10 games with the most wasted potential

a lot of games get announced and we say

wow that looks great really cool idea

this could really be something good and

sometimes it just doesn’t work out that

way hi folks it’s Falcon and today on

game ranks 10 games with the most wasted

potential starting off with number 10

it’s Red Dead online rdr2 was and still

is one of the biggest and most important

open world games of all time but if you

looked into how Rockstar has treated

that online mode you’d think it was a

failure it wasn’t though uh as of

November 2022 it had sold 46 million

copies one of the best selling games of

all time so you’d think it’d have a

pretty thriving online community but

missteps from Rockstar combined with

overall neglect means that the online

portion of the game is more like a ghost

town which is a real shame because Red

Dead online is pretty great and it could

have been a lot more like so much more

but instead of trying to Foster the

community and add features to drawing

more players Rockstar basically gave up

on the mode and dedicated all their time

and the insane money to their machine

that already makes tons of money which

is Grand Theft Auto online the sad truth

is that Red Dead online was never going

to be as popular or make the kind of

money the GTA online did like a slow

Cowboy game can’t sell you stuff in the

way an over-the-top crime game can but

that doesn’t mean they had to give up on

it the story of Rockstar’s mismanagement

of Red Dead online is a really long one

even for people who still play it and

really like it it’s hard to get over the

fact that the whole thing could have

been so much better if they just put the

time and resources into it but they

didn’t

at number nine is Anthem yep Anthem I

almost feel like I have to remind people

what Anthem even is like it’s a game

that came and went so fast it’s super

easy to forget about like it’s a third

person shooter you fly around in an Iron

Man suit a BioWare yes that BioWare made

it uh it was loaded with live service

crap and they gave up on it in less than

a year it failed hard but it’s not like

it was destined to suck it was a new IP

set in a potentially interesting world

and the mix of flying and combat really

could have been a lot of fun but like a

lot of BioWare games this game suffered

a really rough development cycle like

sometimes their games come together real

good after a rough development cycle

like Dragon Age Inquisition and Anthem

is an example of when they don’t the

thing about Anthem is nothing really

fits together the loot system’s super

basic you can’t really customize the

character builds were barely a thing

story was linear and dull the worst of

all the flying which was like one of the

main selling points of the game felt

tacked done you basically used it to go

from point A to point B and that’s about

it but I don’t think BioWare really knew

what they were trying to do I mean

management literally told people never

to mention Destiny while designing the

game they didn’t want to copy it but in

the end they made a lot of the same

mistakes Destiny made and had fixed by

that point

um and as a result their game really

never got a chance and it’s mostly just

forgotten about

at number eight is watchdog’s Legion

originally I was gonna put the original

watchdogs on here but uh honestly it’s

the third one that had the most wasted

potential like the first one never

managed to reach its visual or narrative

potential but in terms of gameplay was

pretty good sequel fantastic it’s one of

the best open world action games ever

and while the third isn’t terrible it

could have been a lot more I’m talking

primarily about the very vaunted Legion

system where there’s no quote unquote

main character instead you just play as

anyone which is a cool idea but the

implementation was really weak at the

end of the day you were basically just

using a character creator that only let

you hit the random button like that’s

