2007's Ten Biggest Gaming Letdowns 232
Game|Life offers up an anti-top-ten list, noting the three blog authors' biggest disappointments from 2007. Chris Kohler's biggest letdown echoes my own feelings on this topic: "No LittleBigPlanet. PlayStation 3's software library got significantly better this holiday, but there's no killer app. I honestly don't know if LittleBigPlanet would have been one. But I think it's going to be mine. It's going to be the thing that glues me to PlayStation 3... when it ships. I was all ready to start building worlds and sharing them with my friends and generally start being a jackass by now, but it won't happen until next year -- late next year, if you believe the rumors. I hope they're not true. And I do hope LittleBigPlanet sets the planet on fire when it releases." Any gaming 'event' this year an epic fail for you?
My biggest let down of 2007 (Score:3, Interesting)
Without compare, the biggest gaming letdown of 2007.
Halo 3 Easily Biggest Gaming Letdown In 2007 (Score:0, Interesting)
Remember when Halo 3 was going to have 1080p next gen graphics?
Remember when Halo 3 was going to be the standard which all online games try, and fail, to live up to?
And then reality hit...
Bungie could only manage to get Halo 3 to run at 640p resolution and not the minimum standard 720p for real next gen games.
Side by side screenshots of Halo 2 and Halo 3 had gamers scratching their heads as to which one was supposed to be the next gen game.
Bungie didn't bother to bring Halo 3 out of the dark ages of online gaming and implement dedicated servers.
And Bungie because of the lack of dedicated servers Halo 3 could only handle 16 players at a time for online games. There are pc shareware games with better online setups.
And because of the lack of dedicated servers Halo 3 games end up being low player count matches that are plagued by lag.
Ok, so even if the online part of Halo 3 is a disaster at least the single player lived up to the hype...
Nope, single player also runs only at 640p with the same last gen looking graphics.
The campaign is incredibly short and linear
The Halo 3 story is easily one of the lamest even by the incredibly low fps genre standard
It was learned the extent recently how Microsoft used their mountains of cash to secure high reviews for the game with 'gift bags' that were sent out to reviewers that were worth some 7-800 dollars or so. You have to imagine that Bungie just didn't see any reason to put any effort into the game at all when they knew Microsoft's marketing types were going to be out in full force buying off reviewers.
Re:Some disappointments (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Death of the CRPG (Score:3, Interesting)
On the other hand, we have the Witcher, and NWN2: Mask of the Betrayer, which makes it one of the best CRPG years in a long time. Which brings us to my disappointment, mirrored nicely by this article: This was a great year for PC games, the best in a long time, but online media seems only to care about consoles.
Re:Wii (Score:2, Interesting)
(my favorite wii games, right now, are wii sports, wii play, sonic, mario, and nights. just got mario and nights, and they are probably the best two wii-exclusive titles 2007 provided.)
What About The Wii Lineup? (Score:2, Interesting)
The Wii's the only next-gen console my wife and I own, and while we've played a lot of the tennis game, some Zelda, some of the first Rabbids game but no other titles have really grabbed our interest. I bought one of those 'maze in the air' games that came out early on, lent it to a friend and haven't cared to ask for it back.
The lineup (outside Nintendo) seems pretty weak, but I've not paid a lot of attention lately.
Re:Halo 3? Disappointing? (Score:1, Interesting)
When PS3 fanboyism infects a story, don't expect any amount of sense from it.
Halo 3 was nothing groundbreaking, but that didn't stop it being one of the greatest releases of 2007, if it was a dissapointment to anyone then they're simply expecting the impossible. The very fact it wasn't groundbreaking is because it was simply the best that can be done right now alongside releases like The Orange Box, Bioshock and Timeshift.
Compared to games like Assassins Creed, which frankly I thought was going to become my favourite game ever thanks to the trailers Halo 3 etc. did fantastic at meeting my expectations. AC was my biggest let down simply because it turned out to be "Repetitive Tasks and Wall Climbing Simulator 2007" rather than an interesting, deep game centred around assassinating targets using cunning and skill.
Command and Conquer 3 (Score:0, Interesting)
Re:Xbox 360 Hardware And Software (Score:4, Interesting)
They took a billion dollar hit to their bottom line to STOP the bleeding of consoles... they admitted (in no uncertain terms) that EVERY console they sold (up to that point) was potentially destined to fail... and fail for the SAME FLAW.
20% not high? 30%? How many consoles have to go back to Microsoft (and how many times), before you admit there's a flaw in the 360 that is VERY troubling and VERY problematic for their goodwill and future as a gaming company.
The failure rate of the PS3 is infinitesimal. Google is your friend. The Wii's also a solid performer. Compared to the 360 the PS2 launch console is more reliable.
You've been nursing Bill Gates' ballsack too long to notice the facts DO support his statement... and it's NOT fanboy rhetoric when the VERY company extends the warranty for a _SPECIFIC_ failure to 3 YEARS, for FREE. That had "class action dodge" written ALL over it, chum.
AC, indeed. Sometimes your asinine insinuations really get to me.
Re:Some disappointments (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't make excuses when there really aren't any to make. You can cater to a broad range of hardware if you put in the effort. Blizzard doesn't *need* to from a business perspective, but I wouldn't be bothered if they tried.
Re:My biggest let down of 2007 (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Halo 3 Easily Biggest Gaming Letdown In 2007 (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not like it's a big deal, they made their choice so they could run at framerate and get the lighting they wanted, but at least some of us could tell immediately. By the way, the reason they do this reduced framebuffer size (and it has to be horizontal as well as vertical) is so the whole thing fits in the GPU's embedded memory and they don't need to resolve to main memory during the rendering process.
Re:Xbox 360 Hardware And Software (Score:3, Interesting)
As for the AC posting, do you really blame the guy for posting anonymously and going against popular opinion? Slashdot's moderation system is not friendly towards those with a different view.