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What's the absolute worst game of 2016 you played?

Maybe Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse. Its story is way more insulting than even the particularly disappointing one in Zero Time Dilemma.
It's basically the children's version of SMT4, though not only in story, but also gameplay. Going into SMT the last thing I'd ever want to play is some dumb happy-go-lucky Pokemon styled animu shlock that holds your hand and wants to ship some generic waifu. But that's what it was.

Though while tons of games this year disappointed me, there's nothing outright shitty (so far). It's just a buncha 6 or 7/10s for which I had much higher hopes, particularly when it comes to Japanese/mid-budget games.
 
If we limit this to games I actually finished, then my pick would be Loud on Planet X, a rhythm shooter game developed in Toronto featuring a bunch of Cancon-friendly artists and CHVRCHES and HEALTH. It's not necessarily that the game is bad, but it is rather short and the PC port doesn't seem particularly well done (no official controller support, mouse controls that feel like converted touch controls). The best part of the game is easily the soundtrack, but the actual gameplay is simplistic at best and awkward at worst.

It seems a little unfair to pick on a game built by a small indie team, though, so let's try a different angle. If we include games I played but didn't finish, then it's Mirror's Edge Catalyst that loses out. Again, not an awful game, but it does have some pretty major problems in my view. Where the first Mirror's Edge was lean and muscular, Catalyst feels bloated. It has a whole bunch of open-world junk that isn't that interesting to do. Technical limitations mean the promise of being able to make your own way across the open world is marred by mandatory chokepoints that often make your journey much longer than they could have been if you could just JUMP ACROSS THE STREET. And in terms of performance, I could never get the PC version to feel all that great compared to either the PS3 or PC versions of the original Mirror's Edge, though that could just be poor optimization on my part. I do plan on going back to finish it one day, but in a year with so many good to great games, Mirror's Edge Catalyst suffers by comparison despite glimmers of quality.
 

Red Devil

Member
Considering 2016 releases only(of which I haven't played that many) then it's Dragon Quest VII on 3DS. Although calling "worst" feels bad because it's quite a good game.
 

Skux

Member
I haven't played many bad games this year, but the worst would be Firewatch. The gameplay is inconsequential. The choices are inconsequential. And for all the mystery and hype, the story turned out to be far more boring than interesting.

The voice acting was good though.
 

awcarew

Member
Firewatch. It blows my mind a narrative driven game with such a mediocre story received any praise. I love artistic games like Flower, Journey, etc. but this game just failed for me at every level imaginable.
 

Mr_Moogle

Member
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One of the worst Nintendo games I've ever owned/played.

It's almost comical how badly Nintendo treats this franchise. People literally just want an updated version of Lylat Wars but Nintendo just can't bring themselves to do it. They are constantly trying to reinvent the wheel with SF and it never works.

Pokemon Go would be the most dissappointing for me. The constant removal of features made the game tedious.
 

The Argus

Member
I'm finding Watch Dogs 2 incredibly grating.Plays like a last gen open world title, the writing tries way too hard to be hip and relevant. Sometimes it feels like they took some story writers from Law and Order, hey guys what's in the news today?! Visually it seems like they tried to make it as GTA V like as possible, but captured none of the physics are detail. I also find the AI to be at Saint Row 1 level.
 

Halabane

Member
FFXV. When you have to have a movie and several anime to start the game, then announce you need to go back and fix story beats in the game (twice once day one and now in the future) after hyping the importance of this story is guaranteeing disappoint. Because you messed up. They also failed at character development, made fun of stereotypes not from their culture (my opinion but it annoyed me) and the combat system is simply not fun to just button mash. I don't get the reviews of this game in general and really have come to conclusion I am out of sync with them. My friends/co-workers returned it and never finished. I did finish it, but regret wasting my time.