really what this ended up being instead

of playing as a defined character with

motives a personality and a unique model

you played as an ugly NPC with a limited

selection of abilities that didn’t make

the game more interesting just made it

so you had to swap between a few

characters every once in a while

apparently the system was a lot more

in-depth and interesting at first but

they play tested it into Oblivion and

took out basically everything that would

have made it unique and that ended up

making it into just another Ubisoft open

world game but with a barely talking

protagonist protagonists I guess not

exactly the Revolutionary experience

they made it seem like it was gonna be

at number seven is Mass Effect Andromeda

and I don’t want to pick on BioWare here

like but seriously so uh new Mass Effect

game set an entirely new universe slate

wiped clean more about exploration

rather than an increasingly narrow scope

of focus on action should have been

awesome uh wasn’t what was supposed to

be an entire new Galaxy got condensed

down to a few planets and while that

could have worked it was mostly just

painfully dull paint by numbers open

world crap Vehicles were back and that

was cool but uh you barely got to use

them for anything other than driving

through these really painfully dull

planets doing busy work outside of the

open world there are some positives the

combat is a lot more vertical and

dynamic and wow is it ever good but

again this game was supposed to focus on

exploration rather than narrowing down

on action so the thing that they

improved upon wasn’t the focus and as

you know Mass Effect has a real

complicated story where things that you

do have big effects but instead of using

the Clean Slate they had apparently

given themselves it kind of just

transported all the same grudges from

the last galaxy to the new Galaxy on top

of that companions are pretty

forgettable uh the two new aliens really

aren’t that interesting and the whole

premise of colonizing a new Galaxy

basically gets thrown out in the first

few minutes there was so much potential

here like it could have been an amazing

new Trilogy instead of a single mediocre

game and they’ve announced Mass Effect

four so uh that’s what we got a single

mediocre game in the Andromeda Galaxy

at number six is Castlevania Lord of

Shadows 2 uh the Castlevania games were

awesome The Originals on the Nintendo

are all-time classics Castlevania

Symphony of the Night was one of the

best games ever and the Game Boy Advance

in DS games continued the Legacy in a

positive way they were all

um 2D though this series just never

quite got to that same standard when

they went to 3D probably the best it

ever got was the first Castlevania Lord

of Shadows it was a reboot that was a

pretty good starting place but didn’t

have a lot of the classic monsters and

the music ah not quite there there’s

really good music in the Castlevania

series and not in Lord of Shadows the

sequel could have been amazing if it

took everything good about the first

game and works in stuff from the classic

games but what we got was a bizarrely

bad sequel that kind of just doubled

down in the worst parts of the first

game combat is somehow clunkier uh there

is a bizarre focus on stealth and if

anything the world is even more

disconnected from the classic games

story is a mess which is a shame because

it had a pretty intriguing promise that

it mostly squanders Dracula in the

modern day would be awesome and I admit

there’s some pretty cool visuals in the

modern day Parts at times but it doesn’t

work these days the best 3D Castlevania

games are just Souls likes like they

don’t really play anything like

Castlevania but the souls games kind of

have that right spooky atmosphere and

challenging gameplay all they really

need is a Wicked soundtrack uh someday

we will get a good 3D Castlevania game

but it seems like it’s gonna be a while

because this game bombed bad

and number five is the order 1886.

