5 role-playing games that never lived up to the hype

Role-playing games have always been a fantastic subgenre of video games, offering varied narratives, explorations, and tons of playtime that are otherwise not common in other genres. While 2023 is shaping up to be a great year for RPGs and video games, multiple role-playing title releases over the past few years have been less than ideal from their envisioned marketing.

From the recent Gotham Knights to the disastrous Mass Effect Andromeda, this article will list five of the most infamous RPGs that could never reach their claimed heights of critical acclaim despite receiving several gameplay and content patches later on.

Disclaimer: This article is subjective and reflects the writer’s opinions.

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Final Fantasy XV, Dark Souls 2, and 3 other role-playing games that never managed to meet expectations

5) Ghostwire: Tokyo

Ghostwire: Tokyo, which is 2022’s flagship title from Tango Frameworks and Bethesda Studios, was an interesting RPG title set in modern Tokyo. Players explore a supernaturally infested Tokyo as they take part in unique first-person combat and unravel the mysteries of the game world.

Despite its intriguing backdrop and gorgeous visuals, Ghostwire: Tokyo failed to captivate the masses in lieu of its clunky combat and storytelling fumbles that kept it from being the truly immersive role-playing game experience it set out to be. However, despite its shortcomings, it is still one of the decent games to pick up on sale.

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4) Dark Souls 2

The second entry in the Dark Souls franchise and also hailed as one of the most eagerly anticipated sequels, Dark Souls 2 never quite managed to live up to the expectations laid by its predecessor. Players expected a lot from the title, and FromSoftware could not deliver at the time due to the troubled development.

The game suffers from weaker lore, floaty controls, and unbalanced difficulty that put it off for many eager players on release. The admittedly weaker level design and artistic choices also did not help cement it in the players’ favor either. Not to mention, several things in DS1 were plain better to the point that Dark Souls 2 sometimes felt like a cheap rendition of the cult classic, which was a bitter pill to swallow for a lot of people.

It comes to no surprise that Dark Souls 2 is considered as the “worst” entry in the souls-like series due to its various flaws.

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3) Gotham Knights

Gotham Knights was supposed to be the spiritual successor to the beloved Batman Arkham games, yet it turned out to be mediocre. The game was plagued with performance issues upon release, which was partly to blame for the poor reception upon launch. However, no amount of patching could fix the mess that is Gotham Knights' world design and visuals, which somehow managed to look worse than Arkham Knight, a 2015 title for the previous generation!

The loot-based repetitive gameplay Bland, coupled with a mediocre story that ended on a cliffhanger made to sell post-game DLC, did not do great favors for the game either. No wonder Gotham Knights remains one of the more disappointing experiences awaiting fans of Batman and the Bat-Family.

Indeed, playing the then similarly received Arkham Knight remains the best way to experience both Gotham and the Batman family to this date.

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2) Mass Effect Andromeda

Mass Effect Andromeda is a science fiction role-playing title from BioWare, which is set in the beloved Mass Effect series of video games. A lot of hype was generated for the game, as this was the next-gen Mass Effect that fans had been longing for after the rather divisive Mass Effect 3.

Although the game managed to unite fans together, it was not in the way the developers had hoped. Hatred emerged against the game's title, owing to its mediocre story and awful bugs that completely ruined the experience.

To this day, the game remains plagued with ridiculous facial animations and bugs that offer an unintentional level of comedy to it. Additionally, the game feels less rich in lore compared to the original trilogy, and the characters are nowhere near as likable either, which makes Mass Effect Andromeda considered to be one of the most disappointing games to ever have been released in recent years.

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1) Final Fantasy XV

Final Fantasy XV, aka Final Fantasy versus XIII, is an excellent action role-playing game from Square Enix that is set as a mainline entry in the Final Fantasy video game franchise. Unfortunately, the game suffered from numerous developmental issues and delays before finally being released for the PS4 in 2016.

All of this resulted in a rushed, incomplete story that really dampened the experience of Final Fantasy XV. The game strayed from its original vision of Versus XIII, and that the entire transformative change may have led to so many unexplored ideas, which is due to its rushed and troubled development.

While the royal edition fixed a lot of issues, in the end, Final Fantasy XV remained untapped in its potential as it ended up a shadow of what it could be.