Most Disappointing Games Of 2012 So Far

With 2012 over half way done we decided to look at some of the games that left us disappointed. While these may not be terrible they were never the less disappointing for various reasons. If you disagree, agree or want to submit your own choices then feel free to comment!



Sean Halliday:

Ghost Recon Future Solider

As someone who didn’t mind the switch from tactical shooter to third person action shooter, I thought I’d enjoy future solider. Unfortunately the game fell flat at almost every turn for me. The campaign felt like a loosely stitched together set of rather dull and prolonged missions. Holding off a area from wave after wave of enemies was used way too much and far too often.

The action had its moments, but for the most part it felt dragged out and very tame. The gadgets added nice little touches here and there but ultimately felt rather gimmicky. With little to no narrative and a general hit or miss mission selection, Future Solider felt hollow both in single player and on co-op. Multiplayer wasn’t much better with some poor maps which often resulted in grenade spam. While some of the game modes were fun, the overall quality of the multiplayer was lacking. A number of nice ideas sprinkled into a rather average multiplayer experience. Gun smith was a nice novelty to play around with, but that was about it. Ghost Recon: Future Solider wasn’t a bad game, it simply left me feeling underwhelmed and disappointed.





Stephen:

Alan Wake : American Nightmare

Alan Wake was one of 2010′s biggest surprises, at least for me. It offered an engaging narrative, great visual style that contributed to the atmosphere and an overall compelling experience. Naturally, when I heard of a new Alan Wake title arriving on the Xbox Live Arcade platform, my nerve endings twitched with excitement. Unfortunately, American Nightmare wasn’t a continuation of the experience I had fondness for, rather a step backwards.



Easily the biggest flaw concerning American Nightmare was the ‘Groundhog Day’ nature of the story, whereby you replayed the same three sections three times each, with slight variations each time. Not only did it feel like the developers had run out of ideas so they repeated what they had to artificially extend the game’s length, but it removed a crucial element to what made the original Alan Wake so compelling – the feeling of not knowing what lay ahead. When you played through each chapter in AN, you knew what to expect, when you expect it and how to kill it. The result was a frustratingly simple experience that was only made difficult if you had a memory that couldn’t be cast back half an hour.



I was expecting so much from American Nightmare that what it eventually produced underwhelmed on so many levels, from the tedious narrative style described above, to the lack of intriguing characters and more. I never expected Alan Wake 2 but I was hoping for a title that could bridge the gap between the original and its inevitable sequel. Needless to say, that simply didn’t happen. American Nightmare felt like nothing more than a spin-off to Night Springs, the TV show prominently featured in the games, and a poor one at that. Had it it been a TV show, it would’ve been cancelled before the first season had even concluded.



Sean Clayton:

Prototype 2

Although the original Prototype came out amongst some great company (inFamous, Red Faction: Guerrilla) it was more than capable of holding its own; with a decent story-driven element that drove you forward and a power-fantasy element that went above and beyond what the competition offered. Prototype 2 missed the point completely when it followed up in early 2012 with a less compelling, less driven mess of a game that offered none of the flair of the original. Prototype 2 seemed to miss the idea of balance that the first game was excellent at capitalising on; yes, you were an over-powered mutant but you also had a heart and a driving force while, in the sequel, you were a heartless killing machine with a throwaway story, seemingly drawing from such games as Army of Two with its douchey fist-bump humour that overshadowed what could have been a fun experience. The violence had become uniform, unearned and less desirable. The power-fantasy was exponentially bigger and yet the drive to discover more of these powers and live out such dreams was gone. The sequel lost focus and therefore balance and became little more than a plod to the end just to see the completion of the weaker story and to never have to come back to the game again.

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