Your 2008 disappointments.

[Balrock246]

The whole point of "Mirror's Edge" is for you to have a myriad of choices available to you, all while sticking to a relatively linear path. You can climb a cooling unit, or you can jump on top of it; you can run along a wall to get past it and grab onto a pole; you can find another ladder to get where you're going instead, et cetera. I've mentioned this on the forums before, but it's basically a modern day "Sonic the Hedgehog" (as in, Genesis-style) -- if it had better combat, free-roaming, and so on, it'd be a pretty GTA clone. Why do we need another one of those?

Here's the main problem though, through 75-85% of the game your running for your life from cops and you don't get the opportunity to explore levels and do the cool tricks that the game was hyped up with. And a lot of times (especially when indoors) there is only one path and generally only one method to go along that path.

Now this does get resolved in time trials where (from my experience, haven't played this too much) there aren't any cops but really how many ppl want to solely play time trials where any mistake basically forces you to restart.

btw Free roaming and good combat where you don't die in 2 shots does not make it a GTA clone. Just because a game has free roaming does not make it a GTA clone >.>

Unfortunately, pretty much everyone who has played "Mirror's Edge" has missed the point, so the game's sales are doing horribly and EA is considering canning the franchise already. People are complaining about story, and combat, and all of these things that are just asides to the real experience -- nobody cares about the replay value because they don't like to replay games that way. It's very sad.

However the thing is that story and combat are a part of the experience. Doing the same section over and over because I'm forced to fight cops who are drastically more powerful then I am decreases my enjoyment of my experience with the game. And Mirror's Edge has no replay value; it's a linear plot with linear levels and as mentioned before often linear paths.

People used to knock EA for not innovating, and now that they are, no one cares. (I don't disagree on "Spore," though, but I was never excited about it at all, so I don't think about it much.) Cool, they'll be back to just churning out sports titles in no time.

I do not knock EA for trying to create a different game. I'm just stating the areas where the game fell short. I am highly looking forward to the next in the series and hoping it improves.

[Kurp]

Brawl and GTA IV.

Spore sucked, but after so many delays, I stopped caring.

[Kohan]

Here's the main problem though, through 75-85% of the game your running for your life from cops and you don't get the opportunity to explore levels and do the cool tricks that the game was hyped up with. And a lot of times (especially when indoors) there is only one path and generally only one method to go along that path.

Now this does get resolved in time trials where (from my experience, haven't played this too much) there aren't any cops but really how many ppl want to solely play time trials where any mistake basically forces you to restart.

The time trials are where all the replay value lies. You said that it doesn't have replay value, but that simply isn't true. That's why I made the reference to Sonic titles. Did anyone play them for the story? Heck, no. You played them over, and over, and over, shaving off a few seconds here and there until you were absolutely bad ass at them. That's what the time trials are there for. If you don't like that type of gameplay, then "Mirror's Edge" is not for you.

Meanwhile, I am loving it to death because as a friend says, this is what Sonic in 3D should have been. It's all about momentum, efficiency, and fine-tuning your times -- it's beautiful. Couldn't care less about the story, combat, and all that, it's perfecting the time trials I'm after.

I am especially bitter and snobby about this game, though, so don't take it personal.

[Koyuki]

Mercenaries 2
Saint Rows 2
Warhammer Online

[Elesirdur]

Fable II - though my personal disappointment with the game is tempered against my girlfriend's enjoyment of it; she's put way more hours into it than I have and is still having fun.

But Spore definitly takes the crown of shit for biggest disappointment for 2008. Will Wright and Maxis games have a special place in my heart since they were some of the first games that I got to play as a kid and the first games that made me feel like a gamer. I had been hanging on every press release, video, and screen shot of Spore since I read about it first back in like 2005 and was waiting for something amazing. What we got, unfortunately, was so scaled back and simplistic I was just appalled. Sure I played it pretty much non-stop for over a week, but after I had made it to the centre of the galaxy I just did not care anymore. Biggest letdown of 2008, no contest.

