There are so many different video games that get released within a given year. And yet, one can imagine how many games are released over a five-year period across different platforms. With so little time available to us, there’s never enough to sit down and play every single game that is released. This is why it’s so annoying when you play a game that ends up being incredibly disappointing. Whether it’s because of poor mechanics, technical issues, or even just a bad ending to the experience, disappointing games can end up feeling like a waste of time. Nobody likes it, and nobody wants to find themselves in that position with the games they play.
Over the last half a decade, have there been a lot of disappointing games that ended up being like that? Often we find bad games that are reviewed poorly and fade into obscurity. But being terrible and just disappointing aren’t always the same thing, even though they can overlap with some titles in various ways. Occasionally, a game will come out and be enticing enough for people to play, and yet end up becoming a disappointment. Here are ten of the most disappointing games that have come out in the last five years.
10 Battlefield 2042
The hype was cut off
People who love to play first-person shooters online have a deep love for the Battlefield series, especially on PC. But with the release of Battlefield 2042, that good will of the franchise was put to a big test for many players. While the initial release of the game garnered a lot of attention and had player counts in high numbers, things began to drop off shortly after. A lot of the issues that popped up for Battlefield 2042 involved complaints about online matches and technical problems that would arise during them. Bugs and glitches were often problematic, leading to online matches turning into a mess.
Things weren’t helped by the game’s lack of single-player content from previous Battlefield titles, as well as key components to the multiplayer modes of the series. Many fans were upset that the game lacked the class system that the series was known for, which was part of many aspects of the balancing to online multiplayer. And while the developers would update the game and introduce a large number of changes to the gameplay, many Battlefield fans find this release to be a dud.
9 Cyberpunk 2077
A very rocky start
To many role-playing game fans, CD Projekt Red is a name synonymous with quality titles and epic storytelling. This is why so many people were excited for the release of Cyberpunk 2077 for multiple platforms, and were willing to be patient with the company as it took a long time to release it. However, when launch day came, it was met with utter disappointment and anger from many online. Cyberpunk 2077 suffered from a very rough launch on every platform the game was playable, with massive issues that affected nearly everyone’s experience. Things got so bad, that a version of the game for the PlayStation 4 was actively removed from the PlayStation Network by Sony, following a massive backlash to the launch. Some players felt it was the worst game launch they had seen in a long time.
Players shared tons of their broken experiences online, showcasing videos and pictures of some of the worst bugs the game suffered from. It got to a point where Cyberpunk 2077 was the subject of many jokes and comparisons to other games having a terrible launch. Over time, however, CD Projekt Red was able to develop and release patches for the game that fixed the majority of problems, but the damage was already done. Many people felt an incredible level of disappointment with how Cyberpunk 2077 ended up, with some walking away from the game completely for a long time. Luckily for CD Projekt Red, some would eventually come back after the release of the expansion Cyberpunk 2077: Phanom Liberty. By then, the game received so many updates and patches to correct all of the issues players brought up, and eventually became the game that was originally intended.
8 AEW: Fight Forever
Nostalgic but flawed
Source: THQ Nordic
Wrestling fans love to go back to some of their favorite wrestling video games from the 90s and early 2000s. Some of the best wrestling games include ones on the Nintendo 64, such as WWF No Mercy and WCW/NWO Revenge. But the 2000s brought a lot of changes to the genre, as the wrestling business changed with the times. Games like WWF SmackDown, TNA Impact, and even WWE 2K had very different approaches to game design, even though they attempted to recreate the spectacle of sports entertainment. However, the first AEW video game based on the alternate wrestling promotion tried to bring thigns back to the good ol’ days for players.
This unfortunately did not happen the way they hoped it would. AEW: Fight Forever was a game that played very similar to the great wrestling games of the N64, but was nowhere near the level of quality they once had. Massive bugs, terrible glitches, and repetitive gameplay brought the experience down, and ruined what could’ve been a great return to classic video game wrestling. Some AEW fans were still able to enjoy it, but the game was still a massive disappointment to nearly everyone.
