Most Disappointing Games 2023

Same here! The only game I recall I actually played to the end without an invert-Y axis option was the original Beyond Good and Evil back on the Xbox and I struggled every single moment of it, especially with that photo mode... Tried recently the remaster (which still lacks an option) and couldn't pass the opening stage...

To be fair AA has a point. I've never considered Dead Space scary. There's too much action there. Tense as fuck? Definitely. Sphincter tightening? Constantly. But actually scary? Nah. Although there's very few games that actually are scary. I can still only think of PT as one "game" that I genuinely found too scary to continue playing for more than a couple of minutes at a time. Dead Space is too sci-fi squidgy monsters in space to be truly scary. PT was scary because it was so... domestic. You're in the loop of a house haunted by the ghost of a woman who was murdered there. I would also say Amnesia: The Bunker is my other scary game. Again, because of the situation more than the monster. You're in the trenches, the tunnels, under a battlefield in WW1. It's dark and there's something in there with you you cannot kill. There's one point you reach a bunker and can briefly look outside. You see the sky. It gives you a bit of hope, until bullets whizz past your head and you have to duck and go back down into the dark. Dead Space, again, is too in your face BALARAGHBLARGHBLARGH to be truly scary. The most unsettling it gets is when you realise how far the unitologists will go, or the bits in DS2 in the nursery.

So erm. Yeah. I don't really know what point I'm making. If I'm making one at all. Or why.

I recently completed The Callisto Protocol, and must admit I didn’t find it especially scary, despite some really good sound and visual design. It was more of an action survival game really.

It does jump scares and gore well, but you quite quickly become desensitised to that. I’ve not played Remake Dead Space and it’s been a while since I played the original, but I remember it being a little more unsettling.

In games, I think terror works better where there are more consequences than the simple checkpoint restart. Soulsbourne games are often much more likely to have my palms sweating (as well as delivering some good gothic / eldritch horror) than most survival horror games these days.

I didn't play all that many games this year, but Starfield was definitely the biggest disappointment. I tried. I *really* tried. I put nearly 50 hours in just noodling around doing side quests and the like, but I can't say I was really enjoying it. Eventually I just gave up and stopped playing, despite being close to the end. I've now come to terms with the fact that Bethesda lost me with Fallout 4 and they've done absolutely nothing to win me back. I probably just won't bother with Elder Scrolls VI.

Company of Heroes 3 was runner-up. The zombified remains of Relic really did the bare minimum with this one and I'd had enough within just a few hours.

Really hoping Blackbird Interactive can stick the landing with Homeworld 3 - I really don't want that game to be top of my list next year.

In fact reality being twisted also shits me up. There's a level in Thief called the Sword which has you plundering a large manor house. All well and good until you reach the third floor and the laws of physics no longer seem to apply. Shit me right up because it was so unexpected.

Anyway. I'm derailing. Biggest disappointments, lets have you!

Actually, as I'm shitting up my own thread, this has made me reinstall Wo Long again so.. yeah. That happened. I'm going to go back to it after Lies of P and see how I feel. It may come off my list. I don't think so though, but I'm prepared to reevaluate.

It's 20 mins to get semi-comfortable for the session. It's not 20 mins to switch completely, never falter and be competent in every game you play from that moment on.

I could stumble around for 20 mins to play Teardown for a bit, but as soon as I jump into Apex tomorrow lunch it wouldn't stick. It's a much longer investment in change to rewire decades of familiarity, and I'm not willing to do that to play Teardown.
Especially when they're likely just going to patch it in.

If you think the controls are irritating in Teardown, just wait until you realise the campaign is ruined by that stupid time limit bullshit.

/unicorns

Maybe you just need to try harder.

Okay. Let's pretend you're right. Let's pretend it's purely because I don't want to, and nothing to do with the fact that I find it incredibly uncomfortable and difficult to attempt. Why is this something that you even have a problem with? I'm trying to decide if you're just messing around or you're being a bona fide arsehole about it. Maybe you could help me out, because I really can't be fucked with this.

Welcome to the flame war over keyboard controls vs mouse controls.