He noted that the long development time for Skull and Bones likely came down to the fact that its studio, Ubisoft Singapore, lacked the development experience required to work on the mechanic at that scale. Founded in 2008, Ubisoft Singapore was largely a support studio for other teams, having helped in the development of titles like Assassin’s Creed 2 and onwards.

“Ideas have a window, and that’s another reason we’re trying to do things faster this time,” said Hutchinson. “They age out and become stale. I think the team was junior. They were trying to essentially make Black Flag crossed with World of Tanks or World of Warships. But I don’t think they had experience in that. And then they didn’t really have experience in making even an Assassin’s Creed game down there, because they really did co-development. And then I think it just got away from them.”

Hutchinson went on to describe the excursions that French and Canadian Ubisoft employees would have to go on to provide in-person support at Ubisoft Singapore as year-long vacations. He believes that this attitude ultimately resulted in the lack of a growing talent pool at the studio, describing these employees as not being serious about its growth.

“For a lot of the French or Canadian developers, they would go down to Singapore for a year’s holiday,” he said. “They weren’t going down there to make that studio huge. They were like, ‘Oh, that’d be fun to work for a year in Singapore.’ I don’t think they were serious. And you couldn’t get as many people, the talent pool just wasn’t deep enough.”

Skull and Bones was announced all the way back in 2017. It would go on to have an lengthy development cycle before ultimately coming out in February 2024. While it was originally believed to be a multiplayer-focused take on the sailing and naval combat mechanics from Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag, reports at the time indicated that it had gone through many changes in direction and scope. One report has indicated that development originally started in 2013 as an expansion to Black Flag.

The launch of Skull and Bones was ultimately met with a lukewarm reception, with many noting that it offered a bland gameplay experience. The fact that Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot had referred to the game as being a quadruple-A release certainly didn’t help matters.

“You will see that Skull and Bones is a fully-fledged game,” he said in his attempts to defend its $70 price tag. “It’s a very big game, and we feel that people will really see how vast and complete that game is. It’s a really full, triple… quadruple-A game, that will deliver in the long run.”

Skull and Bones is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.

Well, we’re still seeing new ideas in games today, but what’s perhaps more common are promising ideas that end up flopping. Whether it’s overpromising, poor execution, or trends chasing monetization, these games prove that a great idea alone isn’t enough.

Here are 15 revolutionary gaming concepts that sounded incredible on paper but then folded like a deck of cards with its execution.

Exploring A Full-Sized Galaxy – Starfield

Everything that Todd Howard presented to us about the then-upcoming open-galaxy Bethesda RPG seemed too good to be true. Skyrim in space was enough to get most of us in pre-order lines, but the promises went much further than that. There’s the hundreds of explorable solar systems with thousands of planets, sure, but the customizable space ship and ability to fly your ship and recruit crew members excited me the most. Unfortunately, when the game released, it was apparent that Todd’s promises really were too good to be true. There were practically no memorable characters, nearly every planet was devoid of interesting content, and ship navigation was frustrating and under-utilized. The game sold well enough due to initial hype, but a 97% player drop-off after six months and the broader damage to Bethesda’s reputation paint a clear picture of Starfield’s shortcomings..

Pirate Live Service – Skull and Bones

Just about everybody wanted a large open-seas pirate game where filled to the brim with tense ship battles and sea shanties, but the developer somehow managed to screw that up completely. The biggest failing with Skull and Bones was that it was a $70 title with a predatory live service model tacked on top of that. You had to grind for what seemed like hundreds of hours obtaining the ‘pieces of eight’ just to upgrade your hard-sought pirate ship equipment. The whole experience was just so bogged down in incremental monetization that even the few fans that were left had a hard time sticking with it for long. So much for the first ever AAAA game.

Hunters vs Hunted Multiplayer – Evolve

I wasn’t exactly the biggest Left 4 Dead fan in the world and even I was pretty excited about Evolve in the 2010s. Evolve pitted a group of hunters against a horrific Godzilla-like human-controlled opponent, differentiating Valve’s team-based shooter with an asynchronized matchup. The big distinction with Evolve is the colossal prey is just one human-controlled creature, resulting in a lopsided 4 versus 1 scenario. Matches were novel and hilariously fun … for the first couple hours. Running around as a hulking horror monster in search of four helpless little humans makes it hard to frown. But the novelty wore off pretty quick. The balance issues, very thin post-game offerings, and hefty price tag for what was essentially a repetitive game loop contributed to Evolve devolving to the husk it is today.

