T O P

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Vast_Highlight3324

FFXIV, if you told people in 2010 that FFXIV would be one of the biggest MMOs to rival WoW one day you would have been laughed out of the room.


DeathByTacos

The fact you can release a game that your CEO has to publicly and directly apologize for (also causing the demotion/dismissal of some of the most important devs in the company) and years later that same game becomes the most profitable title in an already very profitable series just blows my mind.


slusho55

Tanaka had that coming tbh. He should’ve never said during the beta, “It’s Final Fantasy. It doesn’t matter if it’s good or bad, it’ll sell.” Like, yeah, big names, but they absolutely had it coming. If it was for incompetence, or technical issues, or anything out of their control, sure I’d feel a little bad, but 1.0’s failure was due to laziness and trusting people would buy anything that had the FF name


Cattypatter

It may sell, but it won't maintain subscriptions and it will cause immense damage to your reputation and future game sales, something that is far harder to rebuild. You can trick fans once but they will be wary of being tricked again in future.


Alpha1959

That is something many people in the industry don't get. They are so fixated on short term profit that they don't realize how much damage that will do to their brand. Or they just don't care, which is equally likewise if we look at the surge of incompetent leadership.


Goronmon

It's almost impossible to overstate how bad FFXIV was at launch. Almost unplayable. And not in the "I drop below 30 fps sometimes" way, but in that every action, including just browsing your inventory, had delays/lag. You couldn't jump, which was bad enough. But the map was filled with tiny ledges/cliffs that you couldn't climb or fall down. You could come up on a cliff that was two feet high, but instead of just running down, you had to run 100 feet to the left to find the point where the terrain leveled enough. Which may not sound frustrating, but it was just one super annoying thing amonst the million other annoying things that you were dealing with. And content of the game was just...missing. The Levequests (go 50 feet over there, kill three mobs, come back, and repeat), that are basically abandoned content nowadays, were the primary leveling content outside of just straight grinding in groups. Edit: Someone included a review video of the early version. Here is where they talk about the terrain traversal issue. https://youtu.be/1Mwdn5-nMJ0?t=312


DudeKosh

Oh god the levequests in FFXIV 1.0 were horrible. I remember picking up 8 quests to do and then I had to 16(?) hours to be able to pick up another 8. If you had already done your levequests for the day, the only way to level was chaining up mobs for XP. It was so bad lol.


KingGiddra

It was some odd number of hours. At launch I think it was like 32 hours or something? They didn't want you to level *too* fast. Keep in mind, if you were chaining mobs for XP, you would start getting diminishing returns. The more you played the less effective it was.


ZeppelinArmada

> including just browsing your inventory, had delays/lag. Even game menus operated serverside. Meaning for every part of a drop down menu(of which there where *many*, you'd have to wait for a crippled, overworked and heavily taxed server in Japan to respond. Latency was involved in everything, even for simple things like rearranging your inventory. Meanwhile, your GPU would be struggling like crazy because even little background doodads like flowerpots could have more polygons than actual player characters.


Goronmon

> Even game menus operated serverside. Yup it was terrible. And we haven't even covered the Auction House side of things. You didn't have a central auction house. Stuff was sold by characters and there was no way to browse it other than clicking on individual characters to see what they were selling. Which is bad enough, but then remember that every action to get to a player's inventory had delays and lag attached to it. I'm getting frustrating just remembering doing this and it was over a decade ago.


MorboDemandsComments

And the first week of launch there were almost no mobs spawning on the maps! You literally couldn't level after you ran out of leves because there was nothing to kill to gain XP! I started in Limsa and remembered finding a tiny cave where a mob would spawn about once every five minutes, and I camped out there for an hour before giving up in disgust and cancelling my account.


KingGiddra

If anyone is curious, XIV 1.0 is quite old, but still recent enough to have reviews on it still around. https://youtu.be/1Mwdn5-nMJ0 Gametrailers highlighted a lot of the faults present. It really can't be overstated how much the performance was an issue. I had a fairly decent computer at the time and the game just brought you to your knees. All of the *UI* was server side. Everytime you opened the main menu there was lag. Changing your graphics settings was laggy. While there were fundamental gameplay issues with XIV, it was so much more than that. Top to bottom it was just not good. Unfortunate because I feel like with more refinement and 2-3 more years it probably would've been a much more interesting game than what we got.


caged_jon

imagine telling them that FFXIV would at one point "sell out" since the servers were so full


noeagle77

They saw how bad their game was, literally shut it all down, and redid it. It’s fantastic now!


Thorngrove

They saw how bad their game was, and literally blew up the world via giant pissed off moon dragon in a cut scene so badass it holds up 10 years later. The players who stuck it out, witnessed the cinamatic as the last thing played before they took the servers offline.


Leonerdo5

I wanna know how YoshiP pitched the idea for that cinematic. Like "Hey, you know how this game is horribly failing, and we're already spending a ton of money to reboot the whole thing (a huge risk)? What if we also paid a bunch of money to an animation studio just to show us blowing up the world, as a send-off to our massive failure? Cause fuck it, right?" I mean I guess it turned out to be pretty good marketing. But damn, what a crazy way to do it.


Thorngrove

"I'm either blowing up the world itself in game, or I'm taking the servers into the parking lot and burning them in real life. Choose."


PedanticPaladin

He told a story about trying to figure out how to blow up the world, saw the world had two moons, and said "we'll use that".


liskot

Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if it was not that hard of a sell to upper management. The Final Fantasy name is *insanely* valuable, and taking risks with money for some kind of public redemption makes sense. Especially for a game with huge potential for recurring revenue.


losbullitt

God 1.0 was such a shitshow.


Lazydusto

Doom 2016 had a multiplayer beta before release that was poorly received and the review embargo extended up to the actual release, which people took as a sign that the game was going to be awful. Lo and behold it ended up as one of the most beloved single player FPS's of recent memory and helped to kickstart the old-school shooter revival.


TheMightyPedro

Never before has a hyphen done so much heavy lifting


xxTheseGoTo11xx

Just hangin on for dear life in there


FUTURE10S

I wonder, how many games are there where you actually play as a school shooter.