7 Gotham Knights
The bat-family fails
Source: WB Games
The Batman Arkham series are heralded as some of the best superhero games ever created, as well as the best Batman games ever released. So anything that is related to them will draw massive attention. But to make a great Batman game is no easy task, and just having something vaguely related to the Arkham series isn’t a guarantee of success. That was the harsh lesson the development team for Gotham Knights learned after the release of the game in 2022. Gotham Knights featured the other heroes from the bat-family, which are characters outside of Batman himself. While this enticed DC Comics fans at first, it became clear that this wasn’t a game on the same level of quality or appeal as the Batman Arkham games from Rocksteady.
Gotham Knights had elements of cooperative multiplayer and extras that DC fans could enjoy. However, the game felt very shallow to most critics, citing how boring mission objectives were and how bland each playable character was. The combat of the game received a lot of criticism for not being as fun to play compared to the Arkham series, despite having suit upgrades and other bonuses that were similar.
6 Balan Wonderworld
A poorly made game
Source: Square Enix
Yuji Naka, the man who created Sonic the Hedgehog and Nights into Dreams for Sega, is a name that gets everyone’s attention. Whenever he’s involved with a new game project, it’s anticipated it will be interesting. But that wasn’t the case for his 2021 project, Balan Wonderworld. The game not only ended up being a massive disappointment, but was incredibly bizarre to those who played it. Some of the appeal with the visuals and overall presentation was geared towards those who enjoyed games like Nights into Dreams, but the overall design of the game was very mediocre. Some critics at the time felt that the game was so poorly designed that it had sections which felt like it wasted time, with little to no good payoff.
Between its one-button gameplay for most actions, and its confusing level design, most people were not happy playing through Balan Wonderworld. To them, they expected something far better in quality from a person like Yuji Naka, given his past history of releases. Things just did not end up working out, and the game has since faded into obscurity.
5 Starfield
Not as cosmic as we hoped
To a lot of Xbox players, Starfield was going to be a massive game from Bethesda Game Studios that changed the perception of the Xbox brand in 2023. It was going to be the reason to jump into the Xbox ecosystem, and show why it was the premiere platform for true hardcore gaming. What resulted instead was a game that divided everyone who debated the quality of releases across all platforms, and disappointed all players. Starfield is a role-playing game that takes players across galaxies to different planets, where they can complete missions for various factions and follow an epic story that spans the cosmos. Unfortunately, a myriad of bugs, glitches, broken scenarios, and many other problems would prevent Starfield from becoming the game that most Xbox players wished it would become.
Although many parts of Starfield are very ambitious and are great concepts at their core, the execution of everything just didn’t live up to the hype of it. Traveling between planets was limited, as was space travel as a whole, compared to how the game was initially pitched to players. While there were a lot of plot points and side stories, not all of them were interesting enough to hold the attention of players, or become memorable. Starfield may have been a great concept with tons of neat ideas for a role-playing game, but the end result was far from what may have been envisioned.
4 Star Wars Outlaws
I have a bad feeling about this
A video game set in-between the events of two original Star Wars movies should be a slam-dunk idea. A game like that where you can freely roam around planets in a galaxy far, far away sounds like an even bigger winning concept. But what resulted was a massive disappointment that still lingers long after its initial release. Star Wars Outlaws was developed by Massive Entertainment, the same team who made The Division, and published by Ubisoft. A new adventure with an original character set during the time of the original Star Wars trilogy should have been a win for everyone involved, but ended up becoming a major disappointment for fans and players alike. The story didn’t resonate with everyone, but it was the gameplay that caused fans to lose faith in the newly released open-world Star Wars game.
The biggest problems with Star Wars Outlaws were the cavalcade of confusing design choices and annoying game bugs that plagued the overall experience. Players complained about the terribly designed stealth sections, inability to hold secondary weapons, horrible checkpoints, and so many other aspects of the game that were a major hindrance. It didn’t help when patches for the PlayStation 5 version of the game caused everyone to lose their save data in order to get the update that fixed multiple issues. The release of Star Wars Outlaws was not pretty and led to many people moving on from the game pretty quickly, despite multiple post-release DLC expansions that brought in more classic Star Wars characters.