Open World Parkour – Forspoken

I remember being pretty hyped for Forspoken right before its demo released. It was made by the Final Fantasy XV studio using their in-house engine, all of which I’d been a big fan of. And the open-world parkouring just looked absolutely mesmerizing to top it off. Well, after playing the demo, I found myself frankly appalled. The best thing I can say about Forspoken is that it looks nice and has a serviceable soundtrack. The dialogue is perhaps the biggest culprit behind it’s failure, but the repetitive enemy encounters and throwaway isekai story don’t help sell the game either.

Your Choices (Don’t) Change Everything – Mass Effect 3

A lot of gamers want a good choice-driven narrative and plenty of games have attempted it over the years. Yet, carrying over those choices for a meaningful endgame remains an elusive accomplishment for many titles. Mass Effect 3 is perhaps the best example of this. Mass Effect 2 was noteworthy for carrying over key decisions made from the first game and branching those off into even more scenarios into the third game. Yet, Mass Effect 3 ended on a whimper with originally only three endings. The worst part about the narrow endgame funnel was just how paper-thin the different endings were. It’s like all the player-driven choices throughout the three games came to the same uninspired conclusion, albeit with a different color tacked on.

Mandatory Crafting – Metal Gear Survive, Fallout 4

I’m all for looting abandoned houses in open-world games, especially when paired with a robust crafting system. Yet, some games rely a bit too much on crafting to advance the main story. In the case of Fallout 4, crafting is absolutely essential no matter what you plan on doing in the game. The game’s big draw, other than being another Fallout, was its settlement creation system. Yet, to properly build up your settlement, you had to grind for loot and craft like crazy. And then on the extreme spectrum, you have Metal Gear Survive, which made crafting the core gameplay loop, and by extension, the only loop the game had to offer. Crafting is a fun aspect of gameplay, but there’s such a thing as too much of it, as is the case with these two games.

Detective Vision – Batman: Arkham Series, The Last of Us Part 1

Batman: Arkham Asylum made many of us fall in love with detective vision gameplay. Turning on the infrared goggles and snooping the environment for clues just added so much to the setting and gameplay. But then, it seemed like every other game out there started implementing it, and the novelty didn’t quite stick. The Witcher 3 had Geralt investigating hundreds of trails using his witcher sense, but fans generally like it there because of his fun banter. But the later Arkham games and The Last of Us Part 1 tended to overuse detective vision to the point where it slowed down not just the gameplay but story as well.

Procedural “Infinite Story” Generation – No Man’s Sky Launch, Daggerfall

I remember how skeptical a majority of gamers were when Sean Murray talked up his infinite galaxy filled with procedural generation in No Man’s Sky. The game released and, well, a majority of gamers felt correct in their initial skepticism. No Man Sky’s launch lacked the touted multiplayer component that it now enjoys, but it also felt barren and void of meaningful content, something procedural generation often struggles with. An earlier example of empty fields of infinite procedural generated content was Bethesda’s Daggerfall. Daggerfall boasts a staggering 62,000 to 80,000 square miles of traversable land with well over 10,000 towns. It was simply the largest game at the time of release, dwarfing most modern open-worlds today. Yet, the dungeon design was … well, absent. And the actual content within such mammoth maps were repetitive and shallow, even if other systems were novel and fun at the time.

Memory Editing — Remember Me

On paper, Remember Me’s mix of third-person action combat, platforming, and puzzles in the form of Memory Remixing should’ve been the beginning of a new hit franchise. DontNod had the budget and concept for a longlasting series and rewriting people’s past to influence an outcome in the plot was the big selling point. And you don’t just rewrite memories in cutscenes, you actively re-arrange objects called glitches in the subject’s mind like a puzzle. It’s a truly terrifying ability, and one that would’ve rivaled the Animus from Assassin’s Creed if it was used more fully in the game. In the end, Remember Me was known for its subpar combat encounters and underbaked story. If only Remember Me could’ve remembered the Memory Remix mechanic enough for gamers to remember it.

Possess Enemies On-the-Fly — Mindjack

Who remembers the Japanese cover shooter game from the early 2010s, Mindjack? Yeah, probably not many. Besides the generic third-person shooting mechanics and forgettable sci-fi story, it had an innovative mind-hacking mechanic thrown into the mix. Being able to possess enemies and convert them to your side on-the-fly sounds pretty dang fun, until you realize the AI is awful in Mindjack. The repetitive level design and bland missions didn’t help the promising mind-jacking concept either.