[Olo401]

As much as I want to like Warhammer Online, I really find myself shoveling it off to the side more and more so I can play FFXI again. Some of the necessary changes the made recently are OK, but just aren't enough to balance things out. Combine that with the server merging shit and consistent gfx AND crashing problems that have been around since day one, and things just aren't looking good at all.

In fact now that I'm talking about it, I was just shopping around for another MMO to try out. Jumpgate Evolution looks really promising, if they can do the upgrade of the original game correctly. Shit if SE could pull off a full game engine & gfx overhaul for FFXI like Jumpgate is planning, and maybe add in some better PvP shit, it'd give the game so much more life.

[Kenai]

Mmmm...

Wii Music (but not for what you might think)
Fable 2 (I had fun with it, I wanted to like it more, but the last 1-2 hours of the main story ruined a lot of the fun)
Infinite Undiscovery (I was hoping for so much more from a new IP with that pedigree)
WoW (stupid ass OP'd DK's, but I really liked the rest of the Xpack, just not as much as I hoped I would)
FFXI (stupid ass Alexandrite crushing my few remaining PUP dreams)
Wii/DS western dev support (you people FAIL and should feel bad, I REALLY hope the PS3/X360/PSP/PC market will be enough to support you though, good luck)

That's it, I think. Far more enjoyments than disappointments, thankfully.

[Exoduso]

Wii Music

Were you expecting Rock Band 3?

[Kenai]

Were you expecting Rock Band 3?

No. Wii Music and RB are totally different games. Wii Music is actually a conundrum: on the one hand, I consider it to be by far the most "hard-core" of the Wii line, and somewhat well done at what it does: making and changing the music to make it sound good is REALLY HARD, and if you get it right, it actually sounds really unique and awesome.

On the other hand, I HATE games that focus so much on user-created content, which is what this game does and little else. User-created content in itself is perfectly fine, but I hate doing things like that for some reason. I simply can't motivate myself to make anything like that on a regular basis, so having to do that a lot is a buzzkill for me. There are some other problems with the game (even though I think the hate on the game is amazingly irrational, especially by people that haven't played it, it's NOT a simple game), but I had no idea it would be like that. I wanted more Nintendo songs on it too.

[Dayson]

Going to go with Spore. Lacked a lot of content imo. Also, wtf concerning getting attacked by other races. I'd be on the other side of the goddamn galaxy plantings trees on some random nameless planet I just glassed with my ship and low and behold my home planet gets attacked.

How can I be the only goddamn space ship my civilization has to defend itself? They have to call me back from my campaign of destruction and terror to wax some random pirates? I got so tired of having to help out my allies that I just start nuking planets and made a mad dash to the center of the galaxy where I met Bob, or Joe or w/e God's name was. Haven't touched the game since.

Fable 2 was very disappointing as well. For a sandbox type rpg the game was quite linear and there wasn't much room to explore and such. Casting spells was practically useless until I built up a dick load of hp, because by the time the spell was ready the enemy would have already carved their initials into my chest.

Not to mention the act of just eating a pie made my character fatter than holy hell all of the sudden. I went with the female character and god after I had skilled her up she turned into this horridly buff and ugly monster with a decidedly evil smile, and of course the pot belly from the pies.

Oh and of course the lack luster ending where all you do is walk up and stab the bad guy once to kill him.

Grew bored with the game after a couple hours, married two men and moved them into two houses across the street from each other just to watch them have a bitch fight in the street over me. Then I killed them both and put the game away.

[chazzyphizzle]

Aside from the final hour or so of Fable 2, the most glaring problem in my eyes was that there was pretty much 0 penalty for dying. ONOES if i die i can't pick up that 200exp!!! That dimmed the light for me and then the ending flipped the switch entirely.

