Top 10 Annoying New Features in Video Game Sequels

What was the Arkham series missing before the latest entry was released? The BatMobile of course! What wasn’t it missing? Mandatory ““non-lethal”” tank battles seemingly in the middle of every mission. Transforming the batmobile into a tank to fend off wave after wave of drones tanks was not only got repetitive, but served no real purpose to the plot. With this entry having the fewest “predator” sections of the series, we feel the focus was lost in order to accommodate the bat-mo-tank.

With the first game encouraging players to meticulously conserve and curate their ammo supplies, Invisible War lost some fans by switching a unified ammunition system. With one clip to rule them all some of the depth of the first title was stripped away from players, with many fans blaming corporate meddling and a need to dumb down the franchise for mainstream consoles as the primary culprits. This feature, along with the overall poor execution of Invisible War lead most fans to see this sequel as severely inferior to the original classic.

What do gamers hate? Unnecessary interruptions. Whether it’s a reminder to go to chores or having to go to work, breaking the experience is the worst. Now imagine a feature that does this on purpose every time the game switches from day to night. Stopping the action with an on screen text prompt that never … seems … to feel … any … faster. Clearly a product of its time, as this allowed the game to load the new aesthetic, it feels like a feature the game would have been better off without.

Treating players like children is a sure fire way to infuriate them. Upon failing a mission or dying in these Marquee Nintendo titles,, the difficulty was automatically lowered in order to help the player progress. The most frustrating part of this feature; is that it prevented players from going through gates locked to a high difficulty. Even more annoying: Director Masahiro Sakurai brought back this feature in Super Smash Bros for 3DS and Wii U’s single player mode. Dropping the difficulty cause we made a boo boo is just condescending, we’d rather learn from our mistakes to overcome challenges, rather than have the challenge taken away.

Double whammy. In a series celebrated for its tense survival horror with a bit of action, the fifth entry tweaked the formula a bit too much toward action. When Sheva Alomar made her debut in this 2009 title, she drove fans mad not because she’s a bad character, but because her AI was as dumb as a brick. This made Co-op play almost mandatory due to the AI, and the tension felt from playing horror games was almost non-existent. This combined with an inventory system that was totally balls – requiring lots of reshuffling and dropping of items just to pick up new finds. And that AI? Don’t bother giving her your healing spray to save on space, cuz she will use it at the worst times.

Flying the iconic vehicles of the Star Wars franchise is a dream come true for all fans. What isn’t on the bucket list of most pilots? Jogging around Hoth at a pace rivaled only by Jabba the hutt. Sure the settings are still as iconic settings are all present, but the controls in these ground sections were inexcusably terrible, with the biggest problem being that you couldn’t aim manually. In a franchise known for it’s true to the film dog fighting, pulling players out of the cockpit wasn’t the best idea for the Rogue Squadron.

The turn based battling of the original was intact in this GBA classic, but the addition of a Judge, similar to a referee, monitoring the battles got old quick. Arbitrary laws that changed every day randomly chose one ability to be illegal, which could send your characters to jail if used. So, for one mission you won’t be able to use fire magic, for the next you might not be able to heal, etc. Though an interesting idea, it’s clearly obvious this was a barrier designed to make sure you don’t use the same strategies over and over. Did they really not have any other way to prevent that from happening?

A feature that got so out of hand that developer Blizzard had to patch it out of the game. The auction house allowed players to sell and bid on in game items with in game gold – or even real world cash. This essentially allowed blizzard to cut off any potential illegal markets created by players, like the ones that sprang up around Diablo 2. However, it soon became clear that in order to drive up demand for the stuff in the aunction house, getting loot to drop while, you know, PLAYING THE GAME was super duper un-fun kinda rare. Thank god for Reaper of Souls, which removed the auction house and made loot drops a common occurrence again …

Sometimes franchises take weird turns, but Nuts and Bolts went full speed in the absolute wrong direction. Abandoning its platform roots that made the first two games beloved classics in favour of a car building sandbox, It could still be a pretty decent game, if it weren’t for the fact that it had Banjo Kazooie slapped onto it, and why? Because someone at Microsoft felt no one wanted 3D Platformers anymore. A bizarre UI and the regularity of new vehicles needing to be built took players out of commission after a few sessions, and you have a decision that started to see the decline of the once mighty Rare.

Before we get to our top pick, here are a few honourable mentions:

Life Gems
“Dark Souls 2” (2014)

Friendship Levels
“GTA IV” (2008)

Rage Meter
“God of War Ascension” (2013)

Gun Degradation
“System Shock 2” (1999)

Underwater Combat
“Monster Hunter Tri” (2009)

This is what many gamers feel could set a dangerous precedent for the future of gaming as a whole. At the launch of Sim City 2013, developer EA Maxis told players that SimCity was designed to be played online because the game required you to play with other mayors nearby, and that it was only possible to save through their cloud servers. This turned out to be a big fat lie, as within a week a modder found a patch in the code to make the game playable offline. Not only was the social feature something that no one wanted, but server issues cause the whole game to be completely unplayable at launch. All this forced EA to backtrack on its claim within a year, earning them the title of Consumerist’s Worst Company in America for the second year in a row.

Do you agree with our list? What do you think is the worst added feature? For additional top tens, be sure to subscribe to WatchMojo.com.