Open-World Live Service Campaign — Anthem

Bioware is still chugging along today even after lukewarm releases like Dragon Age The Veilguard and Mass Effect Andromeda, but Anthem was the signal that the  studio just wasn’t the same anymore. Despite building a reputation for rich storytelling and immersive character interactions, EA made Bioware go the live service multiplayer route with Anthem. That decision didn’t go well with longtime fans or newcomers. The launch was plagued by glitches, bugs, and crashes galore. And the long-term looter-shooter loop didn’t do enough to keep players around. This is alll despite a genuinely fun jetpack system that allowed players to fly around with their mechanized soldier through the environment with ease. It’s a fun game to fly around in, but was a chore to actually do anything else.

Superhero Looter-Brawler – Marvel’s Avengers

Marvel’s Avengers was another game that cashed in on the live service looter band-wagon, with the advantage of having the Marvel IP tied to it. There was actually quite a bit of hype building up for Crystal Dynamics’ huge new AAA superhero game. It came out during a time of Avengers high and within a game industry that hadn’t capitalized on it yet. Needless to say, many gamers desperately wanted to pick their favorite Avenger and fight some baddies in a high quality action game. But the aggressive repetition within the mission design and lack of a post-game severely hindered what was supposed to be an ever-evolving game. If you’re going to make a game with the kind of structure of Marvel’s Avengers, at least build it around a compelling story and interesting gameplay.

AAA Episodic Storytelling – Telltale Games

Where’s Telltale Games been, by the way? Episodic interactive game dramas just aren’t the same since Telltale’s reign in the 2010s. Telltale’s The Walking Dead fomented a revolution in the episodic potential for smaller-scale video games. But it seems that ever since Telltale’s Game of Thrones, the formula just hasn’t seen the same kind of success. The stagnant cell-shaded art style contributed to gamers just getting tired of Telltale games, but the realization that choices were largely illusory or at least highly bottlenecked also likely played a role in the genre’s decline.

Time-Manipulation Shooter — TimeShift

Everyone loves a good bullet-time Matrix moment in movies or TV, especially so when we get to control it. TimeShift leaned into the slow-motion cool factor and then cranked it up a notch with full control over time itself. Centering a first-person shooter on time manipulation abilities just seems limitless in its potential. But despite the ability to freeze time in the middle of firefights, the game just felt lackluster to play. Like Anthem, the game had one cool thing going for it: the time-bending abilities, with nothing else to compliment that. The story, while told within a cool dieselpunk setting, was awkwardly paced and surrounded by forgettable characters. And the enemies were bullet-sponges without much thought put into their encounter design. We all love a good time-bending mechanic, but TimeShift just didn’t make a good game around it.

Cloud-Powered, Fully Destructible Cities — Crackdown 3

Gamers were surprisingly delighted by the chaotic sandbox that Crackdown 2 provided and hyped up the next game beyond what it was capable to deliver. The third game executed on the sandbox action hero concept about as well as MindEye did the GTA formula (okay, maybe not quite that bad). Where the second Crackdown delivered on laughs and mindless fun, the third drilled repetitive urban landscapes and bland mission design into our tired hands. Even the advertised cloud-powered destructible environments didn’t make the final cut into the game, except for the now-dead multiplayer mode that nobody played. Crackdown 3 failed to iterate or improve on the chaotic sandbox formula that fans loved about the second one, so much so that even Terry Crews couldn’t save it.

“Game producer with 13+ years of experience across AAAA development, strategic partnerships, and media management,” read the LinkedIn profile of Yakovlieva before it was changed. The producer went on to mention Assassin’s Creed Mirage and Assassin’s Creed Shadows as being the AAAA games in question.

“At Ubisoft Sofia, I have contributed to several flagship titles in the Assassin’s Creed franchise, including Origins, Valhalla, Mirage, and Shadows,” the profile continued. “I have successfully led cross-functional teams through large-scale productions and milestone delivery, with direct collaboration with Apple on industry-first initiatives.”

It is worth noting that, for its part, Ubisoft hasn’t really brought up the concept of a quadruple-A release since Skull and Bones, likely in no small part thanks to the title failing to make much of a dent in the ever-crowded live-service multiplayer market. Whether Yakovlieva earnestly meant to describe both Mirage and Shadows as quadruple-A games through excitement for the releases, or whether it was simply a typo remains unknown.