[Kyo]

Aside from the final hour or so of Fable 2, the most glaring problem in my eyes was that there was pretty much 0 penalty for dying. ONOES if i die i can't pick up that 200exp!!! That dimmed the light for me and then the ending flipped the switch entirely.

You also suffered body scaring as well.

[Tomiko]

FFXI (stupid ass Alexandrite crushing my few remaining PUP dreams)

I agree on this one.

Mario Kart: Wii is my addition to the thread. I love the game, but the items ruin it way too much at times. After seeing the customization in Brawl, I was hoping for similar here, but I got Blue Shell'd and Pow Block'd up the ass instead.

[Ohaigaiz]

Basically all big title releases.

[GraveRobberX]

GTA IV, where did all the fun stuff go?

Mercenaries 2, WTF!!! did anyone game test this, glitches/bugs galore
A Special Fuck You on the Pirate Missions, FUCK YOU Parrots!!!!!!!

Mirror's Edge, great game, but the time trials pissed me off, no leeway, come the fuck on
11:00 minutes to get Chapter 2 done w/o 1 hiccup, mistake, death, or wrong turn, and if you do mess up, timer keeps going (5-7 seconds lost) Fuck That!
Chapter 2 is long, longcat long, so many twists and turns, just youtube it, its insane

[Arachna]

GTA4, good game, but not as good as it was made out to be.
MGS4, I still really enjoy the game, in fact it is my GOTY but I can't overlook how disappointed I was with certain parts of the story.
Gears of War 2, terrible matchmaking system and the campaign was just ok in my book.
The Last Remnant, installing to the HD took care of a lot of lag issues but without going into too much detail I wanted to bang my head against the wall when Emmy joined. For christ sake, I saw it coming but it still pissed me off, what a waste.. (I stopped playing at that point, I'll pick it up again soon though)
DMC4, "Hmm, I know how to make the game longer, at the halfway point, make them backtrack the way Nero came from using Dante, nobody will notice!"
Wii, I finally got around to playing some games at a friends house. Sure it's fun for a few hours but I prefer the good old controller, playing games I enjoy a lot more on the PS3/360.
Sony, for fuck sake, pay money to keep games exclusive to your fucking system.
Microsoft, you sent me a message saying I'd get 400 MS points for free back in July, I never got them. Communists.

[0ni0n]

Spore, what a disappointment it was! I first saw a trailer of the game a couple years back and it looked phenomenal. Only to find out that it became a combination of watered down version of civilization, sim city, and flow (the game where you evolve as a micro organism by eating others). I didn't even bother downloading it after playing it for a bit at a friend's place.

Farcry2, bought it and played for about 12 hours. Without some sort of viable online feature like left 4 dead, repetition just killed it for me. Every mission seems to consist of 15-25 minute of driving and 5 minute worth of shooting, and it reminded me of some of my FFXI days. And what sup with just 1 main weapon? Sniper riffle or Mp5? How about both? I liked the fact that weapons are worn down overtime and it really added a reality element to the game play. But after a while, the only thing it contributes is your travel time. It was a fun game while it lasted but it was definitely not worth the $50 price tag and 9.2+ rating on many game sites.

[Xanthu]

I'm trying to work through the Brawl Bawwwing, which I admit I may have missed elsewhere, I got it kinda late.

I dunno, what were you expecting out of it? It's a fun fighting game with Nintendo (and other) characters. I'm sorry it didn't shit gold?

And I didn't play it myself, but Spore did seem to be a big disappointment, especially with all the hype around it.

[Null]

Did I actually see somebody say MGS4??

I'd have to say Fallout 3 was the most disappointing for me. =Granted, I beat it three times and put hundreds of hours into it. I still couldn't help but feel a bit underwhelmed as a whole.

[BadKarma]

Did I actually see somebody say MGS4??

I'd have to say Fallout 3 was the most disappointing for me. =Granted, I beat it three times and put hundreds of hours into it. I still couldn't help but feel a bit underwhelmed as a whole.

MGS4 was awesome but it could have been better in my book