Non-RPG General News - Fails of the Year 2016

Gamepressure made a list of a few fails of the computer gaming industry in 2016:

Fails of the year 2016 – let's get ready to grumble

The gaming industry has definitely witnessed worse years than this, but it could’ve been A LOT better, too. 2016 is coming to end, and it’s the right moment to sit and moan about all the things that went wrong in the gaming biz in the last 12 months.


The ending year will surely not go down in history as the best 12 months of video games. It’s not that it was an unusually bad year – a couple of really good games came out, both in the AAA (Uncharted 4, Titanfall 2) and the indie segments (Darkest Dungeon, Inside, Firewatch). But for every great game that came out there was a new flop or controversy waiting around the corner to even things out. And since we’ve discovered sadistic inclinations within our editorial team, we’ve cooked up a nice little sum-up of the greatest disappointments of 2016 for our readers.

With some of the following stories you’re probably all too familiar, and about others you might have never heard – we discuss games that simply didn’t live up to our expectations as well as calculated schemes.Althoughmost of you won’t be surprised to see No Man’s Sky as number one on this list of shame (let’s skip the artificial anticipation – we all knew who messed up the most this year), a few unpleasant surprises are also listed among the remaining 14 entries. Still, our goal isn’t to beat a dead horse – we just feel there are a couple of things we should publicly denounce to make sure they never happen again.

Let’s quit the stalling. Despite the unpleasant subject, we wish you a pleasant read, and hope that the coming year will generate a much shorter list of failures.

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Thanks Farflame!

More information.

Imo this year was very bad in terms of good games releases and disastrous for pc games because almost every AAA was a shit port release.

Originally Posted by porcozaur
Imo this year was very bad in terms of good games releases and disastrous for pc games because almost every AAA was a shit port release.

I can only agree. Thank goodness for Steam user reviews and refunds.

Year 2016 was a good year for me. It's all personal. I'm not going to enter into the discussion though, because I'm sure you'll start to bash any game that I'm going to mention here.

Originally Posted by Lev
Year 2016 was a good year for me. It's all personal. I'm not going to enter into the discussion though, because I'm sure you'll start to bash any game that I'm going to mention here.

I'm glad you enjoyed 2016, good for me too. I played some good games in amongst the stinkers. I resent the implication that I mindlessly bash games btw.

Tastes differ you know, best not to get worked up about it. Forums are for discussion of positive and negative elements. Can't really avoid it and I'm sick of tip-toeing around other peoples sensibilities so tough bikkies.

Have a happy new years!

Good gaming year for me - although I mostly played game released in previous years:

Mordheim
Age of Wonders 3
Divinity Original Sin 2 (alpha)
KOTOR 2
Eador: Imperium (alpha)

Were the most notable. Not bad at all.

The article blames Bethesda's new reviewing policy on the ground it prevents buyers from making an informed decision.

Several articles from that site were already posted: they all failed to inform about the product, only to inform on the writer's tastes.

Bethesda's decision has one effect: writers from that site will no longer receive a copy before initial release.

It does not remove information as articles from that site fail to inform.

Who the hell are these people?? "Titanfall 2 is a great title, its potential slaughtered by a thoughtless marketing decision." Excuse me? How do they know what department decided on that date?

Bethesda review policy: most-ado-about-nothing story of 2016. There's typically just a few days between the review date and the release date anyway. The solution for gamers is very VERY simple: don't pre-order or even buy the game on day 1. If you can't possibly wait that long then you've got a serious problem handling marketing hype that's going to mess your life up right and left so you and better start dealing with it instead of blaming others for not catering to it.

There is another issue as well: a certain risk that, in face of such policy, reviewers may be urged to finish their pieces before other sites do at all cost, which could impair the quality of their reviews. Bethesda explains that they want everyone to enjoy their games at the same time, adding that pre-release reviews don’t influence their sales. Curious.

Yeah, it sure is. The answer doesn't fit the question at all. Maybe you should tell us your source for this so we could see if there's some sort of miscommunication going on… but you don't.

Battleborn hasn't been thoroughly designed and developed?? I really doubt that. Maybe you don't like what they came up with but you better have some evidence if you're going to throw out accusations that they didn't even try.