Ubisoft had referred to Skull and Bones as being a quadruple-A release to justify the pirate game’s $70 price tag leading up to its February 2024 release. Responding to a question about limiting the potential player base for the multiplayer game thanks to its high price tag during an earnings call, CEO Yves Guillemot said: “You will see that Skull and Bones is a fully-fledged game. It’s a very big game, and we feel that people will really see how vast and complete that game is. It’s a really full, triple… quadruple-A game, that will deliver in the long run.”

Whether Skull and Bones managed to live up to these lofty ambitions depends on who you ask. In our review of its release version, we called Skull and Bones an average game that, while featuring an appealing aesthetic and fun combat, was plagued with repetitive objectives and mission structure, questionable design choices, and a forgettable story with bland characters. Since then, however, Skull and Bones has seen quite a few substantial updates. Read more details here.

Interestingly, Ubisoft isn’t the only company to have claimed that a game would be of quadruple-A quality. Back in 2022, leading up to the release of Striking Distance Studios’ The Callisto Protocol, Krafton had referred to the survival horror title as a AAAA game that would have the “highest level of quality” and would offer the “maximum horror experience” with “distinguished action mechanics”. For details on how it would actually turn out, check out our review.

These include the addition of Hogwarts Legacy, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, Skull and Bones and many other Ubisoft-published titles exclusively for Ultimate. Premium gains access to titles like Abiotic Factor, Against the Storm, Ara: History Untold, Diablo 4 and more, many previously available only in the Ultimate tier.

As for Essential, the lowest tier, it receives four new titles – Cities: Skylines Remastered, Disney Dreamlight Valley, Hades, and Warhammer 40,000 Darktide. All titles in the Premium and Essential tiers are playable for Ultimate subscribers.

This marks the second notable price increase for Game Pass Ultimate, with Microsoft raising prices from $16.99 to $19.99 in July 2024. Of course, this follows recent price hikes on all Xbox Series X/S hardware in the United States, which you can read more about here.

Overwatch 2

The original Overwatch was a runaway success that garnered a sizeable player base and many awards, and many fans were understandably excited about the sequel. Overwatch 2’s announcement sparked excitement with promises of expanded PvE and a broader scope, but what we got in reality was a shooter that lost focus of what made it so special in the first place. The magic of Overwatch’s PvE was gone, and the expanded PvP options felt shallow and generic.

The trailer showcases some of the features of the Death Tides mode, including its four unique maps, epic ultimates that players can make use of, different ship loadouts, and the rewards that players can unlock, which include things like the Garuda-class Sharpshooter ship which focuses on ranged combat while also being equipped with a quick way for players to escape dangerous situations.

The four maps available in the Death Tides mode are Brimstone, Sanctuary, Sunken Ruins, and Mukiti Falls. Taking part in the PvP mode will allow players to earn rewards and XP that also caerry over to the main game as well as the new Smuggler Pass that was introduced with the major Year 2 Season 1 update – dubbed Ascent Into Chaos – released back in April.

Death Tides joins a host of other features that were brought to Skull and Bones with its last major update, including Item Ascension and a new World Tier system. Item Ascension essentially allows players to further improve their gear after hitting Infamy Tier 9. Through Item Ascension, players can equip their gear with Modification Slots, which can then be filled in with items that provide even more bonuses. More details about these features can be checked out from back when we covered the update.

More features are planned for Skull and Bones in Year 2 Season 2, which has been dubbed Oaths of War. As part of the next season, players will have to pick between two factions as part of a new Disputed Waters system. The update will also bring with it a new Large-sized ship, as well as Megaforts that players can take on as part of a larger crew.

Year 2 Season 3 has been titled Guts and Glory, and will bring with it a new reputation system that will allow players to forge alliances. There will also be the addition of a new officer system, as well as land-based combat for players that might want to take on enemies without having to use their ship’s weaponry.

Year 2 will close things out with Season 4, dubbed Eye of the Beast. The final season for the year will bring with it the Territorial Control mode, along with a new Large ship, as well as the Kraken.

In the meantime, Skull and Bones is currently also running a time-limited event, dubbed The Honorless, which will be available until June 10. As part of the event, players get to take on the titular Honorless for rewards which can be picked up at a dedicated event vendor. Some of the rewards that are part of the event include the Divine Wind epic Bombard, the Kleine Kartouwe epic Demi-Cannon, and the Fuse-Fusing Station furniture.