On the other end, a game SE didn't talk about, is a delightful throwback, tongue in cheek, turned based/pokemon romp with good music and fan service of old characters returning called World of Final Fantasy. Glad to see it not on many people's list here. This one I will continue to play and platinum, because its fun (for me) to play. Actually just bought it for the vita to take my ps4 saves with me on travel.

For the great games that came out this year there was some rather large disappointments and I think a lot of it was due to over hype which raised expectations. Worse this game would have to be no man's sky or SF5 but I did not play them. Just based on discussions with others.
 

Permanently A

Junior Member
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Haven't played something this pretentious since Entwined. Gave up on the sniper boss, because one-shots are cool.

Funny cause that was my favorite game this year and beating the sniper was legitimately an orgasmic experience.

Firewatch was not enjoyable to me. The payoff was so lame.
 
Probably No Man's Sky. I put a lot of time into it because I had started going for the platinum and didn't want to quit.

After getting the trophy for scanning all species on 10 different planets and for withstanding extreme weather, I had my fill and deleted it.

Man, what an annoying, empty, tedious, repetitive, buggy mess.

And the worst is constantly running out life support and the weapon durability and all that garbage. Fuck that garbage. This game was like mgsv in space; it sucked.
 
The Division. Played it for a bit, enjoyed it. But then it lagged out. Reconnected for two minutes, lagged out.

Tried a week later, no connection to the server. Can no longer summon the strength to continue. Fuck online-only with shit online structure.
 
NES remix 2 is the biggest scam ever.

Got it on black Friday for $15 as an impulse buy.

Turns out, it has like 10 levels from each game, and when you finish, it has a store icon that takes you to where you can purchase the full game. I feel fucking robbed.

Awful. Screw you Nintendo.
 

Rocketz

Member
Ark: Survival Evolved.

I know it's Early Access or whatever but I couldn't play more than 20 minutes. I doubt it will ever get finished.
 

Havoc2049

Member
Hopefully No Man's Sky didn't sour too many people on the return of the space combat sim genre. Elite Dangerous is excellent and Star Citizen looks promising.

The worst game I played this year was Project X Zone 2.
 

atpbx

Member
The Division. Played it for a bit, enjoyed it. But then it lagged out. Reconnected for two minutes, lagged out.

Tried a week later, no connection to the server. Can no longer summon the strength to continue. Fuck online-only with shit online structure.

I would say that the division is possible the most dissapointing, but not the worst.

You play through the single player campaign in an amazing looking city, with some fairly decent shooting mechanics and a on the face of it fair loot system.

Then you finish it and hit the end game and basically got told "end game? Fuck your end game, and your high end gear, and anything to do at all fuckers"

And however many updates later it's still completely barebones.

Such a wasted oppertunity, it could of been something special.
 

atpbx

Member
To be fair, it's worst game you played per the thread title.

With all the reviews, let's plays and other videos etc. out there you really have to just be trying random shit just to try it to play games you end up truly feeling are awful these days.

So for most people the "worst" game they'll play in a given year is whatever ended up disappointing them despite reviewing well and looking like something they'd like in early videos they watched before buying.


If it was the ONLY game they played this year, so it someone occupied all states of being at the same time, then yes they would have a valid point.

But that's highly unlikely, so it's just some special people being special.

Happy holidays shit posters, don't ever change!
 
No Man's Sky takes that honor, though to be fair I think I avoided all the real garbage this year and had a great time with most titles.

NMS was wonderful too, for the first few hours where everything feels new. But then you realize its one big empty game of inventory management where gear slots are the only real treasures to find.

Uncharted 4 was my biggest disappointment (I wanted more UC2/3 action), but the new survival mode has the potential to change that altogether. And The Witness having color based puzzles with no alternative solutions for colorblind folks like myself really took all of the wind out of my sails with that game.

Overall though, there was a lot of quality gaming to be had in 2016, and plenty of positive surprises and expectation-dashing.
 

shintoki

sparkle this bitch
Don't have any. From the games I've played.