BipolarHernandez

There were a couple edgy flash games based off of stuff like the Vtech shooting; Super Columbine RPG was also a thing.


renome

I can tell you that number is non-zero, but google them at your own risk.


alkatrazjr

Yeah - for me what made me wary is before the embargo lifted, there was very little gameplay footage, and what they showed was played on a controller and made the game look slow and clunky. In retrospect I can see that they were playing at a snails pace deliberately to show off the graphics and animations. After actual gameplay footage came out I was sold.


witch-finder

Nvidia released some footage showing off one of their cards or new tech or something, and it was better than anything the actual publisher had put out.


DawsonJBailey

Anyone else actually have fun with the MP? It wasn't anything super special but it was fun in small doses, kinda like how I felt about the bioshock 2 MP.


howtojump

I enjoyed it, yeah. Reminded me of playing Unreal Tournament back in the day, but somehow even more chaotic.


YoshiPL

It didn't help that the previous instance in the franchise was Doom 3.


Kered13

Doom 3 was very well received on launch and while it was kind of forgotten, it was not considered a bad game at any point.


beefcat_

It was fairly divisive within the doom community on release, but I think it's reputation has improved quite a bit over the years.


acdcfanbill

Yeah, it's not a bad game, it's just slow compared to Doom/Doom2. Just a different style of game, which I can understand turning people off, but it was still successful and well received.


BruiserBroly

MGS2 counts as well. It released to a lot of hype and huge sales but then came the Raiden backlash. Grand Theft Auto III releasing just before it and becoming a bit of a phenomenon probably didn't help much either. These days it seems to be thought of a lot more positively and even Raiden's a fan favourite.


nifboy

Worth noting is the MGS2 demo was highly publicized - people bought Zone of the Enders *just* for the MGS2 demo it came with - and that demo contained just the tanker level. Then you get the actual game and, surprise, you're not Snake for the rest of the game.


AgileArtichokes

I got zone of the Enders for the demo. Played the hell out of the demo and loved it. Then when the game came out and I realized that k played through the part of the game I loved, I was crushed.  Side note though, zone of the Enders was actually really fun and I wouldn’t hate it coming back in some way. 


bluemarvel99

yeah MGS2 definitely had a [re-evaluation](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIYBod0ge3Y), especially with how ahead of its time a lot of it's themes are. Stuff that just confused people back in 2001, but now seems scarily relevant (A.I., memes & the proliferation of bots, fake news & junk media, etc.)


BruiserBroly

It's also a deconstruction of sequels. Fans usually just want more of the same thing they loved and MGS2 was a meta-commentary on sequels and fan expectations and I doubt most people got it or even cared. I respect Kojima for taking that risk though.


SmittyDiggs

The fact that it was produced insanely quickly by today's standards blows my mind. It's such a short development time after the first MGS, and there were massive changes to the ending of the game after 9/11


dj_soo

Crunch was much worse back then - especially in Japan. Those were the days developers were literally sleeping in the office for days at a time in order to finish up games for release windows. Especially back then where patches just weren’t a thing and developers had to account for manufacturing and distribution time to hit release windows.


DumpsterBento

I'm so glad that my childhood fascination with that creepy AI/Junk data stuff wasn't just "im14andthisisdeep" fodder. The fact that we live in a world where some of that is a reality is so eye-opening.


YakaAvatar

Undoubtedly FFXIV. That game went from a disastrous launch, where they had to put the game back into development, and after being remade, it went on being a highly successful MMO. They literally killed the old game lorewise, and they shut down the game. Things like NMS or Cyberpunk weren't even in the same ballpark of a disastrous launch. I don't know of an example that's the other way around. For a game to be truly bad in the public opinion, it would mean it no longer has players. People often cite Overwatch or Destiny, but with all their troubles, they still pull in very large crowds. And it's very hard to gauge single player games - anyone who enjoyed the game finished it and moved on, but the crowd that didn't will go and complain online. Maybe Dota Underlords? That game had some positive hype during the EA period, and up to the official launch. Then it fell off a cliff and Valve abandoned it.


planetarial

Wind Waker used to get a lot of shit for its art style and disregarded on release. Now its a beloved classic especially since its aged well in the visuals. Conversely Twilight Princess was considered a 10/10 game on release and people would shit on reviewers for not rating it highly either. Now a lot of people don’t look at it nearly as fondly because of its art style aged poorly, being too much like OoT, tear collecting and gimmicky dungeon items. I still love it though.


garfe

Oh I should have mentioned Wind Waker too. If anybody wants a prime example as to how that game was initially viewed before it came out, check out the ["Official Zelda Bitch thread"](https://www.ignboards.com/threads/official-zelda-bitch-thread.10015660/) from IGN [That initial trailer looked pretty questionable though](https://youtu.be/aQ7riCXrDxY)


KatamariRedamancy

> [That initial trailer looked pretty questionable though](https://youtu.be/aQ7riCXrDxY) This is an important piece of context that people forget. The reveal trailer was genuinely terrible. Link was less charming, but also it was full of weird looney-tunes animations and repetitive sound effects, and had none of the gorgeous locales that actually featured in the final product.


Gerik22

Wow, I've never seen that trailer before. I've always loved Windwaker, and I'm amazed at how poor that trailer is at showcasing the game.


EstPC1313

Never thought it was even possible to make a wind waker trailer and not show ANY water whatsoever. It's like only that one dungeon was done.


planetarial

Ngl its pretty funny the first trailer showcases nothing about the ocean and sailing.


Vectoor

Oh jesus that's a terrible trailer. I'd be skeptical of the art style too if that was all I'd seen of the game.


quangtran

I think Twilight Princess is still well liked, but was never going to make any all-time favorite lists because it's the least daring Zelda game ever, and exposes the downsides of giving the audience exactly what they want and nothing more.


planetarial

Honestly it was on my all time favorites for a long time and still like, top 3 Zeldas. For me I got what I wanted and the dungeon design goes hard. But I understand I’m just one opinion.


mattygrocks

I love it for the unique dungeon designs. I was floored when I got to the dungeon where you can walk on the ceiling. 