Skull and Bones is available for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.

A major part of Skull and Bones moving into its second year is that there is a season reset. As part of this, players can only carry over up to 50,000 Pieces of Eight into the new season.

As for the story, Skull and Bones Year 2 Season 1 picks up right where Year 1 Season 4 left off with the reports of the DMC trying to strengthen its position in the Indian Ocean. Now, players will have to deal with an arms race between DMC and the Compagnie as they battle for control over the Indian Ocean. Along with all of this, there is also new technology being developed in the background, which can alter the course of war.

One of the major new features in the latest update to Skull and Bones is Item Ascension. Once players hit Infamy Tier 9, they will get the quest “Ascension and Modification”, which in turn will lead them to the Blacksmith where they can unlock the new feature. Through this, players can ascend their weapons with new modifications. Ascensions have three grades: Basic, Advanced, and Special.

Ascending an item also gives it Modification Slot, which can turn the item into an incredibly powerful tool for players to use in their adventures through the game.

For players that might want more challenge from the game, a new World Tier system has been added to Skull and Bones. With the pre-existing world being considered World Tier 1, players will be able to ascend up to World Tier 2: Cutthroat Seas when they reach the Kingpin Infamy Tier.

World Tier 2 will feature increased difficulty, but players will also start earning more loot and resources. Rewards across various activities, including world events, ships and towers, are increased when playing in World Tier 2.

A new ship-type has also been added to the game: the Schooner. Available after unlocking 45 tiers in the Smuggler Pass, the Schooner is a medium-sized ship that focuses on explosive damage. Its main perk is Fury, which, when activated, increases the damage and explosive effects of broadside weapons. A secondary perk, Volatile, can be unlocked at Ship Upgrade Rank 6, which further increases explosive damage while reducing weapon reload time.

The Honorless is a new time-limited event that will go live from May 6. Available until June 10, the event involves players taking on the titular Honorless for lucrative rewards that can be picked up at the event vendor. Rewards include the Divine Wind epic Bombard, the Kleine Kartouwe epic Demi-Cannon, and the Fuse-Fusing Station rare minor furniture.

Skull and Bones is available for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. For more details about the game, check out our review from its launch period.

LAIR

An obvious pick for a list such as this one, Lair is forever going to hold the dubious crown of being one of the most bitter disappointments in gaming. Factor 5’s excellent track record and promising pre-launch showings suggested that Lair was going to be a huge early PS3 hit, but upon its release, the game turned out to be sort of a broken mess, thanks in large part to its frustrating motion-heavy controls. Even now, close to two decades later, it’s hard to get over the disappointment that was Lair.

LEVEL ZERO: EXTRACTION

Doghowl Games’ extraction shooter is currently in early access, so technically, it can get better- but that isn’t the trajectory it has followed thus far. Level Zero: Extraction had a promising enough premise, but was let down by significant gameplay and balancing issues even at launch. In the time since then, the developer has consistently made updates that have proven unpopular with players, leading some to wonder just how healthy the game’s future is going to be.

Star Wars Outlaws

As iffy as certain things looked before launch, there was still some hope for Star Wars Outlaws from Massive Entertainment’s involvement alone. The Reputation and Wanted system, more organic exploration, and focus on single-player were all the right moves, but it didn’t land for consumers. Those who took the plunge suffered numerous bugs and issues with movement, combat, AI, stealth, and so on. It’s a better game now, but Outlaws still needs work.

Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League

Even with successes like Helldivers 2, this year just wasn’t it for live-service titles. However, the negative response to Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League began well prior, with many criticizing the looter shooter’s format. The release sadly did nothing to rise to the occasion, featuring a horrendous story that falls off a cliff, insufferable characters, and the same dreary games-as-a-service mission structure seen hundreds of times before. With a $200 million impact on Warner Bros. Discovery’s revenue, Suicide Squad clearly didn’t meet expectations.

Skull and Bones

Alleged reboots, high-profile departures, constant delays, and a ballooning budget – Ubisoft’s Skull and Bones had all the key ingredients for a potential disaster. Adding in all the live-service staples like seasons, always-online gameplay, a focus on multiplayer, and whatnot hastened the game’s doom (calling it a quadruple-A title also didn’t help). With player numbers reportedly coming in at less than a million around launch, it was a failure before it even got started.

