twist to classic tales from Norse mythology. While it all looked good on paper, it proved to be less than compelling in execution, as the game was brought down by repetitive pacing and a rather awkward control scheme. Overall, it’s too bad ‘Too Human’ fell short.

#6: “Hellgate: London” (2007)

Set in a post-apocalyptic London, this hack and slash RPG tasked the player with fighting legions of demons in intense, dungeon crawling style gameplay reminiscent of the ‘Diablo’ series. Speaking of which, this game was developed by a team made up of several former employees from Blizzard who had previously worked on ‘Diablo’. With Hellgate drawing inspiration from Diablo’s gameplay style yet with an entirely fresh world to play around in, this was bound to be a hit in the making. Strangely enough, this game just couldn’t recapture that same magic as before, with critics citing the gameplay as being repetitive and shallow. It didn’t help either that online modes were prone to crashes and slowdown. Yikes.

#5: “Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor” (2012)

Hot off the heels of their widely praised ‘Dark Souls’, FromSoftware turned their attention towards creating a highly ambitious, motion-control heavy experience about giant tanks and big explosions. To be fair, it was a cool idea. Using both the Xbox controller and Kinect peripheral, the developers wanted to simulate what it would be like to command a big hunk of destructive metal around a battlefield. All of this intriguing possibility completely falls apart once you jump into the gameplay since it…just doesn’t work. At all. Gamers and critics alike slammed the product for being frustratingly unresponsive, leading to an overall disappointing and unbearable experience. We’re sure this is the same FromSoftware, right?

#4: “Daikatana” (2000)

John Romero was a big deal in the video game industry, having lent a hand in the creation of now iconic works in the FPS genre such as ‘Doom’ and ‘Quake’, it looked like he could do no wrong. His next project ‘Daikatana’ was hugely hyped based on his reputation alone, but (as you may have guessed by now watching this video) the final product was hyped way out of proportion. Aside from a number of production setbacks harming the overall quality of the game, many aspects of the game’s design such as cumbersome save states and awful A.I companions brought the game down even further. Needless to say, ‘Daikatana’ died pretty quickly on arrival.

#3: “Lair” (2007)

If you took Factor 5, who made the excellent ‘Rogue Squadron’ games and ask them to swap piloting an X-Wing for flying dragons, you’d seemingly have a match seemingly made in heaven. Watching video of gameplay up to release made Lair look totally mind-blowing but getting your hands on a controller and playing it for yourself turned out to be another story entirely. While the graphics, story and sound design were all top notch, the most pivotal part of a game (y’know, the gameplay) was beyond broken. The game had forced motion controls that were unresponsive making even the simplest task an infuriating chore. PS3 gamers needed a worthwhile exclusive at the time, but were left with nothing but heartbreak.

#2: “Sonic the Hedgehog” (2006)

Often referred to as ‘Sonic 06’; the only place Sega’s blue mascot ran to this time was straight through a wall. In the leadup to the game’s release, Sega wanted to have the game out in time to celebrate the franchise’s 15th Anniversary, but in what could be one of the most boneheaded decision the gaming industry has ever seen; Sega also decided to split up the development team to have the other half work on Sonic & The Secret Rings for the Wii, While also tightening Sonic 06’s deadline. The end result of this mismanagement was a game that just felt unfinished overall, with terrible controls, glitches galore and a terribly awkward ‘furry’ inspired love story. What were they thinking?!?

Before we reveal our top pick, here are a few dishonorable mentions…

“Homefront” (2011)

“Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5” (2015)

#1: “Aliens: Colonial Marines” (2013)

Considering the influence that the film ‘Aliens’ has had on countless video game franchises, it seemed only fitting that a video game based on the film itself should roll around sooner or later. The first handful of trailers and gameplay reveals seemed to be everything fans could have hoped for but in the end, well…Hudson said it best(Hudson clip).Take your pick where the game messed up bad, as no aspect of game design was left untouched by painful execution. Boring storyline, tons of glitches as well as braindead enemy and partner A.I lead to an experience that will have you yelling in rage at your TV; but in gaming, NPC’s can’t hear you scream.