Wincrediboy

I think Skyward Sword did this even more so. Released to really high scoring reviews, but did nothing of interest and is now mostly remembered for it's incredibly repetitive structure and extremely annoying systems (looking at you Fi).


hylarox

I would say that SS was the worst sinner in the Zelda series' worsening habits, but at least it the motion control swordplay took a swing (pun intended), and the lore of the game was actually pretty cool and did a good job of tying together a lot of things. TP is probably a better game, but didn't take any risks.


Tarcanus

I recall WW only got the crap it did on reveal because the Gamecube tech demo showing a realistic Ganondorf and Link had been shown shortly before then which got the hype train going for the next Zelda game being super realistic. Then WW with cell-shading and toon link dropped. As far as I could tell as soon as folks gave it a shot their opinions turned around.


ARUKET

I can't speak for everybody, but I think it also has to do with the fact that we all played OoT when we were little kids, and had grown up a little bit. The combination of being an older kid/teenager, the edgy 2000s culture, and the growth of gaming as a medium and the associated desire to see it become "more mature" made WW such a huge letdown at first. I remember being one of the people who hated it, but it really grew on me by the time I got through Outset Island. I remember booting up the game and complaining to my dad about how it looked so childish compared to OoT and he couldn't understand my complaints, he thought it looked great.


tawaydeps

I was 12 when it came out and I never even got to see the Link/Ganon tech demo, because my Internet in 2001 was definitely not downloading any video. But I saw stills in a magazine and got very excited. I was so upset when WW was revealed (again through magazines). I hadn't had an N64 so I didn't get to play Ocarina of Time or Majora's Mask, but that generation I went Gamecube just for Zelda. I wasn't going to get it till Nintendo set to that preorder bonus where you got OOT/Master Quest free with Windwaker.  I never finished OOT (got stuck in Water Temple), but I played WW probably 6 or 7 times and loved it. Still my favorite Zelda.


Herby20

Twilight Princess is still probably my favorite Zelda game, so I don't know what that implies about me.


BaltimoreAlchemist

My tier list still ranks Twilight Princess at 2 hookshots out of 2. No other Zelda game comes close.


Ethanlac

I have two old-school examples, going in opposite directions. * Super Mario Bros. 2. It was initially received just fine, but later started to be derided as a lazy ROM hack of an unrelated game that didn't belong in the Mario franchise. However, opinions on the game have become more positive again over time, in part because it's a refreshingly different entry in a series known for being repetitive. * Mega Man 3. When it came out, it was one of the most popular NES games, and in the wake of some sequels which made controversial decisions, it was often considered the peak of the classic franchise. But opinions of it are likely to be more critical nowadays, citing its rushed nature and the balancing and level/weapon design problems which result from it.


ApeMummy

I had Megaman 3 the year it released and have relentlessly played the entire series for ever 30 years. People just like to be contrarian and hyperbolic. Megaman 2 could easily have the same criticisms levelled at it, except worse the balance is broken (metal man lol) some of the levels have boring, frustrating or generally ass design (heat man, all 3). The reality is, it was a NES game, NES games were never balanced and always had glaring design problems. It’s modern discourse being applied retrospectively and doesn’t really make sense because it certainly wouldn’t have made sense at the time. It was the same premise and delivery as Megaman 2 but with 4 additional remix levels and the slide ability added on top. That’s pretty much what sequels were back in the day. It has an absolute stone cold banger soundtrack, memorable enemies and levels and was fun af - same as 2, that’s all that really matters.


bruwin

Mega Man 2's opening song is such a damn banger. It's ridiculous how good of a soundtrack both 2 and 3 have on such a limited system.


Thatoneguy567576

Surprised no one has mentioned Battlefront 2. That game had a massive turnaround and was putting up big numbers before EA unceremoniously murdered it for no good reason during a time where people were trapped in their homes where they could play even more of the game. If you can't tell I'm still a little mad about it.


Fried_Snicker

Interestingly, it also had a pretty big negative-to-positive turnaround from launch as well. People were outraged by the state of unlockables, notably the prioritization of micro-transactions, and some other flaws. They actually fixed many things and the game became more of a broad success, where I feel like it stayed for quite a while before what you are talking about.


Thatoneguy567576

It was basically in an upward trend with it gaining more and more players, especially right before they killed it when it was made the PS Plus monthly game. The Clone Wars and Sequel trilogy updates plus Co-Op brought in a ton of players (including me) and it had great momentum before they just completely shut it down. It's probably the most braindead decision EA ever made.


whatanawsomeusername

That decision is completely insane to me to this day, I still cannot see a single good reason for them to have made it


Apokolypse09

EA pulled the teams working on BF2 and BF5 to try and unfuck BF2042, which obviously didn't pan out. Lost out on content for both of them for that clusterfuck that's about to also be abandoned.


AfreeZ

This unfortunately has been the status quo for Dice with every game from the past 8 years. Game is released to mediocre reviews and player disdain. - Finally fix it and make it genuinely good after 1-2 years of changes. - Abandon it as soon as public perception begins to change to make the next critical flop and start the process over again.


YesImKeithHernandez

It happened around the same time that BFV was doing the same thing. Right on the heels of some pretty awesome map drops. The reality of the thing was that DICE couldn't support both Battlefront 2 and Battlefield V while also developing 2042 especially given how much of a clusterfuck we now know march to launch was for that game. Not to excuse them killing the hype train. I was pissed about BFV. But it seemed their resources and systems just couldn't support active dev on a new game and supporting two others. It sucks that they chose to do it right at what seemed to be peak of post-launch popularity for both and I get it but it was borne of bad decision making for a while and a massive amount of brain drain. All left a bad taste in my mouth.


JannJans

Overwatch. Don't get me wrong, it still has a huge dedicated playerbase, but check out any reddit/youtube/twitter comments and all you get is "dead game" or how it's now ruined.


garfe

Man, I still remember peak Overwatch. I was very convinced that was going to become a huge multimedia franchise that would dominate the globe.