Planet Coaster 2

Incredible visuals and the studio’s penchant for attention to detail did little to make a difference for Planet Coaster 2, which is, by all accounts, a hotly awaited sequel, that much more palatable. The awful UI, pathing issues, lackluster pools, awful characters and various bugs were just too significant to ignore, even with the better campaign. Frontier has rolled out improvements, and it will likely excel in the long run, but for now, Planet Coaster 2 is an underwhelming ride.

Farming Simulator 25

After the failure of Farming Simulator 23 (at least on Nintendo Switch), Farming Simulator 25 marked a return for the franchise to consoles and PC. It shipped with extensive bugs, an annoying user interface, jarring physics, and multitudes of other issues that remain. That’s on top of the unoptimized performance on PC, which hinders the otherwise strong environmental effects and textures. Mods will likely make it a better experience over time but at this point, fans would appreciate a strong title out of the gate (which certainly applies to our next choice).

Starfield: Shattered Space

Starfield had its share of mixed impressions after launching last year and Shattered Space seemed like the perfect opportunity to address many issues while offering a fresh slate. However, the hand-crafted planet of Var’uun’kai delivered the most rudimentary content and barren surroundings to go with lackluster characters and story-telling. Even the intriguing gravity anomalies barely appear after a point.

A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead

I was excited about Stormind Games’ first-person horror, especially with how it leveraged the films and their mechanics. Unfortunately, A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead is a hugely linear, highly scripted experience with bizarre AI, questionable design decisions, and a predictable story that fails to really leverage its endearing characters.

Concord

Sony’s biggest first-party failure in years, Concord was seemingly doomed from its first proper reveal, especially when the hero shooter elements became apparent. After a beta with abysmal numbers, it would launch to middling reviews and reportedly sold only 25,000 copies. Sony initially pulled the title from sale and shut down servers before eventually shuttering it and Firewalk Studio.

Rise of the Ronin

Director Fumihiko Yasuda revealed around June that Rise of the Ronin was Koei Tecmo’s best-selling game so far, with the publisher even reporting higher sales than Nioh. That’s all great, but the game itself fell short of what we expected in terms of open-world activities and storytelling. At least the combat remains enjoyable, and Team Ninja has provided some extensive post-launch content for free.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard

The first Dragon Age title in ten years was bound to have astronomical expectations, especially with all the rumors and reports of reboots. Combat was sharp despite pivoting to a real-time hack-and-slash approach and the environments are gorgeous, without a doubt. It’s everything else that either whelmed or disappointed, from the uneven characterization and writing to the mission structure. Though it wasn’t BioWare’s worst, it’s far from being its best.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6

Significant improvements over last year’s game don’t excuse Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 from disappointing in other ways. Despite a superior campaign, its story ultimately felt flat (and continued the same cliffhanger approach), while multiplayer fell short with its map design. Zombies is surprisingly good despite some balance issues, and while the overall experience classifies as “good,” it’s nowhere near the series’ heights.

Unknown 9: Awakening

There’s always some skepticism when a developer gets ahead itself and plans out an entire universe for its IP before the first game even launches. Unfortunately, Unknown 9: Awakening loaded its bland premise with dull writing and boring combat, while various bugs and performance issues weighed even heavier. Suffice it to say that with an all-time peak concurrent player count of 285 on Steam at launch, Unknown 9: Awakening failed to meet any expectations heaped on it.

MultiVersus

From promising platform fighter to being pulled and relaunching earlier this year in a worse form, MultiVersus has had quite the journey. It’s hard to pinpoint all the issues, be it the sheer lack of quality-of-life features at launch or how underwhelming Rifts felt after they finally went live, but above all else, the feel and fluidity from the open beta felt like it was missing. And unfortunately, Player First Games hasn’t been able to capture the magic ever since.

XDefiant

Initially revealed as part of the Tom Clancy series, XDefiant would become a standalone entity while still crossing over with the publisher’s various other titles. However, despite some responsive shooting, it couldn’t match the features and content of other free-to-play shooters at launch. Various issues like network performance also affected it, causing a sharp downturn. Maybe there’s still time to right the ship, but based on the company’s other live-service endeavors, XDefiant’s days could be numbered.

Outcast: A New Beginning

Developing a sequel to a niche title from the late 90s is unusual on its own, but perhaps Outcast: The New Beginning could cater to long-time fans. What it offered was a massive world with nothing exciting, loading up players with menial tasks and awful writing. Appealing as it may be for those seeking more old-school-style titles, A New Beginning felt more like an awkward continuation for a cult-classic series.