If you ever feel bad because something went wrong, think that at least you are not Colossal Order. A studio under the umbrella of Paradox Interactive that had to apologize for the state in which their game, Cities: Skylines II, was released. They had to refund the money for their first DLC to those who bought it because it was as broken as the game. Because even if you make mistakes, it is unlikely that they will have the magnitude of this.
But let’s not deceive ourselves either. Colossal Order is not the only one who, for various reasons, did not release their game with all the polish they should. Or even finished. Because in the history of video games, there are many games that were literally broken. Unplayable, half-done, or with fatal bugs that took weeks for their developers to fix. That’s why we’re going to remember some of them. Especially because, in some cases, those games ended up being good!
Aliens: Colonial Marines
However, that’s not the case with the first game on our list. Aliens: Colonial Marines is a game developed by Gearbox, creators of Borderlands, that was an absolute disaster. After a long and difficult development, they ended up handing over the development to TimeGate Studios to finish it. The reason? Because Gearbox wanted to focus on developing Borderlands II. In fact, there are rumors that Gearbox’s CEO, Randy Pitchfork, diverted funds from the project to make Borderlands II. But the only thing we know for sure is that Aliens: Colonial Marines was released and it looked bad, it looked worse and it shouldn’t have been released in that state.
Sim City (2013)
Something happens with city builder sequels that are doomed to have terrible launches. Something that happened with SimCity, the 2013 game by Maxis Emeryville and EA. The game wasn’t bad, it just required a permanent internet connection. In 2013. And EA didn’t plan for so many people wanting to play the game. This caused the servers to crash and it was impossible to play the game for weeks. Two years later, Maxis Emeryville closed its doors. Somehow, EA didn’t.
Diablo III
The case of Sim City is especially comical because they could have taken note from Diablo III. The highly anticipated sequel from Blizzard had two problems. The first one was that it required its players to have a permanent online connection and the server prevented players from logging in at the same time. The second one was the introduction of a real-money auction house, which completely destroyed the game’s economy. It took them months to fix this. And even to this day, they haven’t regained the players’ trust.
Cyberpunk 2077
In a more optimistic note, there is the case of CD Projekt. Cyberpunk 2077 was released in a state that, on consoles, was literally unplayable. Constant crashes, textures that didn’t load, and the game being half-baked made many players hate it. According to its own developers, the game still needed another year of development. At least. But CD Projekt invested time in patching it and releasing an expansion that delighted the audience, closing a game that, in the end, managed to save itself and show everything it had inside.
The Witcher III
This doesn’t mean that people aren’t still upset with Cyberpunk 2077. And it’s not the first time CD Projekt has made a mess like this. The Witcher III was a poorly optimized and half-baked disaster at launch, nothing like the game you can play today. With updates and patches, they managed to deliver a game that, for many, was the game of the year. But of course, with The Witcher III, they didn’t have to publicly apologize for its state. Several times. In a format that has become a meme for apologizing.
Skull Island: Rise of Kong
Few stories are sadder than that of Skull Island: Rise of Kong. The game has graphics that are two generations behind. A simplistic and boring gameplay. An absurd level design, an unreadable map, and hilariously bad cinematics. But also an exploited and underpaid studio that had to release the game in less than a year if they didn’t want to lose money. Did Skull Island: Rise of Kong turn out terrible? Yes. And the blame is not on its developers, but on its publisher: GameMill Entertainment.
Fallout 76
Let’s try to end on a more cheerful note. Fallout 76 is a game that went wrong. Very wrong. Although all the Fallout games from 3 onwards have been a bit deformed, none have had the problems of Fallout 76. Filled with bugs, with a tedious loot system, a complete absence of NPCs, and later on, a tremendously unpopular subscription system, the game was a launch failure. But a failure that, with patches and updates, has become a beloved game by the community, and has recently broken its own player record.
Will a rushed game always be bad?
Although on one occasion Shigeru Miyamoto said that a game that suffers a delay will eventually be good, but a rushed game will be bad forever, it is not necessarily true. Some of these games are now good. Others, not so much. But the truth is that haste is a bad advisor, and this is demonstrated with all these games that, honestly, deserved an apology.
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