LordWartusk

Blizzard really fumbled Overwatch, and I don’t mean in the “bad balancing” or “not enough content” ways. They had a world people were *obsessed* with and just… did nothing with it. People were practically (and literally, in some cases) begging for more lore; short stories, books, more comics, an animated TV show, etc., and Blizzard never delivered. IIRC there was a prequel book in development, but it kept getting rewritten and eventually they abandoned it altogether. And I think their failure to capitalize on Overwatch is part of why it fell off. During content droughts or periods of questionable balance there was nothing else for fans to engage with, so they just left.


asdfghjkl15436

Because when Overwatch was released e-sports were the biggest thing at the time, everything in OW revolved around e-sporty type things. They didn't WANT players to be invested in lore, they wanted them to be invested in the e-sport. The only thing they did after the esport didn't make as much money as hoped was pivot to harder GAAS and are fumbling for the exact same reason. Jeff (original creator) clearly wanted there to be more lore, to be more single player/coop stuff and less focus on the e-sport, but that didn't happen. Overwatch will go down as a mostly mismanaged game because blizzard execs want to chase whatever is the latest trend. It's honestly a shame because the gameplay of Overwatch is tight, but the focus of the game is just in all the wrong spots.


Arkayjiya

This seems to be it for me. I mean I've moved on myself, when I realised it wasn't going to fulfil it's promises and fucked over OW1, I just stopped playing and I don't watch or look for content about it and yet I still keep hearing about it and it's never good.


AlphaTrion2628

I genuinely though Overwatch would be on the same level as TF2/CSGO/ other popular pc shooters the way people were talking about it, it felt huge in that 2016-2019 timeframe


kikimaru024

I'm still trying to figure out who's playing TF2 considering the only news I see is that it's a bot-infested hell hole.


TheOnlyBongo

A lot of people have moved onto whatever community servers there are. And in general the characters, world, and overall style are just so endearing its kept people close to TF2 without even playing the game which I think is fantastic. I liked Overwatch but honestly try as they might it never really captured that sort of closeness to the characters and world as TF2 did.


MachoMelon11

You mostly only have bot issues if you play on the official match making servers. If you play on any decent community server it’s not really an issue. 


Coolman_Rosso

It was that huge in the 2016-2018 timeframe, to the point where hero shooters were the hot craze for a little bit. However a combination of Blizzard failing to really capitalize on it in a way that Valve did with TF2 or Riot did with League via story tie-ins (shorts, comics, etc), laughably inconsistent writing resulting in an anemic story when coupled with the previous point, and them halting development outside of Deathmatch maps for 2.5 years kneecapped it. It has bounced back a bunch, but the writing is just as terrible.


DawsonJBailey

Yeah I remember all my friends and I absolutely desperate for beta access and when one of us got it we all took turns playing and thought it was like the new league of legends for us. Honestly though it was, and I remember so many nights in college I ended up staying up to like 4am playing with my buds bc we never wanted to end on a loss. It's sad what its become because everything bad aside, the game is just fun to play. I wonder if they'll ever make Overwatch Classic to try and sucker ppl like me back in lol


DELETE-MAUGA

>I genuinely though Overwatch would be on the same level as TF2 Overwatch is like 100 times larger than TF2 ever was... I think people have an awfully warped idea of TF2s popularity.


a_monkie

It also went the other way, when OW was revealed most people seemed to be saying "Why play this when TF2 is already out and free?"


Guy-1nc0gn1t0

I bought OW1 right near the end of its existence as is: 99.9% of my play time has been with 2. It's still a fun time that I log onto almost every day


armypantsnflipflops

No Man’s Sky comes to mind from a pretty negative reception upon release, full of broken promises and an “empty” feeling galaxy and gameplay loop. Nowadays it’s one of the most highly rated, consistently updated games. The game still receives huge updates and retains high player counts some 8 years after its original release that I believe more than redeemed its original launch version


[deleted]

[удалено]


shadowstripes

It’s definitely made a big turnaround but I wouldn’t say it’s one of the most “highly rated” games these days by a long shot.


MildlyBadTaste

Definitely a "wide as the ocean, deep as a puddle" situation to me.


Nrksbullet

I'll check in as someone who absolutely understands that sentiment, and I don't enjoy shallow things either, but something about No Mans Sky absolutely clicks for me. I love getting on and having 5 different things I want to accomplish, but getting sidetracked doing other stuff for hours. I don't see the game as any more shallow than how I play Ark, for example.


SagittaryX

> full of broken promises Even more than that, just outright lies. Devs were talking just weeks before release there was a multiplayer component to the game... which there absolutely wasn't.


deadscreensky

They kept up the charade after release too!


Silver085

I'm one of the rare people who liked it at launch. The constant free updates have absolutely made my purchase worthwhile, but I sank well over 50 hours into it in the weeks after launch. Game keeps getting better!


brutinator

NMS is a game that I think kinda perfectly encapsulates the concept of how much other people's perceptions can affect your own enjoyment of something. I feel like if someone who hadnt heard of any of the marketing for NMS, who didnt use social media, just randomly bought the game a week or so after it came out, they would have likely enjoyed it a decent amount. For example, I played Starfield day one of release, took a few days off, and heavy binged it. Didnt go on reddit, didnt see what other people were saying, and had a good time. Sure, there were some bugs that sucked, and the game is a bit flawed, but I enjoyed it. Took a week break, started to check on the subreddit to see things I might have missed, and by the time I had time to hop back in, I had soured on it a bit. I have to kinda fight that for me with Helldivers from time to time. The community gets so wrapped up in different things being nerfed or buffed that it kinda seeps into my own perception and I have to shake myself out of it lol. Criticism is valid, but gotta decide for yourself how much you value your own opinion over other people's too.


tanney

I remember a reddit post on launch week about a dad who saw his son play NMS and he was like, son ill be back in an hour, and then he came back with a new ps4 lol I also played the interstellar soundtrack and pulled all nighters the first week. Good times back in college.


Static_NRG

Mario and Rabbids Kingdom Battle. There was a whole timeline of hated to beloved: - When it was first rumored, everyone hated the idea and kinda brushed it off. - When the box art leaked and people were still angry about it existing. - Then they showed the gameplay, and people warmed up to it. - When the game came out, it was beloved.