Bah, enough with it. This article is more like a nicely done forum post than an article. I can read plenty of those right here.

Originally Posted by Zloth
Who the hell are these people?? "Titanfall 2 is a great title, its potential slaughtered by a thoughtless marketing decision." Excuse me? How do they know what department decided on that date?

Those people can't fathom disappointment with Titanfall and Watch Dogs gamers punished by not buying the sequel even if it was the best game in the century.
No date would have helped, no decision would have helped. Nothing. Dampings need to be scrapped not invested more into it.

Dancing on EA/Ubi CEO music? Their problem.

Was a great year for me, one of the best. Not looking forward to 2017 for many reasons though.

It was pretty bad for me. I barely played any games released in 2016. Out of all 2016 games I spent most time with Xcom 2 and then Siege of Dragonspear( less than expected).
Tried new Civ and tried a couple of other games as well, nothing stuck.
Spent most time playing Path of Exile in the end.

CoD seems to be dying out. But biggest fail? Capcom: Umbrella-rebels? Forces? Hell, I can't even remember the name. Edit: Corps, that's the name.
Massive fail of a launch, even on day one practically no one played it.
What's even more dumb, was Capcom already had a very interesting melee/TPS system from RE VI, which worked amazingly well outside of main story/in mercenary mode. With some tweaks/refining, it would make one hell of a PvP game.
Never understood what was there to be hyped about NMS to begin with. Also Denuvo seems to have completely failed in boosting PC sales as publishers were expecting. Surprised no one mentioned this.

The biggest fail? No Man's Sky of course. But the biggest RPG fail, I'm thinking the Technomancer. I remember how hyped people were about that game. Wasn't it voted close to the top for RPG of the year around here? I just picked it up for $15 on Steam Winter sale, but haven't played it yet. Not too many good RPGs have been released in 2016. The only titles I can think of right now are Tyranny and DOS 2. DOS 2 looks great but is still in early access and in a rough state with not much content. Tyranny is good, but I've only played 13 hours and from the sounds of it, that's about half of the game.

I think that 2 games I'm most looking forward to are ELEX and ME Andromeda.

Originally Posted by Zloth
Bah, enough with it. This article is more like a nicely done forum post than an article. I can read plenty of those right here.

I can support the idea though. The end of the year is usually about recognizing the best efforts, but it's also important to recall the biggest missteps. Maybe we need a video gamer's equivalent of the Razzies? If only for a good laugh.

Originally Posted by Hyperion
Not too many good RPGs have been released in 2016. The only titles I can think of right now are Tyranny and DOS 2. .

No love for deus ex and dark souls?

Anyway if there would be a best rpg of 2016, my vote would go to salt & sanctuary, exceptionally done

Good year for me, dark souls 3 took most of my time. I'm also enjoying DX:MD and watch dogs 2.

Technomancer disappointed, combat was tedious due to enemies taking so many hits to kill. So I ended up getting bored with it. I'll most likely give it another go at some point though.

Weak year indeed

Originally Posted by joxer
Those people can't fathom disappointment with Titanfall and Watch Dogs gamers punished by not buying the sequel even if it was the best game in the century.

Huh? Watch Underscore Dogs was roundly criticized, but the first Titanfall got a ton of praise and the MP community was very strong - and much more positive on the game that CoD's or BF's communities. There's zero evidence that player disaffection with the original Titanfall led to poor sales of the second one.

Titanfall community? It exists?
Okay I admit my ignorance.

Meanwhile, I'm still sticking to League of Legends (toxic) community. It numbers in millions and most comment on Titanfall there is "never heard".

Biggest gaming failure this year for me was Me. I don't know whats happened but I've had the hardest time getting into games I should love this year. Maybe its the weak games but I couldn't even finish Witcher 3 though got 2/3 of the way through but ran out of steam and never really started Fallout 4 or Dragon Age: Inquisition (I know both are not this year). I've got 331 games in steam and honestly none are drawing me in. Strangely I did finish Tales of Zestiria and I cannot really say why.

Hoping 2017 is better with Torment and that will recapture the spark. I fear my expectations might be too high though.