Puzzle and Dragons
Final Fantasy Brave Exvius
Pokemon Go
Dragon's Dogma
Rocket League
Deus Ex Mankind Divided
Paladins

Not really sure... it was all good.
 
Honestly, but I mean all they want is comments like yours to feed off of. I understand if it was disappointing but worse...? Cmon.
I think you guys have to think of it in the context that most people dont play busted ass games in the first place because they can tell what is going to be broken/bad. These threads are always going to amount to the most disappointing game because of that.

I picked No Man's Sky. I'm sure there were plenty of games that came out this year that are technically worse than NMS, but I can't use them as my answer because I never bothered playing them.
 
If it was the ONLY game they played this year, so it someone occupied all states of being at the same time, then yes they would have a valid point.

But that's highly unlikely, so it's just some special people being special.

Happy holidays shit posters, don't ever change!

Is this more whining about listing Uncharted 4, even when people have given their explanations? Better to insult than engage, it seems.
 

Rathorial

Member
Would be Mirror's Edge: Catalyst to me. The game was such a dumpster fire bummer of boredom, when the move to an open-world should've fundamentally improved the game.

The fun of parkour to me is analyzing an urban area, and plotting your own traversal course through it. You have one of many options to get through the space, but you try for the most efficient and/or entertaining.

Instead, Catalyst reminded me that "open-worlds" can often be quite linear when you break down the missions spaces you enter, and bizarrely DICE made one of the most restrictive linear-ass 'open' cities I've ever seen. Constantly as you try to see if you can find a shortcut, a different way or god forbid be creative...you realize that won't take you where you need to go, and end up having to double back to the point I might as well just always follow the damn red streak.

Then when you backtrack through the same sections of the city to get to missions, you get plopped into a linear space that is somehow narrower than the 1st game's levels, and I feel funneled to repeat the same rhythms of movement...because they did almost nothing to expand your traversal. Yeah, the controls and animation feel improved, but the only tool that tangibly changes the experience is a grappling hook, which is pathetically underused, and always in very prescribed places than say any movement mechanic in Titanfall 2. Also, the wonky and terrible melee combat actually made me miss guns as an option, and at least the 1st game let you completely avoid fighting altogether if you were good.

At this point, I'm unsure if DICE even knows how to make a good video game anymore, much less something better than a previous entry in their very few franchises.
 

Jobbs

Banned
Uncharted 4

edit: lol, I see I'm not alone. It's not the only game I played, but I don't play a lot of games I know are bad. Of all the games I've played this is absolutely undeniably the worst. It was boring, tedious, obnoxious, and poorly written. It gets high marks for presentation, but presentation without anything else doesn't make a game good IMO.
 

SubbieD

Member
Cancel everything I said below, I played fucking BLOPS3 and sold it ASAP this year. Fecking garbage. It was so bad, I forgot I finished the SP until I read about it below.
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Pretty much loved everything I played, so I'd have to say least fun in a party of awesome would have to be Gravity Rush remastered.

Eventually i maxed all the abilities and you can practically stay afloat forever, but there were several chapters which got to be like a chore of sorts (hate 14).

Will be in for GR2 nevertheless.
 

The_Dama

Member
CoD:IW

I only played the beta and its the first CoD game since CoD2 that I didn't buy on Day 1 and never will. I only want CoD4 Remastered.
 
No Man's Sky, which I know means I'm getting off pretty light. Just a plain boring game. Seemed a bit broken in some ways, but I think the boredom factor weighs more heavily in my personal experience with it. I ran with the game for about 15 hours... And that was enough.
 
Probably Rise of the Tomb Raider, if I'm honest.

I had hugely high hopes, so that made it my experience worse, though.

I really enjoyed 2013 and had heard that this followup was way better. I was psyched.

There were good things about it. The graphics could be amazing at times. Some of the scenario design and environmental puzzle solving was strong.