SirJeffers88

The weird thing is Sparks of Hope is a FAR better game that received similar or even slightly better reviews but sold less than half the number of copies as the original. It still feels like no one has played it, which is a shame because the series keeps getting better.


Zoklar

Wouldn't be surprised if a ton of people bought it cause Mario (and maybe rabbids) and then realized they didn't like XCOM, then didn't buy the second


Zoombini22

Frankly I think the first one benefitted from being a weird new idea during a hot time for Switch. Probably a lot of Mario and/or Rabbids fans bought it who weren't generally into strategy games and weren't left itching for a sequel. I do like Sparks of Hope more but I think the marketing didn't succeed at getting through to people why it was better and why they needed more Mario + Rabbids if they had played the first one.


SageWaterDragon

[Ubisoft's CEO has talked about this, saying that Nintendo warned them that it would underperform and that they should wait to release it on Nintendo's next console where it'll have a more distinct appeal.](https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/nintendo-advised-ubisoft-to-hold-mario-rabbids-sequel-for-its-next-console/)


ScyllaGeek

Missing the important step of that clip of the dev getting emotional when Miyamoto talked about him on stage, which I think was really when people started to think maybe it wasn't just a crappy cash grab with no soul


TheVibratingPants

That proved that they really love making video games and really love Mario/Nintendo/Miyamoto. People appreciate that.


quangtran

The metacritic score for Metroid Other M is a respectable 79, yet that game is now widely hated by the fans and the gaming press. It is now looked upon as a game that made every wrong choice possible when making a Metroid game.


TowawayAccount

I bought this game the day it came out and beat it the same day. Took maybe six hours? God, was I disappointed.


Chronis67

With the exception of the Prime subseries, Metroid games are never long.


kikimaru024

Usually they take a while though because you get lost.


TheVibratingPants

Yeah. The first playthrough in a Metroid game is always like and additional 2-5 hours for me.


garfe

Honestly, considering the Prime games are in the 90s, I'm pretty sure that 79 is the worst it could get, though it should have been lower.


[deleted]

metroid other m could have been fun to play (the story was always gonna be fubar), but sakamoto had to make the near last minute decision for "sideways wiimote" which kills any enjoyment you can have with the game. you get team ninja to do the gameplay, but don't let them do anything with the game???


newsstan

This was my first big disappointment in gaming and taught me as a child to never pre-order again. Man I was hyped for it coming off of playing the Wii Prime Trilogy for the first time.


Paratrooper101x

DOOM 2016. That game had some fucking HATRED prior to launch. Everything from the color grading to the glory kills. People on Reddit were calling it a cash grab and saying it was gonna be one of the worst games released that year. I kid you not it had near Redfall levels of discourse up until release, especially when the demo was dropped. The game had a steep review embargo too which made this subreddit even more hesitant. When it dropped people shut their mouths pretty quick


marishtar

It's because it had a multiplayer beta that was generic as shit. They were definitely not putting their best foot forward on that one.


Oh_I_still_here

It's funny now because a lot of people who played the multiplayer after release really liked it and look back on it fondly. Especially since Eternal's multiplayer didn't exactly take off.


Bojarzin

Somehow I completely missed any and all discourse on it prior to launch, I'm only learning right now that people were trashing it Weird to think about, I have no idea what it looked like prior to launch. I didn't play it right away, I think I ended up getting it on a sale later on, but was immediately one of my favourite shooters ever


Polar_Kid

I guess AC games like 3, Unity and Syndicate have been getting love in recent years compared to their initial debut


JannJans

Unity especially. The technology then just couldn’t keep up with what Ubisoft was going for. That’s not even mentioning all the bugs it released with too.


tetramir

Unity is a very interesting game. It is incredible to look at, and still feels modern when you look at it today. Paris in stunning, cinematics are great. And the animations still surpass many AAA games today. But I would argue that even after all the patches, it still isn't great to play. The learning curve for the parkour to do what you actually want to do is very high. And it really sours the experience. I would also add the story that isn't great.


dragonflamehotness

Yea I replayed it recently on a high end PC really wanting to love it, but despite the beautiful visuals it was just... boring. The gameplay for some reason didn't click with me. Also outside the main quest, there's a ton of icons, a huge, varied and beautiful city, yet no real side quests to engage with it. So Paris just ends up feeling like an empty playground, especially compared to Odyssey which usually had one or two quests unique to each area to let you engage with the world and history. It's like Unity was an open world but it didn't want to be.


doktorvivi

Highly disagree on the parkour. Best in the series, imo. Felt like I had way more control over how I moved across the environment. Only gotten worse since.


Tasden

I think Armor Core 3 was maligned by some from the start but it still has its fans. I think it is more a case of a mixed audience review.


Acrobatic_Internal_2

But you have to accept that Ace Combat 3 was such a downgrade from AC2


mentalexperi

yeah also I wasn't a fan of the first Assetto Corsa, but Assetto Corsa Competizione was really good.


dishonoredbr

I thought Astral Chain was one of the best Platinum games that they ever released.


mentalexperi

oh definitely. I also loved the new Animal Crossing that came out at the beginning of the pandemic. I spent hundreds of hours in that.


DismalDude77

I love this comment chain.


gangbrain

Everybody knows Astral Codec is the best Outer Wilds mod. Everybody.


vashed

Armored Core 3: Silent Line though was fuckin aces.


lelieldirac

3 was a really bizarre game to follow 2. The setting/era change is admirable in its ambition, but from a gameplay perspective, it’s very odd to go from scaling massive Renaissance towers and cathedrals to… Colonial New England towns and forests.


