Top 10 Video Game Trailers Better Than The Game

Presenting the world’s greatest wolves in sheep’s clothing. Join http://www.WatchMojo.com as we countdown our picks for the Top 10 Video Game Trailers Better Than The Game.

For this list, we’re counting down our picks for the best trailers that got us so hyped to try out the finished product, but once we pressed start we just couldn’t shake our feelings of disappointment. Sorry PT and Silent Hills, but thanks to Konami we never actually got the chance to play the actual game so you’re disqualified.

This epic trailer promised to make us feel like badasses taking on fearsome adversaries in intense brawls. While we ended up with a solid RPG with various fetch quests, missions and a healthy dose of text adventure, the intensity of the trailer was lost in the countless hours spent on the campaign. The typical RPG combat felt hollow compared to the choreography of the trailer, and the promise of choosing your own destiny felt wasted when sequestered in small repetitive environments washing out the epic scope and feel of the story.

K, after a decade of development hell, we knew this wasn’t gonna be the game of the year. But, the trailer did give us a slim glimmer of hope that it would at least be a bit of dumb fun – a throwback to a simpler time, perhaps. Alas, in the end, Duke was stuck straddling the old and the new, with lame jokes and a confusing bunch modern shooter mechanics, without doing anything new or interesting with any of it. Duke as a character was just as we remembered him, which made him feel old and dirty, and not cool at all. It was time for Duke to grow up, but instead we got the same dirty jokes.

There was a renewed focus on cinematic presentation for the new console generation, and Ubisoft promised to deliver it with a trailer showing off a slick and sneaky assassination. Being surrounded by a crowd and still managing to take out your target using parkour skills was impressive and looked fun, but it turns out the game thought little of the city’s AI which resulted in a world that felt lifeless despite its size. The potential to make you feel like a stealthy assassin was all there, but it never delivered the killing blow.

Taking on zombies as military personnel should have been intense, and the cinematic and atmospheric trailer had a perfect blend of horror and action to get your adrenaline pumping. But then the game turned into a mechanical and AI mess. The best military games put effort into making your comrades effective partners, yet the trailer’s emphasis on a team based zombie genocide was simply non-existent in the end. Here’s what I’d say instead of the yellow: While we’re not completely against an action focused Resident Evil game (as long as it’s a spin off) at least make it a good spinoff.

Sony would rather forget the debacle this trailer caused. Promising incredible graphics and cinematic gameplay that would justify the high cost of the soon to be released PlayStation 3, Sony passed off the video as in game footage despite it actually being pre-rendered, and even included an entirely fake gameplay segment. While they did end up doing a good job with the final game, the trailer built up so much hype and received so much criticism for essentially being a bait and switch that the game simply had no chance of living up to the trailer’s tainted legacy.

The beloved movie franchise seemed to finally have its chance at delivering a truly bone chilling Alien experience. Being part of a large military group getting massacred by the Xenomorph threat, we thought of nothing less than tons of action, heartfelt losses, and scary aliens. The game was a love letter to fans filled with little nods to the franchise, but the intense struggle the trailer showed was all but lost with the copious amount of ammo and weapons. You’re never left wanting in firefights, and the Xenomorphs ended up as nothing more than roaming idiots. There’s nothing less frightening than that.

Promising first person platforming like never before, and never since, this trailer was exhilarating to watch as we witnessed parkour jumps across buildings. But the excitement never returned in game as the repetitive, linear levels, and poor combat set pieces left players with little desire for a follow-up. The lack of platforming imagination and gameplay options made the game feel extremely limited and what should have been an example for others to follow became nothing more than a curiosity.

Bioware has always been a strong storyteller, and their foray into this universe is no different. With an epic trailer that oozed the Force, we were ready to forget the prequel movies and return to what made this franchise so special. The game’s story choices felt impactful and did Lucas proud, but then the gameplay got in the way. The promise of becoming a Jedi just doesn’t meld well with slow and repetitive RPG mechanics. Ultimately, the intense lightsaber clashes of the trailer were left behind in favour of executing commands. If only we got a movie length version of this trailer instead.

This live action trailer reminded everyone that the Covenant was dangerous. It was emotional, intense, serious and even scary. The final game was impressive by all counts, with a compelling campaign and excellent multi-player, but it was missing the emotion and thoughtfulness from the trailer, not to mention the super gritty atmosphere. The trailer was a reminder that you weren’t the all powerful Masterchief, but another soldier fighting an unstoppable enemy. The game was a reminder that the Covenant still felt like the villains from a Saturday morning cartoon…

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

Call of Duty: Ghosts (2013)
DC Universe: Online (2011)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution (2011)

Taking the media by storm, this controversial trailer received a huge backlash for showing violence against children. The beautiful slow motion trailer depicted a heart wrenching zombie apocalypse, but the game ended up as an action heavy RPG with bland and repetitive missions. This is why it’s important that your trailer reflect your game properly, because people felt like this was a bait and switch, plain and simple. Ultimately, though Dead Island did a lot of things right, the gameplay experience became as mindless and heartless as the zombies roaming the island, and that’s why the trailer was so much better than the game.

Do you agree with our list? What’s your favourite trailer that was better than the game? For more hyped top 10s published daily, be sure to subscribe to WatchMojo.com.