3 Marvel’s Avengers
Not so mighty after all
Source: Square Enix
Putting together a superhero game shouldn’t be that hard, especially when it involves many of Marvel’s popular characters. Marvel’s Avengers seemed like a great idea to capitalize on the excitement of the many Marvel Studios films, while creating something unique and original. But what players got instead was a disaster of a launch and co-op experience that lacked any significant punch to it. Marvel’s Avengers had a full campaign story that brought together Earth’s mightiest heroes into an original plot, but wasn’t interesting enough to keep Marvel fans invested long after they finished it. A lot of the criticisms of the story in Marvel’s Avengers focused on how much the game wanted to interject aspects of the MCU, without adapting what the films were doing at the time.
But the real disappointment came from the combat and co-op missions during gameplay, which many felt were incredibly underwhelming. Enemies and boss fights felt like giant damage sponges, with the powers of each hero feeling like they were ineffective most of the time. In addition, getting into a stable session of multiple was a challenge because of the many connection issues that would arise. Marvel’s Avengers eventually had multliple DLC expansions released, which contained new playable characters and story details to follow, but many didn’t stick around for it. Eventually, Marvel’s Avengers was taken offline and official support came to an end in January 2023. The game was also delisted from digital storefronts in September that same year.
2 Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition
Messing up the classics
There is arguably no bigger video game series than Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto franchise. So when the announcement of an HD re-release to the three PLayStation 2 Grand Theft Auto games would be happening in 2021, people lost their minds with excitement. Each game within the trilogy was a monumental release during the PlayStation 2 era, with most open-world games taking inspiration from them. But as Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy was released for all platforms, it became very clear to everyone that things were not going smoothly. All three games suffered from a variety of technical issues that made them unplayable in the eyes of some players, with most feeling like the release failed to meet anyone’s expectations.
While the polished visuals were a nice touch that most appreciated, major technical issues like bugs and glitches with effects were incredibly frustrating to encounter. In some cases, elements like rain and lightning were bugged to the point of making missions very difficult to complete, especially when the player’s visibility was impacted. Multiple updates and patches would later fix many issues that were brought up upon the game’s release, but the damage was already done. Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy may have been a nostalgic trip to a time when opne-world games were really beocming something more, but nearly everyone felt that this trilogy of legendary games deserved so much better.
1 Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League
A very foul release for DC fans
One of the biggest disappointments in 2024 comes from Rocksteady Games and their release of Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League. Their portfolio of work is a testament to the excellence of superhero games, which is cemented with the Batman Arkham Trilogy. So it seems like a winning idea to let Rocksteady create a video game that takes place within the same setting, but brings in more heroes and villains from throughout the DC Universe. Fans of Rocksteady were very excited to see what the team would do when given the reigns to more DC characters, especially ones with a bit of a sharper edge to them. What resulted wasn’t a major hit or worth addition to the legacy of the team, but instead a major disaster that left everyone feeling high levels of disappointment.
What makes Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League so terrible is how much it feels like a chore to play through, but is made even worse by the game’s collection of bad problems. Terrible bugs and visual glitches involving every playable character, as well as locations on the large map, were big problems that impacted the core experience. But many players and critics went on to state how poor the main plot was in comparison to what Rocksteady Games had done previously. The outcomes for various characters in the Justice League were points of major criticism, including the fate of Batman in relation to the untimely passing of Batman voice actor Kevin Conroy. All of this was made worse when the game received some additional post-release content, including new playable characters, that nobody enjoyed. The backlash about various parts of the game continued for a long time, up until official support for the game came to an end in January 2025.
A disappointing turn of events
Sometimes, games don’t turn out the way we hope they would. While most development teams aim to create an experience that will entertain and excite players, that doesn’t always come to pass. With so many different video games being released over the last half decade, there are bound to be multiple titles that end up becoming failures and huge disappointments to everyone. Hopefully, in the future, other studios and development teams can learn by example and avoid having their projects become one of the disappointments that fade into the background over time.