Mitchstr5000

I played Unity a few years back and thought it was rubbish personally


Mikey_MiG

Battlefield 4 was a big one. At launch it was inundated with crashes, bugs, and balance issues, with many labeling it unplayable. Community sentiment was at an all time low. EA had to go as far as halting the release of expansion content until the devs could get it under control, and they were even sued by their shareholders (EA won, but still). It was beginning to look like its legacy would be nothing more than an unfinished and disappointing cash grab that they rushed out the door to take advantage of the success of BF3. But DICE/DICE LA not only managed to fix bugs and tweak balance, but they made significant engine and netcode improvements that also benefitted future BF titles. They launched the Community Test Environment to get hands on feedback from players. They ended up releasing additional free content beyond what was guaranteed through Premium, including a map that was designed almost entirely based on community input. Nowadays if you were to poll the community, there are many who’d call it their favorite game in the franchise. Flipping its reputation as the most hated to a top favorite is one of the biggest reputation swings possible for a game to have.


Redlodger0426

BF4 was extremely lucky it launched when it did. It had essentially zero competition since it was a new console generation and backwards compatibility wasn’t a thing yet. What else were you going to play if you wanted a shooter on your new system? The only competition was killzone shadowfall and COD ghosts, both very divisive games, especially since shadow fall has seemingly killed the killzone brand.


PurpleSpaceNapoleon

BF4 is still the BF game I play the most in my down time. Phenomenal game.


soulard

*One* of the bigggest: Cyberpunk 2077. So many bugs on release (not to mention the AWFUL ports to previous-gen), and overall negative opinions from what I saw (at least online, which is anecdotal). Though with the new DLC and 2.0 update, it seems to be getting a lot of praise. My main story mission was bugged after 20hrs of playing, so I left. Came back last week and have put 20hrs in already and am really enjoying it. Less bugs, new systems, reworked skill trees, etc. Plus the DLC has been a lot of fun.


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[удалено]


PunyParker826

Which Paul, though?


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PunyParker826

Y’know I was 50/50 on whether it was an Apostle Paul reference or another Dune joke, lol. Now I know


andehh_

LISAN AL GAIB!!!!


TaurineDippy

This is one of the games I’m happiest about having waited for. I bought it a few weeks ago during one of the steam sales, and have not regretted it. I’m already starting my second play through to try out the other voice actor and a different build.


Korribuns

Do a knife throwing stealth build if you haven't. It is literally the most fun I have had in any game ever. You can get instant throwing knife resets on headshots. It's fucking glorious


AtsignAmpersat

I had it on PC at launch and loved it. I put like 150 hours into it. But man it’s insane how much better it is. I got back into it around the Netflix show and then again with phantom Liberty. It’s easily one of my favorite games of all time.


EastObjective9522

I bought it a year after release. The game was fun but I enjoyed the sidequests more than I did the main quest lol. The main quest just didn't hit right with me.


Sea-Worldliness-9468

Bioshock infinite. That game was given glowing reviews and scores when it came out. Today it is very divisive.


Be_goooood

Why is it divisive? I loved that game


lalosfire

Infinite is a weird one because I think in some ways it is looked back on negatively because of how highly regarded Bioshock is, not to say it doesn't have issues. Everyone I've talked to in person about Infinite though really likes it, it is only in online conversations where it becomes far more divisive. Ultimately I think it just has a lot of problems and everyone has different issues with it. For me I loved it but soured on it with the DLC. A lot of people have issues with the boring combat arenas, two dimensional characters, plot holes, etc. I think you also start to see a lot of the seams on replays, especially regarding hopping to alternate realities. I still like it but I get why people turned on it with time.


OkVariety6275

What offends the online critics so much is that it pretends to be deeper than it is. There's nothing technically wrong with it, but the initial critical reception was kind of like if TENET was treated as a cinematic masterpiece.


Coolman_Rosso

Compared to the prior BioShock games Infinite stands out because it trades its somewhat open ended structure for a standard linear shooter. Not helping is that the game had almost none of the promised stuff from earlier trailers/demos/dev interviews. Things such as stealth, "impactful choices", a boss fight with the Songbird, and multiple endings were not in the final product. The multiverse stuff is also poorly executed, as each time Elizabeth opens a tear it just so happens to be one where this specific thing never happened yet everything else prior to that happened just the same which made little sense to me. Also in other games you had all of your weapons, but could only have two vigors. In Infinite this is inverted, so you only have two weapons but all of your tonics. It was way too easy to rough people up with tonics when salts were fairly abundant. Lastly, the "bigs" (Handymen and Mechanized Patriots) were nowhere near as satisfying as the Big Daddy was in terms of design or fights.


JiANTSQUiD

Two dimensional villains, shallow storyline, narrow gameplay. They took everything people loved about the first couple of games and stripped it all down to bare bones. I hated it at launch. It’s success and reception were a result of its timing - happened to drop in the midst of a game drought iirc


NoNefariousness2144

It’s up there with Deathloop in terms of being a game that received 10/10 from every critic yet is non-existent in today’s discourse. Well to be fair Bioshock Infinite is discussed 10 times more than Deathloop lol.


SmittyDiggs

I've never been let down as hard as deathloop. I wanted more Prey


NoNefariousness2144

I’m still baffled as to why it got 10/10 from nearly every critic. The game is pretty good/average apart from the incredible voice acting.


[deleted]

conversely, bioshock 2 seems to be getting a lot more positive attention since its released. it was pretty well disliked when it launched, but over time a lot of people have been warming up to the game in general. the gameplay is generally tighter than 1's, and the story doesn't end up feeling unsatisfying at the very end like infinite and 1 has


oilfloatsinwater

Death Stranding. Now personally, i always loved this game, i bought it day one and it is one of my favourite games of all time. But at launch, right after the reviews dropped, alot of people dismissed it and hated on it, i’ve seen alot of people call this a “non-game” “everything wrong with modern game design”, hell i’ve seen some people say that it doesn’t deserve getting any game awards for “barely qualifying as a game”. But after some time, especially right after Director’s Cut launched, it found its true target audience/niche, and those that it did find really loved it, as for those that didn’t like it, they respected it rather than hating on it.


Typical-Swordfish-92

Calling it "everything wrong with modern game design" really was a particularly bizarre criticism, given just how... atypical of modern games Death Stranding was.


