Today’s category is tricky because I think people tend to conflate the concept of being disappointing with being bad, and that’s not what this list is about. There are bad elements in these games, some of which are more subjective than others, but none of these games are bad.
These are the games I played this year that I felt were uninspired and under-delivered.
Honorable Mention – Dragon’s Dogma II
I knew there was a strong possibility that Dragon’s Dogma II and I wouldn’t get along as swimmingly as I had hoped before it released, but I wanted to give it a fair shake anyway. I really tried to like this game, but it’s just too hardcore of an experience for me. That isn’t to say that it’s a bad game. Plenty of people love their video games to be both punishing and obtuse, and Dragon’s Dogma II is the epitome of both. I was disappointed with Dragon’s Dogma II, but it was a long shot to begin with.
The Plucky Squire
I wrote a whole thing about The Plucky Squire back in September about how utterly infuriating this whole game was. It was glitchy mess that constantly interrupted your progression to slowly pan around the map towards your obvious objectives or force you to listen as characters exposited at you for a while. As a game, it genuinely had no faith in the person playing it as evidenced by its over-tutorialization and hand holding.
Despite all of my issues with the game, I still powered through and made it to the final boss fight. It was there that The Plucky Squire fell apart in the middle of said final boss fight and crashed. Since then, I have not been able to load my game back up and finish it. I could simply restart the entire chapter of the game and be done with it, but my experience so far has left a terrible taste in my mouth. I don’t think I’ll be returning to this one.
Star Wars: Outlaws
Star Wars: Outlaws isn’t a bad game — it’s just a boring one. In my 8 or so hours playing it, I had already begun to feel like I had identified the game’s loop and decided I already had my fill. It didn’t help that the game itself just didn’t play great. There were multiple instances of my character mantling something or using a ladder when I didn’t want them to, which isn’t great for when you’re trying to avoid being seen by the only Storm Troopers in the galaxy who can actually hit a target. Mechanically, Star Wars: Outlaws is uninspired and repetitive even when it’s working well.
But even if it was more mechanically interesting, the story (from what I experienced) was just this boilerplate Star Wars narrative that wasn’t engaging at all. I didn’t hate the main character, but I didn’t feel any affinity for them either. The main story line is a real confusing one too, focusing on your character building up a team to execute a big heist. That on its own is whatever, but when every mission feels like an underwhelming heist as is, you eventually lose confidence in the game’s ability to make that big finale compelling.
While the game has been patched a lot since I last played it, I think there are core issues with it that can’t simply be patched out. From the jump Star Wars: Outlaws feels like its doing its best Star Wars impression while offering nothing particularly new or interesting. Maybe it gets better after fifteen hours or something, but I just don’t care enough to return to it. Star Wars: Outlaws is underwhelming but fine.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard
I felt so strongly about this wet fart of a game that I wrote a damn article about it — that’s how much of an impression it left. To summarize my feelings about Dragon Age: The Veilguard, I first need to contextualize some things: First, I am not, nor have I ever been a fan of Dragon Age as a series. I’ve never hated it or anything, I’ve just never felt anything about this franchise. Secondly, I’ve played the Mass Effect series, and for the most part am a fan of it. I consider those games to (mostly) be pretty well written and compelling.
While Dragon Age: The Veilguard has some decent story lines and a couple of compelling characters, I think from top-to-bottom, that game is devoid of any soul. It is the paint-by-numbers version of an RPG. Nothing you do or say matters because you will be the hero, and nothing is going to derail that inevitability. Dialogue options feel less like making choices, and more like picking the tone of a predetermined line. The combat is flashy but gets incredibly repetitive after you fight the same recycled enemies throughout duration of the game, and even the few boss fights you encounter don’t do much to keep things fresh.
I didn’t even have particularly high hopes for Dragon Age: The Veilguard. I knew these weren’t games I had ever enjoyed, but the combat looked fun enough for me to try getting onboard. For the first few hours I was really enjoying my time with the game. I liked the characters I had met and was curious about their lives. The world seemed cool even if the lore was a little dense and hard to follow as someone without any background with the franchise. But I was really ready to engage with this game as a whole, but it just consistently showed me how paper-thin of an experience it was.
There were rarely gray areas in the narrative. Dragon Age made it very clear that it wasn’t interested in challenging anyone with divisive storytelling, ensuring that just about every conflict would eventually be wrapped up nicely and neatly with a little bow on top. There are moments when the writing is genuinely compelling, but rarely does The Veilguard have the confidence in both itself and the player to let these moments breathe. By and large, most stories seem to wrap up a bit too nicely, usually allowing everyone to get the closure they desired.
But at the end of the day, I still beat the damn thing because it was fun to play. The gameplay loop was decent, the set-pieces were nice, and the environments were cool to wander in, even if there was rarely a reason to poke around for secrets. I feel like some people will really enjoy their time with this game, while others, like myself, will just be completely underwhelmed by it.
That’s day three of Game of the Year behind us. Come back tomorrow for the final top ten list of games. Consider subscribing to The Bonus World so you can get an email updating you whenever we publish something new.
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