speaking of games with great settings

and atmosphere the Order 1886 really

could have been one of Sony’s big new

franchises if it didn’t stumble right

out of the gate with a kind of

forgettable first entry it’s a game with

a cool concept you play as an immortal

Warrior taking on Supernatural threats

in a visually interesting steampunk

world but the actual gameplay left

something to be desired I don’t want to

call it a snooze because I like it and

also resident the Order 1886 Defender

Jake baldino really liked it but it’s

also not really that different from your

standard first person shooter the main

twist is that sometimes the guns are

pretty interesting but uh the

environments are small the story’s kind

of predictable and the game is very

short you’re Immortal it’s steampunk and

they’re Supernatural stuff except

there’s not really a whole lot of

Supernatural stuff you fight like two

werewolves in the game the moment that

the story gets interesting it it

basically sequel teases you like that’s

the end sorry the princess is in another

castle and you’ll never see that castle

because we made this Castle way too

short and kind of generic at times and

nobody’s gonna buy the next castle like

it has all of the make

setting and if it wasn’t a sixty dollar

game if it was like a 20 game I think it

would have been remembered differently

so at sixty dollars it’s basically a

competent Tech demo for PS4 it still

looks good now like just to be clear

look at this game it looks beautiful

that looks like a fairly recent game

honestly and that’s from the beginning

of the PS4 cycle it’s not terrible it’s

not even like there’s any major problems

it’s just not enough at number four is

artifact looking back at it now artifact

seems kind of destined to fail but when

it first came out it seemed like it

could be really big digital card games

were at an all-time high valve announced

they’re making a new game with Richard

Garfield who created Magic the Gathering

sounded like a license to print money uh

wasn’t at all I like far from it

um what makes it so wasted is that the

actual game design is pretty cool and

interesting it’s a cross between a card

game and a MOBA like it was doing

something that was just a little bit too

complicated in a real card game and I

think the problem was it really wasn’t

that fun to play like a lot of the

design is clever but that doesn’t make

it fun and then valve was real slow on

making some changes to keep players

around they take a slow and steady game

design that is not cut out for live

service games like this like people

needed to know what’s going on what

they’re doing where it’s going how long

it’s going to be and Val just barely

talk if they’d been a little more

responsive and been a little more

flexible about what the game would be

also maybe main monetization that wasn’t

easy as hell to hate artifact could have

been probably a huge name in digital

card games and now it’s kind of more of

a punch line at number three is hello

neighbor a game most people agree has a

great premise it’s like combining a home

alone with rear window you play as a kid

investigating the house of your creepy

neighbor the whole goal of it is to

sneak in find out what he’s up to but

the whole time he’s hunting you like a

less threatening xenomorph adapting to

what you do do in learning and allegedly

forces you to find new ways of sneaking

around him it’s clever but anybody who’s

ever played it agrees that while it

starts off pretty good it slowly gets

worse with each new build that they put

out the clever AI aspects of the game

were downplayed and the more tedious

Parts became the focus which is bizarre

because while it’s relatively popular

most reviews from people who’ve actually

played it are not great this game could

have been a more intense version of

alien isolation with its AI programming

but it’s just it never turned out to be

that

at number two is Epic Mickey before Epic

Mickey came out this game has some major

hype behind it it was a war inspector

game set in a weird and dark alternate

version of Disney it’s by the creator of

days X and it’s Disney stuff seen

stranger and darker than pretty much

everything we’ve ever seen from the

company it can’t be understated how

interesting those first pieces of

concept art were and what they hinted at

but what we got was not even close to

that we were kind of expecting a

post-apocalyptic Disney Deus Ex but uh

got a less good Okami with all of the

edges filed off Epic Mickey was just a

safe pretty by the Numbers platformer uh

there were some ruins there and a few

things that kind of looked like the

concept art if you squinted a little but

by and large it was the Disney we all uh

new and we’re kind of sick of by that

point yeah those first Concepts were

never gonna be the actual game

especially one actually paid for it by

Disney but it’s still a missed

opportunity even if realistically what

we got was exactly what we should have

expected

and number one is Spore game with

Limitless potential and so much of it

wasted so so so much this was another

game with like astronomical hype I mean

we’re talking about a thing that was

gonna simulate an entire lifespan of a

species not a creature like a race of

things he started a cellular level and

reached all the way to ruling a Galactic

Empire that’s the scale that we were

talking about but uh it was a game that

was as wide as an ocean but with the

depth of a puddle each evolutionary step

was basically a small mini game with

almost no depth to it and it really did

not take long for players to get born

these days it’s not uncommon for games

to come out that are fairly light on

content and eventually become great

years after

um like no man’s sky or sea of Thieves

but Spore kind of came out in 2008 and

while it made a lot of money it wasn’t

making the Sims money so it really never

got the chance to grow into something

more complex and interesting the

technology was there the way you could

create creatures and evolve them was

pretty great but it needed more the

expansions and updates never

materialized either leaving us with a

game that’s kind of fun to mess around

with but could have been a lot more a

quick bonus for you too shenmue 3 uh for

years it seemed like the shenmue series

was done but in 2015 14 years after

shenmue 2 used Suzuki came back to

promote a Kickstarter and it was a huge

success finally after all these years

fans could see the conclusion to the

Epic Saga it took another four years to

make the game but in 2019 people got

their hands on it and basically nothing

happens you don’t fight the bad guy the

plot barely moves forward and pretty

much nothing happens this was you

Suzuki’s one chance to finally wrap the

game up or at least end it in a

satisfying way but it ends on a tease

for a sequel where the actual plot will

be it was very frustrating was it the

worst thing ever no but like yeah it was

fun to do some more shenmue stuff but uh

it didn’t go anywhere and it was

supposed to be the thing that finished

it all off Ah that’s frustrating trading

now and that’s all for today leave us a

comment let us know what you think if

you like this video click like if you’re

not subscribed and has a great time to

do so we upload brand new videos every

day of the week best way to see them

first is of course a subscription so

click subscribe don’t forget to enable

all notifications and as always we thank

you very much for watching this video

I’m Falcon you can follow me on Twitter

at Falcon the hero and we’ll see you

next time right here on gameranks