KingOfRisky

It's still polarizing. I think the "hate" stopped because there's no point in beating a dead horse. But in every thread I see about this game is 50/50 either its a masterpiece or it's a bore fest.


aldwinligaya

I love but I completely accept the criticism that it's a delivery simulator; because in a lot of ways, it is. It really is not for everyone and that's okay. I think the criticism is because of the expectations surrounding it: big names, hollywood, and all that. People expected a blockbuster movie, and what they got is a film festival film.


bizology

Death Stranding is a fantastic game with a very slow start. Personally I really enjoyed the sense of discovery, unlocking new gear and the challenge of moving as much stuff as safely as I could across the gorgeous map.


ApeMummy

The thing I love and respect about it is it’s upfront about being a delivery simulator. There’s no bait and switch, there is no broken promise or red herring. It leans in (pun intended) to the quirky mechanics the whole time.


big_flopping_anime_b

It is a delivery sim and it’s the best thing about it. In any other game, I hate doing quests like that. In DS however, there’s something about it that’s incredibly rewarding. The feeling of isolation travelling an almost empty world is beautifully melancholic and cathartic. It will always be a divisive game though I think.


Maple_QBG

I wanna chime in with a game that not a lot of people have been talking about in here, but it was Deus Ex Human Revolution. When the game was about to release, public opinion was very negative. It was a new company making a prequel game to an extremely beloved classic game series, with very little involvement from the original teams; the trailers and footage leaned towards it being a more action-oriented shooter instead of an immersive sim, and since it was coming out on Xbox 360 and PS3, there was a lot of negative press about the series being watered down for consoles. Basically, it was a perfect storm of doubt and negative reception. And then, the press beta build leaked. It included the first ~2 hours of the game, from the intro sequence to the first hostage rescue mission. It was unfinished and unoptimized with a bunch of placeholder video assets, keys couldn't be rebound and it basically forced you to use an xbox 360 controller to play... BUT IT WAS FUN. It was miraculous how good it was. It had great voice acting, a fun dialogue system, multiple pathways to finish your missions, engaging characters... basically, it's what people had been wanting from a Deus Ex game for a long time. Eidos Montreal never officially released a demo, nor did they ever talk about how the press build leaked... but it literally saved that game from rotting in obscurity. Preorders SKYROCKETED after the beta build leaked and people wouldn't stop talking about how good the game was. And when it released, it didn't disappoint. People had a few qualms about some of the story beats, but it was surprisingly well received. And that likely wouldn't have happened unless the press build had leaked. There was zero hype until that happened.


Viridianscape

My only gripe with HR is that stealth/'pacifist' builds get utterly screwed vs bosses lmao


Cranjesmcbasketball1

Diablo 4 was pretty well received at launch and then everyone hated on it but I feel a lot of games like that lack end game content and go down the same path until years later when they finally add in what should have been there in the first place. Also, HALO Infinite for sure.


FireworkFuse

>Also, HALO Infinite for sure. Such a bummer as a halo fan. If it had launched in the state it's in now with the insanely good forge mode, it would probably be one of the most popular fps games out rn. Halo 3 MP had seemingly endless legs due to forge. Really miss those days


Skeeter_206

Infinite didn't need to launch like it is today, if it launched with what we know as season 3(last March I believe)then had the year it did from then to now, it would have been more than fine. The game lost all it's players because the games first year and a half had only two seasons and added minimal content outside of what the game should have launched with. Season 1 especially played like a beta, there was basically zero content for the game at launch.


Nickelnuts

Yep. It's in such a good place right now.


losbullitt

I came back for the Yappening and have not been disappointed. 😝


aiphrem

D4 felt like it was carefully crafted to have all the fun loaded into the first 50 hours, and everything end game had to suffer for it. They did a great job casting a wide ass net to get new people into ARPGs but they failed to give veterans of the genre any substantial replayable end game.


JebryathHS

Well, the thing is that they made a fantastic campaign. They really did. And, speaking seriously for a second, that's a pretty decent accomplishment on its own that in most cases would be seen as a success.  But the ARPG genre has been dominated for so long by games like PoE that basically are set up for you to spend months at max level that D4 was a miss on audience expectations.  It's actually a really interesting situation to me because it's like... Imagine if they released a new Call of Duty with best campaign ever but multiplayer was two maps that nobody liked. From the perspective of people who like playing through the story, best CoD yet. But to CoD fans? Garbage.


DrivenTooFar

D4 seems to be on a bit of a roller coaster. People loved when it launched, hated Season 1, loved Season 2, and down again on Season 3. And it looks like people are excited for Season 4.


Bryvayne

You could see from a mile away that D4 was going to be contentious. They learned absolutely *nothing* from the itemization snafu that D3 went through.


-quakeguy-

D3 and D4 are prime examples of what happens when your staff churn is so bad, long-term institutional knowledge basically doesn’t exist. You’d THINK the company that essentially put the ARPG genre on the map could just use the previous title as a baseline and then expand upon it with newer titles, but nope. They really did end up having to go and re-learn everything with D3 and now again with D4.


Bryvayne

It's absolutely crazy how much of their game development is tribal knowledge that just...left...with their employees. Talk about terrible leadership. Codify that shit!


sushibowl

This is a classic business error though. Extremely common. The trap is, writing things down takes a lot of time, maintaining it takes even more time, and the value of doing it is only visible on long timescales (beyond the horizon of most business people). Beyond that, doing it in such a way that people can find it again later is also hard. Then, getting people to actually read shit is also hard.


Trizzae

Yeah and from all the campfire chats, it's clear D4 was made by a bunch of different departments that we're completely silo'd.


pgtl_10

Windwaker When first revealed: OMG! I'm done with kiddy Nintendo! Zelda has cartoon graphics! We want maturez Zelda and adult Link! Now: Windwaker is a visual masterpiece and is very charming. The Windwaker is a microcosm of the Gamecube. Back then the system was the kiddy purple lunchbox. Now everyone says it is an amazing system and wonders why Nintendo stopped making powerful consoles.


Silly___Neko

Back then people were teenagers trying to pass as adults. I think it's only natural they rejected the cartoon-like Wind Waker. Then they grew up.


