1. Cyberpunk 2077
Remember the hype train? CD Projekt Red promised the moon, delivered a buggy mess, especially on last-gen consoles. Night City was gorgeous, sure, but the systems felt shallow, the AI brain-dead, and the glitches legendary. Yet, the story had hooks, the characters were compelling, and eventually, patches and the Phantom Liberty DLC made it playable, even great. We stuck around for that glimmer of what could be, and the sheer audacity of its ambition.
2. No Man's Sky
Hello Games sold us on infinite exploration, but launch felt like a tech demo, not a game. A universe of nothing, really. The community felt betrayed, and rightfully so. But credit where it's due, they never gave up. Years of updates, new content, and a listening ear transformed it into something truly special. We kept dipping in, hoping for that promise, and eventually, we got it, proving sometimes developers *do* care.
3. Anthem
BioWare, the masters of narrative RPGs, chasing the live-service trend with Anthem. It was a beautiful disaster. The javelin combat felt fantastic, genuinely. But beneath that shiny exterior lay a barren wasteland of repetitive missions, a nonsensical loot grind, and a story that felt like an afterthought. It was a prime example of chasing market trends over creative integrity, a sad end for a studio trying to mimic others. We played for that brief flight fantasy, then logged off forever.
4. Death Stranding
Kojima went full Kojima with Death Stranding. A walking simulator for some, a profound exploration of connection and isolation for others. The gameplay loop was divisive, often tedious, yet utterly unique. It’s hard to call it "off the rails" in the traditional sense, more like it *created* its own rails in an entirely different dimension. But people played it because it was *Kojima*, and sometimes, you just gotta see what kind of fever dream he cooked up next.
5. Starfield
Starfield, Bethesda’s grand space odyssey, promised hundreds of planets, boundless exploration. What we got was a loading screen simulator with vast, empty spaces and procedural generation that felt… lifeless. The core Bethesda loop was there, but stretched thin across a galaxy that lacked the handcrafted charm of their previous worlds. It felt like an ambition measured by quantity, not quality. We played because it was Bethesda, but mostly just wandered around, hoping for *something* more.
6. Mass Effect: Andromeda
Mass Effect: Andromeda had the unenviable task of following a beloved trilogy, and it stumbled hard. Facial animations were meme-worthy, the story felt generic, and exploration was a chore. It completely missed the narrative depth and character impact of its predecessors. This was BioWare again, struggling post-original team, trying to capture lightning in a bottle and instead releasing static. We played out of loyalty to the series, hoping to find a spark, but mostly just sighed.