The bad things were numerous though. Insanely painfully boring story. Seriously a hideously cliche video game story. Irritating narrative devices (like recordings and artifacts that felt forced). Extremely overrated open world components that were just dull time wasting sections. Gameplay oddities that if they carried over from 2013, I don't recall (perhaps due to better scenario design). Examples: the lack of a properly functioning cover system, a terribly clunky traversal system and imprecise, laggy feeling, combat.

The game felt riddled with bugs too. Odd autosaves at times when I would get experimental with stealth and fail, leaving me with dangerously low ammo or conversely "saving me out of trouble" at times and robbing me of the chance to actually beat an area due to oddly frequent checkpoints. Traversal hiccups were excessive too and I'd frequently move in odd, delayed, ways, move in directions I didn't choose, or fall to my death almost at random.

It was still like a 6.5, and not a terrible game, but I was expecting a 9. Also it's relative, I played a lot of great games this year, and this is my least favourite. Plus, I can't overstate how much I despised the incredibly terrible story. It was agony. I yelled at my tv several times.
 

PlayerOne

Banned
If it was the ONLY game they played this year, so it someone occupied all states of being at the same time, then yes they would have a valid point.

But that's highly unlikely, so it's just some special people being special.

Happy holidays shit posters, don't ever change!

Oh my God, all these edgy people saying Uncharted 4.

Jesus. I mean, maybe its not your thing and you can definitely not like it. Opinions and all!

But "absolute worst game of the year"? Literally the best rated original game of this generation and the one that is being GOTY contender on every single outled out there is your worst game of the year? REALLY?

There wasnt a single worse game in the entire year?

The hyperbole is real, damn.

Oh enough with the whining like little kids.

We played games this year and we found the worst out of all we played was Uncharted 4.

Why the fuck shouod we be called names just because it's the worst title we played this year? Are you that fucking invested in the game that youll bitch and whine when more than a few people found it to be the worst game they played this year?

"Oh but there are worse games out there!" We dont fucking care because we didn't play those, okay? The worst game we played is UC4, period.
 

Markitron

Is currently staging a hunger strike outside Gearbox HQ while trying to hate them to death
Can't be worse than Black Ops III.

It's pretty easy for me to believe after playing through that torture.

Infinite Warfare is exponentially better than BLOPS 3, that game was fucking terrible, whereas IW is pushing Doom and UC4 for my personal GOTY.

It's the Battlestar Galactica game I never knew I wanted. It gets extra points for the finale not taking place in an AI's dream.

Oh enough with the whining like little kids.

We played games this year and we found the worst out of all we played was Uncharted 4.

Why the fuck shouod we be called names just because it's the worst title we played this year? Are you that fucking invested in the game that youll bitch and whine when more than a few people found it to be the worst game they played this year?

"Oh but there are worse games out there!" We dont fucking care because we didn't play those, okay? The worst game we played is UC4, period.

Just FYI, responses like this will make it difficult for people to take you seriously. A shitpost followed by a 'well that's my opinion' post is usually the sign of a troll or fanboy.
 

Reaz

Neo Member
For me it was Stardew Valley...i was told it is one of the best indi games of all time...
Not for me i guess...
 

Piichan

Banned
Mirror's Edge Catalyst.

The open world was pointless and at times genuinely frustrating to get around. The story was absolutely naff. The 'improved' combat and thus the forced combat sections were truly and absolutely the low point of any game I played in 2016. Oh and it occasionally looked ugly as fuck on PS4.
I never thought it looked ugly, but other than that, I agree.
 
No actual terrible games but one or two I didn't enjoy enough to play more than about 15% of the total game.

Soma. Yeah, no. This went nowhere real fast.
Deus Ex: mankind Divided. I loved Human Revolution but this just didn't get started. I just couldn't get into it for whatever reason.


also: I did have NMS but I didn't hate it (or love it, it was exactly what I expected)
 
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