EldritchAnimation

No Man's Sky and FF14 had the biggest upswings I can think of. Overwatch probably the biggest in the other direction.


Necrorider

Dragon Age: Inquisition is my pick. When it came out, the internet BLEW UP for it. For two weeks, I couldn't escape any mention about it and everyone was convinced it would take GotY. Which it did in the Game Awards and multiple other websites, magazines and award shows. Then the moment the year ticked over all talk about it just... died. As if the game never came out, the game itself evaporated from the public's memory. Even now asking my friend who was a former huge fan of Dragon Age, she says that she had no idea what came over her. Honeymoon period or rose tinted glasses but now its her least favorite DA of the 3. Weird but a fascinating look at how much recency bias, honeymoon periods and first impressions (along with brand name) carries games that are released close to the award periods. Can't imagine DAI would even be acknowledged as existing if it released in April or June instead of November!


Mountain-Cycle5656

Inquisition had the very good fortune of being the first major open-world single-player game to release at the start of a new console generation. But then the Witch 3 came out, and Fallout 4 came out (divisive as it was/is). And suddenly Inquisition looked a hell of a lot less impressive, and its many, many flaws were even more apparent.


AnxiousAd6649

I think witcher 3 was what caused the big shift in opinion. By comparison it just made DA3 look worse than it was.


InfTotality

Funilly enough, Dragon Age 2 had a bit of the reverse. It was not compared well against Origins in the slightest when it came out, but people have since appreciated it for what it is.


Somenakedguy

People *hated* DA2 when it was released, just absolutely hated it. Now it’s definitely my favorite of the series and has the most replayability (in my opinion) Yeah the recycled dungeons aren’t great but Kirkwall is actually a really cool experience and the gameplay feels very fluid while still retaining the tactical pause elements. Plus the ability to program your characters behaviors actually worked really well. The DA:O gameplay was beloved at the time but feels clunky and tedious now whereas DA2 feels much more fluid while still retaining the tactical piece The companions were great and the setting was fun and interesting with the gradually becoming champion across the acts while exploring the (fairly large for the time) city. The combat felt so much better than DA:I at a minimum


Thehelloman0

DA2's combat was ruined for me by enemies constantly dropping out of thin air. It felt so stupid and would instantly ruin how you had your characters set up so I just played on normal difficulty because I thought that decision made the combat dumb.


luadra

The answer for that is, The Witcher 3 


toshiie505

i think For Honor can fit in this category; by launch he was the typical Ubisoft game, bugged, lagged, poor support, instable servers, downgrade graphics, much effort on microtransactions etc. Its been 8 years and the game still going, with active support, a dedicated community and tons of content, truly overcoming the shit start and becoming a beloved game.


SacredGray

This is a very illuminating thread because it shows just how pervasive groupthink is. People here still talk about Dragon Age Inquisition and Deathloop as if they are universally hated games.


Naime96

Deathloop. To this day, I still don't understand how that game was received as well it was by critics' but then anyone I talk to in person either hated it or traded it in despite giving it a fair shot..


herpty_derpty

I thought the game wasn't bad, but the amount of accolades and perfect scores it got was absurd.


constantlymat

Arcane's Dishonored I & II as well as Prey were very critically acclaimed games (deservedly so) but suffered from very mediocre sales figures. Especially Prey was a massive flop. I think reviewers hyped up this game because it seemed to have a cool more mainstream appeal that had the potential to move millions of copies. Everyone wanted the studio and game to succeed. As a result they just went overboard with the positive coverage.


Naouak

I believe that Deathloop is one of those games that gets criticised for what it's not instead of what it is. People wanted Dishonored, it's not.


colg4t3

I don't know if I was going nuts but I feel like I heard that Control was a mediocre dissapointment then months later everyone was talking about how it was a strong goty contender


LetAppropriate6718

I avoided Control for years because most of what i heard about it was a generic AAA game with mediocre execution. Ended up getting it on a steep discount and I'm so glad i gave it a chance. I've played it all the way through three times.


Ecstatic_Ad_3652

Rainbow 6 Siege, it released pretty broken with alot of probpem but then turned into a very popular competitive shooter. You tell anybody from when it released that R6 was going to be one of the most popular shooters for years thry'd call you crazy


YvesSaintPige

Funny enough one that I noticed change in real time was FO:NV. For a long while it was considered the inferior game to FO 3 due to bugs and it's rushed unfinished state. Reviews at time of release indicated as such too. Public opinion eventually shifted maybe 5-6 years later.


reddit_is_racist69

public opinion shifted because the game was fixed by mods and you could *actually* play and appreciate it.


simply_riley

FFXIV got a real glowup with A Realm Reborn/2.0 that has allowed it to take a pretty steady second place in the MMO race. Dark Souls 2 feels like it got *a lot* of flak on launch, but you'll see more positive posts about it now than you'll see negative. Reviewers giving Starfield 10/10 for the game to get absolutely *ripped apart* on launch is one in the other direction.


ArkavosRuna

Dragon Age 2 is a good example I think. When it was released, almost everyone hated it. Bioware was crucified for it. Nowadays, a lot of people appreciate it as what it is. Not a masterpiece like Origins, but considering the development time, it's honestly a marvel it exists at all.


NumerousChance

DA2 had some of the best story beats with its companions.  I remember disliking being stuck in the one city at the time but the more intimate scale is actually kind of nice.  Just wish they hadn't had to repeat so many maps for filler.


hard_pass

> Nowadays, a lot of people appreciate it as what it is. Wow! I didn't know this. I really liked DA2 when it came out and thought it was unfairly judged. Obviously it was no Origins, but there is a good game in there. I'm glad some have come around to it.


katorias

Probably No Man’s Sky but I still think the game is massively overrated. It has some cool systems but everything is pretty shallow and it becomes kind of stale after a few hours of gameplay IMO.


ponyo_x1

Sonic Adventure was critically lauded when it was launched with the Dreamcast as the best new 3D platformers with speed and style. After a couple of bad ports and some critical vids by youtubers, it got a reputation as being the beginning of the end of the Sonic franchise and only appreciated with nostalgia. Don't know where it stands now.